John Flansburgh offered an explanation of the legal issue with the inclusion of a brand name:[10] It was a brief education for us in the difference between protected speech and trademark infringement.

Although it was a possibility that we could have gotten away with it, or settled with the NyQuil manufacturers for a small amount of money, the path of least hassle was simply omitting the name from the package.

"I Should Be Allowed to Think" excerpts the first line ("I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical") of the poem Howl by Allen Ginsberg.

In an interview, Flansburgh explained that "the line 'Dig him up and shake his hand' is actually very specific – a parallel idea to a lot of his paintings which involve resurrections, skeletons and puppets being animated.

Instrumental excerpts from "No One Knows My Plan" and "The End of The Tour" were used as the opening and closing themes, respectively, during the first season of the animated variety show Cartoon Planet in 1995.