Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - Card-Carrying Victim | Ep. 337

Episode Date: July 14, 2026

Soren is convinced he could get a stranger to hand over $100, while Daniel insists $20 and a fake microphone are all you need. The guys workshop increasingly elaborate scams, debate the right amount of gratitude after lending someone money, and discover that sleeping outside is much less peaceful once the sprinklers, rooster, and mystery bites show up—all of which somehow still earns Soren the bravery award.Thanks to Mint Mobile for sponsoring this episode. Make the switch! http://MINTMOBILE.com/QQFollow the guys on Bluesky!https://bsky.app/profile/danielobrien.bsky.socialhttps://bsky.app/profile/sorenbowie.bsky.socialBonus episodes 2x/month at patreon.com/quickquestion OR Apple Podcasts

Welcome to quick, quick question for you all right. I want to hear your thoughts. I don't know what's on your mind. I've got a quick, quick question for you all right. The answer's not important. I'm just glad that we can talk tonight. So what's your favorite? Who did you get?

I think you're a... Welcome back. It's Quick Question the podcast. I'm Daniel O'Brien, joined as always, by Mr. Soren, Bui. He's too good at everything Wow See if I wonder If that's what's playing in your head

All the time when you walk around town Does that mean you have It's unclear If you like yourself If you have a good self image or a bad self image Yeah I'm really flipped there didn't it I'm hated I'm hated everywhere I go

But it's because everyone's so insanely jealous of me. Yeah. So, yeah, it really flips. I think that means I do really like myself. I think so. Well, then you'll be uniquely situated to answer this devious quick question that I have. Okay, great.

And it's one that I wish we could, it's almost a taskmaster thing. It's something that I wish we could test out in real life. And maybe one day we will meet up live with a camera and do it. That's that show with Kumail Nanjani, right? That's right. America's sweetheart. Definitely everyone loves him, and he did not use to ruin a bunch of other people's comedy sets back in L.A.

in the early 2000s. I'm wondering, sometimes I think about that. Sorry, I don't mean to derail us immediately, but Kumil Nanjani, we did a comedy set with him. I still think, like, why do I hate him? Do I hate him because they genuinely don't like him and like what he does, or do I just have this axe to grind

because he once was so terrible to us at a comedy show? Terrible to us and also would like... He was like, like, mean and vicious with a sniper-like precision at our comedy show. But he also had a reputation at the time,

and I think he's gotten much better. He had a reputation for getting drunk at other stand-up shows and ruining them in other ways with less sniper-like precision. Okay. I mean, I love the movie Sick. I thought that was very good. I think he's a funny guy. Big Sick.

Yeah. The Big Sick. I thought he was great in, I thought Big Sick was great. I thought he was perfect in Silicon Valley. As a guy who is like awful and hateable by design. I think he was like, this is a good use. This is, this is, this is, this is, this is, this is a well, well-deployed Kumail. Yeah.

And I, and the, and when he was mean to us, he was doing it in a good way, he was like, successful. And I think that's a really, it's a really hard person to hate, but I'm really good at it, you know? Oh, I really don't, don't, don't like him at all. And it's very, I don't think it was too good on Taskmaster. Yeah. And I didn't either. I didn't either. There's one, there's a game in Taskmaster where they,

I think they wanted you, wanted you to do the bravest thing or the most vulnerable thing. And what he did was open up his browser history to Alex Horn, the assistant, the creator of Taskmaster. Yeah. Like you, I'm giving you permission to, I don't know what's on there. I didn't clear anything. You look at it and you can say what's on there.

and his search history was Google searches for Camille Nogiani and pornography and he is so he is like before the episode came out I was following on social media that like that Alex was talking about

this is this is crazy that he let me do this thing he really didn't want it to go on TV I can't believe this happened and he was really regretting it and he was like can we please cut this and then I watched it and saw that his search history was porn and Kumail Nanjiani Google results. And man, is there anyone in the world who didn't think that's exactly what it was going to be?

There is nothing less surprising to me than the idea that with idle time, he is Googling Kumail Nanjiani. Maybe Kumail Nanjiani strong. I could see that being something he Googles regularly. But anyway, so we're in a quick question. Yeah, go ahead. How much money do you think you could get from a stranger? And you can't say, you can't give it back. And you can't say this is for the podcast quick question

where I'm doing a contest to see how much money I can get. you need to just get money from a stranger. What is the maximum amount you think you can get? And how would you get it? And then the next time I'm in Los Angeles, let's try and do it. Let's try to just take money from people. Yeah. I mean, I need some time to plan it.

But I'm pretty confident from an absolute stranger I could get a hundred dollars a hundred dollars yes yeah i think i could get a hundred dollars that's fucking nuts you you don't think you were you expecting something less than that i think i always knew that you were going to say i think i can get twenty dollars from a stranger and i had it in my gut that you would you would aim higher for yourself yeah but a hundred dollars is crazy to me. How? Well, deception. I think I'm going to have to do a, I got it, I'm bringing a clipboard and a piece of paper that I've printed out on your printer, honestly.

But it's going to be like a, it's going to have to be a subscription service or like a magazines or something that I can go from a door to a door and I can say, hey, would you like this? would you like subscriptions to these things? You could get it and it's going to be this much a month or you could just buy it all up front for a full year of National Geographic magazine or whatever for $100. I think I could get $100. Like an actual old-fashioned scam. Yeah.

The kind of scam that I have fallen for. I was at my friend Samantha, not even at my home. I was at my friend Samantha's apartment. She was sick, and I came over to make her soup, and she was sleeping, and then someone came to the door, and they were like, I am selling magazines door to door. And I was like, well, I don't, well, bad news, buddy, this isn't even my door. I don't live here. And he was like, but you live somewhere. Do you want magazines?

It's like, damn, I do. And I bought, like, a bunch of subscriptions that I never got. I'm like, oh, it's a scam. It's not a scam. They didn't get my credit card information and take all of my money. They took a few magazine subscriptions worth of money and then rode off into the sunset.

And I never got my magazines. Which is fine. I didn't want them. I just don't know how to make people leave sometimes. I felt that it was a scam as it was happening. I was getting these magazines for my kids. And as it was happening, I was getting the sense that this was a, a scam. But it was somebody who was doing it for their school or whatever. And then I, in the middle of it, I was like, I kind of wanted it to be a scam because then I was like, you know, that's a small price to pay for every other time that somebody comes to my door. I say, oh, I don't do it at the door. I just don't do it. I got scammed once and I don't do it anymore. I wanted that to be true when I said it going forward in the future. So I was like in the middle of this scam thinking, hmm, I think I'd like this to be a scam. I think I'd like to have that under my belt.

I can't believe $100 was very shocking to me And then going door to door is crazy to me In this day and age Going door to door And asking for anything Well I have other plans

That was like Like the first first up Was like okay I could get If I go door to door Here's the thing I can't be I'm not the type of person Who can out on the street

Just come up to somebody And be like Hey This is the same thing situation. I need some money because of this and this and this because that's the immediate way to get somebody to shut down. That's the way you're doing it wrong. I'm going to overwhelm them with confusion. You're going door to door with your with your deception. I am sprinting up to them and holding something that looks like it could be a microphone and in the way that like all fucking content now is someone holding a little fluffy thing that is like it's the one. reason that everything that you see on your phone looks disgusting. It's grotesque, all these

lapel mics in hand, and the subway takes guy who has one taped to a metro card. It's all atrocious. I would do something like that. I would grab some like fuzzy frog or some other stupid piece of bullshit and run up to someone like I'm Billy on the street. And I'm doing this in L.A. I'm on the Santa Monica Promenade because people are so trained that like cameras are everywhere and and TikTok is constantly happening and Instagram live is constantly happening and anything is a show now especially if I'm in Los Angeles in Santa Monica on the promenade if I just run up to someone holding some bullshit and I'm very excited and I'm like $20 and you win give me $20 if you win $20 in my hand right

now and you win and they give me $20 and I say you win and then maybe I have another buddy come up and throw confetti or something and then I run away I think they would A, I think they would do it. I think Taurus and Santa Monica have $20 on hand. And I think they would do it thinking there is a camera somewhere. Everyone's looking at me. This is going on. And I think they would also think he's going to give me that money back and explain the premise of this bit eventually.

But here's where my training comes into play. I'm so fast that I don't come back. And I just run. And I know the streets of Santa Monica. I know better than anyone. And so you can't even find me on these streets. I'm in the wind. I'm taking my shirt off.

I look like a totally different guy. You have the door code to that one office park alley. That's right. That's a really good idea, actually, to treat it like you're on some sort of show and that they to just get the money from the $20 feels completely reasonable in that respect. I think $100 they'd be much less like that. Right.

think anything over 20 they'd be like no I'm not going to give you $50 right now but 20 and also if people are like me one of their greatest fears is being on someone's tictock live show and looking stupid I think about it all the time everywhere I go I worried I'm one of these little punks fucking show and then I'm gonna make me look stupid because I don't know anything about whatever their stupid shit is and I think there are a lot of people like me and if I come up with a with a stupid hat and a tight shirt and I'm like $20 and you win $20 and you win and I'm like ha ha ha ha of course I'm a team player it's you're the guy

from the thing here's $20 and then I'm like peace and I'm gone and I'm so fast and I did exist it and I did in fact and here's the thing that does mean I robbed a person yeah and there could be consequences for me and I don't think I would be able to explain to the ghost of you you don't exist anymore

No, but like, here's the thing about my premise. There actually are cameras everywhere, and people are filming things all the time. And at a place like Santa Monica Promenade, there are security cameras too. So even if I outrun this person, the police state will track me down and be like, you robbed that person. I was like, no, you don't understand. It's not robbery because I asked for it and they gave it to me. They'd be like, that's technically true. but we can't

we can't let something like this happen we can't let a person like you exist so you have to go to jail now I still don't think that's gonna they're tracking you down for $20 I think that they're not that's not worth it to them because you also don't live in Santa Monica

you're not like I don't have anywhere I'm off the fucking grid unless you've been doing this a lot and they're like FBI's finally on your trail and they're like we got to catch this guy this has been a problem then I think think you do this one time in Santa Monica.

That's, no one's, no one's coming after you. You're not looking over your shoulder the rest of your life. No. And if they do catch me, guess what? Where's your proof? I already spent the money. Look, there are things in life that you don't want to be transparent. Like, you're close.

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The reason I said 100 is that I think that you're, I think most people who are doing any sort of trickery or anything like that out in the streets. They're trying to get small amounts. And there's an amount threshold where you're beyond that where suddenly it seems genuine. Where like whatever you're offering or whatever you need it for, like you're past the point where it could be a scam. Right. You know what I mean? Who are seeking money to buy drugs.

Where I grew up, what they do is they come up to you and they say, excuse me, my wallet was stolen. I just need 50 cents. I'm short a couple of dollars to get a train ticket home to see my daughter who is sick right now. I just need a little bit. They do that to enough people and they get enough money cobbled together by coins and dollars to buy the drugs that they want to buy. That is a very recognizable. No, no one is coming up and saying like, excuse me, I just need, I'm a normal person with means. I just don't have my wallet right now.

So can I have a quarter? That's not a real situation. You can tell that's a scam. Right. And I'm not going to do, I'm not going to put busking on here. I'm not going to offer something from my house because that is a trade. It means I am giving them back the value of or what I think, believe to be the value of what they're giving me. So it needs to be something where I need to deceive them.

But 100 feels so big that they're going to be like, okay, all right. I mean, I have $100. I can help you. I can do that. this. I think I'm warming up to it just because in my neighborhood, these aren't scams. I mean, they might be. I don't actually know.

But like frequently someone will come to the door and say, hi, I'm in the neighborhood. I'm installing a window at your neighbor's place and they'll point to some vague house. We're installing windows. Would you like a free quote on your windows? And I say no. They're extremely pushy. Yeah. I don't believe it's a scam.

I do believe it's a very aggressive sales technique for windows, I guess. But it happens enough that it's common enough that it doesn't, you wouldn't immediately call the police if a Soren buoy type came to your door and was like, yeah. I am, my name is Soren. I do pest removal. or law and blah, blah, blah. I offer some kind of service

that a couple of people on your block do. Would you like me to do yours? It's normally $200, but because I'm already going to be in this area, I'm charging $100 flat monthly. You can cancel it any time. And I will, you know, there's not landscaping in California

like there is out here. So you would rearrange their rocks or scream at their cactus or whatever it is that you people do out there. I think that there's, There's also, I mean, I use the example of magazine subscriptions because I was trying not to be as evil as I possibly as I could be, which is, I could easily just go to people's doors as doctors without borders. Or I go to people's door as, um, uh, heal the bay or I sit in front of a whole foods and I do that. And I'm like, actually, if you want to be a part of the nature conservancy, you've got to donate.

It's actually this much a month. It's like, it's going to be $20 a month. Or if that's too much for you, you could just do a hundred dollar flag. now but I'm only I can't accept less than that like that and they would and they would assume that you're supposed to be there because they've seen your picture inside the Whole Foods they don't realize it's for the iced teeth thing they're just like I've that's employee of the month I've seen him before yeah I could easily and Doctors Without Borders does that and they're very pushy too doctors with borders comes

Doctors without borders come people's houses and they're like hey here's what we're doing here's a little piece of paper that's in a plastic sheath somehow that makes it more legitimate. But like, take a look. Take a look at what Doctors Without Borders is doing. And you're like, okay, great. I will donate online. And they're like, actually, it means a lot more when you do it when we come to your door.

And I'm like, I don't know because I got scanned once and now I have my card carrying victim. So I don't have to do this anymore. I get to, I just donate online now. But I think I could easily do that. Those people were all over the Santa Monica Promenade when I worked there. Yeah. Just like, excuse me, do you have two minutes to talk about the environment It was like,

the question always pisses you off, man. The question is always like, hey, do you have two seconds to protect dogs? Yeah. Oh, God. No.

No. Kill them. I don't even have two seconds, so kill them. That's the other alternative, right? Is that I'm now a dog murderer because of the question that you ask and I'm not stopping.

Okay, yeah, sure. Write me, put me down for no. No, I don't. I think. you could do that. I also used to have to gain signatures. My wife, you know, environmentalist, she would occasionally when she worked for the collision for clean air or the American Long Association, they would be constantly needed signatures for shit. It's all about like smoking in calabasas. Like let's make smoking in calabasasas illegal or whatever it is. And so you're going to get a bunch

of signatures from people that say, hey, we're residents of this area. We would like outdoor smoking to be not tolerated anymore. And so you're just going around and getting signatures. So I'm like, go into a laundromat. And you get a lot of turnover there and you're just, and people are sitting there so they've got time and they can't leave. So you can be like, hey, I don't want any money from you. I just need a signature.

And I think that if you are troublesome enough, you could be like, I could make all this just go away for 20 bucks. Look, you don't have to sign anything. You don't have to sign anything, but if you give me $20, I'll leave you alone. And every time that I see you from now on, I'll leave you alone. I'll put you on the list that we don't go to this house. And I could do sort of like a mafia type of thing where I could make your life a lot easier if you just give me some money right now. Those door to door, let me talk about the environment or in my case, let me talk to you about your windows.

they're so potentially fraught because or maybe just for me maybe if you just have a short temper like I do where the guy will come and say hey we're doing some windows can we look at your windows and give you a free estimate on what it would cost to make your windows more energy efficient and I'll say no no thank you

and then they'll say oh that's that's that's that's all right Can I ask why? Now I'm furious. Because now... We were supposed to have this conversation. Because I don't have a reason. And now I feel stupid for not having a reason. The reason is I don't think this is how business is supposed to happen.

The reason is I don't think a person is supposed to come to my house. And that's where I get my windows from. I'm supposed to get my windows from Amazon like everybody else. And the fact that you're here and you're asking me and I was so quick to say, I don't want energy efficient windows in a way that suggests I have a good reason. And then you ask me why, what my reason is. Now I feel stupid. Now I'm insulted.

Now it will get violent. Now more questions. Now if you further question my decision making, we're going to have an issue. I'm starting to wonder, because no one's carrying $100 around with them in cash. No. So I'm going to have to have some sort of tap situation. Do I have that in the inner scenario? I think you can get Venmoed or tapped, yes.

Oh, I think Venmo is too sketchy. I think that they won't do it. Or maybe because they can track me. Yeah, I need some sort of tap where I can basically be like, do you have a card? Let's just tap it. And you know what? You just sponsored a kid in Yemen.

Oh, okay. I thought you were going to show them a picture of one of your kids and then they would have to be like, you just sponsored a kid in Norway. Cute, right? No, you're right. They don't have a ton of,

it's not a ton of poverty in Norway. It's really just a couple of kids who need a helping hand. Yeah, the person's like, is he playing PlayStation right now in that picture? Yeah, look, don't look too closely at it. All right. Okay.

Yeah, I need some time to think about it I think I could get money. Did I tell you that I had no money in the streets in italy? And you ran out of money completely in Europe and you slept on benches. I remember that. I'm sure you've talked about it on the podcast.

Did you ask people for money? No. I had a jar of peanut butter with me and I was eating that pretty much every day. At one point, I stole a blood orange and it felt terrible about it. And it was like, never doing that. again.

But the entire time, I had a camera, and I was like, what if I could just pawn this camera? And so I'm like wandering around kind of like, my peripherals like looking for a pawn shop, thinking if it gets dire enough and I really need to eat something, maybe I could just pawn this camera. And then as I'm sitting there with the camera and like, after thinking about this, because I can just look at it to think about it, it's sitting next to me. and I see somebody walk through this piazza who's like looking at the camera. And I was like, what if my stuff got stolen?

What if everything got stolen? What if I go the other direction? What if everything gets stolen? And then I am helpless. People will just give me money then. Watch the opposite of pawning something. What if I'm a victim? Oh, that would be so great.

maybe I could be the victim of something. And maybe I can say all my money got stolen and I wasn't just dumb and ran out on my own. I think there was a band that did that when I was in college. It's, it can't be gaslight anthem, but it was because that, because they continued to be a successful-ish band. But I feel like there was some like band band, not a band that was just like buddies trying to make it. It was an established band that was like,

we have a gig in New Brunswick, but unfortunately someone stole all our equipment. They stole all our instruments so we can't play the gig. And then everyone raised money so they could buy new instruments and they played the gig. And then we heard about them doing it again later. It's like, that's a pretty... I mean, it's a decent scam, I guess, but it's...

Yeah. I guess, I suppose kudos that you group of guys found each other to bond over not one but two things that you like music together and also crime. It's rare. It's rare to find people so on the same page. Yeah, all of them with the same ethics or the same lack of ethics to be like, this is fine with all of us, let's do it.

So Daniel, I guess that question then is you know how much you could get in person or how much you think you could get in person? How much do you think you could get online from one person? Oh, from one person? Yeah. $1,500.

Yeah, I think it's really high. I think like $2,000. And it wouldn't even, it wouldn't take long. It would be so fast. And I think I could do it. I don't think I'd have to go through like multiple people. Like I have to keep like cold calling or anything like that. I think I could pretty easily get $2,000 from a single human.

I am conservatively I think if I get 1500 it's because that's the number I asked for I think I if I because I want to put something on paper with you so I can meet a goal if I'm just like

blue skying it I don't know I mean for multiple people that you could get it's it's so easy to grift in a way that like we we have given money to people online people that through social media and stuff that are asking for it because they're in dire situations or so we

believed and it turned out that this was just their thing every once in a while they would just ask for a bunch of money and everyone was like okay you must need it if you're asking for it because that's such a humiliating thing and we didn't realize that within their brain that part's broken that part shut down it's like there is no humiliation there's no bottom yeah it's it's tough because I know this sounds like very, very Pollyanna and everything, but like, I truly think everyone should be able to live and no one should have to worry about money. And I'm not siding with landlords. I think, like, rent is, is too high and money is too stressful for too many people. And we've, we've built society incorrectly that, uh, we've been, we've all been duped by

corporations and landlords. Uh, that said, the people that you're talking about who would routinely be like, can't make rent. It's almost the first of the month. Rent is due again. And I'm so close, but if I don't make it, I'll get kicked out of my house

and I don't know what I'll do. Part of me, after having already given money to these people, it's just like, well, you know, that's true of me too. I also have rent due, and if I don't pay it, there will be problems. How did this happen again?

This wasn't unexpected. fifth time. You know this is going to keep happening, right? I'm not just your person who pays your rent. I don't want that to be the situation. Yeah. Every time that even on blue sky, I see it all the time where somebody is like, hey, help this trans person who's really struggling. And I'm like, bet, here we go.

Like, you can have some money. Here's some money. Here's some money. And then everyone's when I'm like, I think I've given this person money a lot. I think I keep giving this person money. Am I this person's job? Right. And I know that like it's the point of helping someone when you have the means to help them is,

is you're helping someone and you have the means to help them. And that's it. But at a certain point, like, well, show me your monthly expenses. Where's the money going? The money that I'm sending you there. Yeah. Where is it actually going? I don't want to micromanage this.

but like... I do. Let's see. I think I've, in fact, I've earned the right to micromanage it. Yeah. Outside of businesses, people, individual people that I've given money to or friends that I've given money to, I know theoretically that I'm not supposed to have any say in where that money goes.

Yeah. But that's all I want. I, and in fact, no, that's not true. There's other thing that I want is the proper appreciation for what I did, which is. It's both deeply selfish things that I want from them in those circumstances, which is why money is so fraught. Like, giving money to friends is so fraught. I want to know where the money's going. And I want to be able to see it.

I want to be able to see some progress. And then I also want them to thank me the way that I want to be thanked, which is how could they possibly know? They can't. But I'll tell you a lot of times it's not enough. Whatever, if I'm giving them $100 or $200, and then I get a mass email that's like, hey, thanks, thanks everybody, you really save the day. I'm like, whoa, did you include me on an email with people who gave $5? That's, I think there should be tears here or something. You've got to think of some other system.

Or when they're like, sometimes they'll promise thing. shout out at the bottom of the email with like and specific thank you to the to the platinum level friendship soren buoy there it is yeah uh i want i want something other than just like oh the other thing is yeah you give over like a hundred dollars and somebody sends you back just like uh if it is on twitter blue sky or x or whatever and they're just like hey thanks i'm like i just that was a dm That was a DM, a one-word DM. I feel like you're, you would just owe me just a little bit more than that. I know, I know everybody else isn't giving you $150.

I know. I gave you. I know you're not sifting through a lot of these. Yeah. And we haven't talked in a long time. And I came out of the blue. You're, your guardian angel. I just want the proper.

amount of thank you. And if they gave that to me, the sky's a limit in terms of how much I'm going to give them the next time. It's like that Ben Franklin effect. If they give me a bunch, if they give me a bunch of praise, maybe even more than I deserve,

that I'm going to like, I'm like, oh, bet. Like from now on, you are getting, I'll give you whatever you want. You need a car? I'll get you a car. I'll figure out how to get you a car. I do this Doctors Without Borders thing

where I go to door to door and I can earn you someone pretty quick. Daniel, I have a question for you. shoot when was the last time that you in any capacity just slept outside in the open no tent just slept outside would have to be fourth of july um maybe 22 or 2023 you spent a night outside 24 yeah oh i mean a bunch of a night outside. Yeah. Yeah. That counts. And it was on purpose?

No. Okay. All right. There's a circle. Usually the circumstances are, yeah, you get drunk and you pass out somewhere. No, we used to live across the street from the, we used to live on the beach, and it was 4th July, so we would go and lay on the beach, and, like, eventually fireworks would happen. We'd fall asleep, and then we would wake up to fireworks above us, and we'd fall asleep again. Okay. All right. It's all very romantic and sweet.

My, and of course we were drunk. I mean, I can remember. You had asked me this question 20 years ago. I'd have been like, it was last weekend. I vividly remember that we got drunk and then the police came and everyone had to leave. And I ran through an alley and climbed on the roof of another building and realized I couldn't get down. And so I fell asleep up there.

Yeah. But I went to a guy. weekend really recently. My friend who's got a place in Ohio was going to have like a guys decathlon type of thing where we all come and we do a bunch of different sporting events and then one person wins, which is like right up my alley. Absolutely. I get there on the first night and the sleeping situations are not hot there because it's at somebody's house and it's a bunch of guys. And I'm trying to be respectful. I don't want to be the person who snores in a room and wakes everybody at.

else up because I've been on the other end of that and it sucks. I know that I snore if I'm not in a certain position. So I was like, you know what? I'm just going to bring a sleeping bag with me when I go up there. I'll just sleep outside. It's Ohio. What's the worst that can happen? And he's got like a little patio area.

There's some patio furniture out there. And I was like, I'll just sleep there. And everyone froze. It was like a record scratch moment where like you're going to you're going to sleep outside? I was like, yeah. And they're like, in the open. where things can get you. I was like, yeah.

Yeah. And it seemed crazy to them that I would even consider the possibility of sleeping anywhere that didn't have walls around it. And then I started double checking and I was like, why is that weird? Why is it? I know I haven't done it in a while because you go camping with kids and stuff. You don't sleep. I've done a lot camping trips too where you just, you don't bring a tent. You're just outside.

Yellow frost on your sleeping bag in the morning. That kind of sucks. Other than that, it's a big deal. That's more of my concern than, like, critters or bugs getting at me. It's just, like, waking up at 3 in the morning wet from... Yeah, you get due. Or whatever happens at night that makes it wet. But that's the joy of a sleeping bag.

In a sleeping bag, it's not really going to bother. Unless it's raining on you. And you're in a synthetic bag. Nothing's going to really get through to you. So I'm like, it's no big deal. But then I start feeling a little more heroic because no one else is willing to do this. And they all think that I'm a lunatic for sleeping outside. And I was like, no, I'm one with nature.

Are you not? When did you give up on that relationship? And so everybody also, they're all older. And I thought we'd be drinking that pretty much that whole night. No, everybody's going to bed at 11 o'clock because they want to get up the next morning for their pickleball. like they're pickleball and swimming and archery. Sure. Decahathlon.

And so I go to sleep out there. And it's kind of hard to fall asleep at first because, you know, you're in a sleeping bag, you're not used to being that confined. And then, I'd say within five minutes of me falling asleep, everything just goes completely wrong. And it was a huge mistake, I'll say, for me to sleep outside. I should never have tried. It was so dumb of me to try to sleep outside.

First of all, he lives on this property that's got trees, but all the trees have lights that shoot up the tree, but I guess those lights don't go on until midnight. And so all these lights go on at once, and then the sprinklers go on at the same time. So it's just this Bellagio show all of a sudden in front of me. And it's all at once. Like, it's really alarming and startling.

All these lights go on, and then the sprinklers are making these terrible gurgling noises. It's not just like a, you know, there's all the, like, the sprinklers that are fucked up out there that are like bubbling and stuff like that. And so it's just, it's loud in a way that is not consistent and it's also very bright. And I was like, that's fine. I'll power through this. How long can sprinklers go on for? Well, it turns out a long time.

I mean, people, it was probably over an hour that these sprinklers were doing their thing. And I finally turn away from them. I'm trying to go back to sleep. And from, I would say on the hour, from one to two to three, there's a rooster on a nearby property, a ranch somewhere that's just very confused. He's guessing. He's guessing at that point. He knows the hour. He knows that that he has that figured out, but he doesn't remember when the sun actually rises.

And so rooster just going off every hour on the hour. And that really fucks you up because that's an abnormal noise. and as a parent I don't want to blame this entirely on my kids but as a parent you're keyed into new noises because a new noise means something is wrong

and I didn't used to be this key into new noises I just sort of accepted them but every new noise I'm like I'm up for but the first part of the night was wonderful I could hear frogs it was dark

and there was a screech owl that was nearby and that was very charming to me until later that night there was a barn owl in the tree right near where I was sleeping. And it sounded like he was just screaming at me. Just like a scree. That's not a barn owl, if you're not familiar, does not do a pleasant little who. It does like a real scream.

And like it's in trouble. So screeching. The whole night I was kind of like, what am I doing? Like, why am I out here? What am I gaining from this? It's also I'm in a sleeping bag and it's hot and I can't quite get the, temperature right because you know you got to kick like one leg out of the bag and stuff and then then you're getting cold and so you're slipping it back in also the the the hood of a sleeping

bag has just never been a convenient thing see it's always in the way unless your head is in it and then you're sweating your fucking ass off yeah so but i tough it out and i stay out there the entire night because i don't want to be the guy who moved back in after everyone was like you can't sleep outside that's dangerous yeah so i tough it out the entire night. I do not sleep well at all. And the next morning I'm complaining about it. And I'm like, but at least it was just that.

I have, for the past week, have had some sort of bites on my body that are beyond mosquito. I don't know what got me. But bites that are so insanely itchy and sting so bad and have lasted for over eight,

now nine days that I have no idea what they are, but I fucking got me. Two follow-up questions. Yeah. Did you win the decathlon? No.

No. Humiliating. How terrible. I know. I'll go into one. I can't believe. But what have you put on the bites? Just cortisone.

Okay. Like a steroid. And that's, it's doing nothing. I mean, it has no, it takes no, no purchase against these bites. Like the, one of the bites is finally going away. you can see it right there. But it was, it was, it was like a separate nipple

is what it looked like. It was a bumpy on the around the outside, then the middle had a little raised area that looked filled. It wasn't a great situation. And it was the most, it has been consistently, the most distracting bite I've ever had.

I got another one on my neck, and then I got one on my hip. And they're awful. Something, a tarantula or something got me. Yeah. Now, for the decathlon. The decathlon was soccer. It was swimming, archery, horseshoes, pickleball.

A lot of those are not my sport. I have a lot of sports under my belt. A lot of those are not mine. I do feel like that's not 10 things. Oh, well, when I say decathlon, I just mean it was a bunch of sports all combined. So we had a, but you also had T. teams. So you were on it with somebody else. And then as a team, you would score points throughout

it based on how you did. And then at the end, you don't compete against that person that's on your team. You're just, the two of you are now the champions. Obviously, soccer. That's a sport I played when I was young enough that I'm now, you know, the door's not shut on me going back to FIFA. The things that I was doing on this field two on two was stuff you'd be seeing out there in a game between America and Paraguay. Like, I was unstoppable, right? Pickleball, I'm not, I'm going to say I'm not good at,

and I don't have a natural proclivity for it. That means a lot for me to say, Daniel, about a sport, that I don't have a proclivity for it. I was not good at pickleball and didn't know you could be. Do you never play it? Never play it. I never play it, but the thing that I know about pickleball is that it's, it's, it started for seniors who are trying to stay active.

And the selling point is it's very easy to do. Yeah. I understand that it, that that's the, you know, it's a low floor, high ceiling kind of thing. Anyone can play. But if you're playing with real competitors, I understand that it doesn't, it doesn't, it doesn't, make everyone great at pickleball. It just means that everyone can play it. Yes.

The trajectory of pickleball is that it was, from what I understand, started for seniors and then commandeered by hipsters and young people. Yeah, Tom Brady and some vampires. And now but who then... There's a lot of hedge fund and AI money. Ruined the sport for some reason. I didn't understand the scoring or anything like that.

I had like the fundamentals of like tennis, right? You just hit a ball over a net. And that's sort of the job. And it has to bounce a certain number of times. Or only for the beginning. Then after that doesn't have to bounce it all. But learn the rules as I was going and didn't realize, like, there's a real strategy to hitting somebody else with the ball, to, like, hitting the ball across the net and

trying to nail somebody with it or hitting it right at their feet. That's like the goal is you put it as close to their body as you can. So positioning is really, really tough. And these guys were very good at it. And these are all bankers and stuff. guys were good at pickleball. Yeah, they were very good at pickleball. The swimming, swimming is something I did when I was young.

I went to Junior Olympics, Dan. I thought, oh, swimming. I'll kill in this. These guys, one of them is an iron man. So he swims in the ocean, which is like a totally different animal. The other one looks very much like Michael Phelps. He just has the right body for it and is designed for the water. So, yeah, I got crushed there as well.

Archery, that was great. Archery was a brand new thing where nobody else was doing. No one else had done it before. And I was like, yeah. I can kick ass at aiming things. This is great. Yeah. But ultimately, I didn't even come close.

My guy and me, we didn't even come close to winning. We got absolutely rocked. What an elite squad that this person put together. I hated it. I hated losing to them. And also, you're so, you're tired, covered in poison bug bites. I'm exhausted. You know, play soccer.

We played, these were 20, no, these were 25 to 30 minute matches because we finally brought it back down to 25 because it was the 30 minute matches were getting to be a lot. That's a lot of exercise and a lot of cutting, a lot of moving. I walked out of there feeling like shit. Like I'm 43 years old. I walked out of there with my back's hurting and has hurt for the whole week. My foot is hurting in a weird way. where I thought maybe I had done your weird airport thing where I'd broken it.

But it was only hurting when I'd walk on it occasionally in certain ways and it was a blinding, stabbing pain where I had to sit down. Then I'd get back up and it would be fine. It's just the hurt in the most confusing ways where I was like, what am I doing? I shouldn't even be out here. But yeah, it was a bad weekend. It was a bad weekend that I anticipated really showing off

everything that I'm good at. And it turns out I'm not good at anything. anymore and that's going to be a tough pill for me to swallow going forward you win the bravery award you were the most brave of the whole weekend I was a brave little guy I slept outside you're bravely sleeping outside despite all of the dangers that I faced all right everybody thanks for listening this has been quick question with Sorin and Daniel you knew that if you liked our theme song that's by me Rex if you like a video version of this podcast you can watch it on YouTube if you want more this podcast. You can become a Patreon subscriber

and we give you a little extra, little bonus episodes every once in a while. Not every once in a while. Every other week we do it. It's got a real consistency to it. And this podcast in general, all brought to you by Gabe Harder. That's it.

Bye. Bye. question for you all right the answer's not important I'm just glad that we could talk tonight so what's your favorite who did you get? Two best friends and common heroes if there's an answer they're gonna find it I think you'll have a great time here I think you'll have a great time here