From Dothraki in Game of Thrones to Chakobsa in Dune, Language Creators (Conlangers) David J. Peterson and Jessie Peterson have created dozens of new languages for many of your favorite movies and TV shows. We talk what goes into creating a new language, anthropomorphic beavers and plot secrets hidden in languages. Then, we unveil a new Candle of the Month and countdown the Top 5 Fish.
David J. Peterson and Jessie Peterson: 01:16
Pointless: 27:48
Candle of the Month: 50:52
Top 5 Fish: 58:56
Interview with Language Creators (Conlangers) David J. Peterson and Jessie Peterson
Unknown Speaker 0:00
Music.
Nick VinZant 0:12
Welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, creating a language and fish you
David J. Peterson 0:21
you have to have both technical knowledge can be learned creativity, can't it
Jessie Peterson 0:28
takes a very long time. And so something as small as like I see a cat
David J. Peterson 0:34
was nulisu, which is a language for anthropomorphic beavers that the two of us created for our I want
Nick VinZant 0:42
to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance subscribe, leave us a rating or a review, we really appreciate. It really helps us out. So I want to get right to our first guests, because from Game of Thrones and House of the dragon to dune and shows like Vampire Academy, they specialize in creating new languages specifically for shows and movies. These are language creators, also known as a condlanger, if I'm pronouncing that correctly. David and Jesse Peterson, so how do you create a language? Oh,
Jessie Peterson 1:18
that is a really big question that we could answer in three hours. But to try to sum it up in a 32nd spiel, the way we do it is we start at the smallest unit. And so we start with the sounds, picking out what sounds will be in the language, and we build up from there, making you know, what will the syllable structures be? How will those sounds come together into little packages that will eventually become words? And then how are those words going to come together to create phrases and clauses? And so it's just that's the the very short hand version, step by step.
Nick VinZant 1:58
So if we took English for an example, just because we're in the United States, I think of like one. Very common language, like, what is English kind of built upon? That would be an example of how you then build a con language up.
David J. Peterson 2:12
English is just like any other spoken language, it has a phonology. What a phonology stands for is a sound system. A sound system comprises individual sounds that are that can be manipulated to create differences in meaning. For example, in English, pack and back could be different words, right? And another language, say, in Hindi, pack back, back and back. Could all be different words. They can't be in English. In English, those distinctions are considered too subtle to make meaning distinctions, not in Hindi, but so be it. That's just a way that the two languages are different, and so all languages have this set of sounds that are considered to be important for making meaning distinctions. And when you create a language, you create those sounds. You also create the rules by which those sounds can be put together. So for example, the sounds that are found in Hawaiian, almost all of them are found in English as well. However, we know that a word like clomp. Clomp is an English word. Every single one of those sounds is found in Hawaiian. That is the K, the L, the aval, the M and the P, all of those sounds are in Hawaiian, but it could never be a Hawaiian word, because Hawaiian doesn't allow for any syllable to end with a consonant, let alone two of them as an MP, and it doesn't allow any syllable to begin with more than one consonant, say, a K and an L. This is why, when something like Christmas gets borrowed into Hawaiian, it comes out as kaliki Maka, because they have to kind of force it into that framework. So when you are defining the sound system of a language, you're choosing the sounds and also defining the framework. If
Nick VinZant 4:17
you kind of start out with the basic sounds of it. How long does it take to where you're getting the words you're getting, the sentences you're getting, the paragraphs, etc, etc. It
Jessie Peterson 4:28
takes a very long time. And so something as small as like I see a cat, a nice, short sentence, lovely, small, most likely, all those words are going to be basic in whatever language we're dealing with, as long as they have cats in their area. And yet, there's so many decisions you have to make that a sentence that small could end up taking days of work to translate. We gotta decide, what are the pronouns going to do? I How would how are those pronouns going to be shaped up? Are they. Going to be marked with cases. For that matter, is a cat going to be marked with a case? For that matter, is the verb to see going to work differently than to take or to grab or to, you know, hold something much more tangible and like active? Are those verbs going to work different? What are you going to do with tenses? And so it's all of these little decisions for something as simple as I see a cat takes hours and hours.
Nick VinZant 5:24
I don't know if this is the best analogy to make it, but it sounds like it's kind of like you're the domino surrounded by all other dominoes, and if you hit one, it goes throughout the entire rest of the language as well.
David J. Peterson 5:35
Yeah, yeah. I never thought of it that way. Makes makes creating a language sound like more of a catastrophe. I like the idea
Nick VinZant 5:45
on the kind of the devil's advocate side, right? Like, this is, why not just make it up? Like, could you just make up gibberish?
David J. Peterson 5:54
You could make up gibberish, but then it would be gibberish, not a language. Yeah, that
Nick VinZant 5:58
is a good answer. Like, oh, you win this round, sir.
Jessie Peterson 6:05
I will also say, too, on the gibberish note, that humans are really, really bad at just spontaneously creating gibberish that won't start repeating. It's just like, at some point you're just going to start using those same elements over and over and over again, because that's your brain's been primed, and it's like, gosh, I can't think of a new sound to save my life. And so you know, your string of gibberish that's supposed to represent this whole clause only has like five different sounds in it, and like the same syllable over and over again. And so if you see a show or a movie that has used gibberish, and there are some out there, you may notice that really, all they say is something similar to oinga, buen gehunga, and it's translated as something really complex. And then you hear the next sentence, and oinga is used again, but in a completely different way. And it's so silly. It comes out gibberish. Is so silly when we try to do it.
Nick VinZant 6:59
Do you? Do you feel like there's been a big buy in amongst producers in this recently,
David J. Peterson 7:06
in general, I would say it's an upward trend, but only with those that get it, with those who care. And often, when it happens, it draws attention, which means that you're more likely to it's it's more likely to be discussed, more likely to be noticed than not.
Nick VinZant 7:26
So when you look at the process, right, like, do they give you the lines of dialog that you that they want you to create the language for ahead of time? Or do you create the language and then match it to what they want to say?
Jessie Peterson 7:41
There's but, I mean, like, there's no no matching. It's all about translation at that point. And so no matter what lines they give us, whether ahead of time or after we've already created a bit of the language, there's still that process of breaking it down to, you know, like, what does the line mean? Because we never do, like a word for word translation, you break it down to say, well, what's the meaning of the line and how would they express it in this language? And so it doesn't change our process to have the lines ahead of time or after the fact. We prefer to have them ahead of a time, just because that gives us a better idea of the content and the vocabulary that's going to be spoken about most by these people, and that really helps us develop the vocabulary in a way that we're generating words that will actually be used in translations when we create a language and have no lines that we know that we need at that point, you're just making words that may or may not be useful for the translation process that may never show up on screen. And so for any project we've worked on, we have so many words that are part of the language that no one will ever know about because they never made it on screen.
Nick VinZant 8:53
Like when you're creating a language, how do you decide on what the tone of that language is going to be? And the example that I would be most familiar with is like the difference between Dothraki and valerian, right, where one sounds a certain way and indicates a certain kind of people and another sounds a different way and indicates kind of a different mindset. So to speak, how do you decide what the tone of the language is going to be?
David J. Peterson 9:17
It's a perception, but it's not accurate. I would say there's nothing about the sound of Dothraki that indicates anything about the speakers. It's, it's just a language. It matches the it matches the phonology that George R Martin came up with that he put in the book. As I analyzed it. Same is true for high believer in I mean, there's, there's really nothing about it that says anything one way or the other. You can take the same sentence and translate it into both languages, and you can, once that's translated, you can say that sentence and you can shout it. You. You can whisper it, you can say it, you know, in somebody's ear, like you're trying to seduce them. Doesn't make a difference all of this stuff. It has nothing to do with the language. It has to do with delivery. Has to do with who's saying it and how, also what they're saying and why. And so really, if you look at the Dothraki, it has now that you do with their language, it has to do with the situations that they've been put in and what they're saying. For example, I I would ask you, how would you define English? Is English a harsh language? Is English A mellifluous language? Is it a beautiful language? So is it a is that a capitalist language? What is it?
Nick VinZant 10:44
I guess I would say, like, kind of to your point, it's all of the above. It just depends on how the person decides to use it at that time. Yeah. So they, like, even a producer wouldn't come forward and say, we want this language to sound this way.
David J. Peterson 10:59
Oh, all the time.
Nick VinZant 11:00
How do you kind of with what you said before? Like, how do you kind of reconcile those two things that, like,
David J. Peterson 11:06
we tell them what they want to hear, and then we do what we're gonna do.
Nick VinZant 11:11
That's the way to do it, really, right? Like, that's the only way to kind of do it in some regard, yeah, um, I was gonna ask you other stuff, but these are kind of summed up. Are you ready for some harder slash list or submitted questions? Oh, yeah, think so. What is your favorite language that you've created
David J. Peterson 11:31
keeps changing. Most recently, I said a Raytheon for defiance for one of the languages that I created for myself, and then a language that we created together was nulisu, which is a language for anthropomorphic beavers that the two of us created for our our YouTube series, langtone studio, I loved
Nick VinZant 11:51
it. I just like that was not anticipating that that was what that was going to be created for. And for some reason, I was like, oh, I want to hear more of this language.
David J. Peterson 11:59
Can you say anything in it. David, so salematimo casba Sabina, I'm sorry. Salematimo casba Sabina, there we go. The Beaver carries the stick to the rock.
Nick VinZant 12:15
Jesse is that? Are those your favorites as well?
Jessie Peterson 12:19
You know, like David, my answers regularly change, just depending on what I'm in the mood for in that that particular time, because, like languages are is so impossible to choose favorites among them. It's like asking, you know, what's your favorite word? And some days you're like, This is it? In other days you're like, I don't know, I I like, you know, like these 20 words a lot, and then you start listing words you like, and suddenly you have, you know, 500 favorite words. And it's no longer a favorite, like David and his favorite music albums. And so usually, though, like the some of the languages that are nearest and dearest to my heart in terms of what we've done together, I would probably put mini Shea at the top, just because it was the first language David and I ever created together. It was a language used for free forms, motherland, Fort, Salem, for these witches and their witch community. And so that one is is very near and dear to my heart, not for any sort of linguistic reason, but just for, you know, remembering the process and the the nostalgia of it all. And in terms of favorite language I've created on my own, I would probably put joy at the top of that list. It's a personal language that I created and have been working on actively for, like, I guess, about five years now. And so it's, it's one of my favorites.
Unknown Speaker 13:53
How do
Nick VinZant 13:54
you create words that aren't already in existence, right? Like, I would think, between all the languages of all the things that people have said, like, how do you come up with something? Like, nobody's ever said that before. Is it hard, or is it actually that snow that's really easy.
David J. Peterson 14:06
It's not even a concern. I mean, natural languages do this all the time. They have lots of words where it's like, you say this in this language, you also say it the same way in another language. And these two things are totally unrelated. Just happens.
Jessie Peterson 14:21
And so, yeah, we call that skuing Because it's like it it happens. And it happens in natural languages, like you can look across the board and you can find examples, and the only one coming up out the top of my head, David, maybe you can help me out here. But literally, the only one on the top of my head is Poopoo. In Finnish means bunny. And it's like, That sure sounds like an English word, doesn't it? But it's, you know, totally different. But you see these words all the time where it's like that 100% sounds like an English word, but it means something different, or 100% sounds like this English word in an accent, and they kind of mean the same thing. And so you look up their etymologies to see if they're. Related and find out they're not that. It's all just like accidental, and it's fantastic. I love that.
David J. Peterson 15:05
Yeah. Another good pair is Mata in ancient Greek, means I. It also means I, in proto Austronesian reconstructed, the two languages are completely unrelated. Same word, same sound, same meaning, total accident. Hardest
Nick VinZant 15:21
language to create that you've done, like, Oh, that one was really took me a while.
Jessie Peterson 15:26
For me, one of our hardest experiences of creating a system was an ajna Marie, which was a language for vampires, for peacocks, the Vampire Academy. And we had decided that we would use a series of auxiliary verbs, or helping verbs to create certain meanings with the verbs, like whether it was finished or ongoing, or things like that. And creating the series of auxiliaries ended up just being incredibly difficult to be like, Well, what is it going to look like when it's first person, second person, and so on and so, like, it just took a lot of time so that it was difficult to create, but not as, I guess, difficult to use on the flip side, once you had the charts, yeah. But then I think Bucha is the hardest for me to use, which is our language for mice, just because we added in all of these little details that are marked on the language. And I absolutely forget, and I have to go back every single time and read like, have to document to remember what gets marked, where to be able to translate something.
Nick VinZant 16:35
How many different languages for animals have you guys made? Because I'm really interested in, like, what animals you've picked to make a language for? Like, I don't bears. Is
Unknown Speaker 16:45
bear? Go ahead.
David J. Peterson 16:46
So for our YouTube series, we're creating languages for little kind of kingdoms or communities of anthropic, anthropomorphic animals who are a part of a board game that I'm making kind of a battle board game where the little animals they fight, right? They're very cute, though, so it's kind of hard to make them fight, but yeah, so we've done one group per season. So first we had rabbits, then opossums, then mice, then cats, then dogs, than beavers, and we are currently working on our fox language.
Jessie Peterson 17:24
And then, as a side project, I actually did a language for squirrels that we may fit into this world at some point.
Nick VinZant 17:30
How much money do you make? Like, can this be a full time living in Hollywood in the broad sense of things at this point,
David J. Peterson 17:38
it's a career for us. It could theoretically be for another person. However, the opportunities are not, are not great, like they're increasing, which is nice, but there were, there will never be a huge demand, simply because there are very few theoretical projects that would ever incorporate a created language, like consider Sleepless in Seattle. You know, it's it's a fine movie. It's hard to imagine how a created language could have benefited that project. Shall we say, you know, a lot of movies, a lot of television shows, are simply about real life people doing things in the real world. Those people are usually not language creators. So you couldn't even have it as like, you know, oh, they're a language creator in the show. And so we're going to have some of the things they do right most projects, and I would say most, most books, most movies, most plays, most TV shows all across the entire world, are done in one language and the language of that particular country or region, and that's it. So because of that, there's never going to be a massive amount of opportunities. It's nice that the number of opportunities are increasing, that those that might use one are using one. That's great, but it's just never going to, I don't think it's ever going to reach a critical mass where it's like an entire industry with tons of different language creators, simply because most stories don't involve it at all. When
Nick VinZant 19:29
somebody comes to you with a budget, are we talking four figures, five figures, six figures?
David J. Peterson 19:37
We've had, we've had projects come to us with, you know, three digit budgets, and then, you know, Marvel movies and everything in between. You know, have
Nick VinZant 19:48
you ever had somebody speak one of your languages to you, like, come up to you and speak it? Yeah.
Jessie Peterson 19:55
That was the saddest yeah that you could, I know, I
Nick VinZant 19:58
thought like it came out. Like, Oh, this is sensitive. I shouldn't ask anything else about it. Sometimes
David J. Peterson 20:03
I don't recognize it because I don't want to say they're not speaking it well, but they just don't say things the way that I would. Often I'm so embarrassed about this, but like, I remember once, like I was doing a speaking cake, and they there was, like, a cake, because it was a big thing for, you know, undergraduate mixer. They made a cake and they put an inscription on it in high valerian. And I was like, Well, those are certainly high valerian words. They're like, You know what it says? I'm like, I have no idea. This is not even close to being grammatical. I don't even know what you were trying to say. I don't remember what that word is at all. So it's like, I don't know.
Nick VinZant 20:51
But Do people ever say to you, jacarus, right? Like, that's the one that jumps out to me that like, Oh, I know that one.
David J. Peterson 20:56
Oh, sure. I mean, I didn't make that word, but sure, you didn't make who made it? George RR Martin,
Unknown Speaker 21:03
Oh, he did.
Nick VinZant 21:04
Boy, I didn't read those books very closely. It's one of
David J. Peterson 21:07
the, like, it's one of the five words of Valerian he created. Oh, I
Nick VinZant 21:10
didn't know that. Oh, no, but mouth. Oh, is there a difference when you look at it from a written versus a spoken perspective? Like, do you take your process completely differently. If, like this is only going to be written versus is only going to be spoken,
Jessie Peterson 21:27
it's not that it's different, but obviously, if it's not going to be written, we don't create an orthography for it. So we don't, you know, go through the process of actually creating a written form for it. We just have the spoken version, if it's going to be written, then we create original, unique orthographies for the system. And so like for us memory for Vampire Academy, we had a writing system for that language. But then for the other language I had mentioned, many say, for the witches, it was not written. So we never had a written form that we created for it. And so, yeah, so like when we create the writing systems, we we create a whole writing system for it.
Nick VinZant 22:12
When you go to create these, is it better to have more technical knowledge or more creativity? Which direction does it seem to go
David J. Peterson 22:21
you, you have to have both technical knowledge can be learned. Creativity can't. At least in my experience, I don't know it can be practiced, certainly, and kind of get in the habit of it. But there are some things that I feel like can't be taught. It's one of the reasons that I admired Jesse as a language creator so much. Her creativity was just off the charts when we started working together. It's because I was hiring somebody to work with me, and I, I looked at her work and was like, this is this is somebody who has it, you know, at a certain point, like, some of the technical things aren't as important, because you can learn those, right, the creativity, you can't. It's got to be there. So, yeah, ideally it's both. But in terms of, like, where the heart is, where the fun is, where, where the it factor is, that's the creativity, not the technical knowledge.
Nick VinZant 23:23
You know how the discussion forums are, right? You know how discussion forums are. Are there ever secrets to characters or the plot or etc, buried in the languages that you create?
David J. Peterson 23:37
I mean sometimes, but usually nothing very big. There's, there's a big theory going around in the Game of Thrones forums about Azor Ahai, which is this mythical figure that's going to figures into the main prophecy of the thing who's going to come and save things. They thought it was Jamie. Because Jamie, at one point in time, in the show, he gets his hand cut off and his sword hand cut off, and it's replaced with a a fixed golden hand, right? And the word for hand is on those in valerian, and the word for light on yours. And so Azura high is a lot of light, right? And so they there was, there was this theory that in embedded in the valerian language, was this clue that Jamie was a high, which I don't know that might have been very clever, but it was completely and totally 100% unintentional and not not intended at all. I created each of those words entirely separately for different reasons. They're both roots. I. I just came up with them. They're entirely separate times for, you know, wasn't even thinking about it at the time, and so sometimes they can, it's just ends up being further Not, not red herrings. I don't know, red herrings is the best thing. I was going to say, not easter eggs, but red herrings. And so that was kind of cool and fun. You know, speculation for a bit, totally not intended. I can't think of a time where we've had some like, really strong, like, plot relevant, like clue, that was the language Jess, can you?
Unknown Speaker 25:38
I'm
Jessie Peterson 25:41
if we have one, it is not coming to me in this moment. That's
Nick VinZant 25:46
pretty much all the questions that I got is kind of anything that we missed, or what's coming up for you guys? I know you're working on stuff right now.
Jessie Peterson 25:54
Yeah, yeah, so much. And I don't even know I am staring at David through the screen here, because it's so much of it is upcoming projects, so that we can't talk about until it's released. And so there are, like five of those that we're working on right now. And then David, I think we can talk about a few.
David J. Peterson 26:19
So part of the problem is when we're working on something that's brand new, you know, like, so, for example, it's, it's not a super big secret that, you know, working on the next season of House of the dragon, the next season of The Witcher. You know, these are things that have been in production. And so it's not a surprise when we say that we're working on that. And so that'll be coming at some point. The other stuff that's like, brand new and hasn't been released yet, that's the stuff that we really can't say anything about it. And even, like the latest movie, I don't think there's been any kind of announcement that we've been working on it, that there's been no build up at all. Yeah, yeah. And you know, the studios, they're very touchy about this. They're like, we want people to be talking about this at this point in time, and exactly at this point in time, and not before. And blah, blah, blah, anyway. So, so yeah, suffice it to say, this summer will be the start of a very big year for us.
Nick VinZant 27:16
I want to thank David and Jesse so much for joining us. If you want to connect with them, we have a link to them on our social media sites. We're Profoundly Pointless on tick tock, Instagram and YouTube, and we've also included their information in the episode description. And if you want to see more of this interview, the YouTube version will be live on our YouTube channel on April 3. Had to do the math real quick, April 3 at 12:30pm Pacific. Okay, now let's bring in John Shaw and get to the pointless part of the show. At what age do you think that you could possibly lose to a child in a fight? And I'm thinking zero to five, five to 1010, to 1515, to 20.
John Shull 28:05
Like, am I actually trying to fight them? Like, are we actually throwing down
Nick VinZant 28:10
you're going for it? Like, you're you got, you got to try.
Unknown Speaker 28:14
Are weapons involved? Are we just God,
Nick VinZant 28:16
what day is it? Is it a Tuesday? Is it windy outside? What angle does the sun at? What kind of clothes does it have? Does he have on pants or shorts? Is he wearing a hat? Same? What color is his eyes like? Well, how many answers to the question? Do you possibly parameters? Do you possibly need to just answer the question, right? Like is, is, are we next to a road? Is it a highway? Is it a cul de sac?
John Shull 28:40
Listen, I'm in a great mood because I woke up at 2am to smoke some meats.
Nick VinZant 28:46
I bet you did, all right, I bet
John Shull 28:50
you did, delicious. They're gonna taste amazing. And I can't wait how
Nick VinZant 28:55
many I'm not I'm not feeding into this because I know you just want to talk about you how much meat you smoke, which we all know you smoke, a lot of may and meat,
John Shull 29:06
to answer your question, probably 11 to 15. I think,
Nick VinZant 29:12
yeah, I think 11 to 15 is, is probably when there's a possibility, like, I think definitely 15 to 20, because you've got some kids that are basically grown men by the time they're 15 to 20. And I'm not the biggest dude on the block, right? So there's definitely some 15 to 20s. But I also, I think you have to acknowledge that there's probably some 10 to 15 year olds that could take
John Shull 29:39
you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, anything younger than 10, I'm not. I'm not, I'm not so confident on because I'm gonna, I should be able to overpower a 10 year old, and obviously below that, yeah. But once, once we start getting over 10, things start to get a little cloud.
Nick VinZant 29:57
Things start to get a little bit dicey, because. Okay, I thought of this because I was like, play boxing. I have a five year old and I have an eight year old and play boxing. The five year old, I was just thinking like, oh my gosh, I would just destroy him. Like, if we ever got in a fight, if I ever needed to, like, I could just destroy him. And the eight year old could still destroy like, oh, you know, he just doesn't have the physical strength yet to really hurt me. But they've got the speed and kind of the quickness there that like, oh, they might, well, you might have to try a little bit. That's where I think 10 to 15 could probably get you if they really you ran into the wrong,
Unknown Speaker 30:37
bad little kid.
John Shull 30:40
I don't know. Man, six to nine, six to 10 too. I feel like there's one or two instances where that may happen. Oh,
Nick VinZant 30:45
so I polled the audience about this question. 4% said three to seven. 4% said seven to 10. 34% said 10 to 15, and 15% said 15 to 20. So 15 to 20 is the dominant one. But I don't think people are. I think people are underestimating how, like, tough some 10 to 15 year olds can be.
John Shull 31:06
Yeah, I mean, especially if we're, if we're boys and girls, have hit puberty, some of them by then, so they are sometimes full on adults. Uh, body wise. Oh, the best
Nick VinZant 31:17
man at my wedding was a full grown adult by seventh grade. He's a full grown adult by seventh grade
Unknown Speaker 31:24
who was the best man at your wedding. I
Unknown Speaker 31:26
was at your wedding, Ryan.
Unknown Speaker 31:28
Oh, Ryan, red, is he still alive? He's
Nick VinZant 31:31
still alive. But I remember people thought that he was going to be the greatest athlete in, like, Kansas history, but he really just matured way faster than everybody else, and he's like, Oh my God, he's incredible. And then they just realized he was a full grown man by the age of 13,
John Shull 31:47
and then by 14, it had all caught up to him, and he was just an average guy.
Nick VinZant 31:51
And then he was just an average guy by that time, like, a little bit better than average. But then when everybody caught up, he's like, Oh, he's just kind of like, he's he's pretty fast.
John Shull 31:59
That's about it did it? Did he ever? Did he ever tell you about how he likes to smoke meat? How much do
Nick VinZant 32:04
you want to just talk about the fact that you're cooking? Just go ahead and get it over wet. Just understand, tell us. I've
John Shull 32:12
I was having this conversation with somebody. It's a random conversation. Somebody who told me that they're a chef locally in Metro Detroit ended up being a lie. But it got me thinking,
Nick VinZant 32:21
why would they lie about being a chef at a metro Detroit? Like, why would you just lie waiting?
Unknown Speaker 32:27
Like, I'm just gonna lie about waiting
John Shull 32:29
to grab takeout. And this person started talking to me, which I
Nick VinZant 32:33
Oh, yeah, whenever somebody's talking to you, I don't do that, yeah. And then they
John Shull 32:37
just start talking about this, you know? But got me thinking, like, just because I'm almost 40 doesn't mean I can't have a second career.
Nick VinZant 32:44
Oh yeah, dude, you can start over your life anytime you want. Man, it's never too late. It's never too late to make a change. It never is unless you're like, 80s, you want to be a professional basketball player, well, then it's too late. But,
John Shull 32:58
yeah, it's definitely not, not happening there. I've seen your
Nick VinZant 33:03
meat. It's way too small, tough and not useful enough to be a professional meat.
Unknown Speaker 33:10
Oh boy. Oh, you brought it up.
John Shull 33:13
I'm gonna stay away from my meat, but the meats that I smoke are fantastic. Oh
Nick VinZant 33:18
yeah, I'm sure that you're taking in all kinds of meat.
John Shull 33:23
I'm gonna move on to Sean brought it out, Michael. All right, I know I just wanted to talk about the lovely craft that is smoking meat cooking. Okay, not making a pancake that looks like it's been through hell and back. I
Nick VinZant 33:36
love my pancakes. I make great pancakes. We're not having a food off right now.
John Shull 33:41
All right, we are not alright. Let's give some shout outs here. I thought this was an interesting name, Oscar von witzeldorf. There's,
Nick VinZant 33:52
there's, that's, there's no way, dude, are you underneath me? There's a child. That's my room.
Unknown Speaker 33:57
Oh,
John Shull 33:58
that's thank thank. Thank you. To YouTube there, Oscar von witzeldorf, Stacy K Mr. Red. And then I only put that on there because I thought Red's kind of a cool first name. You don't hear any reds anymore, but it used to be a somewhat popular name in the 20s, 30s and 40s for men. Oh yeah,
Nick VinZant 34:20
that's a pretty solid name. That's probably the only color you can really be named after for a first name. You don't want to be named like yellow or green, like red. Grange was a famous
Unknown Speaker 34:31
or football player, I think
John Shull 34:34
look at you over there. Brad Maddox, Kyle Chandler, but not the actor, because I looked them up and apparently they have no affiliation. Which would be cool if it was Kyle Chandler. You don't even know Kyle Chandler is not a clue. Well, that's that's your own fault, but not necessarily surprising. I also did watch the worst movie I've ever seen this past weekend. I can tell. You about it later. Um Ethan Moore, Kimberly Baker, saucy sauce. I just once again love saucy sauce thanks to Instagram, where apparently no one uses the real name on any handle anymore. And then Jason Peters, and we're going to end here on Thomas McKinley, thank you to Instagram so all over the place. Good job watching you. Good job watching you. Proud of you,
Unknown Speaker 35:31
uh, proud of you for this good worry
John Shull 35:34
you ever get, good worry you ever get, you ever get disappointed to the point to where, like you just get frustrated and furious. Oh yeah, I have children. True well beyond that, I finally had a couple hours the other night, so I'm like, You know what? I'm gonna watch a movie. So I haven't watched a movie like straight through in a while, TV show, whatever. Okay, I've always been a fan of M Night, Shyamalan, his his work and his movies, I'm pretty impressed. So I turned on a movie called trap. You ever heard of
Nick VinZant 36:10
it? That's probably tells you everything you need to
John Shull 36:13
know. He directs it. His daughter stars in it. The main star, though, is Josh Hartnett. If you remember him, not
Nick VinZant 36:21
really. He's one of the ones that you get confused with some of the other ones. Like, there's always a couple of actors that are kind of the same, like him, Channing Tatum, the guy who's Hayden Christensen. They're all kind of that same, like general. So I just, I don't know, yeah, I don't know which one he is.
John Shull 36:42
And it was, long story short, I was kind of half excited, thinking it was going to be, you know, the plot kind of sucked going into it. But I was like, they'll turn it around. They didn't. I didn't even make it halfway through the movie. I turned it off. Just not, not good. Um, yeah. But then I then I just found myself sitting there furious, like, Why did I just waste an hour of my life. So then I just had a beer and ended up falling asleep on the couch. Okay, nice little evening.
Nick VinZant 37:06
Cool. Man. That was a great story, and I know that well,
John Shull 37:11
appreciate you. You know, I want everyone that's that's Look, that's seeing you, you nice haircut, I'm gonna give you positive reaffirmations and not being asshole to you, like, Oh,
Nick VinZant 37:23
thank you. I'm feel pretty good about this haircut. I haven't been getting to get my hair cut as much as I used to. You know, I'm getting a cut probably every three months now, where I used to get it cut maybe every six weeks, most things, I'm a little bit nervous, right? I've reached the age that, like when you cut it, I'm not sure what's going to be under there, so I'm always pleasantly surprised that it's going okay.
Speaker 1 37:41
160 pounds. Of pure bullshit, five baby, I gotta lose some
Nick VinZant 37:46
weight. Okay, I don't, yeah, I don't understand. M Night Shyamalan, he had one good movie, and he's been riding that for basically, for the last 20 years. Like, oh, Someday he's gonna make another
John Shull 37:57
good one. It's not gonna happen. That's accurate by any stretch of the imagine. That's how I feel it. That's that's fine. Um, do you want to give us an update on your
Nick VinZant 38:09
Vespa? How's it going? It's a scooter. It's a dual what's the difference a dual motor climbing scooter? Show it the respect that it deserves, because it's awesome, and I love it. And I took it around. Yesterday, I went and took my son to go play basketball. I can get to the grocery store in no amount of time. It's the ultimate form of transportation. I'm gonna go ahead and say my scooter is the ultimate form of transportation, because
Speaker 2 38:35
you just hop on it and boom, you
Nick VinZant 38:38
just stand on it and go. It's basically like flying, riding an electric scooter is the second best thing to fly.
John Shull 38:47
Like that hot tua girl once said spit on that day.
Nick VinZant 38:49
I never actually saw that.
John Shull 38:53
Uh, once again, it was because we live in a world of perverts, and the only reason she became popular is because of horny men. Yeah. That
Nick VinZant 39:01
mean that's, well, no. And women, bro, your audience, man, go with, play the hits. Play the hits. Don't hate, don't hate the play would be cool. That would be
John Shull 39:11
kind of cool to become, like, accidentally famous, like that. Like, you know, she didn't think that one sentence was going to be like her existence. But here we are.
Nick VinZant 39:20
Oh, life can change so quickly in a second, life can just change so quickly, and you'll never see it coming. I'm a big fan of that. I'm a big believer in the idea that you'll never see the big change in your life coming.
John Shull 39:35
Speaking of big changes in kind of tragic changes. Did you see those crazy videos coming out of Myanmar and Thailand of the earthquake. Want
Nick VinZant 39:42
to think about earthquakes, bro, I Well, I live in Seattle. I don't want to think about earthquakes, because one's going to hit me any second. That's going to basically erase the entire North Pacific Northwest. So I don't like to watch.
John Shull 39:55
Well, it got me thinking, because I think a couple weeks ago, we were talking about this, and you said, or. Quakes are the most terrifying natural disaster to you. And I live in an area where, you know, we're not susceptible to earthquakes. I don't even think I've ever felt one, but damn, I could imagine being on like, the 30th floor of a high rise and just having the entire building sway and being able to literally do nothing about it. That would be no, no thing, no. Like, what are you going
Nick VinZant 40:22
to do when the Earth moves underneath you without warning? Like, there's some things that maybe we shouldn't do. Like, if you live in an earthquake prone area, I don't think that putting a pool on the top of a sky rise is the smartest thing. Like, let's not do that.
John Shull 40:39
I mean, I'm, you know, whatever good, good on them, I guess. But until that
Nick VinZant 40:43
happens, oh, I don't understand. There was, I saw one video that somebody was in one of
Unknown Speaker 40:47
those pools.
John Shull 40:49
They were there. Yeah, the video that get out quick, the video that haunts me. And not to compare that to 911 but remember how there was all the videos of people jumping out of the towers. And, you know, 911 Yeah, which is harrowing enough. Well, there was a couple of window cleaners that were stranded on a high rise, cleaning the window, and you just see them swaying back and forth. And then, you know, I don't know what keeps them up or down, but like, they they go down about five feet. Then they stop and they keep swaying. It's just like that. That's, I don't even know, like, I don't even I'd probably just sit there and just be like, Yep, this is
Nick VinZant 41:27
it. Oh, I think that you just accept it. I think that you just like, you just accept it like,
John Shull 41:33
but I say that just to go back real fast, because I'm sure a lot of people are wondering the comparison, just the shock and awe of the video, like, I was like, Oh my God. Like, that is insane video. And also capturing something like that is just that's, that's incredible. Like, what a what a moment, what a terrible moment to capture,
Nick VinZant 41:51
but awesome to, like, watch and not be in. Like, whoa. That's crazy. Yeah, dude, don't mess with the earth. That's, that's my general saying it for years, man, don't mess with the earth.
John Shull 42:03
Actually, years, you've been saying it since we started this podcast. Oh, it's, that's like a reoccurring theme of, right? Like,
Nick VinZant 42:08
it's not a, you know, a huge mental realization to think, like, wow, we probably shouldn't mess with the earth.
Unknown Speaker 42:16
You don't have to be that smart. Figure that one out.
John Shull 42:21
I'm a little disappointed this episode as well. Nick, why? One of my I don't want to say childhood heroes, but someone that I looked up to, celebrity wise, he's kind of been a douche for a while now, and I, I think it's confirmed that he is officially a douche, and that is Will Smith, oh yeah,
Nick VinZant 42:44
that's a little surprising. He wasn't one that you could it's not like, um, who's the guy who was the Joker? He has a band. Oh, Jared, yeah. It's not like somebody where you instantly look at and I think that the opposite sex always has a much easier time telling when someone's just like a terrible person. It's not like him, where you can immediately look and be like, I bet that guy's a super creepy person in real life. Like, I bet he's a huge weirdo in real life, right? Like, yeah, Will Smith wasn't necessarily like that, but then he's he started to go down that road where you're like, Oh, he's got something I don't think. I think probably every celebrity does, to some degree, like that's not the kind of life that you would pursue if you didn't have some other pretty large motivations to push you in that direction.
John Shull 43:40
I got hit twice this week. I got Will Smith and then I got Hawk Cogan. Oh, well again. Cogan has
Nick VinZant 43:46
been going downhill for a long time, but I'm not familiar with what Will Smith did now.
John Shull 43:51
It's just it's not necessarily what he did. But remember when he slapped Kid Rock a few years ago? Yeah or not? Kid Rock, Chris Rock, not Kid Rock. Chris Rock, yeah, at one of them, Oscars. Well, Will Smith has has basically used that to come out with a new album of music, and it's centered around kind of that incident. And it's like, you used to be an A Lister like you, you know, you used to be the top movie star in the world and a a music artist, and now you're like, resorting to having to, you know, a viral moment that made you look like a complete idiot. And that's what you're gonna, you know, and people are gonna buy the record in the album, like, I just, I don't just made me, made me sad. Oh yeah, he could tell for
Nick VinZant 44:34
a little while he's been trying to desperately cling on to it, like he's been trying to hold on for a while.
John Shull 44:41
But another thing that we've talked about on this, on this podcast is, and you brought it up, and have good points on it, is, like, no matter how much money you have, if you're at that level, you're still chasing it like, but what is he chasing at this point? He has to have all the money in the world and friends and fame,
Nick VinZant 44:57
because I think that you i. I think that when you pursue anything with that level of relentlessness, there's a hole inside of you that you are trying to fill, and it will never be filled. Like it doesn't matter how rich and famous you become, if you'd have a desperate need for attention, it's just never gonna go away, like you always have to treat the disease, not the symptom. And I think that that's what happens with those people. It's like people who just want more and more and more money, like you'll never have enough. You have to I think that's one of the greatest lessons you can learn in life, is when enough is enough and to be happy with what you have. And some people just that never happens. And then they become increasingly more erratic as they try to pursue and fulfill that desire rather than just fixing what's wrong within themselves.
John Shull 45:50
Well, don't, don't, don't look at Britney Spears as social media, because it's,
Nick VinZant 45:56
I feel terrible. Yeah. Anyway, get rid of the conservative ship, like, oh
John Shull 46:02
yeah, that's gonna make her even
Unknown Speaker 46:06
healthy, yeah.
Nick VinZant 46:10
All right. Well, what Hogan do? It's not
John Shull 46:14
necessarily what he did, but his ex wife came out, possibly drunk, and basically filmed a video of herself saying how he has ruined the family, and blah, blah, blah, and he beat her, and he was, you know, a terrible husband, basically, all things that we all kind of had guessed. And, you know, if you watch their show back in the day, back in the day, being like, five years ago, you also, I mean, it was kind of all there anyways, but she came out and said it, and he responded by releasing like, a 22nd video with his current wife, who was like, 30 years younger than basically just pointing and laughing at a screen. Oh, basically, like they were, you know, and it's just, it's like, Come on, dude at the at the end of the day, that's your ex wife, no matter how much you dislike her, blah, blah, blah mother of all your children, I believe, like, went through all the bullshit with you, and here you're mocking her. Like, I just,
Unknown Speaker 47:10
oh, I don't I think that whenever
Nick VinZant 47:12
you are a super successful person, successful in air quotes, right? Like to get to the top of a field, you kind of have to be a terrible person, because you have to have things pushed to so far to one extreme that another aspect of your personality is really going to shop, is really going to suffer, suffer. What are you drinking? Well,
John Shull 47:33
uh, Costco special. Uh, it's called buys, B, A, I, I'm
Nick VinZant 47:37
going to go to Costco later today. I'm pretty excited about it.
John Shull 47:42
I actually, I used to dread it because, you know, you spend a lot of money out front, but then you realize that their shit last you weeks, and yeah, it's up, plus they have
Nick VinZant 47:52
their hot dogs are, oh yeah, amazing, oh yeah. We can keep talking about Costco all day, but let's, let's not, let's move.
John Shull 48:00
Kind of a fun question here. So when you're at a restaurant and you're offered the choice of a salad or a soup, which one do you take salad?
Nick VinZant 48:10
I've had some decent soups in my life, but overall, I would say that soups have generally disappointed me far more than salads have disappointed me. I'm gonna go ahead and say that soup is probably the most disappointing entree that you can have. Soup is very hit or miss, and it really doesn't kind of do the job that you want it to do, like I want to be a little filled up and have it taste good, and soup generally doesn't do that. It's just the most disappointing.
John Shull 48:38
Yeah, you definitely like to, you don't you don't like to take it all, but you like to take most of it. I disagree with you on that. I think soup is by far the better choice. And I've actually been let down. I don't know this is, this is? This is gonna sound weird. Well, go ahead, I've been let down by more salads than I have soup. I love soup. I think the soup is fantastic. Oh
Nick VinZant 48:59
no. I've been let down by far more soups than I've been let down by salads. Soup lets me down way more than salad lets me down because salad, you know what you're getting, and salad, you can always kind of spice it up a little bit. But if a soup goes bad, and I have no idea how those ingredients are going to taste in relation to each other, either,
Unknown Speaker 49:23
yeah, like all the things I description,
Nick VinZant 49:24
I'm like, Well, okay,
John Shull 49:27
I wonder, like, who decided that? Who decided you either get a soup or a salad? Why can't they offer you, like, a cheese tray or an egg roll? You know, it's just,
Nick VinZant 49:37
I don't know. We'll complain to the restaurant.
John Shull 49:41
I'm, well, that's what, that's what this forum is for, is for us to complain to each other, right? That what we do, bitching, yeah,
Speaker 3 49:49
we're just bitching, bitching about stuff. Okay,
Speaker 1 49:52
do you do you have a favorite swear word? I.
Nick VinZant 50:04
I mean, shit is probably my favorite one when you get right down to it, because you can drop it in places where you can't drop the F bomb like it's it's just as versatile, I think not quite. It's almost as versatile, but slightly more accepted.
John Shull 50:28
Okay, yeah, and I, yeah, I think it's easier to move on from a shit than a, you know, yeah, a motherf
Nick VinZant 50:34
Right? Like, if somebody's dropping those, you kind of like, God dang, well not God dang. Or, like, just think,
Unknown Speaker 50:42
God, dang, God bitch. Uh,
Unknown Speaker 50:45
stone bitch is of a good that's a good one, though I do like that one.
Unknown Speaker 50:49
Listener, are you ready?
Nick VinZant 50:51
Oh, that's all you got. We had somebody in the chat. I can't really read very well. Whole hand 72 you're asking about the candle of the month. Oh, oh, really. Oh, that makes my heart warm. I know, yeah, oh, you're the candle connoisseur. So it must be time.
Unknown Speaker 51:11
Wait, where's it go? I forgot. Oh, wait, it's time.
Nick VinZant 51:17
I saw a good one. I can now. I can't do the horse very well. That's I got it, I got it, I got it. Now I lost it. It's time. The Outlaw candle connoisseur Rides Again. Candle of the month. Oh, and he's not ready. He's not ready. No,
John Shull 51:36
I was, I was refocusing, and I was, I was partying the way, because April's candle the month, and that just made my whole my whole day, by the way, thanks. Whole hand 72 I also like candle the month. You do. It's basically the only and a shot and a shout out to Nick as well for the fantastic intro, you're welcome. Um, so anyways, as we know, April is in most places, brings rain and mud in mild temperatures after a long winter. So I have to give a quick shout out to Tony Abrams for giving me a shift, giving me a whiff of this, of this candle when I was when he had picked it up and he said, You know, I think you would really like this. So anyways, head over to homesick com, get the April showers candle. Okay, and it is. It's going to have kind of a an herbal feel to it, but it's also going to feel like fresh rain drops on a newly sprouted plant on April 16, while you're sitting there reading a book in 61 degree weather, having a coffee at seven o'clock in the morning on a Saturday.
Nick VinZant 52:55
Wow, that's what it's going to bring out of you. I do like spring, man. There is parts of spring where it's like, oh, life is returning to the world.
Unknown Speaker 53:06
Yeah? Just just to confirm,
Nick VinZant 53:07
though you were having a conversation with another man who said that you probably would really enjoy the scent of this candle,
Speaker 3 53:16
yeah. Just you guys, when that words were uttered, did any alarms? Any alarms go off or anything like that? No, no. Actually,
John Shull 53:25
this person, I don't, they're in the they're in the entertainment field, and I deal with him, you know, probably once or twice every year, and apparently he listens to the podcast, or at least knows about can over the month and stopped me, and, yeah, that's next thing I know. I'm talking candles for 20 minutes for getting a zoom call I had. So it was, it was great, 20 minutes. So wow,
Nick VinZant 53:56
sometimes you just get into an in depth conversation about candles with another man. Did you guys hug at the end? How did, how did it end? Was there a physical greeting at the beginning or a physical greeting at the end?
John Shull 54:08
No physical greeting at all. Nope. It's gonna, it's gonna cost you a little, a little bit more than some of the candles I put out there. It's gonna be about 30 bucks plus shipping. It's 14 ounces. It's going to give you about, I don't know, mine burned for like I did, like, a week and a couple of days straight. So it's going to be about 60 to 80 hours. Once again, homesick. Com, and it's the April showers camel. You're
Nick VinZant 54:35
just leaving that thing burning all through the night.
John Shull 54:40
I mean, not Well, yes, all through the night, but obviously you that's just
Nick VinZant 54:43
a terrible idea.
John Shull 54:46
I love, love waking up to it. I love the fresh aroma. Do you love
Nick VinZant 54:51
setting your house on fire? What kind of a responsible husband and father keeps a known fire risk in his house at all times? I. Right? That's just poor dadting. It's poor dadting.
Unknown Speaker 55:05
What's up? I don't understand why I wouldn't allow out of my house.
John Shull 55:10
Oh, that's why you're not the Canon secure
Nick VinZant 55:12
fire in your home, unmonitored flame.
John Shull 55:15
Nope, you're just the guy with the nice hair. Uh, what's
Nick VinZant 55:19
the latest in the candle forum discussions since we found out last time you did candle that you are apparently going on Reddit talking about candles all the time. So what's any latest controversy in the candle forums?
John Shull 55:34
I mean nothing, nothing to do. You need to do. You need to go get a glass of water or something. Dying. Continue. This isn't good. You might be dying. What's hot in the can of forms? Well, I mean, it's spring, so a lot of people have shifted from the candle forms. You find a lot of people kind of migrate in the spring, and then usually the the planting forums, which I am not a part of, but traffic is a lot less in the spring that that I've noticed. The
Nick VinZant 56:07
fact that, you know, this is horrific, like, the fact that you have been in and out of these forums and have been able to put this pattern together, to me, is incredible, right? Like, Oh, it's April, boy. Nobody's in candle chat. Like, what's going on? Nope. Oh, silly me, it's planting season. Is that what you're doing? Like, you're just like, John, it's planting season. That's how that went in your that's how that went in your house, right? You were like, Oh man, there's just not very many people in candle chat today. There's no the where's the vibe? Where's the candle discussion, where is it? Like, I'm not feeling the candle chat. And then you were like, Oh, wait, it's planting season. Did your penis fall off when that happened? Like, did it fall off?
Speaker 1 57:00
Actually, you're kind of spot on what what had Well, what
Unknown Speaker 57:04
happened there was,
John Shull 57:10
yes, somebody had asked a question about a candle back to them. So they said, what is happening on this chat? It seems dead or something, responded and said, It's planting season. So that's what I'm basing my my guess
Nick VinZant 57:28
on. You know what? Though, for me personally, number one, do what you like. But if that would have happened, and I would have made the realization that you had, I would have immediately just 180 in my life and changed, like, nope, going the wrong direction here. I'm going the wrong direction here. I gotta make changes.
John Shull 57:50
I love candles. I'm not even I don't even care. I love you, yeah, man, if I could, yeah, you do you? You know what? Apparently, like, whole hand loves it, or either that or he's making fun of me, I'm not sure, but it's all good. Or she this? We don't really know what to hear she, but it's true.
Nick VinZant 58:07
Okay, all right. Well, good, very candles. Sorry to hear that the chat forum isn't going off, silly. John, did you say that to yourself? No, yeah, you did. Do you tell your wife about that? Do you tell your wife about the candle discussion chat? Does she know? Does she know this is what you're doing?
John Shull 58:26
No, we don't really talk candles a lot. And see why.
Nick VinZant 58:28
I can see why. I would have a hard time. I can't. I don't know what life is like as a woman, but I would have a hard time like looking at my husband as he walked in and started talking to me about candle chat. I'll be like, Wait, you're the protector of this house, and this is what you're gonna be in here chatting about, is your flavor saver? Get out of here
John Shull 58:49
gone? Well, it's kind of there a little bit, don't they grow? It's disappointing. Listen. Anyways, Okay, you ready for our top five? Almost 40 years old. I can't grow fucking phases never happen. Yes, I'm ready. All right,
Nick VinZant 59:02
so our top five is top five fish. It's your number five fish. I'm gonna say fish like that. Every time I get a chance to say fish, I'm gonna say fish. What's your favorite so module, you gotta meet fish. Any candles that smell like fish? Fish themed candles, fish, fish. Let's wait. I'm
John Shull 59:26
just waiting on you to be done. Just want to talk about fish. You You let me know when you're done, and I'll go into my fish.
Nick VinZant 59:32
No more talking about fish. We don't talk about fish anymore. Jesus
Unknown Speaker 59:36
Christ.
Unknown Speaker 59:39
Want to talk about fish.
John Shull 59:42
I want my camera to keep focused. Just need
Nick VinZant 59:45
to be focused on fish
John Shull 59:49
number five is the only area specific fish I put on my list and to Michigan, even though it's around the country, but it is the trout.
Unknown Speaker 59:59
Oh, okay.
Nick VinZant 1:00:01
I mean, I thought you were gonna go a little bolder than that, like a trout. Like, wow. Watch out for this guy. He's wild and crazy.
Speaker 1 1:00:10
What? I don't know why that gets criticism for
Nick VinZant 1:00:14
me. I mean, it's a trout. It's like, oh, you gonna go what's what's next? Bass,
Unknown Speaker 1:00:20
you wild man,
Unknown Speaker 1:00:22
how'd you know? Large mouth, small mouth, rock. Which
Unknown Speaker 1:00:25
one are we doing? Small mouth, obviously.
Unknown Speaker 1:00:29
Okay, all right, what's your number five or five
Nick VinZant 1:00:31
is the blue tang? Blue tang?
Unknown Speaker 1:00:34
The hell is a blue tang? You don't
Nick VinZant 1:00:36
know anything about fish. I'm sitting here over having a conversation with a guy doesn't even know anything about fish.
John Shull 1:00:47
Blue tang, Finding Nemo for everyone out there who also doesn't know what, right? It's a
Nick VinZant 1:00:53
blue tang. It's I love, I love blue tang is the coolest, and it's got a fun name to say, like blue tang.
John Shull 1:01:03
It just doesn't really, it does. Never done anything for Oh, but
Unknown Speaker 1:01:06
it's trout. Like, you're like, oh, trout, yeah.
John Shull 1:01:10
You know why? Because trouts are strong. There's all kinds of them, ones even luminescent, like a rainbow called the rainbow trout. I mean, come on,
Nick VinZant 1:01:18
Oh, I do like rainbow trout. I used to fish for rainbow trout. That's fun.
John Shull 1:01:23
Number four, alright, mine number four is it? It's on the list only because it's haunted my dreams ever since I've seen a photo of it. And, well, that's why it's on the list. And it's the blob of fish. Oh, I
Nick VinZant 1:01:35
don't like weird fish, man. Like weird fish creep me out. That's why I don't like the ocean, because, like, Oh, what's that? Things down there? I don't even want to look at that like, I don't want to think about those things, man, Mr. Nick, I'm
Unknown Speaker 1:01:49
not opening my eyes.
Speaker 1 1:01:50
I got a human nose and eyes and a mouth. It's weird looking, all right? I took it off. I'm still not
Nick VinZant 1:01:56
looking, making my eyes closed the episode just my number four is a shark. That's fair. I didn't be specific about shark because I pretty much like all sharks. Like all sharks are pretty much the same. I mean, obviously the Great White is like the coolest shark, but all sharks are pretty cool. That's why I have sharks in number four.
John Shull 1:02:15
I think that is far too low to have on the list. Like sharks are, I mean, yeah, I'll obviously get to it, but sharks, they deserve a
Nick VinZant 1:02:27
higher it's going to be really difficult for me to take your list seriously when you started with trout.
John Shull 1:02:32
I agree. I agree. I don't, uh, well, my number three is probably really going to piss you off then, because I kind of, I basically put two of the same fish into one. So my number three, it's a tie between salmon and tuna, because I feel like they're the same fish, even though they're not the same fish, but like, they serve the same purpose, and they're both delicious,
Nick VinZant 1:02:59
yeah. I mean, like, I can see why people would be totally confused by that statement, but I can also see how salmon and tuna are kind of the same fish. Like, they're both, like, fish you eat. I didn't realize that tuna were really big. I really thought that they were small.
John Shull 1:03:17
No, they're Yeah, they're massive fish. I'm a fishologist, so
Nick VinZant 1:03:23
I'm a marine biologist. We're probably specialized
John Shull 1:03:26
in fish. No fish, nope. I have a plaque and everything. I'm a fishologist. Okay,
Nick VinZant 1:03:31
well, then if you were a fishologist, you should know the trout is not the fifth best fish. My number three is the blue whale, largest animal ever, the blue whale. I'd love to see one. I bet that's unreal to see a blue whale in person. I've seen some other whales, and I've seen your mom.
Unknown Speaker 1:03:53
I don't even know
Nick VinZant 1:03:56
that was seamless. You didn't see it coming anywhere, right? Like you didn't see it. You had your hands up protecting the face, and you got
Unknown Speaker 1:04:05
hit with a body blow. Is
Speaker 1 1:04:09
our our whales, fish? I thought whales were man, unclear
Unknown Speaker 1:04:12
to me. I have no idea.
Nick VinZant 1:04:15
I don't care. It's in the ocean. I understand that there may be some differences to me, but like, look, it's in the ocean. Maybe it's a mammal, but in my mind, it's a fish.
John Shull 1:04:26
I did my list based upon things that are classified as fish only. So
Speaker 3 1:04:29
okay, I didn't do that. No, whales are not fish.
Unknown Speaker 1:04:35
Yeah, they're mammals. Whatever,
Nick VinZant 1:04:37
I don't care looks like a fish to me. Don't come in here with your science, nerd, nerd, nerd. You're nerdery. Get out of here. I mean, you're right, but you're like, I don't care.
John Shull 1:04:49
I'm telling you, I'm a I'm a fish ologist, I'm telling you. Okay,
Speaker 3 1:04:55
all right, half my list is probably wrong, man. I.
Unknown Speaker 1:05:00
You have dolphin as number one. No, dolphins
Unknown Speaker 1:05:03
are garbage. Get them out of here. Overrated, overrated. So
John Shull 1:05:07
I kind of gave you a hard time because my number two is the largest fish in the ocean. What is it? And that is the whale shark.
Unknown Speaker 1:05:18
Oh,
Nick VinZant 1:05:21
what is a shark? A fish?
Unknown Speaker 1:05:24
I guess it yes, a shark is a fish.
Nick VinZant 1:05:26
I mean, whale sharks pretty cool.
John Shull 1:05:29
They can grow to be 42 feet long and weigh up to 50,000
Nick VinZant 1:05:35
pounds. Dang. Like that's crazy, man. Sharks are fish. That's impressive. I'm a fan of the Greenland shark personally, because apparently it can live to be like 400 years old. So if you think about that, like there's a Greenland shark that's alive right now that was born in like the 1600s
John Shull 1:05:55
What do you think Greenland sharks are gonna do when President Trump is the ruler of Greenland.
Nick VinZant 1:06:01
Maybe they'd have to change their name. Do they change their name? Do you
John Shull 1:06:05
think they'll be like the United States of America sharks? Now you
Nick VinZant 1:06:09
think they have to change their name? What a thing like, you know, what? Just gonna call this something different and like people anyway. Let's not get into that whole thing. Yeah, yeah.
John Shull 1:06:20
Send the Vice President to Greenland. It's, it's fine now, like, if there's anything else going on the world, right? I love what's your number two? Love the pictures
Speaker 3 1:06:26
of him, just like standing there all alone because no one wants to talk to him, just him in a field by himself. Let's not get into it. Let's just move an awkward
John Shull 1:06:35
spot to be told to do something. You go do it, and you're, I mean, he has to, I mean, JD Vance, I want to believe is somewhat of a smart person. He has, like, he has to be on that, get off that plane and just stand there and go, What am I doing? That's what
Nick VinZant 1:06:55
I don't like that to me, I wonder what the motivation in those kind of things are right, because let's not get into this whole thing, right? But when we look at the stuff that happened with the group chat, I just don't, I could never, I don't think anybody would be like, I need you to blatantly lie for me and just keep blatantly lying and just just keep doing it like, well, but why? Right? Like, I could never just put myself in a position in which you were so clearly and completely wrong. Like, no shirts, not black. It's not a black shirt, not wearing a black shirt.
John Shull 1:07:38
My man, there's, I didn't bring, I didn't bring that up on purpose. But there's, I mean, there's so many things about I was, I was added to a national security text thread.
Nick VinZant 1:07:50
He might be, man, he might be, you know, you might not even know, you can be on there. Still could be. Man, okay, anyway, let's just go. Let's just move on here.
Speaker 3 1:07:58
What's your number two, Orca, the killer whale,
Nick VinZant 1:08:03
also, I think, not technically a fish, but I don't care. It's awesome. Like you ever seen those videos of those things hunting? That's incredible. That's incredible. Yeah, they're better hunters than we are.
John Shull 1:08:16
I will say this, that if I was gonna put whales on the on the list, like, actual mammal whales orca would be on my list. Yeah,
Nick VinZant 1:08:24
that's a pretty cool animal, man. That's, you could make an argument that's probably like, the most advanced man animal on earth in terms of what it does. Like, how do we hunt? We hunt together, and we use our tails to, like, create waves and like that. Knock things. That's crazy. What's your number one?
Unknown Speaker 1:08:45
Sharks?
Nick VinZant 1:08:47
Okay, I understand it. I understand I understand sharks. Sharks are pretty cool. Do you have any particular shark you would put it number
John Shull 1:08:55
one? I mean, you got to go with the mother of them all, man. And that's the gray white shark you got. You have to now, fan favorite of mine is Hammerhead, just because they're so obscure. But I mean, great whites are, I mean, I feel like, if Great Whites weren't a shark species, no one would give a shit about sharks.
Nick VinZant 1:09:13
Oh, I mean, hammerheads are pretty like they would kind of hammerheads would make them stand out a little bit just because of their unique look, but Hammerhead is one of those things where, like, I'm not sure if you're like, really cool or a dork,
John Shull 1:09:28
like, let's, let's, let's look at this like a basketball team, right? Hammerheads are Scotty Pippin. Great Whites are MJ,
Unknown Speaker 1:09:38
okay. I Yeah, okay,
John Shull 1:09:42
my number one Tiger sharks are Luke Longley, it doesn't matter, uh, what's your number one array,
Nick VinZant 1:09:49
those big, giant Ray things that swim like that, like that. I would love to see one of those in person. I bet that would be super cool to see a man array.
John Shull 1:09:59
I. You're not talking about the ones that you can pet at the zoo. You're talking about the big ones that are in the ocean. I believe. I know it's kind of just trolling. Rip, Steve, rip.
Nick VinZant 1:10:09
Steve Irwin,
John Shull 1:10:13
I think a stingray got him. I think he went on with a stingray. He did
Nick VinZant 1:10:16
what's in your honorable mention? Because I need to go to soccer practice.
John Shull 1:10:21
We'll just cut it there, man, we'll
Nick VinZant 1:10:25
mention what do you got in there?
John Shull 1:10:28
So I actually had Stingray on the list. Okay, good, respectable, respectable, because I forgot about Mance Ray. I put on my personal favorite, which is my favorite fish to eat, which is walleye.
Speaker 3 1:10:39
Okay, I don't really eat a lot of
John Shull 1:10:45
and jelly. I have jellyfish on the list, but I had, I need to look it up to see if they're actually fish. I don't know if they're considered fish or not. And then I put on lionfish.
Nick VinZant 1:10:55
Cool, cool. Okay, those are interesting choices. I would put on the clown fish. I think that's a cool fish, cool looking fish. Um, I had another one that I just completely forgot.
Unknown Speaker 1:11:09
Why'd you say fish? Like that fish, uh,
Nick VinZant 1:11:12
the clown fish. Oh, the puffer fish. You know the thing that like, the blow fish, that just goes blows itself up. Like, that's a pretty cool, like, that's, that's a good strategy. What's your strategy? I just get real fat.
John Shull 1:11:28
I was gonna make a joke there. I'm not going to. This is a PG podcast. I mean,
Nick VinZant 1:11:32
like, octopuses are super impressive, but I'm not gonna, I don't like, like, that's like, an octopus or a jellyfish are things that I just don't want to be anywhere near like, they just creep me out that whole lack of a body, yeah. Like, no, I don't want anything to do with that. You,
John Shull 1:11:48
you said a couple weeks ago, I don't want to be in water where I can't see my feet. So
Nick VinZant 1:11:53
I need to know what's underneath me. I don't like that feeling of like, nope. I like to be on the ground. Oh, okay, that's gonna go ahead and do it for this episode of Profoundly Pointless. I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, leave us a quick review. We really appreciate. It really helps us out and let us know what you think are the best fish. And they don't really have to be fish, really, just something that lives in a body of water, is what we'll accept you.
