Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - Ours Was The Good Baby | Ep. 338

Episode Date: July 1, 2026

Daniel gets back from Italy with an alarming report on the state of America Versus Italy, a country that not only believes in clear allergen labels, but also bottle caps which remain physically connected to the bottle. Plus, the guys compare notes on having a good baby on a plane, the quiet realization you just aren’t going to see Project Hail Mary I guess, and what happens when you put a bunch of Knicks fans from New Jersey on the same flight to witness a historic W. Thanks to ASPCA for sponsoring this episode. To explore coverage, visit ASPCApetinsurance.com/QUESTION.  The ASPCA is not an insurer and is not engaged in the business of insurance.Thanks to Mint Mobile for sponsoring this episode. Make the switch! MINTMOBILE.com/QQThanks to Keeper for sponsoring this episode. Get 60% off personal and family plans at Keepersecurity.com/QQ.Follow 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

question for you all right. Question for you all right. The answer's not important. I'm just glad that we can talk tonight. So what's your favorite? I think you'll have a great time, yeah. Hello, and welcome back to another episode of Quick Question with Soren and Daniel, the podcast for two best friends of Colorado. I ask each other questions and give each other answers.

I want to have that podcast. Senior writer for last week tonight with John Oliver, an author of How to Fight Presidents, an international man of Listerine, Daniel O'Brien, joined us away from the co-as, Mr. Soren-Bui, Saurin, say hello. Hey, everybody, I'm Saurin Bui, I'm a right for American dad. I don't have any books under my belt, but I'm still a dad, and I'm also American. The micromachines, micro-machine, micro-machines.

There you go. Listerine of Mist. Oh, I like it. International man of Listerine. So the thought process was I don't want to, like have a toothbrush with me on a plane. Like I'll have it in my carry-on because if I get stranded without my luggage, it's nice to have a toothbrush with you where you land.

But it's not part of my carry-on suitcase that is like at the ready that I can grab the way I could like my Kindle or my AirPods or the cable to charge my phone or anything like that. So it gets somewhere buried for later. And still, no matter what. happens when I fly, I feel like my breath is never more disgusting to me personally than when I get off a plane. I don't know what it is about the process of flying, but it just feels like I need mince or listerine or something. You know what it is? The cabin pressure?

I don't know. What is it? Yeah. I don't know. It's like dehydration. You're not doing your normal lubrications on a plane. It's true. You're beholden to them.

They don't like it. They will walk through the alley every once in a while and they will say, are they galley. And they will say, are you ready for your lubrication? And you have to be like, yes, please. And then there's like, well, this is the window at which you are allowed to lubricate. And other than that, no dice. And then, like, I peek ahead through the curtain to business class and they're just giving it away the whole time.

No one's wearing seat belts. They're using their phones. It's relatively wet up there. Sopping. What do you drink? We got to talk about travel, Soren. Yeah, oh, sorry. Yeah, okay.

International. Well, so there's a lot. There's the travel and there's also the, I want to get into my main thing first. My main, my, the music rant of the week. My rant of the week. Ah! I like that interstitial. I spent about 10 days in Italy, a foreign country,

and I loved my time there. I came back with a takeaway, which is that. We're as competitive and as arrogant as we are as a country here in America. For those reasons, no one, none of these other countries should ever be better than us at anything. And I want to be clear about what I don't mean. I don't mean soccer. And I also want to be clear, there are a lot of very thoughtful people who are really scared about China beating us as a global super power and like setting prices and having all the money and the most people and whatever whatever it is that reasonable people are very worried about China beating America in like a vague

esoteric, global, historical sort of way. I cannot tell you how much I don't give a shit about that. It seems like none of my business. I don't care. The other things that I don't mean, when I say I want America to be better than the other countries, I don't mean the stuff that is somehow subjective. Like some countries, they have free health care

and parental leave lasts a year, if not more, if you need it. and you have unlimited sick days. I personally think we should have that in America. Some people here in our country don't believe we should have that because they have been fooled because they are dummies and they've been tricked by corporations into thinking that there's value in work above all other things. I think they're wrong. I think they're fooled dummies. But still, even that is not what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about when I went to... Italy, the menus at every restaurant. On the back page of the menu, there's a list of all allergens that exists with a corresponding number. Number one, gluten, number two, whatever, three, Wova, eggs, nine. What is Wauva? Milk, dairy.

Wova, eggs, quavos. Yeah, okay. They list all of them. There's over 14 allergens with numbers on the back of every menu and every single item in the menu. that you go to has in parenthetical's, the numbers, to show you which allergens are in there. So I don't need to speak the language. I don't need to talk to a waiter.

I don't need to run the risk that the waiter is going to be wrong. And there are plenty of times in America where I'll look at a menu item and I'll say, does this have egg in it? And the waiter will say, it shouldn't. And they're right. It shouldn't. But they're wrong. It does.

And then I'm sick. This takes all of the guesswork and all the human error out of it. Every menu for every restaurant that we went to in Italy had the allergens listed clearly, and it didn't ruin the aesthetic or flow of the menu. It's such a good idea. I look at this and like, why are they, why are the other countries beating us on menus? This is such a stupid thing for us to be losing it. It's such an easy fix.

And I'll give you another one, Soren. in the land of Italy there are plastic water bottles with the tops like we have and the plastic ring that secures the top of the bottle. USA. That's right. They got our water bottles. And when you unscrew the cap

on the plastic water bottle, it pops open and there's some kind of technology in the ring that it's secured to that it stays secured. It stays bound to that ring. So it's always hanging off like a little tipped cap on the top of the water bottle

so you can put it back on. And you never lose your cap. It never falls off and rolls away. You never get the very relatable temptation to take off the cap and chew it up while you're driving because you have... Whoa.

You grind your teeth a lot, so you chew up all your water cap. Wow. And then your wife is like, You cannot be doing that. You can't be chewing up all your water caps. It's disgusting. Stop doing that.

This solves that. It's a great idea for a number of reasons to have a cap that stays on the plastic, Poland Spring, and Desani bottles and whatever else they have over there. And we don't have it. Completely relatable reasons. No. And it's better. And I don't know why. We're losing the war on menus.

We're losing the war on plastic bottle caps. So. And I'm fired up. You can discover some things in other countries that are better suited for your particular life. Yeah. And you're like, why does America suck so bad? Right. These are things that specifically cater to my egg allergy and my oral fixation with chewing on plastic bottle caps.

Yeah. And that's why it's my rant of the week. Why are you chewing on bottle caps? No, come on. Engage with me and the thing that I want to talk about. All right. All right. I, by the way, I deal with a lot of...

Everyone can't be my wife. Everyone can't be mad at me for chewing on bottle caps. I go to a lot of birthdays. I don't mean to brag. I go to a lot of kid birthdays, and they always have to have some sort of water juice box scenario there. The juice box has pissed me off just because the plastic associated with the straw, the little plastic, the sheath that the straw sits in is a big nightmare.

But every time that they've got little water bottles at these, it's a connecting water bottle top. I mean, we have that. technology here. We are using it. Put it in everything. But we are, I guess we're not doing it on the big ones. We're not doing it on the Dasanis and stuff like that. It's,

it kind of pisses me up, actually. It pisses you off that it's there? I'm actually Yeah, because when I'm trying to drink, it's like I can't get I can't get my mouth fully the way that I want it on the bottle. It takes them getting used to it. It's

a less pleasant experience overall. I'm also deeply concerned, Dan, that you would discover pretty quick, if you had just one of these in your car, that you're still picking up that entire waddle bottle now, you're gnawing off that little connector and you're chewing on the top. Sure. Would I see in this feat of engineering a masticatory challenge? Soren, of course.

I'm not going to sit here and stare at you would say I wouldn't see it as a challenge. I'm not going to sit here and pretend that we're not men. And that this man wouldn't consider it a true honor and privilege to chew through this feat of structural engineering. But you, all right, I appreciate that you enjoy it. That's nice. And also it seems like it's every water bottle there. Yeah. Is that right?

I'm not totally loving how much plastic water bottles you're using when you're in Italy. You know, who else doesn't love it is Italians. They, uh, the, this is another one of those things that they're, they're, they're probably objectively better at than Americans.

Um, but it didn't make my list because I'm, I'm, I'm a terrible American. They, they are, are so, we are,

we're, we're just the most wasteful country in human history when it comes to water. And it's just no question. And you see when you go to restaurants and like, water is not offered at every table. You have to order water specifically, and then you pay for it, and it comes in a bottle that is like a large bottle that you share. They're not giving you tap water for it.

You also have to ask for ice, and when you do ask for ice, they are not happy with you. And it's not because you're watering down their horrible coffee or whatever, which I am. But they're mad because they've gotten, it seems like they've gotten the entire country to agree that it would be bad if we ran out of water. We haven't gotten our country to accept that same truth. And I think I'm on our side on this one.

No. No. You live in New Jersey. It's not a concern for you there, but it's a concern. You remember what it was like to have it be a concern. and Italy's basically their entire habitat is Southern California in Italy, with the exception of shamanate, like up in the mountains. That's like, it's, oh, it is, it is.

It's very much like California. You've got like the full, the full gamut of California, basically there. And it's, you've got a lot of different variation, but it is, it's dry as shit. Yes. I'm happy that they're doing that. I'm also happy that they, are they looking at you funny about the fact that you're drinking out of a plastic water bottle as opposed to carrying around your own water bottle? I was never drinking a plastic water bottle out in the wild.

I bought a plastic bottle that I would like refill at home. And then when I was out in the wild, I would just like visibly struggle with thirst and dehydration to show that I'm like doing my best. What's up, folks? It's your boy, Daniel, coming to you from vacation. Vacation is a lot of fun, but what it means to me. right now is that I am away from my dog. Jackson, my beloved dog. He has a dog sitter right now, and I've missed him so much that I've just been checking in on our security cameras to make sure he's

having fun, and he is having so much fun that when I go back from my vacation, I'm going to be a different and even better and more attentive dog dad. That's the kind of relationship that we have with our pets as people. I am on vacation and I'm supposed to be enjoying the sun and instead I'm just thinking about the real son, my dog son, and how much I can't wait to get home to him and play fetch and give him treats and make him my whole entire world because I would do anything for him. Pet owners know what I'm talking about. Today's episode is sponsored by the ASPCA Pet Health Insurance Program. If you ever owned a pet, you know they run on their own life. Jump first, think later, ask questions, never.

It's part of what makes them so lovable. My dog will eat trash from the street, and it gives him a lot of problems in his tummy, but I love that his optimism supersedes his survival instinct. He thinks maybe this is going to be delicious, and that's why I'm going to put it inside my belly. And that's how I end up with surprise vet visits that you didn't see coming. That's why ASPCA pet health insurance helps cover eligible vet expenses,

so when those moments happen, and you can focus on getting your pet the care they may need instead of stressing over the cost. The ASPCA Pet Health Insurance Program offers customizable accident and illness plans that can fit your budget, your lifestyle, and even your pet's particular quirks. If you let's be honest, vet bills can add up fast.

ASPCA Pet Health Insurance has been around for almost 30 years and has covered over 1 million pets. And when it's time to submit a claim, it's easy. Just use their app and receive reimbursement for eligible vet bills directly into your bank account just so you can get back to focusing on what really matters your pet. To explore coverage visit ASPCA pet insurance.com slash question.

That's ASPCA pet insurance.com slash question. Again, that's ASPCA pet insurance.com slash question. This is a paid advertisement. Insurance is underwritten by either Independence American Insurance Company or United States Fire Insurance Company and produced by P-D-C insurance agency, limited. The ASPCA is not an insurer and is not engaged in the business of insurance.

I do have a small gripe with hydration flas with like the ones that are built like tanks. Two things. One, if you do try to travel with one, they are insanely heavy. Even without the water in them, they're like four pounds. Like it's so much added weight. And then you add the water into that. It's a lot to be carrying around.

Second, those hydration flasks have no flexibility to them. So that when you get on a plane, if you don't, as you're taking off, airate that thing, then when you get in the air, it's just a bomb waiting to go off, basically. If you try to open that, you're getting sprayed and everyone in your vicinity. is getting sprayed with water because of the caddum pressure has changed around you. So I also don't like traveling with a hydration flask. I do the same thing as you, which is I go to the airport. They don't want me to have water there.

Fine. I'll drink their water. And I'm going to get a bottle of water. And then the rest of the trip I'm drinking out of that plastic water bottle the entire time. I'm brushing my teeth. Everything that I need water for, I'm doing with that plastic water bottle. I don't, though, have water bottles just hanging out in my car. And that was the thing that you used to have, which was you'd have pallets of water bottles.

Yeah, I used to be, having water bottles was the only way that I would guarantee I was drinking water, which science agrees is important. And it used to be really bad at drinking water. And then for some reason, water bottles, it must have just been like, like a laziness thing of like, oh, it's always cold and I don't have to clean anything. I, that's, those are the two things that are important to me. I can grab a water bottle and it's cold. I don't need to, like, if I didn't have it, I didn't have an ice machine at the time,

so I didn't have to, like, go to the ice cube trays and get ice, put the ice in a glass, and then refill the ice cube trays later and drink the water and then clean the glass. Eventually, I just had a water bottle. And I could, I could also, like, very easily, dumb guy, measure the amount of water that I was taking in, which was good. because the science has drink this much. And I could say, like, okay, before I've left for work, I have had 32 ounces of water. That's a great start to a day.

Now, I have no water bottles in the house. I just have like these flasks, the hydroflasks that I drink from all the time. But I don't travel with them because they take it so much room. They're just a nightmare to travel with. We don't have a solution. I would request that we go back to the analogy. maybe not the BPA ones, but the they have a newer version of an algae,

which are, you know, the hard plastic water bottles, very light, very easy to travel with wonderful tools. I'm going to say. I would still, I'm on the record, I want an everyday, fashionable, socially acceptable, easy to fill camelback for pedestrian use. the things that I have every time I go backpacking or hiking and I have a camelback, I feel like this is, there would be no stopping me from filling this up at home

and just drinking from it all day. And wouldn't it be great if they were like fountains somewhere in the public where we could all just like pull up and lean over, bend over a little bit, and the fountain would fill up our backpack of water. and we could just drink it all day long. I think that there are so many people out there that think that they love hiking because they're like, I get into nature and I feel so refreshed afterwards. I feel good.

I feel energized. I feel recharged. And those people are actually just hydrated for the first time in their life because they've been wearing this thing. And it just sits there in your mouth. This little straw just sits there. And when you want water, you just bite it. And water just squirts in your mouth, basically. And if you had that your whole life where you just water.

was that accessible to you, you'd feel that great all the time. Yeah. Okay. Well, I need to know more about Italy, Daniel. First of all, I need to know about the trip there. I was very worried about your trip. You traveled with an infant, as far as I understand it. You're still an infant.

Right. Okay. And you went all the way to Italy in business class with an infant. Yeah. So you had a lot of people that were going to be traveling next to you who were like, you know what? Honey, let's treat ourselves to business. business class, this is our honeymoon.

Let's really enjoy it. And then didn't anticipate that they would be there next to a three-month-old. How did that trip go? Our perfect angel baby boy did not make a peep on that plane. What?

I know. The trip is like ten hours. Oh, seven, okay. So we're on this plane, and my baby is sleeping perfectly, beautifully, angelically. And three things are going through my mind this one I keep waking up I'm also trying to sleep and I'm waking up because I'm so

wired at this point for baby crying means daddy gets up and does something about it so every time I hear a noise I'm up and I look over at my wife and baby and they're both asleep so it's fine the second thought I had was this baby had better not wake up my baby and then the third Yeah. Very small, petty thought I had was, how do I let everyone on this plane know? This isn't my baby. It's not mine.

Because everyone saw us walk on the plane. Yeah. And they all probably thought, I hope that baby doesn't ruin my plane experience. And I want to make sure they know that it didn't. Ours. I'm not going to say. I'm not going to say ours is the good baby.

because the other baby is good too and those parents are good too and if my baby cried I would say what of it babies cry it's a plane it's not good or bad but ours was the good baby ours was the one that wasn't crying and I want you all to know that

and because because it just so happened that our baby didn't cry I will take credit for it even though I would not have accepted blame if the baby did in fact cry yeah I felt I felt that before on a plane with my children.

When they get a little bit older and you can make them laugh, that was like a big quiet thing for me was there was some other people see you walk on with a child. And you can tell already the people who are like, oh, fuck. Yeah. Oh, fuck. There's a baby on this plane or there's a toddler on this plane. So when another kid was crying, I was like, everybody's going to know this isn't my one. And I'm like holding my daughter up or playing with her.

her so that she is laughing at the same time. So you get like, it's still noise. It's still a lot more noise, but it's like, but now you see that my baby wasn't the one that was doing the really bad noise. Mine is only slightly less aggravating. We actually, as far as disruptions on a plane go, we had a more surprising one, which was we flew out to Italy during game. of, no, game four of the NBA championship,

we started watching that in the lounge of the airport, and we stopped paying attention because by halftime, the Knicks were losing badly. And even though Knicks are comfortable down 20 points in the fourth quarter, and we've seen them do this over and over again, we were still like, this is not, this is it. We're going to win it. We'll win in six, and that's okay.

but we're definitely not going to win now. And then we just, like, distracted ourselves with baby stuff and lounge stuff because Cooper in the lounge was not as good as he was on the plane. He wasn't screaming. He was just, like, violently awake. And so I was putting him to sleep in the lounge. And, like, this was, that's a very physical process of squats and walking circles in the lounge to get him down. And I did that.

And whenever something good happened on the TV for the next, people would clap. I took that as like, this is for me as father. They are clapping. They see me walking and putting my baby to sleep. And they're cheering for me and I will accept it. So we weren't like super tapped into what was going on in the game. By the time we got onto the plane, it was fourth quarter and it was very close. And like, this is a, we took off from JFK.

This is an international flight. It's in New York plane. It's a New York town. It's New York. we were flying and like all of us watching the game together on this plane and like throwing our hands in the air and people are clapping and hooting and hollering and I heard this poor woman who was probably the mother of the baby who screamed the whole flight who just said can you please keep it down to the to the plane and I felt so bad like no one even first of all no one kept it down second of all no one even granted her the courtesy of of a no we won't. It was just like, lady, I'm sorry.

No. It's not going to happen. It's 10.30 on a plane, on a Wednesday. Of course we're going to scream together. You should have known this when you booked your Emirates business class flight six months ago. You fool.

Why didn't you know that the Knicks would be here in this exact situation? I feel a little bad for her, but also, like, she has to understand that disruption on a flight, of all people, she should understand that disruptions happen on a flight, right? You're a, your mom. Just in this circumstance, it's you finally get to feel it from the other side. You get to have everybody bothering your baby. If I told you that Mip Mobile plans are only $15 a month, you would probably be wondering what the catch is. what's going on here.

Well, let me tell you something. There is no catch. There's nothing going on. There's no gimmets. There's no gimmicks. There's no gotchas. Just unlimited talk, text, and data. Fast, reliable coverage on the nation's largest 5G network and an award-winning care team.

I guess that makes Mint Mobile a catch. Since switching to Mint, I've really enjoyed all of my talk, my text, my data. It's fast. I've been traveling a lot lately, as listeners know, and my coverage has seen. seen no interruptions or dips. It's been very helpful because I work remotely and I need good coverage. You should check out MintMobil. Make the switch at mintmobile.com slash QQ. MintMobile took what's wrong with wireless and made it right with premium wireless for $15 a month. You like your phone. You like your number. I like both of mine. You can bring them to MintMobile.

You can choose from three, six or 12 month plans and say goodbye to a monthly bill. Get out of here, monthly bills. Ditch overpriced wireless with MintMobile. It's so easy. Sign up online and get three months of premium wireless service for 15 bucks a month. To get your new wireless plan for just 15 a month, go to mintmobile.com slash QQ. That's mintmobile.com slash QQ. Cut your wireless bill to 15 a month at mintmobile.com slash QQ. That's it. There's no catch. $45 upfront payment. Required equivalent to $15 a month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Speed slower above 40 gigabytes on unlimited plan. Additional taxes fees and restrictions supply.

C. Mint Mobile for details. And I'm sure she, like all traveling mothers, came up with every possible toy and distraction and timing to keep her baby to sleep. And she just couldn't have planned for one of the greatest

comeback in basketball history. Well, I'm amazed that it went as well as it did. That's wonderful. Congratulations. I'm amazed. I'm also like I, you know, I'm talking about how great my wife is on this podcast a lot. And it's, I'm going to keep doing it right now because both of the flight and just being in Italy with a bunch of suitcases for five days. It's I want my wonderful wife.

to quit her job, which is, I believe, something in fashion. And I want her to do a different job that is like running a giant company or a small country. Because the logistical feat of having everything we needed and not an excess of anything. I don't know how she did it. I can't wrap my brain around it because there are so many, like, everything when we were on the plane and needed something, whether it was for me or whether it was for her, whether it was for Cooper, it was not only on the plane with us, but it was like reachable. It was easily accessible. And there were other carry-on things that weren't accessible. And we didn't need them.

And that's why they were away. And then every time we needed something when we were in the car from the airport to our destination or anytime we were. we were in our rooms and we're like, oh, you know, it would be really, it would be really great if we had this thing that our baby likes. She had that. She was prepared for everything. She had Soren. We flew home on Father's Day, my very first Father's Day. She had two different Father's Day branded bibs for when he inevitably filled the first one up with too much spit and drool. She had everything. And I'm just thinking like, this is. this woman's talents are wasted or being my wife. She should be running Amazon. Wow. That's incredible. So, I mean, generally, I'm trying to remember what it was like the first time we flew, but we've got a real divide and conquer situation where I'm in charge of packing all

of the clothing for our children and their toiletries and anything they could possibly need on the trip itself. She is, though, in charge of all snacks, which is a big job. Like, the water and snacks and making sure that you have all of the right things and the things that the kids currently like as opposed to what they liked a week ago. And those two really cancel each other out. But we already know going on the plane, if there's like the kids are getting bored, they're getting bored, they already ate. What do you have soren? And I'm like, okay, here's what, here are our toy options.

You just got on a plane with your things And your wife had everything else I had some oversight on what What we had for the boy And also like in my defense He doesn't he's not allowed to eat or drink anything And very few toys can hold his his attention I do what I bring to the table is just like walking around

And putting him to sleep And just like indefatigable energy when he's fussy and needs to be held and moved, which is most of the time now. And I did on the way home almost

9-11 does because I was walking back and forth on this plane trying to put him to sleep. And like the thing about Flying Emirates is there is a little lounge on the plane so you have some room to walk around a bit, which was very useful when you have

a baby. And I'm in the lounge. walking this baby back and forth. And, like, there are mirrors back there. And so I'm looking at his eyes and watching him go to sleep as I'm doing... Yeah, yeah. ...a hundred and fifty squats in the sky. Talk about air squats. We'll be right back.

And I'm doing these squats and putting him to sleep. And I finally get him to sleep. And then the flight attendant who was working the bar in the lounge of the plane says, We'd like a drink. He immediately wakes up again. I'm like, you're like, and I can't even. I can't even go anywhere. I can't.

And I'm not going to say anything to you because I don't want to talk while the baby's on my chest. But it's fine. We got them down. And then I watched a pretty shitty movie. Do you know, I had the time of my life on this trip and the flights were great. And I love my in-laws and everyone who was at the wedding that I attended and the extended trip that we had. And nothing went wrong. But the thing of it is sort.

Yeah. When you have a baby and you've had a baby for three months. Familiar. And you know what your life is going to be like roughly. And then you see that at around the three month mark, you have a flight. You have a long flight, in fact. You start to think, what movies am I going to watch on this plane? They're going to have movies that are in theaters now.

this plane is going to be I'm not trying to sound dramatic my only chance to see Project Hail Mary in my life if they don't have Project Hail Mary on this plane I'm going to kill myself I was going to ask exclusively about that movie

it's not hurting anyone to have Project Hail Mary on the plane that seems like exactly the movie I'd want you to watch on a plane anyway I'm like that it's a movie that's just left theater it's no longer available kind of anywhere for a little while because they I don't know they build anticipation for streaming or something but it's a movie that's just not accessible and if you missed it in theaters it's like okay I've got one shot at this for the rest of my life with my child I thought about that on Father's Day because I was like I I can watch something on Father's Day my children aren't around me on Father's Day because that's the way I like I like it and I was like guess what I'm going to go find Project Hail Mary surely it surely it's I can just rent it somewhere. It's inaccessible.

You can rent it now. I checked Monday, and I saw that it was available for rent. And even that I'm, I, what am I going to do? Because that's a movie, my wife will try to watch with me. And if I rent it for $5.99 and we start it at night, she'll be asleep in five minutes. minutes. Yeah.

And we'll try to watch it in bits and pieces over a few nights until the rental expires. Or I spend $20 to buy it. I just want to watch it a little bit. Just for me on a plane. And instead, I watched James L. Brooks's Ella McKay. What the fuck is that? What is that? I thought it would scratch the same kind of.

I love James L. Brooks so goddamn much. He made as good as it gets. He made The Simpsons. Oh, I mean, I like James O'Brien. Great movie. He made, How Do You Know with Paul Rudd, Owen Wilson, Rees Witherspoon, Jack Nicholson, that movie that we talked about on this podcast, this dangerous banger.

How do you know that great flick? Cameo, Dean Norris, Tony Shalube. So many. stars in that flick and he made Elam K. He doesn't make a lot of movies. And he made this L. M.K. movie with with

Ella McKay, who was played by you keep saying that name. I'm going to go for it. She was played by Emma Mackie, who is not Margot Robbie or Samiro weaving. She's the other one. The other blonde. The one from

sex education. She was in this. Oh, yeah. I like her. and Albert Brooks was in it and Jamie Lee Curtis was in it and Woody Harrelson was in it and Camel Najani was in it and a few other this guy who was on slow horses

but I don't watch slow horses so he was a revelation to me he was in it and he was great the movie was not really good there were a couple there were a couple of lines that I thought were decent

and okay and I was scrolling through the list of movies on the plane and I thought this one, this is another movie that, if I don't watch now, I will never, I'll never get another shot. And this feels like a fine consolation prize for a plane that for no reason doesn't have Project Hail Mary.

And it just wasn't. Well, so it's, as I sit there eating my vegan meal because I can't order a meal with no eggs. Your options are just a meat meal or a vegan meal or a vegetarian meal. And the vegetarian meal can't be trusted. So I have to get a vegan meal, which is quinoa and shaved carrots. Oh, fuck.

They really... I'm eating... That was such an afterthought. They were third-class citizens. Keenwa and shaved carrots watching Ella McKay when I want real food and Project Hale. Mary. That's brutal. Knowing that what you could have had is really tough. Think about everything in your life that requires a password these days.

Your bank, your email, your work stuff, your script portal, your kids stuff, the stuff for your security camera, the all the many apps that you need to get, the fishing apps that you look at, the fishing booking apps. that you look at, the apps that are about fish, all the fish apps that we all have that all require passwords to keep our fish data safe and secure, think about them. Now think about how many of those passwords are actually strong and different from each other. For most people, the honest answer is not many. That's a real problem. And it's exactly what Keeper fixes for you. I love Keeper. For all of my fish passwords, Keeper takes the guesswork and the memorization out of it for me. They handle the passwords. They make a strong passwords and they save the strong passwords for me. So I don't have to use any of my brain or any of my paper to keep the passwords straight.

It frees me up to do other things. Like, guess what? Fish, that's right. It frees me up to fish. Keep really saves me time and prevents headaches because there's nothing that I loathe more than having to put in a password and having the website say my password's wrong. And then me say reset the password and then they send me an email and then I have to click a thing and then I have to put a code in. It's so much work just to get into my fish app to look at fish. Thanks to Keeper for sponsoring quick question. Keeper is a password manager that creates strong unique passwords for all your accounts, stores them securely in one place and logs you in automatically across all your devices so you never

have to remember, guess, or worry about your login credentials again. Right now, Keeper's offering our listeners 60% off personal and family plans at Keepersecurity.com for business keeper takes the chaos out of managing access for teams so they can securely share logins, control permissions, and protect sensitive data without slowing down day-to-day work. From individuals to large organizations, millions of people worldwide rely on Keeper to keep passwords organized and accounts protected. Keeper helps you to stop thinking about passwords altogether. Free your mind and just get on with your day. Right now, Keeper is offering our listeners 60% off personal and family plans at Keepersecurity.com slash QQ. This offers only for podcast,

That's Keeperssecurity.com slash QQ for 60% off personal and family plans. Make sure you use our link so they know we sent you. Keeperssecurity.com slash QQ. Bye. It is a real delicate balance to find the right movie on a plane because if you end up watching the wrong one, it can really fuck up your whole plane ride. And I'm in the same boat as you. As a parent, I will fly.

I'll fly. When I flew to New York to see you or I flew in New Jersey, I would have just flown there and then flown right home just for the opportunity to sit there and watch movies uninterrupted without my kids. And I messed up on that ride. On that plane, I was flipping through the movies and I was like, well, what haven't I seen?

What should I catch up on? And I was like, oh, here's one that I know everyone's been talking about called Marty Supreme. That would be a good one for the plane ride. I've never been more stressed out in my whole life than watching that movie. Oh, right. I like that movie a lot, but it is unplayed. It's deeply stressful at every turn. Don't get a second to rest.

No. And I'm freaked out and, but I'm riveted. So I'm freaked out. I'm high tense. I know that I'm high tension because when every time that they come on the speaker and they want to talk to me and it pauses the movie, I lose my mind. I want to yell at somebody. I did.

Because you've been talking about being a parent and watching movies on planes for so many years. that I knew it was important. And at first I started the bride, the Bride of Frankenstein movie, yeah, by Maggie Gyllenhaal. The reviews were not good, but there were enough reviews that were like, it's interesting that I thought maybe this would be one of the times

that I disagree with the reviews and I appreciate a movie taking bold swings. And like 10 minutes into it, I was like, this is a mistake. And you cannot see this through. You can't. This time is too valuable. You have to abandon this.

And I mean, obviously, how the bride was meant to be watched, right? And Project Hail Mary, for that matter, on a screen that's just a little bit bigger than your phone, but not as big as an iPad, constantly interrupted by a pilot telling you, there's dinner service starting. Listen, Project Hail Mary. Listen, Lord and Miller. If you wanted me to watch your movie on a big screen, then you should have made it when I was single and living in Los Angeles and seeing a movie every goddamn day. This is more your fault than mine.

I didn't have a kid most of my life. A bunch of opportunities to make movies. You could have made it then. I know that The Odyssey is coming out if it's not already out. And I'm a little panicked about that. Because the two of us with our fingers on the pulse for this popcorn. culture podcast. That's my jam.

The Odyssey, Greek epics are my jam. And I need to see it and I need to see it in the way that it was meant to be seen. And that's just not how I watch movies. And so I'm a little panicked because I'm going to have to come up with a plan to somehow see that in a theater without anyone. And that's a lot of time that I would be using up that I would otherwise have for, you know, anything else in my life. I know. I mean, this summer is going to see not just a Christopher Nolan Odyssey movie, which looks awesome, but another Dune movie. Yeah.

And another Spider-Man movie and a new Avengers movie. And I don't know that I'm going to see any of them. I think I'll just be like a different guy now. Well, it. And I think that's fatherhood. It's not a bad guy to be. No, I'll tell you, dude. Later on, you're going to get to a point in your life where six years.

from now, you're going to be like, okay, I have a little bit of free time. Let's see what I missed. And then you'll just like scroll through and you're like, oh, I never saw this. Or the best is that you will get to movies and you'll be like, I didn't even know this existed. Who are all these people together in a movie? This is incredible. Jake Gyllenhaal was in a thriller where he played his own antagonist. What is this movie? And you'll just be able to dive into a movie that everyone else has seen and you just completely miss because you're a different man now. I know, but... You don't want to be that, man. But I know that a Spider-Man movie is coming out. I know. I know.

So, Daniel, in Italy, you had... Your son, I know, notoriously, does not do well in the car. How did he do? You guys must have been driving all over the place in Italy. We were not. We had, uh, from the airplane to where we were staying for the wedding, and then from there to, like, Like we just, we hung out at the, the wedding venue because you were, it was like your wedding and that we just sort of took over this villa, the way that we took over a town for your wedding.

We just took over this beautiful Italian villa with a small but like intimate and hilarious, wonderfully fun group of friends and family. And then a car ride from there to, we continued the Italy trip. My wife and baby and I and my mother and father-in-law is how it called Santa Margarita. Gure in Italy. That was a car ride. And then we bummed around like we walked there and

got on a train, took a ferry, but mostly just did like stuff in town. And then another car, there were five car rides total that I was worried about for this trip. And he was great. He would fuss and we'd give him a bottle and he stopped fussing. And part of it was

for two of these car rides. I mean, we had a drive for all of them. We're not going to rent a car in Italy. I'm not insane. So we had four adults entertaining a child whenever he made a peep. And that was that was pretty helpful. Yeah, that helps. I find, you know, now I'm mentioning, so obviously plane rides are always a gamble with a child. But being on a vacation with a baby, they do tend to take like crazy leaps and bounds just being on the vacation. It's the they unlock all these different achievements that you just like you expedite the

course of action for them. I I don't think my kids still do it. But there's something about being on vacation where your baby is just like, oh, I can do everything now. You know I can speak. Did you know that? And I don't know what it is. Maybe it is that they're surrounded constantly by people who are engaged with them as opposed to me. I'm just sitting there on my phone being like, oh, there's a Jake Jillenhall movie. I missed that one. Huh. You know?

And as we, uh, he did seem like he grew a lot on this trip. Um, I don't know if that's just the timing or if it's just like that, that fresh, delicious Italian air. Oh, man, better. And there's, there's a lot of stuff for him to look at and we're showing him a whole lot of things. And also there are times where I'm, uh, just wandering around carrying him in the city.

And then, like, two older Italian people would come up and not miss beat, speak a lot of rapid fire Italian to me and the baby. And then make noises to the baby. And then they walk away. And that's the case where I look at my son, I'm like, we're both kind of the same boat. I know that's how you experience all conversation. But, like, we had the same cultural experience just now. I understood as much as you did. Yeah, we're both a little bit scared.

but yeah, we're all smiling. It seemed like it went pretty good. They left and didn't seem like they were upset with us, so that's wonderful. I have another thing to say about Italy, Soren. Oh, please. Now, I've lived in New York and Los Angeles. Yeah.

These are major cities. Uh-huh. They make movies about places like this. So I know a thing or two about a thing or two. This place that we went to in Italy. You know what I didn't? you know, I didn't pick up on anywhere. The smell of wheat.

Oh. I was very surprised because it's full of people. Yeah. And it's beautiful there. And it's not like I was seeking it out or anything. But in Los Angeles, it's inescapable everywhere you go. And New York, it's gotten more so. It's in the fucking gym here.

Now in Italy, there's like, I don't, is it a country of edibles? Or is it like, like, very, very frowned upon? or what's going on there. It was deep. Is it illegal? I don't know. I didn't. Oh, you didn't check in any of it.

I bet it's still just an illegal drug there. I bet that's the main reason. Also, just culturally, I think it really is a cultural thing. If you don't have weed, there's no doing a jumpstart weed in your culture. Nobody ever, it just doesn't take root in the same way. It's, you know, it's like the first time you do it, it's your paranoid and freaked out. And I think that you get, you don't have anybody who's ever gone past that stage. And you're like, well, why would we use weed here?

We have wine. We've got Kianti. Everyone did seem very locked into their own specific vices that, like, people will have an apparel spritz or a beer starting at like 10.30 in the morning. And they will have a cocktail with every meal throughout the day. And they smoke. Everybody smokes, too, which is very upsetting. Not great with a baby.

Yeah. Oh, the only other, the, the, the smoking just reminds me of, uh, uh, not humiliating moment, but I did a, a pretty good job. I don't want to toot my own horn. That's not what this podcast is for. This podcast is about humility. I did a pretty good job, surprising even myself communicating in Italian on behalf of my family while I was there. Really? Really?

Yeah. a way that was like it's it felt like five years of italian in middle school and high school a hundred years ago as a baseline plus all of the spanish that i had been taking on duolingo because the languages are very similar and then just a little bit of brushing up right before the trip it all sort of uh coalesced into uh a decent handle on the language that surprised even me and was very helpful for us. And I was proud and confident with the way I'd been communicating, except one time when we sat at one cafe for lunch and the smoke was too much.

So before we even ordered, we got up and we were going somewhere else and the waiter looked at me like, what's going on? And I was saying, Fumare, Tropo Fumade, was trying to say too much smoke. And I couldn't remember if I was pronouncing Fumare, right? Or if I was confusing Spanish and Italian on. that one and he was looking at me like he's still non-compisco

and so then I was like miming smoking and also I wanted to like convey animata poetically that I was talking about smoking and I

I did the dumb thing which is not just go like if I was trying to communicate you I'd be like you know but because I was in Italy I was doing like cigarettes go. It was like, you know,

how some people, when they're trying to speak, they're trying to communicate with someone who speaks another language and they were like absentmindedly, they'll do an English with like, like they'll speak broken English with an accent when they're trying to communicate with someone else.

Yes. As if that helps. I was doing like, in an Italian accent as if that would, as if A, that's a thing that exists. And B, he would be like,

ah, C, see. Puff, a poof. E poof. So you're both doing it at each other? Yeah. He didn't understand, I assume.

Didn't know what you're talking about? You didn't do like a cough. No, but like I'm leaving. Yeah. There's no accent on a cough. You can just go, you just want to swat at the air and go. Yeah. I wondered if it was so.

Bobbino. If it was so common there that it hadn't occurred to him that smoke would be the reason that we would leave. Oh. Right. I do remember being on trains a lot in Italy and being really fucking myself when I got into a smoking car as opposed to a not smoking car. Because, man, do they really go for it in a smoking car? It's like they're going to, it's like their job to make the thing as cloudy as possible. Yeah.

Well, I'm glad it was a good trip. I'm glad that your child was good. I was actually thinking about you a lot during the trip because I was like, man, that's, that could be a nightmare with a three-month-old. I was, we were pretty zen about it because a lot of it was preparation. And after the preparation, it's, you're just kind of, you're just in it. Like everything else, really. You know, you're on a plane and you hope he doesn't scream on the plane. But you also tell yourself like, yeah, he might scream.

And if he screams, then he will scream. and this is, this is, we will, we will sue them. We will try to soothe him and this is temporary. And everything else is just like, we can, we would like to explore this town in Italy. If he hates being outside, if he hates exploring, if it's too hot for him, we will just sit in our Airbnb the entire time and that'll be what we do and that's okay too. And all of it is just like, we're, you know, we're here. I kind of just kept, kept telling myself over and over again, we're doing this.

You know, there's no, you can't, it was more stressful leading up to it as I'm thinking about, like, wouldn't it, is there any way that we can not go and it not be my fault? Or is there any way that we can go and not have to like go? Can we just be there? Is there all the stuff that I'm fretting about and like, and imagining the worst thing happening at every pass? Once we're on it, it's just like, well, we're here. This is, this is, we're doing it. And whatever happens, we are going to deal with it. Oh, good.

I'm glad you had such a good trip. I'm glad that you had this wonderful trip. A good trip. Did you fucking hear about Project Hail Mary? It's Father's Day. Ruined. Every single, every single time Italy comes up, this is going to drive your kid crazy. Every single time in your family history when Italy comes up, you guys will be like, oh, you've been there to him.

Yeah. You've been there. And he'll be like, I wasn't really. fucking there. I don't know what you're talking about. Please stop saying that. My mom does that with Mexico and I was in her stomach, but she's always like, you've been to Mexico. I almost had you in Mexico. I'm like, well, I don't have any recollection. So please stop saying that. All this stuff where for the rest of his life will be like, you lucky kid, you flying international at three months old. And we're like, Dad, that really feels like more of a fun trip for you. That doesn't, that does not qualify.

please stop saying that. All right. Well, everybody, that's going to be enough on the old Italy episode, Italy episode, as Daniel would call it, as Daniel would call it. Thank you for listening. If you liked our theme song, that's by me, Rex. If you like a video version of this podcast, you can do that on YouTube.

If you like more of this podcast, you can become a Patreon subscriber and get every other week we do another shorter version of, not even a shorter version. It's not like an abbreviated version of what we just did. A completely new thing that's just shorter. If you like this podcast, at General. That's all thanks to Gabe Harder.

Thank you very much for listening. Arrivedici. Arrivalela. I think you'll have a great time here