The James Donald Forbes McCann Catamaran Plan - temporary visual reprieve

Episode Date: April 15, 2024

Join the sailing club to contribute financially to James Donald Forbes McCann's journey to boat ownership: https://www.patreon.com/jdfmccannBuy the several books written by James Donald Forbes McCann: https://www.jdfmccann.com/books Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Thank you for listening to this episode of the James Donald Forbes McCann catamaran plan. If you'd like to listen to bonus episodes, go sign up to the Patreon. That's patreon.clom. Clom? Ah, we f***ed it. Anyway, look, you'll find a way. Catamaran Home! and I'm here to tell you about the new Google Pixel 9 powered by Gemini. Anyone who knows me knows the Pixel has always been my favorite out of all the phones I've ever had. Now, with Gemini built in, it's basically my personal AI assistant. Since I'm truly terrible at keeping up with emails,

I use Gemini to give me summaries of my inbox, which is a lifesaver. And if I'm feeling stuck creatively, I just ask Gemini for help, and bam! Instant inspiration. You can learn more about Google Pixel 9 at store.google.com. Hello and welcome to this episode of the James Donald Forbes McCann Catamaran Plan. The show where I, James Donald Forbes McCann, am trying to raise enough money to buy a boat. I thank you for joining me once again, or perhaps for the first time, on this journey to boat ownership. A couple weeks ago, we had a big pivot where we brought out the

visual component of the podcast that was up on YouTube. And we didn't have a big drop off in listeners of the audio only pod, but we did have a boom in video watches. So we will be going back to the video component. It seems like a no-brainer if we get more people engaged that way. But today, I'm sorry to say, we're taking a visual reprieve. Now. Just a temporary visual reprieve. Now.

Because it's been a very big and busy week, and I don't have time to do the video. And this is the moment that I have. This is a chaotic time in my life, but I feel like it's about to be smooth sailing. Maybe. It's been a very chaotic and strange number of days. We went to Disney World and I'm going to make up not having a visual component here by doing a whole video on Disney World and having all my thoughts about Disney. But today we're in Austin and well, some big changes. So I

came to Austin. I thought we'd be here for about a month and then we'd go back to Australia where we'd be there for about four months and then we'd come back to America. And since then, I've now got additional opening work in America. So I've sadly had to cancel the show that I was going to do in Adelaide. I was going to do a new material show in May. That's been cancelled. I think everybody's been refunded. If something goes wrong with the refund, you let me know and I'll straighten it out. And I'll be back, I think, in July for a very short amount of time to go to my darling friendses, the wedding of my darling friends, plural, Jack and Margot. I'm looking forward to that. Oh, ladies and gentlemen, listening to the James Donald Fools We Can't Get Him Around plan.

It's been a lot. We're staying in Austin in one of our wonderful podcast listeners' friends' home. of our wonderful podcast listeners' friends' home. You can maybe be able to hear by the fatigue in my voice and my difficulty expressing the plural that it's been a big time. We're staying in the home of the friend of a podcast listener in Austin, and it's been wonderful. We're cat-sitting. The cats are so affectionate.

The last time I did a cat-sit, we had first moved to Melbourne with our daughter, who's now... Oh, is she four? Is she five? She's five, I think. And she was about three months old, and I had gotten a job in Melbourne. Oh, no, I hadn't even gotten a job in Melbourne. Excuse me. I was looking for a job in Melbourne.

It's so much worse than I remember. We were unemployed, and we managed to get a cat sit in like an hour. It was in a place called St. Andrews. It was over an hour outside of Melbourne on a very long and windy and at night terrifying road that towards the end I was driving very fast because I was very depressed and my wife was also uh she was um I don't like to use the term postnatal depression but she was definitely depressed postnatally and we just had this baby screaming and screaming at us as I would get up each day I would do you know open mic spots at night and

then during the day I would be pounding on doors and looking for increasingly insane jobs I oh I had a mullet and I cut it off to go to the interviews and I thought this is the sort of sacrifice a man must make is not having a mullet. And it didn't do much good until I met a woman named Samantha. I was desperately underqualified for the job, but she let me have the job and she's my friend for life. Samantha, you saved me. But we were looking after these cats and it was this big property and we didn't have a very long handover with the people who were there. And they said, yeah, just let the cats out. They'll come in.

They'll come in when it's time to eat. The cats didn't come back. And for many hours, I was chasing the cats over this enormous bushfire-prone property. A BFBB-prone property. And it was terrifying. I BFBB. Prone property. And it was terrifying. I just remember thinking, I couldn't, I'd lost visual contact on the cats and I thought we'd been here for a day.

The baby won't stop. The baby is screaming interminably. The cats are lost. My wife is depressed. An African gang is going to break in here. It was also at the time we were in Melbourne, people were talking about African gangs breaking in. And it remains to this day a question of how prevalent African gangs actually were in Melbourne.

But yes, of course, as a tabloid press reader, I was worried that I'd be out at night and African gangs would come and mutilate my young family. I was just talking about it with my wife. would come and mutilate my young family. I was just talking about it with my wife. It was definitely the, it was one of several low points, but it did all turn around. But that crazy phase of being like, I need to be able to look after a family, going from a hipster, going from a successful bicycle riding journalist hipster doing, you know, dabbling in comedy as I chose

to desperately needing enough money to live now and having to go through that and having to put my young family through that and my colicky daughter. Ooh, it was a rough try. I better be quiet. I better not make too many big noises because I'm in the car now.

I'm in the Toyota Sienna in Austin at a cat sit that's going so much better wonderful cats you let them out they come straight back in when you want them more or less one of them i didn't want to come in for a little while but has come in now but they never stray far they're just lounging in the backyard so nice and in beautiful aust beautiful Austin. In wonderful weather. In leafy green Austin. And we're going to be staying in Austin for a bit longer. Because I have all this wonderful opening work. I got to open for Shane Gillis last night. At the HEB Arena.

It was like 8,000 people. And I get to do it again tonight. And friendly, wonderful Austin people. I can't believe. I mean, it's like it's a dream come true. It's, we need to find a house here by Thursday night because people are coming back from overseas holiday. Vacation, I believe they call it in the United States. Holiday, I will continue to call it.

And we have to be out. Actually, they've been so good as to tell us, you can keep staying. But I've seen this house and I'm not going to put them through. I'm not going to put them through that. That's unfair. So we're going to try and be out by Thursday. We're meeting with a realtor tomorrow. And we're going to go and look at a bunch of houses in Austin and try and rent one for, you know, it's work going up to July and then maybe after. We'll try and get a 12-month lease and that's where, that's how we're,

that's the dismount on the last, if you've been listening over the last few months, you know, it's been a little choppy and yeah, smooth disembarkation If you've been listening over the last few months, you know, it's been a little choppy. And, yeah, smooth disembarkation in sight. Thank you for being along the journey. Thank you for listening. Thank you for being on the Patreon, everybody, on the Patreon, keeping us alive.

Oh, my goodness. I haven't actually, I haven't had to touch the Patreon in a while. I haven't had to use that money to live while being here in America. Which is nice, because the comedy's going quite well. Ah, as my children snore in the back, and I prepare for a nap myself. Oh, ladies and gentlemen. Can I read you a poem?

Can I read you some of my new poems? Here's another thing. I think I'm going to have enough poems to have a new book of poetry real soon. I don't know what I'm going to call it. Currently it's called Mind Palace. But I will need to change it. I don't know that the Mind Palace poem is terribly impressive. Here's one. This one is about writing ABC books for babies.

Writing an ABC book for babies is all fun and games until the last three letters. But at the start, oh baby, baby you can be adventurous, brave, courageous, different, exciting, flamboyant, gregarious, having infinite jest constantly through the El Mino roller coaster Anyway, there's that poem. before rounding the corner headfirst into yacht zebra like an absolute coward. Anyway, there's that poem. Here's a less wholesome poem I'm working on. It's not done yet. Where is it? Where is it? It's about being Japanese.

I might call it Turning Japanese. Do you think anyone else has named anything about being Japanese turning Japanese? I'll have to look that up. As I just continue to dawdle in what I'm saying, while I can't find my damn Japanese... My damn... Here's a sad one. Here's a sad one that's not about being Japanese. I wish that I could talk to my friend, but alas, my friend is dead.

And so I have to substitute talking to one of our mutual friends instead. And together we can guess at whatever our mutual dead friend would have said. And never, I suspect, get remotely close to it. That's a sadder one. Put that more towards the middle of the book, I think. Oh, here it is here it is Japanese poem I think I'd like to go to the nation of Japan

not as a big white tourist but as a little Japanese man who has grown up in Japan and who is biologically Japanese who resents his Japanese life and acquaintances and desperately wants to leave the country I imagine riding a bullet train that means absolutely nothing to me, except that it's the easiest way of getting from point A to point B, and then crying emotionally, singing

a snappy karaoke song. Imagine partaking of upskirt photography without knowing it was wrong, as though upskirt photography was a visual ice cream. Imagine living in the ruins of nuclear war and innately understanding what that means and wanting to get out of there to a big flat western place and going weeks at a time without seeing a single Japanese face. And then the end of the poem will be like,

that's the way I want to be in Japan. I could just say that's the way I want to be in Japan. I could just say that's the way I want to be in Japan, but I'm trying to make them rhyme, because whenever they rhyme, people seem to be quietly pleased. And whenever they don't rhyme, people go, but that one didn't rhyme. And frankly, when I read poems and they don't rhyme,

I go, what do you think you're doing, honestly? Would I like my poems if I read them? Oh, that's not a bad idea for a poem. That's too meta. Oh, ladies and gentlemen, there's a beetle on the steering wheel. Flick! I'm sorry that the production values of this podcast are a bit lower than ordinarily. I like it to be a bit more flamboyant.

Oh, there's a butterfly. Man, that would be nice on the visual component. That would be nice on the visual component. If I could get the butterfly, it's gone. It's gone. It's back. Love is like a butterfly. Life is like a butterfly. Sex is like a butterfly. There is only one thing in the whole world that is not like a butterfly. And that thing is a butterfly. It's gone. It's back. I tell you, they have beautiful wildflowers all over the highways in Austin. Well, I think just in Texas, you come across the Oklahoma border,

and then on the median strip and to its left and right, so many wildflowers and so many butterflies on the wildflowers. And as you're driving at 100 miles an hour, just killing butterfly after butterfly. It's okay killing other bugs, but it is trifle macabre, the feeling of hitting something as beautiful as a butterfly popping off the windshield. But otherwise, the wildflowers, I pass without criticism. I love them so very, very much. Someone wrote to me this week for advice. I was going to say, I was apologizing.

I was, ah, yes, I was apologizing for the lack of energy and editing and visuals, but this has been the biggest week of my professional life oh my we got a we got a babysitter and i was able to bring my wife out to this stadium show last night she's going to stay in tonight but it was just so i should have to text the babysitter and say we don't need her tonight because wife was very tired after last night but it was it was so lovely to get to go and show my beautiful wife off. My beautiful... I get to stand next to her and people know that I have a hot wife. I mean, you can take that too far. You can take that too far.

I've seen people take that too far. But it is... I mean, my wife... She's always with the children and she gets to meet so few people that... I suspect some people were wondering if she existed. Someone was saying... My wife, she looked me up on google which I try not to do and the top suggestion was James McCann wife and someone was saying there is no wife James is not really a catholic this is all an act I thought that was boy that's not the character I would choose that's not the commercial enterprise

that I would be embarking on if I was just to sit down as an entirely nullified person and put together the character who would win America's hearts and minds it wouldn't be the one I am I'll tell you that although maybe it would be nah nah I am, I'll tell you that. Although maybe it would be.

Nah, I'd be disabled and Chinese, for sure. I'd be a patriotic disabled Chinese lady. Hey, someone asked for advice. Alright, this letter is coming in from... We'll call him Mr. Protestant, because he signs it, you're filthy Protestant listener from Denver. from, we'll call him Mr. Protestant, because he signs it, your filthy Protestant listener from Denver. And I like to protect everybody's names,

but filthy Protestant listener from Denver, here you go. Here's the letter. By the way, before I begin, I am listening to the Rest Is History's five-part podcast series on Luther, Martin Luther, Mr. Martin Luther Peasant Senior, to differentiate him from the other much-beloved Martin Luther.

Listen, Martin Luther, who started the Protestant Reformation, he was crazy. Talked a lot about poop. And that's all I have to say. Anyway, let's do the advice. And this is, by the way, this is a podcast being done by two men squarely in the Protestant tradition. And as they go through Martin Luther's story, you can't help but think that guy's a loon. Well, you might be able to help but think that.

I can't help but think that. All right. Dear James, sadly, I write to you not with a business inquiry, but with a request for advice. I am not a woman. Oh, yeah, I guess he's found my email on my website asking for business inquiries. You can use that email for anything other than stealing my identity. I'm not a woman, but I have a wife and daughter

and I feel that the amount of estrogen in my household currently qualifies me for some level of advice. If not, then I'm sorry for wasting your time. I will just jump in and say, even though the advice column is for women to try and get women to listen i will happily field advice from anybody uh including men my problem is this i am a graphic designer and with the recent birth of my daughter i feel an overwhelming desire to provide and care for her

this is good and i relish this feeling i didn't know that i'd be telling i didn't read this very much i i'll be honest with you i didn't read this very much i i'll be honest with you i didn't read this before i started i knew there was an email in advice and i looked it up i did not know i'd be doing the story about going and living with those cats that ran away from me and everybody being depressed and my daughter screaming all the time and trying to provide for my family so let's see how we go this is actually one of the few ones that i feel relatively well grounded to talk about. So, wants to provide for the family, new daughter, graphic designer.

However, here we go. I am worried that I will not be able to provide for her while also maintaining my artistic integrity. I am self-employed and make enough for our small family for now, but I fear that soon I will need to quote-unquote in now and say I was shocked when I first entered the corporate workforce that ties are out. At least in Australia. No one's wearing a tie. A tie actually marks you out as a deeply underclass person who still thinks ties have to be worn or like someone who's running the business.

But I tell you, graphic designers, you'll get away with an open collar or a turtleneck. I guarantee it. How do you, asks filthy Protestant listener from Denver, how do you, James, as a creative, balance the needs of your family while staying true to your artistic endeavors that provide for them? Are there lessons I should be learning from you? Should I too pursue boat ownership as a means of both housing and transportation. Thank you for the content you create. I especially loved your recent Good Friday episode

as it made me consider if I too am making an idol of work and money, your wisdom does not go unheeded. Your filthy Protestant listener from Denver. Well, well, there's, there's, there's, I'm actually, I'm going to sit up. I've been in a semi-reclined position in the Toyota Sienna hitherto. It's a fascinating question, and it's a junction that comes from many people because you really do have to make a choice.

I need to sell out. I have done, I mean, I started working a job. I started working a job when I had a family. Here's the first thing i'm going to say if you can get remote sellout corporate work it's not really sellout it's not going to take up that much of your time no one knows how long it takes a graphic designer to do things if you can get now if you're on the office you know if you're on the office floor if you're in the office playing the office politics blah blah blah no good um they'll see that you're on the office floor if you're in the office playing the office politics blah

blah blah no good um they'll see that you're not working very much but i i tell you with the motivation of the family and with some uh hard liquor and perhaps a nicotine uh consumption possibility you'll be able to get a week's work done in a day. If you take yourself from the family, you take yourself away, you bust out a 15-hour to 18-hour day, whatever it is. I used to do it to get away from my screaming family when I was in Melbourne and I was working. I was unemployed, but I got this to help me get a proper job. Oh, man.

I guess we would call that underemployed. Excuse me, that's a realtor. Yeah, I would go to McDonald's. I would go to a 24-hour McDonald's, and I would sit there and just work all night on a... It was like... It was a freelance writing company that was definitely meant for people in India

because it was it was like seven dollars an hour um so you I couldn't live on that and so I anyway it was nuts it was crazy but then as I I developed a technique that I believe any anybody could do of entering into a state of such incredible focus distinct from the distractions in an office that if you if you have you know if you're in a managerial position obviously you need to be there all the time because you have to look at people but if you're just in a if it's like you have a list of tasks to do for the week i would say get a remote position and get them done in a day you'll have enough money to take care of your family

and you'll have enough time the rest of the week to do other things. If you can do that, you know, and if you can do it in a role that is... obviously don't work in a graphic design thing that you hate. If you're a really committed Protestant, the advice would be, you know, okay, obviously don't start doing graphic design for the Catholic Church. Now, of course, as a Catholic, I think that's exactly what you should do. And once you're inside, you'll see what wonderful people we all are, what a terrible mistake you're making with the scatologically obsessed Martin Luther. But, fine, best job I had,

and I would work more than one day a week for this one, but it wasn't like proper, full, every single minute of every day like you would in an office. I got to go and take walks sometimes and be with my family. I was working for a bird charity. I tried to do all my work for them in a good way and go to all my meetings, but when you work remote, you can work such different hours with so few distractions i think you'll be shocked by how you can get that work done fast hey how you like that how you like that hmm from me to you do that you can at some point it may be worth taking the jump and just doubling down 100% on the freelance graphic design stuff. I've not seen your graphic design work. I can't see it

here. It's not in the email. That would actually help. By the way, for future advice columns, if anyone else is a graphic designer and wants advice about that, send through some of your graphic design work because potentially, filthy Protestant listener from Denver, your work's not very good. I don't know. Maybe it's sublime. If your work is great, my advice would be keep doing what you're doing and have the fear of providing for a family. Give you the kick up the bum necessary to continue, you know, working at a much bigger rate. But for, you know, not knowing, I would say in the abstract.

Yeah, get a job. but for you know not knowing i would say in the abstract yeah get a job get the job that doesn't feel too silly outy while you prepare to just throw yourself into the i mean obviously at some point i did i stopped doing the corporate job here's the other thing i would have kept i would have kept working for the bird charity i love it there i love the ladies who work there. I enjoyed the work. I think I understood some of the work. I'm not especially passionate about birds, you know. But I'm not excessively anti-bird. And I learned a lot about birds working there.

And as I was coming to America, I realized like the week before I came, I wouldn't be able to continue doing that job because that you can't do remote work in America they count that as American work and my visa did not cover that kind of work so sadly I had to resign from that position and it well I went from I had all tickets. I was all ready to go. And I thought, no, it'll be all right. I still have a job. I'm coming to America. Then I got fired from that job.

So, hey, it's all worked out. I wouldn't tell anyone to do what I'd done. Because we still don't have a house. And if we don't have a house by Thursday, we're in a pickle. Yeah. Denver Protestant, filthy Denver Protestant, I would say, at some point you might want to, if you're good at graphic design,

you might want to make that job, job, job, job, jim-jum-job, jim-jum-job. You might want to make the jim-jum-job. I want everyone to know that that was me stumbling over my words, and not a racial bit at some point you might want to make the jump but it's probably going to be obvious when that time is and it might not be immediately i kept thinking i'm always thought i'm one to two months away from quitting my job and just being a comedian. And it never happened. It just didn't happen. And in hindsight, it was great that I had to quit my bird job

because it gave me all this time to relentlessly pursue comedy in America. And if I'd been here trying to do different things the same time, gosh, the word, I'm going to take a nap before the stadium show tonight or I'm going to be in some serious trouble. Anyway, the time will come when it's time for you to make the jump.

You don't have to do it right now. Right now, you just have to provide for your family. I know it's very hard having a child. You're changing in a lot of different ways. Your relationship is no doubt

extremely different to how it was before in many ways not just the sexual but let's not discount the extent to which the sexual dimension goes through a bit of a shake-up it gets better i mean for a lot of people it gets better for you again maybe much like the graphic design work, if you could send me a sample of your sex life, I'll be able to make a more involved decision about whether or not that will get better. I don't want that. Keep that away from me. Oh, what is that?

Why is someone making those noises? Why is someone making those noises? Who is that making those noises? Ah, I think there might be a... Um... I think there might be a vibrant individual carrying on in this neighborhood. Hmm. Well, that'd be an interesting one to capture on the visual component apologies for that

that'll be back soon i look i hope that um i hope that helps denver protestant filthy uh you should probably not pursue boat ownership as a means of housing and transportation just because it sounds like you need an answer relatively soon. And I'll tell you, coming up on three years in, the boat remains elusive. But I think we might do it. I think, honestly, I think we might do it under three. If we keep going at this rate, four, five.

It's a five-year plan. Nothing wrong with a five-year plan. And all the thank youss and that's all fine. I wish you luck. You're doing a hard thing. As a Latin mass boy from Adelaide, I know no shortage of poets, writers, thinkers, cinematographers, photographers, dancers, whatever. Whatever the creative endeavor is. dances, you know, whatever, whatever the creative endeavor is. And then you just have all these children and it forces you to make, you have to think strategically, but it can be done.

I've seen it done. Keep your integrity intact as best you can. Yeah, you know what I would say? I would say keep your integrity 100% intact, but also definitely change your idea about what your integrity is. That's the secret to holding on to your integrity and never compromising your integrity is changing integrities. That's all I have for you. I wish I had more. I'll tell you what,

if we get a house this week and we move into a brick and mortar style home, sadly it would be difficult to move into a boat. Austin is landlocked. There is a river, but I don't think you can get a catamaran on that river. If we're not homeless, I'll let you know how it's gone for me.

And if it doesn't work, and we are homeless still, and we're living out, I'll let you know how it's gone for me. And if it doesn't work and we are homeless still, and we're living out of some different Airbnb, or I just drum up the finances for a motorhome, I'll let you know about that too. We figure it out as we go. I'll tell you something my priest told me when I was worried about providing for a family. He said, you have to house them, you have to feed them, you have to clothe them.

Speaking of your children and your wife. As a man, you have to clothe, feed, and house. And you have to raise them in the faith. You have to love them. I don't know if he said the last two things. He was just talking about the material provisions. The heart and soul is an entirely other matter. But if you can keep your family sheltered,

even if it's difficult, not very nice shelter, but they stay safe and warm during the winter and dry and wet months, whatever. If you can shelter them, if you can feed them, and if they're not naked, you're doing your job. And everything beyond that is a bonus, but it is not necessary. Keep that in mind when you're thinking about your integrity. I wonder if my wife would have a different point of view. And we're not going to hear from her right now.

She's inside with our beautiful daughter, who's no longer colicky, no longer screaming in the wilderness, waiting for an African gang to come in and machete everybody. She's drawing, and she can write her own name. It's a very beautiful moment. Earlier this week, my daughter discovered that she could read. My wife has been doing phonics with her, and she's been picking up the phonics, It's a very beautiful moment. Earlier this week, my daughter discovered that she could read.

My wife has been doing phonics with her, and it's been, you know, she's been picking up the phonics, but things don't all click together. And suddenly, just like, something went off in her brain. And she, Mom, I can read! She was getting out books and just reading through the books. It was... Oh! Filthy Protestant, what a journey you're on.

What treasures are in store for you? And, of course, for all my other listeners. I want to say a big thank you. Oh, to look. About 100 people at this point. Everyone responsible for me having shelter and providing shelter for my family. If I'm not providing shelter for my family, I'm glad that we've got a wonderful podcast listener doing it and his friend.

And clothing, we've been going to Goodwill. We've been buying some beautiful Goodwill clothes. And we just came back from a grocery store where I've got to tell you, I treated our family to milk in a glass bottle this week. Maybe that's, hey, one of the cats has come outside. Hey. It's a beautiful cat. I love cats. I love them. Could we have a boat cat? Cat boat? The history of cats on boats. I think you'd rather have a cat on a boat than a dog, just for logistics. This podcast has been going on for much longer than normal.

That's what we can do. If the quality goes down, the quantity can increase. But I think it is time for me to switch over to the Patreon. I'm going to switch over to the Patreon now. If you'd like to join the Patreon, it's there. There's all such highquality stuff on the Patreon, including podcasts like this one, and also a high-quality one.

I'll talk about Disney World. How do you like that? All right. I'm going to talk about Disney World on the Patreon. Here is music. Thank you. As a Fizz member, you can look forward to free data, big savings on plans, and having your unused data roll over to the following month. Every month. At Fizz, you always get more for your money.

Terms and conditions for our different programs and policies apply. Details at Fizz.ca. Hey, it's Mitch from SideNote Podcast, and I'm here to tell you about the new Google Pixel 9 powered by Gemini. Anyone who knows me knows the Pixel has always been my favorite out of all the phones I've ever had. Now, with Gemini built in, it's basically my personal AI assistant. Since I'm truly terrible at keeping up with emails, I use Gemini to give me summaries of my inbox, which is a lifesaver. And if I'm feeling stuck creatively, I just ask Gemini for help and bam, instant inspiration. You can learn more about Google Pixel 9 at store.google.com.