Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - The Guys Go Grey!

Episode Date: January 21, 2022

Soren and Daniel face their mortality! Also the guys might have created a new fad diet (fast food and pasta but nothing else).  And as always big thanks to our sponsors.  Thanks BetterHelp.  Get 10% off your first month at betterhelp.com/qq. Thanks Hawthorne. Take your quiz and get 10% off your first purchase at hawthorne.co with code QQ.  Thanks  Postmates.  Use code QQ and get $5 off your first five orders.

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use, and you get your cash back through PayPal or Check. The idea is simple. Stores pay Rakuten for semi-mum shoppers, and Rakuten shares the money with you as cash back. Download the free Rakuten app and never miss a deal. Or go to rakuten.ca to start giving the most bang for your buck. That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N. 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 am one half of that podcast, author of How to Fight Presidents, staff writer for Last Week with John Oliver,

and good buddy Daniel O'Brien, joined as always by my co-host, Mr. Soren Bowie. Buenas tardes, señor Bowie. ¿Cómo está? Buenas tardes, Dan. Chur, chur, chur, chur, chur. Wait, I'm deciding now whether I want to walk that back. That might be offensive.

Did you know you called it last week with John Oliver? I did. Yeah. Roll the tape. Let's take the whole thing again. No, leave it. Okay. I'm pretty sure you did. I could be wrong. I was so, here's what I think I'm finding is that the more Spanish I learned, the worse I'm getting at English. I think there's a finite amount of words that can take up space in my brain, it sounds like. So I think

by saying, by learning how to say, good afternoon, Mr. Bowie, how are you? I've completely forgotten where I work. I did find that when I would travel abroad, that when I'd use my Spanish, I could start thinking a little bit in Spanish. But then when I tried to think in English again, or I tried to talk to people in English, I was like, no, this isn't really coming together the way i hoped it would this sentence uh it is there's really really room in your brain for like one at a time it does seem uh so dan you're taking spanish lessons i am i'm doing uh this app called pimpsler 30 minutes a day every day i've been doing it for 10 days

right now and it's 30 minutes of listening it's a really it's a strange way to learn a language because it's not I'm very thankful that I studied Italian because a the languages are very similar but I'm I'm be grateful that I studied it because there are a lot of basic things when you're learning Italian or any other language in like middle school at at 14 years old or whatever where you're gonna go through like here are all the pronouns here's I here's he here she here's they here's them here are a bunch of verbs that just means like to work to drink to eat here are the rules for conjugation I does this to the verb you does this to the verb blah blah blah

blah blah you learn all these rules and you're not we're not starting with rules at all with this app they're just they're teaching you like very basic helpful conversational language stuff without any uh information about the rules so like i i know why certain verbs are changing because I remember how that process goes from basic Italian but I feel like you I don't know if a person could just jump in and like I want to learn Spanish knowing nothing but English I want to just I want to just like sit here and and see if I could pick this up from this app. Thanks to BetterHelp for supporting Quick Question.

For 10% off your first month, go to betterhelp.com slash QQ. Start living a better life today. Thanks to Hawthorne for supporting Quick Question. Hawthorne is a premium grooming brand that tailors your personal care routine to your unique profile with skincare and hair care made just for you.

Take Hawthorne's quiz today and get started on your personalized self care routine at hawthorne.co and use promo code QQ to get 10% off your first purchase. Thanks to Postmates for supporting Quick Question. Postmates isn't all just burgers and sushi. I can order anything from toilet paper to phone chargers from stores like Walgreens and 7-Eleven and a Postmate will drop it off right outside my front door. Download the Postmates app and use code QQ. Yeah, I see.

Okay. And so you're going in cold. You've never had a Spanish class in your life? No, never. And there's some stuff I've picked up just from A, pop culture, B, living in America, and C, working in restaurants. There's a lot of Spanish speakers in every kitchen I've ever worked in. And it's, it's helpful to learn a few phrases to communicate with them back and forth. And it's, it's really fun. I like, I like having a class to, to learn something new. It's a really interesting way to learn things because it's just a narrator being like here today we're gonna talk about like you're meeting someone new

and you're telling them that you don't speak the language very well or you're asking them if they speak English or you're saying I understand a little and so you're drilling phrases in that family a lot. And in taking these classes, I've stumbled onto one of my favorite pieces of, I think, unintentional comedy. Okay. Because in every episode, every chapter, every class, whatever, there's a man, a woman, and the omniscient voice of the cold narrator. And because it's educational, there's a lot of repetition and things are never too complicated. It's a lot of like very basic variations on greetings variations on where is blank how much does X cost

and in this particular lesson it was variations on where and what do you want to eat and in these particular exchanges the man is hungry that's his entire game and the woman character is doing the heavy lifting in terms of like the variations in this realm. Her answers are like, I'm not hungry. Or I'm hungry, but I don't want to eat here. Or I don't know what I want. And then sometimes back to I'm not hungry. And it unfolds like this very tense, passive-aggressive relationship drama with this indecisive woman with nonspecific desires and a man whose only modes are reactionary

to her and repeatedly saying, I want to eat something. And you get this, the way it goes is like the narrator talks and tells you what to say in English. And then you hear the man or the woman say it in Spanish. And it's just this guy's like, you get to the restaurant and your friend has changed her mind. How would she say, I don't want to eat here? Now, how would you say, what do you want to eat? She says, I want to eat something, but only a little, and not here. Now you say, I want to eat something. I'm sure they're just repeating things to drill it so I learn it, but to watch it play out as a scene,

by the time they go to like the third restaurant and she's changed her mind again yeah all he has said this entire time is either what do you want or i want to eat something i really just want to break in and be like i think you two should go home i think like pick up separate fast food on the way this guy's gonna snap that is how conversations generally go though is there's a lot of repetition within the conversation of like especially when you're fighting where you're like i don't i don't think my point was heard there i know what i want i want food what do you want she says i don't know i don't want this i'm like man what do you by this? Or do you mean a burrito?

I don't know. Yeah. Well, Daniel, you know that I speak Spanish. Oh, say that again. How? You know that I speak Spanish. You know how to speak Spanish.

Yeah, do you know that I speak Spanish? Oh, do I know that you speak Spanish? I know that I speak spanish oh do i know that you speak spanish uh i know that i've i've i've observed you speak spanish to children yes and i'm going to give some more context no that should do it i think between we used to uh volunteer together is that where there were a lot of spanish kids that you would talk to or was it just different co-workers bringing their kids to the office? Where did I watch you talk Spanish to children? I think it probably would have been at our fight club.

Okay. Sorry, our volunteer thing that we would do. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's where it would have been. I'm trying to think of the kids though maybe like az or somebody yeah you were uh it was one of those things that i should have engaged with you more at the time and and talked about hey that's that's that's impressive that you could just bust out spanish and and and talk to people uh but i'm but also at the time, I was just like, oh, this is just another fucking thing Soren can do?

All right. Can he juggle in Spanish too? My Spanish is, it's like brash. It's like I will, my wife has been to Central America several times. She spent a lot of time there in college and her Spanish is way better than mine, but she's much more timid about using it. And for me, I, at some point I just gave up on all

of their conjugations other than the present tense. Occasionally I'll use progressive because it's a much easier, it's really easy to use, but like, that's like, I am walking or I am talking, that's progressive, but like present tense, anything I'm going to say, I'm just going to use present tense because as I'm talking, like they get what I'm saying. And then I don't have to sit there for a second and be like, all right, let's see past participle. Let me think for a second. Okay.

I got it. And I, and I have to like conjugate it in my mind for like, okay, yo, to you, that is like, I don't have to, I can, I can just be like, you know what? I'm so sorry about this, but you're just going to get the present tense and it works every single time. So they understand what I'm saying, but it's, I'm not like a, they're, nobody's going to be like, oh, are you from, are you from Argentina or anything like that? Two things that I'm definitely not grasping intuitively immediately is I know that there are uh different masculine and feminine versions of things where it's where like buenos noches buenas tardes or or i might not even have that right but i just know

that like some take buenas if it's a feminine word and some take yeah buenos if it's a masculine word uh and i'm not there's not an intuitive way to immediately sense those differences coming, and I'm hoping that buenos and buenas aren't different enough that I'm going to say something accidentally offensive. I think I'll just look stupid, which is fine.

I'm okay being stupid in as many languages as will have me. And the other thing I'm not grasping, almost on purpose out of spite is they this early on they're still making it clear that there are distinctions for when you're talking to someone uh very casually versus when you're talking to someone who is either older or a stranger so you would use like okay a more formal instead versus two and like tns or tna and those are things where i'm like well if i'm talking to someone uh respectable who i don't

know they're just gonna have to deal with me wait so they haven't given you any qualifiers for that for like when to use each some of those you don't ever have to learn like full set throws are they they're teaching you the vosotros command i bet i mean i'm not conjugation no not yet they're just like like you mean like you're steadiest or two yes yeah okay and that's the kind of thing where i'm just not i'm not going to hammer that into my brain immediately and i think that's i'm i'm assuming that's fine that yeah if I'm dropped somewhere where everyone speaks Spanish except me I think they will be fine enough that I've learned some of the language I don't think anyone's

gonna not answer me because it's like oh you you used to instead of who stead and I'm like yeah but the rest that sentence was can you get me to the hospital please yeah that's i i like i i'm as fickle with using ustedes or two as i am with like whether or not i'm going to take a receipt from cvs when they ask like i i will not i just there's nothing that determines whether or not i'll do it just like how the weather is strikes me that particular day except with children with children i usually use that is because I think it's fun. Yeah. And I think, I don't know, they think it's fun, but I have no, no basis for that. Hey, this is going to maybe sound cliche, but what's getting in the way of you living your best life. And when I say best life, what does that mean to you? Does

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you're dropped right into conversation. So we don't have a lesson where it's, where here's the alphabet and here are the numbers numbers only come up in the context of the lesson so like i know what 12 is because in lesson three it was determined that a soda costs 12 pesos i don't know what what 11 or 13 is but it's like here's how you would say the soda costs 12 pesos i'm like okay they'll, doce. Got it. All right. I hope everything I come across is also 12. That's very funny. I never really thought about it that way. Yeah. I mean, I'm sure that there's so much that they're just like not giving you in the foundation of the Spanish just to get you to a conversational point. And it seems like something that like, if Spanish is at all similar to Italian,

the numbers will be eventually a very easy thing. Yeah. I guess like glossary terms and stuff, those fall in pretty quick. But I don't know, that's the part that stuck with me the most. Like I know the word for all the things, the nouns, and I know most of the verbs adjectives are tough but like that that stuff will come back to me right away and that was because that was what was drilled into me in school it was like the conjugations and stuff were like okay now we'll get into that in level three or whatever but early on you're just learning a bunch of nouns yeah because that's how you're gonna get by you to be like, you don't have to be like, um,

los chiquiles or like whatever you want. Like you, you just be like chiquiles and they'll be like, yeah, we'll get it for you. Yeah. One other problem. And then we can get into the show, but another problem that I'm noticing I'm having with this app. Uh, and I love it by the way, really enjoy doing it i i i i hardly endorse pimpsler as an app for whatever language you want to learn um this is a problem i've noticed with myself dating back to my incoming brag college acapella days oh yeah

uh whenever i would so we'd all learn a song together all the various parts and then you would audition in front of the group to be the soloist for that song and one of the things that one of the guys in the group pointed out to me was that I was mimicking like the the tonal quality of this the singer of the original song like I like the the tonal quality of this the singer of the original song like I I it's like a bashfulness of my own janky ass voice I've only like now at 36 gotten comfortable singing like the weird freak that I am and not trying to sound exactly like Rick Springfield singing Jessie's Girl or Dave Matthews when I'm auditioning for one of those songs and even in like every musical that i did in high

school in local theater was like trying to sound like the guy in the recording and match that as much as i could and not be like this is what i sound like singing this is what i sound like doing an impression of nathan lane singing and that is i'm finding also true with this app because i'm i'm repeating after these two people. And I'm not even going to do it on this podcast now because I'm already fearing like if I ever do it in the wild in real life, it's going to sound like I'm doing a character, like some Spanish character guy with a deeper voice or some like indecisive woman. Like it's not you. when you talk you sound like Soren speaking Spanish and I'm very much like don't think it's alabano because

that's how she says it right you're following the woman's the woman's cadence that's I think that's pretty common I remember a kid in my class in high school who as he would say stuff, he'd be like, like, like the way that he'd say it, he'd like squint while he did it and kind of like lean back. And the teacher eventually was like, do you know that you're squinting as you, as you asked for that taste of an apple? What? And she was like, are you picturing somebody in your mind when you speak Spanish? She's like, yes. And he had somebody who like was neighbor and he would like do what his neighbor did when he spoke, which was like the squint and kind of like a, ah, like a lean back.

Yeah. Replicating that. And he was like, incapable of speaking Spanish without doing the squint. It was just funny. Miming a cigarette in his hand. It was, it was very, very funny. But I think that's pretty common where you're just like, well, whoever the person is that's speaking to you, that's the one you're going to pick up. The same way where I think there's a lot of Indian people who learn English, but they sort of have a British accent because so many of them come

by English through England. And they're just like, well, this is how we say it. Well, let's see, Dan, you had, I don't know if I'm allowed to say this on the podcast, you had like a brief relationship with a woman who was Spanish, didn't you? Or was she Brazilian? Yeah, Brazilian. Oh, so she spoke Portuguese. Yes. And I wasn't going to learn Portuguese. It was a- It's ugly language. I will admit. It was two tiers of communication

where first I thought like... It's sad. I'm going to learn this. I'm going to learn Portuguese when she comes back to America in a few months. I'm going to have learned Portuguese and then I worked on it for a little bit.

It was like, I'm going to learn you are very beautiful in Portuguese and that's it. That was my strategy when I traveled abroad, where I would go to a new country. First of all, I'd be on a train because there was like a channel that went everywhere. And then that was what I had to pass on. And anytime I'd be going to a new country, I'd be like, okay, wait, fuck. I don't, I don't speak Italian.

And I'd like look for people on the train who also look like travelers. And I'd be like, do you speak Italian? And sometimes they'd be like, yeah. And I'd be like, well, is it okay if we travel together for a little bit? And then other times, if I couldn't find somebody, I would just flip through this book and I would just be like, I need the best five phrases. Right. That's all. And I'm going to get by on these five and I will learn them so well that I can, that I'll be able to pronounce them exactly right. And that's all I will

use the entire time I'm here. When I went through Europe, I, all of it is out of my head now, but I learned in the language of every place that we were visiting, uh, hello, I'm'm sorry i don't speak this language very well do you speak english because that's a better way to start things off than just immediately assuming they speak english even though they speak english almost everywhere it's still more polite and puts you on better footing with a stranger to apologize and say you don't speak the language very well and ask if they can help you out the only downside of that is uh saying it in in france once so just with this lady say parley and they said no i was like oh me uh yeah i kind of oversold it when i said i don't speak french very well that's all i speak exactly you just heard, by the way,

that was wonderful, Dan. That was like, thank you. If I would've heard that, I'd be like, that guy's fluent. That guy's fluent.

That's what, and so like when I went to France, all I would do is I'd say, uh, bonjour, and then I would point to whatever I wanted. And that just meant like, I would like,

and then whatever it was that I wanted. And, uh, and that was like, that was working really well until one day I was like, walking up to somebody and I wanted to do. And, and that was like, that was working really well until one day I was like, walking up to somebody and I wanted to find a bathroom. And I was like, oh,

fuck. I can't point to it. Cause I don't know where it is. And then I was like, my first thought, this is my first crude thought was mimic peeing. And I was like, don't,

don't, don't do that. Don't as if you're flying. Don't like mimic. Like, and I was like don't don't no no don't do that don't do that don't as if you're fly don't like mimicking like and i was like oh fuck bathroom and then you feel like such a loser yeah and they just watch their faces fall you know yeah especially if you've like ramped into the language and you're feeling good he was like uh toilet please do you have a bathroom where I can poop uh but yeah that's it that was one of my still continues to be one of my biggest fears is that I ever feel like a fish out of water which is why I've worked so hard throughout my life to be so cool in every situation. So if I am in a foreign country and a tourist, I hate that feeling. There are so many

people who give into it and I'm jealous of them, the way that they're just like, no, it's okay. I'm allowed to be here. It's fine. I'm allowed to be a tourist here and I'm allowed to not understand the system. And I hate, I can't, I won't ever give myself over to that i always feels terrible yeah i was fully memorizing basic phrases and like also going through like what are what are hand gestures to avoid in amsterdam that might be offensive that are like very normal in america that might be offensive like in amsterdam i i learned you can't just walk up to someone and kiss them on the mouth. They consider that rude there. Yeah. Isn't that weird? I mean, yeah, yeah. I would say not in COVID, obviously, but yeah, before COVID, that's weird. Do you have a favorite Spanish word that you've discovered since you've been doing this?

Like one that you're just like, oh, that's a fun one to say. I'll give you some examples so you've been doing this like one that you're just like oh that's a fun one to say um i'll give you some examples so you can i don't so the only the thing that i love the the most is it's and it's not even a word that i learned from this is adios just because every time it comes up in a lesson it's funny to me because it's always like i'm always struggling through like okay let's let's meet at the restaurant at the at the hotel restaurant let's meet at the hotel fernandez okay how much do you have i have this much i'm gonna pay and then as soon as the narrator's like now say goodbye i'm like like it adios! Like it's my favorite. It means I can meep meep and scram on out of there. Yeah, adios. I really, really enjoy saying clanchas. I think that one's very fun. What does that mean? That just means sandals.

Clanchas. And then I also really like saying cacahuates, which is peanuts. Peanuts. Those are my, when those would come up in conversation in Spanish class, we'd be doing like a skit or something like that. I was pretty, pretty often I would try and squeeze in that I needed some peanuts or that my shoes weren't fitting right. Certainly when I was learning Italian, aranchata for orange juice. I like oh that's fun that's a fun one to say oh that is nice um you know something else that uh i i think about you most of the times that i do these lessons

because uh well let me explain why it's not a bad i'm not just like idly thinking about you it's what's doing there's a a short film that you and justin veyer did for for our old website cracked years ago where it's you and uh i believe in the narrative of the sketch the the woman is your maid or the maid at a hotel you're oh you had her at a hotel um and Yeah, I met her in a hotel. Oh, you met her at a hotel. And you don't speak her language very well. She doesn't speak. She does the entire scene in Spanish and you're talking to her and you think you've made a suicide pact with this woman that you've bonded with and you're both going to jump off this bridge together. Yeah, because our families couldn't possibly ever adhere to our love.

Right. But I foresee this as a romantic relationship that she does not understand. Yes. And it's a very, very funny short. We'll have Bacon link it in the show notes. And there's one thing that... So, part of the narrative is you project onto her a sad broken life that she doesn't actually have you assume she comes from this broken home i believe because one of the things you mentioned that she doesn't have a father uh and she says tango and papa and you go you have a dad and because i've i i watched the sketch so many times both as a fan of it and also in my capacity as an employee of the website who had to like rewatch our videos over and over again for quality control reasons tango and Papa you have

a dad very great basic Spanish for me so like as soon as we got to learning have and the different ways to conjugate that I was like i've got this guys don't worry i need to pause this and take a second when it comes to uh want and eat but tango that's right yeah uh that i forgot i had forgotten about that that was actually the first sketch where i realized that i was gray we were shooting it and they were doing stills on set. And then Justin was like, I'll send you the stills. And he sent them to me and I was like, I called him and I was like, these shots of me from behind. Is that just the light?

What's going on there? He's like, did you not know that you have gray hair? I was like, no, I had no idea. And that was, I mean, I was like 28 and I just started gray. I started noticing gray hairs it seemed i'm sure it's not true but it seems like it happened on my 36th birthday that i'm looking in the mirror and seeing gray hairs for the first time they happened overnight and i'm generally okay with aging in the forward process of the forward march of time but I was mad not not strictly the idea of of gray but

I was like no my thing is I'm going bald that's that's my path you don't get both I don't yeah I'm not going to be graying and bald I'm going to be a bald guy and that's okay yeah you don't get both yeah there's fingerprints of death there's too many i yeah i really thought uh i would never be able to grow a beard and i'm at the point now dan i don't know if i've told you this i could grow a beard now i have enough facial hair yeah the gaps have all grown in i can't grow a beard because my beard would be entirely gray. So the ship sailed and like, finally I'm there. I'm there at the dock waiting to get on. And I, it's, it's not, it's not even feasible for an entirely different reason now.

Do you think, so I just want to see it, I guess. Yeah. Cause, cause a gray beard doesn't yeah necessarily need to be bad no if it was uniform and it was like a like a white or all kind of a solid gray i think i could do it but it has that that first of all growing a beard this first for me the first month of growing a beard it will not be a very attractive beard it'll be like stringy and weird and little patchy before it fills in now imagine that but there's like some of the hairs are kind of curly and white and then other ones are just kind of a gray and some of them are still a little dark and and maybe some of them are blonde but you can't tell the

difference between that and the white and so like it's it it's gonna be such a weird awful even when i haven't shaved for a week i'm like oh jesus i look about 10 years older yeah so i remember being in my mid or or late 20s i guess mid-20s where i two things were on my radar simultaneously one i'd been shaving my head for so long and wanted to grow my hair out again and that's a very hard thing to do because there are there are so many terrible in between stages from shaved head to whatever your next hairstyle is it just looks it has to look bad by design for a very long time there are a lot of mini bosses you have to beat along the way yes yeah so there was that and also as someone who wanted to grow facial hair for a long time i was like i think i can i think i can do it i think if i really put my head

down and keep at it i can do it because it was just like patchy and stubbly for a while and if i just really went for it i could at least see what i could i could pull off and like no bullshit timed it out for a window when I was at work but knew I was taking two weeks off from work to to just work on my book how to fight presidents where I was like I need to just like lock myself in my apartment and work on this book I can't have any distractions because I just need to get it done and that was true but i was also like okay so maybe like a week and a half or two weeks before that i'm gonna stop shaving and i'm gonna stop cutting my hair and then like let the worst of it be contained within this two-week period where no one's allowed to see me and it was like perfect circumstances just like completely

isolated myself to get through the worst of it and the awkward stage. And then be like, aha. I mean, the other side of this tunnel is pretty bad too, but we're out of the tunnel. You came out of that, but that's how you should look at the end of writing a book. That's how everyone expects you to look at the end of writing a book is like, and I have a beard now. And everyone's like, yeah, no, that makes sense because you were on a boat for all that time.

Yeah, sure. That's what Hemingway did. Yeah, of course. So I think that that's's that god that was smart if i would have known it would have been nice to have somebody tell you before covid this is how long cove it's gonna be so that you can be like great i'm gonna try some on my body now absolutely i wouldn't ordinarily try i would have fully not gotten a haircut it's like let's see where it goes i knew i know when i was younger my hair was was curly and i would have like a big afro for a number of years i don't know i don't even know what i'm working with up there anymore let's see

let's see what happens when i just seed control yeah i would have i would have liked to have not shaven i would like to have tried to grow in some creative facial hair, something new that like maybe no one's seen before. And I might've even like, you know, like if I could do something that was very District 1 in that Mockingbird movie. Sure. Yeah. District 1, the capital from Hunger Games. Yes, exactly. Yeah, it's some twirly stuff. I wanted to just see what I was capable of. And then I would have also really liked to have seen what would happen,

both grow my hair out all the way, and then also shave it completely and see which of those things I liked. Because you don't know what your head's going to be like underneath there until you do it. Yeah. My daughter, my daughter, I don't think we'll ever be able to shave her head because she's got a little

bit of flatness in the back, in the back of her head. Cause you know, you can't put your baby down on their stomach when they sleep. And so they spend so much time on their back that generally they, it kind of gets a little flat back there and then it rounds out on its own you have the option occasionally to get a helmet and then the pediatrician was like honestly her hair will cover it easily i wouldn't do it so he didn't and so you don't notice it when you just look at her

but if i put my hand in her head i'm like ah there it is yeah there's your there's your one flaw and that's going to be a conversation you have if she ever does want to shave her head you're like listen we've kept this for you as long as we as we could your head's totally up in the back i'm sorry we you up as well i'm so sorry your head's shaved like a flat tire we could have fixed this if if we put you in a helmet, but you wouldn't. Come on. Our daughter's not a loser. That was a lot of work. That's right. Yeah. We couldn't take you out in public then. And think of all the social dynamics you developed because we took you out so young. So yeah, I'm never doing that,

never growing a beard. It's just one of those things I will live with. And you know what? At some point, they're going to go out of style and everyone's going to come back to old buoy shorn face. I don't know that I'll ever be old buoy shorn face. I've been not having a beard for a while and have just been, but I, but I haven't been doing like clean shaven and I don't know if I'll ever do that again. I just buzz it on a low setting to get that that careless stubble that takes people an afternoon but takes me three days and

a lot of careful work yes i've i've been affecting that casual look that's a good one especially when it's just a little bit shorter than your hair yeah like when you're when your hair on your face is all kind of uniform like almost the same length all the way around. It's a really good look. For guys. Yeah. Hawthorne is a premium grooming brand that tailors your personal care routine to your unique profile.

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That's H-A-W-T-H-O-R-N-E dot C-O, promo code QQQ Hawthorne dot C O promo code QQ. Um, well, dude, do you want to get into the show? I do. Yeah. Uh, I have a question that's, that's vaguely related to what we've been talking about insofar as it's about health and wellness in the future and the passage of time. Uh, but if you want to go first, you can. no you got a way do it quick question go ahead is there and I don't exactly know how to put this a difficult but good thing that you know is in your future but you're still putting off anyway like you know

it's it's inevitable I bring this up because a comedian podcaster, Billy Wayne Davis, a very funny person, uh, has been doing, he's cut processed sugar out of his diet and he's been documenting it on Twitter. a while ago where he was talking about like day 15 no sugar my energy is up i'm sleeping better this is the same as it was when i cut out alcohol i can tell that this is a better way to live and i'm like oh me it's it's because better sleep and more natural energy those are those are my tickets that's what i'm looking for all the time. And I've made a lot of other health changes in the last year or two towards that end. And I'm always looking for new stupid health things to obsess over. And cutting out processed sugar is an attractive challenge that I know I'm just going to fucking hate hate but I also know how my brain works and I heard the right combination of words and I'm like yeah that's probably next that's that's probably the next thing after having cut

out bread processed sugar is another thing that can go to lead me towards this healthy lifestyle that I'm clearly heading towards did you i just don't want to did you cut out bread yeah oh damn well it's it's i'm not like super religious about it or anything i just had like uh like a window of weight in mind like ideal body body weight that I was aiming for that I couldn't reach with the normal stuff that I'd been doing in terms of exercise and diet. And I just couldn't cross the plateau that I'd hit at a certain point. And the experts are pretty much in agreement for the kind of loss that I'm talking about. The easiest way is to pick one thing that is in your regular rotation of your diet that you can

lose and get rid of it. Whether that's like, all right, I, I'm going to cut out soda or I'm going to cut out French fries, you know, some specific thing that you, you definitely eat a lot. And bread was the, the clear winner for me because if one thing I should cut out as pasta I eat so much fucking pasta but I'm never gonna stop eating pasta okay until I'm dead in a fucking ditch but I was looking at like what's what's something that is part of my regular diet that I think I can lift out and it's not going to be coffee so it was bread because i'm not eating like we've talked about this before i don't eat burgers most nights

because it's weird to make burgers for one person but i settled into a pretty good routine of having a breakfast sandwich every day just sausage or bacon and a dairy-free cheese on a bagel i would make every morning and i loved it i was like okay well that's that's a that's a big one right there if you get rid of a bagel your your daily bagel let's see if that has some kind of impact after a few months so i i have cut out bread with a few exceptions. That's so bread. I assume it would be true of you too. It's so disruptive because bread is in every single meal I eat. Some form of bread is in every single meal I eat. It was only breakfast for me. That's surprising. I guess I love sandwiches an awful lot.

Yeah. And I mean, sandwich meat is its own enemy. But I don't know. I think that I don't think I could do something as big as bread because it's a staple for me. I think that the thing that I always think about is fast food. Fast food is such an important part of my life. And I love it. And I look forward to it.

And I use it as a treat to do other things that I hate. And I know at some point, it's just not tenable for me to eat this much fast food and I'm going to have to cut it out. And I hate thinking about that day. It's processed sugar for me. And I don't know, it's, I don't think it's going to happen soon. And I also feel like if I went to a doctor or a dietitian and you know, the way you go to a financial advisor and you just show them everything, if I like show them a journal of what I eat, the doctor would be like, why the fuck are you eating so many gummy bears? Cut that out. I was like, listen, doc, no, I cut out bread. That's the sacrifice. The gummy bears are staying. Your body wants the gummy bears.

When I've cut out things in the past, I found that the only way to do it was to treat it, to like convince myself to do it was I would say, I'm not cutting it out forever, but for the month of November, I'm not doing soda. Yeah. And then you get to the end of that month and you're like, well, I worked so hard that month. I should just not do it again. And then you can kind of like trick yourself into not doing it anymore. And then when you finally have it

again, a few months later, you're like, this is too sweet. I don't like it. And then you've broken the spell. But it's very easy to fall back into if you have it even twice, or if you're like, well, it's like Thanksgiving. This is fun. Like I would like to drink something that I enjoy, which is a Dr. Pepper. And you do it and then you're like, and now I'm back. Right back to where I was. I feel very lucky that I cut out soda years ago for no clear reason. I just stopped drinking soda, and it's not been a part of my life ever since. And I'm thankful for that, because I recognize that it would be a hard habit to break.

It's really rough. But now I have no taste for it. That's great. You're in a good position. Man, you've cut out all the good stuff. You're fine. I know. You don't smoke.

Do you stop drinking too? Yeah. So you don't smoke. You don't drink. You don't do cocaine anymore. No. You don't do- I mean, Christmas.

Yeah, but I mean, you were in LA. Yeah. That was, you had to. Yeah. They don't i mean christmas yeah but i mean you were in la yeah that was you had to yeah um they don't let you off the plane your parents listen to this right i should let them know that we're joking and dan and i have never done coconut i think they they they know that i i feel like it's it's we're very deeply scared. Yeah. I wear it on my sleeve that it's, it's so terrifying to me. And it's like, not only would I never do it, I have had nightmares that someone forced me to do it. I'm so scared of it. So you, but you've already cut out a lot of things.

I, I feel like you need something to look forward to with food. Food is. Gummies. Yeah. Food and pasta, I guess. But you know, yeah, pasta is... What are all the corn chips? I make pasta like three or four times a week, honestly. Okay.

It's too much, but I'm not going to stop. The gummies... I think I'm going to back off gummies for a couple of reasons. We've talked about this on the show, how much I love gummies. It's the only candy I eat, and I eat a lot of it. Every've talked about this on the show, how much I love gummies. It's the only candy I eat, and I eat a lot of it. Every single day I have gummies. I keep them in the refrigerator or the freezer,

and they're great, and I have different kinds, and it's awesome. And it was like a fun, whimsical podcast episode that we did where I talked about gummies, and then a lot of people in real life reached out, and they were not happy about it. It was very upsetting to people who love me and then when I was out in LA and I saw you and bacon for dinner

I mentioned getting gummy bears and It was clearly not fun at that table like you both very quietly were like you're still doing that Like there was concern in your voices. I was like, oh no, we don't, this isn't like one of those, like, like y'all have friends with bad qualities that you still tolerate. This isn't that for me. Oh, I think it's fine that you eat coming here. I, I realized also my, so there are certain red flags for when you know that you have an unhealthy relationship with food or a particular food that's like bordering on a uh what is it called a a food

like anorexia and bulimia a food disorder yeah disorder they're like bordering on disorder uh where if you are eating something and then hiding what you like, the wrappers and stuff for what you ate so that no one in your life knows you did it. That's a big red flag. Okay. I'm pretty loud about gummies. Then that's fine. That's why I think you're doing just fine. Okay. I think that you can. But it's no good. I get gummy guts. You know gummy guts? It's when you eat too many gummy bears. It's when you eat too many gummy bears either before or after a long run.

What is all that pectin doing to your insides? I'm trying to think of what the... I'll tell you what it's doing, man. It's trying to find its way out pretty fast. Gummy guts. That's so gross. It's trying to find its way out pretty fast. Gummy guts. That's so gross. But of all the vices in the world, a guy who eats too many gummy bears, that's pretty low stakes.

That's a good vice to have. Yeah. I feel like if you stay there, because what's going to happen is you're going to replace it with something. If you take out gummy bears, there's going to be something else that will fill that void. That's like the treat void, which it can mean a lot of things. It doesn't just have to be food. However you treat yourself to something that you think you don't necessarily need, but that is an indulgence. There's a lot of dangerous ones out there.

But yeah, I mean, like I didn't drink soda for a while when we would, when we'd be filming a lot, I didn't drink any soda because I didn't like the way that I would drop off after having caffeine or like all that sugar. And so then I just sort of stopped drinking soda when we'd shoot a bunch of after hours or we'd be on like set for one of our shows that we would make. I just sort of stopped drinking soda when we'd shoot a bunch of after hours or we'd be on like set for one of our shows that we would make I just stopped drinking it and then one day

I'd mentioned that I liked Dr. Pepper and our assistant AD was like hey I got some extra Dr. Pepper just for you and I was like you fucking enablers why would you do that why would you listen to me thank you Put it in my car! That is the nicest thing I've ever heard. Please put it in a separate cooler so no one else drinks it. I think about my relationship with fast food, because yours I know is different. You have a real combative relationship with fast food. Mine scares me for a different reason, because I go throughout my life just thinking like I

Can never eat fast food again. I'm I I don't want it like maybe on a road trip I'll get it cuz it's it's easy if we're saving time but like Yeah, I'll probably I'll probably die never having fast food again, and then I will just find myself It's like a like a blackout smash cut to a few nights later and just like four mcdonald's burgers in front of me and i'm like how did this happen it happens something in my brain will just flip and i will i and and taco bell will appear yes that's the fast food i'm Like I'm just not in control. It's like whatever they're putting in there in the food to make it achieve that bliss point. It keeps you. And I've done the same thing where I'm like, I'll get in my car at lunch. And one of the things I love most about lunch is that we break from work and I can go eat whatever I want because I own a car and I own a wallet. And that's so exciting to me that like LA is my oyster. I can go anywhere except to get oysters. I don't like those, but I will immediately,

I'll get in the car and be like, well, I shouldn't have fast food. Cause I just ate some yesterday or whatever the reasons are. That's the best reason. I just shouldn't have fast food. And so like, I'll be thinking about, well, I could go to Whole Foods and I could get a salad. I could go here. I think they have something that's like a little bit lighter. And as I'm doing this thought process, my car is just going to Taco Bell. Like eventually I'm in the line and I'm like, oh, I guess I'm, I guess I'm having Taco Bell.

Like I wake up to the, almost my, my mind has tricked me into thinking about other things. Well, it distracted me while it took me to Taco Bell. Like I wake up to the, uh, it almost, my, my mind has tricked me into thinking about other things. Well, it distracted me while it took me to Taco Bell. Right. You're at the order window. And at that point it would be rude to leave. It would be crazy. It'd be crazy not to eat Taco Bell. I can smell it from there. You don't want to insult your hosts. And then I can convince myself of certain things that like the health benefits I'm getting from it. Cause I'll be like, well, I don't eat the meat here. I'm generally eating vegetarian when I go to Taco Bell. Being vegetarian does not matter when you're ordering three bean and cheese burritos

and a big Dr. Pepper there. Yeah. I think a good rule of thumb for me to discover that a habit of mine is not healthy is how dangerous I become to rationalize and justify it. When I'm at the store looking at gummy bears or like at not even looking at gummy bears, if I'm at Target deciding between a normal bag of gummy bears or like the larger bag of gummy bears that is supposed to last a family weeks and my decision point is like this will save me trips if I just get this one and then money yeah but like in terms of like the the violent anger that I get I think it's very telling that a switch flips in my brain and I'm like what am I doing all this running for why am i even going to the gym if not to have as many gummy bears as i want i just become like this like a king that needs to be slain at that point yeah where i go through

every sacrifice i've ever made in my life what was it all for if not to die in this pile of gummy bears you're suddenly the defense attorney in a trial that doesn't exist. Giving the defense of a lifetime in front of a jury that you imagined. Pulling out a list of all the times that I didn't eat something sweet, all the candy that I didn't eat. The way that I've also tricked myself into not eating what I really want to eat, The way that I've also tricked myself into not eating what I really want to eat, which is fast food, is as I've got the opportunity to do it, I'm like, I am going to feel the same or better if I eat something else at the end of it. It's like all I could focus on is the meal itself and how good it's going to taste. But I know that in my brain after it's done, I've regretted fast food several times. And when've eaten something else I'm the same kind of full like my stomach doesn't change all of a sudden it's like no that fast food really hit it I can eat something that's way better for me finish it and at the end be like oh actually I feel just as

full that was great and I'm I don't feel terrible and it's like I can guess they imagine myself at that point the future me i'm like just take care of that guy like he's gonna be in the exact same position no matter what just don't do it here don't eat this terrible shit beforehand yeah but i think the only trick i've stumbled upon that's been helpful to me is i've i've rewritten history and i've recontextualized lunch as not a fun thing i've just decided like because my lunch every day is is a salad now unless i'm like i don't know why i'm saying unless i don't i don't go anywhere or do anything i guess i went i broke all of my rules i had i went to my brother

and sister-in-laws over the weekend and we had uh sandwiches for lunch so i had bread and i had a big lunch but normally i i don't go anywhere for lunch i'm home and i make a salad and my brain just knows lunchtime is not one of the meals that we look forward to it's a meal that does a lot of the work that we need because it's it's the time that i eat vegetables when i almost never eat vegetables anywhere else and like breakfast is breakfast is fun and and dinner's where it's really at and I know that I know science is changing all the time but I'm pretty sure the science is like start big and get smaller with your meals big breakfast medium lunch small dinner I'm never gonna do that I look forward to

dinner all day it's it's a highlight of my day cooking it and eating it and I think if I just have a miserable quick salad that i eat in the kitchen standing over a counter every day i think that's fine i think that that justifies it used to justify breakfast sandwiches now i would love suggestions for breakfast because now i just have like grits and a meat every day because i don't I'm not having breakfast sandwiches I have dairy-free cheeses I can't eat eggs and really are you allergic to eggs yeah I think so I haven't talked to anyone because again doctors are really quick to blame the gummy bears on any problem you have they refuse to even take that off the table, even as a hypothetical.

They don't want to engage in it. It's like, what if the gummy bears are medicinal? What else you got? Yeah, they have a whole different service that you don't even understand. Yeah. Well, so yeah, without eggs and without like without toast bread my my breakfast options are pretty limited so it's grits and a meat or just like sometimes i'll just make uh these plant-based sausages that i like and just eat two discs of sausage in the morning i don't know why i'm saying it like that i love it oh you Oh, you do? Okay. Are you putting ketchup on it? No. Okay. Well, you're talking to the wrong guy because I don't eat breakfast. That's why

I look forward to lunch so much is that by the time I eat lunch, I haven't eaten for like 14 hours. And that's also how I've tricked myself into eating a lot faster when thinking it's okay. Because I'm like, anything at this point would be good for me. My body would get something out of anything I put in it. Well, you know what? I think that can be our show for today, Daniel. Oh, wait.

I have one more thing about aging since that was a loose theme of this episode. Yeah. Something. Daniel oh wait I have one more thing about aging since that was a loose theme of this episode yeah something I'm laughing thinking about it it's pretty it really bumped me out of the time I had a birthday recently and went out with my brothers and sisters-in-law to a restaurant and we mentioned to the waiter that it was my birthday and he said oh congratulations you're turning uh 25 26 and i said yes definitely like you know the like charming waiters will joke that you're they'll like do it an age that is comically younger than what you are to be like a good natured sweet thing to do uh and he left after making that that that fun gesture my sister-in-law was like how does that feel it's funny that you could be 26. it's a joke that that you could be

confused for 26. it's like it doesn't feel great it doesn't feel great that that that like different different adult age is a joke yeah that's something you agent to I guess yeah the assignment was what is a comically young age for this person to look like 25 oh shit I had a real sobering moment the other day when we were all sitting around in the house and I was like lounging on the couch with my son in a way where I was like my head was all the way down so it reached onto the back of the couch which is very low. So I was slouched and that's not a very flattering look but my son looked over at me and he goes, Dad, you got a big tummy.

I was like, I do? Be honest. You mean that? Is it real? Is it really big? Are you saying that because you actually think it, or is that just like a funny thing? Because I don't like, I just wait, wait, hold on, hold on. Touch it. Touch it. Now punch it, pinch it, punch it, see if you try to pinch it, take a tear, take this. I wasn't ready before. Take this phone. Hold on. Here's my passcode. I want you to take a picture. I want you to take 16 pictures and then I want to see them from your perspective what this looks like um and i was like oh that's just waking them up in the middle of the light and be like hey ronan hey ronan according to the according to the cdc my percentage of body fat i'm in the lowest

percentile okay so it might seem big to you because you're a child, but compared to the country, Ronan, wake up, wake up when daddy's talking. Yeah. Like you have to see what I'm comparing myself to. That's the important thing. You're comparing yourself to me and that's not fair. That's not fair. Look how small you are.

Um, yeah. So anyway, I spun out on that for a while. And then like, I, there are just these little like fingerprints of death that are all over me that I didn't used to have where I'm like, Oh, I guess I get, sometimes I get gray chest hairs now too. That's great. That's new. Or I tried to do a kip up the other day you remember those do you know what those that is that's where you like uh like like pull up until you're like and then you you know uh mount the pull-up bar no um a kip up is where you're lying on your back and you're like oh i'd rather be standing and then you just yeah yeah yeah you roll up onto your hands and then you kick your feet up in the air and then you and then you you pull your upper torso up and then you kick your feet up in the air. And then you, and then you, you pull your,

your upper torso up and then you land on your feet. Yeah. And I used to be able to do those no problem. And my son and I were playing in the grass with a remote control car. And I was like, you know what? I could just get, I know how to do this. I do used to do this all the time and went to go try Kip up, kicked my feet out and went about horizontal in the air, about a foot off the ground and then came right down

and knocked the wind out of myself. And he was like, what was that? What were you trying to do? I can't answer you because I feel like I'm dying. I need like 30 seconds of you not talking to me or I'll get very upset.

I used to be able to do those and I don't think I will ever try to do one of those again because not only i used to be able to do those and i'm i don't think i will ever try to do one of those again because not only am i convinced i can't do it i am certain i'll hurt something yeah and like not even unexpected thing to get hurt i'll hurt something very surprising like i do these i work out with this uh ao app it's from men's health they have a lot of great workouts on it and I'll get it on my TV and I'll do it in my apartment just to the thing on the screen. And sometimes while we're doing a move, the trainer, the pre-recorded trainer will be like, you might be feeling a little bit of

tension in your hamstring here. And I'm like, what if it's like your entire back though? What if it's not my hamstring so much as it is my knees neck back shoulders face and heart what about what about those things and like since we're naming things my hamstring too well i hope people i hope this resonates with somebody i feel like our audience might be my skew a little young and they're like, what the fuck? There's just two old guys complaining about being old. I've heard this. This bit is so tired. Alright, well,

you can follow Daniel on Twitter at dob underscore inc. You can follow me, Soren, at Soren underscore ltd. You can follow Quick Question or ask them questions at qq underscore Soren and Dan. You can email us at QQ underscore Soren and Dan. You can email us at QQ with Soren and Daniel at gmail.com. Our sound engineer and editor and producer is Gabe Harder.

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