Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - Nowhere to Sit at the Ween Show

Episode Date: November 12, 2024

The guys talk the things people swear are good but are in fact bad, like swimming and concerts. They also discuss the top-heavy nature of halloween playlists and the nature of sports fandom. Thanks to Factor for sponsoring this episode. FACTORMEALS.com/qq50 and use code qq50 to get 50% off your 1st box plus 20% off your next  month.

I've got a quick quick question for you alright I wanna hear your thoughts, wanna know what's on your mind I've got a quick quick question for you alright The answer's not important, I'm just glad that we can talk tonight So what's your favorite? Who did you get? Who do I be? Do you remember? Words without a word at all You're going on I saw a movie Daniel O'Brien Two best friends and comedy writers 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.

So hello again and welcome to another episode of Quick Question with Soren and Daniel, the podcast where two best friends and comedy writers ask each other questions and give each other answers. I'm one half of that podcast, senior writer for last week tonight with John Oliver, author of How to Fight Presidents, and I'm sure you could tell by now. Once again, sick boy Daniel O'Brien joins us always with my colleague, Mr. Soren Buie. Soren, say hello. Hey everybody, I'm Soren Buie. I'm a writer for American Dad. Not currently sick, but really, I'm not surprised. Let me just say that. And it's not just you. I'm not like you've got a weak immune system. I think everybody's on the verge of it right now. Yeah. For just no reason.

Yeah. Just these things can just manifest out of absolutely nowhere. One day you just wake up and you're tired and you don't want to eat or drink or taste anything or go anywhere or talk to anyone or do your job. Do your political comedy job. It's just part of the game. A big shout out to our delicious, fresh, never frozen sponsor, Factor,

delivering delicious, fresh, nutritious, chef prepared meals ready to eat in just two minutes. Head to factormeals.com slash QQ50 and use code QQ50 to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month. Uh, soren, before we get into our show, I have a quick question for you. Yes. Oh man.

Wait, that's you mean let's jump into the show as opposed to let's do the bullshit. We usually do. No, I want to just like get a question out of the way and then do the bullshit later. Oh, okay, great. But I just I had a thing top of mind. I was it's a it's a it's a little basketball quiz for you. Oh, I was at my brother and sister-in-law's house the other day and my seven-year-old nephew has a basketball poster on his wall.

There are, uh, and it's like an NBA superstars, I think is what's the branding on it. There are seven players on that poster. Okay. I want to know if you can name them there. I, the one caveat without giving too much away is, is I would say this poster was probably made at the beginning of last season. Okay. Okay.

All right. Well, I mean, I'm gonna get the big ones out of the way. Curry's on there. Right at the gate. Wrong. Okay. Alright. Is Joker on there? Yes. That's one. Joel Embiid? Yes. Okay. Jalen Brown? No. Really? Okay.

This is good radio. I'm having fun. Wait. Jalen Brown's not on it. Oh, okay. It's gonna be, what's his name? KP. What? You know, KD. Yeah.

KD's on there. He's on there. Okay. LeBron James is on there. Finally. Yes. And there's not gonna be another Laker. They wouldn't do that. Okay, LeBron James is on there. Finally, yes. And... There's not gonna be another Laker. They wouldn't do that.

Oh, uh, is Westbrook on it? No. Wow, KDL asked Westbrook. They did- is there a single Celtic on it? Yeah. Oh, there is. You just picked- you picked the wrong one. Oh, who is it?

Jason Tatum. Okay, okay. Yeah. You just picked you picked the wrong one. Oh, who is it? Jason Tatum. OK, OK. Yeah. There's two more you're missing. One I think you're going to kick yourself. And the other one. Is Ja Morant on it?

No. Oh, OK. He didn't make it because of the extracurricular activity. Yeah, I think they were. Enough information had been out by the time this poster was made. Okay. Is there a, what's that? What's the, oh man, I can't think of his name. He was a clipper for a little while. Clipper for a little while. Yeah, I'll think of his name here in a second. If that's the way that you describe James Harden, that would be pretty funny.

It is not. Oh, is James Harden on it? No, he's not on it. Oh, that would have been surprising to me. Oh, Giannis. Yes. Okay, good. How many more do I have to go?

Just one more, but I'll just give it to you. But it is, this is the one I thought you'd be- Is it Luca? It's Luca. It's Luca who the league had been pushing for so long as like they're, for some reason, the league wanted Luca to be the new face of the sport. And I just can't put my finger on why, Luca specifically is who the NBA was pushing heavy.

Yeah, I wonder why. It's so strange, hard to get a bead on why, they white, they would have chosen. I know. I was surprised at this, like we were just talking about basketball, the seven-year-old nephew and I talking about it and I was asking him his favorite players and was shocked that he didn't like Curry. And then he was talking to me about his poster and I was like, take me to your room now.

Like I needed to see this poster to see who made the cut. And I was surprised to see Joellen Bede on there. I don't know how popular and how beloved he is. He's always up for potential MVP. Yes. Joellen Bede. So I think they have to put him on there. But yeah'm some of the other ones I'm surprised by. I am genuinely surprised by Luca. Yeah. I also, I, the reason that I gave you the caveat that of when roughly I think the poster was made is I feel like if a version of this poster gets made now, Ant-Man is going to be on there because that is, that is like every young kid's favorite player right now. Ant-Man? Oh, yeah!

Yeah. Oh, that's a surprise that he's not... I don't know why, it completely is based on him, but yeah, he's wonderful. Yeah. He's a real... He's an incredibly fun superstar that is very exciting

because you're watching the the the older players are they're all gonna retire the next couple of years and you're trying to figure out who is going to be the exciting face of the sport and you just you Jason Tatum is very good it's just the most boring surgical basketball player on the face of the earth so when Ant-Man comes out and is like demanding of the spotlight and doing cool tricks and having fun, he's like, oh good, sorry Tatum. Yeah, you're still great at basketball, sir, whatever.

But yeah. Daniel, I don't know if you remember at Cracked when I would proselytize about how Vaughn Miller was breaking this, the NFL and like changing it, revolutionizing it because I had this realization that before him you had a lot of defensive players who were famous. You have defensive players who are famous and you have two camps. Basically, you have defensive players who are famous because they're like beloved and they're

considered very smart players and they're considered really good at like, they're like guys you'd want to like go and have a drink with and talk about the game. And then there are defensive players who you are worried might murder somebody. Yeah. And like those are, but like both really well respected, but like clearly two different camps. And then if you go through them in your head and you're like, all right, but like, both were really well respected, but like clearly two different camps. And then if you go through them in your head and you're like, all right, well, who goes in each camp?

A real pattern emerges that's not pleasant. A pattern emerges that like, we are selling black defensive players as bad guys, and we are selling white defensive players as good guys. Like it was JJ Watt and it was like Carl Mecklenburg and like all these guys that from like, if you just look like, and even like Troy Palamalu, I think got kind of like, it just like got in there. And then on the other side, it was like, it was really, it was not a good look for the NFL. And then Vaughn Miller came along and Vaughn Miller was somebody who everyone was like, oh, we could be charmed by this guy and they were fine with it. And so I was really like shouting from the mountaintops

like we've changed. Like things are different now. Yeah. I feel like I could, I even in my, my waning football days was seeing a lot of like incredibly fawning puff pieces for JJ watt. They were, they, the league just really looked for any opportunity to celebrate this white Texas big strong football player as like, now I know he's not technically a troop, but isn't he like troop adjacent? Don't we love him?

We love this guy. Clay Matthews is another one. Like there, we had all these guys that we were just like, yeah, they hurt people, but I mean, look at them. They're so cute. And so it was really, it was a troubling realization for me because I had obviously participated in it. I hadn't realized it until that moment.

And so I was like, oh, fuck, another thing I missed. Anyway, I like this poster though. I'm into it when I was a kid I used to have a poster in my basement that was the best player on every team basically, it was like trading cards on a poster and I Had a nerf basketball hoop down there and I didn't understand a thing about the NBA And so I would go down there and I would be like, okay, obviously I'm the Nuggets But I'm the nuggets,

but I'm gonna be playing against this team with the little hawk on it. That's the team I'm gonna be playing against. And then I would play against them on my Nerf basketball hoop. And like basically learned the teams that way. Also learned like, I would say the most valuable lesson of sports,

get like a foothold in every team. Know who the best player is on every team. And like all of a sudden, you know the NBA. Does your son have favorite teams in any of the sports? Yeah, he has a favorite football team and he has a favorite baseball team. I've taken him to two Bronco games. The Chargers are his favorite team.

I was curious because I was talking to my nephew about this and he has favorite football teams. He kind of goes back and forth, but they are not his dad's favorite team and they're not a local team. And it's, I think part of it is just like, you pick up what kids at school, if there's a really passionate Jaguars fan that he is friends with, he just likes the Jaguars now. I didn't think it was going to be the Jaguars.

Well, that's amazing. That's amazing that there's a kid in school that's like, they're going to get it one day. They're going to do it. I promise they will do it. We just gotta get our entire offensive line in order. We gotta get our defense in order. And enough that like, you're going to school and like preaching it to other kids.

It's like, what do you have a favorite team? Dude, hop on the Jaguar bed wagon. That's amazing. Yeah, I didn't anticipate that. Yeah, Ronan is not a Broncos fan, despite how hard I've tried. He is a Chargers fan. And I think that some of that is a product of the games I've taken him to have been Chargers games.

And in those seasons, the Chargers have just annihilated the Broncos. And so he's like, well, I'm going to be a failing good team. And then in, in, Hey, dad, it's not a big deal or anything like that, but, uh, you seem miserable. You don't see the Broncos fans. It was really rough. We leave these games and it gets pretty dark in the car. And then in baseball, he is a huge Milwaukee Brewers fan.

Man, that is good for him. You live in Los Angeles and you have an opportunity to be a kid who is rooting for the winning team. Right, bandwagon doesn't exist yet. You can be. Yeah. You live there, you're from there. You could just like be a Dodgers fan and it's fine and it and you would really enjoy it right now. I think but no gonna be a

Brewers fan. My nephew who does live in Milwaukee is very funny about the way sports work because his mom is from New Jersey and she is a Giants fan. His dad is from Denver. Well, not the he's from Colorado and he's a Giants fan. His dad is from Denver, well, not Denver, he's from Colorado and he's a Broncos fan. And so he, in his mind, is not like, oh, you inherit the team from your parents. In his mind, it's you are a fan of the team

from the city you live in. And so he's like a huge Green Bay Packers fan. Huge Green Bay Packers fan. Ladies and gentlemen, we're getting into cuffing season. You know what that means. You got to find somebody good and somebody warm. And that means somebody who probably has been eating a lot of good comfort hot meals.

You want those hot, savory meals this time of year. And man, if you are trying to be anything other than just like a meatball, it's tough. It can be very, very hard. Well, I'm here to tell you that there's one way to make it just a little bit easier, and that's with Factor. Their chefs do the shopping and the chopping to bring you fresh, never frozen, fully cooked meals

right to your doorstep. All you have to do is heat and eat. All of their meals are dietitian approved, so you know you're getting the nutrition you need along with the fall flavors you crave. Listen, you got a lot going on outside the kitchen. We're coming up on some holidays. Holidays where you have to be out and about in the world, singing in your choirs or whatever you do.

Factor delivers fresh nutritious chef prepared meals ready to eat in just two minutes. Head to factormeals.com slash QQ50 and use code QQ50 to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month. I've been eating Factor Meals and I gotta say, I love them. I love that it takes the decision away from me. Lunch, hands down one of my favorite meals, connoisseurs will know that lunch is something that I proselytize all over this country.

Lunch is a moment where I generally think I could do anything. I could have anything. And I gotta say, when I'm at work, that's the scariest, most daunting thing I can think of. Factor has really helped me in that it prepares meals for me that I know I'm going to love. All I gotta do is go to the fridge, slap one out, poke some holes in it, and pop it in the microwave. So whether you're managing your calories, maximizing your protein intake, or simply trying to eat more balanced, Factor has dietitian approved meals that will help you meet your

wellness goals. Choose from six meal preferences including keto, calorie smart, and vegan plus veggie and round out your order with nutrient-rich smoothies, snacks, and energy shots to keep you satisfied all day long. Head to factormeals.com slash qq50 and use code qq50 to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month. That's code qq50 at factormeals.com slash QQ50 to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month. All right. So when I got another quick question for you, you know, we were just firing today. I know we were going to. I don't know if I'm lamenting the loss of bullshit. I think I'm not.

I think I'm actually enjoying getting into the show. I just had to check in with my heart and it was like, yeah, this is good. All right. So go ahead, shoot. This is a question that I saw pop up on Reddit that's been bouncing in my brain. What are you sick of people telling you is great? And I feel like I want to jump in here and say you're not allowed to say Star Wars because you famously don't like Star Wars. And you've had to put up with hearing about it for a long time. By the way, is there like a new Star Wars series coming out that takes place in high

school or like- I think it might even be younger than that. Yeah. Star Wars skeleton crew. We're so scared to have a new show. I know. It's... I, as a writer, have found that very helpful because now I've been like, I was struggling on a pilot that I was working on, but I just decided to make it set in the Star Wars universe with absolutely no permission from anyone. I was like, this is so much easier

than building my own lore. Oh my God. They have lightsabers and they're called lightsabers. This is, this is the best. All the rules are already written down. I will lying through this thing. That's actually a really good cheat is like, even if you don't tell anyone, even if you erase your tracks later, yeah, you set it there and it all becomes so much easier to write because you have this like base to stand it up against. Yeah. I can, if I ever have to send this to like a studio or an agent or something, I could

do a find and replace on Skywalker and just like change it to something else equally dumb. And then it's not a Star Wars show. There's somebody who had me read a script of theirs and I was reading it and was fine with it. Didn't notice anything strange. And then all of a sudden I realized one of the characters was named Shoshana for a minute, for a hot minute and realized that it was a, it had originally been a girl's specs. Girls?

Yeah. And had changed all the names afterwards and forgotten one. Shoshana was in there. Okay. And also I do want to think about your question, but also before I do that, I, I originally, when I was trying to get my current job, I had written a pilot and I'd had you read the pilot. Yeah. And it's like an ensemble cast, which man, if you're going to write a pilot, I suggest you don't put an ensemble cast in it. Cause you've

got to put a lot of thought into who all the characters are going to be. And realize very early on, oh no, I don't. I'll just borrow from another pre-existing franchise and just fudge those characters. And so I had done Winnie the Pooh. When I had pulled, like there was very clearly like a rabbit analog, there was a Eeyore analog. There was a Bapu analog. And it was so fucking easy to write

because not only are you just like, do you have already a foundation for each of your characters that you can pull from. You are already guaranteed that those characters work together. And so you start writing it and you're like, yeah. Oh, thank God somebody else put thought into this.

Because all of a sudden, like you just watch them fall into place and you're like, oh, yes, like they work well with each other. I'm a huge fan of theft as a writing hack. I think it's awesome to write something either with like an existing character in mind or on one of the other pilots I wrote, I was set in a high school and one of the kids I just decided was John Mulaney. And like, there's no risk, if this ever got made or anything, there's no risk that someone would say like,

hey, this is, you just, you, this is clearly John Mulaney, you stole this from like a person's persona. Because it would be cast with a 14 year old and the 14 year old would just like read the lines their own way and bring their own thing to it. It's really just me who is like, I can't think of a character. What if John Mulaney was this one? And I'm just going to have this is a conversation between John Mulaney and Shia LaBeouf. And that's because those characters exist in my head, they can now like, they're fully

formed for me. So I know how they sound and how they move and everything. And it's like a victimless crime because no one's ever going to know. Yeah. Unless, unless you're allowed to make the show yourself, in which case, as soon as you're doing those records or like you're on the seat on set, you're going to be like, it's just, um, I textured it a little different. I project, I projected, I, could you just like hold a, hold your fist right like this.

Yeah, that's nice. A suit would help, maybe a suit. Okay, sorry, let me get to your question. You're asking, is there anything that I'm sick to death of being told is good? Yes, just off the top of my head, there's one. I hate people who are like, have you been to any good shows lately? are like, have you been to any good shows

lately? Or like, have you been to any concerts? I think concerts suck. Do you? Excuse me. I think concerts suck. I think that... Let me go through all of the cons of a concert first and then I will go through the pros. And I think I can make a pretty good case for why one is way, like there's clear, like one side has way more on it. Things are, things are about to get real heated

on this podcast, so I'm fired up. I'm loving it. Getting to a, getting to a concert is the worst. It's always going to be in the middle of the city. It's going to be at a venue where there's a bunch of other people also trying to fucking go. And so like getting to it is a problem. The other thing is you don't really know when to arrive because if you've got somebody like, let's say, we know, like they might go on right away and they might play for three hours or you might go to a concert for somebody else,

some other like some jack off, like Ben Fools 5 and you're gonna get there and you're gonna have these opening acts and the opening acts can be up there for two or three hours like you might have three opening acts you don't know and then you're finally gonna get to the point where you think that they're gonna come on stage and it always just takes fucking longer than you think it's gonna it takes forever for them to come out stage because they're gonna come on stage. And it always just takes fucking longer than you think it's gonna. It takes forever for them to come out on stage because they're like, I guess building the atmosphere and like getting people excited.

They come out, if you're, let's say you're sitting at a concert and the people stand up in front of you, concert's ruined. Like already you're like, fuck, now I gotta stand up. Now I gotta stand between the back of their seat and the front of my seat and try and casually dance in this limited little tiny airplane space. Or if you have floor seats, then that means like,

or you just got floor tickets, then you're on the floor, it's packed, there's a lot of people around you at all times brushing up against you. And nobody can agree on what kind of dancing should actually happen. Some people get real into it. And if one of those people is next to you, you gotta move.

Or if like you're feeling it, you're the fucking problem all of a sudden. Like I've been to concerts too where I've been like, yes! Like I'm the guy and I'm like dancing and like loving it. And you can just feel like the crowd be like, all right, dude, just take it easy. Like they're saying it's never going to be right. And I've never been to a concert where I, that first clapping starts happening.

We're like, they're like, all right, thank you everybody. Good night. And everybody starts clapping that I haven't wished. Let's just not do it on core. Let's just make that it. Let's just go home right now. But it never is that it's all, they're always going to come back out. And then we got to do the pageantry of like we clap for fucking four minutes.

Yeah. I would get rid of that for sure. They come back out. The only good concerts I've ever been to is... Yeah, it sounds like you had a really bad experience sitting down at a Ween concert and that started all this rolling. I can't imagine... Actually, I really liked the Ween concert.

Why? That was a bad time. But I didn't sit at the Ween show. I went to Coachella and you just wander around between bands and it was phenomenal. It was like a religious experience where you find somebody where you're like, I don't know this person and then you listen to them and you're like, I think this is my new favorite artist. And so I went through and it was like a day that was catered to me too at my taste at the time.

And I fucking loved it. I loved being able to like drift between bands. It's great. I don't think I knew drift between bands. Yeah. It's great. I don't think I knew that about you that you went to Coachella. That is some interesting added lore for your backstory. But more on topic, one of the things I've been fiddling with here in the live stream is a bracelet. Oh, it's... Wristband from a concert I went to last night, Sorin. As you were talking about how horrible things were, it made me think about the seamless Uber ride to travel from our apartment

in a straight line to the Stone Pony, a famous music venue that was not too crowded, perfectly intimate to see a show. It was so fun. We stayed soarin' the whole time. And I haven't stayed. Were you standing up? Yeah. I haven't stayed the whole time for fuckin' anything. I'm almost 40. I don't stay to the end of shit.

I have to go to bed all the time. Surely it sucked to stay in there for so long. It was awesome. We loved it. And it was, you know, two days after an election that didn't go the way that we wanted it to go. And we debated maybe skipping the concert. But I mean, the reality was we had tickets already and we spent the entire day both of

us staring at computers, reading news and trying to come up with takes for work and realized that if we didn't go to the concert, then we were gonna just continue that experience into the evening. So we went and it was Sammy Ray and the Friends, a band that I've talked about before that I love so much. And the lead singer came out

and gave like a pep talk at the beginning that was just like, this sucks and it's bad and we're all going to make it through together. All right. Now we're going to do like our funky fucking awesome show and we're going to sweat and we're going to have the most high energy show you've ever seen. And they did. And another great thing that I love about seeing concerts in New Jersey, because it's not strictly Stone Pony,

it certainly helps at the Stone Pony, but I've heard it tell that it happens in other venues in New Jersey, is when New Jersey crowds like what you're doing musically, instead of clapping and hooting, we all yell, Bruce, it's so fun. It's such a specific adorable Jersey thing that like we all just instinctively associate good music

with Bruce Springsteen. So when something doesn't sound anything like Bruce, but it's just like, ah, Bruce, Bruce, Bruce, Bruce, Bruce. Yes, Bruce to you. Bruce, Bruce, Bruce. You've hit the platonic ideal and you're like, that's Bruce. Yeah. Pizza, pizza, pizza, Bruce. You've hit the platonic ideal and you're like, that's Bruce. Yeah. It's a pizza, pizza, Bruce.

Everybody's reaching towards Bruce. Oh man. That bums me out. Wait, was there an opening act? And you stayed for that? You were there for that? We caught the end of the opening act. Okay.

So you came late. Yeah. And you arrived on like, how did you know? How did you know that you were going to like when to arrive? Because that's always befuddled me. That was dumb luck. We got to the area. We left our apartment probably when like the doors opened and we went straight to a restaurant

near the venue and ate some snacks there. And well over an hour after doors open, we started sauntering over to the club. And I was really thinking like, we're gonna miss the first song. We're gonna miss a couple of songs. And we didn't, we only missed the opener who we weren't there to see. I'm so surprised that you do well at concerts

because I guess the overarching broad strokes of why I hate them is that music for me is such a personal experience. And experiencing music with other people seeing your face and looking at you and being in the same room as you is really... I don't like that. That's... That feels awful. I love it. What I do is I jack off to music.

Does that not? Yeah. Now we've been to concerts together. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You and I saw the cranberries. Zombies.

Yeah. Zombie gets me going. I was trying to think of what would be the least appropriate musical act for you to jack off around. And I do think the Cranberries specifically singing a song about the troubles in Ireland. I think that's probably, I think we landed on it. I think we did it. Speaking of Zombie, I'm kind of pissed that that song shows up on so many Halloween playlists now.

Yeah. Only because of the name. Because I'm like, dude, the barest amount of research. This is not a Halloween song. It's offensive that you're making it a Halloween song. That came on, I was at the gym doing a workout class on Halloween and they had their Halloween playlist and there's like a pump up version of Monster Mash and I'm like, hell yeah.

And then they play Thriller and I'm like, hell yeah. And then it really starts to fall apart after the first two songs that everything is zombie or like the band has dead Kennedy in the name. So that's kind of spooky, right? I want to get down to the band. Um, yeah, I, there's some other ones like, um, I always feel like somebody's watching me has become like an institution of Halloween. I also don't feel like that's a Halloween song either.

I think that we're really stretching. We don't need a bunch. We don't need to have so much Halloween music. Ghostbusters, Thriller, Adam's Family, I'm fine. We're done. Okay. Well, yeah. So I don't like concerts. I've never had a time at a concert. So it's like a hike for me. I've always been done with every hike a mile before it's over. Every concert I'm done way before the concert ever ends. And I had to just sit there for it. Hiking is a, uh, one of my favorite things to do. It's a very poorly conceived form of sport or exercise, whatever, whatever you want to

call it. The idea that you have to return is just dog shit. Like you did the hard thing. You did the hard thing. You climbed up to the top of the thing and there's nothing to look forward to after that because you're not gonna have any more challenges because it's all downhill after that and you're not gonna see anything new because you just went through it and it's like well this is this is this is just to get back to the car and I really they should helicopter lift everyone at the top of every mountain I guess is what I'm pitching something they got they got to think of something because yeah you're absolutely

right like it sucks it's like you get to the destination and you're like bingo we made it waterfall whatever and then like, or peak, summit somewhere. And then you're like, okay, and now we're going to do that whole thing again. But the end result is we get in a hot car. Yeah. It's like, nah, man, nobody wants that. What if at the end of a basketball game, they made the players clean up the stadium after? No, they did all this stuff already. Let them just go. That's how kayaking is. Like down river kayaking, like you just, you play for a while, you get in the river, you

go downstream and then a shuttle comes and gets you. Yeah. All right, I'm done. I'm done here. Yeah, I'm finished. I think mine is swimming. And I've got my foot on the scale a little bit. But swimming is a thing that everyone says. Who's selling you on swimming?

Everyone constantly, as soon as you mention swimming, people, no matter who they are, just at the ready have like, that's supposed to be one of the best cardio exercise, like the best cardio exercise for you. People love to talk about how swimming is actually surprising you, really, really, really great for you because you're using all your fucking muscle, you know, all that stuff. A lot of like runners that I follow in the running community. They are also swimmers. And there's a guy, my buddy Ryan Holiday, who's a writer of stoicism. He's a really great writer. He was a lifetime distance runner. And now he's been on this swimming kick. So when I say people are really

trying to sell me on swimming, it's one guy who swims a lot and like has his favorite pools. Like he's got like a bucket list of pools in the worlds that he wants to swim in. And he has like, he like researches who built the pool and like, and this is the oldest pool in America. It's like, who cares? Why is it? Why is that important to you? Why is that part of it? But he's super into pool, super into swimming for all of the physical, but also like it's very meditative and good mental health stuff to swim. And I just, I am sick of hearing about it. I don't want one other person in my life to point out how good of an exercise swimming is because I think it sucks. I think it's, I think you're wet

and I think it's, and swimming is I think you're, you're wet. And I think it's, and swimming is hard and I'm not good at it. Yeah. I was going to ask, are you, how are you as a swimmer? Not very strong, Soren. All right. Could you, could you do every, if I was like, shout out strokes at you underwater where you could hear it, do you think you could switch strokes and go into a different one? No. Okay. You know what? You know freestyle, right? Yeah. I can... And maybe some breast.

I cannot drown. I can get myself where I need to go with swimming. And back when I was... When I was briefly a... Soren, you remember when I was a scuba guy? Oh, fuck yeah, dude. I forgot about that. I was getting scuba certification.

They require you to like swim and tread water for a certain amount of time and a certain amount of laps. And I could do all of those things, but I don't know like the names of strokes or why we do them. I would say there's really no benefit other than like, let's make swimming harder. Like butterfly, nobody's, butterfly is not a convenient way for it to get from A to B. Like that's the dumbest stroke we have and we only invented it to be like, well, let's come up with like a really hard one

for the really strong guys. Yeah. Okay. That makes sense. I'll say that I've never been very good at water sports. Growing up landlocked, I think I just, I would like to assume it's because I didn't have opportunity, but in general, I just suck at them. I'm not good at the breathing. I'm not good at like knowing when to breathe and when not to breathe. And I was on swim team. So like I did get proficient enough.

I can do all of those strokes. If I was to go into a race right now, I would not get disqualified, but I would not win. And I'm also a very lithe person. And one of the troubles with being really lithe is that you sink. Like you are not buoyant at all. And so I have a hard time. I don't understand like how to get fast in the water. And I don't feel like I'm ever going to be at a point where I can hold my breath for

long periods of time. I don't like swimming as well is what I'm saying to you. Now getting into a pool and drifting down to the bottom and just holding my breath there for a while and like hearing just the water absorb all the noise, not having a single smell. Usually I have my eyes shut too. It's like being in a deprivation chamber. So in that respect, I guess I understand like the meditative quality of it. I love water and being in pools and being in the ocean and everything. It's just, I don't like it. I'm not good at swimming and I don't want, I, and instead of just like

accepting that I'm bad at a thing, I want the world around me to change. I want people to stop bringing up swimming. That seems easier than confronting whatever's inside of me. It's such a shitty exercise. Like, I'm gonna like try to just champion your cause here, Dan, because first of all, running on a treadmill, at least you have a screen in front of you.

At least you can look at something. You get to watch the office or something. Or if you're out on a run, you get to experience a lot of different things. You're not just swimming for miles, enjoying the scenery, checking out new things underwater. You have a finite amount of space that you're going back and forth in. And if you're gonna get a real big like exercise out of that aerobic exercise out of that,

it's gonna be miserable. It's gonna be awful. You have to find somewhere else to go in your brain because it's gonna be torture otherwise. I remember growing up, we didn't have a pool. We were part of the Hazlitt Pool Club which has a variety of pools and diving boards and stuff just like a place to kill time in the summer and there would be there was always that the certain chunk of the day where the big pool part of it would get

roped off so people could do their exercise where it's like all right it's four o'clock that means some of the pool is now reserved just for the people who are here to exercise and you cannot cross the lines and you will just wait until they are done exercising. And they always had people come out there with their fucking caps and their fucking goggles and their fucking earplugs. And they went and they did their back and forth laps. And it's very serious swimmers doing their back and forth laps while a bunch of 10 to 19 year olds are watching them in this shared pool, many of us peeing and watching them and even at the time as a kid I was thinking like, I don't think anyone likes this setup.

I don't think this is good for anyone. I don't think the swimmers are happy that they have to get their stupid exercise in, in a small one-hour window with a bunch of onlookers. And we are pissed as hell too that our fun childhood pool time is interrupted by these people who can't fathom exercising anyway other than this. We're all having a miserable time. End of flashback. That's how I, I mean, adults swim. That's what when I was a kid, we would go to the pool and then you got to get out of the pool so the adults are allowed to swim for a little while. And so you're just sitting on the side, just looking in the water at these adults swimming their slow laps. As a really young kid, when you don't have like a real understanding or appreciation

for exercising, you're just sitting on the sidelines watching them swim and just like, you're using the pool wrong. You're not even doing the whole pool to yourself and you're not even doing fun with it. One more thing I'll say about swimming here. Go for it. And then I'll be done. I... You're going to go?

I'm going gonna just leave. I don't think it's a good form of exercise because it's... Maybe it's like helping your muscle some, but it's... What it's doing to your bones is way worse. What's it doing to your bones? It's making them weaker. It makes your bones weaker. If you just swam, let's say you started tomorrow and you're like, from now on, no more running.

I'm just going to swim. Then your bone density will start to decrease and decrease and decrease because there's no resistance in the water. There's no impact. And so every other sport that you do, like even things that feel very non-impact, like low impact, like running are actually like, there's a tremendous amount of impact because every time your foot hits, your bone density is growing.

And when you just swim as you, you swim, when you just swim as you're exercise, your bone density decreases like you're in space. Like it's not, in the long run, like that's really dangerous for you. You have to combine swimming with something else. And if I'm having to do that already, I'll just do the other thing.

I don't need the swimming. I'll cut that part out. I'm glad we can agree on this. Not necessarily. Did you know that? No, I had no idea. I mean, I knew that. Tell this guy that.

Yeah, I know that there's no, none of the things that are good for you are just purely good for you. Running is my favorite thing in the world to do and it's going to destroy my knees. It's going to make me one of those weirdly shaped people when I get older. I wonder if you know what's going to happen. I already can see it. You and I are going to be like 60 or maybe even a little later and we're going to be like, you know what?

I really love swimming. It turns out it's much easier on my body than all the other things I was doing. I know what I said before into a microphone recorded forever, but I actually really love these stupid fucking tiny weights and just being in the pool and swimming my arms in circles for a little bit for 25 minutes. I would bet that for PT and for people who have injuries, swimming is probably the very best thing you can do because of the same reason. It's not high impact.

And high impact, you're right. You have to thread the needle. High impact really fucks your body up. But that bone density, don't lose it. You got to have it. I was just listening to the Smart List podcast and Sean Hayes was talking about something I hadn't considered for Broadway actors who Need to do so much PT for

repeated Stress injuries that you know you think like yeah, of course if you're if you're Dancing at your theater job all day every day, that's a lot of workout that's gonna need some time. But even beyond the dancing, he was talking about seeing an actor get pushed and hitting their leg on a couch and then falling onto the couch.

And if you hit the same spot on your leg on that couch every day, eight shows a week, that is going to be a massive problem for you because we're just, we as humans are not designed for that kind of repetitive stress injury of just hitting the same thing over and over again. Which is what I do when I run. Every day, a thing that is supposed to save my life.

They're like, oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. You shouldn't, dude. Yeah, it's great for your heart. But think of your bones. What is good for my heart and bones? Ah, nothing. We never figured out bodies. We had no. Yeah, we just, can you turn back time?

That would help. That would be good. But like, oh, their direction time's going, it's time that's bad. Time is the bad thing. Yeah, I mean, have you been in plays where you had to do like a lot of physicality and you realized pretty early on, you're like, oh, this thing I keep doing is potentially

going to hurt me for life. Certainly. I was always trying to be very physical in theater because I'm a clown at heart and was like, I can throw myself on the stage and land safely. You practice it, just like wrestling and fake fighting with your brothers and friends your whole life. Yeah. You're just like, yeah, I know how to look like I jumped up in the air and landed squarely on my ass. The trick is I do it. I land on my ass. And it's the kind of thing that when you first try it out in performance in rehearsal, I jump up and land on my butt and it's funny

and it doesn't, the only bar for whether or not you decide to incorporate it in the show is, did this hurt now, this first time that I did it? It's like, no, you know what's surprising? Like it didn't hurt at all. Okay, great. Then you did it 900 times and your body knows it's coming now. Yeah, it's really awful.

And like you get these like giant bruises and you're like, I have to do a show tonight, but I can't even touch this spot on my body. Your body who doesn't, how's that going to go? Doesn't understand what's going on. Just like it's every day at 8 15. He hits the same part of the tailbone and I don't know why if he would just sending him switch change something else.

I'm doing everything that I can. I've sent him all the red flags. I couldn't he's not listening to me. Yeah, I never even thought about that though for like plays. I've sent him all the red flags I could and he's not listening to me. Uh, yeah, I, I never even thought about that though for like plays that have to go on indefinitely. Yeah. You really have to be careful. And I would assume also singing. I mean, just the act of singing and belting every single night would be really tough on you. You'd have to figure something out to take care of your throat. They had that this piece on Ben Platt when he was doing Dear Evan Hansen, which is one of the more

challenging roles that have been written in the last like 25 years in terms of the amount that he has to sing in that show. And when he was doing it per this piece, he was just not living a life otherwise. You know, you do your show and then you go home to drink your nighttime tea for your voice and then you wake up and you just sit quietly all day because you don't wanna tax your voice when you don't need to. And you do that for however long mentally you can do it.

And then it's like, all right, I can't be Evan Hansen anymore because I haven't, I've had tea and soup every meal and talked to no one out loud for the last eight months of my life. I can't do this anymore. Yeah. I guess that's, I mean, I guess that would be true of everything that you do. can't do this anymore. Gee, yeah. I mean, I guess that would be true of everything that you do. With writing, there's nothing comparable.

I'm not afraid to pull something, pull some writing muscle. Whereas I imagine if you play in the NFL or anything, if you, when you find out that an NFL player injured themselves off the field, you're pissed. You're like, what are you doing? But that's a human. Like that's a person who's trying to live a life,

a young person who's like, wants to be out and is excited and finally has like all these means with which to do it. And you're like, how did you fucking pull your ankle ice skating or like frame your ankle ice skating? Like they want to go do stuff. And I'm sure that that's gotta be a real, that's a really tough for them.

So much of their, like people are playing pickup. If you love football and you're like, I look, those guys are like that bachelor party is playing pickup. Can I just go play with them? You can't, you're not allowed to. Right. Because you will get humiliated and probably fined if you show up to work at your NBA basketball job with a spring neck. I was like, yeah, it was Thanksgiving and my cousins were over and they wanted

to play like football in the backyard. We had a couple of beers and I'm sorry, but now I've tanked the season because I tripped on a root playing touch football in the backyard. I understand I'm not allowed to do that. I'm just getting up on a ladder to put up Christmas decorations. I think you probably think about it with every single thing you do where you're like, well, this could be if this goes wrong, it's going to cost me millions of dollars and ruin my life. I was a secret fear leading up to my wedding that I had in the back of my head the whole time

was that I was going to injure myself doing something completely unnecessary and avoidable. It wasn't even just as simple as I would sprain my ankle running and then I would be in a cast for the wedding. It was going to, my wife would come home to find me sprawled somewhere and I will have broken both of my wrists. She'd be like, how did you break both your wrists? And I was like, well, I tried to put my feet on one wall and my hands on the other. And sort of like, I wanted to see if I could Spider-Man walk my way to the ceiling and try to get a cobweb down. You've never done that before. I know this was a strange time for me to try out

this fun thing I wanted to do. I couldn't wait. I mean, I totally understand that because my whole personality has been based on that. Well, I'm gonna try a thing. I'm gonna try this other physical thing and see what happens. And then succeeding, you feel invincible. And when when you don't you feel like the dumbest person in the whole world for having tried it

Every time I have an injury from something dumb and it's like Daniel. How could you be so stupid? I want to be like well in fairness to me There's a whole lot of shit that I do where I where you don't find out about it because I don't get hurt And this goes great. The numbers are strongly in my favor. My entire sense of confidence is built off the fact that this has gone right so many times. Yeah, okay, every once in a while it's going to go wrong and I'll break a leg. That's fine. I'm as surprised as anyone that I can't ride a unicycle. I thought if I could do a pro go stick, I should be able to do this too.

Well, I didn't. I can't. And I perhaps there was a better time for me to find out if I could unicycle than the morning of the wedding. But I saw an opportunity and I seized it. Please take me to the hospital. All right, everybody. We're going to cut it there.

We're going to end the show right there. I'm going to do a new thing with the end of this show, which is that, we're going to cut it there. We're going to end the show right there. I'm going to do a new thing with the end of this show, which is that I'm not going to go through all the places you can find us or the show because I feel like at this point, either you're going to keep listening through it. You've already done it before or you don't care. And so instead, I'm just going to say the thanks that we need to say which are to Gabe Harter and Jacob Weinstein who are the glue to this podcast they make all of our edits they do all the Video they all the videos they do every all the posts like they are

They're the the real What do I want to say here the not I want to say the glue glue. I want to say like, cause it's more important than glue. Glue is just sort of like a non-factor. Like they really, they run the podcast. Yeah. We wouldn't be here without them. I checked out and read something. What are you, who are you talking about?

Are you still talking about Gabe and Jacob? Holy shit. Gabe and Jacob. Still talking about Gabe and Jacob. Yeah. Well, I felt like they needed a proper appreciation. I was like completely zoned out and I came back and I was like, I feel like he said, glue 900 times.

That can't be right. Yeah, it did. I said glue a lot. All right. And then also thank Merex. Merex did our theme song. We really love it. I love it.

I would listen to it even if we weren't doing this podcast. You can find their music on Spotify. You can also find full albums of theirs on merex.bandcamp.com. Goodbye. Bye. I've got a quick, quick question for you. All right. I want to hear your thoughts.

I want to 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 could talk tonight. So what's your favourite? Who did you get? Who would I be if you remember?

What's the answer? What did I do? Who got the wings on? Oh forget it Sore and booby, Daniel O'Brien Two best friends and comedy writers 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 you you you you you you you Ladies and gentlemen, we're getting into cuffing season. You know what that means. You got to find somebody good and somebody warm. And that means somebody who probably has been eating a lot of good comfort hot meals. You want those hot savory meals this time of year. And man, if you are trying to be anything other than just like a meatball, it's tough.

It can be very, very hard. Well, I'm here to tell you that there's one way to make it just a little bit easier. And that's with Factor. Their chefs do the shopping and the chopping to bring you fresh, never frozen, fully cooked meals right to your doorstep. All you have to do is heat and eat.

All of their meals are dietitian approved so you know you're getting the nutrition you need along with the fall flavors you crave. Listen, you got a lot going on outside the kitchen. We're coming up on some holidays. Holidays where you have to be out and about in the world, singing in your choirs or whatever you do. Factor delivers fresh, nutritious, chef-prepared meals,

ready to eat in just two minutes. Head to factormeals.com slash QQ50 and use code QQ50 to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month. I've been eating Factor meals and I gotta say I love them. I love that it takes the decision away from me. Lunch, hands down one of my favorite meals, connoisseurs will know that lunch is something that I proselytize all over this country. Lunch is a moment where I generally think I could do anything. I could have anything.

And I gotta say, when I'm at work, that's the scariest, most daunting thing I can think of. Factor has really helped me in that it prepares meals for me that I know I'm gonna love. All I gotta do is go to the fridge, slap one out, poke some holes in it, and pop it in the microwave. So whether you're managing your calories, maximizing your protein intake,

or simply trying to eat more balanced, Factor has dietitian-approved meals that will help you meet your wellness goals. Choose from six meal preferences including keto, calorie smart, and vegan plus veggie, and round out your order with nutrient-rich smoothies, snacks, and energy shots to keep you satisfied all day long. Head to factormeals.com slash qq50 and use code qq50 to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month. That's code qq50 at factormeals.com slash qq50 to get 50% off your first box plus 20% off your next month.