Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - Throw Trash Anywhere | Quick Question Podcast Episode 254
Episode Date: October 8, 2024The guys tackle the ultimate apocalypse question: what pointless societal rules would they ditch if they were the last people on Earth? Spoiler: parking gets chaotic, and the new life motto becomes �...�throw trash anywhere.” Soren ends up battling the thought he’s one step away from ending up on TikTok.If you want extra content to get you through the lonely, trash littered times of the apocalypse - get a bonus episode every other Friday for $5 at www.patreon.com/quickquestion FACTORMEALS.com/qq50 and use code qq50 to get 50% off your 1st box plus 20% off your next month. Thanks RocketMoney.com/qq. it could save you hundreds a year.
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I've got a quick quick question for you alright I wanna hear your thoughts on it now what's on your mind
I've got a quick quick question for you alright The answer's not important I'm just glad that we can talk tonight
So what's your favorite? Who did you date? Who do I be if I were to die today?
Oh forget it
I saw a movie, Daniel O'Brien
Two best friends and comedy writers
If there's an answer they're gonna find it
I think you'll have a great time here
I think you'll a great song and you
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, senior writer for last week tonight with John Oliver, author
of How to Fight Presidents, and guy who feels like
there is a spooky devil on one shoulder but no angel on the other shoulder, Daniel O'Brien,
joined as always by my co-host, Mr. Soren Bowie. Soren, say hello.
Hey, everybody. I'm Soren Bowie. I'm the one who will be doing the hand gestures today because
Daniel has clearly given up on it. I noticed that a lot of mine end up looking like boy band moves.
That's just part of me.
I think that's in my blood.
There's something, I think when you have a face like mine, it's in your DNA, there's
just your natural inclination is to point in a one and then kind of move your hand and
then kind of wiggle your shoulders with it.
Anyway, I'm Sorembui.
I'm a writer for American Dad, clearly in the wrong job.
And this is our podcast.
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to rocketmoney.com slash qq. Did you allow yourself to like boy bands when they were
uh really making a huge splash in America? No. And I don't because you were a little bit older than me also so this might have been when Backstreet Boys in sync 98 98 degrees, O-Town, were getting their heyday when I was like at the
the tail end of middle school going into high school. Uh-huh. No, well, Backstreet Boys was
earlier. I mean, Backstreet Boys was, wasn't it? Wait, what's the one? Is there, oh no, New Kids on
the Block. Um, there was one that was even earlier. Yeah, way early. Um, but the the boom, I feel, started with Backstreet Boys.
And I was young enough that liking a band of singing boys was not a cool thing for a
13-year-old boy in New Jersey in the past to do and it was between like the guys who were like
clearly designed to be like romantic objects for women they all each guy fit a different archetype
so it was like clearly music that was not engineered for me uh that was one part of it and
also the fact that all of the girls in middle school were really into those bands that paradoxically was another reason that it was not cool to like them
as an older person you realize like oh if you have a crush on someone and they
talk about a band or an artist that they like familiarize yourself with the
things that your crush likes so you can talk to them about it.
But yeah, at the time it was very much like...
Cause you feel like him about it. Don't immediately hate it. But yeah, at the time it was very much like- Because you feel jealous of it.
That's for girls!
And I like shitty music.
I was curious at that how universal that was or if by the time Backstreet and Nsync rolled
around you were already older, old enough that like you had settled into Pearl Jam or
whatever.
There was no nuance.
There was no room for nuance at like middle age, like middle age, middle school age.
When I was in middle school and middle age at the same time.
There was no, you couldn't, if there was something that was universally panned, you better fucking
pan it too or you're done-sco.
Like there's no way you're going be you're gonna convince people like actually
There's some really credible things you can find from this there
Middles with Backstreet Boys with in sync it was important to your personality that you hated them
Yeah, and I don't know that I was even familiar with the music
I don't think I was hearing it much and it was still a big part of me was like, ah
Fuck the Backstreet Boys, Monica
Lewinsky, oh, look at her.
Like that, like just shitting on the things that you're supposed to shit on.
In retrospect, I'm very glad that like my musical tastes were so set early in in a pretentious
way by my parents.
Like I was like raised on Beatles and Simon and Garfunkel so I
had music that I liked that felt like mine and when Ben Folds 5 came out in
the 90s and sounded similar to things I already liked that was like an easy slot
to fit into yeah but in retrospect it's very strange and confusing time being in
middle school 96 to 98 and it's like Backstreet Boys came out,
but you, you're a guy, you're not allowed to like them. And then Britney Spears came out and it's
like, well, she's hot. Like, no, that's for girls too. And like, well, what? Yeah. But I don't want
to like smashing pumpkins. Yeah. Listen, you're gonna hear a lot of songs on the radio. They're
all a trick. You're not supposed to like any of them. It's all a test. Yeah, I do remember
being in middle school and like Green Day coming out and being like, oh, this one's a lot. I'm
allowed to have this one. And then you'd be like, okay, they're good. And then but like quietly also,
my brother had an REM CD, he had this automatic for the people. And he was monster. I can't remember
which, but he had like an REM CD and I would listen to it on my own. And I wouldn't tell anyone that I was listening to REM because I was concerned that that wasn't cool.
It was like, at the time it was also, he was gay and never went to school was like,
that was like the worst thing you could be in middle school.
Sure.
And so I was like, privately listening to REM and like really loving it and never
horrified by the prospect that someone
would discover that CD in my case. Yeah. I remember very vividly in middle school when like
corn came out and orgy and I was like this is I guess I have to like the this shit garbage.
That's how I felt about Limp Bizkit. Limp Bizkit came out, I was like,
alright, well I'll listen to this when I have my windows down, because that seems to be the most
important thing, time to do it. It seems like all the girl music is way better.
And they all have fun when they listen to it, they don't get like mad and they start looking for fights.
You know that I had my pop music renaissance when i was like 35 where like i started to discover
that pop music was actually good because for so much of my life i had rejected it on the premise
that i wasn't supposed to be liking it and then i would hear like a i would hear a selena gomez
song like bad liar and i was like um uh everybody, this song's really good. Yeah. We can listen to this, it's okay.
Ah, the past.
No.
But I want to talk about the future.
Here we go! Whoa, it's just like itching for that segue.
Soren, I got a quick question for you.
Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
The world is dying and everyone knows it.
Let's say the world dies and you are the last person on earth.
This is not, you're not one of the last people on earth.
It's not walking dead.
It's not the last of us.
It is not even Will Forte is the last man on earth.
It is just, you know, it's just you in this world now. What is the first?
Social construct that you abandon
Immediately and I'll go first while you think because I'm gonna talk my
Way in and our audience into my way of thinking as well. Ah, you have to get some
Yeah, that's you have to really back to no, no, no, It's not bad at all. It's just, it's very lame.
Spoiler alert. Because the...
Last, last man on Earth, when it's Will Forte's character, and he truly thinks he is the last man on Earth,
because he hasn't met the other characters yet, but he has every reason to think he is the last man on Earth,
he stops shaving his hair and his beard, grow out a whole lot. Very basic
hygiene stuff goes out the window. He is peeing and pooping in swimming pools. He's getting
drunk all the time and just sort of like wandering around. It presents this idea that society
is the only reason that we are grooming ourselves and taking care of our hygiene,
which might to some seem like a knee-jerk. Like, yeah, of course, I'm not going to...
The world is over. I'm not going to brush my teeth anymore. I'm not going on a job interview
or anything like that. I would retain so much of that because if COVID proved anything, it's
because if COVID proved anything, it's that I will still shower and clean myself and groom myself. That is not a thing that I want to lose, that I'm only doing for society's sake. I lived alone in
my apartment for 15 months not seeing anyone and I was still like brushing my
teeth and putting on deodorant and and like not turning into a complete slob a
thing that I look forward to when the world ends and I'm the last person there
something that makes me very exciting excited and it seems lame and it seems I'm sure you're gonna poke holes in it or point to a better more obvious thing
That I should be excited about but I can't wait
to
not obey
Society's rules about where I can and can't park in a parking lot. Because I will just park I
will still I think if the if the world ends, I will still drive on the roads. Not necessarily
the speed limit. But like at a safe speed, I'm not going to do anything dangerous or
go crazy. I'm probably not going to obey stop signs or stoplights or anything
like that. But I'll still like use the infrastructure because the infrastructure is sound. And I'm
imagining that in this abandoned world, there will still be grocery stores and clothing
stores and camping stores and Lululemon's where I will like, from time to time shop
or loot. If for some reason, I still think there's cash in the drawer and that might
come in handy one day, I'd like to go out looting and I'm selling the clothes. You're not shopping. No
It's looting every time. Yeah. Oh, that's that's fair. I
Daydream about
pulling up to a store and parking my car and leaving it there and going in and there's my car right by the door when I
come out because well a couple reasons I am not the I'm not always entirely accounting for how my time
on this earth is spent or wasted I'm generally just like living and going through life and
enjoying most of it.
I am never more aware of the passing of time than when I am looking for parking. It happens
very quickly. If I'm in a parking lot or a parking structure, or if I'm in one of the
big cities and you're looking for street parking and you're going down blocks and navigating
one ways immediately, It's instant.
It's muscle memory for my brain to just think about being at the pearly gates or at the
end of my life and being shown an accounting of how much of my life was spent looking for
parking and it makes me more upset than anything.
It makes me more upset than any of the other frivolous time wasters waiting in line at a grocery store.
Does not bother me as much as looking for parking.
So that's a big thing already. Already I'm mad at the time I've spent looking for parking.
We were given this great big beautiful fucking world and we made parking such a pain in the ass almost everywhere what a foolish
thing to do what a level of time wasting and stress that we didn't need to add
but we added anyway that's one part of it and the other part of it is and I
understand how I'm gonna sound about this I'm gonna sound when I when I say
this but in my lifetime the special parking spaces in parking lots reserved for
people has grown monstrously. And I know that the reason that I'm most upset about this
is because I am I am so blessed and so lucky that I will never need any of these parking
spots. When I was growing up, it was like there was like two handicapped spots and they I am I am so blessed and so lucky that I will never know any of these parking spots
But when I was growing up it was like there was like two handicapped spots and they were the best spots in the parking lot
And everything else was open
in the time between then and now there's
Spots in some parking lots for expectant mothers fine. There are spots for families
And there are spots for families. Okay, I don't recall them existing when I was part of a young family growing up but
but fine.
There are now parking spaces that are completely overtaken.
There's like rows of parking spaces at Target that are numbered.
And they are specifically for people who have ordered something in advance
and they want to pick it up and they don't want to go into the store.
There's some grocery stores that do this to Whole Foods notorious for all of these like
tech adjacent stores where they wanted to optimize everything by removing humans from
every situation.
You just pull into a number of parking spot and then someone will come out of the store and wordlessly drop your groceries into your car
and then you drive away.
Those are the best spots in the parking lot now.
And there's no way for me to know in advance if anyone is going to use those parking spaces
in a target.
I don't know if someone is actually has actually placed an order and is going to use parking
spot number two.
So I have to play it safe and not use it.
And for all I know, they're going unused all day.
It's a stupid thing that no one asked for, that now is everywhere,
and is taking up the best parking spaces in a parking lot.
I think about parking a lot.
If that wasn't clear...
You didn't mention it, but a huge chunk of that is going to EV parking as well.
And that certainly benefits me, but it doesn't benefit a guy like you.
No, I've never got a coal every single day.
That's right. I'm never going to meet the criteria for any of these special
parking spaces that there's they're never going to have the best parking spot in the house for the guy who pays his rent on time always or the guy who does a
good job at work. I don't get special. Where's my fucking parade? They're never going to
be for me, which is a wonderful blessing. It's also infuriating infuriating to be to
be burdened with such high functioning legs that
I can't afford to part from very far away and walk.
So when the world ends and it's just me, and I'm still in this scenario going to Target,
I cannot wait.
I look forward to it more than anything else. I'm gonna keep my house as home-like as I can
as long as the lights are staying on and the electricity works. I'm gonna clean it. I'm gonna
use the the the toilet until I can't anymore. I'm gonna keep up all appearances. I'll change
my clothes day to day but I'm gonna park right in front of the Target or the post office.
Don't know why I'm going to the post office, the end of the world, but I find myself there
a couple of times a month, so I must have some business going on.
Well, okay.
I guess I'm really charmed.
I'm charmed by your vision of the future, where you, when you can give up all of society's
norms, the one you're going to give up is parking in the wrong spot.
Because it implies that you are going to like, you're still going to shops, but you're going
to park in the parking structure where cars are meant to be.
Not in Adam's.
You'll then walk down the stairs because elevators don't work anymore,
and you will gently open the door of the shop and go in. Yeah. Whereas in my future, I would
anticipate, first of all, I don't have a car that's mine. All the cars are mine. Any car that I can
get into is mine, which means that they're expendable. And also there's a good chance
that that door is locked to the front of the store. I I say maybe like a 50-50 shot, depending on what the apocalypse was.
I'm not going to risk that.
I'm driving through the front of every store I go to.
And then I'm just getting out, I'm getting my stuff, and if the car doesn't work anymore,
I'm just grabbing another one that happens to be close by, maybe one of those numbered
spots at Target.
I'm just going to get in one of those.
And so I don't see a scenario in which I'm ever
even parking again. I'm basically like, even if I know a store is open, like it's one that I've
been to previously and I need to go get more stuff from it, I'm driving a car there, putting it neutral
and just stepping out of the car as it continues wherever. I feel like I would be so future conscious that if I drove the car into the Target storefront
so I can go out and get toilet paper and then left and got in another car and drove home,
the next time I came to that Target I would walk in and be like,
well now it's full of raccoons and whose fault is that?
It's my fault for driving the car through the thing. Now I've made the target less useful to me. And what if I want to stay at the target
for winter? I can't. There's this huge draft now because of the car-shaped hole in the front.
You're not going to live longer than like two years.
All this planning is for aliens that happen to find the planet later.
Like there's nothing that's going to benefit you.
Fuck up a target.
Smash the doors.
I do think there's this, even though like the, by the rules of the hypothetical, it's
not the Will Forte show, no one else is ever coming.
Even though I set those rules, there's still a part of me that is like, but what if someone
does come?
Right. What if I'm being watched right now?
Shouldn't I leave it nice?
Shouldn't I?
What if I'm being watched at this very moment?
So I still turn on my computer and switch on incognito mode.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No.
No. No. No. No. No. No. I think that, first of all, the thing that I would be very excited to give up and I'd
be so happy about is the idea of like throwing anything away.
Throwing stuff in a trash can or recycling bin or deciding where stuff should go.
I no longer would think about any of that.
Everything is going directly on the ground.
I don't need to recycle for anything.
Who am I saving the planet for at that point?
I don't need to put stuff in garbage bins because if stuff gets really stinky in one area,
I just go somewhere else. So there is no such thing as a trash can to me anymore. I'm just
raiding places, eating all the- unwrapping all the stuff and just like, rappers go anywhere.
Now, I may not shit where I eat. Like, I may have like a nice place where I live and the rappers are not in there.
Yeah.
But...
Here's what makes me realize how stupid I am. As you're saying this, in my version of
the apocalypse, I'm still not only putting my garbage in the garbage can in my apartment. I'm still walking down the
stairs and out to where the garbage bin is. A task that I hate in real life. I'm
still doing it because that's what you do and in this scenario if I get to a
point where the big garbage thing is full then I'd be like I guess I got to
get a garbage truck and haul some of this stuff to somewhere else. Like I know, no, it didn't occur to me.
You haul your body somewhere else and you live somewhere else now.
I, like, I would have fun with it too.
I mean, I'm eating a whole steaks in my car, whatever is left and like throwing tomahawk
bones out the window.
Like I'm excited for all of that.
I'm excited for both of us, by the way, doing a lot of driving in this apocalypse.
Yeah, yeah. Which, to your point about how I'm not going to live for more than two years,
I don't think I'm going to have access to cars for more than like a week and a half.
I think I'm going to run out of gas in my car and then-
If I remember correctly, something happens to unleaded gasoline as well. Like, it becomes
unusable after like four years
or something like that.
I don't think I'm gonna make it that far.
Which means that the only vehicles
that still use leaded gas are personal airplanes.
So I'm thinking from now on, that's what we're doing.
We're just flying our personal airplanes
everywhere in the future.
So obviously I'd be very excited to do that. The other thing that I would
be excited for is I'm going to live in something mobile. I'm going to have a camper, or I'm going
to have an RV, or something there where my house goes wherever I want it to. I don't need to...
You're so bad on gas mileage.
it too. I don't need a ton of space. You're so bad on gas mileage.
I'm going to put solar panels on the top. It's going to run on... I'm going to also figure that out. I'm going to figure out how to do solar in a car. No one else has figured that out. And our top scientists today have figured that out.
But I want to, I want my house to go wherever I want it to go. I don't need a ton of space and I'm not like fancy about like what that space looks like. I love the convenience of having everything I own in one place
and it comes with me wherever I go. So that means that when I trash a place, because I will, I'll
trash everything and I've spoiled it, I'm going to move on and I just go somewhere else. And I just keep doing that until I'm dead.
I think that's how some people live their lives now.
That's van life.
Like that's like, you think the van lifers that are all over social media, like, there's
part of me that's insanely jealous of that lifestyle because you're giving up a lot of
stuff, you're giving up a lot of security and everything. But most of that is money based. Most of that lifestyle because you're giving up a lot of stuff. You're giving up a lot
of security and everything, but most of that is money-based. Most of that is societal-based. It's
like cleanliness. It's food security. But I don't need any of that. Like money doesn't mean
anything. Food is everywhere in abundance in every single store. Even if I get past the point where
everything's spoiled, at least there's still canned goods and stuff like that. Like there's going to be stuff I can
find anywhere. And so all I'm doing is just running away from my own messes, basically. I'm like,
I'm sure I'm assuming toilets and stuff don't work anymore. I'm spending some time in one area.
And when that shit pit or whatever is full, I'm going somewhere else.
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box plus 20% off your next month. That's interesting that you how quickly you
abandon garbage and recycling. Yeah, I'm so excited.
Because you're such an environment conscious person. Yeah, imagine the relief.
Yeah, but I thought you were saving the world
because you wanted to, not because you have to.
Oh, well, there's no, no, but there's nothing,
what am I saving?
I was gonna, I'm not trying to save the Earth itself. I'm trying to save humanity. Like, that's the issue. And when
humanity is gone, none of those- none of those things matter anymore because I'm not a big enough
impact. My footprint isn't big enough on the Earth that it's gonna continue to cause those issues
that the Earth is currently suffering from. I'm only one guy and not suddenly everything is way better
because the population has decreased to one human.
And so I don't have to worry about any of that stuff anymore.
All that stuff that's hanging over me every single day
when I think about how often I'm flushing the toilet,
how long do I shower, when I'm washing dishes,
how much water am I using?
When am I recycling properly?
Is this thing washed out well enough?
Can I even recycle plastics?
Like all these
things that are- can take up so much of my day every single day, I don't have to think about ever
again. And in fact, I get to do the opposite. I just get to fucking throw shit- I get to burn my
own trash. I can burn my trash. I'm thrilled about that. Maybe I will keep it in a pile. Maybe I will
continue to collect it so that I can burn it. Yeah. I was wondering why there aren't any...
Where there haven't been any episodes of The Walking Dead
where they come across a guy who was just in a camper van
who was just like, I don't know, I'm not part of anything.
I'm just doing my thing.
And I'm realizing that, oh, they probably killed that fucking guy.
He died off camera somewhere.
Right.
Because he's not contributing to any society and they're like,
well, your stuff is useful if you so long. Right. Because he's not contributing to any society and they're like, well, your stuff is useful
if you're not.
Yeah.
Yeah.
There was one guy in The Walking Dead who had a, was backpacking.
And I was like, yeah, backpacking.
And within the same episode, that guy's eaten.
Yeah.
I was like, oh, oh yeah, okay.
One of those one-off guys where as soon as they get introduced and they're like, I found
a different way of life that is, that makes happy and it's like oh man that guy's
fucking toast give him two commercials and he's done this is a real teachable
moment for one of the bloodthirsty people that are our heroes it's like it's
almost a childhood dream of mine because I basically have my fort where all my
best stuff is but that fort is mobile
and I get to take it anywhere that I want.
And that's like the dream.
Yeah.
Well, I don't know what else I would give up though.
Like I agree with you that,
so in terms of like showering, shaving,
a lot of that hygiene stuff is for your own good. It doesn't feel like
it because we do usually do it for other people. But it's like, if you let that shit go for too
long, it's maybe as some people found out during the pandemic, a whole host of other problems
suddenly come about. Like, you don't shave for long enough, and you're not doing anything to
help your beard. You're getting like these red bumps underneath your face that are really painful and bad and irritated. And you don't shower for a long
time and all of a sudden you're like, getting this rash on my chest. A lot of these things are for
your own fucking good. And so if you ever read a book like I Am Legend, did you ever have to read
that? No. I Am Legend is wonderful because it's about a guy who basically has, watched, lives through the end of the world and then is so sad, so deeply sad in the beginning of
it that he just doesn't even care about life anymore and almost kills himself. And then
after a while just comes to terms with the fact that it's just him and he's got this job he wants
to do every day, which is he goes into different houses. He carves all these wooden stakes.
He goes into different houses and uses up all those stakes killing vampires that are
sleeping.
And that's like all he does every single day.
And that's what he lives for.
And like he starts to come around again where he like gets in shape.
He wants his hair cut a certain way.
He wants it to shave.
And he wants that sense of life or that sense
of order back. And I'm like, yeah, I like the sense of order. I like all of that.
But there are certainly elements where like, I love the idea of clipping my
toenails not into a thing, not into like a napkin or a toilet bowl or whatever,
whatever you do it. I just like doing it anywhere. And then I just leave that space
and it stops existing behind me.
I love that.
There's, the item legend thing is fascinating to me.
There's something that John Mulaney said on his,
Everybody's in LA show as like,
as always just a throwaway line of his
that finds purchase in my brain
that I think he was talking to John Carpenter about zombie apocalypse stuff, and like, how
long he would survive, you know, he was asking other people how long they'd survive or what
they would do in that kind of scenario. When it was turned back on him, he was like, Oh,
no, I'm gone quickly. I like my life. I don't like living It was such a like throwaway
but like for me like incredibly profound thing that like that I
Understand why the Walking Dead existed as a show as a piece of narrative entertainment, but
It wouldn't work for me
In real life as a person if someone was like we have to survive
We have to keep going, because
that's all that matters. And I was like, no, I liked that when I had like movies to look
forward to, and a birthday coming up. But just the idea of living for living sake is
like, no, I'm not interested. I prefer the infrastructure, not just that the world built,
but that I built around myself this like very very, I don't wanna just like marvel
at the beauty of having arms and eyes and taste buds.
No, get me out of here.
Take me out.
I mean, it's a good point.
I think I've been on enough trips,
like camping trips and stuff that I'm content
with the idea of like, oh,
I actually do like life like this without anyone else around. I think I would like it enough that
I would do it. Also, I'd be way too scared to die. Like, I wouldn't know how to do that.
But the other thing, Daniel, that I don't think either of us is considering and would really
benefit us in this sort of apocalyptic scenario is there are very, there are hobbies that are very conspicuous that
like you can't just do without a bunch of people seeing you do it and therefore
we don't pick it up. We don't do it because you've got to be bad at it at
first. Yeah. And this feels like a really great opportunity to take up some of
those embarrassing hobbies. Like those hobbies that are really tough at first
and no one really enjoys, to the drums or golf. I would drum and I would surf and as much as I said
I would like, I would keep my hygiene correct. It's a real opportunity that I almost took in
COVID just like, let's see what happens. Let's see if I really let my beard go or like my hair go into,
into like dreadlocks or something like what,
what are my options that I've never been able to explore before?
Oh my God.
The idea of doing creative facial hair or even like,
there'd be a moment where I would shave my entire body and just be like,
let's see what this is like. Let's see how the other side lives.
The other half lives.
I do all kinds of things with my own body.
I might try to give myself a tattoo.
Like, who gives a shit anymore?
I'm the only one who sees it.
I would experiment so much with facial hair
and I'd be out in the world harvesting berries
or whatever it is that I do, parking wherever I want.
And I'd pull up to the target and I would look, just catch a glimpse of myself in the world like harvesting berries or whatever is that I do parking wherever I want and I pull up to the target and I
Would look just catch a glimpse myself in the mirror and forget that I'm in like handlebar mustache ponytail face
I'm like
What a cool guy you are. Let me dress the part for a while. What if I looked like this in real life?
What if I just?
What's a guy who looked like this?
What's a guy who looked like this? I like it when you see yourself at a Target like that and be like,
I gotta get some clothes to go with this guy.
Like, I gotta find this guy's outfit.
And like, do a fashion show in the broken mirror.
Knowing my look, I would have a handlebar mustache, ponytail, leather jacket, white shirt,
and then some other survivor would come upon me with their crossbow and I'd be like,
Oh, first things first, I don't actually look like this.
This isn't... Let's just try it. So this isn't real.
Actually, I could use your advice. Let me just like bounce something off you.
This guy, he looks good with a bag of eggs, right? That seems right. Hard boiled eggs,
just a bag of shelled hard boiled eggs. I mean, I said I don't look like this, but
could I? What do you, I mean, you don't know what to compare it to.
I don't look like this, but could I? What do you, I mean, you don't know what to compare it to.
Well, like, did it seem like I was wearing a costume or do you see me and be like, look at that guy, what a mustache. I'd actually love to show you some pictures of some other
ones that I've already cycled through. I've bookmarked a few that I'm really ready to go
back to, but I want to try everything first. Don't look at this one. This one, this one,
this one was called clown in real life. Don't get that. It doesn't make any sense
I want I was if you must know I was
Toying around with an idea that if aliens did come to the planet wouldn't it be funny?
to someone if I was like a clown
and the aliens thought they'd come upon Clown Planet
and then I could just tell them what Clown Planet was like.
Wouldn't that be a fun bit?
That was a period of my life where I was pretty confident
I wanted to die, but I wanted to die in a funny way.
And I thought that might be fun to stumble across.
Would you have
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Um, okay. Uh, Daniel, I have a quick question for you.
Hit me.
When you actually played organized sport,
did you like snap into a second gear where you
were super competitive or were you just never that guy?
I think I was that guy when I played basketball because there was a lot more
for me to do to feel like I was playing a sport but when I was playing Little
League baseball and I was my position was right field or one season catcher who did nothing and I could never
really hit or throw and I didn't like it. My only my competitive nature came out and the
what I brought to my little league teams was spirit on the bench.
I was always big about getting people to chant, let's go blank, whomever is up at bat, we're
chanting for them and like doing all the other baseball chants to get people jazzed and get
everyone clapping, everyone moving.
And when we were in the field, I was big for, come on, come on, let's go.
We got this.
Or when there's an out, I would say like two outs, two outs, played a second, played a
second just letting people know.
Like I from a very early age was, was trying to create value in the only ways that I could,
which at the time was just like an understanding of the rules of baseball to say,
there are two outs, the play is the third or, or the play is the first, or any base, any out,
any out, you know, that that was my contribution was to let, to remind people of the rules because
I wasn't going to commit any of the plays, but that's super valuable. Everyone was going to know
what the play was on my watch. That chatter out in the field is like what all coaches want the most from their players.
Also at that age, nobody knows what the play is. So like the ball comes to them and they're like,
oh shit. Let's see. Oh, there's a guy running to second. He's there already. Oh, there's also
a guy going to first. Damn, that would have been been good one to yet. So you have somebody at the beginning of the
play being like, you're the forces first and second, or like being like two outs.
So they're going to run on anything like just like those little reminders are
super valuable. So you were, I would say you are the glue of the team. I'm going
to just like, I didn't see it at the time.
I agree with that assessment. I think I was participating and I had a lot of team spirit
and in basketball I felt more competitive just because again I could run around and like feel
like I'm playing and and throw the ball wildly if it ever came to me and try to play defense and
like defense was a thing that early
on I decided like this is the thing like this is what I'll contribute I know I can't shoot I know
I can't drill very well but like I'm gonna stick on a guy I'm gonna I'm gonna get in their face and
like uh without breaking any of the rules I'm going to make their time inconvenient that sounds I mean
that's good that's I I think back to my own childhood,
and the only reason I bring this up is because my son is currently playing soccer,
and he's just started it. It's brand new to him. He's doing great. He's really liking it, and he's
trying very hard, and he's understanding the rules, and he's getting better every day.
He's trying very hard and he's like understanding the rules and he's getting better every day. When I'm at the games, I'm realizing I am on like a razor's edge from being a real problem.
That my own competitive nature is gonna get me in trouble at some point at one of my son's
games.
Like it's not like I'm yelling at the kids or anything like that.
But I get so amped up and when I was coaching at the kids or anything like that, but I get so amped up.
And when I was coaching his baseball team and stuff like that, at least when I was coaching his baseball team,
I had stuff to do because I could be like, after each play, I could be like, hey, great play, great play, guys.
Like, here's what what do we miss on that one? Or like, hey, let's like, like when that grounder comes to you,
I need you to pick it up and throw immediately. Like, you plant, you throw, like that kind of thing.
So I know that I can I can always channel it somewhere because I need you to pick it up and throw immediately. Like you plant, you throw, like that kind of thing. So I know that I can, I can always channel it somewhere because
I had something to say. I very pointedly not volunteered for his soccer team because I
don't know enough about the AYSO yet to know whether I like, I'd even be able to teach
these kids anything. And so I'm like, I'm on the back burners, but I go to his games and I cannot fucking help myself,
but be like, look at Kent, Kent's wide open, like that kind of shit.
And then when stuff goes down that's wrong, like this last game, my son got,
you can be a lot more physical in soccer, which is not something he's used to.
And a kid really like pushed him off the
ball, like full arm extension, like pushed him off the ball, didn't go for the ball at all.
And they got called on the penalty. But my instinct was to like rush over there and start
shouting it like to the rep, like, you see that you see that? And I have to like bottle that up
every single time. And so you see all these videos online of like dads being the worst versions of themselves at their kids games
and not getting the fact that it's a kids game.
And I'm like at every single moment stifling that in myself where I'm like, I am.
I could be a real problem here.
And it bubbled up only once when I was coaching his team, his baseball team.
There were, I may have told the story on the podcast before, but like we were playing a game,
it was in playoffs and the other coach was getting very animated and big and like shouting a lot and
clearly he cared a lot and he was nuts. It was just rattle, rattle, rattle.
I'm sorry.
It's alright.
I promise it's getting worth it.
And at one point he didn't like the coat, the call that the ump made.
And so he started, like a cartoon character, took his hat off and started stomping on it.
And just to give you some context, the umMP was, I think, probably 12 or 13 years
old.
Right.
And so I'm next to that guy because I'm playing, I'm being a first base coach at that moment.
And I'm like, Hey, you got to calm down and set it in a way that was not nice.
And was very like, just like, only for myself.
Only for myself.
And it did not go, it did not go the way I wanted it to which was,
oh yeah, you're right, I'm sorry.
It was, it raised the stakes a little bit.
He's like, what?
What?
Why do I have to come?
Like he started getting really big in animation.
He's like, why do I have to come down?
What?
Well, only one team's allowed to have any fun here?
And then he's getting mad and he starts like coming closer, like getting in my face.
The other coaches from the other side start yelling, like they're like, hey, stop, stop,
stop. And eventually like this whole thing kind of like simmers down. But I loved it in my heart.
Like I wanted that. I like I was feeling it too. That's why I even said something to begin with.
I could have said fucking nothing. And then would have gone like it would have just gone away.
But I had to dig. I had to like get this guy who was being shitty. And then I felt... And then when he started getting in my face, I was like,
YEEAAH! Getting very excited about that.
And it just... You get amped up by any sort of game, regardless of who's playing it.
I couldn't... I can't help myself. And so now I'm sitting on the sidelines and I'm like,
being like, YEP, BENE! Shouting at the other kids, getting very excited,
in enthusiastic ways, not calling them out on shit.
But I feel it.
And I can't I think maybe it's not healthy.
And I have to figure out how to deal with this before I do something super embarrassing.
I feel like I understand your question better now.
And like, like confidently, no, I was not competitive when I was a kid
playing sports. I was an active participant and I was aware of things and I was like throwing
my whole ass into it. Yeah, but I would do the same as I would when I was shuffled around
to all of the other different places I was forced to go to at that age. Like I would when I was shuffled around to all of the other different places
I was forced to go to at that age like I would also
Sing the hymns in church and stand up when I was supposed to do that and put my whole ass into that because it was just
Like one of the yeah places that my parents shuttled me out to a few times a week
I feel like how can you stand out to try your hardest?
Right and seeing other kids. How can you stand not to try your hardest? Right. And seeing other kids who would,
when we would, I wasn't competitive because we would lose often in all of my sports and I didn't care when we lost.
And so when I would see kids who were really beating themselves up over it and like crying over a loss, they'd be like,
what are you doing? None of this is, none of this matters. You don't, yeah, you don't cry at the end of church, right? Just we just we're just cheap
But it's fine. We look
the end of every
Little League baseball game is good
Because it's done and now we don't have to do it anymore
Isn't that great that we can go and like have some choice over what happens in our lives?
And we're gonna spend that choice playing video games? Isn't it great? We're done
with this part. We're done with baseball, which is like church. Soren, the reason I was rattling off
is I just uh, or rattling off camera rather, is I happen to have these uh, pictures at the ready.
We didn't plan this, but this is who is playing baseball. This is- oh my god look at the- the,
This is who is playing baseball. This is oh my god. Look at the
The that's where the bat goes, right?
You can't tell but it says that is sports stars
No, it says port tar
Um, that's adorable. How did you have those made did your parents have those made?
What do you mean made a picture was taken?
It's a baseball card. Do you have stats on the back and stuff like that? No, these are when you played Little League Baseball, they didn't have like
picture day where you pose in uniform with the team and then we do all that.
So they come out like a photograph.
They come back with a photograph, not like a baseball card,
which is the baseball card is very cool.
These came in like a like a full grid and then you could cut it out
Oh, right. Oh, right. I didn't all say sports stars. I have
There's others
It's pretty serious pretty serious athlete
We had going through these in a box at my parents house. There's also like a
Card that was filled out, I guess when your
kids are playing Little League that it's like name Daniel O'Brien team, whatever
St. Louis my team was and that it has position and height and weight and for
weight I think they wrote 60 pounds or 40 pounds whatever is normal for a
six-year-old and then for, they just wrote on two lines because there wasn't enough space for it. They
wrote under four feet tall, which as I was looking at this card, I was talking to my dad, and like,
could you not find the tape measure or just couldn't be bothered to figure out how tall I was?
or just couldn't be bothered to figure out how tall I was. But it was like, not four feet.
One of the other numbers.
Yeah, we just went to Wildwood.
We tried to get on some amusement park rides.
You had to be four feet tall to get on him,
and he couldn't get on.
So definitely south of that.
Yeah, it seems like one of those,
like a dating profile trick where you don't put your actual height if you're under six feet.
Just like, well, not six feet, but like, you know, another one, another one.
You can fill in the blanks. I'm not going to say five eight. I'm not five eight. I'm just not six feet.
Five seven. Yeah, I, so I didn't get those stat lines. That's a very cool thing to have.
I also, it was like, I was very competitive.
I was very competitive.
That's what I was going to ask because you like competitive for the sake of your kid,
I think is probably a different gear than how you were at that age, unless I'm, unless
you were exactly the same level.
It's just sport.
It's like being involved in a sport and I love it. But I'm also not the, I'm not a, I'm not a good person when I'm doing it.
I have to really watch myself as I'm doing it to make sure that I maintain being a good person. So like same with when I was playing as a kid and in high school, I was, same way. I had to really watch myself that I wasn't swearing
out there on the field,
because there's like parents lining the sidelines.
I had to make sure that I was not being a real,
like elbowing people and shit like that.
Because I was so, it meant so much to me
and I don't know why.
It's just like, as soon as the whistles blows,
like I'm a different, things matter differently to me.
My priorities reset and it's
something else that takes hold where I'm like this is if we don't win this I'm gonna cry all night
and so I would do that were you crying when you lost it depended if I if I play if I was contributed
to the loss then yes if I did something that I felt like was pivotal in the loss then yes I was
going into a bathroom when I was crying. So sports that were independent, like swimming, for instance, where it was
all on you, if I didn't even win my heat, which is, I do know how like it works, like
you, you have different heats, and then you like the people who win each heat go on to
a new one, and then they race each other, and then they, and then that's who gets like
a ribbon. So if I didn't even win my heat,
I was crying by the pool. Like I didn't have a bathroom to go into. And so I just like
start crying there. I was, I don't know, I would play football in the driveway with my
dad and my brother. And if I didn't win, they would go inside and I would go out in the woods and I would cry.
And just like feel very devastated that I didn't get it done. And so there's like, I've carried that with me throughout my life and now I'm an adult and I do it vicariously, which is like the
worst, most pathetic, saddest way to do it. And I just have to like sit there and just pray that I don't do something big.
Yeah. Because I promise you every game you go to from now until the rest of your life, every childhood, every one of your child's games that you go to, there are some parents there with their just...
itchy trigger finger to film something that they could post on the internet called, Dad Freak Out Soccer Game LOL.
It's also...
Banned from field forever.
Probably because they're just waiting for it.
I recognize it in myself that I also, it's the quality that I hate most in other people.
And in fact, that only riles me up more.
So if I see, like in his last soccer game,
it wasn't even his game.
The fields are next to each other and we were on the line.
He wasn't even there.
He just found a game happening.
No, no, no, no.
It was a different game.
His was not happening on one field,
theirs was happening on another.
And in the other field, there were parents like that.
There were parents who,
as soon as their kids were getting close to the goal,
they were going nuts.
And then like, if the kid missed it,
like the dad was taking like a real walk around in the middle of the field,
being like, like cool, like being very pat, showing a lot of pageantry about cooling off.
Or like if they did score, he's still doing the same kind of trot around like places he shouldn't
be over onto our field and shit like that. Like just getting very big. And I was just seething
and hating this guy the entire time I'm seeing it. And I think it's because I'm it's just me looking in that mirror.
It's just me seeing myself and they like, oh, this is such a bad look. This is such
a bad. Nobody likes this. And I am one bad call away from being that dad right now.
It's rough, man.
Movie therapy?
No.
No.
Well, so far, I'm glad to say that it has not overflowed.
It hasn't like, it hasn't happened yet.
Other than that one instance where I was,
I was righteous.
Yeah.
Other than that one incident, I haven't done it yet.
But I, boy, do I feel, and like there are times where like like the kids will be out on the field and they think they hear whistle on another
field. And so they all stop. And I will scream like I will be like, go like yell at them. Like
you have an opportunity here. Like, yeah, try to trying to be the loudest person so that they hear
me and all that does is like freaks everybody out
yeah oh god there it was there it was um and i i can't beat this demon yeah
well the show is quick question but you knew that already thank you again for joining us
you can find daniel araya blue sky uh just go look for us it's easy well you can find Daniel Araya on Blue Sky. Just go look for us.
It's easy.
Well, you can find Soren on TikTok under a video titled,
Crazy Dad Freak Out Must Watch!
Exclamation mark, exclamation mark, exclamation mark.
Devin Sawa lookalike Throttle's mom.
Not a good look.
Yeah.
Okay, well, you can find us on TikTok.
The show is still on X.
You can find Quick Question on X.
And I think that there are occasionally clips,
video clips of this podcast,
because we do a video version of this podcast
with every single one.
So if you're listening to this in your car or whatever,
and you want to see our faces,
you can always watch this on the internet.
You can watch it on YouTube. We're on TikTok, from what I hear, and we are on Instagram, from what I hear. I really
am pretty limited in the amount of social media platforms I actually use anymore. If you liked our
theme song, that's by Merex. You can find their music at merex.bandcamp.com. Those are full albums. Or you can just get their songs, a la carte, anywhere you listen to music.
Oh, we have a Patreon.
We do a Patreon that is every other week, and which we do a little bit looser version
of the show.
We occasionally answer questions from you guys.
Or we just talk about you.
If you've said something else to us and we just decide it's worth fodder.
Like we'll talk about it as well.
And sometimes we just ask each other questions that we feel like, you know, I'd be curious
to hear your opinion on this, but I don't think it would support an entire episode.
So check that out.
And oh, of course, we got to thank our podcast, Chief Podcast head of operations. Sure.
He gave harder.
And we actually have, he's in a tandem
and occasionally his partner will also do our shows.
That's Jacob Weinstein.
He's doing this particular show.
So a big shout out to him as well.
I don't know if he's completely unfindable on the internet.
Go ahead and try.
Jacob, is that okay?
Okay. So when I'm so hard, sorry I'm not helping you on these outros, I clicked
on over to Nextdoor while you were talking and some woman named Linda wrote
does anyone know what kind of animal this is and sent a picture of a clear as
day of Fox and I wanted to say you
fucking idiot it's so obviously a fox drinking from your pool nothing has ever
looked more like a fox in that fucking history of foxes or photographs so you
get it you're just you're competitive about this
competitive nature just takes it's a's a different animal. It's a fox. Alright, thank you. Bye.
Bye. I'm just glad that we could talk tonight So what's your favorite? How did you get?
Where will I be remembered?
What's it out there?
Where did all the good things go?
Oh forget it
I saw a movie Daniel O'Brien Two best friends and comedy writers
If there's an answer they're gonna find it I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah
I think you'll have a great time, yeah I think you'll have a great time, yeah I think you'll have a great time, yeah I think you'll have a great time, yeah I think you'll have a great time here
I think you'll have a great time here