Ask Dr. Drew - Heather McDonald: Onstage Collapse, Skull Fracture Recovery & Tour Update – Ask Dr. Drew – Episode 72

Episode Date: February 14, 2022

Heather McDonald is an actress, bestselling author, and comedian known for her work on Chelsea Lately and her popular podcast "Juicy Scoop with Heather McDonald." Recently she made headlines after she collapsed on stage during her comedy show in Arizona and was treated for a skull fracture. Heather was released from the hospital and is recovering at home, and joins Ask Dr. Drew LIVE with an update on her recovery and comedy tour. Follow Heather at:  https://twitter.com/HeatherMcDonald   https://instagram.com/HeatherMcDonald   https://HeatherMcDonald.net   Support Heather McDonald's Juicy Scoop podcast on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/juicyscoop  [This episode originally aired on February 9, 2022] Ask Dr. Drew is produced by Kaleb Nation ( https://kalebnation.com) and Susan Pinsky (https://twitter.com/FirstLadyOfLove). SPONSORS • REFRAME – Since the beginning of the pandemic, nearly 1 in 5 Americans has reported consuming an unhealthy amount of alcohol, but only 10% of them are actually getting the help they need. Reframe is a neuroscience-based smartphone app that helps users cut back or quit drinking alcohol. Use the code DRDREW for 25% off your first month or annual subscription at https://drdrew.com/reframe • BLUE MICS – After more than 30 years in broadcasting, Dr. Drew’s iconic voice has reached pristine clarity through Blue Microphones. But you don’t need a fancy studio to sound great with Blue’s lineup: ranging from high-quality USB mics like the Yeti, to studio-grade XLR mics like Dr. Drew’s Blueberry. Find your best sound at https://drdrew.com/blue  • HYDRALYTE – “In my opinion, the best oral rehydration product on the market.” Dr. Drew recommends Hydralyte’s easy-to-use packets of fast-absorbing electrolytes. Learn more about Hydralyte and use DRDREW25 at checkout for a special discount at https://drdrew.com/hydralyte  • ELGATO – Every week, Dr. Drew broadcasts live shows from his home studio under soft, clean lighting from Elgato’s Key Lights. From the control room, the producers manage Dr. Drew’s streams with a Stream Deck XL, and ingest HD video with a Camlink 4K. Add a professional touch to your streams or Zoom calls with Elgato. See how Elgato’s lights transformed Dr. Drew’s set: https://drdrew.com/sponsors/elgato/  THE SHOW: For over 30 years, Dr. Drew Pinsky has taken calls from all corners of the globe, answering thousands of questions from teens and young adults. To millions, he is a beacon of truth, integrity, fairness, and common sense. Now, after decades of hosting Loveline and multiple hit TV shows – including Celebrity Rehab, Teen Mom OG, Lifechangers, and more – Dr. Drew is opening his phone lines to the world by streaming LIVE from his home studio in California. On Ask Dr. Drew, no question is too extreme or embarrassing because the Dr. has heard it all. Don’t hold in your deepest, darkest questions any longer. Ask Dr. Drew and get real answers today. This show is not a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. All information exchanged during participation in this program, including interactions with DrDrew.com and any affiliated websites, are intended for educational and/or entertainment purposes only. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Very special day today. A friend of ours graciously agreed to come in and give you an update on her unbelievable mishaps across the last couple of days. The great Heather McDonald, Juicy Scoop. Heather, come on in here. Our laws as it pertains to substances are draconian and bizarre. A psychopath started this. He was an alcoholic because of social media and pornography, PTSD, love addiction, fentanyl and heroin. Ridiculous. I'm a doctor for... Where the hell do you think I learned that?

I'm just saying, you go to treatment before you kill people. I am a clinician. I observe things about these chemicals. Let's just deal with what's real. We used to get these calls on Loveline all the time. Educate adolescents and to prevent and to treat. If you have trouble, you can't stop and you want help stopping, I can help. I got a lot to say.

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with over 350,000 downloads. downloads with reframe there's no stigma just science no labels just support to learn more go to join reframe app.com slash dr drew use the code dr drew for 25 off your first month or your annual subscription that's at join reframe app.com slash dr drew sunglasses are because so i guess uh when i fell on stage doing stand-up um i fell right back nothing broke my fall i was alone on stage so i didn't have anything to grab or any human to grab and because of the concussion and the skull fracture on my head i guess that caused um two black eyes which is i wasn't aware of happens you know when people suffer head trauma so i didn't right so a classic yeah yeah classic sign of skull fracture is what's called raccoon eyes where you

get completely blue orbits and uh heather piled makeup on but still couldn't's called raccoon eyes, where you get completely blue orbits. And Heather piled makeup on, but still couldn't hide the raccoon's eyes. So she's going for it and just going to look like a movie star with the sunglasses. She still looks great. Yeah, you still look great. So congratulations on getting through that. Now, you said nothing broke your fall. You couldn't grab. I've watched your video several times and i'm here to tell you you lost consciousness and then fell down there would be no grabbing of anything because you were already unconscious then and then you hit your head which added to the concussion and further lack of consciousness with about what 15 seconds down um in watching the video the whole video because the club

films your whole set um yeah i was down for a while and there was like a little bit of like movement with my stomach like a rapid breathing that i could tell from my top and then you know people started coming up and and then it's like i woke up and it was like a movie where like all the faces are around you like what happened you know they always do that scene from the perspective of the person that's passed out um i do wonder though like so when i was i remember being on stage and i had this like and I was like, whoa, what the fuck is happening? I'm holding my mic and I can see everything but it's like a really dizziness And I was like, whoa, I better power through this this better go away I don't know how I'm gonna do another hour and 10 minutes of material

and then I think that's when I took a couple steps to kind of like you know, and then I Don't remember anything else and I was like, you know, and then I don't remember anything else. And I was like, you know, oh my God. And then I pass out what you see. I am kind of wondering though, like, had I not been on stage and I felt that way, I would have, you know, grabbed on someone or sat down. Maybe I wouldn't have passed out though.

Maybe I would have then, you know, had a sip of water, had something to eat and been fine. You know, it's like, because I had no place to go or grab then, you know, and then of course, you know, where it happened and everything. It's crazy. Yeah. Yeah. And then everyone started texting you what happened yeah yeah and everyone was so sweet and nice and i'm just like you know at a certain point they say you know you're supposed to be one thing they want me to do is like you know not be on my phone not watching like tiktok videos on my phone and texting too much on my phone and you know our friend josh flag is like what happened i'm like okay at this point there's's actual articles you can read.

And so finally, I'm like, I don't mean to be a bitch, but can you just listen to the podcast? I say the whole story in detail. I really don't feel like texting it out with a brain injury, okay? Yeah. So speaking of the brain, good job. I'm sure Josh was fine. And given the brain injury, do you are aware of any effects of that now? Any memory issue, thinking problems, mood right from the start, you know, and I'm asking me questions, always coming in the room, asking me my name,

the year, the time, the date, you know, the president squeezed my hand, lift up this. I was always able to do all that. yeah,

I mean, sometimes if I had kind of hurts, I'm only taking Tylenol. They offer, they said, well, we've got Oxycontin for you. I said,

no, thank you. I i you know i've watched enough of the movie again people want no right exactly people want to blame the what this the whatever the family was that uh and you know push that stuff it's the doctors and they're still pushing it jesus and i said and they're oh really you had a really bad... I go, no, no. I go, you know what? When I gave birth, they gave me something Norco or something. I'm like, it made me nauseous. I already threw up once right after the head injury, twice actually.

I'm like, just Tylenol, just the Tylenol. And the Tylenol has been doing the job. So I just have been taking Tylenol every four to six hours. And the back of my head is sore so i put some ice on there like on a pillow when i rest but no the sleeping's been okay actually you know good it's been not great and do you not like i'm getting the hours yeah do you have your discharge papers can you do you know what's on the discharge sheets exactly what they called everything um no i haven't really examined it i mean i talked to they you know four different i mean there were like four different neurosurgeons that everybody looked at everything and they asked me every question i'm not on any medication um you know they did two cat scans the second cat scan the

morning after they said it's starting to heal, which was the, um, bleeding on the brain from the skull fracture. So they're like, that's just gonna, you know, go. Then we did the, you wanted me to do the echo cardio. We did that one and that appeared to be fine. That's checking the heart valves. So, I mean, honestly, they just don't really know why i've never fainted before so and did did did chelsea faint also do we know what happened to her

we um i found a little bit more in that uh what i didn't realize is that she had some type of i think she may have had some type of a panic heart racing kind of a thing, but I'm not sure just that her photo showed that she was had a couple of things. Looks like it was, you know, monitoring the chest area. So she, I think did her show Thursday night and didn't feel well after and then canceled her Friday and Saturday and then that Friday I didn't know and then you know passed out on Saturday so like yeah it's just crazy that you know we've worked together and know each other and this happened and you know when I saw that I was like oh that's too bad I wonder she was in the hospital with like

I wasn't you know but she was like I'm gonna be's too bad. I wonder if she was in the hospital with like, I wasn't, you know, but she was like, I'm going to be fine. And I'm, you know, just whatever, going to schedule it. But she, I think is canceling a few more shows. I'm not sure. So that she's really taking like a solid amount of weeks off. I fortunately don't have another show until the end of March, which I feel confident I'll be able to do fine. Yeah, I'm really glad I don't have shows this weekend. I would not want to be standing up and doing a whole hour. But I mean, I just recorded my podcast for tomorrow with Sarah Colonna, of course, sitting here. But I'm fine to be on for a couple hours,

but I'm trying to take it easy. Did Sarah just give you shit or was she sympathetic? No, she was great. She was actually one of the first people to like text. And my son, Drake, who goes to ASU, was in the car with me. As you know, I am married to Peter Tobias and he is very cheap. So the first thing my son, uh, Drake, so no, it was Peter Jr. said, we are refusing the ambulance ride. A hundred percent refusing the ambulance ride. I don't want to pay for that. I'll drive her myself. No, the backseat with me and my sister-in-law who lives in, uh, Peter's sister who lives in

Arizona. She was great great she's like i'm taking you to the hospital i know that you should go to with this great neurological center and um and it was a great hospital st joseph's i was very happy with it i mean the only time i've been to the hospital uh is i went home with a baby so like it's not like i'm familiar with what it's like to have an IV in my arm or anything. And so, but in the backseat, you know, you know, Drake had my phone and he was like, oh, Sarah's asking, are you okay? And, you know, cause all of a sudden fans started like DMing people that they know that I'm friends with that, you know, they follow all of us. So people knew, a lot of people knew right away.

And then, you know, then the actual news got out too. Well, when you open in later March, don't make any jokes about Jesus or Jesus saving you from COVID or anything like that, because you might get struck down again. I always joke about that because I talk about being Catholic and Jesus, and some people are like, you know, not okay with the way I talk about being Catholic and Jesus and some people are like you know not okay with the way I talk about and I'm like oh Jesus thinks of a hoot whatever and so in in never you know it's so interesting you know Drew because like before the vaccine I got a lot of for not stopping my show for you know going out you, going to Mexico, all this stuff. And, but I, you know, I never got COVID. And then when the, when the vaccine came out, I got it, you know? So I'm kind of like, I come out

on stage, like, I don't care if you don't get it, but like, just so you know, I, like I did everything I'm supposed to do, stop giving me shit, you know then and i've never gotten covered where i'm like at a certain point you're like well now wait a minute is something wrong with me like or are we just the chosen people like joking about it and then i literally i told my my assistant i go can we do a tiktok where you just make like a a floating jesus just come down and like flick me like like flick me as i just fall over like clearly jesus loves me the most like flick i just fall over um yeah and the comments on these youtubes and stuff of people just being like you know first time a female comedian made me laugh you know just awful

it's like whatever yeah i have to say i bet my life i bet we're gonna look at it in just a second here but i bet the juicy scoop world rushed in to support you yeah i mean you know that that was so funny because when i was at the hospital the security came and they're like you know um we put you on celebrity status and we want to make sure that you know people aren't going to come up at, you know, do you need any special protocol? I'm like, um, I probably just have some like Phoenix moms that like want to bring me some cookies. Like I don't have like a psycho, you know, I'm not Brett Michaels who actually happened to, that's where he went when he had his like brain situation was the same hospital. And they're

like, Oh, do you want to see the same hospital. And they're like, Oh, do you want to see the Brent Michaels room? He donated some guitars here. So I'm like, no, I, you don't need to worry about like rock of love type of crowd here. I'm,

you know, I just have some classy moms that might want to like, see how I'm doing. Yeah. Bring flowers. 90 day fiance. Exactly. Or a housewife fans. Well's let's watch do you have

any questions for heather before i go to the video i'm just you know i'm so glad she's okay i'm you know i my dad had a subdural hematoma and he had a surgery you know for it because he fell in and um he went back to work a week later like he was like, I got to go back to the hardware store. So yeah, but you can bounce back. He seemed to be okay even after the surgery. And I know it was cheap. But I'm glad it wasn't worse. I'm so glad. Your husband, who you've called cheap, and a slave driver that puts you right back up on the podcast.

But Caleb, I want you to jump in and tell Heather what you told me. Oh, that was absolutely genius. You hit it while the news was hot. Like I saw you, I woke up this morning to you on the front page of Yahoo.com and immediately the first result is your own podcast. So great job. You couldn't have planned it better. Heather was like, who did that?

I said, her husband made her do that. And I said, well, at least she gets a benefit from it. I know. But I don't i would hate for something horrible to happen to you i was just like i was stunned i was like i saw it i was like oh no oh no this is this is so i i didn't look at i know and i was having one of and i was one of my fans yeah one of your fans called me let me know so that was nice yeah it was one of our our community patreon our crossover community between locals uh ask dr drew and juicy scoop there's a little bit of overlap

there and so we love it because i drew was in the shower and i was yeah she was in the shower she goes get up yeah look at this video you got to call heather i'm like she's in the hospital i don't got to call Heather. I'm like, she's in the hospital. I don't want to be one of these people that's calling her in the hospital. I said, call Peter. So I called Peter. Yes. No, we appreciated that we were able to talk to you. Yeah, that was helpful.

No problem. So I was worried that it was some, we've seen some weird vaccine reactions. Most of them have been benign, but fainting is one of those things. And I had worried that there was something to do with that, which I still worry about it because you've never fainted before. And what's a healthy adult fainting all of a sudden? I mean, straight away fainting. That's weird. And there is something called POTS syndrome.

Those of you who had it after COVID or after the vaccine know that we get these problems from the spike protein that change our ability to modulate our blood pressure. It's called POTTS, POTS center, but sort of an autonomic dysfunction. And I suspect you had some little version of that. And like you said, had you not been up on stage, you could have sat down and put your head between your legs and probably been just fine, but that you were up there with no place to go. You push through, boom, and that's it your pressure dropped and let's take a look at it and i mean okay go ahead a little bit clearly jesus loves me the most seriously so nice so nice oh you were already unconscious do Do you see that? Your head was flipping back before you got to the ground. And then I saw where Jesus came down and flicked you, though.

I saw that. Yeah. Oh, this is the whole tape. This is where people. Yeah. 911. Wow. So there you go.

And you were about to say something before the tape. You want to finish that thought? I can't remember what we were saying before. So hard to watch. It's so hard to watch. Yeah. I got the chills and I just, I just was like, I was watching you breathe. I was just like, thank God she's breathing.

But her arm was moving, Drew. You know how you say, like posture. Yeah, my arm was kind of like my arm was doing something weird Yeah, people get weird posturing They'll go like this, they'll kind of go into this sort of motorcycle pose when they hit their head sort of a common thing, kind of a seizure thing

So, we looked back and I did get the booster which I had double Pfizer and Moderna booster, three weeks to the day of the fall. Is there anything that you've seen about time-wise? Because, you know, when I asked the doctors about that, they said, oh, normally. Okay, go ahead.

Two to three weeks. Two to three weeks is where you see a lot of this stuff. I have a friend that got the booster, and he got really destroyed by it. He still can't walk across the room. He's having all kinds of symptoms. There's a lot of funny stuff. We don't really know what it all is and where it's coming from, but it's still worth doing it. I'm not at the point where I'm saying that it's it's still worth the risk but it's got

a lot of funny side effects and syncope it's called fainting is one of them and i think it's from the pot syndrome p-o-t-t-s and so and i was worried what i wanted to check was to make sure you didn't have any evidence of myocarditis um you know when you were you were you know that's why i wanted that which is an inflammation of the heart and it changes the way the heart muscle functions a little bit. And that's, that's why I was red hot on that echocardiogram. Right. Yeah. I mean, so, you know, what can I do now?

Yeah. I mean, I don't think I'm going to get the fourth booster though. I will say that. There, there is not, yeah, there's not yet evidence. There's not science for that yet. If you were 80, we'd be talking about it. I literally talked about it to my 75 and 80-year-old patients this morning that I was telling them, I think you're going to probably need it. You don't need it. There's no evidence for that. But the other thing that happened is you got a multi-million dollar stroke workup, man. They did so much. They did an MRI, MRA.

They did vascular studies of your neck and your heart. They did a great, huge workup on you. You must have been in that MRI scanner a lot. Yeah, I think I went in a couple times. And then they did ultrasound for the heart and the neck area. They came in. Yeah, I mean, I didn't know. And that was my scary thing when they were like, okay, you're going to spend the night in the ICU. And I was

like, oh geez. You know? And then they're like, and we have to give you this sponge bath and all this stuff so that you're ready to go in case we have to do a procedure. And I was like, whoa, am I going to wake up with like a shaven head and you guys are going to like do an emergency brain surgery? Like, that's what I was like, do I need my husband here? Because I don't want that to happen. I don't want to die. But like, and then they were like, no, no, no, that won't happen. I was like, okay. Cause I was scared. Like, do I have some tiki time bomb? Do I have some brain tumor I didn't know about? I mean, that is what I was initially thinking when I was like on the way to the hospital. Right. And then that can

happen that way. Yes. Yes. It can happen that way. And they check that very, very carefully. The issue with your subdural, which is a bleeding right under the skull is sometimes they do have to put a hole in your skull and drain it, but not when they're real small. So you must have a very small one that those resorb on their own. Are you needing a follow-up scan another week or two? No scan. It's like a conversation because the next day I did a scan and they said it's already starting to heal. So it'll just heal naturally. And fortunately, there's no open wound or anything. So I was really lucky in that respect.

Wow. Well, listen, we wanted to just do a checkup on you. I appreciate you stopping by. Everybody Everybody go to Juicy Scoop. Is there an episode coming online tonight? colonna where we um just talk we talk about some fun stuff pamela anderson and tommy lee that movie and tinder swindler and some more fun stuff but you know it's uh it's all juicy scoop it's uh listen to it whenever you are free to every tuesday and thursday give us give us a juicy scoop i saw you in front of uh the salt lake City Church for what's her name? That seemed to be a moment for you. Okay, so the Real Housewives of Salt Lake have an actual church leader, this woman who, if you are a Christian, she acts about the least Christian way you can.

She's cruel. She's mean. She only wears designer clothes. She calls people fat and everything else. Anyway, so we go to her church, which is now boarded up. And her tagline is, if you come for me, I'll send Jesus for you. So I just did a big, long episode exposing her as a cult leader and all the things that her weird church does. So everyone's like, do you think Mary sent Jesus for you? I'm like, yes, she did. And it came down and he flicked me.

He flicked you straight away. And listen, on this podcast, on this streaming show, we thought of you the other day. We interviewed Stefanka, Stephanie from 90 Days, 90 Day Fiance. Do you know who she is? Yes, yes. I remember her. Yeah, yeah. How's she doing? She's fine. You should interview her. She'd come on in a millisecond, I'm sure.

She's got, as always, there's a whole lot more. From her fart jar. Yeah, selling her fart jars. And as always, there's a lot more going on. So can she no longer produce the farts health-wise? It's complicated. She really didn't have anything going on. The farts didn't really cause her health problems.

But she has a long history of something called aplastic anemia, which is a really dangerous bone marrow disease. And so she's on immunosuppressives and all this stuff. And she's like, you know what? I don't want to screw myself up anymore. she switched it to something else kayla do you remember what else she's selling now she's yeah there's nfts so instead of nfts fart jar nfts yeah exactly she sells the nfts of the fart jar amazing kind of genius you know you know i is it as genius as selling this yes well talk to your friend Susan about that look at that ladies I want to know I want to know I want to get in the camera I want to know it's in there do your

kids have this and how weird if it was like in their bedroom staring at them when they have a date over like just like hello you're giving me you're you're giving me ideas but i actually thought it'd be a cool vibrator i know susan like if we were together right now i'd just like go down on you with this face right here save it for after dark so so heather you can at least claim the head injury my wife walks thinks and talks like that without head injury so you can say i'm de-repressed i don't know what i'm saying i was hitting the head susan's like that all the time she doesn't get hit in the head and then that's how she talks god god knows what would happen she'd be like one of those old man that just grabs at people oh that's me so um so all right listen we'll let you go uh

anything else for heather before you i think you need to have susan on juicy scoop because god knows what you'll get out of her no no i miss you very much and i'm glad you're okay yes and and you what we'll do dinner. Let's do a dinner soon. Yes, let's do dinner and we're not doing anything for Super Bowl. We're being old, lazy people in front of our TV with a glass of wine. Take it easy. Go home. We'll see you very soon, okay? Bye.

Bye. Bye. Bye. Thank you for stopping by. The great Heather McDonald, everybody. What is her Instagram? Let's get the Instagram out. At Heather McDonald. The Instagram is at Heather McDonald. Okay. And again, put it up there if you would uh on the banner uh caleb just so we have it up for a minute because i people get nope i still hear her uh mc there you are mc no not mac she is one of the she's one of the top podcasts in comedy and consistently yes she's she's got the highest reviews she's very very popular and

has a great comedy um show as well lucky to be in with her and her friends who are also comedians and had some fun times we're gonna hang out with them in june we're gonna go to the wine festival and catalina i was thinking about her right as she john and uh and um yes sarah sarah yeah colonna but um yeah i'm really i'm really glad we're friends i don't i can't remember how we met did we meet heather mcdonald yeah you met her on your show on hln right no i'm i used to go on chelsea chelsea that's right you're in chelsea she was in the round table she was in the round table. Drew was in the original Chelsea Handler all the time. I think it was the first week. I mean, ridiculously in every show. And yeah, that was one show I didn't kill.

What's that? It's still on camera. What? Her husband is still on camera. Bring him back. Bring him back. Do you need more talk? Hi, Peter.

What's going on? Do you want to say hi? You couldn't resist? I don't know if you're Peter. He may not have mics. We can't hear you. We can't hear you. Peter wants hear peter wants to be he wants to get the glasses so he can say it's a peter bobblehead all right well we can't hear you bye

i love peter you see how he looks like we're gonna sell this bobblehead with our glasses a lot of get on that you can sell the peter bobblehead peter's the mastermind behind heather's success and they've been together they work work together and they, you know, support each other. It's, they're such a cute couple. I really love it. Yeah. And so the, but where I really got to know Heather. And he sails. So we, we get to go sail. Yeah. Where I really got to know Heather on, if you remember, there was a show called like After Lately or After Chelsea or something. Remember when they had their own, the writers had their own show? That I did a bunch with Heather and that's how kind of,

we got to know each other. And then I brought her back. She was on your HLN show. I have an HLN show. So we've got the great Mike Carano standing by. We'll get to him in just a second. First little break. Be right back.

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dissolve in water to make a great tasting drink that is a 75% less sugar than your typical sports drink. It uses all natural flavors. It's gluten-free, dairy-free, caffeine-free, non-GMO, and even vegan. Hydrolyte Plus Immunity is also now available in ready-to-drink bottles at the Walmart, next to the pharmacy, or as always, you can find it by visiting hydrolite.com slash drdrew. That is H-Y-D-R-A-L-Y-T-E dot com slash drdrew. And be sure to use that code drdrew25 at checkout for a special discount. And we are back. Heather McDonald, thank you for stopping by and saying hi to us.

Oh, and that is Mike Carano. Mike, why don't we bring you right in? Mike Carano. Do we have audio right in mike carano do we have audio am i all right i we have audio i hear you right there you are how are you sir is it this microphone or is it perfect i think it's your mic and friend because i heard you're tapping it clicked yeah and you're kind of close though can you back up a little bit? Your head's too big. I've got $10,000 worth of microphones in here. Well, I want you to know, you sound better than most people do, so it's good. You're getting a good sound coming in.

Yeah, you sound good, but I can't see the top of your head. You mean my dulcet tones are the actual audio quality? Can you just turn? Are you doing it off your computer? There you go. Back. That's a little better. And then point the camera up towards your head a little bit.

Okay. Point it up a little bit more. I don't like that. Let's just cut off. You're going to see my bald spot. Cut off Drew's head. I don't like people looking at that. Now I see it.

I can see it when you bend over. Cutting off the head is fine. All right. Perfect. Well, Susan gets really weird about matching boxes. I just don't like when like one person, I mean, you're a photographer and I watch a lot of, you know, these zoom things on the news and stuff.

And when they have like the guest face so close and then the hosts are way in the back, I just find that just drives me crazy. So there you go. And I keep telling Caleb, well, in that case, because I'm a rebel,

let's do this. It's better. Any way I can give the old F you to anybody. I'm making my job easy. Caleb's chasing you. I know. It just looks weird. So how have you been?

I haven't talked to you forever. What's going on? Give us an update. I know. I'm pretty good, man. I'm pretty good. I got a cat, and it's been very disruptive to my gypsy freewheeling lifestyle. And I kid you not, I'm not embellishing one bit.

It's completely changed my life and not for the better. Oh, okay. I don't want him to hear me say that. We have a cat coming to the park today. I love him. I love him. He's actually on an airplane right now and he hasn't peed for six hours so it's going to be really interesting drew and i are going to go to the airport with the lane cruiser i have a cat box

in the back oh and i'm going to park and you're going to go get her and you guys are going to like escort the cat in like it's you know like it's landing the plane landing the damn plane i can jump in the back of the car and pick a dump. I feel so bad. I don't know how long. That cat's going to be shaken up. Yeah. Yeah. Well, he was already kind of a mess.

He just had a urinary obstruction too. Yeah. But she's got them all, you know. How much did that cost? Yeah. A lot. Do you want to know? A lot.

Should I tell her? I didn't say and say do you say it over the internet because i'm 1200 bucks into my free no no don't no i'm oh yeah so so we're we're keeping up with you let's just put it down i know it better i was like that cat better live paulina but it was in manhattan okay to be fair what But it was in Manhattan. Okay. To be fair. Say what, Mike? It was in a snowstorm. She had to take it from Brooklyn to Midtown and put it in an ER for two days because there was a snowstorm and nobody could go out.

So it might have been cheaper if it didn't have to stay the night, the extra night in the snow because New York was basically shut down. Say what, Mike? You were trying to say something. Yeah. No, I was going to say I've been through – I've run the gamut on trying to keep my cat satisfied and avoid him being bored. I've got – in here right now, I've got three, four cat tents. I've got two cat perches. I've got a $400 cat wheel he can run on. Probably 30 toys on the ground, scratchy pads, all these kitchen implements.

And then I went with the laser toys. and the laser toys are a friggin nightmare do not do it don't do it why why he got so hyped up by the laser he went he went in the kitchen and hyperventilated like laying on the ground going for five minutes and I thought he was gonna die and then I gave it two days and I tried to wear him out this is like three days ago I tried to wear him out. This is like three days ago. I tried to wear him out and I turned, there's a robot laser that shoots it on the floor. And he took it as the most prep, the biggest threat any living creature could imagine and fought it for like four minutes, never caught it obviously. And then went in and had diarrhea and threw up i'm like this is not good yeah so avoid the laser a lot too

on my white carpet he's so busy now so yeah that'll cost me another six hundred dollars to clean but but maybe if you need to dump a few of those toys you can bring one over for jack yeah we'll take them got a lot i've got a lot yeah by the way i don't i think the idea of having white carpet is the most pretentious thing anyone can possibly do i know i got talked into it by designer and it's the only thing i hated about her i mean she was really good yeah would you get white interior on your car no and i said why are you putting in white because you should and i was like oh and then i got talked into it i really did and i fought it the whole way so where is it in your room with my

instinct new york it's in the apartment doesn't have animals in it oh yes it wasn't supposed to have animals in it okay it was just a short stay by the kitty. And by animals, we're including our children and other young people. Yeah, exactly. I have another animal in there today. And so, Mike, you put up a video of the week after Susan's dad passed away and she was having to run his hardware store and liquidate it and all. I didn't put it up. That was a private link for you guys. Oh, shoot.

Well, I told everybody where to go. Well, Susan put it up. That was a private link for you guys. Oh, shoot. Well, I told everybody where to go. Well, Susan put it up. I know. Well, you can share it, but it's a private link. Of course. Okay, okay. It makes no sense otherwise. It really touched me.

It was fun to see, and you're very funny, and I wanted to tell you that was a pipe machine for, you know, threading galvanized pipe he could literally he had he had a machine where he could put the threads on any pipe so he would cut the length of the metal you know the the galvanized pipe when we used to we were allowed to do galvanized pipe back in before copper and plastic and all that stuff and then he would cut it whatever length they needed and he would thread it so it was just this and plastic and all that stuff. And then he would cut it whatever length they needed, and he would thread it. So it was just this.

And he was an engineer. He was an aeronautic engineer. So he had, like, all this crap in his garage, too, like that. He had, like, lathes and these machines. And that thing was just, it was such a cool thing. I mean, I couldn't use it. Not as cool as the key-making machine. I still have that, Mike.

You can have it that's so funny because i was going to say i should have bought that thing because i would like to have a key making machine just sitting in the corner how much do you want for it i have it you would make an amazing cat toy the cat would go insane with all the keys literally go vomit in the kitchen oh yeah yeah so you have to be careful with that oh my god i had to clean up is it time to get rid of the key machine? Key shavings. I mean, when I walked into his hardware store, the whole

area was just covered with key shavings. I had to put it all in a box and clean it up. And I kept a little piece of it. And when I got his ashes, I made a little box on the side and I put his ashes in with the key shavings. He's admitting this.

He's actually now. Did he have an affinity towards making keys? He just made keys until he died, literally. And I had to make them too when people came in every day. And I literally stuck it in the safe, and it's in my garage. So if you want the key machine. And the safe. Are you prepared So if you want the key machine. So it has revenue. Yeah.

Are you prepared to get rid of that key machine? Or is it. I don't know. If Mike really wants it. I mean, Jews like that. So it's so. You got to come over and check it out. I'll teach you.

I'll teach you how to make. If it's something you want to sell. It's about a thousand pounds. Hmm. Okay. I'd like to have it. Come on over. You got to take a look.

You can have it back. It's a lot of work to make that thing. I'll show it to you it's pretty funny oh i'm not gonna use i love it i love it too and then it has all those like keys hanging on it and the top that that go to cars that don't even exist anymore it's hysterical it's i it's so classic i don't know i loved it and so mike normally you have lots of questions for me, especially when long periods of time have passed between our conversations. Are you so preoccupied with your cat? I'm trying to come up with a story that's as good as me falling down and getting a concussion and having two black eyes. You don't have to compete with that. You don't have to compete with that.

Please don't. But normally you do have kind of interesting kinds of ideas. Well, I did slam my penis in the bathroom door once. Congratulations. I'm happy for you. Everything turn out okay? You know what I did do? I did stab my testicles with a stick when I was a kid.

Of course you did. I was running with a cocaine mallet and it caught on the ground and it penetrated my testicles. So that's penetrated childhood trauma right there did you have to have sutures i sure did i'm amazed you i'm amazed you never mentioned this now usually when that happens to young males the testicle actually kind of falls out a little bit did you actually have the testicle outside the became okay you're turning my stomach right now because i'm very sensitive about that but uh mine became more attractive believe it or not

it's weird i don't know that that did happen that really did happen i was probably seven or eight years old it was horrible it was horrible and you didn't have any plastic surgery on it to make it even more attractive like a a... You know what? Tightening your Dartos tunic. I had a lift. I had a lift. A Dartos tunic lift. It's like one big...

Just so you know... It's much more attractive. So people know that the Dartos tunic is this thick layer in the testicle that gives the wrinkly. It's called the Dartos tunic. Sounds good. Yeah. I thought you'd like that. I can.

It sounds like a Star Wars character. Yeah. With my childhood trauma. Okay. You tore your perineum? No, we had archers in the family. So they bought my brother a bow and arrow. And I was about three or two, two or three,

and was running down the hall with an arrow in my mouth and fell on it oh god i don't remember it that's a delay everybody but i heard the story yeah i know i don't know what they did oh my god but did it go into your throat yeah oh my god how it didn't go into her brainstem. Well, maybe it did. That's like a funny story that my parents used to tell. Oh, remember the time when you fell on an arrow? And I was like, what? This is when kids were kids and parents were parents. What?

I did what? Sitting back smoking, talking about the time you fell on the arrow we gave you. That was hysterical. My dad is still the same guy. My dad's still the same guy. I swear to God. He's 17 now, so it was when my nephew was five or six. We were looking for him at family dinner, and he was downstairs with my dad, and we

went down there, and my dad had him sitting on a piece of wood with a gun, shooting at a target like 50 feet away inside. Oh. My brother lost his mind he likes he needs to wear eye protection and my dad said he doesn't need eye protection it's fine wow that's a good corona story when i was a child i would go to a park we would go to a park in tucson ari park in Tucson, Arizona, and one of my friends, the only friend who was strong enough to actually pull back a compound bow that his dad had, would get... I don't know if you've ever pulled a bow that's compound. It's very difficult at first, and then you get to this easy point due to physics, apparently, and it comes back easy.

But we would shoot arrows up in the air and just sit like this on the ground waiting for them to come down. Oh my God. Once a genius, always a genius. I think you one-upped me. You were actually a conscious person. Oh my goodness. What are they called? The Greek warriors? I know.

I was a child. Running with an arrow in your mouth? That's the title of Susan's autobiography, just, you know, running with an arrow in my mouth. It does determine my life, taking chances. So, Mike, are you still doing any trauma therapy? I haven't been to therapy for about a year, but I think I'm going to go back for a little touch-up, as they like to call it. Explain to people, because I'm always talking about trauma treatment. You have a really good experience with it, a very vivid experience with it. Explain to people what it was like, EMDR-type treatment, trauma treatment.

I didn't buy into it the first couple of visits it didn't seem like it was doing anything it seemed comical you sit with these buzzers and you talk to your therapist or you think for like a minute and a half while the buzzers are going off and then you discuss what you were thinking about the third time i did it i had what and i hate this terminology but i had an absolute breakthrough experience that was unlike anything in my life. And it shook me up to the point where I genuinely thought she did something to my brain. Like she hurt me in the long run because I had a piercing headache. It lasted for days on end. I was shaken up like to my core for days. And then things just got tremendously better and we had a couple of

lesser experiences like that but it i can promise that it changed my perception of the reason i was going there in a big way it was it was kind of amazing i mean the idea it is amazing it was fascinating it's it's getting you access to parts of your, yep. Go ahead. Well, it's funny. It's funny because stuff came up that I never, I, you know, you know, my history and there was a point when my brother and his wife had a baby and we were all sitting around with the baby.

And my sister said, imagine doing to him what our mom did to us and that began a 10-year experience of us all bonding over the stuff that we went through and in in the emdr therapy stuff came up that we had never discussed like we would go did she really do this and we'd be like yeah she did that to me and it was and i'm not trying to just sit here and blame my dead mom for everything right now, what's going to happen now. But it was fascinating that you somehow have the ability to bury stuff that might be a big deal. And some of the stuff was a huge deal. And I think about it now, and I'm like, it's kind of funny that we just tuned that out. And it came up.

And then once you have to face it, you can find resolve in it. And I guess it's good And I guess it's good. I guess it's good. It's literally that it's a survival mechanism that causes you to wall off from it. You just push it down and back. And what you're talking about is regaining access to that, access to the part of yourself, the material. And you're coming at it from a place where there's somebody there with you so they can support you through it you can regulate

it and build it and sort of figure it out and funny i've talked to your therapist a couple times since you told me that first story and she says and i don't want to scare anybody from uh emdr or trauma therapy that it always is bad. It's always tolerable. They only make it tolerable for you and you always get better. But she said, some people, it's not uncommon for people to say, you broke my brain, you broke something, which is one of the things I think you were saying.

That's how I felt. Yeah, I was losing my mind. I was like, this really effed me up. Something's really wrong in here. It felt like there was a snap, but I don't think everybody has that experience. But like you, you just told me that I might be wrong about that. You know what? Here's the question that has been in my mind for a long, long time. I've seen the change happen when I recognize my bad habits, when I recognize the issues as to why I do things, but I don't understand why I need to recognize that stuff

for me to make a change. Like, why do I need to understand my bad behavior is based on this, based on my fear because of this as a child, or based on my anger because of this as a child? Like, why do I need to understand that to get over it? I don't get that stuff. I don't think you do. I don't think you do. That's not actually the way it works. Great. No, no, no. Listen, listen. Insight is important so you understand what's happening to you.

But what's actually happening is there's a part of yourself that's demanding attention and is unregulated, and you can't access it it and the EMDR gives you access it's that simple and once you have access it can come into the rest of your central nervous system and regulate so it's not there driving all those bad behaviors so it's not the insight that makes you stop the behaviors it's the access to that part of yourself that was hurt that's now in with the whole yeah does that make sense and and just going well i see mom hit me mom hit me therefore that's why i'm aggressive that will not make you not aggressive that will not help that might make you go oh that's why i drink but but it doesn't matter because you've got to stop drinking and go to aa anyway and you just got to live a certain kind of life the insight is not going to make you stop

drinking you've seen that a million times in the program right they they don't do all the insight in the world doesn't make you stop using drugs or stop doing drugs but when you gain access really integrated access to that part of your nervous system you can then start to be integrated as a whole and it settles down a lot of the emotions and motivations that are fucked up okay so then well a moment ago you said you don't need to access it now that you're implying that you do need no i'm saying uh you're saying you're saying the cognitive process of understanding i got injured that's why i drink oh that'll help me stop drinking. No, it won't. No, it won't. You know that.

It won't. You have to stop drinking and live a certain kind of life. And by the same token, and by the same token, seeing that, oh, I had trauma as a childhood, that doesn't do anything.

That just tells you you got to do some work where you gain access to that part of yourself. So again, it's regulated. Not that it's understood, that it's actually accessed it's actually you're it's part of you now as opposed to off somewhere in the distance yeah it does bring

comfort at times knowing that when i'm scared or when i act out there the reason i'm doing it is because i'm afraid of because of something that happened or because i'm again afraid of the response on it you know what i mean i do like understanding that the reason i'm so scared inside of everything is because i didn't feel safe at this point or whatever i do like that that's right and and and sometimes that diminishes its power you know what i mean if you want it to stop because of the insight no it doesn't really happen but it diminishes its power it can make you sometimes stop and go maybe i can change my behavior around this this time you know makes you stop and go you know and and and it and as you gain more and more access to it you also some of the feelings about

the perpetrators start to settle down you know what i mean so your feelings are that's what i hear i wonder what yeah you wonder when that's going to happen it's also you know what i mean so your feelings are that's what i hear i wonder what yeah you wonder when that's going to happen also you know what that feels like i've accepted well let me tell you i've accepted this this a little bit of insight into forgiving her and it's not like who am i to forgive somebody but i've accepted to a point i haven't done this fully but that she did the best job she could with her mental illness. And what am I going to, you know, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? People don't intentionally go, I'm going to be the worst person ever because nobody, nobody who's meant not severely mentally ill would do that. And it's a, it's a tough pill to swallow, but I think it's a, it brings great relief and it gives me the freedom to screw with someone else which is what i'm looking for

no it's you made caleb crack up no it's exactly what i was what i was saying which is that you go there's nothing okay about what she did nothing doesn't not okay at all but she was sick what are you gonna do she you know i was the one that that was there. I'm unhappy that I was there, but I can't be resentful and blaming and all those things that I was, which then if you hold on to all that shit, it colors how you see other people. And if you can find sort of a way to understand what happened to you, unfortunately, nothing right about it, nothing. Okay. It changes your feeling about yourself and changes your feeling about other people,

which is really important. Yeah, you want to hear something crazy that I never thought I would say, which is bizarre. I did not have a pleasant time with my mom for, I'm guessing, 40, 45 years maybe. Like it was never pleasant, ever. I would drive to San Diego and I'd be, hey, want me to come in and hang out for a few minutes on the outside? Yeah, I don't really feel like it was never pleasant ever. I would drive to San Diego and I'd be on, Hey, why don't you want me to come in and hang out for a few minutes? I'm outside. Yeah.

I don't really feel like it. That's how she treated it every week after I drove two and a half hours for a decade. But lately for the first time, I've actually been missing her, which is so bizarre. Like, what am I missing?

I don't understand it. It wasn't like there's all these pleasant memories, but I, I feel sad that she's not here and I wish she was still around. Yeah. what am i missing i don't understand it it wasn't like there's all these pleasant memories but i i feel sad that she's not here and i wish she was still around so so wait a minute did you have a positive yeah did you have a positive experience with her before she died now oh yeah i did right before like i i went over to visit her she was reluctant and i was reluctant and i went over to visit her and I looked at her and I went, she's going to die right now. And I told my brother, I go, you got to come over. Mom's going to die.

And we all came over and I, I went over to her and said, I loved you. I love you. And I gave her a kiss and that wasn't the norm. And I left. And the next morning she died, you know? I mean, Joe, my brother, Joey called me and said, she's on a gurney and they're pumping her chest you know what's funny about it though is she was again very very very mentally ill and i don't know if pathological is the worst but it was all a lie everything was a lie for attention or for whatever reason and as the guy is putting her in the ambulance, she blurts out, I have COVID.

And they straight on my brother and wouldn't let him in the hospital. And that was the end. Oh my God. She didn't have COVID. She never left her apartment. She never went out. She had no visitors. But that's what she decided to yell out for attention at the last second.

And that kept anyone from visiting her or being there. It's kind of funny. It really is to everyone's detriment when somebody with an illness doesn't get it treated. She suffers, you suffer. I mean, that's the part that gets me is that people are allowed to go along with illnesses, that the longer they go untreated, the more recalcitrant they become. And we just let people go into these horrible states where they they are they couldn't be more miserable and the people around them are destroyed there's something wrong

with how we do that that we we need to adjust that a little bit seems to me there is there is something wrong but it becomes so burdensome and so frustrating when you never see a bit of change that you just withdraw like you you eventually go i have a life to lead i can't be the caretaker for you my sister was the caretaker for her forever and you know weekly phone calls from my sister i just got to unload and tell you what mom did and it was it was you know it was insane it was it wasn't so insane you wouldn't do it's not a normal thing it was just like geez louise what the hell is wrong with her but it was too late there was never going to be an awakening there was never going to be a

a slow recovery well certainly after all the years of all that i mean it really becomes like i keep saying you know with with dementia we have to rush in and help those people they don't get better no matter what we do. But schizophrenics, drug addicts, bipolar, they get better right away if you treat them. And if you don't treat them, they become recalcitrant. And then they get brain damage and are never the same. And so it's, ugh. But here is the world we live in. Has there been an advance in schizophrenia medicine where they can have what I would consider to be a time release where the person doesn't have to be responsible for administering yes yes because lots of stuff

like that lots of things like that because it seems to me i often would hear stories about yeah but i would hear stories about people with schizophrenia and oh by the way before they killed all those people they stopped taking their meds and like right i just wonder if there's a way to take that out of their hands there is the compliance is the biggest problem with schizophrenia they they always feel normal and that they don't need their meds anymore after a period of time and unless you have some sort of court order or conservatorship you can't do anything and that's what's messed up right now and that's why you've got us you know streets filled with people that are deteriorating yeah the the part that this you'd appreciate this too the part that everybody misses on schizophrenia and drug addiction is these are untreated even

if a nurse is administering the fentanyl or the meth these are progressive illnesses. They progress. They don't remain static. People will die. And I can't get that through to anybody. Can you refresh my memory when you told me that alcoholism is progressive, what that meant exactly? Alcoholism is kind of a little bit of a special case in that the longer you maintain your relationship with alcohol, there is bound to be some slow increase in your consumption and increase in consequences. And consequences is really the main thing that progresses, frankly, that you'll have more health problems, you'll have more relationship problems. These things will progress. Now, they may not progress to demise with alcohol, and they can stop and start for periods of

time, and some people can kind of keep it under control, so it's sort of a low level. They don't have to really progress. They can kind of control it a little bit. It's hard, but generally, if you're untreated

or if you're continuing the relationship it progresses that's kind of how it goes now how you said it in relation depends on the person yeah yeah but you said in relation to my my drinking like i said well i haven't drank in 10 years and you said but it's a progressive disease and i wondered what you meant by that like what would happen if right now I go buy a six pack and a bottle of Jack Daniels. I mean, am I just going to pick up where I left off or have I gone to a whole nother level with mental instability where it's going to be like crazy town worse than

before. It's in and around the program. You'll heal, heal good times in and around the program. You'll hear people talk about the latter that some that it's somehow worse because your disease has been doing push-ups not usually usually the way it works is you you actually delude yourself that you can control it you start using slowly and look i'm fine i'm great i got this under control and in a very short period of time you

back where you left off because there's sort of a there's sort of a he there's like a hedonic set point there's like a set point in your brain that the that it just takes you to if you have this illness and you've got to get there and it takes a little while to get there and then you start and then you keep progressing from there so okay i thought i didn't think i didn't think hedonic could ever be a set point. I thought it was always moving. No, that's a, it's a, there's a lot in there. I mean,

I mean, what do you mean exactly? Like for instance, everybody has a hedonic set point. Like if I'm a hedonic treadmill, but like a hedonic treadmill. A hedonic treadmill is something different. I just wish I had a boat.

And then you get a boat and you're like, now we wish I had a bigger boat. Now we wish I had a plane. Now we wish I had a bigger plane. Now I need to had a plane. Now we wish I had a bigger plane. Now I need to go to space. It just keeps on moving no matter what you get. That's what I thought. That's what I thought hedonic.

It does do that. That's the progressive part. I didn't know it could be set. No, no. Well, it's set in relation to alcohol because you've been absent for a long period of time. We can move on if this isn't making sense. We don't need to discuss no it is making sense it's set where you left off five minutes it but no it's an important thing because there's different kinds of hedonia right

there there is eudaimonic wellness which is how do you lead a good life and be nourished and feel you know regulated and you know be able to be uh at service other people. That's eudaimonia. And then there's hedonic euphoria or hedonic what do they call it? There's eudaimonic and hedonic happiness, which is just the heroin addict has a very

high hedonic experience when they take their first hit. But that's not a good life. And it does keep moving, as you say. Now, we have all kinds of hedonic set points. We have all kinds, right? Go ahead. How can you?

How can I experience euphoria without taking drugs? Well, I'm trying to convince you that hedonic euphoria is not necessarily a good thing. It's not a bad thing. It's hard for me to say euphoria is a necessarily a good thing. It's not, no, it's not a bad thing. It's hard for me to, or for me to say euphoria is a bad thing. You can't say that, but there's something more nourishing. Yeah.

Well, you're, you're, you're walking into a, you're walking down a risky path with that because if you have addiction and alcoholism, it's going to require more and more and more to induce euphoria. So soon it's going to be jumping out of planes. It's going to be more and more and more to induce euphoria.

So soon it's going to be jumping out of planes. It's going to be sexual addictions. It's going to be gambling. That's what addicts do. They find other ways to trigger that hedonic experience as opposed to going over to the more nourishing experience of eudaimonic happiness, which is service, regulation. I've been trying to kickstart my sexual addiction for years i know it's not worked so well it's not working out at all but uh no shoot yeah no i want to feel i want to feel comfortable just willy nilly

yeah i i know but but there's other kinds of hedonic set points too right like people he people are happy this is in the research they're happy until they can compare themselves to somebody else then they're unhappy they want what the that person has so we have this sort of mimetic desire some people call them and by the same token as you pointed out we get used to everything our hedonic set point adjusts to wherever we are so all of a sudden it's i want a fast car i feel the same now i must need a jet but i don't feel the same and that that's the unhealthy non-eudaimonic hedonia that we sort of pursue in this country a lot that all makes sense and it's kind of funny yeah well it's it's also naturally built into you

because it also shows up in the monkey world we did an interview with a woman who did extensive tests on money and and monkeys and i'm not sure how she did that but i do know that she said if you would give monkeys bananas they were totally happy and then you give another monkey a grape the monkeys with the bananas didn't want the bananas anymore and they would throw them on the ground because they wanted the grape because it seemed like it was a better option. Correct. So we're all just effed up and it's a big old joke and whatever.

That is in the primate system that we, we will literally forego a reward to punish in some fashion or ostracize or whatever. I mean, this is all alive and well in social media right now. You see it all the time, that we would rather punish ourselves than take a reward if it can act out essentially

our envy on another person, which is why there's all these religious restrictions, religious sort of warnings about envy being this horrible emotion. It's one of the worst things that humans do. Envy is terrible. What a way to drive you into craziness, being envious. You know the study.

So much of it alive and well. And it's a pretty extensive. But you know the study where people buy a huge portion of the population that was surveyed would rather live in a neighborhood where they made $150 if all their neighbors made 100 000 than live in a neighborhood where they made 250 000 but their neighbors made 350 000 correct that doesn't mean we're just broken species isn't that nuts well there's a guy well we goes back to the our primate heritage you know for some reason it's some had some sort of adaptive advantage, I guess, but it's in us. Yeah, we like to go into other countries and kill each other all the time, too.

Well, that's another impulse. I don't mean to be crude, but is this whole thing just a big dick contest? Well, yeah, and so that's what Freud thought. He sort of distilled it down to that kind of thing.

I don't know. That seems a little simplistic to me and not really biological the way we understand it anymore. There's also a guy named Rene Girard. Wait. Who talks. It seems extremely biological and likely to me. It seems. That it's built into us.

It seems anatomical. It's just like, look at me, me, me, look at this. Well, maybe, maybe, maybe it seems anatomical and symbolic rather than biologic to me you know i'm saying and and so yes there's a and you're right there's some of that in there i believe there is some of it in there or something like that in there however we conceive of that but i feel like the biological systems are so much more complicated than just something simply symbolic like that but there's another game that guy named renee gerard that has this theory of what's called

mimetic desire and uh he believes that pretty much everything is about wanting something that somebody else wants that's essentially his his which is that the capuchin monkey thing but he he builds a whole theoretical frame around that and he actually thinks that um that that there is mimetic aggression and people have taken his theory and said well that's why jesus was such an important symbol because we no longer tried to kill each other for all these things because this guy died for us so they could say that guy died so we don't have to kill each other for all these things because this guy died for us. So they could say, that guy died, so we don't have to kill each other anymore because that guy died for all of our aggressive sins. Does that make sense?

No, not completely, but that could just be my dumbness. But the whole idea of accepting and digesting that Jesus died for your sins, and I mean, believing that in your heart sounds overwhelming to me. That sounds like I couldn't handle it. My head would explode. Well, how about the fact that, I mean, if you really look at the sort of primitive symbols and the primitive experiences attached to it, not only did that guy die for me, so I don't have to kill other people or, you know, kill the Kings already died. He died for me,

but we drink his blood and eat his body on a regular basis. Yeah. And he lives in eternity. Yeah. And we still love him. He never goes away. Yeah. Well,

but he's still our leader. Genius of it. It does. You don't need to. Yeah. The Aztecs had to kill somebody every day. Was he ever a leader? Was he ever our leader? Of ever our leader of a few of a few people like he was a leader yeah of a few people we're getting into dangerous territory but of a few people yes i would say

some people it was a brilliant idea he well he was a rabbi right and so rabbis are teachers, leaders of sorts, right? This just came up on the other podcast, how Jews wrote the Bible and then Christians took it over and went, see you later, Jews. Now we don't like you. I'm simplifying what we're talking about. You killed our leader. Well, and so tell us about that podcast. Tell everyone about that podcast. The After Disaster, which is a podcast we've been doing for 11 years uh 600 and something episodes it's now a subscription only my podcast is still public the miscellaneous adventures from the world of mike carano and we've been having really exceptional

shows on another podcast that i produce called crazy money with paul ollinger and we have an exceptional guest coming up next week but I can't say who it is. Talk about Paul's show. What is it? It's a podcast that explores the connection between money and happiness. And it's called Crazy Money. And I talked him into doing this podcast because he made a lot of money at Facebook and was not happy. Felt like he didn't have any purpose in life. He got everything he ever dreamed of, and he still felt empty.

So we started discussing it and you were a guest, you were a guest on the second show. We're now at 135. Wow. It's a very academic listen. So it's not the kind of thing you can just put on and have in the background, but it's been an interesting journey.

You have to listen. And my podcast is still me yapping into my phone, yelling at AAA. And Paul, you have to listen carefully. And my podcast is still me yapping into my phone yelling at AAA. Or wherever I'm at. You have to listen carefully. And so do you still have five minutes of mic or three minutes of mic or any video streaming stuff? I do a lot of videos for my Patreon people for the podcast, but I have something coming up, which I'm excited. You know how I've been working

on this movie about death? Well, of course, in the meantime, I get sidetracked and I worked on something else and Paul was out here last week and I actually let him watch clips and he's very happy. So we'll see.

We'll see if I finish it in the next month or two. A little bit more. A little bit more. It's basically i'm hugh hauser and i spent a lot of time in death valley okay which is true which is some which is just a statement of fact and uh yeah i'd never heard of the opera house until i until i met you yeah well there's there's i found a lot of clips from my visits to death valley that

other i don't want to say i think they're funny, but I do think they're funny. And I'm stringing them together in a comedy documentary that may never sell, but who knows? I have no expectations. Did you go to the opera house there? No, we drove through Death Valley. Do you know there's an opera house there? Okay. Susan, I want to tell you, Susan. No, I drove through Death Valley. Do you know there's an opera house? Do you know there's an opera house there? Okay. Susan, I want to tell you, Susan.

No, I don't remember. I don't remember. The fact that you drove through Death Valley without visiting my favorite places hurts me to my core. We may have, but I was 16, so I didn't care. She saw Scotty's Castle, I bet. I just wanted to get a tan. So I was with my best friend, Nikki, and it was 1133 degrees outside and we went outside and tried to sit in the sun. That's all I remember. That's sort of a symbolic metaphor for Susan's life.

So I was in a bikini in Death Valley. You took a road trip at 13? No, I was with my parents in their motorhome like they drove motorhomes oh they had bows and arrows in the back seat you're kidding kidding i hope you're kidding so i wasn't putting them in my mouth at that point have you been canceled yet me no have you yeah it feels like everyone's getting canceled now yeah i got canceled a couple times has it affected you more than more than once over the last 20 years oh my god you've been hit so many times and it keeps bouncing back it's never it's never what i say this is this is one thing i've learned about it it's never what you say it's what somebody said you know it's

someone's perception that's what you can't yeah not even not even perception the horrible stuff we said yeah i mean it's it's literally it's either editing things and taking them out of context or literally just saying he said x even though it's not what i said yeah and that becomes the cancel it's never what people say exactly buckle It's Fatty Arbuckle. Yeah. Yeah. Which is so fascinating to me. And then he became, you know, he branded as a child, as a pedophile, and it wasn't true, but his career was already ruined and over, and see you later. Can I point out something real fast if we have a little bit of time?

Paul had a really good observation about this. We were talking about Neil Young and Joni Mitchell and people pulling their stuff off of Spotify because it will in protest of Joe Rogan and he said he's adamantly against that because what's gonna happen is if you start thinking of Spotify as a conservative network and Apple as a liberal network eventually some country artists or somebody is gonna just go well I'm pulling myself off of Apple. And now it divides it up so the consumer has to buy two services. And I agree with that.

I've been all over the map, and I'm a hypocrite, and I've gone from this side to that side to this and that. But the bottom line is I think if you're trying to cancel somebody, you need to get a life and just go get a job or something because you shouldn't be able to cancel people, you need to get a life and, and, and just, you know, go get a job or something because you shouldn't be able to cancel people period, no matter what, in my opinion, in my opinion, if you don't like what somebody says, just turn it off. And this is a new thing for me because a two years ago, I'd be like, get rid of him, get rid of him, get rid of him. But I've come around to realizing you have no right as a person that doesn't create or doesn't make things to decide who gets to do what they want to do. And I really firmly believe this. And I think it's infuriating.

And I'm sorry to end on such a serious note. Well, I. Can we go back to the girl? It's a bigger dick all over again. It's the same thing. It's the same thing. We did interview her. Do you know that? We did interview her. Do you know that?

We did interview her. Yeah. We like you better. How low have you stooped? You know what? I'm going to do this. She was interesting. She was interesting.

She was fascinating. You guys should meet. You'd be funny together. Yeah, she'd be a great five minutes with Mike. She's a great co-host. She'd be a fun co-host. I'm only interested in meeting people that are potential soulmates. Everyone else, I don't have time.

I was just thinking you'll start dating her. That's what will happen. No, you'll be buying her farts. You come over, there's just jars everywhere. She's adorable. You're like, what's that? Cha-ching. They do that.

Here's the deal. They all go to Austria apparently. I'm very serious. Yeah, I'm very serious about this. We know Angeline sells her clothes and her underwear and stuff out the back of her Corvette. But the person who's selling their farts and stuff, like what does the person who buys that do with it? Do they just save it or do they open it? Like that's the real problem.

Yeah, I knew it was screwed up men immediately who were asking for that, which is why she did it. Yeah. Uh, and, and guess, give me a, give me a region buying other people's farts.

Right. And where do you think these guys are from? Where, where were a lot of them from? Like the real enthusiasm. I know where they're from because I know where they're from because I've seen Angelina a lot. She lives in my neighborhood and they're basically, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm going to get in trouble.

They're German, by and large. Austrian. Austrian. Almost. Right next door. Austrian. Yeah. Well, I don't know the difference.

That's where, right. And so I don't know why, but that's what she's, and she's, you know, met the demand of the marketplace, as they say. But let me get back to the cancellation thing. You said you're mad that people that don't create are able to cancel that people. I'm mad that people who have just learned how to pronounce the words that are names of medication that I've been using for decades, and they think they have an opinion about those medication and how they should be used. That is disgusting. You're effed. That's insane. You are screwed. That's insane.

30 years or 40 years of practice and all that, all those years of medical school and everybody is on par with you now, thanks to the internet. I know they're not, but I mean, that's the opinion. That's right. I'm sorry.

So there's that. You're effed. There's that. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. I know it. And there's that you're f there's that yeah yeah okay all right i know it and there's that and then there's what's happening to rogan i started oh germany or florida that's so funny stefan he's absolutely right um but but what with rogan i started looking at his guests and stuff i was you know i i listen to the podcast i'm a fan and i thought

you know he he only books guests that fascinate him so he can keep his attention going and curiosity going for three or four hours the whole time when he's he he always is talking to outliers people with differing opinions if you want an academic opinion read a book it's in the books it's already there but he wants to talk to people that makes him go oh wow i never thought of that oh my, my God. Who knows this? Where did that come from? He says that constantly when he's engaged with the guest. And so that's who he's going to talk to.

He has to entertain himself. He has to entertain other people. That's his responsibility. Now, he has said now that because he has such reach, he has to think about balance and giving other alternatives. But guess what? People aren't going to listen to that so much. they aren't going to listen to those balanced opinions but okay i think he's right he does need to offer those at least just because he has such reach and we'll see we'll see how that goes it'll be interesting yeah yeah it's it's you know

it's very disconcerting this whole thing which seems to have only come up six years ago, for me at least, but Judd said something a couple of days ago about how, you know, comedy was always the safe place where he thought comedians all were like-minded. And it seemed that way to me too. And then he said when he found out people are on opposite sides and people are fighting each other and people hate each other and people are mean. And that exactly what I felt years ago I was like this isn't what I thought it was it was my little my little family and my little home and it's not like that there's a lot of anger and bitterness out there with the one place I thought was safe and it's kind of uh upsetting that you have to create your own little bubble of like-minded people to hang out with is there is there a way to get that back because this is the most depressing topic i've ever what's that no because i mean maybe it's get back in the clubs you know get everyone back in the clubs together you know i don't know man i don't know have you know free range nights open opened well you'd be good at it.

You're a cult doctor, by the way. Don't you have some kind of Hippocratic Oath where if I call you and say some of the members are sick, you have to come over or something like that? I mean, if I were the only thing handy, sure. Can I muscle you into it? If I'm the only thing at hand, yeah.

I can't use it as a point that you'll be our doctor and if i just and if i discover what you've been doing to people i'm a mandated reporter so uh you may not like that so much huh all right so we have a different room for medical stuff start a kitty cult facility over here kitty cult all right speaking of kitty cult we got jesus christ what are you talking about? You're making it 50 times worse. I'm joking. You want me to start a kitty cult? I know.

We're going to have a, we have a new baby arriving. We have a cat coming. Kitty cult. An actual cat, an actual cat. Wait, what do you mean you have a baby? You can put Jack in there. Oh, the cat.

Paulina's bringing a cat. Yeah, bringing a cat in. I know, I'm so worried. I know. I hope that she drugged him and got up on the way so uh caleb i hear you sort of giggling in the background do you have any questions for mike uh i'm off the air i have some questions for him

okay i've been saving them you sure yeah uh caleb has had an interesting experience as well yeah so he had the same we're not gonna not necessarily but so all right everybody Mike thank you for stopping by appreciate it I miss you we got to talk soon I miss you guys something so all right and let's hang out

yeah we're around we're gonna watch the Super Bowl on my couch I don't think I want to go anywhere all right so that'd be good all right man thank you again give all the plugs Super Bowl on my couch. I don't think I want to go anywhere. So that'd be good. All right, man. Thank you. Again, give all the plugs. I forgot what they are. Miscellaneous Adventures of

Mike Carano. Oh, yeah. Right? Yeah. And then Paul's. I'm trying to be humble. Crazy Money with Paul Olinger. Miscellaneous Adventures in the World of Mike Carano. And then there's the After Disaster, which is subscription only, and you probably wouldn't like it.

Join today. It's with Anderson, our own engineer from Loveline. Yeah, it's the old Loveline crew. Tyler is still there, right? Tyler's still part of what you're doing. Yeah, he sure is. We love you too, Bobby, on Restream. It's usually very funny. Okay, everybody. Thanks, Mike. I'm going to wave you off.

Goodbye. Thank you. Thank you guys. Always great to see you. Okay. See you man. I'll talk to you

later. And then to the rest of you thank you. We really weren't taking calls today. We're just interviewing my

friends essentially. I think Wednesday is like turning into fun celebrity friend day. Chat day. Chat with friends day.

We'll call it fart jar day. Oh was she last week? I don't know. Oh we have Chad Goes Deep next week on Wednesday. Chad and JT, so that should be fun.

If you've never seen those guys, they are funny. So that'll be fun. We go from farts to COVID vaccination experts. Thank you, Caleb, for setting this up. Thank you, Susan, for producing these things. You can get them at dr.com.shop. What else?

Anything else where we need people to turn up? And put in the code drdrew and get $5 off, which is basically shipping. And then also the proceeds will go to Hillside's foster care. Yeah, which is really a great place. Extremely good. And we are still taking hashtag where's drdrew bobblehead photos on instagram and twitter so if you want to you know get in the running for an autographed one and you get to be on ask dr drew and ask him anything for a good half hour and you can bring whoever you want as long as they're in front of

your camera there you go there's been some really cute ones. We're going to show them tomorrow. I mean, we're showing some of them, but we have some more. Fair enough. Rex is losing his mind. We're going to get going. Rex didn't eat today because Jordan left us. Yeah, he really wouldn't eat anything today. It was weird. Yeah, he's all bummed out.

He'll be okay. All right, everybody. We will see you tomorrow at 3 o'clock. Let's see. Let's see. Next Tuesday, we have Bethany Shondar. We have Chad Goes Deep on Wednesday. Tomorrow... We don't have somebody Tuesday?

We have Arthur Kaplan. Tomorrow's a big deal. Medical Ethicist coming back, sort of updating all the mandate issues and vaccines and masking and sort of get his take on these things. How do we call this out? Call what out? Especially in LA. How do we call this out? God.

Call what out? Especially in LA. The mandates are ridiculous. Oh my God, it's ridiculous here. But here we are. At least, look, I'm grateful that the state of California is taking a rational position. The fact that the county of Los Angeles is not is the highest level of incompetence.

It's showing incompetence on full display now, everybody. The CDC is loosening. Multiple states are taking appropriate measures. Watch to see what happens to their numbers. They will continue to tell. Well, they just said they went down on the news this morning. They're like, they're coming down fast. Taking the mask off is not going to affect the numbers. They are minimally effective. You heard Dr. Gandhi yesterday. They can help protect you if you have an N95. It might help you if you don't want to get a cold or something else that is an airborne.

But it protects you. It doesn't protect other people from you at all. And if you're signaling that, oh, I care about other people, that's why I'm wearing a mask, stop wearing the mask because it's not doing that. It's not doing that. All right, everybody, we'll see you tomorrow at 3 for Dr. Arthur Kaplan. See you then. Nice ending.

Ask Dr. Drew is produced by Caleb Nation and Susan Pinsky. As a reminder, the discussions here are not a substitute for medical care, diagnosis, or treatment. This show is intended for educational and informational purposes only. I am a licensed physician, but I am not a replacement for your personal doctor and I am not practicing medicine here. Always remember that our understanding of medicine and science is constantly evolving. Though my opinion is based on the information that is available to me today, some of the contents of this show could be outdated in the future. Be sure to check with trusted resources in case any of the information has been updated since this was

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