You Might Also Like: Earsay: The Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club

**Cal Penn** (0:01)
Welcome to Earsay, the Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club. I'm Cal Penn, and each episode, I dive into an audiobook with a special guest. Today, manners, tastelessness, modern life, and a little bit of loss. We're talking about the new audiobook, The Land and Its People, a collection of rants, observations, love, heartbreak, and laughs from the legendary David Sedaris. It's narrated by him in front of live audiences on tour, and we're lucky enough to have him as our guest today.
Without further ado, David Sedaris, welcome to Earsay.

**David Sedaris** (0:41)
Oh, hi, Gal.

**Cal Penn** (0:43)
So I wanted to start with your essay, Welcome In, because it really kind of struck a chord with me, and I'm so glad you spoke up here. What is happening with this? When did welcome not become enough?

**David Sedaris** (0:54)
I know it. And you know, I can't be quiet about it. And somebody was asking me recently, would you prefer the United States or the United Kingdom? Because I go back and forth, right?
In the UK, you never hear welcome in, but I heard it twice. I was there a few weeks ago. And there were both times Americans who had moved there, who had gotten jobs, and said, welcome in.

**Cal Penn** (1:22)
Oh, no way.

**David Sedaris** (1:23)
And I said to both of them, I said, no, that's not an import. That's not anything. And whenever I scold, because I can't sat up about it, I scold people about it. And then, you know, then you just look like an asshole. But it's a one man war. Well, I don't know, two man war, which is good to hear, that I'm not alone in this, but it's completely unnecessary. The end part, you don't need the end part.

**Cal Penn** (1:50)
You don't need the end. The end makes me cringe.
I live here in New York, and I didn't notice that maybe two years ago or something, right, the welcome in. And it started at like, not the crazy fancy, but the the chummy folksy mom and pop nice eateries around the neighborhood. And I was like, okay, this is irritating only because it's being said to people 15 years younger than me.
Then I noticed it at like the hardware store and like that. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. Welcome in what, to buy plants? I don't know.

**David Sedaris** (2:28)
My friend Ronnie, who lives in California, and she managed to see the score. And she says, he's on the front lines. He's retired now, but she catches these things immediately. And she turned me in on welcome in. It was like, it was really before the pandemic. And then she said, there's this thing that started.
And once you notice it, you can't un-hear it. Then it's just there for the, like, how's your morning going so far? Like you can't un-hear it once you've heard it. And you start counting the number of times you're here. Perfect. Perfect. I said to a hostess at a hotel recently, I said, you've said perfect six times already. You said it.
And then you just, then you're a d***, right?

**Cal Penn** (3:22)
Yes.

**David Sedaris** (3:23)
But there was not one instance that it should have been used. Nothing was perfect.

**Cal Penn** (3:30)
Yeah.

**David Sedaris** (3:31)
How many in your party? One. Perfect. Tell me, is that perfect?
Why are you saying perfect?

**Cal Penn** (3:41)
Yeah. I think what I also just enjoyed about that essay and why it struck a chord with me is it struck that balance between linguistics and cynicism, which is the wave that I find myself on. Like, am I cynical or am I just a stickler for why are we doing this?

**David Sedaris** (4:01)
Every now and then, I'll be signing books and somebody will come and say, you put the fun back in dysfunction. Then I'm like, that's on mugs, right? I guess you're thinking I haven't seen the mug or the greeting card, or wherever you lifted that off and then it's direct from you. I would still cringe.

**Cal Penn** (4:23)
Did you say this? No. No.

**David Sedaris** (4:26)
No, I just went and goes to my mind though.

**Cal Penn** (4:29)
I feel like you're allowed to say it in that setting because David, if somebody's coming to your book signing, they know what they're signing up for. And if they're saying some like that, I feel like they might even be saying it as on purpose to get a rise.

**David Sedaris** (4:46)
Well, I usually go and park myself in a small theater for a week when I'm putting Finishing Touches on a book, right? So in January, I went to Berkeley Rep in Berkeley, and the pandemic didn't really end in Berkeley. Like the audience, a good many people wear masks. And if you go to the coffee shop, they use their sleeve or the hem of their shirt to touch the handle of the milk dispenser because they might touch the handle and then get COVID and die, right? And anyway, this young woman came with a mask on. And I said, you know, I said, it's not any of my business. And I understand that. I said, but I've just loved to know why you're wearing a mask. Like in 2026, why are you wearing a mask? And she pulled it down and she said, I knocked out one of my front teeth.