Sitting at a restaurant, sometimes you catch interesting bits of conversation from nearby tables. You might overhear something weird, embarrassing, hilarious, heartbreaking, or all of the above. 

Now imagine an entire hour of these conversational tidbits stitched together neatly into a radio program. That is “24 Hours At the Golden Apple,” the classic episode of “This American Life” that originally aired on November 17, 2000.

I first heard the episode soon after it came out and I’ve revisited it again and again over the years. It’s my personal favorite hour of radio (or podcast, or whatever you want to call it) and I plan to keep listening to it in the years to come.

The premise is simple. The crew of “This American Life” set up shop in the Golden Apple, an all-night diner in Chicago, from 5:00 a.m. on a Friday until 5:00 a.m. the next morning. During that time, working in shifts, they recorded interviews with everyone they could: the owners, servers and staff, regular customers, and people just stopping through. 

The result is an unforgettable show. It’s funny, unpredictable, poignant, thought provoking, and endlessly entertaining. 

If you haven’t heard it, I highly recommend it. If you have heard it, I recommend giving it another listen. To whet your appetite, here are six of the best moments from the show:

 

1. “And that’s it.”

Joe, a customer who used to own a construction business, punctuates everything he says with the phrase, “And that’s it.” 

Examples: “I retired. I’m 78 years old and I gave the business to my two sons. And that’s it.”

“Ten, eleven years old I start working for [my dad]. He was paying me a dime an hour. And that was it.”

Joe has several more stories in that vein. He’s a pretty interesting guy. And that’s it.

 

2. John, another customer, was Illinois’ youngest butcher at age 8. He says, “Back in 1979, I was interviewed by Fahey Flynn. I don’t know if you remember back in 1979, Fahey Flynn was a well-known newsman right here at Channel 7 News before he died in ’81. I was the youngest butcher in Illinois in 1979.” 

I shudder at the thought that if the folks at “This American Life” hadn’t recorded interviews in that place on that day, I still might not know who was the youngest butcher in Illinois in 1979. I might not even know about the great newsman Fahey Flynn, or that he died in ’81. 

John the butcher is a great interview, and incidentally, if you want an example of the classic Chicago accent, he’s got it.

 

3. I’ll let customer Alice DeLuca speak for herself. 

Alice: “I work at a purification center. It’s sauna, running, vitamins, and minerals. It’s a program to rid your body of toxins and radiation.”

Interviewer: “Have you done the program yourself?”

Alice: “Yes, I have.”

Interviewer: “Now, to the naked eye, it looks like you’re smoking, drinking coffee, and about to have some sausage. So how does that square with the whole toxins thing?”

Alice: “Well, I’m trying to wake up.”

 

4. Kim, Oscar, and Beth are late night customers who come in with quite an interesting story. I won’t go into it, but I will pass along Kim’s monologue, which is one of the great monologues of all time, in part because of its utter defiance of convention and coherence.

Kim: “This is Kim. I’m at the Golden Apple. I know I am. And I’m with Oscar and Beth. Oscar, Oscar, who I have no idea who he is. Beth and I are riding in a cab and he like, hops in. I’ve never even met this guy. I need to order food. I’m a journalism major, by the way. Yeah. So, I know what you’re doing right now.”

Kim is a sharp one. It’s good to know that as a journalism major, she understands how newsworthy it is to find a group of fully soused young people at an all-night diner on a Friday night ordering some eggs.

 

5. A customer named Nancy offers up an interesting perspective on life: 

“My name is Nancy. Where am I and what time is it? Well, I don’t think I’m really here. I think that I’m doing like a two-dimensional kind of thing. So, there’s part of me that’s here and part of me that’s… somewhere else. The future me. 

“So, what time is it? Earthly time? It’s 1:15 a.m. And there is no time where my future self is. You know how you, when you go to sleep and you dream? How you can bend and shape the events that take place in that dream? Well, what if that were your reality? And what if this were the dream? 

“You know, you can actually paint your future and you can make everything that’s ever happened, is happening, and will happen, …has already happened. It’s shape-shifting time and events so that you know why your soul is here. And that’s the purpose: to know why you’re here. To know why you came back.

“I know one past life, I was a cowboy and I was shot by accident. And I’ve met two of my four buddies that I was with together. And we’ve agreed to come back on some kind of subliminal basis. So yeah, I was a cowboy in one lifetime. Probably right before the turn of the century.

“And my other lifetime, I really don’t know, but I know I was crushed. And I don’t know by what, but it was probably a large building. I haven’t identified the time yet. I’m still working on that. [Pause] 

“Can I have, umm… can I have a short stack, please? That’s all. Thank you.”

Say what you will about Nancy. She believes in reincarnation, she believes she was a cowboy around the turn of the century, she believes she was crushed by a large building. But her beliefs don’t remain in the abstract. They affect her everyday decisions. Not wanting to get crushed again by anything that might topple over, she makes sure to order a short stack. It’s the safe choice, the wise choice, and the delicious choice.

 

6. The trials and tribulations of Danielle and Allison take up a good amount of time in the final fifteen minutes of the show. They are two young friends who share an apartment, and when Danielle steps outside for a moment to try to find one of their other friends, she shares a bit about what’s been going on:

“Me and Allison. I think that she feels like we’re growing apart because I have kind of been mean lately. Not like, too mean, but she’s my best friend. She will always be my best friend. It’s just like now that we live together, we have constant ‘each other’ and it’s just like we realize the things we could overlook before, are actual issues now. 

“Like, we’re complete opposites. She doesn’t like people. I love people. She likes staying home and reading. I can’t stand staying home and I can’t stand reading. And I mean, I don’t… I don’t like thinking. It’s like, thinking is something you do in school, and then when you need to. And she’s not like that. And that’s, that’s very cool and I mean that shows that she’s not a robot or whatever. You know?

“But she’s 17. She’s only 17. And she acts like she’s 23. She’s I guess, above, you know, the normal teenager. She thinks of things. She cares, you know, and that’s what people in college do, and that’s what, you know, older people do.

“But me and most of all my friends, we’re not ready. We don’t want to do that. You know? We wanna just sit back and have fun.

“I mean, she just needs to find the right people to hang out with. And for right now, it’s not my thing. This is my thing. I like this scene where it’s just like we’re gonna sit back, we’re gonna have some fun, we’re gonna laugh, we’re just gonna let everything go. You know?

“Just like, alright. The Golden Apple scene. Yeah.”

Well said, Danielle. Now, if you want to sit back, have some fun, laugh, and just let everything go, I recommend you check out the Golden Apple scene. It’s my favorite hour of radio and I get something new out of it every time I listen. I hope you’ll enjoy it, as well. And that’s it.

Here’s the link: 

https://www.thisamericanlife.org/172/24-hours-at-the-golden-apple