The Way I Heard It with Mike Rowe - 177: It's Thanksgiving! What the Chuck?!

Episode Date: November 26, 2020

Mike sits down with his producer Chuck for a candid conversation about the future of The Way I Heard it.  Whiskey is sipped, decisions are made, life goes on.     

Do do do do do do do. Dumb. Is it weird to love people but despise human resources? If so, well, color me weird. It's not to say I don't respect the millions of people who work in HR departments and companies all over the country. I do. It's just that I don't envy him. That's why MicroWorks doesn't have an HR department for better or worse.

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How do I know if this is actually recording? Well, if you're looking at the little waveprints and you see ups and downs, then that tells you that it's actually recording. I'm seeing that. Are you seeing that? Well, you've just described my entire life. Little waveforms going up and down? Ups and downs on a waveprint. How's 2020 treating you?

Hi, everybody. The voice you're hearing that isn't mine belongs to Chuck Klausmeyer, the producer of this podcast. Some of you have heard him in the past, and now all of you are hearing him in the present. Chuck, say something interesting. Well, what are you drinking, Mike? I am drinking a little bit of Rip Van Winkle,

made by our friends over at Pappy Van Winkle, distillers of high-quality bourbon. You might remember the fundraiser we did not too long ago for MicroWorks, where we auctioned off a bunch of Wolverine boots. Didn't auctioned them off. just made them available. And people bought them. They bought them.

Yeah. Yeah. Pappy Van Winkle used the casks from their old bourbon barrels, you know. And they incorporated them into the heel stack. And Wolverine made all these by hand and they donated them. And we sold 300 pair, raised 120 grand for the foundation in two hours. Which is fantastic. But I have to believe that people listening are wondering, what have I stumbled into here?

I didn't hear the little music sting in the beginning. No. You know, and now there's two guys just chatting. What's going on, Mike? Bold new world, friends. First of all, happy Thanksgiving. That is our main goal. Chuck is up here in Northern California visiting with me for a couple of days.

He's the producer of the podcast, as I mentioned, and as many of you know, we've been trying to figure out what to do with this little piece of real estate that you have so kindly allowed me to occupy for the last four years in this little place we like to call podcastlandia. That's exactly what we call it. Because it's a place like no other oasis in the media landscape. You know, the podcast world obviously is a thing. And I've learned a lot the last three or four years. Didn't know anything getting into this.

Oh, neither of us. No. No. But I know now that we are the number one short form podcast in the country. At least we were a couple years ago. Yes, right. I don't know if we still are anymore. But the way I heard it, we were.

The way I heard it, yes. But they're all getting longer, too. They're getting longer. They're getting longer. And fans of this podcast know that a couple of weeks ago I wrote a story called The Trouble with 159, which talked about a claim I made in episode 159, that Billy Martin Jr. took exception to. And I wrote about the back and forth

between Billy Martin Jr. and myself and what that did to me in terms of impacting the way I think about this podcast and what I would like to do with this space that the listeners, if so graciously, allowed us to occupy, you know? And it started as kind of a weird existential examination of, is this the right title?

you know and then I realized I was you know Thanksgiving was coming and my parents 60th wedding anniversary was right around the corner and I wasn't going to be able to see him and my dad's birthday was a day after that I wasn't going to be able to see him and the pandemic is still here and the lockdowns are still here and the experts disagree with each other and the journalists are at each other's throats and the politicians can't be believed and did I mention the pandemic is still here And the election isn't resolved And there's so much strong and drang and divisiveness And I just realized I was having a hell of a time writing anything

Because every time I sat down here at my little keypad The only thing that came out the other end Was not a story for the curious mind with short attention span It was something else You know And so I told the listeners that I wanted to let the world spend for a bit and think about what made sense. And then, as you know, things blew up on my Facebook page.

And hundreds of people, you people, came by and very kindly encouraged me to continue doing this. And so it's really been an interesting conversation between my buddy Chuck and I about what to do moving forward. We've had this conversation multiple times, many times. several very long walks around your hood and it changes daily. But I think we've settled on something, have we not? I think we have the makings of a plan moving forward. But, you know, I just want to say that it was, it's really been great writing short stories. It's really been fun channeling Paul Harvey. And I don't want to stop doing that, you know, forever. But I got to tell you, it's also good. It's also been really instructive listening to guys like Joe Rogan

and comedians like Bill Burr and some other podcasts that I've stumbled across and I admit it I envy I envy the form you know where you can sit down with a friend or a or an expert or a celebrity or just somebody who's interesting you know a worker and talk to them you know like a human being I just I think that's something that I want to experiment with if I can. And so throw into the mix, you know, the other practical realities of my ridiculous business right now. Chuck, by the way, works with me on a lot of different things.

Microworks, my foundation, he's a critical part of. But he's also a recovering actor. And it's just done some great work on a series that you're going to be hearing a lot about in January. called 6 degrees. Six degrees with micro. And his old buddy Chuck. This show has been sucking up a lot of our time. And there's a terrible rumor that seems increasingly likely to be true that Discovery wants

more dirty jobs. And another rumor that Facebook wants more returning the favors. And another rumor that TBN wants more of somebody's got to do it or something like it. There's even a rumor that this podcast, the way I heard it, might very well be turned into a TV show. So this is all good news. Yes. But it just means, you know, in this weird zero-sum game, I've only got so much time to do whatever it is I can. And man, writing takes time.

Yes, it does. Particularly for you. Look, it doesn't come easy. It brings me great joy, but it's never come easy. And fundamentally, you know, the way I heard it, was supposed to be a narration project. It turned into a writing project, and I'm not complaining at all, but part of the reason I think I felt so overwhelmed a couple of weeks ago wasn't that I got the story wrong, you know? I didn't really, I mean, I apologize to Billy Martin, Jr., if I got it

wrong. But the reason that I wound up going down a rabbit hole was because in getting it not wrong, I created a problem anyway. I was out there essentially repeating a story, an unconfirmed story, passing on gossip to a certain degree. And that just really made me think a little bit more carefully, through the lens of all the ambiguity we've been talking about that the country's dealing with.

Do we really need one more guy out there going, I could be wrong? I probably am. But I mean, that's one of the way. of the great things about the title the way I heard it is that it's got forgiveness baked into it meaning that you may not have it entirely right. Look, for that reason, I'm not backing away from the podcast. For that reason, the way I heard it is going to continue forward in a slightly different form. But look, it's Thanksgiving. And I made a comment on Facebook a couple of days

ago with regard to the coming lockdowns and with regard to our our country's attitude towards safety. And don't worry, I'm not going to get political. I know it makes you nervous when I go down this particular road. But I was just thinking, you know, 102 pilgrims got in a 80-foot boat, you know, so they could worship the way they wanted. And they took a 3,000-mile trip. And half of them died. on the way. And here we are, you know, living in this, in this world where, where living is the only thing that matters, where safety is the prime directive. Paramount. It is, you know. And so I've,

I've been writing about that and I've been thinking about that. And, you know, when I, when I said that story, when I talked about the basic Thanksgiving story, I heard from people on my page saying, well the way I heard it was a bunch of religious fanatics got on a boat and came over here and killed all the Native Americans. And isn't that the point? It seems like every single thing today has a yin and a yang, a pro and a con, a black and a white, a blue collar, a white collar. There are two sides to everything. And we're trapped in this thing that Gutfeld, Greg Gutfeld called a prison of two ideas. And he's right.

So in that world, the way I heard it feels like the only sensible thing to do, the only logical way to begin any argument, I think, is by saying, look, I could be wrong. But it seems to me, blah, blah, blah. And I don't want to stop doing that. And nor should you. So I think now that we're 10 and a half minutes in, we should tell everybody what you've decided to do with the way I heard it with Mike Roe, the podcast. Well, the first thing I've decided to do is not worry about your obsessive, compulsive devotion to time. I don't care how long this podcast is anymore.

Historically, it's been short stories for the curious mind with short attention span. Originally, they were five minutes. Then they crept up to 10. In the future, the way I heard, it's going to be longer. It's going to be maybe a half hour, maybe longer than that. And in the immediate future, I can say for sure that's going to be. be the case because what I want to do is make my book available for free on the podcast platform, one chapter at a time. So if you didn't know it, and if you did, I wrote a book last year called

The Way I Heard It and in the book are 35 stories pulled from this library of biographies. But the book actually includes 35 additional autobiographical tales from my own misspent career and life. in some way rhyme with the famous figures who I never met that I wrote about anyway. So the book did well and nevertheless there are a lot of people who haven't heard it. So in this weird interim, in this weird time where we're living right now, where I can't bear to walk away from this audience but I don't have the time to write any more stories in the immediate future, I thought perhaps we could put up a chapter at a time from the book and maybe, maybe, my old friend Chuck, the guy sitting across from me right now, drinking my overpriced liquor,

maybe he would sit down and chat with me extemporaneously, unpack some of these things, if you will, and take a deeper dive into the way we talked about the way I heard it. Aha. So that's what we're going to do. So I took you another two minutes. Took you two minutes. I am obsessed with time, I guess. I don't know.

Look, I am too. And I don't want to waste yours, gentle listener. I don't want to free associate. I don't want to ramble for no point. There's enough of that out there anyway. And I promise you, I'm not going to do that. At least I'm going to try not to. But I do, I did learn last week, last couple of weeks, that diving into these stories

and better understanding what I got wrong and what I got right and maybe sharing with the listeners some things. that I wasn't able to include in the tales themselves, maybe people will dig it. And maybe you won't. But if I've learned anything about the people who listen to this podcast, they will let me know. We'll find out. They will go to my Facebook page,

and they will tell me how amazing I am or how disappointing I am. Mike, you churlish imp. Type, type, type, type, type. Hey, that's my mom's. There's. Churlish imp is her sign off. Anyway, folks, that's what's happening.

You've just listened to my old friend Chuck and I talk for 13 minutes and 40 seconds. Here in my modest home, a little north of San Francisco, where I will remain for the rest of the year. Starting next week, we will put up a chapter at a time. We'll share that with you. We'll talk about it. You'll tell me what you think. Sound like a plan? Sounds like a great plan.

And if you can't wait for every chapter, you can always buy the book now or the audio book. Let's not turn this into a commercial, Chuck. For once, we're not going to have a commercial. Unless, of course, you need a mask because we're selling those right now to benefit the foundation. But no, no, no, crass commercial interruptions. This was just a sincere attempt in under 15 minutes to wish you a happy Thanksgiving. Explain as best I can articulate the future of what I think this point. podcast should become and invite you to share whatever feedback you might have on my Facebook

page. Having said all that, Chuck, we have 20 seconds left. How do you want to spend that time? Wishing you a very happy Thanksgiving, a safe one, and hopefully 2021 is much better than this year. Hey, 2020. Don't let the door hit you with a good Lord split you. You said it a lot nicer than I did. What a year, friends. Here's to 2020. but I'll talk to you before then. Next week, in fact. Adios. The ocean delights us

as playful otters restore coastal kale forests. The ocean teaches us how our choices impact even the deepest places. The ocean connects us. Visit monterey Bay Aquarium.org slash connects.

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