Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - David Common: Toronto Mike'd #1437

Episode Date: February 26, 2024

In this 1437th episode of Toronto Mike'd, Mike chats with CBC's Metro Morning host David Common about his career in news media, hosting Toronto's most popular radio morning show and more. Toronto Mike'd is proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, Palma Pasta, Ridley Funeral Home, The Advantaged Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada and Electronic Products Recycling Association. If you would like to support the show, we do have partner opportunities available. Please email Toronto Mike at [e-mail]

Welcome to episode 1437 of Toronto Miked, proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh, homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. RecycleMyElectronics.ca.

Committing to our planet's future means properly recycling our electronics of the past. The Advantage to Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada. Valuable perspective for Canadian investors who want to remain knowledgeable, informed and focused on long-term success. And Ridley Funeral Home. Pillars of the community since 1921. Today, making his Toronto Mike debut is the host of Metro Morning on CBC Radio 1. It's David Common.

How are you? Welcome to Toronto Mike, Mr. Common. Thank you very much. Glad to be here. You're anything but common, right? I'm anything but common. Yeah, that's... That's an ironic name, like when a skinny guy is named Fats.

You could go that way. Sure. Work with me there. Okay. So I can't wait to find out more about your great career at the CBC. As you can see, I donned my 1976 CBC shirt. This is the shirt that was like distributed to TV Ontario had like some Alliance of CBC for covering the Montreal Olympics and a guy at TVO thought that maybe I would enjoy this shirt more than he does it was just sitting in his closet. It is epic. I will give you full credit it's not only is it beautiful in like the 1970s orange but it has the 1970s collar that goes on for like three or four blocks Hey, yeah, it's highly flammable though. Yeah, please don't light any matches near me. I'm worried. It'll just spark up

It will be done So be careful around this flammable shirt But I'm gonna ask you at the top before we find out how you're doing and I read some nice notes that came in You're a smart guy. Is there a word for when you're like frightened AF of something, but also selfishly you love it? Cause I'm referring to this February weather we've had in Toronto. I'm out there waiting for you.

I had a palma pasta delivery and it felt like, I don't know, May? It is weird. And it's like this yo-yo winter weather, right? Because we go on and off. It's going to be, as we record this, it's eight degrees and wall to wall sun out there. And we just come out of a weekend when it was,

I think it was like minus 20 at one point with the wind chill. So it's weird, it's beautiful. I feel a little guilty, climate change, and yet also- Well, that's it. Is there a word for this? Like maybe there's a German word for it. I don't know, but like it's scary.

It is probably the Germans. It's frightening. I think it's, yes, it. Is there a word for this? Like maybe there's a German word for it. I don't know, but like it's scary. It's frightening. I think it's, yes, I think we have a word for it. But I'm frightened by this idea of like, you know, tomorrow it's going to be double digits temps. And it's not the first day we'll have double digits temps in this month, but at the same, so it's frightening. But at the same time, as a cyclist,

like I kind of absolutely love it. Like I'm setting a February record, a personal best for kilometers I can bike in the city. it's all thanks to Mother Nature. Yeah it's just whether Mother Nature is thanking us for it that's the question but I'm glad you're getting out on your bike because absolutely across this city it's amazing to see just the number of people out in shorts first of all right. Oh yeah you always had those weirdos though who would like wear the shorts in minus 10 just okay. I don't think they're weirdos and I'll tell you why.

Why? Because you're one of them. No, I'm not, but I have a close friend who lives in Edmonton and they get winter there. He does not own a pair of pants. I have seen him once. I've known him 20 years. I've seen him once in pants and it was his wedding. And I think he had to go and buy them and then he promptly got rid of them right after that. So he only wear shorts year round. He's got legs like the size of tree trunks. Well, he's just showing off then, right? It's I always say like, like if I had a six pack, what did I watch? I watched the movie the other day. And this guy, God, the guy from

This Is Us and his name is eluding me right now. But he I was telling my wife, like you could great cheese on this guy's abs. Like this is a six pack. Just like you and me. Yeah. And I think if I had that upper body I would never wear a shirt. David, I would never wear a shirt if I had that upper body. Isn't there a story about is it is it Alec Manoa? No, there's well he does not have a six pack Alec. No he definitely doesn't. Who am I thinking of? Who? No I'm you know, I'm, I'm in, I'm you know, there was a guy on the calves. I think there was a guy in the calves who would always take off his shirt just because, you know, he could, but yeah, lots going on here.

So let me just read a couple of quick notes that came in and then we'll get to know you better and we'll talk about, you know, your, uh, your new gig, which is a, I think maybe the highest profile gig in this city when it it comes to radio so we have lots of ground to cover but do you know the band from Winnipeg the Watchmen? Yes I do. How well do you know the Watchmen? Like you know we're similar vintage I might have a few years on you but you probably rocked out to the Watchmen in the 90s was this a big deal? Yeah I don't think I was super exposed to them but I'm absolutely familiar with them. Yeah okay because you are a Winnipeg guy right? I was born in Winnipeg absolutely but I really

look here's the deal. Where you're from in this country it all depends on where you are in this country. So here I am speaking to Toronto Mikes in Toronto. I can tell you I grew up here, I went to kindergarten here, I went straight through high school, went through university, all in this city. Kindergarten? Yeah, from an early age. However, when I worked as I did in Saskatchewan and Manitoba and New Brunswick and other places, Toronto's not super popular. So they hate Toronto. Yeah, so you go and you talk about being from somewhere else. You say you're from Winnipeg. Yeah. Yeah.

That's like when Americans travel in Europe and they have a Canadian flag. It's the same thing, right? It's more convenient for you to identify as a Winnipegger because Canadians like Winnipeggers, but why is it? What's the main reason? Is it a bit of a jealousy or is it the sense that we think we're the center of the universe? But why does the rest of this country seem to dislike Toronto so? So to some degree it is deserved right like I can say that as somebody who has lived around this country that there are a lot of things that do seem to circle

around Toronto but at the same time you know a quarter of the population of the entire country is right in the GTA here right you go southwestern Ontario it Ontario, it's an even bigger chunk than that. It's huge. We decide federal elections, we decide provincial elections, lots of money flows through here, you know, Bay Street, all the big headquarters are here, and so you hate something, there's a good chance that its primary operations are here. Well here, write this note down David. We will not, this city of Toronto will not determine the next federal election. I just want you to take a note right there as my prediction.

Okay. We will not. I'm saying all of the GTHA though. Yeah, so you're throwing in a lot of Mississauga and Brampton. Yeah, you're throwing in some 905s there. Anyway, we'll see, we'll see. Shout out to the 905. So the reason I bring up the Watchmen, I'm a big fan of the Watchmen, but the drummer for the Watchmen is a guy named Sammy Cohn. He just wants you to know, David, he's a big fan of your work.

That is very kind. I think so too. And I now look to my right and I see Brian Linehan, patron saint of Toronto Mike. And I realized this was a gift from the Watchmen. So the Watchmen actually gifted me this to tell me that Brian Linehan would be proud of me. So shout out to Sammy Cohn who's listening in at home.

Very nice shout out indeed. Lanric Bennett Jr. so Sammy's an FOTM that means friend of Toronto Mike. David you're now an FOTM so welcome to the fraternity. Yeah I appreciate being welcome to the club. Lanric Bennett Jr. is also an FOTM, the bicycle mayor of this city. And he just let me know that he chilled with you and the mayor last week. So this is the circle that Lanric Bennett Jr. is rolling in, is hanging with. People like David Common and Olivia Chow, that's a pretty big deal. Yeah, now where was this? Were we treading

water? We'd fall off the ferry or something like that? How many times last week did you hang with Olivia Chow? I think there was an event with a bunch of developers including people who do affordable housing, co-op housing and University of Toronto and they had me come in and ask some of the tougher questions of the mayor so I think that's probably what they're talking about because the mayor and I don't like go skipping out down the beach together or anything like that. No that's too cozy because you're a

journalist. Yeah. You can't get too cozy with these you know political figures that you need to cover objectively. I like that you've got friends of your program here I think that totally makes sense. I get a little agitated when people say we have friends of a program because... I'm not a journalist though. In my defense you are a journalist we're gonna cover some of that ground in a moment I am absolutely not a journalist. Okay, so I can have friends. What do you like to call yourself? Oh Good question. I am I am a mere of Shadow to basement dweller. I was gonna call myself a basement dwelling podcaster, but that might not

Might not cover it all but I'm definitely not a journalist. I mean, I don't hold myself to the same standards that I would hold. For example, FOTM David Ryder from the Toronto Star, for example. There's standards in journalism. CBC has a, I don't know what you call it, a code of ethics. Journalistic standards and practices.

No, sorry. Yeah, journalistic standards and practices. I need that echo effect for that one, David. But I have no such, mine is just be as honest as you can. And when you're unsure of something, don't be afraid to say you're unsure. Like don't act like, you know, something when you're guessing. So I have my own personal standards, but absolutely not at the same. Uh, it's a good rule for all of us. Yeah. Yeah. And a lot of people do that, right?

I produce shows for people who they aren't sure they think maybe this is the way, but they present it like they did, you know, hours of homework and research and have come to this conclusion. And it's like, no, they're just kind of guessing and they're presenting it like fact, not cool, not not super cool. No. Okay, so let's start the present day and then we'll roll back. By the way, David, do you drink beer? That's a loaded question right off the top. I have been known to drink beer. Okay, would you like the most delicious craft beer that this city has to offer? And what would you proclaim as said beer? Well, he asks with a table full of beer in front of him.

You don't have to do this on Metro Morning. I know all of these beers. I know all of these beers. So here's my deal. Like I can't sit I can't sit there and endorse a product that would be against the journalistic standards and practices. Like I feel like that's on the air. No, I still can't. Yeah. But having said that, I can say to you as a normal human being, I am familiar with all of these. The Lake Effect IPA that's there with you has long been in my fridge as has the Canuck Pale Ale. That is a personal favorite. So yes. So you're taking this home with you, David. You're bringing home this Great Legs beer. That can't fight. How many rules? So I, whenever I invite somebody

from the CBC and over the year, many people I'm thinking of Tom Harrington. I could go down the list. We'll talk in a moment about Matt Galloway who came over here. We could talk about, she's no longer at the CBC, but she was there forever. Diana Swain. Yeah. I mean, uh, Jill Deacon's been over here, uh, Dwight Drummond. I'll keep going. I'll keep going. It's a long list. It's a long list. Every time I get a chance to, uh, wear the shirt, this explains why they all smell like beer. Now the thing David is I always take note of the fact that there there's a process, right? Like you can't just go on Toronto mic, right? You have to, do you have to clear it with, uh, like a committee? What's going on there? You got to run it by a, by Justin

Trudeau. What's going on? Yeah. Oh yeah, definitely. Yeah. He and I get on the phone every day and say, what should I do? Let me take my orders from you. Justin, I'm going on a Toronto mic. No, that does not happen. Obviously. Um, we, we do run through a system. It's not really a committee, but, um, a system is even too big a word Like I say to a guy. Hey, I'm going to do this any problem No good

Good. Yeah, cuz you know when there's a problem, I need to know about it David, by the way We're live at live dot Toronto Mike calm so we're gonna get you to Metro morning and then we're gonna go backwards, but I do see that the Toronto Mike dot com. So we're going to get you to Metro Morning and then we're going to go backwards. But I do see that the wonderful FOTM, Jesse Hirsch, even though when he writes me love letters, he has chat GPT write these love letters to me. But that's between Jesse and I will work

that out on our own. But he says, I definitely want to hear more about the role of objectivity or more importantly, how it can still exist. So like, I mean, you kind of touched on it with the beer. Like you can't go on Metro Morning and say the greatest craft beer in this city is Great the beer, like you can't go on Metro Morning and say the greatest craft beer in this city is Great Lakes beer, even if you personally believe that to be true, like you can't, but you

could state it as in my humble opinion, like that's the preface you could use, right? Well, look, I can tell you about things that are in my own life. Absolutely. What we would never want to do is create a perception of a conflict of interest. I can't now go, you know, what if, like, I'm not going to use GLB, Great Lakes Breweries, for example, but what if you're talking about, you know, ABC beef company and you give me a side of beef and I'm like, oh, this is fantastic, delicious beef. And then ABC goes and, you know, poisons

a couple of people with bad beef or something like that. Well, how do I go and do an interview with ABC beef when there's a thing out there of me going, I hear you loud and clear, but if you don't accept any money from ABC beef, I believe you can still say that you enjoyed that beef as you ate it. Like you didn't lie. You liked that beef. And then if this issue, you can still adhere to these journalistic practices and hold their feet to the fire as a journalist. I can totally hear you saying that you see it that way, but remember there's a difference between conflict of interest and perception of conflict of interest. Right. And so perception matters in this business, right? Perception matters, particularly today. So you're talking about objectivity. Right. What do you want

to know about objectivity? Like so this is this a so this is, is this a code that you mentioned? You have to sign off on a document essentially that says while you're on CBC airwaves and representing the CBC, you, David Common, will adhere to these standards. Yeah, the journalist, the JSP as we call it, which is like our internal Bible, right? It's, um, and it's a constant topic of discussion. Um, there are different things that govern everything from when do we use hidden camera, under what conditions, how do we protect confidential sources,

how do we ensure that our journalism is fair. So there's a whole bunch of different topics in it. But objectivity is a funny one. And I talked to friends about it when I'm sitting around having a beer. Objectivity, some would argue, doesn't exist and can't exist because we're all products of our own upbringing, right? We all have our own.

Your product of your environment. Yeah, exactly. And so to that extent, we're all subjective characters to a degree. I try to subscribe to fairness as my buzzword, if I have one. And it's and it's trying to always, even if something to some people may seem completely crazy, like just try to understand it from another person's perspective and be fair to them.

So fairness is a really important thing. And I think particularly in the world in which we live today where it's so easy to not have a conversation with somebody you disagree with, to just sit there and demonize them. It's important to try to keep those conversations going. Because frankly, if we don't, where we're heading is bad. Okay, so let's, a lot of these, you know, themes you've just kind of alluded to, we're

going to touch on later in this conversation. But I really am curious about how you got the gig as host of Metro Morning. Did you know the previous host of Metro Morning was also from Winnipeg? Yes, I do. Is there a bias towards Winnipeg? Even though I just found out now that you actually were in Toronto for kindergarten. Yes, although I will say I did go back after kindergarten, so there were periods of back and forth, right? So yeah, I went to Jesse Ketchum Public School, Bay and Davenport.

Shout out to my downtown gang. It was a very different environment at that time. Charles Street down the road, it's where a lot of, you know, newcomers, refugees arrived in the city. And so that was my backyard in a sense of growing up. I had lived Bathurst and St. Clair, Vaughan and St. Clair area, everywhere from, you know, like Witchwood and Kenwood Road. So shouting out to those neighborhoods, which were so formative for me growing up. But you know, like, you know, like, Witchwood and Kenwood Road. So shouting out to those neighborhoods, which were so formative for me growing up. But, you know, like, you know, as we talk broadly, what was the question?

I've gone everywhere else. I've done the worst thing. Well, I'm trying to determine whether you're really from Winnipeg. If you're here in kindergarten, you can't remember. Well, the birth certificate says so. So the previous host here, so let me walk you through. Oh yeah, Ishmael, yeah. Yeah, Ishmael was the previous host here, so let me walk you through. Oh yeah, Ishmael, yeah.

Yeah, Ishmael was the previous host of Metro Morning. Now he's doing Fresh Air on weekends. So can you give us a little insight into how you got this gig? Is Metro Morning still, and I believe it might be so, you're gonna tell me now, is that the most listened to morning show in the city? Yes, it is.

Now, you will hear some others make similar claims. It's because the way in which the data goes, you can look at it in different ways. So I'll tell you this. We are on the air from 5 30 a.m. to 8 30 a.m. right in that time. We are the number one radio show and by a considerable margin like people 12 and above basically. Two and above. Two and above. Yeah. Never forget those toddlers. Yeah. They're the thing. They're key to the demographic. Come on. You got to groom the future generations to be CBC. Why we have so much Lego content. But I know what you mean. Like if you, you know, slice and dice the data points in the demographic detail, at some point everybody could be number one. We're number one, like women 18 to 24 who listen in their car, you know what I mean? Like, it's like, you can slice and dice demos

and spin it any way you want. But in terms of ears, there's more ears listening to Metro Morning on CBC Radio One than any other morning show in the city, as far as you know. It's not just that, as far as I know. I am extraordinarily confident. There is very rich data about this. You know, it's the only morning show I listen to, so you're preaching to the choir here. And I think you're very good as host of Metro Morning. I'm just curious. So did you want

the gig after Matt Galloway? And then, like, I'm curious, when did you, like, what's the trajectory? Yeah. Like, like if you can walk me through it, because you know, Matt was there a long time. Yep. And he, Barry was beloved and then Matt Galloway was beloved. And as great as his mainly, uh, alpha was, uh, never. I, my opinion now, my opinion, I think there was a, no, it was a bit of a misfit. Like I never felt like he fit in particularly with the journalistic side. I think he's much better on fresh air. I know he changed for his family purposes, etc. But that does open the door for you to take the seat. So can you walk us through the the nuts and bolts of how does David Common get that like prestigious role on Toronto Radio is probably the best

gig in the city when it comes to radio. Yeah, and I know you don't want to go back too far into the distance. But unfortunately, it sort of starts a while ago. So I worked outside of the country for a little less than a decade and when I came back into Canada, I was the host of World Report, which is the newscast that goes into Metro Morning and all the radio morning shows right across the country, top 10 minutes of the hour, every hour. Right. And that meant that I was in studio with then Matt as the host of Metro Morning for, you know, once or twice. And we would talk about the day's news. And so that was kind of my first

connection into the program. But I spent almost my entire career outside of a studio. I was, you know, I like to play outside. And so that was, well, that was what my job was when Matt left the program, I was a host of Marketplace, which is our consumer affairs investigative show, as well as a correspondent who would travel around this country and sometimes around the world doing you name it. And so, yeah, and that was kind of my thing.

But this opportunity came up. There was a discussion, you know, we have all, the CBC has like, because it is a bureaucracy, there's a process. And went through that process. And I'll tell you where I was. I was on a ship, a Canadian Navy ship in the South China Sea, about to transit the Taiwan Strait,

to be followed by the Chinese Navy at very close quarters, and the satellite phone rang. Wow. Wow. Hey David. What the hell are you doing there? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was just on vacation. David, what's up?

Yeah. So that's how it all went down. Wow. Okay. Is it like an audition process or do they, they literally, I guess you had already done so many weeks with my, with my work. And how's it going so far? Like, so, so how long have you been the, being the permanent host of Metro Morning? Okay, so we're talking here to close to the end of February, and it's been a little more than four months. So it's still

pretty early days. How's it going? I think it's going pretty well, you know. Again, if I go back to the data, I'm gonna sound very corporate here, but if I go back to the data, you know, the data is telling us that a bunch of the changes that we've made, and there's not a huge number of them, but a bunch of the changes that we've made are resonating with the audience. People are listening for longer. More people you know, more people are listening. So, so that's really encouraging to see. And, and we hear from people too, you know, anecdotal matters. Absolutely. So four months into this thing,

so are you used, what they, what time does your alarm go off in the morning? I'm sure that's the most frequently asked question. It is the most frequently asked question. Okay. So here's my deal. Um, we are on the air at 5.30 a.m. I wake up at 4.30 a.m. That's pretty good. I feel like that's good. Like you live next door to the studio?

Yeah, I wish I did. There was a time where I remember backfilling for, like filling in for Matt one time. And my alarm went off. My alarm did not go off. I basically just, you know, I didn't turn it on. And 417 a.m. I woke up, my wife woke me up and said, aren't you doing Metro Morning today?

And yeah, I got to the studio very quickly and at the very last second. But no, I wake up now 430 on the air an hour later. I do a bunch of work at night so that I can stay asleep longer. I argue that 430 a.m. Is the morning You know what you're on the border now like yeah I think you're good what time is night for you like are you shutting it down by 9 a.m. 9 p.m.

Yeah shutting things down around then yeah, so some nights It's later like there are nights where I go out with friends or got a thing going on And then it's more like 11 11 30 But you know when the leads are in the playoffs or whatever, right? You got to, you probably want to. That'll do it. That'll do it. Right.

Are you a sports fan? I know I, you know, I absolutely and you've hit the time when I get most into sports is when we hit playoffs. But I'm not, I didn't, it wasn't sort of a big part of my life growing up, but I see you've got, you got your Leafs paraphernalia here. You got my boy Wendell. He's all Clark. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely with the glare of some of the lights I can't see his face, but I see they get the captain see there on his jersey So yeah, that's back when when Doug Gilmore was the assistant. Sorry. I've always called it my whole life

I've been calling it assistant captain It's not assistant captain as Hebsi would tell me it's associate captain or something like that It's not assistant. Didn't you always think the a was assistant growing? I did think it was assistant It's not apparently I'm so associate. I think is the word the a or alternate You're one of those alternate cap one of those. No, that's got to be it. I think I'd be alternate I'm not associate. That's that's a whole different title, but not assistant and all my like I have a Gilmore Jersey a on it when Wendell was wearing the sea and I always call it's alternate and I've been corrected on the live stream by thank you Oakville Mike for seeing there's a lot of Mike out

there. Hey, Canada, Kev works for CBC. Okay, he says he says at one point they did try to add advertisements to CBC radio on like commercials with air and he says at one point they did try to add advertisements to CBC radio one like commercials with air and he says this is his words he says it was a disaster listener revolt and that was quickly undone yeah what I think that was on so there's two radio things this was on

radio to I think the commercials go we've never had commercials on radio one as far as you know I don't think so no okay but yeah I remember it did not go down well. Not well, no. Absolutely not. Now, you know, you've now touched on a few different things you did throughout your career before you got to Metro Morning. We now learned on a typical day, you're gonna shut it down at 9 o'clock, you're gonna wake up at 4.30. I actually think to be on the air at 5.30, waking up at 4.30 is pretty sweet. pretty sweet like you know I've heard stories from people who have to be on the air at like 530 and they're

getting up at like yeah they're getting a clock and for some people they have to do that now like I do have I work there's a studio director I work with who's great she wakes up much earlier than I do and she will wake me up if there's stuff that I can you name her dress Susan McGrenald's yeah shout out to Susan who yeah keeps keeps all who keeps the train on the tracks. And then some. Yeah, look, 4.30 a.m. is a tricky one, but I am one of those, and I'm lucky this way,

when my eyes open, I'm on. You're ready to go. Yeah, no coffee. Did you grab yourself a quick, no coffee? I don't drink coffee, no. Okay. Did you have yourself a quick shower? Is that? No. Anything you can do to save time in the morning. You use that to save time in the morning. Lay the clothes out at night, pack some food for the next morning. You do that all at night. So what

time are you entering the studio? Like I feel like I'm gonna sing some rush here and the walls of the... 5 to 5. So 5 to 5 you're you're in there okay and then you yeah it's all and again there are shows I will tell you there's an FOTM named Stu Jeffries you know Stu yeah okay yeah so I've Stu is the morning show host on boom 97.3 do a very good product at boom sure but it is really like literally he's boarding his own he's a oppie in his own board they say so he's working his own, he's a, apping his own board, is that how you say it? So he's working his own board. He's got no one else in the room with him.

He's the only guy in that room. There's no other human being in the studio. He's queuing everything up. He's literally doing everything. How many people are involved with Metro Morning on CBC Radio One? Approximately. There's me and then two others.

That's it. In the morning. I had envisioned like a team of like 17 people. Oh, that'd be great. Now there are people who come in a little later in the day to line things up. I mean one thing is we do have a we have a different kind of format, somewhat the unique format, and that requires it requires quite a bit of work just for guests and you know if you can have the deputy premier or somebody on you want to have some notes. Do your homework. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Who are we

talking to here today? Okay. Interesting comment again from Jesse Hirsch. I'll give him one more here, which is that he says, does Metro Morning still have a website? He says, it seems like the Metro Morning website redirects to the audio feed. Do you know anything about the Metro Morning website? This is, this rings a bell, but I'm afraid I don't know. I remember when we were talking earlier about don't try to claim things you don't know about? Yeah if you don't know just say that. Don't be afraid to say I'm not too sure about that one. Yeah I do and I do think that is essentially what the Metro Morning website is though it is an

audio feed. Yeah. Are you at all friendly I'm gonna be all over the place here David but I'm excited to have you here a big fan of the program as you know so are you at all friendly with Andy Berry? Like do you have any relationship with Andy Berry? No, I don't. Andy is still around, but I did not overlap with him in my career. And so no, I don't see him on the regular. There are a number of people, sort of the people who've been around a long time. Well, I'll bet you Matt Galloway still has a relationship. Matt does still touch base with Andy periodically, and that's how I hear about what's up with him.

Well, naturally I'm curious because before he signed off from CBC Radio One, he talked about his Parkinson's, and we're all curious how Andy's doing. We know his wife has sadly passed away. Yeah. How is Andy? I think there's a story I heard once where somebody referred to Andy Berry as a draft dodger and Andy very quickly corrected this individual and said a conscientious, it's different than

a conscientious objector, not a draft dodger. I didn't know that about him. Yeah he's an American who that's how we got, we got lots of great people. Shout out to Bill King, a lot of great people came up up here because they were conscientious objectors. The Americans got some good people from us too.

We can go back to John, we can go back further than John Candy. We can look at Jim Carrey. There's a ton of people, yeah. Listen, just when we canceled the Avro Arrow, okay, what a brain drain that was. We canceled it? When did that happen?

You gotta do some investigative reporting on that one revisit that Diefenbaker situation there and deep the chief. Okay, so speaking of okay speaking of marketplace, I want to play a little clip here as we just talk about your life before Metro morning again. You thank you for giving me four hours of your time David wink wink. Okay, here we go. This is just a little clip of David Common. Hi, is that Leonard? Yeah, Leonard. This is just a little clip of David Common. Hello?

Hi, is that Leonard? Yeah. Leonard, this is going to sound like a really weird call. My name is David Common. I'm calling from CBC News. We're doing an investigation into stolen vehicles, and I'm pretty sure I'm sitting in your once stolen vehicle in West Africa. No way. Yeah. Do you mind if I FaceTime you? I don't mind at all.

This look like your car? That's it. It was stolen September, October of last year. And what happened? About three in the morning, you see a car and two guys pull up towards the driveway. And about four minutes later, the light goes off. They're gone. The car is gone. All right, tell me about this.

I mean, I was reading into this, but you were in Ghana for that. In Ghana for that, yeah. So we went and did that at the end of last summer, early fall. And look, we knew that auto theft had been taking off, particularly in the GTHA, that it was groups primarily out of Montreal that were coming in, stealing vehicles. It's evolved a little bit since then, huge. 1.2 billion dollars in cars stolen last year and this is feeding a lot of crime in this city. So we knew

that a lot of them were being exported and we also knew that we as journalists could do something the cops could not. That is go to the other countries and actually find them. There are a number of countries that would be, you know, not that we don't go to unsafe places, we certainly do and have, but Ghana is a country that is easier to operate in. We knew that stolen vehicles were ending up there and we knew that there was sort of a law enforcement agency that might play ball with us if we were to show up. And so we did show up and that's, we did it on relatively a shoestring budget,

considering an international assignment, went there and that was the morning after we landed. I mean, I think that's, that's hour eight in Ghana or something like that. And we found there 40 cars and you just start running the VINs on them. And it's, you know, stolen from North York, stolen from Ottawa, stolen from Toronto,

stolen from Etobicoke, click, click, click, click, click, click, and some of them still had license plates, almost all of them still had the registration documents, some had lease documents, the last time I got my oil changed, here's the name, and so Len, who you heard there, who we woke up at seven in the morning, before I FaceTimed him, he had to put a shirt on, that's a little inside knowledge for ya.

Could you create cheese on his abs? Nothin' against Len. No comment. FaceTime to me had to put a shirt on that's a little inside knowledge for you. Could you create cheese on his app? Nothing against land yeah, no, I'd be probably you know he looked like a trim guy, but that might be a little too much yeah, so Yeah, I was it was really quite something It really quite something seeing where all of these vehicles end up and how quickly just understanding the other end of that equation And again for what program was that for marketplace? It actually wasn't although it sounds like a marketplace story it was it was for the national. I hadn't done stories on auto theft for

marketplace before showing just how easy it is to like hijack a vehicle you know using these relay attacks or the can bus attacks the various ways in which thieves today are stealing these vehicles. Have you ever had a car stolen? I've never have no my neighbor did yeah and relatively recently yeah. This is why uh pardon my French you can't say this maybe maybe you can say it on cbc radio one in 2024 but I always drove shit boxes and nobody ever wants to steal them. I'm I drove here today in a 15 year old Toyota and it runs fine. Yeah, I had my 99 Mazda protege until 2020, June 2020, and I still ran fine. I only got rid of it. I just didn't need it.

Didn't want to. Now what you're not saying is there were horses pulling it for the last five years, right? Shout out to whatever Kidney Foundation benefited from that donation there. You get a tax receipt, which is cool. So you've done, you know, I, I looked it up. You have been dispatched. That's the fancy word. When they send you somewhere to 85 countries, you've been to every province and territory in this fine country. It's great to do that.

That's like the joy that being throughout this country is amazing. Okay, now I rank all the prophets. Yeah. In honor of your favorite, Thales' favorite. You know what, if you were to, in all seriousness, if I were to do that, I would probably pick a territory and I would go with Nunavut. And, you know, I haven't traveled extensively around Nunavut, but I have had the privilege of going to Akaluwet and a couple of the other communities. And it is utterly amazing there. For so many reasons, I've been out on the land, you know, you go out onto the frozen tundra, you go out onto the frozen Arctic Ocean with any of the Inuit who are hunting

or just traversing the land. And it is you look out and you think you see nothing and they'll tell you how you're missing everything. Right. And that is, you know, to do that in our own country that is absolutely wild. Of course we have all sorts of other beautiful things. You know, you can go down to Shubhanacany, you can go to Shediak, you can go all over the place in Atlantic Canada. But aren't you gonna be bored as host of Metro Morning when you have to sit in Toronto all the time? It is a different beast. Like it sounds boring to me.

I feel like you want to be out there. I'm going to ask you in a moment about being in a submarine submerged near the Korean Peninsula. Yeah, it didn't go well. Like that's the actual... Yes, I want to hear that story. But you know, Ukraine, Afghanistan, Iraq, like these are the places, Somalia, you're confronting pirates off Somalia. Like you're going to be so bored as host of Metro Morning.

Okay, you say that, but look, I don't know how your brain works. I'm bored on your behalf. I'll tell you how my brain works. I need new challenges. That's how I'm built. And this is a challenge. We're trying to do something with this program, and I'm not the only one who's involved in it, but I play a big part.

And so we're trying to do a thing and just the idea of having a new challenge, that is what excites me. Sure, but it is a well-oiled machine that you're, you know, you're not building anything from scratch here. This thing is a well-oiled machine. What do you know about building something from scratch? I built this from scratch. I think, and I hope I'm wrong, but I think that you are, you're very, you're very good as host of Metro Morning. I think at some point you you're gonna get this itch and it's like Why am I not on an icebreaker in the Arctic right now looking for the Franklin expedition? I don't know. I mean and I look I have done all of these things and

There is a there's absolutely a joy and an amazement and an adrenaline rush off of all of these things But I I'm not kidding you when I say we look for different chapters. Like I've had different chapters. I've gone through different chapters and new challenges in my life and I need them. And this just absolutely made sense in this moment. And you know, is it going to be my last job in this business? Maybe not. I don't know. I'm four months into it.

It'd be hard to kind of guess where I'm gonna be five or 10 years from now. No, I totally get what you're saying about this is a new challenge. So you've done these exciting things. Let's, again, you're hosting the most listened to radio broadcast morning show in this city. So this is challenges go,

this is sort of like when Strombo took the Hockey Night in Canada hosting gig, you know He told me yeah, that's the gig there's nothing bigger in this country than hosting hockey night in Canada if you want to be like a Sports host etc. So you're now in the in the big chair at Metro morning But can you go back and maybe some greatest hits here? Like tell me a little bit about that comment you made about being submerged in that submarine near the Korean peninsula. Let's hit some of these hot spots here before I find out what the hell you were doing interviewing Elmo. Do you know Elmo? It's

like when I interviewed Ed the sock, like it's a, you know, I'd be amazing interviewing Ed the sock. I interviewed, you know, he'll do it with you tomorrow. If you're like, should I have him call into Metro? Yeah. Um, Elmo was, I, I, I, I did the original Elmo. It's not Kevin Clash. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, he's a very famous little controversy. There's a little controversy there, of course, but Kevin Clash was the original. Yeah, and so I interviewed him and I had no idea who he was or what he looked like when I first interviewed him, but it was for the 25th 40th 40th anniversary of Sesame Street I'd have to go back and probably a late 60s thing so I would say it's probably 50 maybe it was only here's that only knows I'm turning 50 and Sesame Street's older than me so I'm guessing Sesame Street happy

soon-to-be birthday first of all well I'll get back to that because I'm gonna invite you to my party all right okay so happy soon-to-be birthday and we'll look ahead to the party so the submarine, look, Canada did not have submarines for a period of time in its military, and the federal government at the time decided to buy some used submarines that the Brits weren't using anymore. Problem is they weren't so great.

And so one of those- And they smell like cigarettes. Yeah, well, one of them, and quite tragically, caught on fire when it was coming back to Canada and a Canadian sailor died in that another one was was quite badly injured because fire on it on any kind of ship is or boat is very very serious particularly one that is submerged. Yeah. It came back to Canada. You can't open a window. All sorts of repairs being done to it and they spent a lot of money and they ended up sending this one Sub who called HMCS, Shakutami down to the Asia Pacific region to help

part of a multinational effort with a bunch of Canada's friends Watch what's happening in an area that China is getting more powerful and also the North Koreans are You know patrolling with their own kinds of submarines and just trying it's an amazing number of things that happen under the water that are sort of unseen to all of us and so I went with them with that sub and there are things on it that we I can't talk to you about but like is that because you sign and we an NDA of sorts you could yeah you could say that kind of thing that we don't want we don't want people who are our you are adversaries of Canada

to know about the things that our subs can and cannot do, for instance. So there are, mostly I just was never exposed to those things. They'd hide them from me, right? But there are a couple of things that we couldn't tell you where the sub was at any one point in time, for obvious reasons. The challenge with it was the air conditioning broke. And it got real hot, real fast. Now, they gave me the best place on the submarine that you could sleep outside of the captain's bunk, which was right next to the torpedoes.

Whatever it is they put in the torpedoes makes them naturally cool. And you can basically, and not to go over the top here, but you can straddle a torpedo and that's how you cool your body down because, well, the coolness from whatever fuels a torpedo. Dr. Strange loves that. Something going on there. I don't know what it is, but it was a comfortable place to try to sleep when I was on there in the air conditioning. Well, what temps are we talking about? I'm curious. Only because I took my daughter swimming at a

pool in South Etobicoke called Gus Rider. Oh, yeah. Okay. So I'm sitting there. I had to disrobe. Okay. I might not be able to. Gus Rider is known as a hot pool in the city. I felt ill. Okay. I admittedly, I had to, after I had to like literally, I was as naked as you can get without being arrested in that place. It is, it felt to me like it was 45 degrees sitting to watch your kids swim in that pool. What kind of temps are we talking about in this? So on the sub, I think we were, you know, 30, 35 somewhere in there. It's been a few years, so I've forgotten. But look, that's sustained.

The thing is with you in the pool, you could leave the pool. And Gus Rider is, it is known as a hot pool in this city It runs hot and all else has it's wild. It's wild how hot it is there But you know I can't leave the pool because the seven-year-old likes every five minutes looks looks up to see if I'm watching her swim And then yeah, you're trying to maintain I can't just go outside. Okay, so cup greatest hits here But I do so a sauna in that pool, you know, at Gus Ryder. I pull I you know, they have a dry sauna in there. So maybe it's just

run it but Gus Ryder. I've yeah, yeah, I've been to Gus Ryder. I was just there. In fact, the other day, but yeah, and they have a gym there as well. They have a little what now, you know, you don't think it too specific, but what neighborhood do you call home these days? I live in the south end of Etobicoke. So, you know, I didn't know that. Yeah, we're all in the same zone. So when we're finished recording, I'm going to corner you and find out where you are, David. You don't have to give me the address because you don't want some guy in this flammable shirt. Oh, I tell anybody else on the street where I live, but not you.

You don't want me hanging out with my what's going on because of your like butterfly wing collar shirt that you've got there. You know, your insurance company finds out I'm hanging around with my, what's going on with David Common. Because of your like butterfly wing collar shirt that you've got there. Yeah. It's, it's, it's, you know, your insurance company finds out I'm hanging around with this shirt on, they're not going to insure you for fire. Yeah, that's fair. It's dangerous. Okay. So that's, so that's fascinating that you were in that submarine, uh, near

the Korean peninsula, but what is the story, you were on the icebreaker in the Arctic searching for the ill-fated Franklin expedition. Yes. What was that like? That is amazing. And again, for the same sort of reasons that you're going through these waters that are you know the Northwest Passage you hear people talk about it. Only Stan Rogers. That's right okay you hear singers sing about it and you hear people talk about it. It is strategically really important for Canada. These are Canadian waters and ships that couldn't pass through this area are soon gonna be able to pass through

That area year round that there's all sorts of things environmental climate change military strategic that flow through that There's also just a lot of history So you're going past places that the the Anukshuk or Anukshuk looking things are left But they're two or three or four hundred years old because the Inuit used them as like directional finders and they're just left there. So that's just kind of wild, but looking for, I was not on the vessel that ended up finding it. I wasn't like that happened a couple of years later,

unfortunately, but it's pretty wild. They're using side scanning sonar and they tow it behind, you know, a fast boat essentially looking at the surface of just what's down there. It's all pretty shallow too, so it's wild. I did talk to the underwater archeology folks from Parks Canada who did find it, and some of them, this has been their career,

that it's what they've done. And so they were going by and it was the last pass of the day and they, bloop! Something comes up and they looked at the profile of it and they knew before they dove they knew right away this is it. That would be you know that's the joy of being with people who are having these amazing moments and being side by side with them as they're experiencing this. Amazing. Okay now because I'm digging these stories here. I know we agreed on an hour.

I might steal a few more minutes. You can always storm out. But then the headline I'm going to write is David. Listen, is David's common storms out of his Toronto Mike debut. You were watching the our Navy, Canada's Navy, confront pirates off of Somalia. I need a little bit of that one, that's wild. So there's a you know there's a bit of this that's still going on today. We're seeing a lot more of the Houthi rebels who are shooting

missiles at ships and that is an ongoing issue as we talk to each other. But the high seas are you know the next thing you order on Amazon it's on a ship right now and so it's on a ship right now. And so what happens on the seas is really, really important. Even if we don't see it, and we don't think it's part of our lives, it's really part of our lives. So what's happening then with piracy is,

Somalia, very poor country, particularly at the time that I was there, there was an awful lot of conflict, which meant an awful lot of guns, and not a lot of opportunity, and gangs gangs that were running and looking for ways to make money. And one way they were making money was hijacking ships, these cargo ships that were going through and they would, you know, often attack it at night and they basically get a speedboat that matches the speed of one of these big giant cargo vessels and run up a ladder to

try to go inside and get and take the ship, take them hostage, take the ship hostage and negotiate millions of dollars to to get the ship back. And so the navies of the western world got together and said this is this is screwing up our economies we can't have this and so they sent us down there and you know a lot of it is flying the ship's helicopter and that just causes the attack to break, right? Like the moment they see a helicopter that's got a gun on it, the pirates run away. And the Canadians at that point couldn't, you know, the attack was no longer happening.

And so they're not going to start shooting at somebody. Well, I'm just excited to hear our Navy has guns. Like, this is exciting to me. Yeah, and this was, if I remember correctly, it was, first of all, I remember it was an old Sea King helicopter since retired, but this was the first time since the Korean War that a Canadian naval vessel, and the helicopters consider part of it, had fired shots in anger to try to break an attack. And so that was quite something.

I'll tell you another thing, which I tell this story periodically. And this, you know, the beauty of this job for me has been the people that you meet. And it's never, you know, you meet presidents and prime ministers. And that's interesting being in the same room as those people, but it's always about normal folks,

frankly, who are doing extraordinary things, or doing them in extraordinary places. And so I remember there was this one sailor driving this thing called a RIB, rigid hold inflatable boat, and it's their fast boat, they're kind of like a little attack boat. And the ship had seen on their very long range radar, they had seen the signature of a vessel that looked like a pirate mothership. So this is a place to keep guns and ladders and all that stuff. And they thought that could be what this is. So they fire up the gas turbine engines, go flying towards this

thing, very high speed, get up to it and launch this rib, this small, fast attack boat with a boarding party. And the captain of the ship says, get on with them. I'm like, absolutely. You don't have to ask me twice. I go ripping out and we go up to this, you know, this mothership and the shape of it is called a Dow, D-H-O-W. We go up to it and it becomes clear right away. This is not a pirate ship. Oh, it's migrants trying to make a better life. But here is where things get fascinating and

potentially terrifying because there is maybe 80 or 90 guys on top of this ship and they're day four days into their voyage. One guy who speaks English we have a back and forth and it's tense in the beginning you know their guns are out and things like that and they just want to make sense of what's happening. And at the end of the conversation, you know, these guys have to continue with a little putt-putt motor essentially to wherever they're trying to get to all to get a better life. And one guy, the one guy who speaks English says, Hey, do you have any water? Well, they had a box of water in this rib that we were in.

And so the guy who's in charge pulls one bottle out. Well you think about it, 80 or 90 people all of whom are thirsty what happens? They all lean to one side and what's gonna happen to that boat? It is about to tip over and it is it's going down in milliseconds. Everything slows down in my mind at this point. It's starting to tip and this kid who's driving this little Canadian Navy boat, 19 maybe 20, he has the wherewithal to fire the throttle on his boat and rams the other boat just enough that he stops it from tipping. Now here's where things get all the more terrifying in terms of what it could have been.

He probably saved the lives of those 90 guys who were up top. What we didn't know is there were 140 women and kids below deck. And they would have been done for. If he hadn't had the wherewithal, the training, the smarts, the reaction to do what he did and just enough. He hit the sweet spot and saved 200 plus lives. David, listen to yourself.

What a story. You were there because, you know, CBC dispatched one of their finest journalists to be there and you're going to be so freaking bored at Metro Morning. I don't know about that because I'm not bored yet. So well, four months in any, you know, I'm just warning you that it's, uh, you know, you're gonna be like, Oh, at some point I was like, okay, so, and again, I'm happy for you and it's quite the, uh, quite the great, uh, great gig you got there, but I now need to just quickly get your origin story because, uh, I know you went

to school here, but then I see that you went in Stockholm. You studied international security issues at a university, I guess it's called Stockholm University in Sweden. So maybe, can you give me an understanding of like, when did you realize you wanted to be a journalist? And then what's your first gig in news media in this country? Okay. Do you know where Jarvis Collegiate is? Of course I do. My son's name is actually Jarvis. Really? Okay. I love it.

It's a fun fact, but I know Jarvis Coll Jarvis. I got a neighbor who teaches there actually. Oh, okay. Fantastic. Okay. So I went to Jarvis for high school and the air ambulance used to land on our football field because Wellesley Hospital was across the street at the time. They had the burn unit and I would interact with them, with the air ambulance folks. And so it was like, you know what, I could become a flight nurse. That was my thinking out of high school. And then we had really good speakers who would come to Jarvis and you know, had different

people come, premiers and prime ministers and business leaders and what have you. And they'd just tell us about their lives. And this guy came, broadcaster, and told us about what his life was. And it was end of grade 13, that's my vintage. And... Well, we called it OAC though. Oh wait, yes. So, you know, okay.

So I mean, I know it's funny because my mom went to grade 13. Oh, we call it OAC. But it's still a fifth year of mine. Still, yeah, it's the extra year of high school. So I, this broadcaster came and it was like a light bulb moment. Who was this broadcaster?

I don't know if you know him. Peter Mansbridge. Didn't he support that one airports and he would? Churchill, that's you got it right. Well, he's an FOTM too. And his wife was actually in the basement last month. Cynthia Dale, yeah, who went to my high school. Sorry, was she was trapped in your basement or was she actually on the chain up around the corner?

Don't tell anyone. Peter will hurt you. Yeah. So yeah, Peter will hurt you. Yeah. So yeah, Peter came and he ended up writing me a letter of reference. Wow, Peter Mansbring.

And so then I ended up going, you know, there were a whole bunch of layoffs in journalism at the time. And I thought maybe is journalism the thing that I should go and do in school? And I didn't. I ended up going to York and Seneca at the same time. Lots of

these programs exist where you can do... Concurrently? Yeah, yeah. Lots of them exist now but it was the only one at the time so I did yeah so I did them both. It was designed, the program was designed to be like that. You did it concurrent and then in my third year, you're talking about Stockholm, I really, you know, we didn't grow up with a ton of money. I hadn't traveled really at all and had the opportunity to, on kind of the cheap because of the way the program was set up, to do an exchange.

And so went off to Stockholm and it was absolutely amazing. And so you ask where I got my start from Stockholm, I cold called CBC's London Bureau in the UK and said can I come and work for you for free? And they didn't even have an internship at that point, but they liked free. The price was right. Yeah, and so I went there and ended up working there for a few minutes. And at a certain point they had little odd jobs and things like that and they paid me a bit here and there which kept me, you know, kept me basically living in the room I was living in and that continued. Came back here for finish off school and then from there it became a closed captioner at CBC, something I'm terrible at because I type with two fingers and so...

Hunting Peck. Exactly, the Hard of Hearing were very poorly served and somebody leaned over in the newsroom, it was a way in to the newsroom, someone leaned over and said, you're quite awful at that, why are you here? I'm like, it's a way in to the newsroom. Someone leaned over and said, you're quite awful at that. Why are you here? And I'm like, it's a way in. And that just sort of connected me with a thing, which connected me with a thing, which, you know, it worked. Okay, but Dave, here's the big question I have.

When I think of David Common, I think CBC lifer. That's why I'm wearing this flammable shirt right now from 1976. But then when I'm looking into your life and times, I understand you did work for CTV News. I did. Yeah, I did.

So just give me that, because people think you're just like, oh, you're at CBC forever, but no. No, it was not a long time and it was very early in my career, but you know, you can tell anybody who's in journalism right now, you sort of cobble together a bunch of different things and sometimes it means you're working at two different places at once. And there was a bit of that. I was working at both CBC and CTV at one point in time and I was working at CTV solo, but it was in it was in the early days the Yonge Street Bureau right in the Eden Centre.

CTV had an operation there at that point. Wow, okay, you're kind of fascinating. You might have to come back at some point for a sequel. But now let me, I have a hidden agenda here, but when you were working at... Finally we get to the hidden agenda. Well, it's not a bad thing, but you'll see what I mean when I get there, except you, as you know, you mentioned Marketplace. So how long did you spend working at Marketplace? Eight seasons. Eight seasons. Look at you. Okay. And one of the many, many, you know,

subjects that you tackled at Marketplace was the questionable sales practices in Canada's funeral homes. Oh yes. Can you put it put a skimmy it you know obviously maybe we can hunt this down and on a jam or YouTube or something but give me a nut in a nutshell what is that like are people just gouging where did you find that some funeral homes were gouging people. So you are testing my memory about here because there's been a lot of stories in between but and let me try to see if I can get all the details right. So some of it was around pressure tactics at a time that people were most vulnerable. Absolutely. And so trying to upsell you into the better casket or telling you that this wasn't appropriate, even though it's totally

legal. You really are at your most vulnerable when you're in that room. Who are you to tell me what's appropriate? Not. So some of it was that and some of it was looking at the way in which people at some funeral homes, this is certainly not all, but at some funeral homes were incentivized. The notion that people would be paid on commission is hardly unheard of in most businesses.

But it is kind of gross in funeral services. I think it's gross. We can debate that, but yes. Someone at their most vulnerable is sitting there. It might be a dad died of a heart attack yesterday or something, and you're at your most vulnerable. And you have somebody with you who's inccented to sell you the premium casket and the yeah and forget those sandwiches that the old ladies make okay You guys need a steak free But my point is you're incented to raise that bill as high as you can

Want to have you shouldn't be forced to have one or pushed into one that you don't right? You're awfully vulnerable in that moment So again, I mentioned hidden agenda and it is simply well I want to give you a gift right now, which is a measuring tape from Ridley Funeral Home pillars of this community And I'm here to say I've spent so much time with Brad Jones at Ridley Funeral Home and none of those questionable sales Practices happen. I'm that fine. I am pretty sure Ridley emailed me in the aftermath Brad Jones story to talk about it and to talk about how there, you know, there certainly were a number of funeral directors who wrote and said look there

are some of the bigger companies and some funeral directors aren't great players in this, right? There are, you know, a lot of these... What exactly do they measure? What would you like to measure with that Mr. Connelly? I will not answer that. We're not on CBC, don't forget.

Okay, so Brad Jones, Ridley Funeral Home, again, that's an independent family running. He owns the place, his family lives on the premises, and there's not many of those left actually. Who's Ridley then? The guy they bought it from, so Arthur Ridley sold it to Brad Jones, who's a hamper. You really know it? Well, only because I produced their podcast, and I know Brad very, very well. So shout out to Ridley Funeral Home. Do you like Italian food, David?

I've been known to like it, yes. You've got a reputation. By the way, you have kids, right? Because Judy wrote in and said, what's the ratio of your kids laughing at your dad jokes versus rolling their eyes? Oh, the rolling of the eyes is way higher there because it is just, I'm in the volume business, right?

Like I just put them out there and at one point one's gonna stick. So if it takes 1200 dad jokes to get there and then one goes- Yeah, it's a numbers game. Then you leave, right? So these kids are rolling eyes age, like what a- My kids' eyes are no longer in their heads.

They've just rolled right out. We haven't seen them in ages, yeah. So what kind of ages are we talking about here for the kids? I have, I don't talk about my kids a lot only because I think you know I want them to kind of have their own lives but I have as we speak I now have a 19 year old. So I have a 19 year old. You know I have a 19 year old. Do you? Yeah I have a 19 year old and a 15 year old. I had, how old were you? I'm not gonna get you to out yourself. Cause I was, I was 28 when my first kid was born.

27. 27. Because I have a 22 year old. Yeah. And what was it that, because you know, having a kid at 27 is hardly unheard of, but among your peers is that, cause I was on the younger edge of my peers. Okay. So I actually can speak,

I'll come on Metro Morning tomorrow and give you more detail, but I have two sets of children, two wives. Okay. Not the first person in the city who's like that. Right. Shout out to Ralph Ben-Murgy. Okay. Who hit his head and you didn't and I'm proud of you. And after we're finished, don't jump up and hit your head. Okay. But I have lived both experiences. I absolutely, every time I did stuff, my now 19 and 22 year old, uh, my 19 year old lives in Montreal. She's going to McGill actually. So when I, and my 20 year old is at York and She's going to McGill actually. When I, and my 22 year old is at York and I'm very proud of him too. So with that set of children, I was the young dad. Like I was always the young dad. And I also now have a seven year old

and a nine year old. I walked in the school this morning. And when I'm in that crowd, I'm the old dad. Like I literally played both hands. I'm a young dad with one set because there's a ten-year gap between these second and third kid. So I got the four kids but yeah for one couplet there I'm the young dad and for the other couplet I'm the old dad. So you're a young dad. I'm a young dad among some. I don't know like I had a trigger point. I went off on an assignment at a certain point and it was, without getting into too much detail, it went bad.

Like it was- Now I want all those details. It was in Haiti. It was in Haiti and- Oh, after the earthquake. No, this was before the earthquake. There was a coup underway at the time. And it was a very difficult assignment.

There, you know, I almost got killed. Wow. Yeah. And you know- That is a bad assignment killed. Wow. Yeah. And, you know. That is a bad assignment. Yeah, it is a bad assignment. Shut up, you really feel at home. Okay, I will give you, that is, yes, that is well done. I have nothing more to add.

And it was just like a priorities changer. But this is tying to you being a young dad? I feel like that's what you're talking about. Yeah, it was because I came back and I'm like, buy a house, get a dog, have kids. That's why you're the host of Metro Morning. Now we just thank you. It's like therapy. Okay. I'm going to send you an invoice at the end of this and this stable, dependable every day at the same time. It's a short commute and all this you have now as host of Metro Morning is to keep you alive. Maybe.

I'm telling you, you've done some dangerous stuff. Okay. You Metro Morning is to keep you alive. Maybe I'm telling you, you've done some dangerous stuff. Okay, you don't want to you're on you're on your hugging. I don't know what the missiles. What are you hugging there for to stay cool in some torpedo right? Damn the torpedoes. David Shetta. That's a great line. Tom Petty gave me that line the late great. Okay, so again, I am sensitive to your valuable time. You've been wonderful and it's been great meeting you. I just have a couple of, so I wanna say,

the reason I brought up, the reason I brought up the Italian food, you're like, why the hell you ask me about my kids? So yes, these kids, you, your whole family is going to be full of delicious Italian food and you'll probably still have some leftovers because you're leaving here with a large lasagna. It's in my freezer right now It literally arrived from palma pasta about 20 minutes before you arrived

PalmaPasta.com is where you go is delicious authentic Italian food and they were happy to feed the common family Look at that. It's very kind of you. You know, CBC doesn't give this kind of swag. That's that's for sure No, we have no lasagnas being given out. That is true. No beer. Okay. And then quickly, if people are looking for best practices and advice as they invest or have somebody invest their money, please subscribe and listen to the Advantage to Investor podcast from Raymond James Canada.

It's hosted by FOTM Chris Cooksey, whose son scored a hell of a goal the other day. I would just recommend that highly. And also, David, if you have a drawer at home full of old cables or maybe old phones, old electronics, yeah, go to recyclemyelectronics.ca, put in your postal code and find out a place near you. You can drop that off. It will be properly recycled

so the chemicals do not end up in our landfill. That's good to hear. What's the morale like at CBC these days? Yeah, you know, it goes up and down as it is with any journalist organization in this country. CTV has just gone through a whole shwack of layoffs and that's where I'm going with this as you know.

So CBC coworker. CBC's got some difficult times as well. Okay. CBC coworker. Writes in during the live stream, actually, did the feds tell Tate to cut 3% or not? Should she and the other executives be taking bonuses? And that's a heavy question for you mr Common because you enjoy your job, and you don't want to upset anybody I could not tell you what the feds you know

Shockingly they didn't invite me to the meeting you weren't an embedded journalist Yeah, like when Jay Leno was in the closet listening to them Who's gonna replace Johnny very often people who work at CBC are just as surprised as anybody else about what happens in the corporate corridors at CBC. In fact, most of the time I think would be the case. What was the second part of that question? Should these executives, and this is I feel like,

actually I now feel bad for my guest here because I'm giving you a question you can't win on this one but should she and the other executives be taking bonuses considering they're cutting the is it 10% of the workforce I can't remember 250 it's 10% it would be 10% of the jobs which doesn't you know you can you can eliminate jobs without eliminating workforce in other words like early bio yeah exactly and you when people retire and you don't right but look to the heart of the question to the bonuses because you're trying to murder me here well you can always say you know tap out here I'm not here to make any guests feel uncomfortable I look I would just say if I look at my friends who work in the I don't know the answer to this because I'm not a I'm not a manager and I don't get bonuses in that, I'm not part of that structure. But I don't know what they are contractually obligated to do. So if I think about, you know, if you think about the corporate world that

where bonuses are there to incentivize specific kind of performance, I don't know how they're written for our managers, and can they get out of them? I don't know if they can, and if they can't, then they should say that. And if you're trying to incentivize a certain kind of performance, just because it's a big bureaucracy,

we should be more mindful of the taxpayers' money. We absolutely should. But what it does with the bonuses, I'm not giving you, we're super satisfying. I have more questions. I feel like does with the bonuses, I'm not giving you a super satisfying answer. I have more questions. I have more questions. I feel like laying off the hook here. I feel like I should move you away from the CBC, where you

actually are gainfully employed. And maybe just reference the fact that as we speak in February 2024, we're just coming off massive Bell layoffs, which affected many at Bell Media, like many good journalists who worked for CTV news were tapped on the shoulder. Everybody at W five. Yeah, right. Almost everybody. Almost three people left, I think. And radio people. There's some people that, you know, chum 104.5 chum and 45 stations

were sold. Yeah. Does a great episode of John Paul people should listen to who bought four of these stations and we talk about, you know, what- That's a really interesting story. Yeah. Yeah. Like, so Bell calls it, what was the term that that guy, the lawyer, the guy said, basically suggested that there's no future in radio. It's like a, and meanwhile they sold 45 to people like FOTM John Paul and you should

hear that conversation. But, but yeah, it's a tough time for your industry is what I'm saying. It's not just CBC, but CTV and beyond. It is a tough time for your industry. And do you have any concerns? It sounds like you've been embedded and dispatched to all these countries

in very, sometimes very dangerous situations, but it's important to have that embedded journalist you could report back to us via CBC News or whatnot. And it feels like that is an it's endangered and I wonder what that does to democracy. I wonder if that's not good for anybody. I just wonder how you feel as a journalist. Yeah, look I think you're running across the full spectrum of things. I think about the young people that I work with and you know what what a future career looks like for them. So I think about a lot of the really good work that I see happening around me and

I do think about you know some of the forces that we see it play around the world. The point the point is we we actually need people who are engaged in their world and you know what's going on and if you don't have a free press, a strong free press, you got a problem. We'll just ask Russia about that. Absolutely 100% here. So we'll leave it a light note here. I'm ready to play some Lois de la Lo which is one of my favorite Toronto bands. That is a very good band, yeah. Love that band. I'm curious what kind of jams does a David Common listen to? I'm gonna listen do you ever, I'm going to listen to some music

while I work out or go for a walk. I don't know if you have a dog or whatever, but like, like what are you listening to? Oh, I only listen to Toronto Bikes. Why would I listen to music? See, I don't believe you. I thought you were an honest man, David. Come on. Now I'm losing your integrity.

I'm a smart man is what I am. You're losing your, you're getting a little bit on you regardless. Look, lowest to the low is absolutely a thing that I will, that I listen to. Shakespeare, My Butt? Yes! My, yeah. Okay, 1991. Do it.

Well, it's coming. This is on Shakespeare My Butt. You know, do you tune into any Nirvana or Pearl Jam? Are you a grunge guy? Do you prefer the hip hop? You Frank Sinatra? You're like Steve Paikin. You want to hear more Sinatra in your diet?

Like what? Does Paikin really listen to Sinatra? I've done a whole episode of Paikin in which he basically only hear more Sinatra in your diet? Like, does Paken really listen to Sinatra? I've done a whole episode of Paken in which he basically only listened to Sinatra, I think. So no Sinatra has not, I can tell you things that are not on my playlist and that would be one of them. Um, lowest to the low is definitely there. You know, if we're talking about the same sort of vintage weaker than broken social scene,

I hate Winnipeg. Yes. That's like your theme song. That is my, yeah, exactly. Broken social scene. Okay. So you like, you love that like early 2000s kind of thing. Yeah, they do. And don't, don't get me wrong. Like I will, I'm not only listening to CBC. I put on my Q107 and pull up a lot of stuff and got my, my edge on. Put on your deaf leopard. Yeah. I can see that your guns and guns and fucking roses, David. Is that what I hear? That's what you're saying.

That's what you're saying. All right. Seriously, thanks. I didn't know it was such a short commute for you. For some reason, I had you coming from the beaches or something like that, but amazing. I'm going to find out later where you live and I'm going to hide in those bushes. Is that okay? Yeah, by all means.

I will be sure to light them on fire. No, in all seriousness, love the convo. I feel like there's, at some point, I got to get you back for a second. Now that CBC's already blessed your appearance, although they haven't heard this yet, you can come back at some point and tell me more stories from this,

like just stuff you've reported on over the years. You could probably do a whole hour telling me these stories. It's fascinating. So thanks for your time today and for dropping by, man. Thank you. I hope I still get my bonus. Like the lasagna or the CBC. Do they give you fresh craft beer over there? Thank you, Great Lakes. And that brings us to the end of our 1437th show. You can follow me on Twitter

and Blue Sky. I'm at Toronto Mike. David's on the app formerly known as Twitter. He's at David Common. You can follow him there. I'm going to tag him on this when I drop it in about 10 minutes. Much love to all who made this possible. That's Great Lakes Brewery. We just dropped... Ah, it's dropping tomorrow morning. Episode two of Between Two Fermentmentors that drops tomorrow morning. Much love to Palma Pasta who got the lasagna here in time for David to bring home. Recyclemyelectronics.ca, Raymond James Canada and of course Ridley Funeral Home at 14th and Lakeshore. See you all tomorrow where speaking of CTV news Scott Laurie was at CTV news and he he wants to talk about something it's very very interesting story he's no longer at CTV

news we're gonna discuss this is gonna be a lot of real talk tomorrow morning Scott Laurie makes his debut see you all then Yes I do, I know it's true, yeah I know it's true, how much, yeah All them pickin' up trash and them puttin' down rogues And their broker in stocks, the class struggle explodes And I'll play this guitar just the best that I can