Ear Biscuits with Rhett & Link - Our Top Moments of 2025 | Ear Biscuits Ep. 497

Episode Date: December 15, 2025

It's that time of year again! In this episode, Rhett & Link are going through their top 10 moments of the year, and what a year it has been. Thank you to OURA for sponsoring part of this episode. Discover how OURA can help you better understand your long-term health and wellness at ouraring.com/ear. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This, this, this, this is mythical. Canada's Wonderland is bringing the holiday magic this season with Winterfest on select nights now through January 3rd. Step into a winter wonderland filled with millions of dazzling lights, festive shows, rides, and holiday treats. Plus, Coca-Cola is back with Canada's kindest community, celebrating acts of kindness nationwide with a chance at 100,000 donation for the winning community and a 2020. holiday caravan stop. Learn more at canadaswunderland.com. Canada can be a global leader in reducing the harm caused by smoking, but it requires actionable steps. Now is the time to modernize Canadian laws so that adult smokers have information and access to better alternatives. By doing so, we can create lasting change. If you don't

smoke, don't start. If you smoke, quit. If you don't quit, if you don't quit, Change. Visit unsmoked.ca. Welcome to Ear Biscuits, the podcast, where two lifelong friends talk about life for a long time. I'm Link. Let me start over. No, no, don't. This is a new...

No, no, just like, I just want to take this. This is a new show. I want to take this in. It's a new show for me. I just, because Link is going to leave you with his linkness here in the next to last. ultimate episode of Ear Biscuits where he forgets to say I'm Link after the catchphrase. How many episodes have we done?

400 and... Almost 500. 97? Yep. We're stopping short of 500 to... Welcome to Ear Biscuits, the podcast where two lifelong friends talk about life for a long time. It's that my voice wasn't in the right register. It was too low.

I'm Link. And I'm Red. This week at the Roundtable of Dem Lighting, we are doing what we've done at the end of every year for many years now and that is go through the top moments of us individually that we have experienced throughout the year. And the rule is

if you have something on your top 10 list that the other guy also has on his top 10 list but his number is higher, meaning lower, higher on his list, then he gets to go first. Oh, or I thought that you would then that we would wait.

Like if it was number six and then it was number one for you, If I said the thing, then you'd be like, okay, got to come back to that. And then you wait to make it your number one. We also have this discussion every year. And what we have decided is that when we come to those things, we go ahead and talk about them, but the person, if it's higher on your list, you go ahead and talk about it. Even if it's number one?

Unless it's number one, you can wait. Yeah, because I mean, okay. But if it's like number two, like I have something on my list that's really high that's almost as surely on your list, but it's where you put it, is, you know... I understood. I understood.

All right. So we're going to do a little finageling there. We would be talking about your top ten moments of the year, but we don't really know enough to do that. So we're going to talk... Well, we are preparing for the last episode of Ear Biscuits before our indefinite hiatus, and that is going to be the top moments of ear biscuits ever. Approached in a different way. Not in a top ten way.

Because some of them are from you, some of them are of us, some of our episodes, some of them are moments. And they'll be crying. Whoa. I don't think so, but maybe I'll try it. I made myself cry. Okay. All right. Maybe you'll cry.

Before we get into it, let's go ahead and shout out our sponsor of this episode and a number of episodes, ORA, maker of the ORA ring, which we wear and have also been investors in for many years now. We love the experience and the information and the way that it helps us. apply feedback and data on a daily basis to stay engaged in our personal health and vitality. I am coming off a really good night of sleep and a good night of heart health, Link. I'm going to open my app. Go ahead. It's been a big year for my heart, and I've always paid a lot of attention to my heart health, which is one of the reasons I was able. In fact, the aura ring is the, the reason that I figured out something was going on with my heart,

which I talked about when I told that whole story. But one of the things that I have also figured out is that my HRV runs pretty low. My heart rate variability, which is an indication of how well your body adapts to stress. And so continually low HRV can be a sign that you are continually stressed, and that has always been the case for me.

My heart rate variability was like, through the roof when I was dealing with all my AFib stuff, But that was just, it was misreading. That wasn't an indication of what was going on. Gotcha. But I'm coming back from travel, and my heart rate variability has been pretty low. And then last night, I was like, I'm going to do some of my box breathing or some of my, like, six, nine breathing where you're like, you're holding your breath and then exhaling low. I did that before I went to bed.

And my heart rate variability went up by 50% last night from where it had been at the beginning of the week. That's just crazy, and you can see, you can do this practice, and then you can see the immediate impact of it. Because when you look at the app, there's a whole section called heart rate, I mean heart health. Yeah, yeah. Oh, and this tells you your cardiovascular age in reference to your actual age. Which mine is currently eight years younger. Me too. Oh.

But my app is connected to your ring, not mine. Oh, that's a problem. It's always been that way. Just kidding. It says my heart health is thriving right now. Now, I will say, I used to be nine years younger, and now I'm eight years younger. Is that because I've gotten a year older? No.

Yeah. My heart's gotten two years older this year. But anyway, I'm still, I'm in a good place. I'm in a good, good place with that. I need to work on my V-O-2 max, though. This stuff is helpful, and it's a gift that you can give to yourself and to somebody else, because long-term well-being is really the name of the game here. Yes, you can join the over 1 million active members today

by clicking the link in the description to make health and wellness a daily practice at ora-ring.com slash ear. That's O-U-R-A-ring.com slash ear. Okay, I put my phone away, but I didn't need to do that because I have my list and because I've already frustrated you by cutting you off Just a few times. Go ahead and do the first one. I'm going to let you decide who goes first.

You. Okay. All right. All right. Crap, man. I have 14. Well, you only can do 10. My number 10.

I have 14 as well, which is interesting. I mean, I have 15. I have so many more, but... I have four honorable mentions. I list everything out. And Christy and I had a great little date conversation where I took her through everything and she was like, I have to do this.

I'm like, yeah, girl. Everyone should. Yeah, no. Don't let Apple do it for you. I mean, Jenna, don't let Apple make your memories. Do you now do this every year because of? I do, yes. Okay.

Uh-huh. I usually kind of wait. I haven't done it yet because I like to wait and listen to y'alls and get my juices flowing. To make yours better. Yeah. Yeah, I like to be better. My number 10 is my trip to Ireland.

which is kind of, all of my big trips that I've taken, I think it's like made maybe the top five every year. So I feel kind of bad for Ireland that it only made number 10. Well, Croatia didn't even make my top 10. Wow. It's not a good look. I'm sorry, Croatia. You're beautiful, but it just wasn't, it didn't make the list.

And then all you do is just complain about how it wasn't good enough. It was my honorable mission. We had a really good trip. We connected with friends, built some solid friendships. I've talked about all of the stuff in an entire episode. I'm fond of Ireland, but I'm not obsessed with Ireland. Like the people that we stayed with, they chose to, they want to live there permanently. And that's just not, you know, that's not it for me, you know.

the pub to other things that I might be interested in doing ratio is a little off for me but sure is beautiful the roads could be a little wider yes that's my number 10 I'm going to leave it at that

because when we get you know when we get to the end of the list that's when the things really start I'm going to cheat a little bit I'm going to do two as my number 10 and I'll explain why number one of number 10 I've already talked about it

I talked about it at the end of the episode, the state Carolina game. That was your number 10B? I realized that I haven't spent a lot of time with Locke this year because I was going to go to Miami. I've seen him over the holidays and stuff, but I was going to go to Miami to see him, but that was when I got sick. And so I haven't been to see him,

and we've just seen each other with the holidays, and it's been in the context of other things happening, but I did realize that I took him to that game, and it was a great experience. And I really wanted a moment with Locke to be on the list. But I've already talked about that, that Wolfpack whooped into Tard Hill's ass. So my 10B is actually when I bought my first fountain pen.

And I bought two of them together when I walked into blick. Which sounds like a curse word. Blick. When was this? It was earlier in the year. You know, I started doing the notebook thing last year, in the fall of last year, and then I started doing the fountain pen thing in the spring of this year. Okay.

And bought two pins at the time. I now have like 10. Yeah, that started something. And what it represents is not just like a hyperfixation on pens, but also just the way, and I'm not going to talk about this in detail because I have. but just the way that writing things down has been a really significant development for me in a way that I did not expect to be the case. I mean, as you hear yourself talking about it, are you thinking maybe it needs to be a single digit, at least? I'm a little surprised, man.

This is your year of, if it's just the pen collecting, that's one thing. But the writing part, what that unlocks. There's writing things started last year. Okay. If this was last year, and I don't know if I did say this last year. I don't remember if I did. I should have if I didn't. Maybe it was too late.

The moment of starting to write things down. I probably talked about it. I was reading comments on the Mythical Society post about our trip to New York. And a number of videos over there, one of which is just dedicated to your pen shopping. and I really got a kick out of how people were really resonating with PIN specifically or just the passion or with the tolerance that I exhibited or that you exhibited in the record collecting video that the record collecting episode that was another part of that series.

We had so much fun in New York. Maybe I should have made the list. It's an honorable mention. NYC trip, question mark. Yeah. But just, I mean, just to tell you, that stuff lives over there on The Mythical Society. I think there might be five video, individual videos, and they're all like a half hour. Because what we ask Hitch to do was to just capture the vibe of just us, just going around New York City and doing what we enjoy and like pursuing our passions, which are pins and records, and just like letting it, letting it breathe a little. little bit and just being there with us so that's kind of a backdoor promotion for what we're thinking what we're planning to do more of on the mythical society that's the direction the mythical society is headed is more of that kind of stuff little versions and then the new

York city trip is kind of a bigger version but it's just very vloggish it's kind of recapturing that vlog magic that from the in a sense I mean I literally document I documented my entire deep frying of two turkeys and I did it with a phone, but also video glasses. But we're not gonna release it this year. We're gonna release it next year on the Mythical Society. Oh. Because Thanksgiving's over.

So... That kind of thing is gonna be happening on the society. My number nine is our college boys trip to Bend Oregon. Ha! I did it higher, number seven. Oh. And the reason I did it a little bit higher is because they complain when it's low on the list. You don't listen to them.

Yeah, but Tim is on my shit list because my shoulder is still recovering. And specifically... My knee is still oozing all types of juice. It's horrible. The specific moment is the moment of going down the river the second time. The Meglodon? On the Megalodon.

That was so iconic. Five boys on a giant paddleboard. One guy in a lawn chair with a beer. I'm starting to think we should skip a year. We shouldn't even get together because... No, that's not... We're not going to top the Megalodon. Yeah, we will.

Yes, we will. We're not going to skip a year. Yeah, it was a great trip. Maybe the best. There's something... I mean, we just have this affinity for rivers. Growing up on the Cape Fear River and Bowies Creek, we swam all in it.

And it's very special to us. And I think this... Rivers are special. Don't you think for us? I think they're very special. And I like getting on a river with Du Bois and just it's the river sets the pace when you're on a float. And there's something existential man about just saying, okay, it's going to take us. We're here together for the most part until we get separated.

Unless Link is not on the map. Well, that's the beauty of the Maglodon, is that we improved to a point where it's like, we're all here together, and we're experiencing this thing that we have, we're not in control. Something else is in control, and we're accepting it, and we're enjoying it. And there's a social aspect. There's so many people on that river. There's a spectacle to it. It was, yeah. And the trip in general.

The trip in general, we highly recommend. If you've got friends from another part of your life, college, high school, whatever, get together with them, you know? Get together with them on a regular basis. Make, like, be like, you know, I'm going to plan a trip. Once a year? I guess a regular. Regular basis of once a year, or biannual, if you want to skip a year like Link does. No, I don't.

You know, having people that you can pick up where you left off. Yeah, yeah. Who are those people in your life? Try it. Now it's you. Number nine, okay, I have to, this is about a secret project. Yeah, okay. Do I know about it?

Come on now. So, we are working on something. I didn't put this on the list because I didn't know how to do what you're trying to do right now. Yeah, I thought I would wing it here. We're working on something and it required a, trip, a recent trip, in order to do some things that you have to do when you're doing this sort of thing. Okay.

And I think this sort of thing is something that, in a way, has rarely have ever been done. So it's like when you're doing this sort of thing, I know what you're talking about, but then and another. The specifics. The specific way we're doing. We were performing is one of the reasons why it's so exciting, challenging, engaging. and should have made my list. And I will say, just, you know,

if you're an internet sleuth, you can figure out what it is. You can, because somebody already has. Yeah. And so, and that's okay. It's fun. It's not something we're trying to hide from you. It's just it has a time when we will announce it.

But we did this trip, and that was part of the process, and it went really, really well. And it was very encouraging and very invigorating and very exciting and very confirming. Yeah. And this is the sort of the other thing besides the main stuff

that we will be working on next year and it was just a really invigorating trip. And so it made my list. I'm glad that made your list because then I didn't have to use one of mine for it to be recognized. I'm at number eight, which is,

is when Lincoln and I went to Coachella. Coachella, I'd never been. He had never been. We had, I had connections through Post to see, you know, we got to see him. But we got to see, and YouTube also gave us, like, access. So it was fun to be able to be in the mix and experience.

an iconic music festival that I'd heard so much about and to connect with Lincoln about it and to learn how to navigate it, literally. Via bicycle. Yeah, well, yeah, we both weren't on the bike, but yeah. That moment will definitely stick with me when I... Stole a bike. Stole a bike. Well, borrowed a bike.

Temporarily stole a bike. Brought it back. I met somebody, and of course, everybody's going into the first. festival, and I'm leaving the festival, because I can't remember what I was trying to get. Something in your van car or something. Something in our camp. Probably chapstick. I can't remember what it was, but I'm like speeding against all of these people. And I met somebody months later who said... I remember this. You were there? Yeah. Yeah. It's just like a fan came up and was like, hey, I'm a fan, did the normal fan interaction,

and then it was like, I saw you on a bike at Coachella, like almost running over a bunch of people. And you were going fast. Like belining through a crowd of people. And I was like, is that Link? And I was like, yeah. That was me, man. Like the Wicked Witch of the West.

And I got back in. I got back in to festival. But yeah, it was special for Lincoln and I to have that. I would hope that that's something that would make. his list. I will... Is he making one? I will pressure him into making a list so that that can be on it. But yeah, we have fun.

It's one of those, you know, you talk about going to the game with Locke and, you know, your kids get to a certain age and your relationship is constantly evolving, but then you have these moments, these shared experiences that when you feel more like two adults than a father and a son or a kid and a parent kind of a thing and that kind of define and maybe accelerate the transition. And I think into how our relationship will work into complete adulthood and to his independence and all of that. So it's, it was special, but I think it kind of, Because it had that impact to, you know, pretty much our entire interaction was his friends there. And I'm not saying our relationship now is just as friends, but at Coachella, it kind of was.

Right. And then when you come back into the family dynamic or when you're visiting home or going on it, he's, if he comes, when he comes on a trip to, you know, we get to go to Japan at the end of the year. and he's meeting us there because he's been studying abroad and his it ends in such a way that like instead of him flying home he's flying straight there to me. The dynamic is still different

because you're in the family realm. You know what I'm saying. Oh yeah. So that's why I think it was especially special. My number eight was my birthday party

that we had at my house recently. Yeah, I put that on the longest list. Oh, well, thank you. It was, yeah, it was a moment, wasn't it? There's a number of things. Typically, I do not, I would never put my birthday party on it. I forget that it's my birthday, and I don't make a big deal about birthday parties, typically.

And this birthday party was nothing special about it other than the fact that my closest friends were there. Jesse got a heart cake, which I think we talked about and maybe showed a picture of at some point. It was viscerally gross. It was a wonderfully made heart cake. And that I picked up the heart and took a bite out of it,

a la Temple of Doom. Lots of laughs that night. And we had an incredible time because we played games that make us laugh and everybody laughed. And then the moment, within the moment, was that when we were playing wavelength, and we had finished playing, and we had this question about the existence of God, and then you were like, let's go around and everybody put on this wavelength

where you are at on whether God exists or God doesn't exist. And it was like, it was the kind of thing that would be done at like a Bible study that was just a bait and switch to try to convert people. Like we were done back in the day, like, everybody go around and do this so we can convert you. But the beautiful thing about it was, is that it was asking this question about where people stand on the existence of God in a group of people that you know, love and trust, where no one is trying to tell someone else to think something, where no one else is interested in getting someone else to be aligned with their own thinking. But literally, the question was purely curious. You know, it's interesting, I was watching, I was walking somewhere recently when I was. in North Carolina, and there was a booth somewhere, and it was like, how can we pray for you?

And here's a thing, having been on that side of these types of booths, I know, I'm not saying that there's not a pure intention for the people who want to pray for people, but I know that it's more than that. It's not just we want to pray for you. It's we want to convert you. And this is the way in. And I don't know. There's just, there's something about being in a group of people where no one is trying to like get to align everyone else to their thinking where everyone felt the freedom to be completely honest about what they thought. And I was like, this is a really beautiful moment in our friendship that brought us all closer together. It didn't, it wasn't about getting everyone to think the same way, it was about being genuinely curious about each other's

position and having this love and understanding. And it was just a beautiful thing that I was not able to experience when I was in a place where my main goal in life was to get people to agree with me. And then the clincher, though, at the end, which like quite a button, which I don't think the last time we told this, we told it completely correctly. So tell me what you remember, because I remembered an additional detail after the telling of it. We were like, let's see if, let's cover, the way that wavelength works is you can sheath it so you can't see where the dial is landing.

And you were like, let's just randomly reveal the true answer. Let's let the universe slash God decide whether or not God exists. And you did it a bunch of random times. You turned it around and you opened it and it was. No, but you're missing something. Okay. I don't remember. I remember that we turn the dial right to the middle and said,

because we don't know, and we predicted what it was going to be. And we put the dial right in the middle, and then we revealed the thing. Where the dial is at is kind of, where the dial is at is irrelevant, because it's where the pie chart's at. Yes, the thing that you reveal, shows God's answer.

And God's answer, when we revealed it, was right in the middle. But the pie wasn't in the middle. The pie was completely split on the side, so it was completely blank in the middle. Is that what it was? But then the needle... We took a picture of it.

The needle was in the middle. The needle was in the middle. The needle was in the middle because we determined that. Yes, but that was... And then that's what the reveal was. When the things are totally on the side, that means that it's exactly 50-50.

There is no answer. Well, there's two ways that it can be 50-50. If you don't know wavelength, this is probably making no sense. You can have the pie completely here or 90 degrees from that and they're completely split. And both of those happen at the same time, which it makes it even crazier because we did predict. We were like, let's decide where if God really does exist. And, I mean, I guess it was me. I put the dial right in the middle.

The dial was straight up. Right. Which indicates that we didn't expect to get an answer. We expected to get the perfect non-answer. And then when we revealed it, it was the other version of the perfect non-answer. Yeah, the pie was not even in the thing. Which is crazy. That makes it crazier.

It does. It does. Come on, man. I know, but we determined one side of it. The part that's amazing to me is the random part that was determined by God slash the universe. Of course. Okay, fine. That's why I wasn't on my list, because I didn't think about it, though. Okay, my number seven. Seven's a special number on the list because, I don't know, it signifies complete, which really didn't go into my thinking. If we had to hire someone from Mythical Tomorrow, we wouldn't want to gamble on someone.

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at indeed.com slash ears with an S. Just go to indeed.com slash ears right now right now and support Ear Biscuits by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com slash ears. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring, do it the right way with Indeed. What's up, it's Draymond Green.

I'm back for my 14th NBA season and my podcast to Draymond Green show is back too. This season I'm breaking down games, reacting to the biggest NBA stories and sitting down with teammates, rivals, and culture shapers. And trust me, I'm not holding back on the court or on the mic.

Two new episodes every week. New segments, big conversations, real basketball, talk for the real hoopheads. Listen to and follow the Draymond Green Show wherever you get your podcast. We're back, we're better, let's get it. My Seattle record shopping trip with Lando and Christy. We had a great time. It was the previous year that, But Lando and I went on our own little record trip to San Francisco.

So we built on it this time and had an even better time. It was nice for Christie to be there. And I think that built this excitement for that Lando and I built on after that, which was continue to do record shopping around L.A. or at other places that we travel. Even when we went home for Thanksgiving, I mean, we came back with, we couldn't have come back with more records because we couldn't have carried. And to the point where Christy's starting to get a little, lose a little patience that we're constantly looking to go shopping, which is just not something she's ever experienced.

Meaning that when she is with you, now she's got to go record shopping. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, Seattle was great. All the record shops now. And I still have all those records that I can remember that experience by. But that was, I mean, I talked about the New York trip a little bit, but the Seattle one. was like, I think one I'll never forget.

My number seven, we talked about the Oregon trip with the boys, so I'll move to my number six, and now I'm going first. Oh, God. It was my trip to Peru with Shepard. There's a whole episode about this trip. Was that in, like, March or something? It was his spring break, so yeah, March, April. and the specific most memorable moment was we actually went to Machu Picchu two days in a row

but the first day seeing it the way you enter it and you go down this path and you can't see anything you're kind of on this path and then you turn a corner and just like the postcard that you've seen a million times of Machu Picchu and you're just sitting there seeing it in person And like a single tear left my eye. And it was just the weather was beautiful. Like literally? I got teary-eyed. And the clouds were like literally rolling in like over it

and the sun was coming through. It was just this incredibly picturesque thing. And it was the reason that we went on this trip was like Shepardite said, I want to see Machu Picchu. And so it was a great trip for me and Shepard. The first time that me and him have been together, on a trip, just the two of us for any length of time, you know, like for more than a day

or so. And we had a great time, lots of moments from that trip, but that was the one. If you had to do it again, what would you change? Do you recommend going to... Oh, I definitely recommend going to Peru and Machupeachu. I think that's a, it's a type of trip. It's not a luxury vacation. It's not a comfortable vacation. The thing that I would change is I would not have gone to REI before he left and gotten special clothes for Shepard to wear at Machu Picchu because he just wore a t-shirt and big old jeans. Right. For the gram or whatever, I guess.

Yeah. Or just for his aesthetic. Okay. And now I'm at my number six. I guess I doubled up on a Lando, number seven and number six, because this was the year of Lando's driving lessons. Took him to the same parking lot that I took. I took Lincoln and I took the same picture in front of the same place and put it in the family group chat.

Do you go to a Rose Bowl parking lot? Is that where you go? Mm-mm. Oh, that's a good one. I go to a community college parking lot. Oh. And there's an open parking and there's like stop signs and stuff in it. And there's like, there's just a, you know, there's just a...

there's usually somebody else there learning how to drive, actually. People are catching on. Yeah, that's, well, that's my experience at the Rose Bowl. When there's nobody playing at the Rose Bowl, people driving. It's a giant parking lot. This one also has a parking deck that's completely empty on, like, Sunday. So you can drive through the parking deck as well.

So that was... Dad tips. Yeah, like, I remember my first driving lesson. You know, my papa taught me to drive. that 87 Nissan pickup that is still a sore subject when I go home and it happens to come up in conversation. Really?

Because we crushed it in Wonderhole season one. Well, Nana can go see it. But it was a hell of a finale. Was it worth it? I think so. Yeah. And so Lando has, he's finished his online course. And now he's going to start getting, like, driving lessons.

He has to take a test first He has to go into DMV and take a test Anyway, I'm going to start driving him On some actual Isolated roads But yes, you know, just a special right of passage You're a man now When you can drive, son

Well, I can't get Shepard to do it So you're ahead of me Number five So this is the same period of time This summer when Jesse and I went to Croatia, but the Croatia part didn't make the top 10. The North Carolina part did.

Okay. So, you know, we did our little Croatian vacation, and then we spent the rest of that month in North Carolina, and this was the first time that we had spent in North Carolina in the cabin with it being done, because, you know, Jesse's been working on this for a long time. And it was always a little bit in process and in transition, and then you can never really relax,

and there's a lot of things that might be going wrong or whatever, as it was still being... Like hornets. Constructed or, like, cleaned, or, yeah, you're getting the hornets out of there. So there was just a series of mornings where Jesse and I were, and Barbara and Sean, our other children, our furry children, were the only ones that were present. And we would just have these lazy mornings of drinking coffee, reading books,

And it was like, this is the vision, the vision of having a place to come back home and relax, sometimes with family, like Thanksgiving or whatever, but also sometimes without family, and just the two of us. And it was like, okay, we can do, we can do this. We can do this a lot, maybe, as the year's own fold. She had worked on it for years. Like two years. So it's like, two and a half years. to finally have the vision realized, you know, when you're sipping that coffee. Whenever you watch like real estate shows or like HD TV shows,

where the ones about, if there's an aspect to it that's like the vision of what it is like to live in one of these places, they always like to talk about the sipping, oh, this is where you can drink your morning coffee. Well, it's funny that you think about it that way. The thing is, is that, that if you when you live someplace and you travel

to visit family or even when you're on vacation a lot of times as the vacation is coming to a close or you've been traveling you're ready to get back home like you get this like I'm a little bit homesick I want to get back to my routine there's something that has happened with

having the place in North Carolina is I don't I want to come back home sometimes. Like, we get to the last day in North Carolina. Because it's completely what you're comfortable. And it's like, oh, we could see. I love L.A.

I love California. I'm glad we live here. It's where everything else is. And you're not going to build like, we're not going to go back to like pandemic. You're going to build like half a GMM set. Maybe in your basement. Maybe. But I'm just saying that Jesse has done such a good job of making that a home.

And a home, not just for us, because it's, It's used quite a bit by family when we're not there. But when we are there, it is like a home. Barbara and Sean, especially Sean, Sean loves it there. Like, he just perks up. He's in such a good mood when he's there. I don't know. He just loves wood, I guess.

Put him on that plane, though. Well, he's okay. He wasn't the problem. Oh, yeah, it was Barbara. He did throw up, though. He threw up. That's what I'm talking. It wasn't him.

Yeah, he threw up out of joy. Okay. I mean, it's also suitable for a magazine feature. Yes. And is that, I mean, that happened this year. That's on, that's Jesse's list? It's actually, in a way, a part of my list. Oh, okay.

We'll get there. It folds into another item. My number, that was your number five. My number five is Wonderhole Season 2 filming process. That's my number four. Dang, son. So we'll talk about it. Well, technically we'll both talk about it.

Technically, we've tied because I just did my number five, so go ahead. You know, I think... I do have a specific moment, but... It's not the premiere, it's not it coming out, it's not any of that, it's the process of making it. I think that it was challenging. We set up a lot of goals in ways that we wanted to approach it. And I think that we really, we set it up to where we were, we were developing our craft, you know, like our, the way we perform. We also came up with all of these things that were just really fun to do, you know.

You go out on a raft. you're in this you're playing hide and seek in this crazy abandoned power plant I'm trying to think what would be the quintessential like having an improv

scene with Rain Wilson I mean the moment for me was ironically the beginning of filming which we there was the last episode that was released the tiny house in the mansion so specifically

the in the woods part? Yeah, I mean, it was super cold, so it was very memorable. But also, it was the first application of this new approach to narrative storytelling, which is very loosely scripted, not scripted, more outlined, as we've talked about, and executing that. And like running into some challenges, but also hitting our stride and getting to a new level of comfort with that type of thing, which, again, the whole, looking back on Wonderhall Season 2, in fact, I was looking at, I don't know how this came up, but like the, well, you may have noticed

if you go on the internet and look at that channel that some of the thumbnails have changed from the super crazy, Mr. Beastie, clicky, clicky-click style, which was the whole point of click-baited and switch, the theme of the episode, to a screenshot from the episode. And the reason that happened is, you know, we always felt a little bit self-conscious about the fact that we were doing that style of thumbnail, even though we were doing a parody of that type of thumbnails. That was the whole point of the experiment with the season. But as we've discussed on the show, it didn't really work out. And so we said, what if we just A, B, tested some screenshot thumbnails versus those original thumbnails, the super stylized ones? And I think on four out of six of the episodes, the screenshot thumbnail won out.

So what we learned is that we definitely learned again that we weren't right about our strategy. The entire strategy was wrong. Like the pivotal thing. But again, that was the algorithmic strategy. Right. The primary strategy, and that's why I talk about this moment, which was before it ever came out when we were doing the thing that we wanted to do with this new technique, the reason that's the top. moment for me from Wonderhole, season two, is because that was the goal. When we set out,

we said, let's try this new approach to performing. And this is the thing that we want to take and develop and move into the next thing, which we are, the secret thing that I talked about earlier, that is taking that element and building on it. It's not taking the algorithm and all that stuff and building on it. It's taking that, the heart of what we were trying to do with season two and building on it, which is not Wonderhall Season 3, which I think we've already said that, but sometimes it bears repeating. Okay, so because that was technically your number four,

now I need to give my number four. Yeah. But you haven't, my number four is something that I know is on your list, and I'm not even going to say it. And I'm going to say, you skip to your number three. How do you know that? Because I do. I mean, I just, it has to be.

Okay. And it's just, it's, it's just one of those, I just, you know. Do you go to number, what's your number three? Number three is another shepherd related moment. And this is one that I haven't even talked about. So we finally got into something that I haven't talked about at all on this show or anywhere else. All right. I don't think.

So Shepard is a musician He goes to an art school Where his focus is the guitar He is doing classical guitar But he's also like in a couple He's like in a band on his own He's in a band at school

That's part of the program or whatever And he loves music I mean it is his passion It is the thing that he cares about And I you know Jesse and I we're both very into music

that was Jesse's major and of course I do music on the side and so we're a musical family and we and Sheper and I'll sit down and play and talk about music and that kind of thing but when it comes to his performance

of music isn't really he doesn't clue us in he doesn't want us to come to his like shows that he's doing as a band or whatever you don't want you like parents to, like, show up at your show. Uh-huh. You know. And...

When he's, like, performing at a house party. Right. And... Which I think Lando's been to one of those. Which I understand and respect, right? Now... Not cooling up, Dad. There was a recent recital, right?

And this is when they all dress up in, like, full black formal outfits, and they all play their guitars, their finger style, classical guitars. Okay. and we've been to a few of these and Shepard didn't tell us anything about this one we just knew there was a date we got to show up at this thing and we're going to see him perform

and I will say that we had both individually had difficult interactions with Shepard that day, you know, typical parent child stuff so we're a little bit down on him when we show up to this recital and we get there and we're looking at the program and there's all the stuff that they're doing in groups

that they're all playing together but then there are individual or smaller group performances and I'm looking at the program and it says Shepard McLaughlin singing Skinny Love Bonavere I'm like what singing?

I mean not that he doesn't sing but that hasn't been part of what he's done when he's like performed formally He's playing guitar and that's it Yeah, or playing bass or piano or whatever. But he's a great songwriter, and he's a good singer. But I just didn't know it was, in his mind, ready for prime time.

You know, everybody there. Yeah. And if you don't know Skinny Love, this is a hard song to sing because, well, first of all... Like, what's the one, like... Come on, let alone, no, no, ma, ma, ma, ma, ma, ma, ma. Oh, okay. And lots of falsetto. It's also a weird tuning at the guitar.

But for somebody who's like 17 years old and like, I mean, his voice is completely changed, but like you're doing like going in between like belting voice and, you know, Bono Viro's like got all these effects on his voice and stuff like that. I love Boni Varei, but you see him live and you're kind of like, okay, this is better when you can hear the studio recording a lot of times, right? Yeah, because it's like the production, the stuff that he's. He's doing his voice. So I got a little bit nervous, first of all.

Yeah. Because I was like, oh, God, is he going to be able to do this? And let me just say that Shepard got up there and just did an incredible performance of this song. And it wasn't just that it was good. It was that it had this emotional quality to it. You know, one of the, actually another parent came up and was like, You know, a lot of these kids are really good at, they're technically, it's an art school. I mean, they're like so, so many of them are so talented and so much more talented than anybody that we knew, including us at that age, right?

Because of where we come from. But there's a technical ability a lot of times where there's like everything is in tune and everything is kind of perfect. But there's an additional emotional, like where you can take people on a ride. In fact, another mom was like, Shepard really took us on a ride. He took some of his journey. I was like he did. I was like so proud of him. And then, so he does that.

And I'm like texting. I'm like, Shepard, that was incredible. He's like, well, there's more. I'm like, what? And so then it's not even in the program. The guy that the teacher gets up and he's like, well, this is a surprise, but you know, yesterday Shepard said,

hey, I wrote a song on the way to the desert this weekend. And I'd love to perform it. So here's Shepard with another song. And so Shepard gets up there. Like at the end of the thing? No, in the middle of it. So he got up there with this buddy who they were both playing guitar. And he, like, sings this original song.

What? And which was great. And so, I don't know. You can, what happens is, you know, when you're a parent and your kid is, you know, we have the typical conflicts of like, are you, like, how are your grades? You're like, you're falling behind on this. Or like, why's your room a mess or whatever? The stuff that every parent and child kind of argue about. But then there's just something when you see them doing the thing that they're passionate about.

That wasn't something that, like, I never set either of my kids down, I never shut separate down and said, hey, here's a guitar. Be a musician. I want you to do this. You need, there's no, there was no, there were things that we did. Like, hey, let's take you to diving or let's take you to diving. or let's take YouTube basketball or whatever. There's the things that you kind of put in front of him. But then there's the thing that they kind of pick up on their own

and they just do. And then to see it like kind of come to this place where he's like willing to get up in front of his friends and the parents and the school and do this thing. It was a proud Papa moment. Okay. And then, but you didn't like make it like that's where you experienced love. Oh, of course not.

Yeah, that's good. Why are you saying it like that? Because that's what you... I mean, I'm just messing with you because that's what you talked about in the Wonderhole episode about like when you win, you experience love as...

I'm very conscious of that. So you're very conscious of not being the case. Yeah, that's the kind of the point I'm making. But you do love it. I do love him. A little bit more. A little bit more because of that performance. Okay.

Just a little bit. That's what I kind of thought. Okay. Yep, yep, yep. I am at my number three. Finally get to talk about my oldest Lily. She graduated from freaking college. Now, she got a film in digital media degree.

Right. So let's see. It's rough out there. Let's see what happens. She's back in L.A. And she's thriving. But work, it's really hard to come by. I mean, if it's like in the entertainment industry in this town.

So it's tough here on that front. But she is, she's got an apartment. She's got a job. She is independent. And she will, she's close enough that she can call us and say, hey, I'm at this, I met this show seeing some friends. of mine perform over here, I'm not too far, so I think afterward I want to come by and see y'all. It's like, yeah, so like she came by for 20 minutes, and we just hung out. It was her and her

friend and me and Christy and Landau, and we're just like, you know, caught up, and we're thinking like, well, when do you want to come back over for dinner? You know, Christy wants to start having a dinner night. We're at this new phase of we have a bona fide, independent adult out there, her own life and still wanting to come through and be connected to us, but still, you know, venture out on her own and do her own thing and engage life on our own terms. And so the graduation obviously was a special landmark moment where you've invested. literally and but it's you know it's just the the um it's a culmination of a lot of of a parenting it's nice to like be able to like have that focal moment where you're turning the page and it wasn't

you know the it didn't have the emotional quality for me personally of like her going off to college that was like the most emotional moment but this was I mean, probably the most satisfying moment with this sense of closure, celebration, turning the page, and now forging the next phase of our relationship. And so I'm grateful that she wanted to, and I'm glad that she wanted to be close enough, she wanted to be in the same city. Right. You know, so that worked out.

And tonight we're going to a movie premiere together. you know she kind of finds things that she is interested in and like oh i'm interested in this movie it's coming out so then she's she has a knack for utilizing my whatever i've got going on to turn into some sort of i'll say networking opportunity for her which she takes the lead on So I'm like, hey, yeah, if I can get an invitation to something and then you can work your magic, she knows how to work a room, you know, and I'd like to think that she's learned from the best. She gets that from you. And also me. But there is no butt, man.

Look at her. Look at her out there doing her thing. Very proud. Of course, I'm, you know. I think I'm, am I more proud of you than you, than I am of Lily? That's not the question I'm going to ask. I was trying to make a joke. Am I more, am I more proud of Lily than you are proud of Shepard?

Probably. Not? Oh, no. I definitely am. No, it's the same. We're both equally proud. Different stages. I think I'm.

Different stages of life. Can I be more proud? You can be more proud, yeah. Well, I have more kids. I have more kids. I'm probably less proud because I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm disseminating my pride across all three kids. I'm equally proud of three kids.

You're equally proud of two kids. Why don't we take this opportunity to answer the question that some people might have, which is, oh, you've got a daughter in film and media. Why don't you just let her come work at Mythical? Well, you know, remember all that stuff I said about independence and forging her own path. And, you know, I think that's important. important. And so we've talked about that. And there's certain ways that she intersects with, like, again, if I can get an invitation to something or get access to something that then she can parlay into some sort of opportunity, I want to do everything I can there. But for me to be the one giving her all that opportunity is, I feel like it might short circuit a process in her own experience and development. But yeah, I mean, and it was funny because I was like, you made my list when she came over the other night.

And she was like, is it when we did this, the survivor thing for the society? And I was like, well, it's sweet that you would think that's it, but I'm not that, you know, selfish about it. It's something else that you experienced. And she, like, kept thinking she couldn't come up with it. I'm like, you remember you kind of, you graduated from something? Oh, she was like, yeah, college, and she busted out laughing. And it hadn't been that long. I was like, yeah, you're, you doing your thing made my list.

Not you doing my thing made my list. Well, it was, based on what I saw, it was kind of her thing. Yeah, it ended up being her thing. My number two is the L.A. fires. That's my number one. Okay. And it's, I don't know, now I'm really, I'm really regretting it being my number one. Why?

Because of what my number two is. And I, let me explain. So are we coming back? You know what? Let's talk about the fires. And then I'll talk about my number two and it'll feel like it's my number one. Okay. The fires are my number one because when, when something happens that puts a stamp on your brain and an impact on your soul that you,

will never forget. That entire experience for me and Christy and Lando and Lincoln, Lily was still off at school. So the four of us, and then extending to how it impacted work, like our friends and, you know, you guys, and then the entire city. And it was just, it was such a powerful negative. The energy is negative, you know, this is not a, this is not a positive thing. But it was so irrevocably memorable that I ended up putting in at number one because I just think we will always refer to it. You know, that experience of Evacuating

Setting up shop here at the studio Having friends come over and spend the day There's a whole episode where we just talk We go through the entire process of what happened As soon as the fire started and into that week We recorded right after that So that was, you know Very raw, very, very fresh

The moment of moving into an Airbnb that night and then seeing the fire just jump up on the other side of the hill, and then we had to evacuate again before we even moved all the way in. I think that's the moment within the whole thing. We know staying in like four or five different places, and for us it was a little longer than you. It ended up being like two weeks away. And, you know, we have close friends who are,

and we are connected by extension to, a lot of people, especially in Altadena, some of the Palisades that are at this point, almost a year later, you're still very much rebuilding their lives. We didn't lose anything, you know, but we know and are, and have, you know, walked alongside close friends who had to start over completely and have this experience of at each milestone even now with like the holidays and realizing that all of the traditions have to have a different version now or all of the all the ornaments that were special to us that we accumulated over our our kids lives are now are they're gone and now I'm mourning the loss of that now because it didn't occur.

heard of me. Yeah. It keeps reintroducing itself. It keeps reintroducing itself. So for us, and I guess I'm speaking for you too, it's, you know, we didn't experience the loss. We experienced the threat and the uncertainty and just the fear and the trauma of it. But not the loss. So do want to acknowledge that. And our heart still go out to everybody who's, rebuilding their lives and um but yeah i i i i felt like i had to put it at number one because it was just one of those things it's just one of those things i mean it was i mean it was cataclysmic right it was a natural disaster unlike anything that we've experienced since we've

been here, that impacted everyone, some more than others, as you just talked about. But I think it was, like what it did for me is it made me realize how fragile things are. because I think I always thought that, okay, you're moving into a place that is subject to wildfires and, yeah, if you've got like a house that's like in the woods, like next to a bunch of trees and maybe your house will burn down, but like the idea that a whole neighborhood would burn down

and I know that-sections of the city. And I know that that started happening, you know, up in like Paradise, California, you start seeing whole communities going away. But seeing it happen in the near where you were at. Yeah, I mean, a metropolis, one of the largest cities on the planet. Well, and also seeing that like... Oh, okay.

We're all looking at this app and we see a fire start in the wilderness north of our house. And whereas 12 months ago, I would just be like, oh, I guess they're going to put that out. But now I'm like, oh, shit, there's a hundred mile power of winds. This starts running through the neighborhood. Oh, we got to evacuate. It brought a lot of things into focus. It impacted the city in a really significant way.

And the impact of it is going to be felt for a really long time. And, of course, for me, I was at Jesse wasn't even here because she was in North Carolina. So, I mean, I told that whole story about it. was me and Locke and Shepard and then Locke's girlfriend and who had never been to L.A. before and this was her experience. Right. And so, feeling like I was responsible for them and being like, this is not, this isn't where I, I'm not like Mr. turned to in an emergency.

It's just not my, you know, I'm not the first person to turn to in an emergency, I don't think, you know. and and so yeah it was it was a little discombobulating there's a lot of feelings you know it's like you're feeling a lot of stuff yeah yeah and i mean it it it was a start i mean to a hell of a year in a lot of ways you know um yeah it's it was one of those disruptive kind of years it's it's just not Not a great one. Not a great year. Not a great year. You got political vibes.

I mean, it's just not... 20205 has been a hell of a year, both... Really bad. For the world, for a country. Yes. And for us personally, in a lot of ways. So that's my number one, buddy. That's your number two.

So now you only have left your number one, right? Correct. Which I've said was my number four. So... Hold on, but you haven't said what it is. But I know what it is. So my number two, which I will share, and now it's going to feel like my number one.

I'm glad it does. And you know what it is my number one. You can't do that. I told Christy, you made my list. What is it? I did the same thing with her I do with Lily. And she was trying to, she was like, um, she mentioned,

I went into a trip that we went, oh, we were talking about, we went to Joshua Tree for Valentine's last year, and she was like, oh, yeah, that was so special that made the list. And I was like, no, that wasn't it. She was like, what? And I was like, there's something else. And she's like, oh, yeah, our 25th wedding anniversary. I was like, ha, God, you forgot. You need to make your list, I said. And I was like, now you've moved to number two.

Sorry. Oh, well. Because you didn't remember. 25 years of marriage, celebrating in Big Sur, which is such a special place for us, she had signed us up for, and I guess I told you this at the time, we did this amazing hike up into Big Sur beside this creek, and we did a cold plunge in the, and it was, yes, I guess it was May, but it was very cold water. Not as cold as it would have been in January, but...

And there was something emotional about that exercise, like the way that we... I don't know, it just felt the whole... That whole trip in celebration was special. But really, you know, just the fact that we were able to celebrate 25 years, and that milestone is just, I'm super grateful, super grateful for our relationship and the fact that we've gone through so many versions of ourselves and so many versions of our relationship, you know, as individuals, as a couple, we've, we're just, you know,

when you live your life it it shapes who you are every day you're building more on to who you are you're changing your you're morphing you're living you're growing you're dying you're everything and you got somebody that you're doing that with uh in the most intimate of ways It is a lot. It's not, you know, it's a feat. I mean, you're a foot guy. It's a feat, especially with me, right? That's what people are thinking right now,

and that's what you could have said. Instead of the foot joke, you could have said the, yeah, especially with you. Thank you for not doing that. Okay. But yeah, super grateful for my Christy. 25 years. Let's do another 25.

I got my 25 coming up in 26, but I won't talk about it on this podcast. Number one, and apparently number four for Link, is everything that happened with my heart. Oh, I was wrong. I'm sorry. Okay. What was your number four? Just kidding. Again, like many of the things on this list, there is an in-depth podcast. where I tell all of the story around it, so we're not going to do that. But just in case you don't know what I'm talking about,

I had developed a heart arrhythmia. My heart was beating weird. It was kind of out of the blue, but it was fixed via a procedure in September, and I appear to be completely good to go. But it's really what it did, right? Because it happened, the interesting thing is, you know, we take a break,

This is the second year in a row that we've taken a break during July by pushing 12 months of work into 11 months and then taking the month of July off. And using that time as a rest, rehabilitation even, and also re-evaluation. Yeah. There's a lot of thinking that happens during that time and a lot of attempting to have some perspective on what we're doing. and I think there was an element to what happened with my heart where there was a forced wake-up call to say, hey, man, you're about to be 48 years old and you have stressed yourself out to a point

where you've got this heart problem. And whether or not stress caused the heart problem or not, it certainly made it worse and contributed to it, But also, now that I know that I have a propensity to this condition, stress becomes extra important to manage and to pay attention to. And that led to a complete re-evaluation of everything that we do. And I think one of the, the constant theme for this second half of the year, having come back, has been taking a really hard look at all of the things that we do.

And I think first of all, the theme has been, hey, we've got to do less. We have to do less as we move into our late 40s and then our 50s. If we want to keep doing this, and we do. Yes. We've got to be, it has to be personally sustainable. It has to be something that we can continue to do in a way that we enjoy. We got to do less to be our best. And we've got to do it in a way, not only.

that we enjoy, but a way that we can continue to do it because it isn't like we want to retire so we can go do something else. Like we've said multiple times that we don't only think about retirement. We think about sustainability. We think about being able to do what we do in some form for as long as we can do it. Yeah. And I think this year was the first year of like facing mortality in a way that I definitely haven't had to do ever before. Like any sense that I had that I was invincible that I would never have to worry about serious health problems, you know, that was thrown out the door.

And now I think that it's been reflected in a lot of the conversations that we've had. Obviously, it led to us stopping doing ear biscuits, which again is something that we enjoy doing and something that we may do again at some point, But it was, when we were looking at everything that's going on, we're like some things have to drop off up the plate so that there can be room for the things that are on the plate

to really receive the attention and investment that they deserve. Yeah. I mean, it wasn't my heart, so it wasn't my number one. But number four is pretty high because it really had this impact. in terms of like us having this mind meld of I'll put it this way I mean just because it was happening to you doesn't mean that I would come to the same conclusions you know because it wasn't happening to me but we were fortunate that we were coming to similar conclusions you know over our break in terms of a desire to simplify and focus in order to preserve our passion and our ability

and our health and everything. So I'm really grateful that we were independently on the same page when we came back about things. And so I do feel like that, and I did, you know, know besides you and then I don't know I'm still very close to what you were going through and certainly I was very key in your recovery right oh yeah right so yeah yeah thank you for saying that I get what the point I'm trying to make is that it did have an impact on me to open my eyes as well it's like damn maybe that I there will be my version of that and it won't just be hopefully going over the handlebars of a bike, which

was a wake-up call again last week. Yeah. Every two years. But the result of it was this mind-milled of we do need to make changes. We do

appreciate what we want to preserve and fight for. And this it was we each had clarity but the fact that it was so in sync was huge right because we had we had a lot of hard decisions to make you know this ear biscuit's decision was a hard decision to make um asking questions what what all does this impact in terms of where we're going what are

we taking on you know us coming to grips with the fact that we have a a a hit history of leading mythical in a way that is, if we can try this, maybe we, and we could try it, maybe we should try it. And you start to go after a lot of things in order to make, to leave no stone unturned, kind of. Well, our, we've gotten to this point of our success has a allowed us to explore this opportunity or this opportunity, turn over this rock, this rock. So we would, we did a lot of that in order to make sure that we were going down the right path. But the result was we started going down more paths. Well, and I think, I think there's a difference between doing some, I think a lot of the

things that we have done have been, not just because we thought that we could, do it, we would be capable of doing it, it's that we kind of thought that it seemed like the kind of thing that we should be doing from maybe an external perspective. In other words, not necessarily being led by our own instincts and the things that we are truly passionate about, but sometimes you just do something because you're in a position to do it and it creates a certain story about us or mythical. And I think that some of those things have really worked out. You know, some of those things have been great.

But I think that this year was this moment where it was like, you can't just keep making decisions like that. No, you can't. It's not sustainable. You have to make decisions based on your own instincts and your own skill set and the things that you actually bring to the table. And you don't have to do everything that you could do. You just don't have to do everything that you could do. And if you do decide that you're going to do everything that you could do,

then all of those things are going to be compromised. But the main thing is that you as an individual are going to be compromised. And I think that we began to have an acute, I had an acute experience of being compromised in a way that I've always been able to maybe brush off. Yeah. You know, I had the thing happen with my eye years ago that sent me to therapy. was the first indication of like doing too much, being too stressed out. And then this was like wave number two of a similar thing.

Like I get these involuntary physical manifestations that force me to make decisions to think about my own vitality and sustainability. And I think from maybe the mythical beast's perspective, that first wave, because we were, we were like tripling or quadrupling the output of Good Mythical Morning through what we call GMM22. It was easier to perceive externally by fans, but this second wave, because it wasn't, it was different. It was more like, well, if you can make a cereal, why not make it? Why would you not make a cereal? Right. It's just, I mean, that's actually a smaller example.

of it. But it's like, well, the reason we discovered is because everything takes something. And sometimes you say, well, I don't know exactly what this is going to take to make it work. Much less, I don't know if we have what it takes to make it work. Are we the best people to be doing this? So it's do less to do what we do best and do less to be our best. you know from a health perspective and all of that it it's it's a new era and i think the reason that we for us in mythical that we are excited and we would hope that um because again this is not we just don't do this in a vacuum like we do this in the context of the community of mythical beast to support and enable what we're able to do uh and we don't we're very careful to not be

led by you, you know, that we make a decision to not just do what you think we should do. That never works. But we don't do this in a vacuum. If we do something and you don't respond to it, then we probably will stop doing it, right? You know, we're doing the thing that we're following our own instincts and our own skill set, but we're doing it not just for ourselves, we're doing it for you as well. Like this is a community endeavor. It's the intersection of what we want to give you that you want to receive. It's a relationship in that way, but it does start with, this is something that we want to share with you.

But the point I'm getting at is that the reason I would hope that if you are somebody who's a, you consider yourself a mythical beast and you're on board for whatever's next and, you know, maybe you are upset in mourning the loss of your biscuits, but excited about the whatever is coming next. I think there is a reason for excitement. And the reason that we have for excitement is that this is all based on a desire to continue doing it.

Yes. You know, it's all, it's not based on a desire to check out. It's not based on a desire to like pursue other interests. It's all based on a desire to be like, hey, like this, we are somehow against all odds and by a series of very fortunate events, that many of them we didn't have control over. We lucked out to get to be able to do what we do for a living,

to get to be able to live the dream, to fulfill the blood oath of doing something big together. And we want to keep doing that. But as we get older, our capacity, you know, it changes. I'm not going to say it diminishes, but it changes. And we're actually setting ourselves up for a future of being able to really throw ourselves into the things that we're excited about. And I think that, you know, Good Mythical Morning for us personally represents the most obvious place to put those passions. We continue to remain very excited about what GMM is and what GMM can continue to evolve into.

Oh, yeah. We've talked about the elements from this podcast, finding a home in the Good Mythical. Morning world, Good Mythical More. But I think it goes beyond that because I think what we're beginning to see in the conversations that we're having it's like, hey, we like we're in control of what the show is.

We're in control of what lives within the world of Good Mythical Morning. If we're miserable, it's our own fault. Yeah. Ultimately. And it's like we're not making this show for a network executive to approve the ideas. It's us and the team together making this thing for you, the audience. And again, we have to do that.

And when we say sustainability, there's a physical health sustainability. There's a financial sustainability to the show that has to be intact in order to continue making it with the team that we have. And so we make decisions that are based on that a lot. But I think that there's a lot more to come that's very exciting. And I will say, you know, and there are changes to come that will, there are exciting changes and there's some that, you know, you might perceive as negative. And there's, but everything that we've just said and unpacked is the, is the heart behind any change or changes that you may experience. And I am very confirmed and excited and passionate and hopeful and energized by where we're going and where what mythical is going to thrive and look like into next year and on into the indefinite future where we're not retiring. Yeah.

So, yeah, I'd say, you know, replay all of this rationale, like, filter anything that you experience as a passionate fan through what we've just shared with you as we move forward. Another part of it that I really appreciate is, well, I mean, there's been the challenge of leading a company, you know, the thing about the waves and, like, I gave the serial example, but fans not, it not being as visible to fans how we've, like, overextended ourselves, or, I guess all I'm trying to say is that there has been a challenge that we've stepped up to in terms of not only, now that we've had this mind meld, we've figured out the things that we want to do and but leading the company through that has been a challenge but one that I'm very grateful

to be going through and to have with you and the the clarity that we've got has I think I've already experienced that the positive impact that has had on our friendship and our relationship has been really good. You know, when we talk about the New York trip and the things that we were doing and vlogging at the top of this thing, I think is the fact that we had the ability to do that in the midst of everything that we're talking about

shows me that it's happening, it's working. There's enough space to where we can enjoy each other as friends more and not be so white-knuckle just gripping something so tightly to try to keep it. Try to keep it together. Try to keep this thing that's like growing so big and going in this direction and now this direction and this direction.

Let's just, let's keep the, you know, it's like I starts to feel like a ship that is either exiting orbit or reentering orbit, but you've got that shake. It's like, are all the pieces going to stay together? The impact that that starts to have on us is that our relationship is defined by stress instead of by joy and enjoyment. And I'm seeing that we're already experiencing the benefits of like the clarity and making these decisions to do less and be our best. Yeah.

I agree. And I think it's, in some ways, it's a little bit more reflective of, it's not the way that it was back when it was just the two of us and one person, like one intern. Yeah. It's not like that, because that was its own kind of stress. But I think that it is a, there's a trusting yourself with the fact that, You know, we actually, when you really start thinking about it,

when we let the thing that's leading us be our, the things that we want to do. Right. And the things that we feel sort of personally motivated and empowered to do, letting that be the guide, not, hey, this will look this way to someone. To me, that was the, huge. stress level, it just immediately started dropping.

Because a lot of times, I mean, there's been meetings over the past 10 years where we would be in a meeting with somebody and I felt like what I was doing was painting a picture that I did not necessarily believe in. You know, it's just like, I think this is, I think this is... Because you think it's the, we thought it was the path to... Well,

I think this is what... Realizing the opportunity. Well, I think this is what you want to hear. The best example of that is like you're in a room and you're pitching a show. You know, like the whole process that we went through, for example, of like, we'll tell the full story one day, I'm sure, but like the Bleak Creek saga of writing this book and writing the book because we thought that was a really great way to create some IP that then can be turned into the type of media that we really want to do, which is. TV and movies, right? And then the process of sitting in rooms with people

who had read the book and trying to convince them, let us make this movie, let us make this into a TV show, and then having a couple of years past where the version that we are now talking to these people about has very little to do with what we wrote.

Right. But it's a complete, complete departure from what we wrote because we think It's what you in this boardroom want to hear, or you on this Zoom call want to hear. Right. And I'm just, we are, we are never doing that again.

And it's, we're never, we're never painting a picture that we think is the picture that you want to see. We're just going to tell you the thing that it is that we want to do. And we're going to do the thing that we want to do. We're going to do it on our own terms, which again, is going to be probably with significantly less financial resources than we would get if we were to play the game in a different way. but ultimately, I think, much more rewarding. Yeah, so there's, I mean, there's the creative pitch examples. There's, I mean, it just, there's the, it's not, none of it's that visible.

That's why we want to share it like we're doing now, but it's like some of it's business, some of it's creative, and a lot of it's both, and it's just, and it's been a lot, and now it's less. we're doing things differently now and so this has been the year of that turning point and I'm grateful that your heart's good and like there's no lasting effects the ablation as far as we know I mean the lasting effects are the fact that we are applying

the lessons that we learned and that's to be celebrated and I'm grateful that we made it. I'm making it through 2025, and I'm grateful that you're interested enough to listen and understand and support us and still be along with us on this journey. You know, different parts of the journey, the seats look different.

The experiences are different. keep doing the same things, but like, thank you for finding the place where if you want to stay with us that, you know, we want you to. No pressure. We're still here. We're not going anywhere. All right. And, yeah, I think that's it.

I do think I feel grateful, but a lot of it is grateful to have gotten through this year. Yeah. And we got one more of these next week. we'll talk about this thing Ear Biscuits and what it's meant to us to you and

we'll see you then Hey guys I'm willing to do a lot to keep you around okay and I'm just going to say it right now I am willing to do my taxes before the first day I mean the last day

sorry I had a link moment I'm willing to eat liver and onions. I'll do that for you. Just keep you around on the podcast. I'd probably run a 3K marathon for you, babies. Anyway, let me know if any of this will work. Love you guys. Bye.

Oh, it's cayenne, by the way. Not that you know me, but now you do. Bye!