If I Were You - 171: Soulmate (w/Julia Nunes!)

Episode Date: August 31, 2015

Friend and musician (and fellow podcaster!) Julia Nunes joins us to discuss true love, nude pics, and fanny packs.This episode is brought to you by SlugBooks and NextIssueSee omny.fm/listener for privacy information.

This is a headgum podcast. When they offer up, sagely advice How did my life get so long To ride into this podcast show Stepping nearly not hashtag dope by admin And the master would never put up with this shit If I were you, I'd know what to do Send an email or two to the choist of truth

If I were you, I'd know what to do Send an email or two to the choist of truth If I were you, I'd know what to do Send an email or two to the choist of truth If I were you, I'd know what to do Send an email or two to the choist of truth Very, very good. It was alright. Julia, what'd you think? That was like the end of Les Mis.

And that... Just like a band of brothers I picture, like linking arms and uniting against... Yeah, it's a power ballad. Uniting against bad decisions, I guess, is the point of your podcast. They said in their email, this is their theme song submission, and would be honored if we use it, and their names are John and Brandon, and they primarily function as a YouTube channel under the moniker Homebrewed Studios. Not only that, but they made a Pumplemousse-style video of us recording this song that you can see here.

What's a Pumplemousse? Pumplemousse is my friends, just like Natalie. It's like a full circle, so they made a Pumplemousse-style video, and you were friends of those people? Yeah. What style is that video? It's basically them recording the song. It's a video of them recording the song.

Would you say that's their skip? Yeah, you see everything you hear, and there's the screens divided, and you see multiple shots at a time. That's kind of like what you do. That is, Jack got the idea from me. Whoa, really? And he's your friend? Got the idea.

He stole your shit. The whole internet stole my shit. I've never felt any need to claim the fact that I did it first. So then they say, Here I am. So when they say, I did it first. When he said Pumplemousse-style video,

what part of your brain is like, actually, it's a Julian Noon-style video? Not until we started talking about what the actual style of video was, and then you were like, you do that, and I was like, oh yeah, I did it first. That's really big of you. Our goal is to chip away at all of your positivity until the end of this podcast, you're suing Pumplemousse. It's like if somebody made a web series that was like two people talking to each other back and forth,

and it became more popular than me and Jake's web series, and then somebody submitted a video and be like, we made a Brandon and Amos-style video, and I would be like, I can't imagine I'd get to the point in my life where I'm like, I don't even really think about the fact that they stole me and Jake's thing, and now it's a Brandon and Amos-style video. You guys absolutely stole this idea from some other advice show.

I'm sure there were two men giving advice to people. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that's true. I guess we're all from Dear Abby. The original advice show. There are no original ideas. The Bible took them all. Do you know the Bible was Pumplemousse-style? A Bible-style video where you can see everything you hear

and there's split screens. Like Moses is instruments. Of course you went to the Old Testament. You slimy little... That is the famous part. Old Testament's more famous, isn't it? Yeah, everyone always likes the older stuff. Nobody likes the old shit.

When you can get the new shit for free. Julia Noons, thank you for coming on our show for the first time ever. Thank you for having me, Jake and Amir. Julia Noons is a podcaster for the Head Gum Network. Do you do anything else? It's like in my spare time, sometimes I write songs about my feelings, play them for crowds. Oh yeah, when you're not podcasting, you mean?

Yeah, just whenever I can squeeze in an album or two. You'll make a Pumplemousse-style album or something. Wait, did you meet those Pumplemousse people after...? Talk to her about the album! I want to know! I made an album with Pumplemousse funds. Did they contact you because they knew that you made those types of videos or was it a coincidence?

It was like YouTube was such a small community and everyone knew... Oh man, isn't that a crazy sentence? YouTube was such a small community. Yeah, I knew everyone who was killing it on music and when I talked to Jack, he was like, I watched your videos, thought of a cooler way to split the screen up. I think my girlfriend is the most beautiful person in the world,

Natalie Dawn, so I wanted to put her face six times on it and I was like, yeah man, he took the way I did it and made it better. And we talked about it. And then we made more music together. That's art, man, growing, changing, thriving. Because for me, I would be angry and sad about it. You're angry and sad about everything. I wouldn't even collaborate.

I would close myself off to other creative types. When you started Head Gum, were you like, no other advice podcasts? Amir was like no other podcast networks. Like he doesn't even want to exist in the space with other people doing the same thing. I wanted the network to just be me talking. He'll never be happy until it's only him and everyone else is dead.

Don't you understand? He's a Mortal Kombat character. See that now. We met so, so long ago, correct? We met at the height of this YouTube smallness that you were talking about. Yeah. Well, I mean, I assume that that is why you know who I am

because it was such a smaller internet back then. Yeah, that's true. Do you remember how we met Julia? I don't quite remember. Oh, you know what? I think we were like starting to post some of her videos on College Humor is what I think was happening. Because Julia's earliest videos were their ukulele

covers, right? Were their originals back then too? Yeah. I think the first one you guys did was Bye Bye Bye. Oh, yeah. That covered Bye Bye Bye. And then we had that coincided with one of our first shows which was taking place where Julia was going to college.

Yeah. And I got some form of internet message from Jake or one of you that was like. I hope it was a MySpace message. I hope it was a MySpace message. It could have been a YouTube message back when those were not filled with spam. Wow.

Totally possible. What a time to be alive. And then you guys came into my dorm room. Yeah. Just two adult men in my dorm room. That was extra creepy because we're 30 now. Yeah. At the time we were 29 walking into an 18-year-old dorm room.

I was 18. That was it. Do you have any memories of that actual moment? Or do you just remember the video that we already shot? I remember cleaning my room really curiously before you got like realizing that I needed to clean it like 30 minutes before you guys arrived and just like working up a sweat and then being like, Hi.

Yeah. Hello. It was like freezing cold out. Yeah. Also like that dorm room was the tiniest little like I. Did you have a roommate, a dorm mate? I don't know. It was a single.

But I mean, it was like the smallest single in history. Right. And then we were just like making a little music video there. Yeah. You did like a wheelbarrow move across the floor because that was the only, you wanted to do like a blueberry dance portion to a music video. And the only thing you could really do was a wheelbarrow.

That sounds about right. We were young and crazy then. Now we're all adults and smart. This is if I were you, the only advice podcast on the internet hosted by us. I'm Amir. I'm Jake. And Julia Noons is what my name is. Cool introduction.

Thank you. So I'm sure you know, but we answer emails from people who are in need of our sage wisdom. Yeah. That was in the song. Yeah, exactly. Your sage wisdom. Yeah.

Yeah. I think that's, you actually stole that from the song. I too am a thief. All right. Do you want to try to answer some questions? Because, you know, sometimes we don't have three people's opinion. I think we can really help extra hard today, at least 50% more opinions. Yeah.

All right. Julia, I need to give this dude a fake name. Do you have a fake name that I can give this emailer? Charles. It's amazing. Did you just come up with that? At some point in history, someone did come up with it, right? That's got to be true.

I am, I'm going to call my kid Charles. Whoa. That's insane. John, everyone else's name is John. Guys, all of these words we're speaking right now, made up at one point. Crazy. Not that long ago. We're talking in a funny little language.

English is like a very new language. They're all made up by chimpanzee in a robe too, which is crazy. He was at the top of a mountain, just like coming up with words and like throwing them down to the people. That's what you think God is. Just like tucking his words into little pieces of poop and flicking them. Currently. Huh.

That's an interesting one. Charles. Hey guys, I'm in an LDR. Do you know what that is? Long distance relationship. Nice. Hey guys, I'm in an LDR with an incredible girl, but sometimes I feel like I found her too early. I'm a 21 year old law school student and she is an engineering graduate who works in rural

Australia making a lot of money. Majority of the time, she is my queen and I dream of her and I living an incredible life and ruling the world together. Ooh. But as of late, her work schedule has changed, meaning we won't be able to talk as much and in general, the distance is starting to take its toll on me both emotionally and physically. She and I lost our virginity to one another at age 18.

Yes, I started the game late, but the point is I am playing, right? Oh no. I feel like I may have met her too early in my life. She is amazing in every way, smart, beautiful, funny and incredible cook and she's so fucking driven. I've had no bad relationships and I've never been with anyone else and I sort of crave the new experience and bodies to explore. Although I'm really cynical when it comes to women, but that's a whole other question.

The other night I had a sex dream about a girl I used to be into before I met my current girlfriend and for the next few days after that I became sort of obsessed with her. Anyway, that's detracting away from the point I have two questions. Do you believe you can meet your soulmate too early or am I just making an excuse to get myself through my own little rough patch? And two, I know your stance on long distance relationships and it's bad, but what should I do? Thanks.

Charles. I assume from his preface that you guys don't approve of long distance relationships? Not typically. But is this a special case? No. For there are no special cases. Sometimes there are special cases. Where does he live?

I missed that part. It doesn't say, but I assume somewhere in non-rural Australia. Right. I guess the bigger question is can you meet someone that is the best too early? Like then it's like, oh no, you didn't get to experience bad or does it not matter once you find the quote unquote one? Yeah, I think the answer, like can you meet someone too early? Like, yeah.

And if it's too early, then they're not the one. Oh, so like, oh, oh. You have to first assume that he's not correct in saying that she's definitely the one, right? So like if there's room for error. But he's saying she's perfect in every way, but he just wants to experience other people. This is the thing with that because he's saying she's perfect in every way except we're too young and she lives in a different part of the country. Yeah.

So that's not perfect. And I'm obsessed with another girl that I'm used to be into. She's perfect, but the situation is not. So like if you had the perfect human in your life, but she just happened to live in rural. She's not in your life if she lives in rural Australia. I think this guy would say that she is in her life. His life. Touche.

Their lives. Like the perfect human in an imperfect place. Hand me that guitar. I just came up with a pretty interesting story. There's no actual guitar there. He just said a sentence that he thought was poetic and he wanted a perfect person in an imperfect place. I'm so upset. Don't ever joke about music.

Reaching into your fanny pack and pulling out a harmonica. You're just singing I found love in a hopeless place. The hopeless place being rural Australia. Do you think there's something to breaking up with a great person just so you can experience bad people? I don't think that's what he really wants. I don't think the point is to experience bad people. I think the point is to experience more people. And if that's what he wants to do, then he doesn't really need a reason.

He doesn't really need like distance or imperfect circumstance to make that decision. Meaning. Meaning that if he wants to experience other people, he should go do that because that is an indicator of how he feels about his queen. Sometimes I picture us ruling the world together. I definitely want them to break up. Why? You don't like some guy ruling the world with his queen? I don't like the idea of this guy thinking he's a dictator power couple. What I don't like is that he describes her in a way that I'm like, yeah, I would love for someone to describe me that way.

I want the person that I'm with to think that I am a queen and that we can rule the world together. And then to think that that person could also be thinking about some other princess who pisses me off. Don't give it the queen label if you don't actually feel that way because you clearly don't. That's actually true. He's thinking, well, I'm not mad at him, but he's got these dueling ideas. One that he wants to rule the world with somebody and the other that he wants to be with somebody who sucks and like. Yeah, he's like reaching for excuses to get out of there. Right. Clearly he just doesn't want to be with this girl anymore, which is fine because they're in a long distance relationship.

And this is one of the things in a long distance relationship that doesn't have an end point in sight. Like she's working and super driven to stay working out there in rural Australia. Like if there's no real hope of you guys ending the LDR, I don't advise staying in an LDR. Yeah. What are your thoughts on long DRs? Or L distance Rs. Well, I think. Or LD relationships.

Just let her answer. Or L. Long D relationships. Okay. That's the last one. Thank you for letting me know. Although. Okay.

Yeah. I think like physical closeness is super important for a relationship. I think like sex is one of the biggest parts of a romantic relationship. Pretty up there. Pretty up there in terms of like what makes a romance a romance. And if you don't have those two things and there is no end in sight, then like I don't. That sounds like a very intimate friendship. Yeah.

But what if you see each other once a month and then you get out all as much sex as you can possibly cram in 48 hours. And that's like totally enough for you and you're not writing emails to an advice podcast about how you're fantasizing about your girl. Oh shit. If you're like totally happy with your monthly sex, then you're great. Oh shit. I wrote this email.

Drop it. That's a really expensive mic, but push it over. Drop it. No. No. Oh, it's broken. And it landed on a very expensive vase. In your Spanish.

Which you keep on the ground. So if I were you, you'd break up with this person? If I were you, I would stop like trying to pretend you don't want to get out of there. I would just admit that like you're reaching for reasons to get out and just get out. You don't. My best advice is you don't need a reason to get out if you know you want to. Very, really intense. Very poetic.

You don't have to justify it. That might be the best I think to say, but I feel like if I were you, if I were this guy, I wouldn't be able to break up with somebody that I really, really liked at age 21. And I'd be like, hopefully I'll find someone better. I feel like I would stay in this relationship for a little bit longer. A long distance relationship? Yeah, like if I were you, then that is like, that's your thing that you would do. But like, is that correct?

No. Is that a good way to do it? No, I would say not. I would say I would have stayed in this relationship for longer than it needed to be. Yeah. Well, I think what happens here is like if he's, if he stays and he continues to have these feelings, then it just turns into resentment and then he's just wasting his and hers. Right.

Oh, that's also you as a 21 year old when you were a dumb coward. How about you as a 32 year old? Oh, now I'm very quick to cut things off. There you go. I am. Yeah. I'm in and out. By the way, you're imparting, you should be imparting the advice as current you.

Right. But at the same time, I feel like the hardest thing to do is break up with someone that is amazing and great just because you're starting to have some seeds of doubt that might be cutting it off. Just because that's because she also lives across the country. Yeah. But who knows? Maybe she's not going to be an engineering student forever or he's down to live in rural

Australia. So maybe if you are planning on being next to each other. I cannot believe you're advocating for this relationship. This is insane. Well, she's she's great. She's everything he like he considers her his soulmate. And then you guys, he's having some doubts. Yeah.

He doesn't know what the fuck he's talking about when he says soulmate. Yeah. They lost their virginity together. He's never been with anybody else. Shouldn't he be the romantic that like this is a beautiful tale and that? No, I don't ever think that people are like know who their soulmate like you don't get your the first person you're with is never your actual soulmate. Some people just can convince themselves that they are.

Yeah. Also, if he's never had a bad relationship, then it like it sounds like he just kind of puts them all on this even plane. Like they're all good. They're all good enough. Like all of his relationships are just fine. Yeah. Well, he's only been one.

If like, I feel like he was with that other girl that he was into not in a relationship. Right. Yeah. What I want to hear is like, I've been in OK relationships with this girl blew me the fuck away. Oh, so he's just had one food. He's like, this is the best food ever. And you're like, how do you know you don't have another?

Oh, I love cruel. Nothing's better than this cruel. This cruel is so driven. This cruel is so cool. This cruel is trying really hard. All right. So that's two breakups and one stick it out even though you shouldn't. Yeah.

Stick it out until you hate each other. Oh, that'll be for until you feel like you've wasted your time. Until you guys resent each other. Well, how old do you think you should you can be when you meet your real soulmate if 21's too early? I think you can meet them at any age. At any age. That's Jake's thing, but like.

You liar. You're a liar, man. I said at any age, but they just can't be the first person. You just said you were too young. 21 year olds don't know that they met their soulmate yet. And then she said any age. He's like, yeah, any age. I caught you.

All right. So 21 is the cut off. 22. You're officially old enough to meet your soulmate. 21 isn't necessarily too old or too young to meet your soulmate. I said 21 is too young to know whether it is or not. I think you at the very least need to have had other experiences with relationships to have the context of saying this person's my soulmate or this person's the best match

for me. Good thing your parents didn't think that, huh? They dated other people when they were 18. Didn't they meet in high school? They were married when my mom was 19. So? Wasn't that the example? That was the past.

The world was a smaller place. Yeah. Now that you got Tinder, you don't know who's out there for you. My parents had no idea who was in their radius. Could you imagine how hot my dad would have been if my mom knew what was up? What? She should not have been with that troll knapsack of a man. Oh.

So you think that she... Are we talking about your parents settling? Is that how this... Honestly, my dad looks like a fanny pack. You're taking some visual suggestion from my... My fanny dad. Well, we've also said before that my dad looks like a backpack. And a potato and a pumpkin.

And a potato, but Julie's wearing a fanny pack today, so... That does kind of look like your dad actually. He's a small little man. That was pretty cute. Thank you. How do you like a fanny pack? I love it. You're done.

You're not going back to purse or wallet anytime soon. No, I use wallet and sometimes I carry a purse. Is there a wallet inside the fanny pack? Uh-huh. No, that's just a ham sandwich. That's always like a wallet. So when do you decide to buy... When do you decide...

Your stuff. Yeah, how many pockets is that? It's two. Good shit. You thinking you can go smaller than that or that's the smallest it gets? This is the smallest it gets, yeah. When do you decide purse v. fanny pack? I started wearing a fanny pack when I had crutches for my knee injury.

Yeah. And I really like it. And I also think it... Like I like tying things around my waist. I think it helps complete an outfit and now I have like a... Oh, it's like a belt. Yeah. It's funny, all the things that like my mom tried to get me to wear in Europe in 2003,

which I was too afraid that would look too nerdy is now cool. I see you also have a money belt under your shirt just in case you get robbed in Rome or something. Yeah, I have a traveler's map that folds to the size of a dime. You carry your passport all the time too, I bet. Oh my God, guys, I do have my passport. I was in Montreal two days ago. Oh, shit. And I keep it in the back, like in the secret pocket in the back.

What's that? Can I see your passport photo? I was in Montreal. It was okay. All right. Just okay, huh? Yeah, I played a ukulele festival. Why is that not good?

It was great. Are you showing me? Business pleasure, what are you here for? I start stamping it. Oh yeah, I got yelled at at TSA for having CDs. What? Yeah. What does that mean?

But you can't like- This is like, you keep us in good condition. Thank you. Oh, okay. Just a lot of boarding passes on our floor now. Yeah. That's what you get. Making yourself very much so at home.

She would never do this in her own house. All right. We have another question. This one, in keeping in line, when was that photo taken of you? That's recent, right? 2009. Oh. Wow.

Six years ago? Not that recent. No. All right. Keeping in line with the musical theme, we got a question that was a song. A song cover question. Yeah. Yeah.

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I thought it was great, just unnecessary. The second and third time seems like very unnecessary. We get the gist. Do you think that your friend's girlfriend is a bitch and you want them to break up? Is there a concise question in the email or is it just a song? There was no text. It was just that song. That's the gist.

That's not even the gist. That's exactly, that is the question. He just doesn't like her. Maybe everybody doesn't like her. It's from what it seems. Except for your friend. Have you ever experienced that? A good guy dating a bad person?

I have experienced a friend dating someone I didn't like. Are you in the minority or majority? In the specific instance I was in the majority. So nobody liked him? And it was a female friend of yours? Female friend, boyfriend that nobody liked. Why did she like him? I think because romantic relationships can entrench themselves inside of a person in

a way that other relationships are exempt from. So it's just like, sometimes with a guy it's like, yeah, this woman is bad, but coming feels good so that, is she more worse than ejaculating is? No, I don't think that's what it is. I don't think that's ever what it is. It's not a sex thing like, oh, this girl gives me sex. No, because sex is like, it's not that hard to have sex. I don't think anybody is like, I need to be with this person because I'll never have

sex if I don't. I think it's part of it, no. I think having regular sex is mesmerizing and for some people it's not easy to get that. And then once somebody is willing to give that to you, you're like, I'll deal with the other bad shit because ejaculating feels good and it's better than how bad it feels when I'm not doing that. I completely disagree. I think that that could be like maybe a small piece of it, but I don't think that that would

make someone stay in a bad relationship. So what does make it? I think it's like when you're in a relationship relationship with someone, it turns into like a co-dependence that you're just very used to that person being super entrenched in your life. So removing that like really, it's a big piece. I think like a romantic relationship, it becomes like 30% of your perception of yourself. So when you remove that person, you remove a piece of what, how do you think of yourself?

Oh, and then you're like, I don't want to deal with finding another person. Like the idea of losing this person means I'm not going to be me anymore. Yes. So I'll just deal with the badness or do you not even consider it the badness? Are you blinded to it? I think there's also, there's an aspect of like, especially when a bunch of friends don't like somebody, you always hear that person being like, well, you don't see us when it's just us, when we're just alone, because you feel so comfortable with somebody.

And like, if your friends don't like someone, sometimes you're like, oh shit, I shouldn't like this person either. But sometimes you're like, it almost fortifies you into the relationship where it's like, hey, it's me and my girlfriend against the world because nobody else likes us, but nobody sees us when we're, when we're alone and we're, we're actually good together. We make each other feel really good. I was in a relationship where a bunch of my friends would get like tired of me complaining about it.

And what I took from that was not like, oh man, seems like I have a lot of complaints. I took like a, oh man, I'm a negative person and I should stop complaining so much. Oh yeah. That's, I should like calm down and not whine so much so that my friends will still want to talk to me. So like, I'm having a fine relationship, but I just complain about it a lot. Right. And then your friends like can't even help you out of the relationship because you're

not showing them that you're happy. Yeah, totally. But do you think if all your friends had an intervention for you saying, this person is bad, would you like have to believe them? Or would you be like, all my friends are bad? Maybe, but I don't think like most bad relationships are not so bad that someone would hold an intervention. Most relationships are just like, not amazing. And that's why they're bad.

Right. And then you get out of a relationship and then you realize it was bad the entire time. Absolutely. Oh, so while you're in it, you're just sort of like coasting along being like, oh, some are late. So every relationship is good and bad. And I'm just going. Peaks and valleys, ups and downs.

Yeah. Sometimes we fight and sometimes we don't. And then like, and then you leave and you find somebody else or you're totally on your own and you realize for the first time, like, oh, I'm not fighting at all with somebody. Yeah. That's pretty good. Yeah. I love not fighting with someone.

Yeah. Fighting feels great. It seems like most of these other people in my life support me in what I want. Yeah. Isn't it really good? Weird. Surrounded by positivity. Oh, man.

I have less complaints now. Oh, and before the only person that was mean to me was the person I was dating. I think the hard part is actually breaking up like the first couple of days after that are so bad that people want to avoid it. Yeah. So it's like, I'll live my life at a C minus just to avoid a couple of days. Breaking up feels so terrible and there's a very easy fix to it, which is getting back together.

Oh, which is why people do that. You can make those terrible feelings go away by getting back in the relationship. Yeah. Especially when the person you're breaking up with really doesn't want to break up. Yeah. Really doesn't want to break up. And like everything you've ever wanted, like love and support and tenderness is right there in front of you because you have threatened to leave.

Right. And then maybe you've made a lot of leverage. So how do you avoid that? You have to be so mentally strong and like forward thinking that like, no, even though this is easy and good to get back together, I cannot do it. I can't allow myself to do it. I think like the easiest way to get through that is to like create a circumstance where you cannot get back together, like be in a different place.

Oh, like take a trip, get out of there, get out of town. Yeah. Move to Los Angeles. That's good advice. Right. Just LA is just 18 million people that have just broken up with somebody on the East Coast. This is a secret city that nobody has to know about. Yeah.

Whenever anyone moves here, I assume they are in the middle of a breakup. Are you speaking from experience? Yes. It sounded like it was too spot on to be something you made up. Yeah. I had like some really like, I had a cushion when I broke up with my person. I like was home with my family and like he could leave and go back to New York and we could be away from each other.

And even still, like when we were around each other after that, it was so painful that I would, I think of that time as like such a precarious like, it's really just luck that I didn't get back together, that I didn't like stay and. Oh, like you could have easily done that. Easily. Absolutely. Wow. Yeah.

So why didn't it happen? Because I created a circumstance where it would have been very impossible. But that's not luck. That was your decision. Yeah. I mean, that's my advice is to like create a certain, well, we're not actually advising this person. We're advising the guy.

I actually have completely different advice for this person. Oh, what is it? Well, to not meddle, to not, to not get involved, it's not his relationship. Yeah. But what if one of your best friends was dating a terrible? Well, first of all, I feel like it's not necessarily for me as an outsider to decide who's terrible for my, if the girl is terrible, or if like they're both terrible, or if they're just terrible together.

I feel like he, this guy has such a small role in the grand scheme of the relationship that to like, to try to break it apart is a little selfish. I think what I'll, the only thing he could do is maybe talk to his friend a lot and just deduce if his friend is actually happy or not. Because if his friend is truly happy, then get the fuck out of there. Then just don't hang out with the girlfriend if you guys don't get along. But if he's not happy, then, then I think you just maybe kind of talk to him about that a lot until he makes the decision on his own.

Or you put him in a box and send it to LA. Put him in a box. Take your friend, wrap him up in a bunch of tape, stick him in a. Hacking peanuts. Oh, a poster tube. Oh. Yeah. A poster tube.

Yeah. A pneumatic poster tube. He'll be dead. Will you poke holes on the top and bottom so that he can breathe on the way? How wide would the poster tube have to be? That's a great question. What are we thinking? This guy's like, where are you widest?

What's the diameter? Your chest. Your shoulders. Oh yeah. Your shoulders for sure. So that's like 38, 40 inches. That's the diameter of the poster tube. You want to do FedEx ground because he'll, he'll pass out if he's in the air for that

long because they put him in a non pressurized cabin. And then depending on where he lives, he'll be in L.A. in what, four days max? So your advice is all shipping advice, right? Yeah. A lot of it is shipping related. A lot of it is trying to. Is this podcast sponsored by? UPSground.

Yeah. I think, I like Jake's advice, like talk to your friend and like help him lay out the reasons he's not happy if he is, like help him answer questions that can like lead him to see his life more clearly. Because like any sort of like you should do this or you should do that will cause him to. Exactly. I mean, if my friends all told me to do something, I might not do it just to be like, fuck you

guys. But I think that the goal should be to either empower him to break up if he wants to. Or if, if, see if like go into it with an open mind and like maybe he's going to convince you that his girlfriend is right for him. I want to take a second also because like if this is a group of friends that are all guys and they like don't like this girl, I'm worried that's reading between the lines and that's true. I'm worried that like she just has emotions and feelings and they're like a bunch of

bros being like, shut up, how are you feeling? There's, well, there's a major chance that she's like totally doesn't even have emotions or feeling like completely even keel. And it's just that this is the first girlfriend that group of friends has ever had. Yeah. Now his friend is coming out slightly less and he's like, she's ruining the group. Yeah. Everyone hates her, right?

Yeah. Yeah. That's why your advice is the best one because like if he really is happy, if, if she's actually like not the terrible person that he thinks she is, then, then like you just need to like. This is the, like the goal is to do a little detective work and find out if your friend's happy or not. Or if like, because this should, this should not be about making him, him happy. Like, I'll be happier if my friend's single because we'll be friends again, we'll get

to spend time. And you, you do mean actual detective work, like hide in a bush with like a stethoscope. Yeah. I mean, like be a bush and sort of snoop around the yard and move it around. And then when she looks at you, you have to sort of settle down. And that way it's a bush. Did you say detectives have stethoscopes? Yeah.

That's what a doctor has. Yeah. Well, you, you, you press it up against the wall and then you sort of adjust the frequency so you can hear the conversation, ideally in a van or something like that. You can like measure your friend's heartbeat with that stethoscope and be like, see man, I sense stress in you and anxiety. That might be because you're holding a stick, you jumped out of a bush and you're holding a stethoscope to my chest.

All right. Let's take a little break and we'll be back with one more question if that's okay with you. This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Thank you, BetterHelp. If you're finding yourself in a difficult, anxious, stressful situation talking to a professional licensed therapist is the best way to navigate yourself out of that difficult place. And it's not necessarily easy to find a therapist, especially one in your area, but BetterHelp

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This is done entirely online, but you're still getting professional licensed help and it's extra affordable. That's betterhelp.com slash if I were you. Check them out. Thanks, BetterHelp. Thank you to Squarespace for sponsoring this episode of our show. Wow. For years and years and years, we've been ranting and raving about Squarespace because

it's the best way for dummies like me and potentially you that don't necessarily know how to code or design to create a professional looking website. So if you're building an online portfolio for yourself or a loved one or you want to sell stuff online, you can do an online store. They have 24 seven live customer support, email campaigns, data. You can even purchase a domain name through Squarespace. For example, I didn't even look this up, but there's no way you can't buy a mere Blumenfeld is a good dude.com.

I bet that's available and you can have it today and you can buy it through Squarespace and build an awesome website dedicated to me or I guess dedicated to anyone else in your life. Maybe you want to give somebody a gift this season, a summer birthday coming up. Who doesn't want a website? So the best way to do that is to go to Squarespace.com slash if I were you for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, just use that offer code if I were you to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain again, Squarespace.com slash if I were you free trial.

Everything looks good. Let's launch it. Just use that offer code if I were you to save 10% off that first purchase. Thank you. Squarespace. Hey. Hey. Hey.

Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. For our network, three weeks ago, four weeks ago, how has it been versus what you thought

it would be? It's really fun. I'm very much enjoying it. I didn't know exactly what the form was going to be until like a day before it and then my first guest was Jake and Jake basically led through the podcast that it should be like the guest, the reading of something old from their past. Right. I need to say what your show is in case anybody here hasn't heard it yet.

My podcast is called That Was Us and I have a guest on every show that reads something from their past, something old enough to be interesting, text messages, emails, Facebook, something, some written evidence of how they used to be and I make them read it and we talk about how they were then, like how they've changed now, why they were, why they changed, the circumstances of the world at the time they wrote it. And what they've learned since, sometimes we learn things within the podcast. I share stories from similar times in my life. And so far, Jake has been on the show, I've been on the show and Danielle's been on the

show. Danielle Owens-Raid was reading a diary entry from Boy Troubles and Diet Pill Times in her life. Which was early, early March last year. Early, early March. The 14th. So early it was February. It was a leap year to be fair.

But you're having a good time with it? I love it. I've been doing half an hour podcasts but I think I want to talk a little bit longer about life and love. Our podcast also started at like 30 and then we just get more and more plump and robust and then now we're like in between 45 and an hour. Yeah, I could have talked for another 20 about that dude who doesn't think that his friend's girlfriend is cool because I think maybe that guy's not cool.

It's very possible. He did sit for a long time composing a Bastille cover. Bastille cover. So, yeah. Oh, your album. You have a big thing coming up in your life. You forget she does music a lot. You do fucking hats.

You're a podcast. You're the host. Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah, I have an album coming out September 25th. It's called Some Feelings. Is your third album? Yeah, sure.

Is it? It's like I've been making music since I was 14 so I have like a clamshell like picture of me with eyes that I photoshopped bluer that I put out like do I count that as my first album? No. I do. The script on the front is like handwritten. You know what I mean?

Oh, wow. Yeah. That's like those are your early mixtapes then. Yeah, but like people bought them. Oh. You know what I mean? Yeah, they made money. Like the internet bought them.

So you can make money off a mixtape. That's Drake says he made a million dollars off a mixtape. Yeah, I want to be able to say that. Maybe there's still time. Yeah, there's still time. Start promoting your old mixtapes instead of your new album. That's very smart. They must savvy.

Do you want to manage me? Sure. Yeah. What's the percentage? Oh, that's the first question. I won't do it for less than 50. 50 what? Clambake CDs.

Have you pre-sold albums already? Yeah. Or you have to sell albums? I sold like 3000 albums on Kickstarter before I was even done mixing it. Is that the most albums you've sold ever? No. What was your most or is it a secret? I don't know.

I don't know exact numbers of anything. Oh, that's beautiful. Yeah. Well, here's what I know is I order 5000 CDs of any one thing and then I have to order more when I run out. So I know I've sold at least 5000 of my last album. And over 3000 of this one that's not even out yet. Wow.

And when do I get to hear it as a pre-orderer? I think like two weeks before. September. Amir donated to my Kickstarter campaign. He donated to my last one too. Did you? That's really nice. I guess raise your hand if you're someone else in the room that donated to the Kickstarter.

Oh, we got one. Is there still time? Holding an iPhone out. You can pre-order it on my website. Okay, I'll do that. So how do people pre-order it? Can I Venmo you 50 bucks? Can I give you $30 in cash and 48 cents and a stamp?

And if you have some early tracks on your phone, yeah, listen to it now. It's the best steel cover again. Just four minutes of... So how do people pre-order your album? JulianOons.com has my store and you can give me $10 and I will give you the promise of a CD on September 25th. To come. And then can people sample the songs? How do we get people into your music?

You can play the 90-second previews on iTunes. If you pre-order my album on iTunes right now, you get it for a discount and you get one track immediately. There it is. Do you get to choose it? No, it's a song called Something Bad and there's a music video out for it and so that's why it's the one you get. You can listen to Something Bad right now on YouTube. You could, yeah. But she wants the cash, the Skrilla.

Don't tell about the free YouTube link. You listen to one song, you like it, you want more. Which music video am I in and when does it come out, Julian? Oh man, Amir is in the next single I'm putting out is called Don't Feel and Amir plays just like my very annoying and then very upset boyfriend. The ones that all your friends complain about and try to get you to break up with. But I'm not ready to hear that yet. I'm not about that noise. No, Amir smashes breakaway glass over my head in slow-mo in this music video.

You must have broken 80 glasses and bottles over your head. I'm sure it was over 100. And one of them legit hurt you. Like I felt bad. Yeah, Amir was so concerned with my well-being. It was very unlike my relationship. At the time. Because like even the bottles had like a hard part to them.

You're like, alright just keep crashing them over my head but it has to be this soft spot otherwise like it will sound like a glass hitting a table. I had a couple of eggs on the back of my head. There was one shot that we were really excited about. It was supposed to be like a close-up with like just smash, smash, smash, smash, smash. Like just ten things on my head all in a row. And not only did we not use the shot but like three of the things didn't break when they hit my head. Oh no. One of them was a real Coke bottle that I brought in from lunch.

Got confused. Or did you? That's got to have happened once in the history of breakaway bottles, right? That is why we didn't bring in like the snack cart was outside because we just didn't want anything to get confusing. Yeah, and that how the guy in the crow died or something? Yeah, the fake bullet. He choked on a Coke bottle. We're running out of time but I do want to get to one last question.

This one's from a lady. So Julia, can you read it? Sure. We rarely have a lady on the show to lend her voice. Hey guys, alright here's the thing. I have been with my boyfriend for over a year now and we have an extremely great relationship. Until recently he was studying a few hours away, no big deal. When it had been a week or two between visits he would never hesitate to ask me to send him dirty pictures.

I've never minded doing so and it's been something I've actually enjoyed doing since the beginning of our relationship. He's back in our hometown now and I still send him naughty pictures pretty often. That's the thing. It's always me. A few months ago I asked him to send me pictures of himself and he flat out refused. I've brought it up every time he asks me for pics or if I send him some and he always says no. I'm not sure if it's embarrassment, modesty, or if it's a guy thing, but I'm sure he has a gallery of almost 20 pictures of me and I have yet to receive one picture of him.

I brought it up before teasingly but he always changes the subject. What do I do to get a picture of the D? Help. Love, Sarah. Wow. Interesting. I feel like most of the time it's guys sending unwanted dick pics. This guy won't send any dick pics. Yeah.

Well, I think the obvious answer was you should have started an exchange rate early on. Now he's got 20 of yours and you don't have any of his. But that ship has passed. How does she now get a DP? She wants the DP now. DP stands for double penetration. Well, maybe she wants that too. If this is just a small issue, then just don't send him any more pictures until he sends you one because I think that's only fair.

I think that's a conversation you can have where you can be like, hey, this has started to feel uneven and I'm not going to do it again. Next time he asks you just say, no, not until I get the DP. As long as you do it with that intonation, I think it works. Oh, so now you came up with it. I guess I'm a hero. Do you think that's yours now? Yeah, I think this could be like a lighthearted issue.

I think it could be like pretty fun and hot if it's like he's not an asshole. But I'm worried, you guys. I'm worried he's an asshole. Because he won't send him the DP. Yeah, I'm scared that he like the first thing that occurred to me was like, what if he's like hoarding her pictures so that he can like do whatever he wants later and he doesn't want to give her any ammunition. Oh, like this whole relationship has been a long con to get some amateur porn.

I think speaking as somebody who is afraid of sending dick pics. Yeah, what's your ratio of beauty's receive versus DP's out? I've sent two dick pics in my whole entire life. And it's just because like my dick looks really ugly. I don't find, I don't know, like I've had what I've only also only had one person that asked me over and over again to send a dick pic. And I was and I would always say like, I just feel so embarrassed doing it. I can't do it.

Like that being said, send me nude pictures of you, which she did anyway. But she would like, I would say, you know what, I don't, we don't need to do this at all. I can't send a dick pic. I'll send all these like shirtless pics. My dick when it's on a camera, it just makes me laugh. It doesn't look good. It's not photogenic. And then one day she was having like a really bad day.

So I sent her a dick pic. Just to cheer her up with the D. And that's really nice, man. Maybe I sent her snap dick things. But it's got to be, it's got to be, you have to be open. You can't be like, you can't expect the nude pics and not, and not send the dick pic if it's asked. Yeah. So I think what I would do here, she takes a nude photo, really hot one, right?

And then she zooms in just past all the exciting parts. Okay. And then she's like, I'll zoom all the way out. Oh. Then, you know, you screenshot it, you send it. Yeah. You zoom all the way out for a picture of your penis. Uh-huh.

And then you're getting exasperated. I'm starting to rethink my opinion on this because like I'm reversing it in my head. And like if a guy is sending a bunch of pictures of himself to a girl and she's like happy to receive them. And then he's like, I want pictures of you. And she's like, no, I would want for him to respect her boundaries. Right. But like that, but that's taking it halfway, right? Yeah.

So he's respecting her. If he, if he says, or if she says, I like getting your dick pics, but I don't want to send any nude photos. Then like the conversation is over. As long as he, as long as she doesn't keep on asking for, I forget who was doing the scenario. But as long as that person doesn't keep on pressing after the initial conversation. Yeah. There shouldn't be pressure either way. Yeah.

But I feel too embarrassed, too ashamed to send a picture of my penis, but I love getting your nude photos. Then that's one thing, but he can't keep on asking her for the photos and say like, I demand you send me nude photos. Yeah. Keep on sending me nude photos. And he's not going to pony up and like have an exchange. Yeah. That's what's bothering me is like the pony up part of this. Like I don't want, I take back like withholding pictures until like, if you want to send naked pictures.

Then that's your prerogative, but it shouldn't be with like a a an exchange in mind. But she's not as, she is only sending them because he's asking for them. This isn't her on her own volition to taking nudes. She said she likes it. She said she doesn't want to be prompted. She also said that he asked for them. Yeah. Yeah, I think.

If he's asking for them, then he has to realize that he might need to pay for them in a certain way. Yeah. I think that that I like God, this is hard because I don't have, I don't have experience from like I've either done no nude pictures with the person I'm dating or like all nude pictures all the time. Or all dick pics all the time. Just a verse. She finds pictures of dicks that she photographs in the wild. Okay, I have a maybe like a new approach. Like if it is embarrassment, if it's like what Jake's talking about where you don't feel confident about the way.

It's not the size either. It's just cosmetic problems. It's non photo. It's all the weird warts on it, but it's like. Okay, then like maybe you can like do a sexy photo shoot of the two of you together. And he can like see the way he looks hot with you and like how those pictures would be hot for both of you to look at. Then he might be like more into sending some solo hot pics. Right.

That's true. You could definitely make him feel good enough about his dick that he'd want to photograph it and share it with you. Yeah. So it's like next time you're together, maybe you take the dick pic and then the floodgates are open. The ice has been broken and then he feels more comfortable sending you some solo shots down the road. Yeah. Because she doesn't have a why right now. She like guesses that it might be embarrassment and that seems pretty legit.

Also like a guy would never be like, I'm embarrassed of my penis unless you're as open as Jake or what? I'm not embarrassed of my penis. You're putting words in my mouth. I said I'm ashamed of how I look. Let's backtrack. I said it wasn't photogenic. We got to go, but thank you so much. You know, I said it was too big for the camera, right?

It wouldn't fit in a frame as all without panorama mode. She's also mentioned that they haven't had like a real conversation. She's only brought it up joking. Yeah. And he just changes the subject. Yeah. So maybe he doesn't, he might not be aware that it's an actual issue that she really does want these dick pics. Because I think a big part of it too is like, why would you really want this dick pic?

Why would you really want a picture of me dick? Okay, I really do. I want to look at it. Then maybe you do give it to her. I like the idea of doing it together or at least being there the first time it happens. Yeah. A sexy photo shoot. Or like talking about why you want that dick pic in like a hotter way than so that it's even.

Mmm. Yeah. Say you want it regardless of how many nudies you sent him. Yeah, it's not that it's unfair. If you're doing the nude photo exchange, it's worth at least having a, maybe they already have, like one of those don't, an NDA. Yeah. They could sign an NDA.

Yeah, so that it's illegal for him to disseminate it later. That's actually a good idea. Although I should be an app. I think it is illegal anyway. Yeah, I guess it is. It's like inherently illegal. Oh, it's not. I mean, they're like revenge porn is a real thing that happens all the time and the guys are protected behind like the laws.

I thought one of the guys that started the revenge porn site just went to jail. But the, all the men that posted those videos did not. They did not. The guy that started the site went to jail. Yeah. He also went to jail for jaywalking. It was a completely different crime. Well, kind of makes you think you can't go to jail for jaywalking.

Oh yeah. Yeah. I'm thinking of something else entirely. Right. Burner. Cool. I think we answered this lady's question. Did you think you did?

Yeah. I think you did. Did you think you did? I think I did. I think that I agreed with Julia, so that's like me answering it as well. Great. Do you have anything you want to plug before we have to go? You already mentioned your album, which is on sale for pre-sale right now on julianunes.com.

Your podcast that was us on headgum.com. Is it hosted anywhere else? It's on YouTube and SoundCloud. Yeah. iTunes. That's right. And. Anything else that's not related to any podcasting album.

Or album. Promote something. Just say something. How about like Gums. Save the whales. God. We start pushing you. Save some.

Save the whales. Come on. Promote something already. No. No pressure. No pressure. No pressure. Oh, I have a good thing to promote.

Yeah. There is a petition to end Revenge Porn. I think that I would end it on. Thematically good. Yeah. Honestly, we are at the hour mark, so we got to cut you off. But thank you so, so much. I want to look it up.

Okay. The thing I want to promote is change.org. There is a petition to end Revenge Porn. So you just go to change.org and search end Revenge Porn. And sign the petition so that guys can be held accountable for sharing porn of their ex-girlfriends because they're pissed that the relationship is over. Yeah. That sounds like a pretty worthwhile cause.

Yeah. Between that and your album, I feel like people have two things to do right now. Please. Thanks, Julia, for coming on our show. Finally, 171 episodes in. That hell took you so long. Had to move to LA. Oh, yeah.

We had to wait for you to move to Los Angeles. Yeah. And if you have your own questions or your own theme song submissions or own anything, everything is the same email address. If I were you, show at gmail.com. The opening theme song, which you really liked, right, was from Brandon and John. And this closing one is from Allie and Lisette, one of our most prolific songwriters who made a Delilah cover for us. So thank you, Allie and Lisette and Brandon and John and Jake and Julia.

Thanks for having me. We'll be back next week. Bye. Hey there, Amir. How's it going in LA? I've got a couple things to say to you. But please do not tell Jake. He'd be upset.

He'd probably call an album threat. Would halt sunset. Hey there, Amir. I found Jake her with son Tinder. I was mildly confused when I saw he used your picture. Yes, he did. The bio was awfully morbid. The things he said.

Oh, he tried to fool me. Oh, he said that he was you. Oh, your identity was stolen by JVs. Hey there, Jake. Please don't say this to Amir. Buddy, let's slip a secret that I think you ought to hear your mom's involved. I'd like to have this problem solved. It's kind of fogged.

Sotted them together underneath a pink umbrella. And I think that Sam would like to know she was with another fella who was a beer. They shared a hot dog and a beer. Down by the beer. Oh, I saw them at a bar. Oh, she held them in her arms. Oh, please don't give him harm. Oh, where the makey has the charm.

Jake's a fraud and he's so cool. Amir's a player but he's a fool who couldn't help but love his media eyes. Jake's insecure and really shy. That's why he's picked another guy. We think that he is great the way he is. Amir and Jake, I promise you that everything we've said is true. Your lives will never ever be the same and you're to blame. That was a pretty great song even though it was all fake.

Yeah, except the part about Jake's mom.