Futurist Richard Yonck

How will the world change in 2022 and beyond? Futurist Richard Yonck joins us for a revealing look at the new technologies and trends that will shape the future. We talk Digital Humans, Biotechnology, Artificial Emotional Intelligence and manipulation by Algorithms. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Things That Should End in the New Year.

Richard Yonck: 01:50ish

Pointless: 35:20ish

Top 5: 50:55ish

https://intelligent-future.com (Richard Yonck Website)

https://www.facebook.com/IntelligentFuture (Richard Yonck Facebook)

https://twitter.com/ryonck (Richard Yonck Twitter)

https://www.amazon.com/Heart-Machine-Artificial-Emotional-Intelligence/dp/195069111X (Heart of the Machine - Book)

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1948924382 (Future Minds - Book)

Interview with Futurist Richard Yonck

Nick VinZant 0:12

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant. Coming up in this episode, we look into the future and count down the things we don't want to see in 2020. To

Richard Yonck 0:26

some of this, this is kind of an expansion of an area, we'll call digital humans, the idea that we've got more and more representations of ourselves in the world. In the current decade and beyond, we're going to see more and more kind of almost partnerships with a robot or other form of automation in the workplace, so that we're working side by side, this, the phrase for this that's often used is called Cobots, or a robot co worker, some of my biggest fears probably have a lot to do with algorithmic influence, these systems have the potential to, if not themselves, manipulate us be able to be used by other people to manipulate us.

Nick VinZant 1:13

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So the big question in this episode, what does the future have in store for us in 2022? And beyond? Our first guest studies exactly that everything from digital humans and emotional intelligence, to algorithms biohealth and the role that artificial intelligence will play in the coming decades. This is futurist Richard Young, moving into 2022. What do you essentially see ahead for us this year, and kind of in the immediate future,

Richard Yonck 1:56

there's really, from my standpoint, so many different fields, so many different considerations. So I'll talk about things like artificial intelligence. And right now we've got an enormous amount of advancement being made in voice tech, and different aspects of being able to incorporate voice as interface but also voice as a means of supplementing human workforce and human intelligence. Some of this, this kind of an expansion of an area will, we'll call digital humans, the idea that we've got more and more representations of ourselves in the world in the workplace, certainly increasingly in the metaverse, cyberspace, whatever we want to call it, in which we will be able to have representatives of ourselves some pretty rudimentary right now. But over time, they'll have be able to be our emissaries essentially be able to perform certain basic routine tasks, know what our preferences are, whether that's booking a flight for us, or, you know, even something is as currently complex as performing in an interview for us.

Nick VinZant 3:23

And you know, for me, like looking at this from a complete outsider's perspective, I guess, like what's the point? Like, what, what are we what's the goal of creating this kind of virtual selves?

Richard Yonck 3:34

Definitely a valid question. In terms of creating a world, a virtual world, there's a lot of hype, a lot of tech interest, where you have this plan, this desire to create an alternate form of reality, that thing is that a lot of people push back on this and say, you know, I mean, here, we're, we're trying to create this alternate reality, we're actually I creating a more space, more distance between ourselves, we're creating new ways of essentially distancing ourselves from human contact and human interaction. So that's definitely a negative and definitely a reason why this would be not necessarily as everything everybody wants it to be. On the other hand, as a, in a business use case, the opportunity to create things like digital humans, digital avatars, that can represent us and be used for performing various routine and repetitive tasks in the workplace, can increase efficiency and and it's essentially really reduced the number of people that are needed to perform a particular task right now we're we're seeing a real disconnect in terms of the number of people who are available to work and the number of jobs. They're not meshing, or we have a lot of gap there. And one of the ways that this is, unfortunately going to be addressed by some business, is through increased automation.

Nick VinZant 5:26

How soon do you think that's going to happen? Like when you look for the rest of the 2020s? What do you kind of see coming?

Richard Yonck 5:33

Parts of it are already happening? It's mostly a question of how good is it? Is it going to be dependable enough that you can put it into a, a work environment a decade from now? Oh, yeah, I would anticipate that we will see a lot of this.

Nick VinZant 5:51

And when we talk about chatbots, we're kind of talking about the idea of the thing like you do the Hey, I've got a problem with this company. You talk to this thing it like you put in the answer, and you get an answer immediately back like that kind of thing. But instead of having an obvious computer, it would be like me, giving those answers. Right

Richard Yonck 6:09

now you might see an image, it might be photographically realistic, it may be something more cartoonish, that is meant to kind of help suggest that this is a person to person interaction. And that it kind of tweaks some of what Sherry Turkle of MIT used to call our so called our Darwinian buttons, essentially, we are design, one of the earliest things we did as a species was developed language and a means of interacting with each other through emotional and visual cues, a lot of nonverbal cues, and so forth. So to have visual avatars that, continue that or extend that will essentially make us feel more and more like we are engaging with another person. And we fall into that habit very, very easily,

Nick VinZant 7:05

we will feel more like we're engaging with a real person, but it will be less of a real person that we're engaging with the same time, correct.

Richard Yonck 7:13

These are basically statistical models. They're simply connecting words and strings of words and phrases together, based on statistics. So there's no awareness there.

Nick VinZant 7:25

When you kind of look into the future. Are we more poised now? For a bigger change than we have been in the past? How close are we to the next big thing,

Richard Yonck 7:36

the next big thing is always around the corner. And you never know exactly when it's going to happen. If you're speaking about AI, and so forth, we're still quite some ways out from let's just say something that is it, artificial general intelligence, or something very self aware, and so forth. That's still many, many decades away. In terms of just technological development, and innovation, every single day, there's so much out there, and there's so many things that everyone is doing. Knowledge has a tendency to self reinforce, create self reinforcing loops. And so all of a sudden, we're able to do things with our knowledge of genetics. And by using AI and bioinformatics to start mining and finding out new ways to generate new drugs, treatments, therapies, and so forth. This coming decade is going to be huge for biotechnology and healthcare, digital healthcare. So this is definitely a time in which we're going to see enormous innovation over the course of really the coming decades. I don't foresee it slowing down, if anything, it will accelerate,

Nick VinZant 8:52

has COVID changed any of that? Did COVID Speed it up? Pause it have no difference at all, like what do you think

Richard Yonck 9:01

when COVID hit, it accelerated a number of technologies and really put the brakes on a number of others. So that right there, you know, shows you how things that occur in the in our world in our environment that maybe aren't necessarily anticipated can skew the direction that technology and other trends are developing. So, to be more specific, we saw an enormous advancement in areas like you know, remote technologies, the things like teams and zoom and everything else. They really went to town, expanding their capabilities in the during that period. Some of the abilities to deal with situations remotely, whether that's you know, various forms of of the Every drone work and so forth, these advanced. On the other hand, during that time, certainly we saw a huge drop off early, early COVID, at least in things like, for instance, rideshare. Some of it is about the industries, some of it is about the technologies that are considered to be viable to roll out during that time.

Nick VinZant 10:19

What do you think is kind of going to be the next big technology

Richard Yonck 10:23

AI is permeating everything is what what people don't a lot of people don't recognize is that AI is here, AI is everywhere. And it every time it rolls out in some new fashion and is incorporated into various devices in our environment, various parts of our environment, we think it's all very cool, very new, for a very short period of time, it gets good, and then it kind of disappears into the environment. It's part of our background. And it's, it's pervasive, it's there, but we don't think about it, a bunch of the things that go on in our cars, things that go on in our homes, the applications that we use on the computer, all of these are using various aspects and forms of AI, some of them are going to continue to get more intelligent, some of them, there's not much point in in adding to it. But the fact is that over the course of this decade, and the next we're going to see a range of deep learning technologies, forms of machine learning come out and be used in pretty much everything in our world. So just expect that that's going to become more and more a part of our world, and much of it will become less aware of overtime.

Nick VinZant 11:44

Is this going to be stuff though, that's like ultimately going to be good for society? Or is this going to be stuff that, you know, we we go to the lowest common denominator. And what I mean by that is like we invented the internet. And we could use it to have all of the information at our fingertips. But instead, we kind of use it to snipe at people on Twitter, right? Like, is this? Is this going to be good for society kind of things, or

Richard Yonck 12:09

it's an ongoing issue? And a very important question to be asking social media, certainly the internet, they didn't turn out quite the way people expected or wanted. And one of the things that I advocate is that we have incorporate more of a technology assessment in the early design processes of of these new innovations. Because this allows us to can allow us to try to anticipate and overcome some of the different kinds of issues we see with new technologies.

Nick VinZant 12:50

Yeah, and no, I think that a lot of the things that we would kind of naturally talk about are summed up in some of our listeners questions, so I want to jump into them. This this one, I think kind of hits it the thing that we were just talking about, are we creating something we don't understand?

Richard Yonck 13:05

That's a very big question. Are we creating something we don't understand? Absolutely. We are continuously in the process of in the course of building the world, building the future, we create things we don't understand all the ways that will be utilized all the ways it will develop the unanticipated consequences of it. When people Jenner developed the automobile, the early gas engine, they did not anticipate the way that it was literally going to transform our, our cities, our country, our environment. If cars didn't exist, our cities would have an entirely different configuration. And things like as simple as you know, how we lay out streets or pathways, how we have, you know, commit enormous amounts of space to parking and so forth. All these things. Were never foreseen at that time. This happens with every single technology.

Nick VinZant 14:18

When will the future look really different? And I think what they mean by that is like if I were to get into a time machine, like how far in advance would I have to go or be like, Oh, this doesn't even look like earth anymore. Like I don't recognize this.

Richard Yonck 14:32

If you could have looked down on the earth in 1900, we would with enough resolution, we would be able to definitely tell that this is a very transformed world. Part of it is what what the expectation is and as with other kind of forms of thinking imagery, what have you resolution So the more detail we look at, the more things have transformed and changed. As I say, AI is pretty much everywhere it's it. But if you don't know what to look for, if you aren't able to appear into the workings of a particular technology to understand or to see that you don't know that that's going on our world has transformed and is transforming rapidly in terms of it becoming what I typically refer to as more and differently intelligent. There's a growing preponderance of machine intelligence, some of it is skewed and biased. And this is transforming our world. Depending on what you're looking at. You could say that the world transforms almost unrecognizably ill in as little as a decade, think about what the world was like before social media.

Nick VinZant 16:01

What are we getting first flying cars are jetpacks.

Richard Yonck 16:06

We've got both jetpacks are actually kind of useful and cool. In a, there's definitely being incorporated more and more by the military. There's some real benefits there. Flying cars, we're getting into something that's kind of different there. From the standpoint, we can engineer almost anything except that at this stage, it's down to within the laws of physics, it's down to economics, for the most part, when you talk about a flying car, if you mean the Jetsons, where it is a something that has no apparent, you know, method of thrust. That's, yeah, that's gonna be a long time. If you're talking about something that's basically a personalized airplane, or helicopter or a quadcopter, or what have you, there's some thought about that being appealing to people who have considerable wealth to kind of skip around some of the traffic jams and problems in an urban environment and so forth. That is a different matter and gets into a range of issues around inequality problems of what happens when certain parts of society for go, you know, the what everyone else has to use. Does that is that to the detriment does that lead to deterioration of those services and so forth. So that's a big problem. But down to the real issues and and of having cars just kind of flying through the air on a hill, almost like another level of traffic, human beings did not evolve to navigate a three dimensional space, we've always pretty much occupied to possibly two and a half dimensions. We aren't fliers. So there's two problems with that we really make mistakes really quickly. So we've got to turn all of that over to AI to and that's got to have gotten to the point where that's really good. But any small accident you have a fender bender on the freeway, okay, you pull over, you have a fender bender in the sky, it's a catastrophic failure, and you fall. That's to your detriment. And it's a big problem for the city below. So there, you get into regulation liability, the insurers are not going to let that happen. I was

Nick VinZant 18:45

thinking about that I was traveling over Thanksgiving and less like thinking, Could you imagine if all these cars were just flying all over the place? Like it would be a nightmare? Yeah, well, will robots take over the world,

Richard Yonck 18:58

some people would say they already have. They will not take over the world in the IP for a very, very long time, in the sense of a Skynet Robopocalypse Terminator type style takeover. On the other hand, there's the economics of using robotics wrote using robots to supplement the workforce. In the current decade and beyond. We're going to see more and more kind of almost partnerships with a a robot or other form of automation in the workplace so that we're working side by side with technologies that are increasingly intelligent and increasingly able to perform certain tasks that they can do better than we can either through because of the repetition speed. What have you this? The phrase for this that's often used is called Cobots. Or it's like a Robot, sorry AI robot co worker. And this idea is pretty much we're developing in a slow evolutionary pace at this point. But it's increasingly how we work. We use technology all the time in the in our work in our environment, you know, different applications, certain amounts of AI that do analysis for us, and so forth. This just a further extension of this into the physical space. And certainly, we're already seeing this in warehouses, and other kinds of manufacturing and so forth.

Nick VinZant 20:38

In terms of biohealth, what do you think will be happening in that arena? Like, where do you think the changes are going to be there?

Richard Yonck 20:46

Right now, we are on the verge of an enormous amount of innovation and advancement in biotechnology, we have had the ability to sequence human, the human genome in detail for a couple of decades now. So it's taking a lot of time, but we're figuring out some really interesting approaches, and gaining new knowledge about how our bodies work, how biology works. And so we're getting some new, you know, incrementally new ways to deal with cancers through immunotherapy, what's we have to be very careful of, is creating problems for ourselves or future generations through the misuse of that genetic manipulation at this point, we have different tools like CRISPR. With that, potentially, we have the ability to make changes to the gametes, the the eggs and sperm that ultimately lead to the next generations, even if that is changed or manipulated, that can go really, really wrong. And the problems may not show up for generation,

Nick VinZant 22:10

what is your safest prediction for the future? What is your boldest prediction for the future? Like so bold, that if you're around like all your futurist buddies, like you're not even going to say it. It's so bold, that like they're gonna laugh in the fighting suggested, but what is your boldest and your safest prediction?

Richard Yonck 22:31

safest predictions easy, the sun comes up tomorrow. So the expectation that all aspects of the future are unknown or unknowable. It really runs through a whole gamut, a spectrum of certainties, the one that's out there, there has been speculation that somehow or another, we're going to have an ability to interact with the past. At some point, I find this highly unlikely. But if you extrapolate that long into the future, then at some point down the road, you could potentially have a version of our version of our society or civilization affecting change. In the past, I find that almost almost impossible. Ah, okay. There's one I definitely dispute. Okay. The concept that we are living in a simulation. There are people who have talked about this. I think, Musk, I'm not sure if Max Tegmark said something similar, but you know, on the order of 50% likelihood that this is we are in fact living in a simulation, I am going to go with the far more specific prediction that there is a far less than 1% chance we are living in a simulation. It's possible. But that's my prediction. It's very, very, very unlikely.

Nick VinZant 24:08

I don't even want to like think about that. I don't even want to think about it. Right, that I've always wondered, you know, like, what's why? What's the reason that some people think we are living in a simulation like where's the

Richard Yonck 24:23

no proof. So this is one of the big problems with it. It's not falsifiable in any way that I've been able to figure out.

Nick VinZant 24:30

Let me follow up that excellent point by a movie or TV show that you feel has the most accurate depiction of the future.

Richard Yonck 24:37

I love these things for entertainment, but I am simply not going to say any of them are really good representations of our reality, and certainly not yet.

Nick VinZant 24:48

Did you think we'd be farther ahead by now?

Richard Yonck 24:51

Hmm, great question. And very general. Thank you. So did, there have been definitely times Over the years and decades where I've looked at the top explored things and thought, yeah, we'll be at this stage at this point, and we're not. So early 2000s, we had predictions and some pretty accurate ones, that we were going to start seeing autonomous vehicles in around 2017 or so. They're not out there in the form, quite the way we would have thought that wasn't going to be like, Oh, they're going to take over the roads. But the technology is there, the technology developed, and we're at currently, what SAE talks about the Society of Automotive Engineers, talks about is level four autonomous vehicles, we won't see true autonomous vehicles, till probably 2030 or beyond. And I think that that's probably going to be pretty accurate. In terms of where I think I thought, at certain stages that certain aspects of artificial intelligence and its ability to have more contextual understanding would be further along at this point, we're moving into a stage that has been referred to as a third wave of AI, that some of this is developing into projects that are developing more and more capability of reasoning common sense. One shot learning or learning more like human beings do, in in these systems. And we're going to see that advanced quite a bit over the next decade or two. But I think I thought some of that was going to be here a little faster than it was,

Nick VinZant 26:53

correct me if I'm wrong on this. But the thing that I've always heard of like describing AI, and the challenges with it, is that you can teach a computer perfectly, how to play chess, all the strategies, all the stuff, but it can't then take all that knowledge and use it to play checkers. Like it can't think the way that we can where we can take lessons from one thing and transition into another thing.

Richard Yonck 27:17

Sure. Right now, when you talk about that example, we're talking about neural networks, these are systems that over the past couple of decades have gotten really good at certain very specific tasks, they take an enormous amount of training, lots and lots of data. And once trained, they can perform very, very well. There is when they are when the attempt is made to retrain, something occurs that's called catastrophic for catastrophic, forgetting that I'm not sure that's quite right. But anyway, the point is, it loses pretty much most of what it has learned or all of what it's learned, because it's not actually learning. So one of the things that's in this new third wave that is being worked on is to be able to accrete knowledge to to build on prior knowledge to inform what comes after. And that's what much more like what we do today. The other aspect of all of that, I've written a couple of different books about the future of artificial intelligence, future minds and heart of the machine. And in the heart of the machine, I explore the future of what's known as emotional, artificial emotional intelligence or emotion AI. This is these are technologies that can read and interact with human emotion. Now, that technology could one day lead to some very, very important aspects of increased intelligence in our machines, because one of the things that really informs a lot of our, in our intelligence is how we place value on in the world. If you based on your emotions, you know what, to look at what to pay attention to, at any given time, if I'm that chess playing computer, or robot in a room, and I'm playing away, performing excellently and beating the pants off of the human that I'm playing against, and that room catches on fire that the human is going to get up and leave probably rapidly and with a little bit of emotion about it, that program or that robot, or that computer is pretty much going to likely sit there and stay it doesn't have any means of recognizing that its environment. It's what the values have changed in its conditions, and it needs to be able to change its mission based on that.

Nick VinZant 30:11

What scares you what gives you hope?

Richard Yonck 30:14

The future gives me hope. So the future, as far as I'm concerned, is about potential. The future is what ultimately we are all striving toward. We don't, we may be able to remember the past, but being able to interact with anticipate and direct our present day actions to build a generated better future is really what gives us power as a species. Some of my biggest fears probably have a lot to do with algorithmic influence the idea that as we develop these systems as we interact more and more with these technologies, right now in the form of social media platforms, but potentially, later on in terms of other forms of power, environment, AI in our environment, these systems have the potential to, if not themselves, manipulate us be able to be used by other people to manipulate us. That's enormously problematic. It literally gets to a stage where you can look at it and talk about it, undermining freewill very significantly. So I think that's probably my one of my biggest, long term concerns is algorithmic influence.

Nick VinZant 31:39

Do you feel like we're already there? I

Richard Yonck 31:42

think we're on the road.

Nick VinZant 31:45

Yeah, it doesn't like because now I'm hearing about things where like, like, they can tailor this political message to this exact group, tailor this political message to this exact group, even though that group wouldn't necessarily have voted for that candidate. And if it wasn't for this thing, right? Well, you're just you're just become so specific.

Richard Yonck 32:04

Definitely things like that. But I think more nefarious, for lack of a better word right now, is the problem that if you have a system that is able to read and interact with you, whether it's through visual cues, eventually emotional awareness of these systems, and so forth, the ability for them to change their strategy, change script, highly rapidly based on the feedback from us. This creates a feedback loop, one that we in which we effectively become what's known in programming or in, in computer science, as an optimization problem. You want the person to click and click and click again. Okay, well, let's feed them A and B, oh, they click more on B, well, let's do that, again, with another set A or B. And you just keep doing it. And you keep and this is basically how something like Facebook works. That you extend that kind of thinking that kind of potentially manipulation into I mean, the ability to basically turn us into a, an algorithm for profit.

Nick VinZant 33:31

That's pretty much all the questions that I got, man, is there anything you think that we missed or anything like that? Hmm.

Richard Yonck 33:39

As I say, if we can imagine that we can build it, if we can take responsibility for the future that we want to see built, we can build that too. But what we have to do along the way, is not just assume that every single new thing is good. We have to be willing to assess as we go along. And in the aftermath, in order to try to protect the kind of future not just that we create for ourselves, but that we leave for future generations.

Nick VinZant 34:16

Oh, let me ask you this, like what's kind of coming up next for you? I know you got some books out

Richard Yonck 34:20

working on the next book, but yes, always out there doing keynotes for different conferences, consulting for business, and certainly writing articles and, and books. So that's kind of my gig. And that's going to continue to be the case for a good number of years yet.

Dating and Trauma Therapist "So My Mom's a Therapist"

From Dating and Relationship struggles to dealing with Anxiety, Trauma and Depression, Lisa with “So My Mom’s a Therapist” has quickly become a trusted voice for hundreds of thousands of people online. We talk dating difficulties, couples counseling, dealing with social anxiety and trauma recovery. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Christmas Characters.

Lisa: 01:59ish

Pointless: 30:13ish

Top 5: 50:39ish

https://www.instagram.com/somymomsatherapist/ (Lisa’s Instagram)

https://www.tiktok.com/@somymomsatherapist (Lisa’s TikTok)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvOaBpMIiAY (Lisa’s YouTube)

somymomsatherapistpodcast@gmail.com (Lisa’s Email, Podcast Coming Soon)

Interview with “So My Mom’s a Therapist”

Nick VinZant 0:10

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, therapy insights, and the best Christmas characters

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 0:23

is I think, actually, it's worse now than it was even a year ago that we're really seeing the fallout now, I think people are looking for a placeholder for their anger. And it has more to do with them being hurt. And so I have a tendency to turn to the people that are so angry and bitter and say, I'm so sorry for what you were hurt. I'm so sorry. Whoever hurt you, that got you to a place that you hate them that much. Because that's the real issue. Our bodies are wired, are wired to put out fires, not to plant flowers. But where we need to go is we need to work how do I intentionally build things that are calm, pleasant, joyful, to offset the hard things in life, and that's when life starts to feel really good. I want

Nick VinZant 1:01

to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like download, subscribe, share, leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So we all know that we're dealing with difficult times, there's a lot of people who are struggling with a lot of different things. And there should be no shame, or stigma attached to that in any way. If somebody says that they need help. Our first guest is a dating and trauma counselor who specializes in dating and relationships, anxiety, stress, and depression. And over the last few months, she has gained a large social media following by really giving people good advice, actionable advice that might change their lives. This is Lisa, who's best known by her account name. So my mom's a therapist. Want to ask you this question first? How does somebody know when they need to go into therapy or when they should go and see a therapist.

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 2:07

So if you are not functioning super well, you're having a hard time doing the things that you need to do to make life happen, eating sleeping relationships showing up for your job, right? If you're feeling like you're just primal functioning is not working? Well, for sure. That's a yes. But a good portion of it is just really navigating life. So I'll have people too, who just want another set of eyes, helping them navigate life, especially because I work with a lot of teenagers and 20. Somethings just needing help needing help and needing direction. Or if you feel like you're not thriving in life, there's a difference between surviving and thriving. And if you feel like you're not thriving in life, that's another reason to reach out to Becky, there's got to be more than this. This is This can't be it.

Nick VinZant 2:47

So I'll use an example from my life, somebody who recently started going to therapy. But it was such a gradual thing, that they didn't really notice it until all of a sudden, I was like, oh my god, like I need help. Like, how do you notice the thing you don't notice and know that you need to get help?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 3:05

You know, I think that's one of the this is probably the one probably one of the biggest questions I get asked is like, how do I get my husband to go to therapy? How do I get my child to go to therapy, and you can't force somebody. And that's the hard part is because until you are at a place where you're willing to or you're recognizing or you're able to take the steps to come in, it's pointless to get somebody there anyways. Because I know what kind of work goes on in the room. And you kind of have to be in a place where you're ready to say, I'm aware of this, I see it. Okay, now I need to do something because honestly, it's hard work. It is hard work. So what you can do, if you have people around you, you can just gently point things out, you know, I noticed, I noticed you're having a hard time or you know, I'm noticing this is not it's not working super well for you. Or if you're in a relationship with them saying, you know, this is not working well for me. And I know this isn't working well for you. But I'm not sure we can help ourselves here. And I use that we language too. So it's not like I'm attacking somebody.

Nick VinZant 4:01

Have you seen a difference kind of in the number of people and the concerns that people have coming to you in the last couple of years? You know, everybody says the pandemic it's such a difficult time. But are you seeing changes in people's behavior?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 4:14

Oh, I mean, it is a it's a conversation daily with colleagues. I actually I don't have anybody to refer to right now. Because everybody I would refer to as waiting lists. I have a waiting list. I'll take only really complicated cases at this point. And I work probably way more than I should because it is I think actually it's worse now than it was even a year ago that we're really seeing the fallout now. And it's one of those things I think takes us a little bit to catch up with even people that felt like they were doing like they liked COVID teenagers or 20 Somethings or like yeah, their little social anxiety cells were like, Oh, we get to go indoors. We don't have to be around people and I would say well, that works until it doesn't 12 So now you have to go out and be around people again and it's like 100 fold. So really seeing a lot of kids that are really struggling you really, really struggling? Usually out of my caseload, I'll have like, one or two that are like suicidal, I now carry about five or six. So and I know I'm not an anomaly. So I think we're really taking a huge toll on people we are, we are meant to be around people. We are tribal. We are, we are relational. And if we are not around people physically around people feeling energy, it greatly impacts our mental health greatly.

Nick VinZant 5:24

I have some people in my life that have struggled with it, but then they've withdrawn so into themselves, that they almost can't go back into the world. What advice would you give to somebody that's like, Okay, how do I, how do I start dating again? How do I go to work and have to see people again, like that? I know that like, that might not sound like a difficult thing. But I think for some people that really is,

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 5:48

oh, no, it really is, oh, it really I think, started we need to search as validating it. And that's where I start with like, well, hold on, like, this is hard, it is hard. And I really give it like the space, it needs to be like this is really hard. And sometimes people will beat themself up for it, or they just avoid and don't want to deal with it. And I really just honored to say that this is huge. This is really tough. And this is hard work. And so what I'm looking for is when I'm working with somebody, let's let the idea of getting back out into the world or dating again, since that happens to be happens to be the niche I fell into is a lot of dating and relationships is what I try to do is you just start small. So it's almost like exposure therapy, but the sense of like, let's start low hanging fruit. Let's look something like when you check out, go see if you can go to Target. See if you can find find the most non threatening person don't find the hot guy or the hot girl you'd want to talk to you. If you're looking to date, go find like the little old man or woman who's checking you out at Target. Ask them how their day is just strange, very slick. Just do that. If you stress out or freak out, okay, don't go back again, you find another target, find another Starbucks, but the low hanging fruit just to try to get our bodies to having a positive experience, but keeping it really small, where they can have also a sense of accomplishment. And like, Okay, I did that. And then building from building from there. But again, I think a lot of people too. They don't want to deal with it now. So they're like, no, no, like, I'm good. I mean, all I have to do is look all over tic tock to be like, I don't need anybody. I'm good all on my own. And I'm like, well, that again that that works until it does until you're you're lonely and you're wanting a partner wanting connection.

Nick VinZant 7:19

That's what I always worry about with friends of mine, like, Okay, you stayed in your house for two years. But you're 45 and single and you want to have children like what are you going to do?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 7:27

Yeah, yeah. And then and that's where I always like, there's only one road in if I want to have a family or want to have a partner, you got to go down that path. So at some point, we got to figure that path out because there's not another another route. And, you know, tell me if this is too much of a tangent off your question. But what I've often noticed is people because of their anxiety, when it comes to that, they will, they'll swing in and out, you know it, they'll swing, so it's like, I'm never dating, I'm not going out. I'm not dating anymore, I'm fine on my own. And then when they do decide to date, it's like they swing all in with with very few muscles. Now remember, their muscles have atrophied because they've been at home for two years haven't dated. And then they go to try to go back into the dating app world. And they're like, Alright, I'm pulling up my sleeves, I'm going back in and then it's like a shit show. And they're like, oh, like, like, this is horrible. This is it. I never want to do it again. So they swing back out. And again, it's there's that like, all it's like the diet mentality. It's like I'm either fully dieting, or I'm fully like, you know, eating everything in sight. And what we're what I encourage and what we're looking for is no, no, how do we start to thread it in? We want a lifestyle? How do we create a lifestyle? Just like a lifestyle of eating a food? How do we create a healthy lifestyle of dating? Which is, how do I just dip a toe in and then come on out, you know, get you get build that muscle slowly over time, so I can build an endurance. So I'm not swinging into this, like all in or all out of dating?

Nick VinZant 8:48

What are some of the other issues that you're usually seeing people are treating people for?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 8:54

You know, um, I would say a lot of lot of depression, a lot of suicide, a lot of self harm I get I'm working within a population of a lot of teenagers. A lot of anxiety, social anxiety, OCD, I'd say both of those. And then a lot of academic issues from people who haven't had a lot of academic issues before because we lost the external value validation and being in the classroom and getting all the attention for the teacher. And so a lot of people that really hadn't been thriving up to this point are not, not not thriving.

Nick VinZant 9:23

I may edit this question out because I want to ask you something. But then when I look back on it, it may sound like a really stupid comment. So may edit this out. But like, Have we lost any kind of toughness at all? Like have we become where everything is the end of the world?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 9:43

Yeah. Gosh, that's such a good question. Because there's so much there's so much to say that the minute I want to be able to say yeah, we've lost that toughness. Part of me wants to be like No, no, I I've seen people with a high level of grit. I've seen people I call it a high level of grit, which is that sense of self, I don't look around, I don't look at that and be like, Oh my gosh, that's a huge mountain, I have to Oh my gosh, I can't do anything about it. Grit is like, I don't look up at the mountain, I just put one foot in front of the other, and I just do what I need to do. And once I get over the mountain, and over to the other side, look back and be like, holy cow, I can't believe I made it over that now. And I've seen that and I see people with a high level of grit. Do I also see people that look at that mountain, and have a tendency to look at the mount and be like, I can't do anything? I can't. That's too big. This is actually not my problem. This is not about me. It's about that the mountains too big. Right? I can't do this. Do I see that as well? Yes. Do I see more of that in a younger generation than I've seen before? Yes. Yes. I don't see as much grit. However, does that mean that it's not here? No, I, there's always exceptions. And you'll always see that.

Nick VinZant 10:50

I would say though, and correct me if I'm wrong here too. Right. Like you and I are both have an older generation. And I feel like older generations always look at younger generations, like oh, they gone soft. Right. So there is kind of like, kids today. Yeah, there's some of that too, you know,

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 11:06

apps. Absolutely. But I also feel like there's an element here, we need to take in consideration and you told me to if this is too far off base, but that is it, given because of the because of social media, because of internet, the main voices in our lives growing up were teachers, you know, coaches, parents, you know, whatever your local community was, those were the voices in our life. And now the younger generation, they're a lot of their voices, a lot of them, they fired their parents, and a lot of them the voice the main voices in their life are influencers, influencers, who are who are still trying to figure out the world themselves. So do I see the more overwhelmed or more kind of losing their way than previous generations? Yes, they do.

Nick VinZant 11:50

I would say too, and kind of that conversation, too, is like the gatekeeper isn't there anymore, like the people that you and I used to grew up listening to, they were generally the experts in the field. And now it's kind of could be anybody with any kind of thing to say, yeah. And if it resonates with that person, like, I'm not a therapist, but I had a boyfriend once, right? It's kind of a good friend, right? Whatever. That's

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 12:11

exactly how I ended up going on Tik Tok was five and a half months ago, I was looking over my daughter. So I was on Tik Tok. I was looking over my daughter shoulder. And it was a little sweet little 20 year old thing and spandex darling. But she was giving dating advice. And it was, by the way, the worst advice I've ever heard. And I turned to my kids, and I was like, What is this shit? And they were like, oh, yeah, there's like tons of them on tick tock. And I was like, You're kidding me? And I'm like, Yeah, and that's when I started getting on being like, Okay, I got to give some sound advice here. Because this is I'd actually say to do the opposite of what this person says suggested, and a lot of them actually breeding hate for men and hate for women. And I'm like, Oh, that's not going to get us anywhere.

Nick VinZant 12:48

I want to do something a little bit different than we have. In other episodes, we usually get used. We get a lot of kind of listeners submitted questions, but I want to boil these down, if I can into kind of just broad topics, and just what you think about them? People who are having commitment issues, what would your advice be to them? Like, what should they do?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 13:07

Yeah, you know, I think if it's usually when it's commitment issues, it has to do with our, it has to do with our survival mechanism. Our bodies are wired to protect us, you know, the whole goal of our brain and our body is to protect us and keep us safe and to prevent us from being hurt. So it has more I would my encouragement is if you have commitment issues, it has more to do with your survival mechanism in your body and your fear of getting hurt fight or flight response. And so my encouragement would be how do you find someone like me, a therapist or a social worker to help you learned how to regulate your body? Because if you think that that's going to go away, that's not going to go away? If I just find the right person, this will go away. And it's about how do I learn how to manage and regulate my body when it wants to run because it scared?

Nick VinZant 13:49

Imposter syndrome?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 13:51

I'll speak on that one. So imposter syndrome is this sense of feeling like a fake? You know, so actually, I I'll see, I'll see a therapist, I'll be a therapist to other therapists. And that's actually something that often hears them feeling like I'm an imposter. I'm acting like I have it all together, and I don't you see it in dating, too. It's this sense of I'm putting this false person forward. That's like really not me at all. And feeling like I'm an imposter in my own life. And again, that's where it's really that sense of how do I get back to what who, who really, am I how do I? How do I tend to myself, I love saying this on my videos, but you spend more time in your body and with your thoughts than anybody else on this planet. You spend more time with your with yourself and your own thoughts that anybody else even your spouse on this planet? How do we how do we start to make that the relationship we work on the most? How do I start to actually not just tolerate myself but but like who I am? And believe it or not, that's the best way to attend to that imposter syndrome is to start to who who am I and how do I how do I tend to this relationship with myself?

Nick VinZant 14:52

This person just says, Why do I always date the wrong men? And I think we can we can supplant men with yeah whatever, right? Yeah.

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 15:00

All right. You know, I would say a good a good hunch on that, when I usually go with is that there's something with that that's familiar. we gravitate towards what's familiar, not necessarily what's best for us, but what our body knows. So we will often gravitate towards something our body knows even if it wasn't something we like, like how our parents were how a past relationship when we were young was, but ultimately, a lot of the questions I get asked that goes along with this is like, Why do I always attract the right guys? And like, it's not about whether you attract the right guys? Or the right gals? It's about how do I learn how to communicate? How do I learn to get to know somebody? And how do I learn how to set boundaries, so whether you like me or not, it doesn't matter if you're a good guy, or a good or a bad guy. I'm learning how to set boundaries. So I'm picking somebody, that's a good fit for me.

Nick VinZant 15:44

Um, you know, look, I'll be honest about my family life, and that we have dealt with this in which not getting into the politics of it, let's, let's stay away from that. But like there are a big divide sometimes in families, and we have been separated from family members who have gone down certain roads. But for people who are going into the holidays that time of year, like what advice would you give to somebody that's struggling with family members or a family member, that they may have been alienated from because of political or whatever kind of divides?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 16:14

Yeah, that is so hard. So I would go in and believe it or not, I would go a different direction than most people would would expect. And that is, if you try to think about that person, you don't have control over that person, you don't have control whether whether that person is going to spout off about their political belief, or, or how, or maybe there's tension between family members, the only thing I have control over is myself. So what I really encourage and what I work with people on is like, okay, let's have a plan going into the holidays of how to regulate yourself. So you know, if Uncle Bob starts going off about something that I know, just fires me up, what are my things that I know, help regulate my body, I'm looking for things that shift my nervous system back to a regulated state. So all have things already in place, like going for walks, right going for a walk, be the one to volunteer to go get ice, I'm running to the store, anybody want anything, so that you give yourself away a pendulum eating out regulating your body and coming back in, if you know, your family already keeps you charged the whole time, I have them do what's called a drip system, I'm putting a drip system in of things that will regulate my body, whether I need it or not, whether that means I go into the back room and I take a nap or I go for a walk, or I just put on maybe just put on some music that I know really calms my body down. So I have them put in in a drip system. And I'll also have them do what's called front loading before they go in. front loading is just a term that says I already know I'm going into a stressful event, right? And how do I just really get myself regulated, which means I'm taking deep breaths, I'm really calming my body down. Before I go in knowing it's going to activate me, and I make sure I have a time limit. If my family is really tough. I make sure like me and my partner were like, alright, we got two hours here, we got three hours here so that my body knows, okay, it's limited and ends coming and ends come you got this two more hours, you got this and that makes your body be able to manage it more than feeling like it's stuck in something that's flooding.

Nick VinZant 18:04

Where do we get like most of our issues from? Are they deep seated things that we got in childhood? Or in our teenage years? Or do we like pick something up later on in life?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 18:14

No, it's such a great question. I really believe it's like a slot machine. And it's different for everybody, all of us have such customized unique paths. But two people can have the same experience grew up in the same house have similar experiences, and, and interact with and react in their body in totally different ways. Because we're like a slot machine. Nobody has, it's your DNA mixed with your upbringing mixed with your environment mixed with your individual experiences. And so it's everybody's going to react differently, which is why something may register in your body as traumatic but not traumatic in my body, everybody's different. But all of those it's one of those things that it's as we accumulate different things through life, they're going to impact us, you could have a horrific accident in your 30s. And that, of course that's going to impact you. So but somebody may not have that but have childhood trauma. But I think the one thing that is impartial to everybody is that life, there are hardships that come with life. struggles are not an intrusion of life. They're part of life and some people at offended, offended. Like it's almost like Life is like that's an assault on life. No, no struggles hardship are not an assault on life. They're part of life, learning how to navigate those as our work.

Nick VinZant 19:24

That's the way kind of thing we talked about a little bit earlier. That's like, the hard thing is like, right, like, is this a problem? Or is this a natural struggle of being alive? Because life is kind of supposed to suck? Right? Like me and the other co hosts of this channel we talk about, like 90% of life kind of sucks. You're just doing the same stuff. And it's supposed to be hard and you're supposed to fail over and over and over again. But like when do you know like, you know what? This isn't right. I should probably get some help. See

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 19:52

an island that feisty like reply to me wants to push back and be like, No, like no, like, no, no, no, no life. It's hardships in life as it struggles but but I will, I will, I will fight until I have a life that is like calm and pleasant and joyful. What is the actual goal we're going for. I always tell people imagine like a jar, imagine a jar, what we think life's going to be is like food coloring, where the whole jar is either blue and sucks, or the whole jar, we put a drop of food coloring a pink and we want this, we think life's supposed to be all rose colored. And it's not like that. Instead, imagine a jar, and you're gonna have your hardships, those are little blue balloons that are filled up. Our goal is to say how do I find little balloons to put in my jar of things that are calm, pleasant, joyful, silly to offset it so that when I look at the jar, I can see the blue, but overall, I see pink, bringing in what's going on in our bodies, our bodies are wired to for threat, our bodies are wired to default to threat to put out flowers or to put out fires. This is when I listen, our bodies are wired, are wired to put out fires, not to plant flowers. But where we need to go, is we need to work how do I intentionally build things that are calm, pleasant, joyful, to offset the hard things in life. And that's when life starts to feel really good. Really good. Not perfect, hard balloons are there. But I've worked on building in these things, snacks and meals, little things that are calm and pleasant to start to change the way my feels.

Nick VinZant 21:23

Okay, these are some of the more controversial questions I get. Do people really not know what their issue is? Or do they secretly know what it is? And they just don't do anything about it? Mm

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 21:38

hmm. You know, I, you know, I love that question is because there, there'll be people that come in, who will be like, oh, yeah, I need to work on this, or this spouse is bring. And I will say, Wait, what do you want this to change? Like, do you want it to change? Because just because you know, you have something doesn't mean you necessarily want to get rid of it or want it to change? Because there's, you may lose something. So I don't know if this is answering a question directly. But that is one of the things I always stopped to make sure. Right. The other thing I also make sure when I'm working with a couple, the first I started so do you guys want to work on this? Do you want do you want to be together? Because just because you assume someone's aware of something doesn't mean necessarily that they're, they want it to change, or they want a marriage to work? So you got you got to start with asking them, and also kind of getting down to well, if you didn't change it, did things things got better? Would we lose anything? Is there anything that we would lose? Or there'd be a cost? To

Nick VinZant 22:31

have like this question, this person just says, Am I the problem? And I think what they mean essentially is ultimately depending no matter what happens around people's lives, and we're not talking about like extenuating, extending waiting circumstances, but in general people's lives, are they usually ultimately the cause of the things that are happening to them?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 22:51

You know, I would say that's a combination. Sometimes we are the cause, Sometimes life happens to us, and it has nothing to do with us. But when I look at when I look at that, what I hear even in the question itself, am I the problem? Because nobody wants to find blame. If either you need to be the problem, or I need to be the problem because somebody has to be the problem. Why does somebody need to be the problem, because if I can point to where the problem is, and somebody needs to fix it, that's our brains are built, what our brain is trying to do is say, I don't want to be heard anymore. So I have to be able to identify who's to blame here so I can point to who needs to fix it. Right? As opposed to, so I really shift our mentality to say, Oh, I don't think it's that black and white. Until we take our last breath. We are under construction, and you have an invitation to work on yourself. How I see my life is fully up to me. How I my personal one, one of the biggest things I've noticed with clients, they come in hoping for a lot of changes. And yes, external changes may happen. But the biggest changes happens in their life is when they shift their perspective, how they see their own life. So when it comes to you, how you see your own life, yes, that's fully your responsibility, how your invitation to grow. Yes, that's up to you, that you are in control of that you can work on that you can grow. Some things are out of our control, and they just happen. And that's part of life as well.

Nick VinZant 24:08

Who's more to blame for relationships? Men or women? Who's the problem? Okay, the honest answer the problem?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 24:17

Ah, you know, if, you know, it's this is actually a big theme and people that watch a lot of my tic tock videos, no, because I cannot stand the all men or all women. And so I think the minute we try to point a finger on men or a long finger on women, we actually again, there's that blame again, I was just talking about it's either you're the problem or in the problem. So who are we pointing the finger at the men or the women? And in actuality, I would say we have to leave it individual. We have to give them names. There's some great guys and there's some and there's some not so great guys. There's some great girls and there are some not so great girls, but the minute we start to lump everybody together, it's too easy to start to have hate and bitterness and blame. And by the way, even if I were to say Say, men are the problem that while that does is it prevents women from actually looking themselves and growing and seeing how they can grow in a relationship or vice versa. If I were to say, Oh, these new age women, it's easy. It's these women, then all the men are like, okay, good. There's the problem right there. And all of a sudden, what does that do? It takes the eyes off yourself. And it takes off from yourself and say, oh, where can I grow in relationship? Who do I need to still work on? So the answer I would say, is C, none of the above.

Nick VinZant 25:24

I get I get fired up about that, too. And I see those tick tock videos or videos like all men suck all women sucks, like, no, it's probably just the people you're walking around with. It's like, there's a bunch of good people

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 25:34

and good people. Exactly. And now I'd like to take it okay. Well, okay. Okay, now that you've determined that now, now what? And now it does that make our odds of dating one better? Like we're where do we go from there, because all that does is get us stuck in our own bitterness. And I'm all I always say, I think people are looking for a placeholder for their anger. And it has more to do with them being hurt. And so I have a tendency to turn to the people that are so angry and bitter and say, I'm so sorry for what you were hurt. I'm so sorry. Whoever hurt you, that got you to a place that you hate them that much? Because that's the real issue.

Nick VinZant 26:04

This one's a little bit. This one's a little bit more lighthearted. But after listening to people's problems all day, how can you stand people?

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 26:15

You know, if anything, I'm a true extrovert. And that really energizes me and I love that every hour is different. I think. I think if anything, it makes me love people even more. I just look at us as human beings, myself included, and oh my god bless us look at us go. I mean, look at us trying to figure out this show of a life sometimes. I mean, if anything, it just makes me I think love people even more, but I can tell you, you know, the the way that I the way that I've filled my own tank after working all day is I will grab a glass of wine and watch like bachelor and Paradise or some no brainer TV, like nothing that has to do with me, you find me the trashiest TV show. And that is usually what I'm watching in order to refill my tank. Missing this teenage movies.

Nick VinZant 26:59

I don't know if you can answer this one or not. But most interesting case you've ever had,

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 27:05

you'll actually have permission to share this story because um, she actually started sharing this story publicly. Um, hardest case. And the most endearing to me, probably not interesting, but the most endearing was a mom who lost her seven year old child. And I don't think I don't think you're ever the same after the, and I think to walk with her, and watch these little, little pockets of healing with her. If anything, it just felt like I almost wanted to thank her for letting me be in the room, just to watch her heal. And something to me that just was so life changing. And watch her heart grow and heal. And that Collateral Beauty that comes out of it. It's it's never You never asked for suffering. But the redemptive value are things that come out of it that otherwise wouldn't have and watching a book come out of it a book deal and watching her speaking and that that came out of that and her beautiful heart. That that was that was a journey.

Nick VinZant 28:08

I feel like we should end on a happier question. But that's no there's for people maybe who don't have children and listening to this, like there is no pain or worry like that. Right. And if that's not a road that you decide to go down, or one that you're blessed with like that is

Lisa - "So My Mom's a Therapist" 28:28

I can, I can if we want to learn a little later no to I can't tell you probably the most fun situation I got got to work with it was very high. So I get an opportunity every now and then to work with somebody in the industry. And I had somebody that reached out not didn't honestly want to see me for therapy. But it was just very short term. But they had gotten a role on a primetime television show. And they needed it to be a teenager. That was extremely a mean mean girl and she couldn't access a mean girl because she wasn't a mean girl. And my job was actually to do her psychological work to get her into a place where she'd had hurt or pain in her childhood, which she hadn't had to get her to be this like kind of mean girl and then also to make sure I could get her out of it. So I actually was doing the opposite of what I do in therapy is how do we get you to a place where you're acting out? Lashing out and doing everything you shouldn't be doing? And then how do I make sure we can get you back to where it used to be. So that was actually that was kind of fun. That was very interesting.

Nick VinZant 29:26

So you can help people and fuck them up. That's it. I found a new tool I have. I want to thank Lisa so much for joining us if you want to connect with her. We have linked to her on our social media accounts. We're Profoundly Pointless on Instagram, Twitter and Tik Tok, and we have also included her information in the episode description. If you feel like you or someone you know needs help, don't hesitate to reach out. I can tell you that. therapy has made a profound difference in the lives of people that I know. Okay, now let's bring in John Shaw, and get to the pointless part of the show. I have two questions for you. One, have you ever considered going to therapy or felt like you needed to go get therapy? And two? Would you rather be an elf? Or a reindeer? For?

Electric Violinist Mia Asano

From her music to her viral videos, Mia Asano is bringing something new to a classic instrument. We talk Electric Violins, the pressure to be perfect and the highs and lows of sudden social media fame. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Things We Wish We Were Better At.

Mia Asano: 01:39ish

Pointless: 30:06ish

Top 5: 44:00

https://open.spotify.com/track/1ueJotDhUqui1VJp0piINB?si=438e7ae7d84740a9 (Mia Asano Spotify Music)

https://www.instagram.com/miaasanomusic/ (Mia Asano Instagram)

https://www.tiktok.com/@miaasanomusic?is_copy_url=1&is_from_webapp=v1 (Mia Asano TikTok)

https://www.youtube.com/c/MiaAsano/videos (Mia Asano YouTube)

https://miaasano.onuniverse.com/ (Mia Asano Website)

https://www.facebook.com/miaasanomusic (Mia Asano Facebook)

Interview with Violinist Mia Asano

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, violins and things we wish we were better at

Mia Asano 0:22

when I was around age 13, I discovered electric violins. And then for me, it was game over from there like that I was like, This is what I have to do, I have to get my hands on an electric violin, playing violin is very, very difficult. And you're trying to train your muscle memory so that your fingers go to that exact perfect 10th of a millimeter spot every single time. And so, it really takes a lot out of you what ended up happening, I was going through kind of a period of questioning myself musically and I was feeling a lot of imposter syndrome. I posted this one video, and I woke up the next morning with 100,000 followers and I was at the grocery store and I started crying.

Nick VinZant 1:01

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like download, subscribe, share, leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So I think the best way to introduce our first guest is to let you hear her music

this is electric violinist. Mia Sano was it always the violin for you? Or did you try other instruments and then find the violin?

Mia Asano 1:44

When I was five years old, I was given the choice from my parents. They said you could play a violin, guitar or piano. And I chose the violin. And, you know, I could have had other opportunities to try other instruments throughout the years, but I kind of just fell in love with the violin right away and basically never looked back.

Nick VinZant 2:02

What was it about it?

Mia Asano 2:04

Um, it's hard. Recalling back to my five year old brain, I think I just probably liked the look and sound of it the most,

Nick VinZant 2:13

I would say that probably the violin is the coolest looking instrument to play.

Mia Asano 2:19

I would I agree with that. I think both a typical acoustic classical violin, I think it looks beautiful. And it's one of my favorite instruments. But then when I was around age 13, I discovered electric violins. And then for me, it was game over from there like that I was like, This is what I have to do, I have to get my hands on an electric violin. And that's why what I do normally now is I play both acoustic violin and electric violin. But I would say my primary at the moment, and what I'm known for most is being an electric violinist.

Nick VinZant 2:53

So with me knowing absolutely nothing about violins besides what they're called strings. What's what's the difference between your kind of classical violin and an electric violin like what's, what's the difference there.

Mia Asano 3:10

So, classical violin, it's also called, I mean, I call it an acoustic violin, but a lot of people recognize it as a classical violin. So you go to an orchestra and you see people playing these wooden instruments, that's, that's a violin. And typically, they have four strings, the string notes are E, A, D, and G. A lot of the time people who play it will focus on the, the music of the classical tradition. So you know, your Bach and your Beethoven and your Mozart. And that's, that's a typical like classical violin. You also see though fiddle players, they'll play on acoustic violin as well, but they call them a fiddle. And, and that's what when people typically think of a violin, that's what they think. An electric violin can take many shapes and forms because it doesn't rely on the body of the instrument to project the sound. So as you can see, in a classical violin, it's hollow inside. And so through those little squiggly s looking things on the on the instrument, the sound comes through those they're called the F holes. And the instrument itself is projecting the sound out. But on an electric violin, a lot of the time the body of the instrument is solid, or it looks really weird. Like they can make them look as weird as they want. There's this one maker that makes them look like skulls, or there's one the one that I play on. It's called a viper, from wood violins, and it looks like a flying V electric guitar, and it has frets and seven strings. And so what an electric violin allows you to do and why I became obsessed with them really quickly, is they're really similar to electric guitars. So you can play you can plug it into like a guitar effects pedal rig, and so I can put distortion on it. I can make it sound like an electric guitar, I can put all these different crazy effects on it and make It sound like not even like a violin anymore. So something I'm really passionate about is just breaking the boundaries of, you know, I was classically trained for 16 years, I still play classical music, and I love it. In addition to that, I have all these other musical interests like rock and pop, and electronic music. And my electric violin allows me to play those and play stylistically more appropriately in the setting. If I'm in a rock band, then I can plug in and play rock music instead of then I'll go play fiddle tunes with my Celtic band on my acoustic violin. So that's that's the difference.

Nick VinZant 5:33

Is there any kind of animosity there between like the classical violinists and the electric violinist like all these kids, their damn electric violins?

Mia Asano 5:43

Um, yes. There's different. You know, I think this is true in any community, when people do something that's different. And that kind of breaks from tradition, there are going to be purists who take offense to it. I've experienced incredible support from musicians in the classical community who see what I'm doing. And they think, like, I really love that because it's, it's taking the violin to a new level that's opening it up to new audiences, and blah, blah, blah, then there's other people and I get quite a bit of hate comments on my social media platforms, from people who say, I've been told that I'm a disgrace to the classical violin world, I've been told that there's like kind of an ongoing joke from some YouTube channel of people calling it calling my electric violin sacrilegious. So and I know it's kind of like an internet joke. So I, I don't take offense to it or get upset by it. But you know, there's a lot of people who will be like, That's a sacrilegious file and just play an acoustic violin play a classical violin. And there's a lot of people who, because, admittedly, to be a classical violinist, it takes a lot of work. There are people that are practicing like six to eight hours a day. And you know, I grew up doing that I was I was in deep in the classical world. So I have a lot of respect for the classical community, I'm still I still consider myself a part of it in addition to the other stuff that I do. But there's people that have to put in so much work to play this music that is so intensely difficult. So to see someone playing an electric violin, there's a lot of misunderstandings, people think that it takes less skill to play an electric violin, which is not true. And there are people that think that because I'm playing pop music, or rock music, people who are putting in six hours a day practicing this intense classical music, some of them, some of them get offended. They're like what you're doing is so easy compared to how much work I've had to put it's, I think it's a it's a misunderstanding, because I still have to put in a lot of work,

Nick VinZant 7:39

when you look at kind of an orchestra is a violin a harder instrument to play than, say, like, the saxophone and the, like, when people like, Ooh, you got to be good to play the violin.

Mia Asano 7:55

People have to work very, very hard no matter what you play. So that's, that's the caveat. That being said, a playing violin is very, very difficult. And I feel very fortunate that I started when I was young, because I'm like, Okay, I didn't I didn't come up with this. Itzhak Perlman, a very famous violinist said this, he said, you could take a beginner and sit them down at a piano and try to teach them Twinkle twinkle little star, sit them down at a piano and sit them down at a violin. By the end of the day. On the piano, it'll sound like Twinkle twinkle little star on the violin, you have no idea what it's gonna sound like. Because you're dealing with the bow, which has the potential to sound so horrible if you don't know what you're doing with it. Whereas, so like, I think on any instrument, it can be very difficult to play the repertoire, like the difficult repertoire. On the violin, a lot of my students struggle a lot with making it not sound like screeching or that type of stuff. It's very challenging. So I'm glad I started when I was young, because I joke that it takes you about 10 years to kind of figure out how to make it sound not terrible. And then after that, hopefully you're good enough that you can get into a music school.

Nick VinZant 9:06

So why is it so difficult, um,

Mia Asano 9:09

so definitely, the bow adds a whole nother level because you're not just there's there's so much potential, like I just mentioned for the bow to sound scratchy or screechie. The other really difficult part is on the instrument itself. You want your notes to play in tune. And on the violin, there's about a 10th of a millimeter of space where you're playing the exact right note, and if your finger is anywhere around that perfect spot, you're out of tune. And so unlike on a guitar where you put your finger down between the frets, and that's the correct note, or on a piano where as long as hopefully the piano is in tune, you press the key and it's in tune on the violin. You could put your finger down in the right spot, and I'm putting finger quotations the right spot. And it could still be the note, but not the perfectly in tune notes. So I used to spend, I would have a violin lesson and we would spend the entire hour working on one measure of music, because I would be, I wouldn't be playing that note perfectly in tune. And then a lot of the time on violin, you're playing chords. So that's multiple notes at the same time. And you have to play those notes. So they perfect are perfectly in tune with each other. So the way I would do that is I would play it and adjust my fingers slowly, until I can hear them ringing them in the most beautiful Intune way. And then I would take my hand off the instrument, I put it back on the instrument and try it again. And you're trying to train your muscle memory so that your fingers go to that exact perfect 10th of a millimeter spot every single time. And so it really takes a lot out of you, I will say. And then my electric violin has frets on it. And so it looks like guitar frets. But contrary to popular belief, I have a lot of people that think that because I have frets on my electric violin automatically, I can play in tune. So people will say you're cheating because your frets on your electric, the frets don't actually help me play in tune, because it's the same way as on my classical violin, I have a 10th of a millimeter on the electric violin that's perfectly in tune. The frets just serve as like a physical reference point. If I'm playing live and I can't hear myself, then I can see and feel where the notes are supposed to go. Because again, on the violin, you can put your finger anywhere, and not if you can't hear yourself you don't know if that's in tune or not. You're constantly listening and adjusting to make sure everything is perfectly intonated.

Nick VinZant 11:35

So what makes a really like somebody like yourself, what makes a good violinist really good

Mia Asano 11:42

for me personally, I judge it more based on did you make me feel something with what you just played? And that's the mark of like a really good violinist for me.

Nick VinZant 11:49

When people kind of do that when they put their own kind of signature on it. Right? Like can people like myself hear the difference? Or is it mainly just people like you that will be able to hear the difference?

Mia Asano 12:00

Um, I think a trained violinist will be able to hear the difference because again, there's typically a an ideal way to play something. But the thing is, everyone has a different view of the right way to play a piece. Like, for example, kind of the composer that is highly revered for violinist is Bach. Because he wrote these incredible Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin that are so difficult. And to play them beautifully is a really incredible, they're they're meant to be played in churches, like it's a very, like, sacred piece of music for you to be able to play as a violinist. It's also really hard to play it well. And every single violinist in the world has a different idea of like the correct and proper way to play it. So what I learned is you can't really please everyone. I also learned from a teacher of mine, that if I'm going to go play violin for like an audition for an orchestra, and I go and playing Bach, chances are the way that I've interpreted it is not gonna be the same as the way that the auditioner has interpreted

Nick VinZant 13:03

it, the music that your own music now, is that something that you've written? Or is that more of a stylistic interpretation of things?

Mia Asano 13:10

It's both so for my own music, because yeah, what I mostly do nowadays, is alternative contemporary styles of music. So, again, pop rock, electronic, Celtic music, I go to the Berklee College of Music. So I've been studying jazz and r&b. There's all these different other styles of music that the violin is capable of. And what I mostly do is, well, I released original music, and I do write and release original music. So I actually just put out a single, and it's called lunar. And it's an kind of a pop electronic, violin track, but I co wrote it with a professor of mine, Jason attic, who's an incredible jazz violinist. So with him, we kind of put a jazzy bluesy spin on parts of it while still collaborating with some electronic producers to make it very, like pop electronic. So that's kind of the style of music I'm trying to go in. But then on my social media, so what happened is about a year ago, I sort of accidentally had some videos go viral on Tik Tok and Instagram. And that was me kind of just doing pop covers, covering different like songs that were trending. And there was a pretty big public reaction to it. People really enjoyed it. It really liked the electric violin that I was playing on. So a lot of what I do nowadays is playing covers and short, just short, fun daily videos that I put out, just for fun.

Nick VinZant 14:40

Were you surprised by the reaction that you had? Because I saw some stuff? It was like 10 Let's call it 20 million, whatever however many millions it is but were you surprised by people's reaction to

Mia Asano 14:51

it? Um, I was I was I was surprised. I'll be honest, because what ended up happening I was going through kind of a period of calm questioning myself musically and I was feeling a lot of imposter syndrome. This was kind of like in the middle of the pandemic, when it was like that dark time when everyone was like, Oh my gosh, like, Will this be over and I was definitely feeling that. So just to kind of bring myself out of my slump and to try to come back to play music that I feel felt passionate about. I started posting videos, kind of secretly on on Tik Tok. You know, I didn't know much about the platform. I just kind of woke up one day and I had this idea to, I was like, Okay, there's all these trends that go around on Tik Tok. What if I did those, those trending things, but as electric violin covers, so I started doing it, I'm not really expecting anything to happen. Like, obviously, it'd be nice to have your video go viral. But I wasn't really like setting out like, Oh, I'm going to try to get Tik Tok famous. What ended up happening though, is because I got really clear on, I want to be authentically myself, I want to help people and make people happy, I want to. And then I've been honing my video editing skills and my audio editing skills throughout the pandemic. So all of that kind of combined into this perfect storm, where within a week of me posting every day on the app, I posted this one video, just totally not expecting anything to happen. I threw it together in like a half hour just like threw it up on the internet. And I went to the store with a friend. And as I'm leaving the store, I look in the video had 36,000 views. And I was like oh my gosh, and it kept climbing and climbing. And by the end of the night, it had 2 million views. And I woke up the next morning with 100,000 followers and I was at the grocery store and I started crying. I was like how I was not expecting that. I couldn't believe that it happened literally overnight. He there was like a really positive response to it. And that was so meaningful to me because again, I'm coming off of months of feeling so uninspired and sad and and feeling lost musically.

Nick VinZant 16:56

Are you ready for some listener? Some harder slash listener submitted questions? Yeah, let's do it. hardest song to play,

Mia Asano 17:04

hardest song to play? The hardest song to play? I think that's really subjective. It depends on the person's abilities. That being said, I think any Paganini is extremely difficult. He's this incredible composer who wrote these caprices, like to be a violinist that can play a Paganini Caprice is very, very impressive. And then any of like the bigger name of violin concertos, I would say are very difficult.

Nick VinZant 17:31

Have you ever had a violin related injury?

Mia Asano 17:35

Yes, I have had many violin related injuries. I was in an orchestra in high school. And we were rehearsing, I think, to play at like Carnegie Hall, like, which was a very cool experience. But we were having these like really long, intense rehearsals. And I it was like 17 hours over the course of two days. And I remember not knowing at the time I was young, I didn't know how to warm up and stretch before you played. I didn't know the importance of that. And because it was so intense, and I was playing for so long. And I didn't have the best posture. I've learned since then. But I my shoulder started hurting. And then for the next few years, every time I would play my shoulder would hurt my left shoulder. So finally in college, I went into the physical therapist at my school and I was like, Hey, I've had the shoulder pain for the last four years. Can you help me and I went to a sports doctor and they diagnosed it as coracoid impingement. And then throughout the course of that year, I also developed tendinitis in my hands and forearms, and a lot of musicians. A lot of violinists that I know have these types of injuries just from it's called an overuse injury. Because, again, there are people that are practicing eight or nine hours a day, so like of course, you're going to overuse it at some point.

Nick VinZant 18:57

So then, is the violin the most dangerous instrument?

Mia Asano 19:02

Well, any instrument any instrumentalists can injure themselves like pianists, you know, guitar, like all of the ins I don't know a single I have a friend from high school who was an incredible, who is an incredible percussion player. And, you know, they were playing a marimba so much that they ended up with these forearm injuries. So it's not just violin it's, they call us small muscle athletes. So you know, you have your big muscle athletes, like a soccer player or football player. Musicians like technically, according to the sports doctors that I've talked to, that's why I had to go to a sports doctor. You know, we're exercising these small muscles in our hands and our fingers and our neck and our shoulders. Depending on the answer like drummers are using their legs. Yeah. So anyone is really there's potential for injury for anyone if you don't know the right types of if you don't have to take care of your body. And if you're overdoing it, and unfortunately, a lot of young people because we're not taught how to take care of ourselves. We're just taught, practice a lot and get better. Do

Nick VinZant 20:04

people go nuts driving the playing the violin? Like, I feel like it's the kind of thing that you could you would have to be like so obsessed with? Kind of like, I don't know if you've ever seen the movie Black Swan or something like that, yes, the pressure and all that stuff, like, Does that happen to people,

Mia Asano 20:19

um, I wouldn't specifically say like, go nuts. But, um, there's a lot of burnout, that I also have experienced at times, there is a lot of pressure because everyone's kind of competing for similar jobs because this, it's dependent on the person, but a lot of the jobs for violinists are playing in an orchestra, for example, and there's only a certain number of seats in that orchestra. And a lot of those people in the orchestra have kind of a almost like permanent position, it's very hard to get a job in those settings, unless you're really, really good. And to be really, really good, you need to practice really, really hard. And so, you know, people are competing for limited seats, there's very limited, limited jobs available. And so as a result, it can be discouraging for some people. For other people, it's the thing that they want to do the most, and they love it the most, and nothing will deter them from that. And I think for any musician, like, that's what it takes to make it far as a musician is you have to have that internal drive and passion where it's almost like, you can't do anything else, like you have to do this. And then it's worth it. It's worth it to put all that time and energy into it. Like they say, life is suffering. So what you should, you should need to find the thing that it's worth suffering for him.

Nick VinZant 21:41

Most expensive violin you've ever played?

Mia Asano 21:45

Oh, no, um, the most expensive one I've ever played is definitely like, I don't think they let me touch one of the million dollar ones. But they can get that expensive. I've played ones in the, like 50 to $100,000 range, but just like what I'm out of violin shop, like, and they have one there and they let me touch it, you know, like, and but that is the range of a lot of violence. A lot of higher end violins, they can get that expensive. They can range from like $200 that you can buy, like online, from there all the way to millions of dollars and bows to like a violin bow like they can get up to like $200,000. Like, they're there, they can be very excited. I know, it just looks like a stick. But it's a really, really important stick. And some of them are made from like this extinct Brazilian tree wood and there's like, and it's like the best thing that you can get. And so it gets really rare. And so, you know, the prices can really vary on different instruments.

Nick VinZant 22:46

Is it rare? Because it I mean, is that expensive? Because it's rare? Or is it that expensive? Because like, oh, that really is a better violin.

Mia Asano 22:55

Um, it's both. I think there's definitely like, like with anything like with fashion or business, whatever, like brand value is a thing. And there's some incredible violin makers from hundreds and hundreds of years ago that made these pieces of art that are just the most incredible, incredibly intricately crafted instruments that are not only just better, but then because like Stradivarius is probably the most commonly known violin maker. So to play on a Stradivarius violin, you know, it's it's very high quality. Also, it's really rare because obviously Stradivarius is not around anymore.

Nick VinZant 23:29

coolest place you've ever played.

Mia Asano 23:32

Um, there's a couple answers to that. One of them, as I mentioned before, was Carnegie Hall. I toured there with with an orchestra. And it was, it was amazing. Definitely a life changing experience, because it's seen as such a important and incredible venue. But then I've gotten to play some really fun events at different, like nightclubs, and I played at the House of Blues in Boston. And that was really fun. It was that was a really, really fun experience. But definitely, probably Carnegie Hall was my favorite,

Nick VinZant 24:06

best violin related joke.

Mia Asano 24:10

Oh, no. Um, I mean, okay. It's like a thing in orchestras, where, like, we the instruments will make fun of each other. So like, the poor violas and a viola is like a violin. But the tone is a little deeper, the instruments usually bigger, and the strings are different instead of a DG, it's a DGC. So in an orchestra, you have your first violins sitting next to them or the second violence. Then you have the violas and the next level of the cellos. Right. And so all the instruments will kind of give each other a hard time and people will make specifically they'll make jokes about the viola and then the violas will fire back with jokes about the violins, but like, it'll be really funny, like funny but also kind of like, they'll they'll try to insult each other like, oh, like, what's the best best note you can hear or the best sound that you can make from a violin? The sound of it hitting a trash can or something like that. I don't know.

Nick VinZant 25:03

Do you check your VAT? When you fly? Do you check your violin and carry on? Or do you bring it with you? Or why do you check your violin? Or do you bring it with you

Mia Asano 25:13

never, ever, ever check your violin because the violin is so delicate that like even when the weather changes, my violin will freak out. And also, as you now know, violins can get pretty expensive. So I'm not trying to replace my violin every time I check it, and it gets broken. So because the air pressure is changing, and stuff like that, so then there's been a bunch of violinists who have tried to get on airplanes. And sometimes I've heard horror stories about the airline trying to force them to check the violin, and you can't because it'll, it'll break it. I feel really bad for cello players, though, what they have to do is either one of my roommates is a cellist and he will either like take the risk and check the cello but put it in like this really intense like case with all this padding in it and just like take the risk or cellist will have to buy a second plane ticket for their cello. And I have some friends that have done it. My brother's a cellist. So if he were to travel with his cello, he would have to buy a second plane ticket and just sit next to it on the flight. And, and yeah,

Nick VinZant 26:21

that's got to be a weird feeling. Yeah, that's got to be strange. Like, sitting here with my cello. Having like, the cello is just in the middle seat. Not only

Mia Asano 26:34

do you have to do this thing, man, like no, this is this child. You got to put it in its seat belt, Jada, offered a drink. It's it's a it is a wrapper of the plane.

Nick VinZant 26:46

Yeah. It is. You paid for the ticket? You better get those snacks for it. Yeah, since

Mia Asano 26:51

but like, yeah, that would demand it. A lot of people will rent instruments and whatever city they're in. Or like for tours and stuff, even if people are flying. Sometimes they'll have like a driver drive all the instruments to the next location. Like it depends, like people find ways around it. But I think like traveling with your instrument is the best way if you can afford it, like obviously, it's a huge expense. But then you're not playing an unfamiliar instrument where you go, but like my high school orchestra, we toured Europe once and went to Austria. And we're playing there and we couldn't bring our cello cello was on the plane. So we just rented cellos when we were there. And the cellist just had to kind of figure out the bass players to they just had to figure it out when they were there. And there was okay.

Nick VinZant 27:32

Let's see, did you just get a flute? Right? What's the little tiny one? Like the piccolo? Yeah, just get? Yeah, put that thing in your pocket. Um, so you've said some words that I didn't definitely recognize. Best piece of violin lingo.

Mia Asano 27:47

Best piece of violin lingo. There's so much it's so cool. And that's the thing is I've been exposed to like German and Italian and sometimes Spanish, because there's all these different in the music does all these different markings, and you got to learn what they mean. So let's see, a lot of people will ask me, Can you play your violin without a bow? And that's actually one of my most viral videos, was me answering that question? And the answer is, yes, you just pluck the string with your finger and it's called pizzicato. So, or for short pits. I like that one a lot. There's I like ricochet. That's where you kind of bounce your ball on the strings. But every time the ball bounces, you play a note. So sounds really cool. I like glissando, that's when you slide into a note. And I do that all the time. There's, I mean, there's so many I could just go on and on and on.

Nick VinZant 28:41

Oh, those are good one. Now is the do is your new album out now? Yeah,

Mia Asano 28:48

um, then the single is out, I'm in the process of writing the album. But the single, I just dropped it on October 20. So it's been out for a couple months now. And people have been really supportive of it. It's on all streaming platforms. And it's also I did a music video in a laser light studio. And that's up on YouTube. So I'm really excited about it.

Nick VinZant 29:08

That's pretty much all the questions that I have, is there anything that you think that we missed or anything like that?

Mia Asano 29:15

No. The last thing I want to say though, is I appreciate when people are open minded about what the violin is capable of. And that's my passion in life is showing people that the violin can break a lot of boundaries and isn't, doesn't need to be intended for just one style or another. You know, there's so many capabilities and the most important thing is to find what speaks to you and pursue that and find what makes you happy. Because there's space for everyone to and if everyone's doing the same thing, then collectively, we can all support each other and that's the best thing we can do.

Bodyflier Inka Cagnasso

Inka Cagnasso spends her life in the air. Sometimes she has a parachute, sometimes she doesn’t. We talk Bodyflying, the awesome power of wind tunnels and the beauty of flight. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Places You Don’t Want to Be Stranded.

Inka Cagnasso: 01:31ish

Pointless: 27:51

Top 5: 47:26

https://www.instagram.com/inkacagnasso (Inka Cagnasso Instagram)

Interview with Bodyflier Inka Cagnasso

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, body flying, and getting stranded,

Inka Cagnasso 0:22

sometimes in the middle of flight, I kind of catch myself thinking like, This is so insane that this is actually possible that I can just be airborne here and, and fly, which is something that so many people dream off. I've been knocked out once in freefall. But I kind of I was like space off for a moment, I remember opening my eyes realizing that no one's there. And I just like, I wish that I could still get the experience that I could walk into a wind tunnel and see someone fly for the first time without understanding that at all, because he must be insane to watch.

Nick VinZant 0:53

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest spends her life flying. Sometimes she has a parachute. Sometimes she doesn't. This is body flyer. Inka can Jaso real quick, when we talk about body flying, that can be done both jumping out of an airplane and in a wind tunnel. And during this conversation we kind of switch back and forth between those. So I just wanted to clarify real quick what is body flying

Inka Cagnasso 1:31

buddy flying the term good refer to a few different things. But basically you're maneuvering and airflow or freefall with your buddy. Like you end up moving from place to another or doing moves like flips or, or something like this. Wow, did

Nick VinZant 1:47

you get into it?

Inka Cagnasso 1:48

I started skydiving first. I really liked it. But it wasn't really like I didn't fall in love with it until I went for the wind tunnel which is like a something that we use as a tool for skydivers really often to improve your freefall skills. And I'm a dancer from my background. And when I got into the winter, I was like alright, this suddenly makes sense. Like this is kind of like a new type of a dance studio dance floor like, whereas before I could do a few scabs a day, get a few minutes of freefall, maybe learn a little bit of something new. Suddenly good actually start training and improving my freefall skills and the body flying skills. So I've never skydive because I'm an adrenaline junkie, I've skydive because I was intrigued by the fact that I can use my body and challenge my body in such a new different way. It's funny, because I've flown for a long time. And I obviously it's kind of like, almost everyday life thing for me now. But sometimes in the middle of flight, I kind of catch myself thinking like, This is so insane that this is actually possible that I can just be airborne here in this in this weird little tunnel. And, and fly, which is something that so many people dream off. I think my favorite part of it is that it gives me this insane feeling of presence. And then you very rarely get to do something where you're so I mean, I guess watersports, but like that you're so connected to an element. And through that, so connected to body,

Nick VinZant 3:23

when you're doing it, what's the difference versus doing it in the tunnel versus kind of doing it outside,

Inka Cagnasso 3:28

we always move towards where we heavy add like it's all about center of gravity and where we shift our weight. But now, it is two completely different sports. Because in one of them, I jump out of an airplane and the risks are different. And I do need to take other things into consideration than just how my body is connected to the airflow. And then in the wind tunnel, it's so much more about just there. And the technical performance side of things. Because I don't have to worry about my parachute. I don't have to worry about the other fliers in freefall. I don't have to think of this kind of stuff. And and also the risks are so different.

Nick VinZant 4:10

Is it one of those situations, and I'll use an example that I'm familiar with. Right? Like I used to do a lot of rock climbing and rock climbing in the gym is fun. It's safer. It's great practice, but like the real thing is outside. Is it the same kind of thing like the people who are in the sport, do they feel the same way?

Inka Cagnasso 4:32

Some people do. But again, it depends on what you're interested in. Because now if you're adrenaline driven when you're skydiving and looking for that adventurous side of it, you're most likely going to prefer skydiving over WinToFlash for me, because I'm so driven by the athletic side of it, I can actually push myself more in the winter. So for me like it's that's why I'm born went on girl that I am a skydiver. I do both. I love both. But I would say I end up doing more complicated things in terms of body flying, when I'm in the window,

Nick VinZant 5:13

what makes you good at it right? Is it the body awareness? Is it just pure strength, like what makes you good at it?

Inka Cagnasso 5:21

There is definitely some presets, like my dancing background really helped me to move towards what I do nowadays, mainly, which is called freestyle. If you watch a freestyle fly, it looks kind of like dance, dancing, acrobatic moves. But I don't think I've done a lot of sports in my life. And I've never really been the most talented person. But when I was really into something, I always been the most like the hardest worker, right? So because I loved it so much, when I started playing in a tunnel, like I've really put all my energy and time and effort into it. And I did a lot of work outside of the tunnel, not just the flying time itself to get better. And I watched a lot of videos, and I was living and breathing in the things to do outside, like, for my discipline, you need to be strong, and you need to be flexible, and you need to have strength within the flexibility. And now when we get into the airflow, and there's all these different directions and dimensions that we haven't tried before, all of that becomes a lot more complicated, because this

Nick VinZant 6:30

is a safe idea. Like is it safe, safe? Like, should we be doing this

Inka Cagnasso 6:36

in the tunnel, or in this game?

Nick VinZant 6:39

The tunnel seems perfectly safe, right? So I would guess of the sky.

Inka Cagnasso 6:43

You can get hurt in a tunnel too. But it's mainly like you're gonna hit the walls of the net. And it's kind of synchronous stuff. If you're training something like trampolines, or like sometimes you just gonna Yeah, but that's about it. In the sky, we can build a lot more speed. And often, I feel like if you're not a skydiver, you're going to be concerned about like, well is the pass you can open. Like, that's what you're going to be worried about. What I would be worried about when I fly with other people is gliding to with the other people. Because we move fast, right? And if we have opposite forces, you can actually hit each other in freefall with like, a lot of power. And it is not a moment when you want to get hurt or unconscious or something like that. So yeah, there's a lot of accidents that do happen during the freefall time and you need to not only be capable of, you know, flying the things you want to fly, but there's also a bunch of rules about like, how can you how are you allowed to approach formation? How do we break off from the formation at the end of the skydive before we pull to just make it safer?

Nick VinZant 7:47

Have you had any close calls?

Inka Cagnasso 7:49

I've been knocked out once in freefall, which Yeah, this was a long time ago. And there was just a miscommunication. So again, like you usually plan the jump beforehand, you know, where you supposed to be going, what you're doing, who are you looking at? Where are the other people in that formation in relation to you? And yet, something just kind of happened? Mid jump, and it was this huge Norwegian dude who flew into me and kicked me in the head. I had Sonny's on under my helmet. The helmet has like a visor but the visor basically slammed the the Sonny's and the Sonny's broke. So I was pretty lucky that I didn't hurt my my iron. Yeah, where's but I kind of I was like space off for a moment. I remember opening my eyes realizing that no one's there. And I just like, went and pulled my parachute and then figured out what had happened. But I've definitely seen a lot of stuff. And it is risky. And you should never forget. That is. I am. I've been jumping for a long time. But I would consider myself a pretty conservative skydiver because the way I see it is that if I'm doubting if I should go for the next jump, whether it feels like too crazy of a plan for the skydive or the weather conditions are tricky, or I'm tired, and I don't feel like focus no matter what the reason is why I'm doubting myself. I already know that I shouldn't go good. And the worst case scenario is like I'm going to lose that one skydive if I don't go and jump. But if I do go worst case scenario is that it could be my last skydive. And if I already knew that there was a reason why I shouldn't go and jump in. It's really dumb to just not respect the dangers of it. That's how I see it.

Nick VinZant 9:38

Obviously, like, I'm not entrenched in the sport, I only, you know, see the negative headlines every time. Something happens to a skydiver. Are people pushing it too much? Or do we just hear kind of about the incidents that happen? Occasionally.

Inka Cagnasso 9:57

You just hear about the incidents because as a sport It's not really like a large audience sport. So people, you would never see headlines that have anything to do with anything else than accidents. It's probably more dangerous for you to drive to work than it is for me to skydive,

Nick VinZant 10:14

now is his body flying completely different than Wingsuit Flying,

Inka Cagnasso 10:19

I don't base jump, which is when you're jumping off an object, right? However, you can fly wingsuits out of the plane too. Because often people mix like BASE jumping and wings to fly, they're not one thing, there's, you know, when your wingsuit and you're wearing this suit, that adds a lot of surface area to your wing to your body. And then now, that's what you controlling. So obviously has a lot to do with body control, because it's still your body that's moving the fabric, but it's also like the pressure of the air with the fabric that you need to take into consideration. It definitely helps if you have good foundation and just flying your body before you put a wingsuit on, it can get a little bit sketchy if you don't know how you're doing.

Nick VinZant 11:11

That's seems like something that you would want to double check on, you know, you see the YouTube videos and things like that. And the thing that I always wonder about it is, is it an inherently dangerous thing? Or are people making it dangerous, by like pushing that edge and I'm going to go as close to the ground or as close to the rocker body fly as far as I possibly can

Inka Cagnasso 11:31

see, because that's like now we can talk about two kinds of accidents is like is the accidents that are actually an accident, right? So something that happened that just it was just bad luck, which you know, that can happen in any that's the car crashes too. But then it's like if you if you get wasted and you jump in your car and you start driving like you're pushing your limits now like you're pushing your your luck with that. So it would be the same with flying. A lot of accidents happen, because we need more, we want to go a little bit further, we want to try new things. However, most people that do that kind of stuff that I know, those people are willing to take the risk. So they understand the situation, they know that they're going a little bit too far. And they can have that conversation before they jump off a cliff that this, this might be it. There's a big chance that this can go wrong. I know that I have zero margin of error, and they're fine with that. Again, I think that's when you're way more adrenaline driven. So that's not that's not my cup of tea. I think it's insane what people can do when it gets to that side of the sport, but it's different things that drives me or interests me

Nick VinZant 12:55

is the wind tunnel aspect of it is that relatively new.

Inka Cagnasso 12:58

I've been flying for 10 years now. And within that time, like there was like only a handful of tunnels around the world and now there's one in every city. So it's definitely getting bigger and bigger. There's more and more skydivers of flying and wind tunnels. There's a lot more non skydivers fly in the wind tunnels. And this has been a huge change because before like when I started like the only people that would put their money into flying or skydivers that just wanted to become better skydivers. And now there's like a whole generation of kids, for example, that they don't even necessarily ever want to skydive.

Nick VinZant 13:36

So how fast is the wind going?

Inka Cagnasso 13:38

Ah, I can go to like I'm in kilometres 300 ks an hour?

Nick VinZant 13:45

Depends 100 sec. 150 160. Something like that a little bit less? Maybe?

Inka Cagnasso 13:50

No, I think a little bit more. But yeah, it is more. Yeah, you're right, you're right. Basically, you can adjust the wind speed.

Nick VinZant 13:57

Have you ever just cranked it all the way up to see what's going to happen? Yep,

Inka Cagnasso 14:00

yep. Most of the tunnels don't really like they don't have the kind of power that it would be impossible to fly in it. But yeah, for sure if you're going to jump in now with no experience and we talked tarp it out like I don't know if you're gonna come out alive like the wind. The power of the wind is crazy. Like you would not assume it because like when you watch experience fly or fly, you don't really you just don't see it and we were tight outfits. So there's no movement of material or anything like that. So you just it looks like I said it looks like floating. But then I don't know if I would jump into the airflow in a baggy t shirt. You would go like Oh, wow, like that's that's crazy how much the wind is actually throwing me at the t shirt.

Nick VinZant 14:49

Can I could I be seven foot 350 and be an excel at this sport or do I have to be like five 400 pounds.

Inka Cagnasso 14:57

So you can learn do all the same stuff, even if you're a bigger person. But for some things, like you're gonna move faster in the airflow when you're a little bit lighter, right? Because it's just, it can just, it's kind of like if you have an engine in a car, and then depending on how was the car weighs, right? Exactly. So if it's a lighter car, you can drive faster with the same engine.

Nick VinZant 15:26

Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions?

Inka Cagnasso 15:30

I hope so.

Nick VinZant 15:32

I don't know if this applies necessarily. But how far can you go?

Inka Cagnasso 15:36

But it obviously depends on a Oh, hi, do I exit from a plane? Because then I have like, the more time I have the further I can travel. But you can get a pretty good glide ratio out of it. Like, like I said, you're looking down, you're looking at a map, and you can see yourself clearly moving for, for a few miles. That's a wingsuit. You can move a lot.

Nick VinZant 16:00

Yeah, I would imagine like how high are you usually jumping from?

Inka Cagnasso 16:05

Like 13,013, five,

Nick VinZant 16:08

Wow, you really could go could you go higher is that just but that's just generally like, that's where you're gonna do it from.

Inka Cagnasso 16:13

So from 15, we still jump without additional oxygen. If you go higher than that, or if you spend a long time around that altitude, like you need to have oxygen in the plane. So the highest jumps that we do, and like learning environments in normal jumping would be 18,000 feet. And then for like that, and bit of the plane ride be regrade some oxygen

Nick VinZant 16:42

hardest move to do.

Inka Cagnasso 16:46

So there is my nemesis move is something that's a very typical move. In the Freestyle World. It's a flip twist, which you would see on trampolines or any diving really. But when it starts getting into multiple rotations, all of that, it's just something that I've had a hard time with. And in the tunnel we spoke of, it's not really that dangerous, but it is scary, because it's a small closed space, and the walls are really close. And then sometimes in these kind of moves, like the flip twist, like you can create a drive into any direction. And you just need to hope that either you're gonna be able to stop it, or the instructor who's taking care of your safety, they're standing at the door, it's gonna be able to stop it before you smash the wall.

Nick VinZant 17:38

Because you're gonna catch it, it's gonna shoot you one way or another. Yeah. And then like for

Inka Cagnasso 17:41

your own orientation, and knowing where you're at, they can be very confusing when you start adding rotations.

Nick VinZant 17:49

Two part question, I guess, is it a growing sport? And do you think it could ever become mainstream.

Inka Cagnasso 17:57

Um, it is a growing sport, it definitely is like both like within the sport we're growing. But also, I think that external interest towards our sport is growing. So within the time that I've been in the sport, like, it was kind of, we didn't, you didn't get asked to perform to all these like, like, I don't know, live events, or movies, or music videos, or commercials or whatever it was, as much as that happens now, when that kind of interest is there. However, I get a lot of contacts from all these kind of projects, and a very teeny tiny bit of that ends up actually happening. And it's usually due to the limitations, like it's hard to make it available for big audiences. Because it is not something that you can there is these winter laws that you can move around, but they're open air and they're a little bit like smaller and less powerful. So that's a huge, huge thing of it. And before that problem is solved, I cannot really see the sport growing, because you need the big audiences to be able to grow a sport.

Nick VinZant 19:13

Yeah, that is kind of limiting. Right. It's not like you can

Inka Cagnasso 19:17

Yeah, and that was kind of the main problem that I ended up facing. When I get asked it was like, Hey, we have this event like could you please come up before I'm here? And then they like bring your tunnel? Like it's not really something I can just like, like playing Wait me. It is a huge construction. It will take a few years to put one together.

Nick VinZant 19:37

It's yeah, isn't it a race isn't always amazing to me the things that people think before they actually like think about something like what do you mean, just bring the big fan, bring the big fan roll out there?

Inka Cagnasso 19:48

Well, my favorite actually has been a situation where I was asked to come and perform in a TV show in Georgia, the country Georgia. Yeah, yeah.

Nick VinZant 19:59

And today Gotta say it like, it's just Georgia. Like, no,

Inka Cagnasso 20:02

it was so funny as we're having a long conversation about, like the details of it and like, When am I gonna come? What am I going to perform? And they had seen my videos. And then at the end of it, I'm like, Well, what can a wind tunnel? Do you guys have there? And they're like, why is that? I'm like, I cannot actually fly like, I do need a little bit of help for that part. So yeah, that was the end of that.

Nick VinZant 20:29

I can just imagine like you emailing them or telling them that and then the person you are corresponding with then like telling their boss and the whole room of them being confused. Like why? Talking about? Yeah, what is she? What does she mean? She needs a wind tunnel? Should you have won America's Got Talent?

Inka Cagnasso 20:54

Question I think if I should have wanted, I probably would have, right?

Nick VinZant 20:59

What a great diplomatic answer.

Inka Cagnasso 21:03

I never, I never really went there for for me, it was just a great opportunity to be able to bring my sport out there. So I didn't have any form of expectation that it would get somewhere. And that's what

Nick VinZant 21:18

I'll tell you this when somebody suggested this topic to us. And then I looked you up and I saw that video was like, Holy crap. That's really, that's impressive.

Inka Cagnasso 21:29

Right? It's pretty surreal when you see it, like, especially if you don't know anything about the sport. If you've never like flown a tunnel, or you, SK sun or you've never skydived or didn't know that there's freefall, you know that we do something in freefall and skydiving because often we just see the canopies. And then I wish that I could still get the experience that I could walk into wind tunnel and see someone fly for the first time without understanding that at all, because it must be insane to watch.

Nick VinZant 21:57

Best skydiving or body flying seen in a movie or TV show?

Inka Cagnasso 22:02

Oh, no. I have to I don't I'm not gonna name any because I, in general, they're really painful to watch. Most of them are just not realistic. Like, there's more and more movies that they're actually using proper, like stunt fliers and it's done actually skydiving and not like, I don't know. But that freefall part takes way too long. And there's all these they have weird equipment on and and talking to each other in freefall and things like that I like that's just that's not true, it doesn't happen like that. You watch the landings, and it's all like fake. So a lot of that is kind of painful to watch,

Nick VinZant 22:45

you're not talking about Point Break, or you better not be bad mouthing the show.

Inka Cagnasso 22:51

But something that's really cool about windtunnel flying actually, and this is what I've done a little bit is that you don't have to use it for filming a skydive scene. So what I've actually done is like motion capture, but for fighting scenes, because you can do so many crazy things in the airflow that are really hard to actually shoot with, like traditional stump means. Because like, I remember the first time that I was working for mocha project, and they asked me like, can you do two flips in a row. And like what I can do, I can do 200 If you want me to, like, I can just keep going. I could walk on the walls like I can, all those things where you seen the movies, when people I like running on the wall or running up the wall and throwing flips out of it. Like for me that's like, super easy, and effortless to do. And then if you think of the setup that you would have to have to film it with normal stuff mean so I, I hope fingers crossed, because I love working like this, that there's gonna be more of this kind of use for flying in movies.

Nick VinZant 23:56

Best piece of body flying lingo, do you think that anyone will ever be able to jump out of a plane? And just land on the ground?

Inka Cagnasso 24:03

Depends on what you jump out of the plane with, like, without, without a parachute, but still. Yes, someone will do it eventually with like, a wingsuit or something like this. I mean, you've seen the the jet man stuff, for example. And they're able to take off all of that, but even with wingsuits like people are able to basically like because we never go up in freefall. Right? Right. If we could go up that means that we could land without a parachute. But even with some of the wingsuits like people are able to basically slow down their flow rate so much that they they're going to zero. So yeah, it will happen. It's just a matter of time and someone deciding to make the commitments.

Nick VinZant 24:54

What Yes, that's the hard part. Right? Yeah. What's what's kind of like what's the reason that people Can't do it right now they're falling too fat, like you can't slow down enough before hitting the ground.

Inka Cagnasso 25:06

Yeah, exactly that would be the issue

Nick VinZant 25:10

is that the downward trajectory, or the outward trajectory.

Inka Cagnasso 25:17

Because what we actually do under canopy is that we do something and we call it like a turning the canopy for the landing. So we do it turn. And we pick up a little bit more speed from that turn because we start diving, like what our canopy and then at the bottom of that turn, we basically start translating that dive into forward speed. And this is a very comfortable way of landing. Like, this is what we actually trying to do. So instead of like us moving down and landing from that downward energy, we're trying to move forward. So yeah, it's definitely the going down bid that needs to be controlled.

Nick VinZant 25:57

That's one of those things, it doesn't seem like you're getting a second chance, right? Like, what's the future of it?

Inka Cagnasso 26:02

You know, within the sport, there's a lot of talk about, we tried to get to the Olympics and all of this, and there's like big dreams, I'm sure it's gonna happen at some point that are not sure that's going to happen. At some point, I'm sure that we're gonna grow. But I think there's a lot of steps to take before something like this. It is a small sport. But I think we have a good community win competitions, and all of that that might be interesting to the bigger audience in the future. But I think the future is in all of these things that I've been talking about, like kinda everything that has entertainment value, I think that's going to be like flying is going to be more attractive to the bigger audience as a form of entertainment, that is as a competition. Because it's confusing to watch right now. Like, if you go and like you don't know what you're looking at, you're watching the competition. Yeah, like, oh, well, they're flying, but like, you cannot really grasp a lot of it. But you don't need to know how to dance to be able to appreciate a dance performance, or you don't need to be able to sing to be able to, you know, listen to that and and enjoy it, then hopefully through that, then slowly, the interests of the sport side of flying is going to grow as well.

Consumer Culture Expert Professor Sarah Grace

What do the things you buy really say about you? And how are companies using that to get you to spend more than you might want. Consumer Culture Expert Professor Sarah Grace joins us to explain the growing psychology behind consumer culture. We talk shopping display secrets, fast fashion, conscious consumerism and the subtle messages major brands are sending. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Annoying Public Behaviors.

Professor Sarah Grace: 01:48

Pointless: 29:34

Top 5 Public Annoyances: 43:20

https://www.tiktok.com/@profsarahgrace (Prof. Sarah Grace TikTok)

http://sarahcgrace.com (Prof. Sarah Grace Website)

Interview with Consumer Culture Expert Professor Sarah Grace

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, shopping secrets, and public annoyances,

Professor Sarah Grace 0:22

culture, in a way has been replaced by consumer culture. Because the things that shaped us, a lot of what is around us is defined by material objects that we buy, what is XYZ company really selling, you know, kind of romanticizes you and it gets you out of your rational, unreflective mind. And it kind of takes you like to this dreamy state where you might make an irrational decision and spend way more than you thought you were going to make. If you had one of those cars that would say a few different things about you. One, that you're an early adopter of trends, you are forward thinking and innovative, but you also care what people think about you.

Nick VinZant 1:08

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, or leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So we've all heard the sayings about how you are your stuff, you are the things that you buy. But why do you buy the things that you buy? Our first guest is an expert in the psychological ways that brands used to try and get you to buy their stuff. And what the stuff that you buy really says about you. This is consumer culture expert, Professor Sarah Grace. So what is consumer culture really

Professor Sarah Grace 1:50

hard to explain, but culture is something that is around us no matter where we are. And it's one of those things that's often unreflected on, but it influences so many aspects of our life. Well, in our modern worlds, culture, in a way has been replaced by consumer culture. Because the things that shape us, it's not just values, it's not just music, it's not just where we go to church, or if we go to church, a lot of what is around us is defined by material objects that we buy, and things that are marketed towards us. So consumer culture is this thing that we all navigate daily, because every day we wake up, and we try to decide, I'm going to wear this and present myself to the world this way, I'm going to pull out this brand of computer and it's going to have these different stickers on it to communicate something both to myself about myself, but also to others about who I am. And a lot of times our identity and our values and the way that we kind of get by in this world, we navigate through the help of consumer objects.

Nick VinZant 3:01

But it's it's true in the sense that right like we kind of our our stuff, like you could look at the things that I wear and that I own in my car and pretty much get a really good idea of exactly who I am. Is there is there a point like looking back in history where you can identify like, this is where that really changed. And now you are your stuff.

Professor Sarah Grace 3:23

Even back in the Middle Ages, there were gilts of people who grouped together based off of their trade. And different guilds were identified by their clothing, or what they wore, or even think about royal royalty, they were certain colors. And so you could identify who was of different social standings based off of their objects that they adorned on their body. And they actually prevented people who are peasants or lower levels than them from being able to wear certain colors or wear certain things. So actually, this idea, and it goes back to the ancient Romans and Greeks, too.

Nick VinZant 4:00

So like how are companies trying to get us to buy stuff we don't need.

Professor Sarah Grace 4:05

So if you think about basic economics, there's supply and there's demand. So the way that you asked your question assumes that there is more supply than demand. And companies are trying to push things on consumers that they don't want. And historically, like when sales and marketing originated in the early 1900s. That is how a lot of companies operated as they would like create a ton of this type of vacuum and they would have door to door salesmen. And they would have people go out and try to sell this thing that they already created. Well in the 50s 60s 70s that started to switch and marketers really started focusing on well what do consumers want and started creating things, less of a push system and more of a pool system so started creating things based off of what consumers either said they want one and versus via research and focus groups and those sorts of things. Or based off of what consumers were actually buying, so they might have looked at point of sale data, which is a technology that was introduced in the mid century. And they might have said, well, consumers are buying a lot of cans, pineapple. Let's make more of that. And let's make more varieties of that. So the thinking around our companies pushing us things versus are we demanding things and they're responding to that, that desire, the shifting, and that has changed. So I think it's a little bit of both. But for companies to grow, they have to create something new, too, so that consumers will want to replace the things that they already have with those new things. And so that's where we get trend cycles in the marketplace. And the easiest industry to see this in is with fashion. So fashion trend cycles are a beautiful example. They've gotten really short in the last few years. Whereas people used to buy a new dress, maybe once a year, and then they would buy another new dress next year. And they would keep those in their wardrobe for years and years and years and repair them over time as they wore out. Now, the trend cycling what is in fashion, or what is on trend, has shortens. And so you as a consumer feel like I need to buy more often. And I need to replace these things that I already have. That may be perfectly fine. And innovation is a good thing. I don't want that to come off the wrong way companies are incentive buys to innovate. But sometimes they innovate needlessly. And that's when we have access. And you also have consumers feeling like they have to replace perfectly good stuff and get rid of things just because it's no longer maybe on trend.

Nick VinZant 6:54

Who's driving the car, though? Like, are we driving the car? Are the companies driving the car? Like I could have the

Professor Sarah Grace 7:03

I don't know, anybody know, knows who is driving the car. I think that there are people who have really strong stances, and some people would say it is purely companies driving the car, through marketing through promotion through incessant advertising, they're spinning up the wheels of consumer desire. I think that there's some truth in that. But I also think going back to consumer culture, if companies stopped advertising today, they spent not another dime on advertising. We wouldn't know what to do, we wouldn't be content, or know how to not still buy new stuff that we don't need.

Nick VinZant 7:46

Is there a segment of society that kind of keeps that engine going more than other ones? Oh, I

Professor Sarah Grace 7:53

hate to point fingers. I think if you're using the fashion industry, again, social media has really changed this because if you are a high schooler in the Midwest, and you went to school, and you're walking down your hallway, you might have seen like, oh, there's some like new trends. And like, maybe I need to go to the mall and pick up this new sequined purse or whatever it is. But you only kind of saw what was in your community. Social media obviously blew that out. And there are there's this new trend of influencers, posting shopping hauls, especially from fast fashion retailers, like Shi n or forever 21. But primarily Sheehan and I think that, you know, they put those out on YouTube, they put those out on tick tock or Instagram. And they have tons of people just watching them open these $500 orders from this month. And then next month, they're going to do the same thing. And they normalize this idea of it's normal to get a new thing for this one occasion or event, wear it, take a picture and it posted on social media and not touch it again. Because it was so cheap. It was a $7 pair of shorts, that, you know, I got my $7 worth, and then move on. And so again, I hate to point the finger on any one group. But influencer culture is one that has popped up in the last few years that I think keeps that alive. And it also because it's global, you see people, you know, consume in ways that you might not have seen if it was just the people that you saw in person. I

Nick VinZant 9:39

have a personal bias in this that may kind of contaminate the conversation. But I've always been the person that like look, I got the same T shirt I had in high school. I've been driving the same car for 10 years, right? Like I buy nothing new. So my question is though, like, can we stop this? Because if we suddenly stopped buying this stuff, then what happens to the People who got hired to make this stuff, right, like there's, there's this the economy collapse if we get ourselves out, have we painted ourselves into a corner with this?

Professor Sarah Grace 10:08

And I think that that is a really good question. And when you're thinking about any kind of system change, or promoting some sort of systemic change, you have to think of all the different stakeholders who are affected. And what's interesting about our consumer culture is that our consumption and our production is pretty far apart from most of the items that we consume, whether it's food, whether it's clothes, whether it's home goods, meaning that we have, we've offshored most of our production. So I took an economic development class from an amazing professor in my undergrad, who was from Bangladesh. And this was the point the exact question that she posed to us is, okay, we stop buying fast fashion clothes that are made by women and Bangladesh, what happens to those women? What are their alternatives? And I don't know the answer to your question. But I do think what is important is for us to realize how connected our consumption behaviors are both good and bad, globally. So the things that you consume in the United States, in a Midwestern suburb, in New York City, in California, wherever impact people across the world, in both good and bad ways. It does give people jobs. But the question is, are those jobs safe? Are they paying a living wage? Do those people have jobs, but then their river or their water source is polluted because of the factory that's in their town? And so it's a very complicated question that I can't provide an answer to. But I think that you have to think of all the good and bad things that are connected.

Nick VinZant 12:00

Do most people when they buy something, like, do we know what we're really doing? Do we know who's actually making this? What their principles as a company are? Or am I just like grabbing this thing off the shelf and like, yeah, that's a medium t shirt. And that's what I'm looking for.

Professor Sarah Grace 12:16

I think for most of us, shopping, and consuming is a passive behavior. It's an unreflected upon behavior, it's just part of what we do. It's just normal. And it's not something that we stop and think a whole lot about. And you probably picked the one that your parents used to buy. And that's the one that you get, and that's the one that you buy for the rest of your life. And you just don't think about it. There are very few times that we stop and like, really think about our purchases. If you're buying a house, or a car, or an engagement ring, something big you stop and you really think and reflect on it. But most of our consumer behavior is that more like fast, habitual, like we're just kind of moving through the actions and conscious consumerism. To me, people define it differently is that act of just stopping pausing thinking through slowing down in the way that we think about our consumption behavior.

Nick VinZant 13:19

Are you ready for some listener submitted questions? Sure. It seems to be a big thing about brands being authentic. Are brands really authentic? Or is this fake authenticity that they're now basically, like, we figured out how to act like that? 31, I guess, what do you think about this push for authenticity,

Professor Sarah Grace 13:41

brands are kind of put into this place where they have to differentiate themselves, and be unique. And one way that they are unique is to have a personality. And if you have a personality, you don't want to have a phony personality. So of course, you want to have an authentic personality. And I think that for a lot of brands, it differs. But the way that a brand can be authentic, is to go back to their origin story. Every brand has a founder, and a reason for being someone somewhere decided this product needs to be here. And here's why. And so if a brand can go back to that origin story of why the brand exists in the first place, maybe tap into the spirit or the ethos of the founder. That's the way to create an authentic brands, not to try to contrive a story that you think your consumers want to hear.

Nick VinZant 14:36

Is there a store that stands out in your mind, like you walk in and the way that it's organized, or set up the lighting, whatever, gets people to maybe buy something that they otherwise wouldn't have?

Professor Sarah Grace 14:52

That's a hilarious question, because I'm literally doing a Tik Tok series on this right now. And In it, all of the videos start off and they say, What is XYZ company really selling, and kind of paint a picture of how the brand makes you feel a certain way when you enter your space, and how it transports you to a different state of feeling a certain way about yourself or, you know, kind of romanticizes you and it gets you out of your rational, unreflective mind. And it kind of takes you like to this dreamy state where you might make an irrational decision and spend way more than you thought you were going to make. And so a brand truly sweeps you off your feet. And then you walk out and you're like, how did I just spend $200 on a tea kettle? Because the object itself is maybe nice, but it's not that nice. So to answer your question, a couple that I've featured recently are anthropology, which is a retailer that mostly caters to women's clothing and home goods, stationery, mugs, candles, things like that, and they sell an entire feeling of kind of like, like, what's the word?

Nick VinZant 16:20

I know what you're, I know what you're trying to like, right? Like, I've got my life together. And it's good kind of feeling

Professor Sarah Grace 16:27

that to that too. But also, like, I am a free spirit who has my life together, right? It's not, because you have to have a lot of money to shop there. So you have to have some sort of income coming in. But you also it's not like your J Crew preppy, you know, blazer style, it's this bohemian kind of free spirit vibe as well. And so it might even be that it's offering you an escape from your nine to five corporate job into this imagined state where you're really a free spirit going to a Grateful Dead concert. So anthropology does a great job of romanticizing the consumer, and they spend a lot of time in each of their stores, merchandising their product, they hire local artists to come in and do different window displays, they flip and rotate the way that their merchandise is displayed. I've heard on a weekly basis so that if you walk in every week, it feels a little bit different, even though it's the same merchandise.

Nick VinZant 17:34

Is there an example of one that's the exact opposite?

Professor Sarah Grace 17:38

Hmm. Well, anthropology is trying to sell you on a motion, so that you'll pay a little bit more. A lot of your lower price retailers are not trying to sell you any kind of an emotion. They're just trying to serve that functional need for you. So if you think of like $1 tree, or $1, General, you go in there and there is no romanticization is basically the product and the prices. And it's very straightforward.

Nick VinZant 18:08

It's kind of I sometimes I guess I just feel like a fish that is always getting caught.

Professor Sarah Grace 18:14

Well, perhaps part of the reason for that is that market research is really good. And consumer research is really good. They know a lot about you. companies spend a lot of energy, you know, going on trend scouting hunts, and they will peruse the internet, and they'll practice social listening activities to see what people are talking about organically. And when they spot an opportunity. Of course, they're going to try to package it up. And how do we sell that back? Marketers have become ethnographers in a way where they observe the culture and they observe consumers and their natural habitats. And they stay out of the way. And they take notes and they make observations and they draw conclusions about what they see going on. Or they they take data and see what consumers are actually buying. And they use that without ever actually talking to the customer. And then they are able to put together an offering that resonates with the consumer, and the consumer gets it and they're like, Hmm, this company really knows me. And it's because yes, they are deeply observing your behavior.

Nick VinZant 19:32

What is Twiggy? Can you spell it CHEUGY Oh, I'm pronouncing that like so badly. It's a completely different word, isn't it? Okay, well, it's a different word. What is it actually? So what you're trying to say is Chuki which is a terrible sounding word. It's awful. It's awful choice. sounds better to me

Professor Sarah Grace 20:01

cheeky? Well, I don't even want to say it. Um, so Chuki is a word that I didn't know existed until I got on Tik Tok. And it basically goes like this, people would post a video, and they would say, these are the things that are two key. And then they would show, you know, a slideshow of consumer objects, like pants, or a style of shoe or whatever, that they viewed as a mix of both dated but also oversaturated. So it was a consumer trend at one point that was everywhere. accessible to many people, they got it, it was probably eight or so years ago. And now people are labeling it as Chuki. So instead of just saying like, Oh, that's outdated. It's like I say that, but it has a little bit of like an insult flair to it.

Nick VinZant 21:02

It's you're hopping on a trend too late, or you stayed on it too long.

Professor Sarah Grace 21:06

You stayed on it too long, is what it is. Um,

Nick VinZant 21:09

okay. You're very objective. So I'm gonna try to ask you this question in a way that maybe you can answer without saying if you judge it negatively or positively, what brand would tell you the most about somebody like, oh, this brand? I know exactly who you are.

Professor Sarah Grace 21:31

I think that the easier a brand is to describe the stronger the brand is. And this has changed too in the past couple years. Right. So the first brand that I wanted to say was Tesla. Oh, yeah, yeah, I feel like even in the past couple of years, because their production has ramped up and their distribution has increased. More people own Tesla's than before, but two years ago, if you'd asked me that question, easily, my answer would be Tesla. And if you had one of those cars, it would say a few different things about you. One, that you're an early adopter of trends, you are forward thinking and innovative, but you also care what people think about you. And I think that all three of those things are true of early Tesla owners. That might stir some people up.

Nick VinZant 22:24

Can you break down? Like in your research, have you done studied this so much that like you can break down people by exactly the brand? Like if I'm like, okay, Patagonia, right, can you like, so you are this,

Professor Sarah Grace 22:37

that's another one that's changed so much in the past 10 years, as well, like Patagonia 10 years ago, meant something much tighter because the people who wore Patagonia were in a very specific subset of mostly an outdoor crowd, like you are buying Patagonia to go hiking or to go rock climbing. But I live in a college town. So when I go to the store, I see Patagonia on everybody. Everybody's wearing Patagonia. And these are not necessarily people that are going out and participating in outdoor extreme sports. So that's a brand that the meaning has. I don't want to say evaporated, but the meaning has diluted over time, as people who are not in their target market adopt it. And that's what happens is the bigger brand gets their brand meeting is not as tight anymore.

Nick VinZant 23:36

Is there a brand that just tells you nothing about someone

Professor Sarah Grace 23:41

Apple like and I feel like 10 years ago, again, Apple might have told you a little bit of something. But now I think people buy Apple because it's the cultural norm. And I think that it's ubiquitous. But again, I'm on a in a college town. So it seems like everybody has an Apple computer. Or an everyone has air pods and I just don't feel like it tells me anything.

Nick VinZant 24:06

I feel like it tells me something if they have an Apple computer, not an iPhone necessarily, right? Like I don't see the difference in people's phones, like oh, that tells I mean unless it's like a burner phone, and then you're probably a drug dealer or you've got something else going on, you know, kind of knows something about you.

Professor Sarah Grace 24:25

I think that's a good point. So the iPhone brand in particular. Um, but when I was teaching, it was always interesting, everyone would sit down, pull out their laptops, and nine times out of 10 It was an apple. But those nine people were all very different.

Nick VinZant 24:43

I could ask you questions about every single brand that you could imagine forever, but to avoid that, like Are there any other brands that you would that stand out to you and like this means this or this doesn't mean anything?

Professor Sarah Grace 24:56

Hmm. Um, Starbucks is another brand that I've been really boggled by the last few years, when you read about the history of Starbucks, Howard Schultz, the previous CEO, he had gone to a trip on a trip to Milan, Italy and fell in love with cafe culture, and wanted to bring back to America. And so he got to the States, he tried to like recreate cafe culture, Starbucks as a third place to home and work, a place for people to like be in gathering and socialize the Starbucks brand to me, doesn't mean that anymore, and I can't put my finger on what it means. Because Starbucks has things like unicorn frappuccinos, which are kind of like a goofy Instagrammable play. They're not necessarily Italian coffee shop there, kind of all over the place. And that's a brand that is an example of, I think they have some work to do. What is great about brands is that they can be markers of things like quality, I think that brands play an important role. I just don't think that they should play an outsized role in our lives. So brands have a place because they do legitimize what you're buying, or at least that was the original idea. Some brands, take advantage of that basic assumption and make it seem like you're getting more than you're actually getting.

Nick VinZant 26:39

Like, I feel like a Mercedes Benz and BMW are basically kind of the same kind of car, at least in the United States. But the Mercedes Benz says something completely different about something that BMW says, like I look at someone who bought a Mercedes, and I think that's a person who's probably duty pretty, pretty financially. Well, not they're not ostentatious, and they want something that works. I see somebody, I've never met a man who drives a BMW, that's not a douchebag. That doesn't exist. That that's an immediate sign to me. Oh, that makes complete sense.

Professor Sarah Grace 27:11

Yeah, right. Well, that were that you used sign. I don't want to go off on a rabbit trail. But there's a whole field of marketing that looks at the study of sign meanings. And what things signify is called semiotics. And it's actually not just a marketing exclusive field, it actually was born out of linguistics. But semiotics is the study of science. And so that's part of what I studied in my training in consumer culture is to understand, okay, these things signify certain things, things to different people. And sometimes people interpret those meanings differently. So a lot of times marketers are trying to really tightly figure out what those meanings are, and then manage them, because they want everyone to interpret BMW the same way. That's when you have a strong brand. So like I said, Starbucks, I have a hard time defining what Starbucks is right now. And that's because different people would define the brand differently. And I don't think that they're managing those meanings in a really uniform way. And strong brands have a pretty uniform, meaning is shopping

Nick VinZant 28:22

difficult for you. Like, I feel like you would go into a store and just evaluate, like, every single thing like, Oh, I know why they put that display there.

Professor Sarah Grace 28:31

Shopping is not fun for me anymore. Sometimes if I can, like detach myself, but I feel like I know, too. You know too much.

Ski Jumpers Nina Lussi and Casey Larson

Racing downhill at nearly 60 miles an hour, Ski Jumpers Casey Larson and Nina Lussi launch themselves hundreds of feet into the air. We talk ski jumping, the upcoming Olympics, groundhog hazards and why ski jumpers always put their hands out the car window. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Winter Activities.

Casey Larson and Nina Lussi: 01:27ish

Pointless: 24:57ish

Top 5: 43:20ish

https://www.instagram.com/caseylarson (Casey Larson Instagram)

https://www.instagram.com/ninalussi (Nina Lussi Instagram)

https://twitter.com/NinaLussi (Nina Lussi Twitter)

Interview with Nina Lussi and Casey Larson

Nick VinZant 0:12

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, ski jumping, and snow activities,

Nina Lussi 0:21

it's ski jumping is so beautiful because it's, I don't know, it's like the world turns off and you're just out there in the elements by by yourself.

Casey Larson 0:31

If you let go of the bar and you get in your interim position, you're going off that ski jump, whether you like it or not. And then once you let go, you got to be ready to handle whatever happens. So if the winds not right, you know, you trust your coach with your life

Nina Lussi 0:43

stand under the takeoff. And you can hear the rush of the skier coming down. And then you can, like, see them shoot right over your head and kind of start flying. Oh, man,

Casey Larson 0:55

well, sometimes you get bugs. And that's always a fun one. Like if you get a little like be splattered on your goggles. If you'd freak out a little bit.

Nick VinZant 1:02

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guests are some of the best ski jumpers in the world. And right now they're getting ready to try to represent the United States at the Winter Olympics. This is Casey Larson. And Nina Lucy, did you set out to be a ski jumper? Or did this was this something that just happened?

Casey Larson 1:31

I mean, I started ski jumping when I was six years old started just kind of goofing around in the winters, it was a good way to like you know, in between t ball and you know, flag football season per se. But then pretty quickly, it took off into something a little bit bigger, for sure.

Nina Lussi 1:45

We could say that ski jumping found me. Now. I'm from Lake Placid, New York, we had the Winter Olympics in 1980, and 32. So grew up in an Olympic Village upon skis, so as on skiing by age three. And so my brother and I tried it together. And we're basically we're hockey ever since. So

Nick VinZant 2:06

what is it about it? What do you like about it,

Nina Lussi 2:08

it's scheduling is so beautiful, because it's, you have to find the edge of like, risk, but also control and when you're in it, time slows down and you're you can feel the air and you can this like, I don't know, it's like the world turns off, and you're just out there, in the elements by by yourself.

Casey Larson 2:30

Do it was the one thing that I wasn't just, I didn't naturally pick up very well. I didn't naturally pick up this like, you know, golf esque, like super technical sport very easily it was it was kind of tough for me. And then it just became this like addiction to just try and make sure I could, you know, I could bring my arms in, or I could be more aerodynamic or I could do all these things. And, you know, I really didn't realize how much I liked, you know, kind of diving into that, that that side of the sport until like high school. And even after high school,

Nick VinZant 2:57

watching it on TV, I can never decide if this is a simple sport, that's just go down a hill and jump. Or if there's something that's really technical about it, and I don't see it.

Casey Larson 3:09

I call I mean, I call it an extreme version of golf in that sense. Like you can apply like, you know, the amount of video watching and the amount of you know, you know, technical analysis, the amount of just overall, like contorting your body is very similar to golf. I mean, in the sense of you just have to hit this tiny little thing in a 250 yards. Whereas a ski jumper, you have to just you are the ball, right? You are trying to, you know, take off so perfectly. And so my Newton, the differences are so small that you just got to it's very applicable in that sense to the slumps and the highs and the lows of those two sports where sometimes you're feeling it sometimes the rhythms there. And then other days, it's definitely not.

Nick VinZant 3:48

So what are you trying to do? Are you trying to go faster into the jump? Are you trying to time the jump, right? Is it when you're in the air? Like what's the what's what's the goal there?

Nina Lussi 4:01

The takeoff portion is pretty critical the speed. It's a designated start spot for everybody. So yeah, I mean, we spent time working on how to keep your skis super straight and super like in the middle of the tracks, so there's less friction and so that you're going as fast as possible and obviously wax and everything. But the takeoff portion is the simple move from like the Enron position, like the squat type thing into the air, and that's where you're propelling yourself into the flight. And if you can do that, you want to put as much power down onto like down on the on the takeoff, but also move yourself kind of project yourself forward out over your skis. So that's really important and so that the timing aspect of that and the force that you're putting down, but also you don't want to be super powerful and like use a lot of muscle and then you're shooting too far up and then your skis are coming at you. So then, so you need to shoot yourself out basically perfectly and reduce the amount of drag. And then when you're in the air, you're trying to surf right above the air and kind of pull away from the hill, because the takeoff is actually shooting you down. So it's at minus 12 degrees. So it's not launching you up.

Nick VinZant 5:23

It's pointed, I never noticed that it's pointed. I just, it's not a ramp, is it?

Nina Lussi 5:29

No. And that's what everyone thinks they think it's like shooting you straight up. It's actually shooting you at the ground.

Nick VinZant 5:35

Do you just like, changed my entire perception of ski jumping my entire? I always thought that like, oh, yeah, there's a little ramp on the end. And then they go up like they try to jump off the ramp.

Nina Lussi 5:45

With the takeoff with the takeoff power, you're going up because you're, you're literally jumping off the ground. So then, so then you're coming up like that, but you're creating that you're not using, you're not using the the jump.

Nick VinZant 6:00

Yeah, and anybody who's ever like tried to run downhill and jump off of a downhill. That's way more complicated than kind of jumping off flat ground or like jumping off of an uphill.

Casey Larson 6:11

Yeah, I haven't thought about that. But yeah, where you would want to jump forward, but still down to that you can kind of keep your speed going

Nick VinZant 6:20

from when you kind of jump to when you land. How long How far are we talking

Casey Larson 6:27

250 meters through the air. It's that's that's the world record in my I've gone 216 and a half meters on the same day, the world record set. So my my personal best was out shine for sure. But 216 meters, that's still almost 230 yards, 240 yards,

Nick VinZant 6:44

you're still talking like a couple of city blocks. When you're flying over a couple of city blocks where

Casey Larson 6:49

you're, you're flying over. You're flying from UC takeoff through one goalpost. And then you go through two more goalposts and then you land at the 50 yard line, right?

Nick VinZant 7:03

That's insane when you think about it that way that you're essentially flying over two and a half football fields. Okay, this is my armchair analysis of it. So watching it like all right, you jump right at the end, right? Like, how hard is that? Why is it difficult not to like jump at the right time, every time.

Casey Larson 7:22

I don't know I'm in trying to figure that out for like 10 years now. And I still have it. So I think that's my biggest issue is just like why why I always you know, timing is the probably the biggest one just like that take off the minute like bringing your chest up a little bit, or just not getting all the power down, whether that be in your shin it like just not being in the correct position, I'm not putting 100% of the power that you possibly can put down down and getting into that aerodynamic position, you're going to be you're just screwed right off the bat. So you really can't bring your chest up at all, you really got to just stay low, and then just use your legs and go. And at the end of the day, it is a simple sport. And that's kind of the thing is, the older you get, the easier it looks. And that's the whole point of sport is those professionals, the guys that are winning the Olympics, and even me sometimes I make it look really easy. Whereas and that's the whole point of the sport is, is I think I want people to say that I want people to think it's an easy sport, because if they're watching me when they say that, that just means I'm doing it right.

Nick VinZant 8:20

When you kind of actually get into the air, what are you trying to do once you're in the air,

Casey Larson 8:25

that's like, what makes a good ski jumper good is like when he gets in the air when she's in the air. You just kind of naturally note to do. You're trying to, you know, extend and pull away from the hill and just kind of, you know, glide on that cushion of air that you've created for yourself. And are you

Nick VinZant 8:39

like you're trying to achieve a certain like angle though, and things like that, right? Yes,

Casey Larson 8:44

like, it's when you're driving on the highway later today. Or, you know, if you're in your car, pop the window open and stick your hand out. And you'll notice like, if you have it down here, it's gonna dive straight into the ground. If you bring it up here, your hands going to go back to the back of the window. But then you're going to find this little happy medium where your hand just wants to go straight up. And that's the body position we're trying to find with our skis and our body. We're just trying to be not too far aerodynamic, but not also not too far back. Just something where that wiggle just bring us right up

Nick VinZant 9:13

is a great analogy, honestly, like I perfectly understand it right now. Like oh, no, he's correct. So does that mean like you spend a lot of time in car rides? Sticking your hand out the window?

Casey Larson 9:24

Definitely. Yeah. Even Even today, even when it's like 25 degrees out in Park City. Oh,

Nick VinZant 9:30

just to test it out, just to get a feel for it. What kind of like when you when you look at your training, like what kind of training are you generally doing for it

Nina Lussi 9:38

depends on the time of year. So the spring we're usually we're improving our general aerobic capacity, so a lot more of running and that kind of thing. So that's like basic stretching follows you through the whole year. A lot of core falls you through the whole year. Try to build up more muscle with it. squats in that type of thing more in the summer. And then in the winter, less reps, but still high weight to keep the strength. A lot of hurdles coordination, so ladders balance slacklining. Generally, also some things like we do usually two days of in the summer of wakesurfing. So you like, have a nice feeling of where how your feet are moving into kind of, because in in jumping, you need to, like feel the balance and like, be able to be soft without like sub you can, if there are different conditions on the snow, if it's like gets really slow. If you're like super rigid in your position that'll throw you off. But if you can absorb it, then that's that's really important.

Nick VinZant 10:49

So okay, how much control do you have to have if you're coming up to it? And I'm a big kind of math numbers person. So Right. So imagine that you're going down there and you could give 100% Everything you've got into the jump? Can you do it that way? Or do you have to kind of hold back a little bit so that you can land this thing?

Nina Lussi 11:10

Well, you're it's not really an explosive movement. It's like, like a tennis swing or something. Like if you try to really like slam it, it's not going to be as efficient as if you do a really long, smooth, but also a strong stroke. And so that's basically what we're trying to do. So that your best jumps don't feel like you're trying that hard. But you're just maximizing the the output by using like, one time this one coach told me that in ski jumping, you want to use as little like as few muscles as possible. And I was like, like, What do you mean, he was like, well, all the extra stuff that you're adding, that's like that's not helping you. He's like, it's like I'm in orchestra when you can hear them playing. And it sounds like one, one voice and you hear them and it's perfect. But some of like, at a lower level. You can hear all the separate instruments and they aren't exactly in tune. And so that's when the other the extra muscles are involved. So when you can get everything into that one singular sound that is when things are like ideal.

Nick VinZant 12:20

Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? Sure, let's get to it. Strangest thought you've ever had while in the air.

Casey Larson 12:28

Oh man, well sometimes hit bugs. And that's always a fun one. Like if you get a little like be splattered on your goggles if you'd freak out a little bit. But I will say when I was a little kid, I do remember letting go of the bar on a smaller Hill. So I was totally okay. But I remember being like I didn't put my bindings in. And the way the ski jumping boot works is you kind of slam this little, this little piece of plastic into the back of the booth that allows your your heel to come off the ski a little bit. I was like I didn't put that in. So I remember jumping into the air and just wanting you. And it was it was the most scared I've ever been in my life. It was It was wild. I felt like I was I was okay. Thankfully, you know, you get learnt you learn how to falls at a young age, you definitely make enough mistakes where you can fall safely. Basically just keep your knees straight in the air and you're going to be totally fine. Your body's gonna stay relatively straight. But I was I was freaking out.

Nina Lussi 13:21

I mean, one time there was there was like a little there was a groundhog that was running across the land and kale and I could see it below me while it was flying. So I thought, Oh, I hope I don't hit that.

Nick VinZant 13:37

Will you sometimes like jump and kind of veer off to one side or veer off to one side in the air? Or do you pretty much just go straight?

Casey Larson 13:46

Well, your body's never symmetric. But you also naturally want to go straight. So you find these ways to correct so mice, my skis are never symmetrical, but I go straight, if that makes sense. But obviously wind whatever conditions whatever it may be, you end up having some gems where you go to one side more or less, but those hills are massive, allow for like a pretty big amount of play. So you're never too worried about like, you know, landing on the other mining in the grass or landing, you know, off the hill. But yeah, you you learn how to deal with it and you end up if you do it enough times, you're not gonna get too scared by it. So you end up not just knowing how to deal with it, I guess,

Nick VinZant 14:18

for my kind of understanding, so imagine like zero is completely straight. How much will you drift to one side? Are we talking like five meters? 10 meters like, oh, you I've seen a guy drift like 30 meters to one side. Yeah,

Casey Larson 14:34

I mean, there's definitely athletes that are known for it. And we say the winds the winds better on the right side of the hill. So you go to the right side of the hill. That's not true. But you see some athletes just do it. And they're totally fine. And then they have a play of like, you know, 1015 meters so those hills really big into landing Hill. See, they're allowed to do it and they're totally fine. They end up being you know, they're nothing, you know, changes but at the end of the day, I always think like, well, that's just extra meters. I could be flying straight but I'm not flying to the right, you know, so I just think like the straighter the better. But obviously there's there's athletes out there that break those rules and you know winning competitions doing it,

Nick VinZant 15:09

how far up above where you jump is where you usually land. Yeah, the hills

Casey Larson 15:15

are steep. So you're definitely not like flying across flat ground. It's not like water ski jumping that you might have seen on TV where it's like they're they're just flying across the water and then landing completely flat, we have this big hill, we're able to kind of coast on and coast down. So that's why we're able to land so far. That's why we're able to like be relatively safe at the same time to you know, knock on wood. Injuries are pretty limited in ski jumping, obviously, some knee, see some knee injuries and stuff like that. But for the most part, the impact is super low. The only the only sport at the Olympics, it's safe within ski jumping at that level is curling. But yeah, that's kind of why it's so safe, because we're just following the super steep hill just kind of flying along it. And then it does start to flatten out at some point. And that's called the K point, that's when I refer to the size of the hills like the K 10k 20. That just means the hill flattens out at 120 meters. And then after that, I see your mark, you have to go past that if you want to win a competition going past the k points just kind of proven, you're able to break physics, right? You're, you're kind of you're good enough athlete that you're able to just go past that point in fly and fly past that, that flat portion of it of the hill.

Nick VinZant 16:22

So what you're landing on flat ground Are you landing on the slower,

Casey Larson 16:25

it's such a gradual decline in terms of the rate, the radius is so long and so big on any Hill, that even if you go past the point where it starts to flatten out, you're still landing on pretty steep ground.

Nick VinZant 16:36

Oh, I see what you're saying. Right. So like there's the steep part, there's the k point and then there's the kind of steep part basically. Okay, that makes sense to me. Have you ever backed off of one

Casey Larson 16:46

you really can't right so you're in these when you let go this bar right when you hop on a ski jump and getting get ready to go. If you let go of the bar and you get your interim position, you're going off that ski jump whether you like it or not. And you just have the ritual that you trust that you can never second guess right you check your bindings you check your equipment, you check your goggles to get on the bar, you can do it again. And then once you let go you got to be ready to handle whatever happens so if the winds not right, you know, you trust your coach with your life pretty much is how it works. So if your coach lives a you know that everything say everything's gonna be totally fine. I just got to do my job.

Nick VinZant 17:25

Well, when you go though, okay, so we talked to a freestyle Cliff jumper who said that, like, look, every time I go, I'm still scared. Are you still scared every time you do it? Or it's just like, it's Tuesday, man, I've done this 1000s of times.

Casey Larson 17:38

I don't think I don't think I'd still do it if I wasn't still scared. I think the adrenaline and just that little pickup is what keeps you honest and what keeps you focused. So for me, I've never been a daredevil I've never like even when I was a kid and moved up to a bigger hill I took me so long ago to actually like, go and actually deal with it. I was never as fearless little kid.

Nina Lussi 17:57

It's not super like it's not like every jump. I'm like, oh my god, what am I doing? But it is still like every once in a while you will get up there and you're like, either if it's windy or new hill or some something's weird. You're like, oh, this is no, this is serious. Like, I need to like, know what I'm doing like, this isn't a joke.

Nick VinZant 18:22

Okay, ask you this question. Have you ever thought of flapping your arms to potentially go far farther during the ski jump?

Casey Larson 18:33

Oh, man, when people try there's you know, there's like nervous twitches athletes have but I'll throw my teammate under the bus coming back now. Um, if you look at some videos of him up, he flaps his arms pretty bad. But it doesn't add anything. I think it's just a, I think I think it's just a twitch. I don't really know why people end up moving their hands or moving their arms a little bit more than others. But I usually pray stay pretty stuck in the air and don't move too much. But But hey, you know, maybe I'll try it. I don't know.

Nina Lussi 19:03

I appreciate I definitely appreciate the advice insight. I have, like, this was last week, and I was trying to find I was training. So I'm like trying to get ready for the Olympic season. And I'm trying to find exactly how far away from my body my arms are. So like, I was having them probably like three inches away from my side so that I could maximize the surface area. Because that was like enough like the dry like it wouldn't the air wouldn't kind of come between my arm and my body. So just kind of like get a little bit bigger. But I wasn't feeling as much as I wanted to. So then, while I was flying, I was like moving my arms in and out, like looking for the perfect surface and my coach was like, What are you doing? And I was like, I just wanted to like, maximize what I could do and he was like, okay, all right.

Nick VinZant 20:00

Okay. So they kind of sounds like the answer is yes.

Nina Lussi 20:09

We want yeah, you want to know exactly where to, to be in to keep it in that position. So you can kind of,

Nick VinZant 20:16

can you make it? Can you? Can this be a full time living?

Casey Larson 20:20

Yeah, it isn't at this point. Definitely not. I mean, even as an Olympic athlete, you know, obviously trying to make another one, it's certainly not a full time living, it's not something I can, you know, maintain for another four or five years without getting a lot better at the sport. But if you're top, I'd say Top 10 Top 20. Um, if you're on the World Cup circuit consistently, and you're consistently getting like top 30 results, you're able to do okay, you're able to get the sponsors that like watching it. It's the biggest winter sport in Europe. I mean, viewership wise.

Nick VinZant 20:52

So how big is it overseas?

Casey Larson 20:54

Mass, I'd say it's, we fight with, there's so many disciplines inside of ski racing. And there's only one discipline in ski jumping. So that's kind of how we cheat the viewership numbers. If that makes sense. We fill up stadiums pretty pretty much on the regular before COVID with 40,000 people.

Nick VinZant 21:10

Well, how come that hasn't like, Well, why not in the US, right? Like, how come that hasn't hit here?

Casey Larson 21:15

I don't know. I really don't know when you know, as it's definitely better in person, right? Better than it could ever be on TV. Ski jumping in person is pretty pretty darn cool. You get you don't get a little bit more respect for just how absolutely insane it is and how far these athletes are going.

Nick VinZant 21:30

would if I was to show up to like an event. Would I be shocked at how steep and big things are? Or what I look at and be like, ah, that's not as that's not as steep as I thought it was seeing it on TV.

Casey Larson 21:43

I think you'd be more impressed in person. Honestly, I think I think a TV does it some justice, but not enough justice.

Nina Lussi 21:50

I think the best way to see ski jumping is to get as close to the action as possible. Live, of course. So if you one cool thing is if you're obviously not everybody can do this. But if you stand under the takeoff, and you can hear the rush of the skier coming down. And then you can like, see them shoot right over your head and kind of start flying. And where you can see this you can feel the speed and then also when you're in the air, it makes this cool like I don't know, it's a really special sound because you are almost like an airplane so you can hear the the air on on this gear. But on TV, you can't really like that. Those sensations don't really come through.

Nick VinZant 22:36

Who's kind of that like who's the Michael Jordan of ski jumping.

Nina Lussi 22:41

I mean, this girl, Sara Takanashi, the Japanese girl has been like really good for a really long time. There was also a Japanese guy named Noriaki kosai, who was one of the oldest jumpers, and he actually, like transitioned through every different ski jumping style. So he actually used to jump in old style where your skis are like straight. And then he did the V and like has gone to, I don't know, five or six Olympics. Wow, like still competitive got a medal in? Yeah. But that's very rare and like you have to have a body that can sustain that.

Nick VinZant 23:23

Is there is there a country that like oh, here comes the Bulgarians or whatever. Is there a country that dominates?

Casey Larson 23:31

Yeah, the power of the power? The power countries are definitely Norway. Poland, Austria, Germany. Finland is up there. Scandinavian countries are big.

Nick VinZant 23:45

Oh, this is the last one best ski jumping seen in a movie or TV show.

Nina Lussi 23:50

There was like the Eddie the Eagle movie that came out a few years ago. That wasn't like super cool ski jumping. You know what's cool is like, I was training in Slovenia before and two of the guys I was training with they were like stunt double. So they had to learn how to like jump bad to be in the movie. And they like went to the premiere and stuff. So that was cool. So they liked it. But

Nick VinZant 24:21

how do you jump bad? And still, like not get seriously injured?

Nina Lussi 24:29

Yeah, that's the thing is it's like totally about the body awareness and being able to control exactly what you're doing. And so

Fungi Researcher Dr. Gordon Walker

From terraforming the Earth for life to protecting against climate change, Fungi have played a critical role in our past, our present and our future. Fungi Researcher Dr. Gordon Walker joins us to talk fungi, the best mushrooms for your health, microbiology, Mycelium technology and magic mushrooms. Then, we countdown the Top 5 underrated candies.

Dr. Gordon Walker: 01:35ish

Pointless: 37:48

Top 5: 49:51ish

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Interview with Fungi Researcher Dr. Gordon Walker

Nick VinZant 0:12

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, fascinating fungi, and underrated candy.

Dr. Gordon Walker 0:22

So they're cryptic. They're absolutely everywhere. You have fungi on every surface of everything in your house. We have a beginning and an end in many ways. Fungi don't mycelium lives in, plurality incarnate. It is constantly moving, growing in all different directions. There's no central bank brain, there's no central decision making center. And so like life as we know it on this planet, was essentially terraforming by plants and fungi. So they don't just take over the world. They are the world.

Nick VinZant 0:52

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, leave a review, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest is fascinated by fungi. And I have to admit, going into this. I knew fungi were important, right? Like anybody else. I could look at a mushroom and say, I don't really know what that thing is doing. But it has to be doing something important. I never realized how fascinating and how important fungi are in our past, in our present, and for our future. Our first guest is fungi expert, Dr. Gordon Walker. So why are fungi important?

Dr. Gordon Walker 1:38

Fungi are incredibly important. And they're at everywhere on our planet, every interface of life. And it's something that people don't think about because they're generally microscopic, you often can't see them. And even if they're not microscopic, if it's mycelium, it's hidden down in soil, and inside of wood. So they're cryptic, they're absolutely everywhere. They're omnipresent. You have fungi on every surface of everything in your house. And yet you don't see them. And you don't notice them until they create the fruiting bodies, their reproductive structures, generally. So that's the little molds you would see on food, or it's the mushrooms you'd see out in your lawn. Or maybe it's like, you know, some other weird growth, you'd see somewhere and be like, what is that, and yet fungi are all around us constantly. And we have really no idea what they're doing, at least from like a layperson point of view. In essence, what fungi do and why they are so important, is they're specialists at recycling carbon. So in our ecosystems, there's a lot of leftover plant matter, especially. And if that would build up, you would just have like huge deposits of compacted plant matter, that would never really turn into soil. And so fungi have evolved a suite of really powerful enzymes to help break down complex polysaccharide linkages and carbon into smaller units, which then other microbes can go ahead and eat. So they are sort of a keystone species in the first step towards creating soils. And that's part of why they're so important, especially in terrestrial ecosystems. The thing

Nick VinZant 3:07

that I always wonder is right, I see a mushroom on the forest. Like, what is that thing? I guess? Like, I know, it's a mushroom, but what what is it?

Dr. Gordon Walker 3:17

So what is it? I mean, I get this question a lot. And it's, it's a great question, because it's still something that people misunderstand. You know, people think that oh, mushrooms are plants, and they're all these other things like No, mushrooms are fungi. Mushrooms very specifically, are the reproductive structures of the mycelium or the the body of the fungus that is usually below that part of that cryptic hidden part I was talking about. And the mushroom is the visible reproductive organ of that mycelium. So it's like the fruit or a flower. And it's analogous in that it is producing sexual spores to help disperse the range of that mushroom and sort of see the next generation of mycelium and continue the fungus cycle in the soil.

Nick VinZant 4:00

Are they so the bigger part of it then is below ground?

Dr. Gordon Walker 4:04

Yeah, I mean, it's tough to say because you can't ever really see how big the Mycelium is, you know, like the the world's biggest organism is this giant patch of Armillaria or honey mushroom mycelium that's out in Oregon. I'm going to go visit in a couple of months. And it's a it's I don't know, something like 10 miles or more like it's an enormous organism. It's all contiguous. But it's like a couple centimeters deep in the soil. So it's absolutely massive, but it's not like it doesn't have that much biomass. The biggest heaviest organism on the world is this giant stand of aspen trees. That probably also has mycorrhiza with it, but like this giant chunk of honey fungus is just the mycelium in the soil. It's not the mushrooms themselves, right? So the mushrooms themselves are just the reproductive organs of this huge patch of one giant piece of mycelium that spreads out you know, over like a giant National Park kind of thing. So

Nick VinZant 4:55

are they alive in the way that plants are alive or alive in the way that animals are? alive.

Dr. Gordon Walker 5:00

They're alive in a way that fungi are alive. It's a separate kingdom, right? So, so they're all eukaryotes. So we have in backing out towards the tree of life, right, we have archaea, which is sort of like weird extreme final things. We have bacteria, which are prokaryotes. And those are just tiny little single celled things. And then we have all of eukaryotes, which is stuff like amoebas. And protozoa is we have animals, we have plants, and we have fungi. So those are different kingdoms, the plant, animal and fungi. Fungi are really under their own special thing, because they don't move around like animals. But they also don't do photosynthesis like plants. Ultimately, they're a little bit closer to animals in the sense that they are catabolic. So they are breaking down organic matter to produce sugars. And then they breathe co2 and water the same way that we do. But that's kind of where the similarities end. Fungi use a polysaccharide called chitin, which is present in a lot of bugs and like arthropods, so they're like there's a little bit of a relationship there. But like, generally the way that fungi live is so different from the way that animals and plants live. Like plants have a defined structure, right? That grew up their stems, there's leaves, there's parts that do photosynthesis, there's there's roots, so they sort of define structures. Human beings have heads, fingers, toes, we are we have sort of a top and a bottom and we know where our constraints are. You know, we are we have a beginning and an end in many ways. Fungi don't mycelium lives in plurality incarnate. It is constantly moving, growing in all different directions. There's no central bank brain, there's no central decision making center, every single leading tip is like its own little brain. And somehow these 1000s of little tips growing through the soil are are all able to communicate and talk to each other at the same time and coordinate their behavior enough to then produce a mushroom when the rain comes. So it's a little mind blowing, but it's you know,

Nick VinZant 6:56

so then is an individual mushroom that I see pop poking out of the forest floor. That's not one organism that's is one one isn't a separate one or each one is.

Dr. Gordon Walker 7:08

So think of the mycelium below. There's a let's say there's a big patch under usually what we're talking about are called Ecto mycorrhizal fungi. So these are mushrooms that are associated with trees. So you can think of like think of a really big oak tree, and all around that oak tree, maybe under the drip line of where the sort of the leaves are, you'll find like a bunch of mushrooms in a big circle or something around that tree. So those mushrooms are all related. They're often mycelium that's connected to that tree. If you have another oak tree 50 feet away, you might have a completely different mixture of mushrooms coming up under that oak tree because that oak tree has a different set of associations. And the thing too is mycelium. isn't like I said it's plurality. And so you can have mycelium kind of mixed all mesh together. And so there's like a larger body of fungus where you have like a bunch of people that have kind of forgotten where the beginning and end and they're all down. They're like sharing nutrients vibing with a tree, and then they're producing mushrooms that are the mushrooms are producing their own distinct spores for that particular mycelium. But like everything underground is kind of messy, because they're all sort of linked. And there can be there can be competition, there can be mutualism, there can be all sorts of weird stuff going on.

Nick VinZant 8:22

Man, so they are they taken over the world. That's what I feel like, it's gonna happen. I feel like this is the next eventual thing is that they then take over the world,

Dr. Gordon Walker 8:30

I would say they already control the world. And I'd say that we just haven't realized it because like I said, they're kind of cryptic, they're kind of hidden. But like if we got rid of fungi, like life wouldn't exist as we know it. And the thing that I think a lot of people don't realize the importance of fungi is that plants as we know them, basically would not exist without fungi. Plants when they came to land as little tiny algae things, how do they colonize? How could How could algae colonize land? Algae needs to be in water, right? One of the first steps was for fungi and algae to team up and become symbiotic. Where the fungi would help them keep water in and provide structure and the algae would do the photosynthesis to make sugars. And that's basically what lichen is. And like him as like the one of the first land organisms, the fungus is able to produce little tiny threads that will creep down into the rock kind of intercalating between cracks in the rock. And then when it rains, those threads swell they crack the rock. And then you just created little shards of rock which over time become dust become soil. And so like life as we know it on this planet was essentially terraforming by plants and fungi. So they don't just take over the world. They are the world. How come

Nick VinZant 9:43

the best thing we figured out so far to do with them then is just eat them.

Dr. Gordon Walker 9:48

We do a lot more than just eat them. I think the promise of eating them is something that like attracts most people because that's your first experience with most mushrooms as many people eat a mushroom they you know Some people like them, some people don't like them like, I got lucky I found a puffball at age five and my mom was like, that's a mushroom, we can eat that and I took it home was like what is the savory marshmallow it's incredible. And that left a big impression on me like wow, that was a cool mushroom. I want to try more. And and so food definitely led me into trying more mushrooms. In terms of like applications for mushrooms, there's there's lots of them we're looking at are sort of poised on the edge of what people are calling a Miko Cultural Revolution. And the idea is essentially that we can start using fungi for a lot more than just food. They are sustainable protein. They can be building materials. You can use mycelium to make shipping packing materials that are biodegradable, that are sustainable, you can use it to make insulation for houses. I've seen people make like canoes and coffins and all sorts of like kitschy things out of it. There's several companies right now that are working on textiles, fabrics, sort of mushroom leather type products, where they want to put them on leather coats and couches and all this stuff. There's tremendous potential in like the space of medicine, therapeutics, because there's all sorts of novel antibiotics. Cytotoxic like cancer drugs, there's like a huge class of molecules that are being explored, explored within fungi, as potential, you know, cures for various diseases. I mean, like statins that people use to control blood pressure, those came from mushrooms, there's all these like lectins and things involved in immune immunity and immune response. So there's a tremendous like, potential for these in the field of health. And there's also mental health and using philosophy to like help people overcome trauma and, and things like that in their lives. So there's a lot more than just eating them.

Nick VinZant 11:34

If to kind of crystallize it for me, on a scale of one to 10, one being like, we don't even know what this thing sticking out of the ground is 10. We've got this figured out any question anyone can imagine we have the answer to it. And then where would you say we are in our knowledge of them? Right now?

Dr. Gordon Walker 11:53

I don't know if I gave you the most authoritative answer on this. But I would say we're somewhere around like five or six. Like we know a lot. I think in the in the overall estimation, we know about 14,000 species of mushrooms right now. It's estimated that there's about 40,000 species of mushrooms. And then in the world of fungi, in general, it's estimated that there's somewhere between like 2.3 and 3.8 million species of fungi out there that like we haven't necessarily gotten a handle on. Because there's, there's mushrooms. And then there's also the yeast and the lichens, and the filamentous. fungi, and there's just in mold. There's like such a vast variety of the different kinds of fungi and most of them are microscopic, so you would never see them as a mushroom necessarily. Mushrooms are clearly sort of like the vanguard of the of the fungal world because they produce these like beautiful fruiting bodies, and they're very, like engaging and you can eat them, you can learn all the stuff about them, it's harder to get interested in something that's like a microscopic mole that you can never really see, you know, but those things can be just as important because they can cause rusts cause like massive amounts of damage in agriculture and caused like huge crop losses all over the world. At the same time, like we spray all these fungicides in our fields to keep fungus away, without realizing that there's this this fungus called weed like Kobe or ustilago made us corn Smite, it's a it's a thing that infects corn kernels. And in America, we think it's nasty. It turns these corn into like sort of big, fleshy, gray looking gall things. And in Mexico, they love it. It's a delicacy. And here in America, we spend fungicides all over the place to get rid of it. And it's like, a fungus is actually making corn more nutritious. It's upping the protein content. It's making it taste better. And yet, like it's this this weird dichotomy of how like, we love to hate fungus, and especially in agriculture and other cultural practices, like people like do all they can to keep it away with sort of forgetting that, you know, this might actually be of benefit to us if we thought about how to better control it and use it as an ally.

Nick VinZant 13:53

So I guess it's just because I kind of think about about it as being like, not clean.

Dr. Gordon Walker 13:58

Yeah, I mean, but nothing is like, quite frankly, like if you have something clean, if you were if you took a baby and brought them up in a clean place, that would be the sickest kid in the world. They would every single allergy, every single like sensitivity. There is something to be said for like letting kids crawl around the dirt. And like, you know, you want to generate an immune response. And like it helps if you get exposure to you know, I frequently when I'm feeling kind of sick, I'll be like, I'm going to go mushroom hunting just because I like that's my happy space. And I'll be like, snotty and feeling awful when I get out there. And then after a couple hours of digging around the soil and smelling mushrooms and touching stuff and being covered in dirt, you'd think I'd feel worse, actually feel better. I come home and I'm like, my stuffy nose is gone. I feel great. My immune system went through the roof.

Nick VinZant 14:41

Okay, so I don't think there's mushrooms living inside of us necessarily, but there are fungi and that kind of stuff that are in us, right.

Dr. Gordon Walker 14:48

There are some kinds of yeast and things. Yeah, we have a fair number of yeast and fungi that live on our skin. And for the most part, they're they're not harmful. We do know about like fungal infections. Everyone's familiar with like a yeast infection that women have to deal with. And like there's various topical skin infections, ringworm and different things you can get on your skin. Most of those are caused not by some awful fungus that's invading you. It's simply something that was there already. And like the balance of your microbial ecosystem got thrown off because there's a change in pH or maybe we're too sweaty for too long, or what you know, there's some growth of bacteria or something that caused a shift and then the fungus fungi are ultimately opportunists. So, mushrooms, and molds and all these things will do what they do best in their environment. But if their environment drastically changes, they're going to do what's best for them. They're not going to keep doing what you want them to do. They're going to keep doing what they want to do. And so that's like coming from the world of winemaking. That's something you see all the time, because that's dependent on a fungus yeast Saccharomyces servicio, where you have this like, giant vat of sugar, and you put the yeast and you want them turn it all the alcohol. The yeast, though, are smart, they're like, you know, we realize if we turn all of the sugar and alcohol, we're going to die. So sometimes the conditions are a little weird, the yeast will shift and say, Yeah, we're not going to finish that last little bit of alcohol, we're going to like, concentrate on trying to survive for like the next round. And winemakers don't like that winemakers like No, no, we want you to finish all of that we want you to blow through, then not leave a bunch of sugar in our wine, because then it's open for spoilage kind of thing. So, again, yeah, yeast are honest, we have it part of our microbiome, but it's all about opportunity and the balance of the ecosystem. So

Nick VinZant 16:26

do they seem to have any kind of an intelligence,

Dr. Gordon Walker 16:29

there's definitely intelligence, it's what they call network intelligence. So it's not intelligence in the way that we think about it, that we have a central brain. But like I said, they have all those little hyphal tips that are growing in the soil, and somehow they're able to all coordinate. So you know, imagine like some sort of like massive transit system that is like self regulating, and like, you know, imagine, you know, the New York subway system, but somehow all the trains know when and where to go kind of on their own. That's an example of like network intelligence. And that's kind of what fungi and slime molds exhibit. So you've heard of slime molds. They're, they're not fungi, technically, they're other little organisms that, you know, you've seen time lapse of them growing through mazes and stuff, they can like navigate mazes and find food and avoid light. They have all these sort of like, examples of intelligence. But they still you know, they can do simple problems, like solve a puzzle and do these various things. But they don't have they don't have a brain. Their effects on molds are one giant cell slime molds, mycelium are different organisms that behave in similar manners. And they both exhibit this this network intelligence and ability to coordinate decisions across you know, distances, without like neuron potentials, or anything else that we understand as thought.

Nick VinZant 17:38

So is that kind of the difference between like actively thinking versus responding to just external stimuli? The fungi don't get together and be like, hey, you know what, there's this property down there. We go down there, there's some great soil for us. Well, I just think they can

Dr. Gordon Walker 17:53

sense because they can be like, Oh, we can tell that there's some good stuff for us to eat down there. So they might intentionally move down there because they're, that's closer chemotaxis they're moving towards something that they want. So they can sense that. Are they making like a conscious decision? Maybe not. I like to think of it as like, you know, you see one of those like producer music boards from like, a studio, and there's all the little like levels and dials and stuff like that. Yeah, I think for me, that's kind of how I think about it's like, there's some level of like, messing with the dials, where they're like, Okay, we've hit enough, you know, the levels are up, we're gonna go, we're gonna go for it. Right? If they have enough of the stimuli that says, do this thing or move away from this thing, they'll start doing that in an active way you can even like, there's examples of where if you put like a fungi on a plate, and you give it a food source, it'll move towards the food source. And because what it does is mycelium grows in all directions equally until it finds food and then it concentrates all its resources on the food. Right? So it's growing all equally until it finds something and then it puts everything into that that food source because it's like there's food there. If you then pick up the food source, clean away the mycelium and put the food source back. Mycelium will remember where the food source was and grow towards it again. So like it has memory, even though it doesn't have a brain, which I think is really cool. Yeah, I'm

Nick VinZant 19:08

going back to they're taking over the world man.

Dr. Gordon Walker 19:12

They already took over the world. We live in their world. It's we just don't see them.

Nick VinZant 19:17

Um, are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? Sure shoot. Best fungi slash mushroom.

Dr. Gordon Walker 19:24

It's a tough one because I have to qualify it like I have so many favorites and it shifts constantly based a little bit on season. I definitely do have a few favorites. morels are excellent. There's this thing called butter blades that are incredible. I get one here in Napa called emanate of Llosa that I absolutely love. Those are some of my favorite edibles. There's also really cool mushrooms I just like take photos of there's things called high nelum which are a little tough, bitter sort of polypore to fungi but they have these droplets of what's called quotation or liquid on them. You might have seen like the bleeding tooth fungi, it just looks absolutely unreal and crazy. and really cool. So those are some of my favorites. And I know there's there's so many things out there that can just be utterly mind blowing because you come across them. You don't even recognize them as a mushroom. And then you find out later like, Oh, that was fungus like, whoa. So

Nick VinZant 20:12

most overrated like, ah, somebody's talking about portabello. Again, everybody, so great, but it's a jerk or something like that.

Dr. Gordon Walker 20:22

I mean, just just as a side note, I like Agaricus bisporus is what portabello cremini and but mushrooms are all the same species of mushroom. They're just grown in slightly different ways or slightly different strain of the same thing. I think like the fact that everybody thinks that's what mushrooms are, that makes them a little overrated because it's like, there's like, hundreds of delicious mushrooms. There's hundreds of bad mushroom soup, there's like, you know, something like 40,000 mushrooms and only like a couple 100 on each end are gonna be edible or poisonous. And everything else in between is just a mushroom. I'd say maybe overrated mushroom, like, people absolutely love Shawn trails, and they're good. But they're not like, they're not the best. You know, I think people tend to hold things in certain regard because they are familiar with them. Even porcine people really, really like this sort of big kimberlites and porcini. But some of my favorite mushrooms are ones that people aren't necessarily aware of. Because they're not as highly regarded. They're not as highly touted. So I think certain things kind of get over represented. emanate a muscaria is another one that like, I think people get so stoked on it, because it's that classic red little white dots on it. It's poisonous, but it's not deadly toxic. And so there's just a lot of like misconceptions out there around certain mushrooms.

Nick VinZant 21:39

Dem. Which one do you think of like you look at and you say, Oh, that one has a lot of potential?

Dr. Gordon Walker 21:45

I mean, are you talking like for biotechnology, you're talking for food, you're talking for environmental restoration. But well, the potential all of the

Nick VinZant 21:52

above I guess, and the asking really hard like, okay, however you want to define potential?

Dr. Gordon Walker 21:58

Sure. So I think right now, some of the most interesting mushrooms are what are called White rot fungi. So those are mushrooms that have evolved to digest wood. And there's several levels of mushrooms that digest wood, there's white rot, brown rot and then like composters. So this is like first secondary and tertiary SAP probes. White rot fungi are things that can break down lignin, which is a really complex polymer in wood, that crosslinks cellulose and gives it wood its structure, its its density. And why rot fungi have these very advanced enzymes to break down lignin because it's a super complex molecule. And so we've been harnessing the power of white rot fungi, and this is stuff like oyster mushrooms, Ganoderma, reishi, mushrooms, Lion's Mane, these kinds of things, to mine enzymes to do making biofuels to do other like industrial processes. We've also been looking at them to do like bio remediation of like carbon compounds. So like, certain people out there have shown that in a lab, you can get like an oyster mushrooms, eat like cigarette butts, or potentially eat hydrocarbons and oil pollution, it's really difficult to actually translate that kind of practice into a wild situation, because they've tried to like take oyster mushrooms and put them on an oil spill. They don't do what you want them to do, because oyster mushrooms do what they want to do, not what you want them to do. But I do think there's tremendous potential, as you said, to capture the power and chemistry of some of these white rot fungi and use them as allies and fighting climate change and trying to sort of make sense of the mess we've made of the world.

Nick VinZant 23:35

follow this up with a lighthearted one. Do you consider Toad from Mario to be a mushroom?

Dr. Gordon Walker 23:42

Yeah, I think he's pretty clearly an avenue to muscaria. You know, he's a little guy. So

Nick VinZant 23:47

is he the most famous mushroom based character?

Dr. Gordon Walker 23:51

Oh, he might be you know, I mean, the Mario Mushroom is definitely like the one that everybody knows. And that's part of why ama muscaria is so well. You know, recognized around the world.

Nick VinZant 24:01

I guess I can't think of any other famous mushrooms.

Dr. Gordon Walker 24:04

There's there's plenty in like animaIs. And like, I'm amazed once you start recognizing mushrooms, you start noticing them everywhere, because it's like, I've talked to people who are like their hikers, professional hikers or something like that. And they've gone like the whole Pacific Crest Trail and stuff like that. Like do you see any mushrooms? They're like, No, didn't notice any ever. And then you're like, well here, look at my Instagram. Look at these pictures of mushrooms. And the next thing I know for like, weeks on end, people are just DMing me pictures of mushrooms every day. And I'm like, Yeah, I know. I told you they're everywhere. You just like have to key into it. And I feel like it's kind of the same thing with media you you've watched shows and movies and things where there's mushrooms in them and not realize it was a mushroom until you're like oh my gosh, that's a mushroom.

Nick VinZant 24:41

Best place to find them

Dr. Gordon Walker 24:44

in the woods, after rain. You know the mushrooms do grow everywhere. You can find them in the desert. You can find them in the Arctic you can find them pretty much anywhere you can imagine. But you there's a few basic things that really help if you have plants around so they have carbon to eat. and you have lots of water you're going to need rain or at least some snow, melt, moisture, humidity etc. to to get the mushrooms to grow because that is the biggest trigger right is the Mycelium is down in the soil. If it doesn't have any water, it's not going to swell. If the water goes down and mycelium swells up, that's when it says okay, now is an appropriate time to previous to the fruiting body. And that's because mushrooms need moisture to develop. And the spores when they come out, need moisture to kind of germinate nucleate and go down into the soil and start growing again to continue the mycorrhizal network.

Nick VinZant 25:33

Does that always happen super fast like I you know, 1000 Boom, there they are, or is it just you don't notice it until they're done.

Dr. Gordon Walker 25:41

So there's some mushrooms that like come up and disappear within like 24 hours, there's this class of mushrooms called Ink caps, which are like generally little tiny things will grow in which ships there's some bigger ones too. But they'll come up and essentially melt. They don't they don't even disperse their scores by when they just like they come up in their cap turns to black goo and it melts and drops all over the ground. And that can happen in like 24 or 48 hours. That's that's a really fast cycle. A lot of mushrooms will be they'll come up and kind of exist for about a week or two. And then they'll get moldy and rotting and full of bugs and to kind of just like disappear into the forest floor. And then there's stuff like poly pores that can you know, persist for an entire year, maybe five years, you know, there's this one called the Gary con, which can live for like 80 to 100 years on a tree. It's parasitic on the tree, but very, very weakly so. So it's like year after year, it's building layers on layers on layers, which is one of the things you can go to the forest and you'll see lots of stuff that are like conks on trees, and more often on if they're on the side of trails, some will come by and knock it off. And that always upsets me because I'm like, you know, that comp could live for another like 20 years. But somebody just thought to be clever to like whack it off.

Nick VinZant 26:46

Like I didn't know they had such a long lifespan.

Dr. Gordon Walker 26:49

Some of them. Yeah, I mean, that's that's so he's talking about the medical potential for fungi along those poly pores because they're so long lives are full of antibiotics, of cytotoxic compounds that can fight cancers, they have really complex like polysaccharide linkages that can help stimulate our immune system. And that's because those things are built to last right? They're mushrooms that have evolved to not get molded over eaten by bugs, they're going to exist for like 2030 4050 years. So they're full of stuff that's really good at keeping the mushroom whole, and we can take those compounds and use them as medicines and therapeutics.

Nick VinZant 27:25

How can I tell if they're poisonous? That's what I've always wanted to like pick one up.

Dr. Gordon Walker 27:32

Okay, so So behind me, I have two posters, can you tell which ones poisonous?

Nick VinZant 27:36

The one on the bottom?

Dr. Gordon Walker 27:40

The one on top, actually, but that's kind of my point is I get this question. A lot of people say, hey, how do you tell what's poisonous? What's not? And I say you don't? Everyone just wants a rule of thumb. And for fungi, there is no such thing. And I know that's a disappointing answer, but try rephrasing it as this. The way you learn what's edible, and what's toxic is by learning one mushroom at a time. And the way I like to think about this is it's like playing an RPG. When you start an RPG, you have one spell you have fireball and all you can do is spam fireball, you know, you kill the zombie spam fireball, but eventually you level up because you're other killing zombies you gain experience. And then suddenly, wow, I just learned lightning now you can cast fireball and lightning. And then as your other casting fireball and lightning you like pick up another spell. And so mushroom hunting is very much the same thing. You got to learn like one good edible mushroom to start. And there's a few really easy ones you can learn something like chicken the woods is this big orangey yellow poly core, it grows on trees. If you find a big orange ELA Polyvore growing on a tree, it's the only thing that looks like that it's going to be a tip or a certificate the woods. If you learn that, then maybe you can learn a Shawn Trail, which is a little bit more complicated. It does have a few look alikes, but you can kind of like, as you get along in your mushroom journey, you learn more and more spells more and more mushrooms. And you also as you're learning the edible ones, you start to learn the toxic ones. And that's how you kind of start to build this repertoire.

Nick VinZant 28:59

Where do you think this goes? Like? What do you think the future holds?

Dr. Gordon Walker 29:02

I think the future is hopefully bright for our partnership with fungi. I think there's a lot of challenges that we have to face with what's happened with our climate. And I think like the human influence on this planet is being felt more and more and it's like the people who are still saying that the climate change hasn't occurred are they're going to become in the minority. Because as the world fundamentally changes as our food system changes, the weather changes, we're going to have to adapt, or we're going to die as a species and I think fungi because they were some of the original terraforming of this planet are going to be one of the main pillars of how we actually try to recapitulate ecosystems, we have to go to Superfund sites and reforest them we have to sink massive amounts of carbon to stop our planet from becoming too hot to be habitable, basically, and fungi are a huge part of how we're gonna be able to buffer the environment. We're gonna be able to like use them to help reseed plants we're going to be producing sustainable foods you know, there's there's too much animal agriculture. You're going on right now I'm I'm an omnivore. I don't think that we should all go vegan. But I do think it would help if everybody in the country could cut their meat consumption in half, and supplement that with mushrooms. I think the other big thing we'd get out of that wouldn't be just like a positive boon for the climate, we'd see a huge improvement in health too, because fungi have a massive amount of dietary fiber in them. And that's the thing people don't realize how little fiber they're getting in their diet. And like when I say fiber, I don't mean go and eat a box of Wheaties and like have a very uncomfortable BM like I'm talking about like fiber that we need to live and feel full feel satiated, to stock good bacteria in our guts. And I think fungi are absolutely essential source of nutrients that had been largely ignored because people kind of just look at them like the cheap Agaricus by sports a little button mushrooms you buy in a store are not appealing to enough people who have them want to eat them every meal. And so like what I'd love to see is a much larger selection of edible fungi become more available become you know, easier to access in terms of price and availability. And and really see people eat more mushrooms because I think health would improve. And I think we could really help our environment by shifting some of our protein needs to to fumble bass stuff.

Nick VinZant 31:11

This isn't, you know, your area of specialization necessarily, but I think the question is an obvious one whenever we're talking about mushrooms. Right now, there seems to be a big push to kind of move into the was it the psychedelic ones? Do you do you see potential there? Is this kind of a fad?

Dr. Gordon Walker 31:29

I think it's a lot more than a fad. I mean, I think the sad thing is that like we were there in the 70s. And then it was like Nixon for very racist reasons decided to shut down, you know, start a war on drugs that was like, essentially just an excuse to put people in prison. Certainly, if you look at the history of it. Right now, what we're seeing is, you know, stuff like Michael Pollan's book, The Johns Hopkins studies are some really major momentum moving towards showing the value and efficacy of psilocybin and psychedelics in general towards mental health. We certainly have a mental health crisis in this country, you know, the number of people who had issues and can't find proper help, you know, if you've tried to look for a therapist or some like that, it's very difficult and most people can't afford it, don't have the time don't have the access, etc. I don't think psychedelics are a silver bullet, I think that there's a little bit too much kind of projected onto them that they can somehow solve all your problems you still need to go through like the work and the effort of actually tackling your problems. And I think taking psychedelics in a therapeutic setting is going to be where they're going to be most effective, rather than people just kind of like going off on like, Vision quests in the desert kind of thing that because that can be dangerous, and like certainly, like psychedelics are very powerful and they can cause like a mental break, they can they could make you very unwell. Although they are generally very safe drugs compared to like other drugs out there, you can't really OD on one, but you can have a mental psychotic break as a result of taking them in inappropriate setting, or inappropriate dosage or you know, without proper support kind of thing. So I think there is massive potential for it. And I'm really excited to see like Oregon passes 109 measure, so they're gonna actually there's not in place yet. But within like the next two years, they have to have a system for there to be assisted psychedelic therapy appointments happening in Oregon. And there's a lot of places that are decriminalizing. So like, Oakland and Berkeley have done it, Denver's done it and arbour Santa Cruz, there's a number of cities and municipalities and even counties around the country that have started decriminalizing psychedelics, and specifically psilocybin to because it has a lot of potential to help people. And from what we've seen, it has very little downside, right? If you can cure someone's alcoholism in one or two sessions, that's a lot better for society than letting that person continue to like, you know, relapse in and out of stuff until they eventually get in a car accident, kill somebody, you know, so there's, there's real potential,

Nick VinZant 33:51

staying kind of in that similar area, but also more entertainment, the broader topic of it, do a lot of mushrooms have that chemical or genetic makeup or whatever that is that or is that unique to that specific kind of mushroom?

Dr. Gordon Walker 34:06

It's not unique. So it's, I mean, psilocybin is just an alkaloid. And there's a lot of different like mushrooms contain a lot of alkaloids and plants due to alkaloids are compounds that some of them are bitter and poisonous, and some of them are trippy. Some of them are just, you know, whatever they are. Psilocybin is mostly present in philosophy mushrooms, which is the the genre of mushrooms, there's a bunch of different species of philosophy and they grow all over the place. The most common one is one called Philosophy cubensis. That's what people are generally growing in, you know, things as as magic mushrooms. The native range of those is like Florida, Cuba, sort of the south east, they like really tropical warm regions. And so if you see philosophy elsewhere, it's probably a different species, the majority of philosophy or little wood decay fungi that are growing in like witchy pet so like all around the Bay Area, we get philosophy growing, but it's outside of like a Bank of America or like a apartment complex or something like that. It's like well watered woodchip beds where they occur, which is hilarious to me because I'm like, the legality of those things is a very weird gray area because you can't make a mushroom you can't make a plant that exists in nature illegal, it's it's there. It's only illegal if we go pick it with the intention of consuming it as a drug, if you picked it without knowing what it was, if you're like a landscaping guy, and you're like, oh, I want to get rid of all these mushrooms. That's not illegal. It's only illegal once you pick it with the intention. And that's the weird, legal gray area, right? Because if you're out hunting around a Bank of America and a cops like what are you doing? You're like, I don't know, I'm, I don't know what I'm doing. It's not illegal. But if you're like, I know what I'm doing, then it's illegal. Right? There are there are other genre of mushrooms that contain psilocybin, there's some pinellia species, there's some gianopolous species, there's actually a fair number of mushrooms that contain very, very, very small amounts of psilocybin. But usually psilocybin is peat, not heat stable. So if you cook a mushroom, you've cooked, you know, this is a good reason do you want to cook most emotion because you want to cook the toxins out? More often than not, there's bad stuff that could hurt you, if you you know, are eating a mushroom raw, so it's a really good idea to cook all your mushrooms. So lots of it would be an exception, because you actually want the psilocybin intentionally but it could also be quite upsetting if you were to eat something, not knowing that there's psilocybin and that would not that would be you know, getting that's where the mental break comes in. Because you think you're just having dinner. Next thing, you know, you're tripping.

Nick VinZant 36:20

Um, that's all the questions I got, man. Is there anything you think that we missed? Or what's kind of coming up next for you? Oh, geez.

Dr. Gordon Walker 36:25

Well, I do social media on Instagram and YouTube and tick tock, and I think my main goal is to present visually engaging mushroom content that stirs up people's emotions. And I do some I don't know, if you've seen what I do. I know you talked to some risque people, but I have some sort of risque mushroom videos as well. I even have an only fun guy. And I think you know where to find that it is a it's only fun guy. But I have I put some of my more risky things on there. I realized that like me, making videos of talking about mushrooms, takes a lot of effort out of me and I had to like add them, put them together and stuff like good on camera and make a video work. Or sometimes I find a jelly fungus. And I can kind of just squish my finger around in it. And it makes a very intimate sounding noise and people like that or, or hate it. Either way, it causes an emotional response. And the whole point is to get them to stick around long enough to actually read the caption and hopefully learn some information. So I kind of have fun being a little subversive on social media and pushing people's buttons just a slight bit. So

Nick VinZant 37:26

I want to thank Dr. Walker so much for joining us. If you want to connect with him and learn even more about fungi, we have linked to him on our social media accounts. We're Profoundly Pointless on Twitter and Instagram. And we have also included his information in the episode description. Okay, now, let's go ahead and bring in John Shaw. Do you feel like people generally listen to you?

Screenwriter Michael Jamin

From King of the Hill and Tacoma FD to Wilfred, Maron and Rules of Engagement, Screenwriter Michael Jamin has worked on some of Hollywood’s most recognizable sitcoms. We talk how to become a screenwriter, what it’s really like in a writer’s room and the future of television. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Scariest Things in Life.

Michael Jamin: 01:17ish

Pointless: 38:20ish

Top 5: 58:01ish

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https://www.instagram.com/michaeljaminwriter/ (Michael Jamin Instagram)

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https://twitter.com/MJaminWriter (Michael Jamin Twitter)

https://michaeljamin.com/course (Michael Jamin Website)

Interview with Screenwriter Michael Jamin

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant Coming up in this episode, screenwriting, and this scariest things in life,

Michael Jamin 0:23

the first one is the hardest. You can't get an agent without a job and you can't get a job without an agent. And so a lot of a hustling that I started out as a production assistant. You know, in our mind, we think of one thing, but I've worked with so many actors who are just like, I was not, I did not expect you to say it like that. And it's better than I imagined. I think a better question to ask is, how do I write a script? That's so good, it doesn't matter whose hands it falls into. And that's the damn truth.

Nick VinZant 0:48

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest writes the stuff you see on TV, everything from King of the Hill, and Tacoma FD to Marin, Wilfred, rules of engagement. He's been a writer on some of Hollywood's most recognizable sitcoms. This is screenwriter Michael Jackson. So obviously, once you get established in the industry, you kind of get jobs off your reputation. But how do you get that first job as a TV writer?

Michael Jamin 1:25

Yeah, that's the first one is the hardest, you can't get an agent got a job and you can't get a job without an agent. And so a lot about hustling that. I started as a production assistant, on on TV shows, you know, so I was basically a golfer, I would do whatever the boss wanted me to do. And after doing that for a couple of years, you know, I was I was able to say, Hey, can I pitch you an idea for a show? And they're like, you know, that's a that's a very tentative thing to do. Because, you know, you're, you're, that's not why you're hired. But I had really great bosses. And my partner had a writing partner, and we sold they were they were running a show called Lois and Clark, which was the Superman show that with Dean came in geriatric. And so that was they bought an episode of that. And that was my that was my first kind of big break.

Nick VinZant 2:08

When somebody is a TV writer, or a writer for any kind of thing. Are you writing the entire episode slash series? Are you like, Alright, I'm a TV writer. I wrote this one joke in a sitcom. Oh, no.

Michael Jamin 2:20

How does that work? Yeah, you want your you want to be a staff writer, you want to be on staff of a TV show, and a TV show might have like a sitcom I'd have anywhere between, on average, eight or 10. Writers. And you work as a group and you come up with ideas, you flesh them out into stories. And once it's all fleshed out, one writer, or a team of writers will go off and write that episode. So they'll be responsible for writing an outline, that a first draft, maybe a second draft, and the second draft will come back to the writers room. And all the writers work together to rewrite it to kind of quality control it so that you can ever tell one episode of television is written by one writer versus another right? It's kind of it's like, as a viewer watching at home when they go, Oh, this is just an average episode of TV that I might have my favorite show or whatever. And then there's the head writer, the head writer kind of is in charge of basically determine what gets into the script, but doesn't wander the show ideas but what gets made what doesn't. And he or she's is the boss. So that's the that's we call that the showrunner. So in TV, the showrunner is the boss, the show the director answers to the showrunner with the writers answer to the show, what are the actors? You know, I guess they want they want to get the show into the performance that the that the showrunner wants, so he or she is the boss. So it kind

Nick VinZant 3:29

of sounds a little bit like a group project. But somebody puts their name on it at the end?

Michael Jamin 3:34

Yeah, one writers is,

Nick VinZant 3:35

yeah, does most of the heavy lifting. Now is everybody in a room before COVID.

Michael Jamin 3:39

But you were literally in a writers room and you'd be on a sitcom, you'd be stuck in a room with these writers for at least 12 hours a day, sometimes much longer. These writers rooms, the ones I've worked in, are some of the funniest people you've ever met. I mean, these are the best of the best. And so, you know, you can be howling with laughter You spend your whole day just howling with laughter if you're doing your job, right. If you're not, there's a lot of silence, and a lot of when are we gonna get out of here? But yeah, it's collaborative. With that

Nick VinZant 4:07

kind of an effort though. Like how come some come some TV shows? They just they they don't work?

Michael Jamin 4:12

Yeah, right. Well, some of that's due to who the showrunner is who the boss is, some of it's because the network is gives a lot of notes, they have involvement. Sometimes you have an actor who's a big star who won't do something they want to do what they want to do. So there's a you know, it's it's like, everyone wants to say every everyone that I read a kind of umbrella guy named Charlie Hawk wrote a book about this in his analogy, he was a sitcom writer, his analogy was perfect. And he said, it's like, everyone wants to have a hit show. And it's like being in a lifeboat in a rowboat, and you're trying to get the same direction, but everywhere, everyone's wrong in a different direction. The actor is going this way. And the stars going into the showrunner this way and the writers in the network. And so it's like, if you can't get that boat moving in the same direction. It's a real problem. But every One has an ego and everyone, so and everyone has a different wants and needs. So

Nick VinZant 5:03

for you, when you sit down to write something like what's your process?

Michael Jamin 5:09

Well, I write, I write with a writing partner most of the time. So for television show, so we'll come up if it really depends if it's a show, it's on the air for to refer to, if we have a pilot that we're trying to sell, you know, that's a different thing. But it's usually coming up with, if we're on a staff of a TV show, the first thing you have to do is figure out, you have to break the story, you have to figure out what the story is about. And you go to a whiteboard. And you have Act One, act two, act three, and the writers will all pitch well, but what if it starts with what if? And then the showrunner will side of that idea has enough meat on its bones? And then if it does, you start fleshing it out a little bit. And that just coming up with the idea, and and seeing if there's enough meat on the bones that can easily take three to five days before before one word is written,

Nick VinZant 5:52

how then how long would it take to write an episode like, okay, from the start the conception of the idea to the very end, right? Not obviously, for the episode to air, but like this is written and done,

Michael Jamin 6:03

it can easily take from the from the beginning, when someone first has raised their hand and says, I have an idea to when you start shooting, activate, you actually start shooting the episode, it can easily be six weeks, then yeah, it's about quality control. It's about making sure every this story actually works. And that every line is as funny as it can be. And it's a lot of rehearsal, there's a lot of rewriting a 90% of writing is rewriting. So it's really about making sure it works.

Nick VinZant 6:29

Do you kind of when you write something, do you wait for inspiration? Or do you have a time like, alright, nine o'clock, sitting down, and something's coming out,

Michael Jamin 6:37

if you wait for inspiration, you will go hungry? Because I get paid, per episode produced. And a point if like, I can't sell the network, you know, inspiration didn't strike this week, let's just air color bars instead of the TV show. You know, that's not an acceptable answer. So there's no such thing as writer's block or waiting for inspiration. You have to, it's a job you have to you have to make your episode of television. So you fall back on your skills, and you fall back on on your training to get that episode done.

Nick VinZant 7:05

Is whenever you're talking about something creative, though, like that, is it something can you learn to do it? Or is it like you either got it? Or you don't? Right? Because I wouldn't think that people can learn to be funny. You're either funny, or you're not? Yeah, but

Michael Jamin 7:18

you can learn to be funnier. So you're right, you have to be funny, but you can learn to be funny, or you can hone your craft, you know, like, I'm definitely much better writer than it was 26 years ago when I broke in. But I remember, I was working on a show called King of the Hill, as a writer, you know, back in 2001. And the planes flew into the World Trade Center. And all those that tragedy was horrible, because people died was just horrific. And we didn't go to work that day, because everyone thought you into the pot, the country is coming apart. But the next day, we had to go to work. And we had to write comedy. And I assure you, none of the writers were in any mood to write comedy for that day, that week, or that month, or even subsequent like, it just felt wrong and disrespectful. So felt sacrilegious. So many people had died. And we knew that the world had changed, like no one wanted to write comedy. But we all had to because that's the job. And so, you know, you fall back on your training to make to write me a computer instead of someone would pitch a joke, and no one would laugh, but someone would say okay, yeah, that's funny, we could do that. It was very somber. Yeah, that's a good idea. We can do that. And now when you look back at those episodes that we shot, back, then I don't think you'd know, you would realize it was shot during a time of national grief and mourning. You just wouldn't.

Nick VinZant 8:28

Is it when you write something? Obviously, it's different. If you're talking about you know, you're in your second or third or fourth season or whatever. But are you generally do you know who you're writing it for? Like, I'm writing this for this actor?

Michael Jamin 8:41

Yeah, I mean it but if it's a pilot that we're selling, we have an actor in mind. But it that's really just to get a voice. So you're thinking, Okay, what's this is what the voice is what the character is, like, when it comes to casting more often than not far more often that you're not going to get that actor you had in mind. There's an audition process and everyone involved has a say, and, and so once you cast the actor that you get, who's close enough to that part, then the role will the role naturally start changing if it goes to series because you start writing to the actors strengths, and you steer away from their weaknesses. So that'll definitely change

Nick VinZant 9:17

kind of brought this up a little bit earlier. But I think the question that everybody wonders is like, how much do you get paid?

Michael Jamin 9:23

Enough? It depends on it. Honestly, it depends on your level. So staff writers, the lowest level and then it goes all the way up to co executive producer and executive producer that's in TV that's the highest level then the the showrunners kind of like executive producer and the creator. So there are Writers Guild, the Writers Guild that sets the minimums and that will change whether you're doing a half hour show an hour long show cable streaming network every there's different rates. It's a falls in a whole different range. And you I get paid per episode produced. So if the show is doing 22 episodes, I make a lot of money. If the show is only eight episodes on on cable, that's obviously a lot less money. So it just depends.

Nick VinZant 10:07

And then residuals like, how does that work? Because you get continued to get paid, right?

Michael Jamin 10:11

If the show sells somewhere like they start, you know, yeah, if it's if it reruns somewhere, and the writer of that episode, we get paid a residual. And that also is negotiated by the Writers Guild. And so it's standard across the board. So I don't have to say, hey, you know, this show, it's not like, the writers on friends will get more money in residuals than writers on some show you never heard of, it's just that their episodes will air more often. And so though that great, will it keep? You know, okay, well keep getting a check more often. But the actual amount is the same.

Nick VinZant 10:45

Our most writers struggling or if you've got like a good, or you do you do pretty well,

Michael Jamin 10:51

it, you know, it, it's gotten harder over the years, because the series orders have gotten shorter. So if you're working on a show that only does eight episodes, a season, that's a lot harder to make a living than one that would do 22 episodes. So when I broke into the business, there were four networks, there's ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox, basically, and some smaller cable channels. And so it was, I think it was easier than to make a living than is now because you could be on a hit show now, but it only does eight episodes a season. Right? You could be on Barry, which is on HBO, I don't know. Maybe they do 10 or something hit show, but they're not working that much. So once you get off that shit, so you have to, you have to hopefully sell a pilot in between or maybe pick up another job in between that, that the schedule is aligned so that you can go back to your hit show.

Nick VinZant 11:37

I'm fascinated by logistics. And when I look at places like all the streaming services, like are there enough writers to write all this stuff?

Michael Jamin 11:45

There are bad in Hollywood, the number of working writers, his soul is just a little bit more than the number of active players in the NFL. Okay, so it's about the same, maybe a little bit more. It's in the 1000s. But yeah, it's it's not a ton of it's very competitive. Yeah.

Nick VinZant 12:04

But why is it? Why is it still that competitive win for me for somebody looking on the outside is like MIT, there's 1000s of shows on each one of these streaming platforms? And like, why is it still so competitive? When it seems like we got it? What are the math there doesn't seem to work out right 1000s of shows eight to 10 people.

Michael Jamin 12:22

But ya know, if it's a smaller show, so my partner and I ran a show called Marin on IFC, which is critical. Not many people saw it as critically, the critics loved it. But the first seat it was a low budget show, the first season, there are only four of us as writers, only four writers, me and my partner, the star of the show, Mark Marin, and one of the young staff writer. And so it's not a lot of people, as the show, as the show progressed over the year of the couple of the seasons, we had four seasons, we added more writers, but okay, you can remember. So I'm talking about working writers at any given time. So if you're, if your shows on the or you're working, you know, if you're shooting at your shows on the air, but then it wraps, and now you're not a working writer anymore. Now you have to become working, right? So there's all these shows, but they're not like, they're not working all around around the clock. They're not, you know, around this around the year,

Nick VinZant 13:06

like what's the percentage of people who would try to do this and fail?

Michael Jamin 13:12

Well, you know, breaking into how they was one thing, making a career out of it is quite another. So there are definitely writers who, who break in and they're on a show, then they flame out. They never work again. That's not uncommon. Or they work out, they flee and they work again, another five years later, it's just you know, it's so to make a career out of it. It's like to me, I'm like, I'm the that football player in the NFL. Wow, that guy is still playing good for him. It's been kicking around that, you know, that guy. Wow. Okay, I thought he was gonna him. He's still around. Okay.

Nick VinZant 13:45

How come people don't last right? Are they just relying on like a confluence of events to be a good job, or they just only have so many certain ideas or how come you know,

Michael Jamin 13:54

sometimes it's a talent, sometimes it's just not good enough to last sometimes it's a that's just the way the luck will be like breaks. Like if you get on a hit show, and you work for 10 years blue, good for you, you know, but as a young staff writer, and you break into a show, and it goes for 10 years, you got it made, but you could also break onto a show that that only goes like three episodes before getting cancelled. And that's that's the way the cookie crumbles. And the fact that the show is a hit, when you're young writer, you really have very little say over the show becomes a hit or a giant failure. You're You're too young and inexperienced, you don't really have that kind of control. You're just trying to keep up and learn. And so a lot of that is luck.

Nick VinZant 14:33

Obviously, you don't have to name names or anything like that. But can you think of people in your experience that you would say like, you know, they were a great writer and things just didn't work out for them?

Michael Jamin 14:41

Yeah, that definitely happens and I can think of people who are not great writers and things didn't work out for them. So there's a little bit of ball

Nick VinZant 14:48

um, we got a bunch of listener submitted questions. So are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted question?

Michael Jamin 14:54

All right, listeners see what you can do.

Nick VinZant 14:56

Show you knew that would be a hit show you knew would be A bus show you weren't sure of.

Michael Jamin 15:02

I was. Yeah, I knew my, when I read this pilot episode of Modern Family, oh, that's going to be a hit. I loved it. I love just loved it. And that was written by Steven Levitan, who my partner and I worked for, just shoot me. So he created just shoot me. And then we read the pilot script from our family, we were at the time, my partner Ray, we're running a show called Glenmark, DDS on Nick at Night. And so that was kind of a big step for us. Because we were, we were the bosses and we had seen if you saw the script for Modern Family Law, that's going to be ahead. But I mean, I really should, you had to take that back, I knew it was going to be a good show, I didn't know is going to be a hit. Because there's just so many things that are outside of the control of of the show, you know, the the quality script was good. I didn't know that they were going to get the great actors, that sometimes doesn't happen. Sometimes the cast doesn't gel. And sometimes the network will put it on a bad time slot or won't, they won't let allow the show to grow long enough to allow it to become a head sometimes they get canceled. Sometimes good shows get cancelled before they could become a hit. So, but it became a hit.

Nick VinZant 16:03

Any show that you knew like that this this, this is a show that you were working on?

Michael Jamin 16:08

Yeah, like, absolutely. And I've done some of those. And I got this is not going to be a hit. But the job worked out well in terms of my schedule. And so I got we, my partner had, we had one job, and then the show wrapped and we had some time before it came up again. And so we had this big break in our schedule, and we go okay, this is good. You can this is we can make some money here. Even though the show is not going to be a hit doesn't matter. I can you know, I get paid to be to write, so I'm going to write on it.

Nick VinZant 16:34

Any show that you were on that you just had no idea. Like this could go either way.

Michael Jamin 16:40

Um, that's kind of every show because most of it like I said, it's one thing to make a good show and it's something for it become a hit. So I worked. We worked on a show called out of practice, which was on CBS was a sitcom with starring Henry Winkler Ty Burrell. Before he was Phil on Modern Family, stocker Channing and Chris Gorham and Paula Marshall, it was a great cast. And the head writers were joking and Chris Lloyd, to Chris ran Frazier for many, many years. incredibly, incredibly talented writer, Joe as well, like the writing staff was like the opposite. It was the fact that we were chosen for this, to be hired to this writing staff was kind of an honor because it was an all star, they could choose anybody. It was an all star team to be on the show. And I thought the show was excellent. It was really funny. A lot of heart. The network just it didn't give it enough chance to grow the numbers. And so as I thought it was canceled way before its time, and it was a shame, but it could have gone either way. Excellent show that no one really saw.

Nick VinZant 17:43

favorite character you've ever written for?

Michael Jamin 17:47

Oh, you know, I've written I can't say a favorite character. I really can't that would be insulting. I love writing for Nina Van Horn I just shoot me but also David Spade I've written for him on two different shows. Just Shoot Me and and rules of engagement as a writer on that as well. But Mark marron she's, you know, he was an amazing, amazing character and brave. I like writing, we like writing for stand ups, because they're very, they tend to be very brave. And they'll like, as long as he gets a laugh, they're like, I'll do that they're not too worried about their image. Whereas actors might kind of think, well, I don't want people to think that about me, but stand up. So like, I'll do it. So he was a pleasure to write for for four years. But there's so much I'm just I'm singling out like, there's so many. The show I'm currently working on is Tacoma, FD. And the guys who are the actors, Kevin Hefner, and Steve Lemmy. They're the stars, but also the head writers of the show and their pleasure. They're just a pleasure to work for and write for, and they're in the writers room the whole time, and you pitch them a joke or story idea. And you say, say this, that what would happen if you say, and they'll say, oh, that's hilarious. And you're actually the actors actually saying, you know, this is going to work because you're the star and I can tell it's going to work because you just set it. So that's, that's a pleasure, too.

Nick VinZant 19:02

We don't we don't get into politics on this show. And we'll try to have this conversation, I guess, without getting into politics, necessarily. But when you see kind of the Kancil culture that's coming about, right, do you when he as a rider, like do you take that into account? Would you say like, oh, we can't do that? Because this might happen? Or do you purposely like Go for

Michael Jamin 19:23

it? Yeah, no, there's there's much more sensitivity now in terms of, you know, hurt hurting people, you know, he never he never really wanted to hurt people. But when we when we started off, on just shoot me years ago, the rule of thumb was in the writers room, you could say anything you wanted, even no matter how offensive it was, as long as it was funny, as long as it got a laugh in the room in the writers room. And that was kind of the role and then then now we're a little more sensitive, you don't want to hurt people and that's kind of a little more awareness. Yeah, so it's a balancing act. You know, you don't you definitely won't hurt people but you also want to entertain

Nick VinZant 19:59

kind of one of theirs. Like if everybody goes, Oh, I don't know, then yeah,

Michael Jamin 20:02

like, right. Yeah. But I'm not going to worry about the wackos out there.

Nick VinZant 20:07

Hardest season to write. I think what this person means is in terms of like, alright, so you have a show that runs for five seasons like which one of those is the hardest season? Like the first one? The last one? The?

Michael Jamin 20:18

Yeah, the first one can be the most the most difficult because you get a lot into first the writers are still trying to find the show. The first step is you're like, Well, what is the show what you know, and also what dynamics are working within the between the characters. And until you find that you can be flailing and you get also the network is worried it's a big investment, these shows cost a lot of money. So that network wants to protect their investment, you got a lot of interference, but once the show, finds its legs and finds its audience and the network feels Oh, okay, we can calm down. Now we know it's working, things tend to get a little easier.

Nick VinZant 20:51

You know, I always hear these things about right like the network, the boss's the man, that kind of thing. All over the place. When they have notes or criticisms of shows, do you generally understand where they're coming from? Or people like what?

Michael Jamin 21:05

No, is the notes tend to be very similar. And the notes, if they can't, it's not like the network. These executives know how to do your job they have, they have a job, they know how to do their job, but they don't know how to do my job because they're not writers. So a lot of times they want reassurance, they just want to know that the show is in good hands. And if you can, they have an objection. And if you can explain it, then they go, Okay, I see your point. Sometimes their notes are valid, and you go okay, I don't really think about that. Let me rethink the episode and, and we can address your notes or at least addressed the spirit of the note. But usually it's well intentioned. It's not like they're trying to they're not trying to be jerks. You know, they're trying to help.

Nick VinZant 21:42

Best written TV show currently. And if it's one of yours, say it's one of yours.

Michael Jamin 21:46

Oh, well, that's written TV show. Well, I don't know. But currently, I thought I thought fleabag was a masterpiece. And you know, that was a couple years ago, but I thought it was beautifully written and it felt to me that very much like a like a stage play. And of course it was it was based on a stage play. So I just thought, Phoebe Waller bridge. I think she's an amazingly gifted writer made and talented, accurate, and she's a force. So that's my number one. But there's a lot out there that I love. I think Handmaid's Tale is brilliant. That's not a comedy, of course. But I just think it's cheesy. I think it's brilliant.

Nick VinZant 22:18

The show that you would look at though and say like, that's all time. This is the best written show from a writing perspective.

Michael Jamin 22:27

I remember as a kid I wanted to write on Cheers. I thought that was cheers is a brilliant show. I loved it. I always felt it had a lot of heart and a lot of warmth and felt like these. They were family, these characters were like, you just want to hang out with them. To me, that's the pinnacle. And I so I aspire to be writer and cheers. And then I finally moved out to Hollywood. And I started working. And then when I got on out of practice that I was talking about that was written on. We filmed that in the same soundstage on paramount at Paramount that cheers was filmed on, and I Oh, I made it, but I'm just 10 years too late, but I made it. I got here. So and I worked with and I've written. I've worked on some shows with many of those writers x, right, the people who wrote on chairs, and I've since written with them, and I was so cool on the top man, I get to hang out with these guys.

Nick VinZant 23:11

This kind of leads us into this one favorite experience as a writer

Michael Jamin 23:16

might have been just shoot me because that was my first job. And I was like, Wow, I'm here. I did it. This was my childhood dream. And I made it. And so that was very exciting. But my partner I also ran show, which I mentioned, Glenn Martin, DDS and also mer, and that was our first time running a show where you're the boss. And that was a great experience, because then you're really you have more creative control. And you also feel like, wow, I made it on the boss. But even but now I'm not like I don't have the same desire. Like I gotta be the boss. I'm like, oh, no, I've been the boss. I'm okay. I'm okay. Not being the boss to that's fine. There's plenty to be, you know, you don't have the same stress. So that's good.

Nick VinZant 23:52

These are some of the more lighthearted ones are. Our audience is very light hearted. They're smart. They're very light hearted, good. Um, are writers out of ideas?

Michael Jamin 24:02

No, no, we're not. That's no, we're not out of ideas. There's plenty of ideas, ideas, Hollywood tends to choose, you may think that we're out of ideas, because why they keep on why are they making Rocky 10? Why are they making only Avengers movies? And it's because those ideas are much easier to market. And so it's a business. So there's plenty of ideas, the question, the ones that get made are the ones that that Hollywood that would protect their investment feels like, we can sell this idea it's easy to market, we don't have to take a giant risk. They don't want to you know, it's a business, they want to make money, they want to minimize their losses. So I get that so we're not out of ideas, but it may seem that way. And I understand why you think we are

Nick VinZant 24:41

is but how come like is that way in pretty much every sitcom right? They're gonna have kind of the staple of the episodes. I can't think of any off the top of my head, but like, where this character has this happened to them. Like there's always kind of the same general theme. Is that because that's the natural evolution of their care. Are the writers like, hey, we know this works do this,

Michael Jamin 25:03

you know, shows her sitcoms particularly are about relationships. So if you have a core five characters that you're going to hit all those different dynamics, and then when you run out of those relationships to explore, sometimes you'll, you'll create an arc you'll create Yo, this character will okay the what if these two characters break up? What if they get together? Now let's do a whole season where they're dating, what is this character goes to night school? Okay, now we have all these ideas to do. So that's what we have arcs to kind of open it up a little bit. But in terms of, you know, it's, I guess, is the best way I can answer that question, really. So I don't really feel like it's the same thing over and over again, if you find something that works, that dynamic that works. Like, for example, we're on just shoot me, when we discover that George Segal and David Spade were magic together, let's just keep putting them in scenes together, because they're always funny together. So there's that if something works, let's keep doing why are we going to do something worse? Why break it?

Nick VinZant 25:57

I know, this is kind of a very broad question. But in general, like, how much did the actors change the writing?

Michael Jamin 26:03

Um, it depends if how, if you have an actor who's also an executive producer on the show, which happens sometimes, then you can pitch them an idea. And if they don't want to do it, they're not doing it. Well. First, you can never make an actress. You can't literally put words in their mouth, if they don't want to say a line. They're human beings are not going to say it right. So hopefully, the you can build trust with them. And they'll bow though, you know, understand that it's, it's a partnership. But a good actor, or a great actor will surprise you with her line readings. And you Oh, wow, you just made it better than I imagined. You know, in our mind, we think of one thing, but I've worked with so many actors who are just like, I was not, I did not expect you to say it like that. And it's better than I imagined. So a great actor can do that. Catherine O'Hara, we wrote for her and Glenn Martin, DDS, and Kevin Nealon, Judy Greer, they're all like that. They're all like, man, you just made my work so much better.

Nick VinZant 26:53

There's obviously the reverse of that, though. Yes,

Michael Jamin 26:55

there's definitely the reverse. And then you try to write, you know, you steer away from you know, okay, that actor does not play that color very well. Are they can they weep? I know, they can't hit that line without seeming without making it sound kind of mean. So you just write away from that. That's part of learning who these people are and being aware of their abilities.

Nick VinZant 27:16

This is, this is the same person who asked this question to all of our guests, no matter how they who they are, whatever their thing is, how do you feel about Game of Thrones season eight?

Michael Jamin 27:26

Okay, I will tell you that. So I loved Game of Thrones. And I thought it was wonderful. And here's what I have to say about season eight. also wonderful. Thank you. You don't know how hard this job is to create, to you know, to make this show work. It was a giant production. And I thought, Hey, I was happy with it. I thought it was I loved I loved it just as much. And I have a great appreciation for the amount of work that went into it. And I'm not going to bad now that I'm that's crazy. Oh, I could do better. That's nuts, then do better. When people say that okay, then do better. Go ahead. Better.

Nick VinZant 28:03

It's so weird how public perception changes something because I was I'm a huge Game of Thrones fans. This album, see isn't me asking this question. But I don't know it just suddenly kind of like, as it was it,

Michael Jamin 28:16

your intent was for it. And you're entitled to your opinion. But I do I do get it rubs me the wrong way. And people say, Oh, I can do better. Well then do better. Let's see it

Nick VinZant 28:26

from okay. And slightly. Maybe I can ask you this question. From a writer's perspective. Was that always going to be it? Right? Like when you talk about season finales and using Game of Thrones as an example? Was that always how this was naturally going to end?

Michael Jamin 28:42

No, I'm sure if it I'm sure not. I mean, there's no way you could plan season two episode one or a season because you might get cancelled anytime between now and season eight or whatever, there's no way you can map out that arc. That's just too crazy. And yes, they had source material to work from the books. So that made of course, you know, easier. But, you know, I'm sure the writers on that show were they were they wanted to surprise they want to come up with an ending I was surprised that would not be predictable. It's hard. It's like well, where's that balancing out? How do you give the how do you give the audience what they want without giving them what they want? Because if you do they're going to be disappointed as well. You know,

Nick VinZant 29:17

yeah, that's kind of what I mean in that sense is like no matter what they did, it wasn't gonna be Yeah, and always gonna be like me The Sopranos

Michael Jamin 29:25

are the same thing brilliant show and then go to Tony die at the end or not. I was like, Well you know, right. If you if you give the audience what they want they're gonna be mad either way. So you try to surprise them breaking bad I don't believe fell into that trap. I think they I think every single episode of that it in my opinion, it was as if it was written on a clay tablet and and handed to them from God. It's like how did what amazing writing team to be able to do that? And so yeah, that ending felt very satisfying to me and surprising, but okay, it could have gone it could have gone the other way just as well and I still would have loved the show.

Nick VinZant 29:59

Do you Do you listen to that as a writer? No, just like, No, I

Michael Jamin 30:03

don't. I don't I try not to listen to. I try to listen to reviews. If you listen to the good, this isn't obviously everyone says, if you take the good reviews, you have to take the bad ones and I refuse to take either. So I don't. I write for myself, and to make a living for my family. And because it provides me with creative joy, to live that kind of lifestyle. And so, if you like it great if you don't like it, I'm not doing it for you.

Nick VinZant 30:26

But you worked on Beavis and Butthead, who was the better character Beavis or butthead?

Michael Jamin 30:31

No, man. They're a team and there's it's called Beavis and Butthead. You can't have one without the other. You need both.

Nick VinZant 30:39

I think trying to bring that back. They're always

Michael Jamin 30:41

trying to bring it back. I think, you know, there's always talking about bringing it back.

Nick VinZant 30:45

Michael Jordan of TV writing,

Michael Jamin 30:47

there are certain who is? Well, yeah, I guess you'd have to say, the Michael Jordan of sitcom writing. You know, I would say Chris Lloyd is definitely up there. You know, there's so many writers who are just like, Man, this this person, you know, and to work with those people. You know, Michael Jordan makes everyone on his team better. Michael Jordan cannot win a championship without the for the people on the on the floor. We know he'll admit that. Right. So he's now a one against five. So to work with people like that, you know, and I only just mentioned Chris lead, because he's because he's kind of well known. And Steve Levitan as well is also extremely bright and very talented. But I've worked with other writers who you haven't heard of who are like we talked about who are incredibly gifted, but haven't reached that level of success because of luck. Who are and I can I've learned from all of them.

Nick VinZant 31:39

What advice would you give to somebody who feels that their stuff is good, but just can't break through?

Michael Jamin 31:48

Yeah, I It's funny cuz I, I mentioned shortly I post every day I've been doing this but for months, I post writing advice on on social media. Like how to be better how to write how to break into the business, how to be an actor ahead as a director, and you can find it on pretty much any platform at Michael jamman. Writer. So Instagram for sure. And Facebook and Tik Tok, but it's that I get that question a lot. And in the people say, Well, how do I? How do I get my script into the right hands? And I don't think that's a good question to ask, I think the better question to ask is, because it takes the power away from you. You're saying, My, I have a great script, and it has to get into the right hands, but you don't have the right hands? And you don't have the right how do I find the person with the right hands. And it takes all the responsibility and blame out of view the writer and puts the blame on the person with the hands? And that's a cop out? I think a better question to ask is How do I write a script that's so good, it doesn't matter whose hands it falls into. And that's the damn truth. Because if you write a great script, and you give it to somebody who's someone who knows someone who knows someone in the business, and everyone knows someone who knows someone, right, and that person reads it, and they go, Wow, this is a great script, I'm gonna pass it along the line I'm gonna give to somebody else who is a little closer in the business, not because not because I want to help you, who cares about you, I'm going to pass it along, because it helps me because if I give that script to someone, that person who's closer to business, I'll look like a star to them, because they need good scripts. And if I give them something they want, now I look at me now I'm now I'm a boss, right. And the same thing now that person reads the script and they go, Wow, this is a really good script, I can't do anything with it. Sorry, I can't do this is a really nice, I got cut off. This is a really great script. I can't do anything with it. But But I know someone who knows someone, and they can do something, and maybe an agent or a manager. And that's how the script gets passed up further and further along the line. Until finally gets into the person who says I can't this is a true, I can't pay you for this script. I can't use this script. But I have a project that I'm working on. And and I need you to write it. Because you have something that I need. You have talent and knew how to write a great script. And so and then that now you're now they want to exploit you. Now instead of you begging to get work, they're begging you to be exploited. I want to pay you because you have something I need talent and ability. That's how you do it. But no one ever asked that question. Because it's it requires work. And it requires the ability to okay, I want to learn everyone. And this includes me when I broke in. I was like, here's the script, can someone just give me a lot of money for it doesn't work that way. You know, it's too easy. So the better question is, how do I write a script that's so good. Doesn't matter whose hands it falls into that requires learning your craft writing all the time studying, listening to people like me, I'm not the only one on social media who talks of finding a good teacher, a teacher who knows what the hell they're talking about. There's plenty of teachers who don't but and that requires commitment of time and investment in your own energy of investment of energy and often money because you have to learn. So that's what I recommend. Oh, why don't you weren't expecting a lecture, but you got one.

Nick VinZant 34:54

One of our questions actually was like, give us your best TV writing grant, that was it. That's it, man, that might have been it. Um, I guess on the other side of that, that kind of plays along with it, you know, squid game is the super popular thing right now. How do you kind of know like that Right? Or the big thing was like he went 10 years everybody telling him this is crap, this is crap, this is crap. How do you know when to stick to your guns? Or to really like, oh, maybe this really is crap.

Michael Jamin 35:26

And I don't and I know, that's true. But I don't know the rest of the story of his career. Um,

Nick VinZant 35:30

I don't I don't have know anything else about it. Either.

Michael Jamin 35:32

I imagined he had this great idea for a show and he's trying to sell it. But in the meantime, he was trying to do other work I imagined, okay, I can also come up with another script, or I'm gonna try to write in this show or that show. Like, it's not like you just put all your eggs in one basket. You know, you kind of I think that would be foolish. You want to continue, okay, I wrote something great. Maybe I can't find the right market for it. But I'm like, write something else and write something else and something. So you have to continue writing. And I again, the first scripts that I wrote 26 years ago, I thought were great. I thought they were great, right? But now when I look at him, I cringe because I see how much I've grown as a writer over the years. And that's all I've only grown because I've continued writing. It's not because I was hanging desperately on to this one script that I wrote. So write it, put it aside, write something else.

Nick VinZant 36:16

Um, that's really all the questions I got, man, anything you think that we missed? Or what's kind of coming up next for you?

Michael Jamin 36:22

Uh, yeah, so I go back to as a writer, co executive producer, and Tacoma FD that starts probably, I'm thinking in January, my partner, I have a couple of pilots that we sold that we're currently writing. So that's good. And by the way, when you sell a pilot doesn't mean it's gonna be gone here, it means they've paid you to write a pilot script. And then there's, once they there's that you get to that step. And then maybe if they like it, maybe they shoot it. And if they shoot it, maybe they put it on the air. So there's a lot of maybes between now and then. So that's the word that's the life of a writer. Well, I'm happy that we saw this, we get to write it. So there's that. And again, like I talked about, I, I and I'm working on a collection of personal essays that I'm hoping to publish soon. And so that's what's next for me. And I also, like I said it post every day, this started during the pandemic, I had a friend who was begging, want to break into the business. And he's like I am and I used to talk to him, you know, but he I read a script and I couldn't help. And he said, You got to make a course. I'm like, Dude, I don't have time to make a course. You got to do it. And then pandemic hit and shut everything down. So I was literally had nothing to do for the first six months, the band had nothing to do. There's nothing going on in my career in Hollywood, everything was shut down, everyone is hunkered in their homes. And so that's when I made this course. And if any, any of your listeners want to want to check it out, they can learn more about that Michael Jackson comm slash course. And I also post just for fun on Instagram and tick tock and Facebook just daily tips. When we get off of this, I'm gonna go make my my three minute video on tick tock or whatever that I'm gonna share just about, you know, how to be a writer how to live a more creative life and how to break into the business. So if that interests you, go ahead, follow me there. You know, people want that.

Body Language Expert Dr. Jack Brown

There’s subtle signs that can tell you if a person loves you, is lying to you or might be a threat. Body Language Expert Dr. Jack Brown is not only an expert at reading those signs, he can also teach you how to do it. We talk reading others’ body language, controlling your body language and why you should always trust your gut. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Pastries.

Dr. Jack Brown: 01:40ish

Pointless: 26:02ish

Top 5: 48:07ish

https://www.bodylanguageeq.com (Dr. Jack Brown Website)

https://twitter.com/DrGJackBrown (Dr. Jack Brown Twitter)

Interview with Body Language Expert Dr. Jack Brown

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant. Coming up in this episode, the secrets of body language and pastries.

Dr. Jack Brown 0:23

I've actually I started studying body language when I was teenager, I was around an adult who I looked up to. And because I wanted to know how did I was pissed off that like at myself that I didn't see that this guy was nefarious. When people lie, they'll often they'll often elevate off their chair for a split second when they lie. So you can show people that are brain blind pictures of guys coming in with a knife or, or a line or something really scary, lunging at them, and they will still feel fear.

Nick VinZant 0:56

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So have you ever been suspicious of someone attracted to somebody or thought someone was lying to you. And even though you felt really strongly about it, you couldn't figure out why. It might have something to do with their body language. And our first guest is an expert at reading, interpreting, and teaching people to spot the subtle signs of body language. This is body language expert, Dr. JACK Brown. So how did you get started in this?

Dr. Jack Brown 1:41

Actually, I started studying body language. When I was a teenager, I was around an adult who I looked up to, and this adult, I really looked up to them and they ended up not being a good person. So I went to my parents and I said, hey, how do you tell a good person for a bad person? And they gave me a pretty good answer. My parents are good interpersonal skills, but I wasn't satisfied. So I started reading site psychology journals in middle school. And because I wanted to know how did I was pissed off that like at myself that I didn't see that this guy was nefarious? Are

Nick VinZant 2:14

people generally pretty good at, at assessing people's body language? Are we bad at it?

Dr. Jack Brown 2:19

There's a variable skill? That's a great question. The variable skill level, they're women in general are better than men. And there's reasons for that women tend to have a, if you look them are under a functional MRI scan, not a diagnostic one, but a research MRI scan, you'll see that they're if you show him a short video or a picture or something, their brain might be lit up in 25 different places where a man's is lit up in three or four. So you know, women are better whole brain thinkers, and women in general are better communicators. And, and communication is a great example of a multitasking skill. You know, you're constantly what is what did he say? What did I just say? Oh, I was thinking I was gonna say this. I think I say that, oh, look what he did with his face, or like that was where What was that? So you're constantly reassessing. And so it's a multitasking thing, women are better at multitasking. And that goes along with those other things. So people that have less formal education, ironically, to some people are better. And the reason is, is because we tend to look at our degree, and we say, Oh, look, I Johns Hopkins, or Look, I went to the University of you know, Minnesota where, you know, and we tend to really validate those those formal education. And we tend to invalidate and ignore our informal education and our street smarts, people who've been through trauma, whatever the kind of trauma is, it could be sexual trauma, could be physical trauma, could be emotional trauma, you know, they're going to grow up discriminating as they are right now, who can I trust? Who can I trust? Can people

Nick VinZant 3:54

hide it though? Right? Like, obviously, people are aware of body language. I think that people in general kind of get the concept of it. Can somebody hide their body language very well? Or is it something that like, we don't even consciously think of

Dr. Jack Brown 4:10

the short answer that is, yes, it's possible. But usually, even for very skilled people, even for just a short period of time, when actors go in and out of character, there's a real interesting phenomenon, like when they, when they're you have an actor, that's a really skilled actor goes out of character, they have an emotional release. And you see it on their face, and you see different, you know, verbal and nonverbal behaviors going on, that's really akin to what a liar would would do on a smaller scale, and dampened down so when a liar, a liar will get good at suppressing the body language, like kind of like you alluded to a few minutes ago, and then when they go out of character, so they're still sitting in front of you, so they were suppressing it. And now they go through a moment where they're not suppressing it very good. So they come out of it. character. So if you get skilled at looking for these things, you can see them Oh, like wait a second, he had a good poker face there and like were just what was that? What was that, and these are the what these are the people coming in and out of character. And another thing that is really common is they might suppress one part of their face, but it shows up on the other part of the face. So they might suppress their face and it shows up on another part of the body. But even people that do it really well only can do it for a few seconds. And you know, I'm an expert, I don't I don't have a good poker face.

Nick VinZant 5:32

Now, I mean, when you look at people's like behaviors, is it pretty standard across everybody, right? Like you make this gesture This means this or two people vary.

Dr. Jack Brown 5:43

There is definitely individual idiosyncrasies, idiosyncratic behavior, there's inter cultural, idiosyncratic behavior, but, but both of those make up a pretty small minority, for example, the the, you know, between between cultures, it's, it's less than 1% of all your behavior is culturally learned. But those stick out in your mind you're going to notice the red flower in the middle of the yellow flowers and it sticks out but you know, it gives you a false idea of how frequent it is. And and so it's far less than 1% In fact, someone can be born blind from the time they're born born blind and not have any kind of biofeedback as to what kind of face do I make? Or what kind of body do I make any kind of situation and they still will have the same body language

Nick VinZant 6:34

when you look at people though like can you tell generally like okay this person is nice this person's a jerk this person's this or are you just seeing their current emotion reflected in their body language another

Dr. Jack Brown 6:47

great question. If you're really skilled, you can make big pattern umbrella judgments and you can you like there are certain behaviors that are super common for a sociopath psychopath. There are certain behaviors that and you can see those in a pretty short period of time but you still want again, you want a sample size, a decent chunk of time, generally speaking, how body language is classically taught and for the vast majority of times when I teach it it's what's this person is thinking feeling in this moment, because you can have a really you can have a pathological person and you show pictures if you hit someone to hypnotize you in forgot, say you forget all your long term memory, you can see videos of Adolf Hitler you know, petting a dog, he's supposedly like dogs a lot. And you know, lots of people do like dogs and that's generally a good sign. But, but yeah, you know, where he looks Oh, you know, if you if you if you didn't know that, or if you're hitting the ties to forget all those long term memories, but you did have the body language skill, you might make a false assessment that he was stable, or a kind person or, or non pathological. So most of the time, it's what is this person thinking feeling at that moment, but the more skill you have, you definitely can make big pattern.

Nick VinZant 8:05

So I read something one time that when we feel an emotion, our body reacts to it, before we even process that this is how we're feeling is that is that a true thing, the kind of idea that like something makes me happy that my body shows that I'm happy before my brain even realizes that I'm happy.

Dr. Jack Brown 8:24

And there's lots of reasons for that. And some we're still discovering, you know, part of it is just the speed that we process a part of is multitasking. Part of it is what you know, what we might be doing. And the other things this scenario we're in, in part of it is the speed of the nervous system, how quick the nervous signals travel, there's a fascinating thing that's relatively recently discovered. And that has a it's a, it's a connection that we have, that our visual system has with a part of the brain that interprets fear. And so you can show this is so fascinating. So if you have a person who's blind, and there's different ways to be blind, you can be blind in the eyes, but your eyes can also be perfectly functional and the nerves that connect the eyeballs to the back of the brain, the visual part of the brain, they can be functional, but say the brain is blind so someone was hit back here or had a brain tumor or had a stroke and so their brain blind but their eyes weren't good. Okay, so with that as a setup, so you can show people that are brain blind pictures of guys come in with a knife or or a line or something really scary, lunging at them, and they will still feel fear. They say I don't know what this picture is, but I feel fear. So when you look at an audience and or look at a person you go, Oh, you know this song about this guy that bugs me there's something there there's a situation here that bugs me there this person bugs me or you even look at a crowd and you pick someone out and go that person bugs me. There, there's something there. There's something I'm worried about it, listen to those always Oh, Listen to those, that's your amygdala talking. And this is a fascinating validation of what my gut is saying and what my instincts are saying, right? You know, those words those euphemisms that people use for their, their instincts or their subconscious. And this is a physiologic basis for that, that's relatively recent discovered. And that doesn't mean it's the only reason that our, our, our gut or instincts Q is in, we might discover some other things, some things we may never discover, you know, who knows, there might be a supernatural component to that, you know, but, but that is one physiologic component that's really, really fascinating. So, and like, you can take the people that are best at looking at a group of people, that that looks at a group of people and can pick out the bad actors or potential bad actors in that crowd. Who's the best at that third trimester pregnant women, mothers in general are better. And fathers are better than non fathers and mothers are better than non mothers. And the theory is that they're the there's a hormonal base that says that really revs up or tunes up that amygdala connection that I was talking about. Of course, there's overlap there with PTSD, you can you can view over look at everything as trauma when maybe none of it or the vast majority of it isn't. And so there is, you know, that can be taken too far. And I'm not saying that this connection is the basis for PTSD. I'm just saying there's maybe an overlap and that phenomenon, that's a fascinating thing you can over interpret. So you know, you don't want to do that either. But yeah, that's That to me is is is fascinating. And and so I've debrief people who have been kidnapped and of course if they didn't escape, no one would be interviewing him and and what are some of the things and there are there are different authors that speak about this, and you can read this other you know, I'm not the only one who's done this, by any means. But there are people who have been kidnapped and they say, there was a moment when a light went off in my head, I shouldn't do this, or I shouldn't you know, it was before they were surprised, maybe they were cooperating with someone or helping someone do something or someone you know, they befriended someone or, you know, but something was a little off and they didn't listen to their instincts. And but there was a little voice in their head that there's something there and they ignored it, and they suppress it and they suppress it and suppress it, we might do that with a spouse who ends up being a bad spouse or a lover you know, we don't get kidnapped, we just end up being our business decision. You know, business partner, there's a little voice in your head that says something and you suppress it, you get good at suppressing that,

Nick VinZant 12:40

if we're trying to if you're trying to get a read on somebody is there like a place on their body that okay, you should watch this area, because that's going to tell you first what this person is like.

Dr. Jack Brown 12:51

In general, the most important part of the body is the face. And the most important part of the face are the eyes. So you know, learn to look at people's eyes and say, if I was an eight year old, would I trust them, you know, that we bring in all this baggage that we use to rationalize and to cloud our judgment from the truth. So you know, try and look at that person you're in your best case scenario being objective. Another place that people show tension is in their mid face and the mustache area, this right below your nose and above your upper lip, and that does that whole region doesn't have a name, but you can call it the mustache area. People show tension in their mid face, their nostrils might flare a little bit there might see a slight slight tension in their in their in their mouth area. Usually when people are opening their eyelids wide. Usually the forehead goes up kind of like I'm doing right now my foreheads going up and my eyes are open wider and a liar slash con man slash someone who's chronically insincere slash someone who's chronic liar. Someone slash someone who can not be trusted tends to overuse their forehead, so their forehead is always up, their eyebrows are always up, their eyelids are always a little bit wider. Okay, that's the person who's trying too hard. It's like using 19 exclamation marks at the end of a sentence instead of just saying yes or no. You know, yeah, why are you trying too hard? Why are you being overexpressing in your face. Another one is in particular is when their their center forehead is contracted. So just their center forehead is contracted in the center eyebrows are going up, kind of like I'm doing right now. And this is super important, not with the sad mouth, but with a little bit of a smile, not with the big smile usually, but when you have that center forehead, and a little bit of a smile. That is something we all do once in a while so I just demonstrated that but we all do it once in a while when we're feeling arrogant. Hopefully you don't feel arrogant too much. We all do it once in a while when we're feeling smug, incredulity. we all we all feel we all do that when we feel in contempt but we all do that facial expression once in a while but people that do it a lot that center forehead contraction with a little bit of a mouth smile or a modest smile smile those people have that's a really strong correlation with sociopathic behavior and psychopathic behavior. So sociopath psychopathic the technical term for that collective is antisocial personality disorder which should have a different name it sounds too benign but you know a sociopath or psychopath one of the biggest Check Point check marks in something whether someone's a sociopathic psychopath is chronic lying so get used to you know, if someone tells you they love you, I and you don't feel it, you're usually not feeling it because it's something that's lacking in their eyes.

Nick VinZant 15:42

Um, are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions Sir Sir, biggest misconception people generally have about body language

Dr. Jack Brown 15:52

the biggest misconception is to look at if people we alluded to this earlier if they looked at one thing like oh this means they're lying you know if one one thing just one thing always mean this so it's a one to one translation that's that's the biggest misconception

Nick VinZant 16:07

most misinterpreted gesture.

Dr. Jack Brown 16:10

Oh, probably the most misinterpreted one is is one that people always cite is is when people crossing the line Oh yeah, you always hear you know there's different ways you can cross your arms You know, this crossing your arms with your fist is more hostile You know, this is is more insecure you know, you could just be cold um, you know, it could be you know, if you if you're a woman and you're crossing your arms over your breasts, that that's you know, a sign that you probably don't want to talk to this guy you know that that there's there's so there's lots of variations there but you can just plain old be cold, people who are more who are a little bit less than what they will sometimes do that just for comfort when they're sitting. So sometimes depending on your body shape and size you're you do it for more we all do it for comfort once in a while, but just reposition yourself on your chair you know if your chair has no arms you know there's a there's a lot of thing and you're sitting next to people so there's a lot of variations there. You never want to look at one thing but that's probably the most commonly cited misinterpreted you don't want it you you want to look at a lot of things you know, a person can be in love with you and still crossing their arms and further, you know, and there's Yeah, there's I can get I can get I can get a little There are of course sexual elements to some of these. I don't want to necessarily go there. Yeah, there's, so there's an I get a lot of those questions. But yeah, there are. That's probably the the most missing

Nick VinZant 17:50

the biggest one is like that one. So we talked a little bit about that, like women are better at reading it, but who is generally more expressive with their body language men or women,

Dr. Jack Brown 18:00

I would say that women as well, women as well, and they under but they understand the context of it. So a woman with another, a woman with a man who they don't know or don't trust, especially given like, say, in inner city setting, and they've never been that inner city or they know it to be bad is different when the same woman when she's talking amongst her friends and in a in a in a trusted environment. Whereas a guy will tend to have more one flavor across that spectrum. It's not that he won't vary. He will and and you know, there are plenty of women that aren't good at it. And there are plenty of men that are really astute at it. But in general women are definitely better than in demand at body language in both reading and expressing

Nick VinZant 18:43

people who are generally like if they have a traumatic upbringing, they're usually better at it. Why is that?

Dr. Jack Brown 18:49

It's because they have to thin slice human behavior. So if you're sexually assaulted or you know sexually abused or physically abused, or emotionally abused, you you look at people and you say, Who can I trust? Who can I trust in You see all sorts of subtlety that other people gloss over a

Nick VinZant 19:09

person whose body language that you looked at and were scared of our person that really jumped out at you like that person? Or I don't trust them.

Dr. Jack Brown 19:21

Yeah, you want you want a certain name?

Nick VinZant 19:24

If you if you want to give it

Dr. Jack Brown 19:27

there's lots of names. I like some of the show. I'll answer specifically your answer generally. I mean, like some of the mass killers that we've seen, of course, there's you know, like, Who's the who's the the guy from the early 70s that Oh, Manson. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, man. He's got the big eyes, the crazy eyes, you know, and you hear that? The term Crazy Eyes and the big eyes. Why are these people's eyes open wide if you look at say the Sandy Hook killer here, those wide open eyes or Guy Marshall Applewhite, yeah, there are there are certain facial expressions and certain things that really light up your mind. You know from a body language in that's one specific the wide, wide open eyes, you may not be able to describe in words, and you may not be able to bullet point it or write it down in any kind of words. If your instincts say something, I don't, I can't put my finger on it. But I don't trust this person, even if they have a good reputation, even if you heard about them from someone else, trust your gut, especially if there's element of physical danger involved. But even if it's business danger, you know,

Nick VinZant 20:38

best way to tell if somebody is attracted to you.

Dr. Jack Brown 20:41

So eye contact, it goes up. But it's it's a smile. And it's usually a suppressed smile with the eye contact. So this is with love and physical attraction, and blushing, people will blush a lot. And you know, what are they doing with the rest of their body to so when people are attracted, their pupils will get larger to say one person is really attracted the other one, say Person A is really attracted Person B, but Person B is semi attracted to Person A. But Person B sees persons as pupils get bigger, and their pupils get bigger. And then there's a feedback mechanism where each people starts getting bigger and bigger, bigger to a point of course, because the eyeballs only say, right, but this all happens at the subconscious level. You can't control your pupil size consciously at all. It all happens at the subconscious level. Now the other thing that might happen is they might lick their lips, the tongue to lip contact would tend to be slower, it wouldn't be quicker, we tend to be slower. Women tend to cross and uncross the legs more we tend to full body points towards the person we're attracted to. So our feet are pointed to them our hips are pointed to them. Our shoulders are pointed to them our face is pointed them in our eyes are pointing to them and we have high contact and you can fit it more in your chair not because you're good nervous not because you're bad nervous, so that's another reason why you fidgeting Why do you fish in your chair but you're you're really excited. You know people when people lie, they'll often they'll often elevate off their chair for a split second when they lie and that the reason for their is their their sphincter tone in their Peri genital regions tend to tighten up and loosen and tighten up and get stimulated. You know people say I almost pooped my pants or almost shit my pants people say that well in there's really physiology there too, and also a man's testicles. When when is a man's testicles pull up close to his abdomen. They do it for probably for four different reasons. One is when he's cold. Another one is when he's fearful. So when he's fearful, and that's he'll, he'll sit up off his chair you'll see him sit up off his chair a little bit. Another one is when he's sexually excited and another one is called the Kree mysteric reflex when you rub the inner part of the thigh, but just you know you're really attracted that person you're going to be shifting your chair to but that's more of a lateral shift and you're crossing and unquestioned your legs but your full body pointing at that person hugs to you don't if you're attracted to someone you're going to have more contact with them. I have one of the first body languages things I noticed as a teenager it's harder to fake a hug. If you really like someone or don't like somebody it's harder to fake a hug than it is to fake a kiss you can fake a good kiss but you cannot fake a good hug even if you know what to do You cannot fake that good hug and one of the reasons is just getting in closer you there tends to be more full body contact from the hips all the way down you know all the way up your is opposed to the Leaning kind of hugs

Nick VinZant 23:48

you know when you're leaning Yeah, that kind of like that. Yeah, I

Dr. Jack Brown 23:51

know you mean to the hug you know there's less full body contact, I have less affection for that person. So think of that more as an affection thing not so much as a sexual attraction thing. You know, another thing is you know it I get tons of people who say, well, is this guy fake? And he's liking me or does he really like me? Well always think is this affectionate? Because people can fake lust, and they can say things I love you I love you. But one of the things that appear affection affectionate like those like those true hugs, and what people tend to close their eyes longer. What else is if your palms have full contact with their back, you should feel a full palm our contact the full palm of their hand against your back. But if you ever notice your eyes being open during a hug, they shouldn't be you if you really are hugging someone and you're feeling affection, your eyes should be closed. And the reason for that is you're when you shut your eyes You're you're actually shutting down a little bit of your your brain function, your visual brain function. So when you think of something, you go, Oh, let me think about that people close their eyes, or people close their eyes and they smell wine or they close their eyes and they taste that chocolate mousse. It's Not the imagination that you can taste chocolate better, they really can taste chocolate better. And the reason is, is because when your eyes are closed, a little bit more energy in your brain is dedicated towards that sense. It's also true for affection. The reason we close our eyes during a hug or during a kiss is because you want to drink in the moment of that hug or that kiss you want to fully feel that emotion. And so people that fake lust, or excuse me, they're lustful, but they faking love, they won't do that. So you want to differentiate what is sexual versus what is affectionate. The affection is the thing that stays in the affection is really the thing that tells you whether this person really loves you or not.

Entertainer Alexis Fawx

From films and fetish work to cannabis, comedy and coffee, Alexis Fawx is an all-around entertainer and entrepreneur. We talk award-winning sex work, interesting foot fetish requests and more. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Birthdays.

Alexis Fawx: 01:46ish

Pointless: 23:55ish

Top 5: 39:12ish

www.alexisfawxlive.com  (Alexis Fawx Website)

www.twitter.com/alexisfawx  (Alexis Fawx Twitter)

www.instagram.com/alexisfawxlive (Alexis Fawx Instagram)

www.highasfawxshow.com (Alexis Fawx Podcast)

https://feetfinder.com/userProfile/alexisfawx (Alexis Fawx Foot Fetish Site)

http://www.linktr.ee/AlexisFawx (All Alexis Fawx Links and Websites)

Interview with Alexis Fawx

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody welcome to Profoundly Pointless My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, a little bit of everything plus birthdays.

Alexis Fawx 0:21

There's armpit fetishes there's cheese fetishes there I mean I remember when I first started webcaming and there was this guy he took everybody to private just to watch him eat cheese or watch no he wanted to watch you eat cheese it got me healthy it got me healthy mind body and spirit like 100 million times percent. And I love where I am now and I have the industry to thank for that because it's given me that opportunity to take the time I love growing cannabis especially like popping that from seed I have the reason why I like growing cannabis is because it's such a if you plant really communicates with you you know when needs water you know when it needs nutrients.

Nick VinZant 1:01

I want to thank you so much for joining us if you get a chance like download Subscribe, Share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest is Alexis box. And while she's most famous for being an adult films, which is fascinating. She's also involved in so many interesting things. Everything from fetish work, to cannabis, coffee, beer, podcast, variety shows travel, so many things that for the first time I didn't really even know where to start. So I picked what to me was the most recent thing. Foot fetishes you've been doing adult films for a while but what made you transition into the foot fetish aspect of it

Alexis Fawx 1:51

I wouldn't say that it's dropping off it's just expanding what I already do. You know it was just an opportunity to be on a foot site so I took it because I believe in having multiple streams of income and not concentrating on just one site. So feet a F is just another is just safer work foot site makes it super easy. I can take pictures all day at my feet and send it up and make little albums of it

Nick VinZant 2:12

when you go into the different fetishes is like the foot fetish different than another fetish or are they all kind of the same and in a different way if that makes any sense.

Alexis Fawx 2:21

Well I mean you're gonna use your feet in different ways and like when you do customs you are getting really that individual person's like fetish so they may be like I only want to see your soles I want them dirty wear a skirt with it or you know or be nude or this or that and then the next person may be ordering another foot fetish and say you know, I would like for you to be more on your toes or you know, everybody's different and you could get down to the very simple incurrence or you know little intricate details you know, I would like to only have you wear red and have your toes painted this color and it you know, people I have long toes, my toes you know, so I get a lot of requests for that. So I've learned how to move those in ways that are really interesting and intricate for those people that like that that ish, but like any fetish that I I have a lot of requests for I you know, research to make sure like okay, like, what are the terms? What are what are the phrases that people may like or really into and I just try to take note of all those different things, because you're going to hit a lot of people with those. Does that make sense?

Nick VinZant 3:27

So you would like you didn't necessarily start out as this is just like an avenue that you had like, Hey, I'm doing this so I'm going to do this too.

Alexis Fawx 3:34

Once you get into adult work, like you You gain fans and fans are gonna tell you what they like and foot fetish is a very popular fetish. I guess I'm a hustler in a sense, like, you know, hey, if they want to offer me a site to do something, and it's it's you know, it's I'm already kind of doing it. It just makes sense to do it. But yeah, I mean, you could have there's armpit fetishes. There's cheese fetishes there. I mean, I remember when I first started webcaming and there was this guy he took everybody to private just to watch him eat cheese or watch No, he wanted to watch you eat cheese. So it's like do you eat cheese in the refrigerator and be like yeah, he was like Okay, I'll take it a private and like it's like a one line webcast. Are you familiar with like webcam? Yeah, yeah, we are on webcam. Yeah, I have a block of Swiss and you'd be like oh go get it. I'll take it into private we'll eat cheese. Okay. And like yeah, you can have someone you know literally they're paying per minute to watch you eat cheese or or put lotion on your feet if it's the foot fetish or you know there's also you can you know, it depending on what you can also use a toy and pretend that toy and it's just like, almost like you're doing jerk off instructions, but with your feet. It's you know, it's just kind of all internet intermingled.

Nick VinZant 4:49

I keep thinking about the cheese guy with a specific comment. I was gonna

Alexis Fawx 4:53

have nightmares about that. Just think about cheddar cheese. There's somebody staring at you while you eat some cheese. For like 30 for 30 for 30 minutes just eat cheese

Nick VinZant 5:05

was it was it specific kind like he felt differently about cheddar than he did about Swiss or something? It was just the

Alexis Fawx 5:11

fact of eating cheese I got some cheese right here but to give you the visual

Nick VinZant 5:18

I'm alright I'm alright you

Alexis Fawx 5:21

know and smoking fetish I mean that's another one that you know people would like to Hey geez I don't smoke cigarettes I smoke weed but I don't smoke cigarettes. But first of all I'm smoking fetish people you know, it has to be a certain type of cigarette you know what I mean? So they have all that but I really only like the Marvel 1000s or whatever the fuck they're called. And I'm like no, I don't smoke that but if you want me to roll a joint or a blind I'm cool with that. But at least I'll have some fun in the meantime I'm not going to totally destroy my lungs with a bunch of chemicals I don't understand

Nick VinZant 5:47

getting into the more kind of general questions so you know you were in the Air Force How did you get how'd you get started in the industry

Alexis Fawx 5:54

I was in the Air Force A long time ago did that to get out of my small town to move around to have experience to start living life been to college went to school have a degree in physiological psychology specialization or anatomy was working you know in the nine to five bullshit Jobs was miserable and hold off and quit everything and I was living in my Miami Florida at the time. So I was like Oh shit, maybe I should get a job like after six months or something like that. And Craigslist had a ad to be an extra on Dancing bear and I'm a free spirit. I've had a lot of sex I don't like I'm pretty open but all my shit. And I'm like, Oh, I love porn to be an extra that'd be kind of cool to watch people fuck or whatever. So I went in I was going down just to be an extra in here like they needed extra girls to do blow jobs that day and I was like fuck yeah all right, I just raised my hand I was like yeah, I can get paid that much for a blowjob. Lucky I'll do it. And I did it and the next day I was booked for a boy girl and I had a name and everything in history has been written

Nick VinZant 6:58

Did you ever regret it at any point?

Alexis Fawx 7:00

No, never I have never regretted my decisions.

Nick VinZant 7:03

What are you were you surprised kind of when it when it happened? Like how quickly the transition was made.

Alexis Fawx 7:11

You know I think when you're in it you're not really noticing the transition or like like holy shit this is really becoming a career I think like you know you just dive into it and you get into it you start doing it and I even like it feels like I guess like I don't know I'm still surprised today like I still you know when fans come up to me and they recognize me It still feels like the vote like oh my god they know who I am like it's still like wow, I'm still that it shows that personality of like a small town Pennsylvania girl, you know, like, it's never gonna leave me But yeah, it's been a hell of it's been a great career I am so happy and I'm so happy that I did say yes for that opportunity because it gave me a lot of freedom and the freedom that has given me is the time and when you have freedom time to be able to do the things that you want to do and create your own schedule, you become a lot happier person, you're no longer working for somebody else's dreams you can start working for your own dreams and now you're making the money to do so. So it almost like completely changed my life for the better. I was probably not in the best spot and mentally physically or emotionally or spiritually at that time and like seeing yourself on camera Twitter research starting out noticing how people hang on to your every word. Like it just made me think well if I'm going to be on this I'm going to be in this and people are going to see me Follow me Do whatever then I am going to get healthy I'm going to project a healthy image and not just project it and just pretend it but actually be it and be consistent and those actions you know then this is gonna be a great career and business decision and it has and that's how I've just always approached it is you know, it got me healthy it got me healthy mind body and spirit like 100 million times percent. And I love where I am now and I have the industry to thank for that because it's given me that opportunity to take the time for yourself love self care, and do those things in the passions that really really drive my soul and keep my soul on fire. Like I've been able to start different businesses I'm able to travel I'm able to make to say you know what, I'm gonna go do this today. I'm gonna go shoot my bow and arrow in the fucking desert. I'm gonna go do that. And I know I'm rarely gonna go do to the desert and go shoot my bow and arrow. I said it I'm gonna go do it.

Nick VinZant 9:18

Yeah, the thing that I've always wondered about people who are in adult films, it's like what's your what's what's your life? Like? Because the preconceived notion that I have and right we all know what preconceived notions are like, you go to a film set. You have sex on camera, and then it's parties at night like just this crazy lifestyle. This is what I'm imagining. So correct me where I'm wrong like what's what's yours your average adult actresses life really like?

Alexis Fawx 9:47

Again, I will only speak from my personal Yeah, I can only speak from my own personal and how I how I control and I will never speak on other people's lives and make generalizations on other people. However, for myself and for a lot of people that I consider friends in the industry because usual usually flock to those that are very much alike or that inspire right try to flock to those that inspire me that are smart intelligent and they're moving forward with our lives in many directions I don't go out and party I actually ever since I got into the industry I never was I've never been that person like oh yeah let's go party and you don't go party after set you're exhausted you know you're tired you may have a shoot the next day you may have an eight o'clock call time you may have been on set for 12 hours maybe you're working a feature you have you know millions and other things to think about other than going out and doing parties and you know, we I don't have onset romances I don't really know anybody who does not that I would give a shit to tell their story anyway. It's just you know, I mean it's just it's I think the preconceived ideas are always funny because you guys get that from movies that you've seen you think about the 70s and I'm gonna say that maybe it hasn't happened or doesn't happen but it's never happened with me. I don't know and it's not something I think happens on anywhere regular at all it's just like if you go to an industry party is like an avian party so my thing for any party because I'm not a party girl I'm an introvert I like my little home base. I go I do about one I could do about 90 minutes make me shake all the hands I need to shake and I get the fuck out of there and go eat food. But that's me and it's not that we just shoot on camera we're shooting our own content we're writing our own content we are we're planning our lives we are you know I have a coffee business a podcast a comedy show you know I'm making a wine this year I did a beer I'm doing my second beer club you know, I just shot content yesterday I was just shooting a calendar all last week which was about 14 different looks covering my being you know, like whatever, which is long days that's 1214 hour days people don't realize and then like I have to sit here and I get into my computer and I will spend all day on my computer probably the next couple days just catching up on my DMS on all the different private sites that I have you know the subscription site so the only fans is easy Plus, it's not like we just sit around be like get a call me like hey, do you wanna fuck so and so we got cameras on it doesn't happen that way.

Nick VinZant 12:08

Do you have to kind of strike while the iron is hot? I mean, you've had a long career. But is Is anybody in the industry? Is the clock kind of ticking on them?

Alexis Fawx 12:16

I don't really look at that way. I mean, I think like I don't have any clock ticking. I just like to do I love what I do. So why not do it until I don't want to do more.

Nick VinZant 12:29

Okay, are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? Yeah, let's do it. How much does acting matter? Or how much like acting would you say you're doing in a scene? Or is that that's really how you're feeling in the moment

Alexis Fawx 12:43

you know, it depends on the scene and your scene partners you know like luckily I've been in and I work a lot with the same individuals so we know our we know what we're doing and so that kind of we just have fun at that point because we know what to do we know where the cameras are there is it you know that's not really accurate we're just having a really good time and enjoying it acting part you know is more in the dialogue and things of that nature. Some people you know you may have never worked with before and you know the biggest thing you want to create some chemistry so that you the viewer is going to get into that you know the chemistry of the past like whatever you guys see on another side

Nick VinZant 13:25

are you generally doing scenes with people that like in if this wasn't your job like oh yeah I would probably do this with this person if the camera wasn't here

Alexis Fawx 13:35

oh no I'm not match with anybody that like I don't date in the industry or anything like that. I don't even look at it that way I just this is a person I work with. I told him look at it like I really don't I don't look at any single person whether it's female or male and thought I would date you outside of this I never I'd never never crossed my mind I don't think that way these are these are actresses and actors that I work with I have a note like total respect for them and I don't put them in that I don't put them in my imagination like that

Nick VinZant 14:03

hardest kind of scene to do.

Alexis Fawx 14:07

Hardest kind of scene for me for me to do. It's any scene that's really late in the night and I haven't been able to eat and we have any more Angel NDP are getting pretty easy. That means I don't know Joe, was my hardest thing. Um, hardest things to do. It's just maybe I think the hardest time I ever have is like sometimes when maybe. I don't know like maybe when the person maybe when people are things just are prepared. But I mean like things things don't really happen really anymore. You know, it was a lot harder when I was you know, newer in the industry, maybe I don't know that.

Nick VinZant 14:51

Things people want you to do but you won't like most frequent requests

Alexis Fawx 15:00

Like I mean, my boundaries are pretty just basic like I'm not going to like obviously I'm not going to do any kind of. I'm just not comfortable doing any type of medical Dom or anything that involves body like feces. Like really just I'm not into gross things I consider girls that's uh you know, I don't I don't know there's just it just I mean the things that I wouldn't do or just I think common sense shit like I don't even really like to answer those questions because it's like I'm not gonna sit here and name I don't even like see Yeah, I'm just there's just things that you wouldn't do I probably wouldn't do it like, I don't know. Yeah, just common sense stuff I don't do like there's there's certain words or certain not going to vomit I'm not going to you know, like there's just there's things that you could ask that I'm just like, no not gonna vomit. Oh, I don't write my name on boards or my body i don't i think that's that's just not me. I'm not going to do that. A lot of times you get asked like, Hey, can you write my Can you write your name on a piece of paper or you know this or that I don't do that because they can actually literally in Photoshop take that out and put something else in they can? And I just don't want to play with that. You know what I mean? I'm like, I know and also i really i to me, I don't know why I feel this way but I am not writing another person's name on my body. I don't have any names on my body and it's not gonna gonna happen. It just to me is No.

Nick VinZant 16:25

Are those kinds of requests are they frequent? Or do you just like get them where you get them sporadically? Favorite, your favorite type of scene?

Alexis Fawx 16:33

My favorite type of scene? I don't really pick favorites. I don't really do this kind of stuff. Because every scene can be great. I like I really don't have like I don't really don't pick favorites. I don't pick favorite male actors or female actors. I don't pick this thing over that thing. I really kind of take x age experience for what it is. And it's not really in my interest or I care to pick favorites of any sort. I enjoyed the PC and I enjoy ALCS I enjoyed my boy girl scenes I just simple that scenes, girl girl scenes. Dialogue days, it doesn't. I don't really have a favorite.

Nick VinZant 17:19

Just kind of whatever's

Alexis Fawx 17:21

whatever. Like the variety that I'm able to have at work like it's not like I don't go to their office and open open up the same book every day.

Nick VinZant 17:28

What is your personal favorite porn title? Like the title of a film or a scene that you didn't like? That's a pretty good title.

Alexis Fawx 17:37

Okay, well, I actually wrote a few that are my favorites. I will pick those because I wrote them and imagine them and and then pitch them to to mind geek, actually, I did unbound. And I did the voyer next door. And those were my favorite titles, because those were things that I came up with and they produced and they also came up for nomination for awards. So yeah, they did really well.

Nick VinZant 18:03

pretty popular. When people kind of recognize you out in public, do they usually come like right up and introduce themselves? Or say, Hey, I know who you are.

Alexis Fawx 18:12

It would depend on the person. I mean, when he recognized someone that you saw in the porn industry, would you walk up to them? Or would you be shy about it? Because it's really an individual. You might stare you might look you might, you'll do like the look back like I think I know you or that you can always tell the glands you can always tell in the eyes and it really does individual base some people feel very confident and they'll come up and ask for a hug or a pitcher. Usually as a pitcher. I'm not really into like hugging and kissing. I don't really like that. Um, but you know, I don't mind put my arm around somebody hugs All right, sometimes, but no, don't ask me because we have my face. That's not not allowed. Um, and then there's, you know, you have the individual like, I think I know you from somewhere and I'm like, Yeah, probably internet. I love it also, like whenever they say. Yeah, but I was like, Oh, yeah, that's where I know you. But I don't really watch that much. I'm like, I'm one person you can be honest about if you want to know what Tell me watch porn 24 hours, seven days a week, I could care less like that's that's you. That's awesome. You know, kudos. So it really just depends on the person. People people know that I'm very friendly and very approachable. And I love getting my picture taken with fans. I think that's the coolest thing ever. I'm still like, like I said before, you know, it still feels like the first time that when someone says hey, how can I get a picture with you? It's like, cool. Yeah, of course.

Nick VinZant 19:39

Okay, on a scale of one to 10 with one being like somebody you've nobody's ever heard of. And 10 being the most famous people that you can imagine right? Like a list celebrities, etc. At what level would you say is the most famous person that has tried to get into your DMS

Alexis Fawx 19:58

I don't look at my DMS If you at all I don't look at my DMS on any free public social media at all. So if there's anybody sitting in there I'm never going to read it never going to answer it. If you want to get my dm then you would definitely have to subscribe to me and if there's people or celebrities that are subscribed to me and stuff like that, that's their business not mine and I would also never

Nick VinZant 20:20

say what's your best gardening tip?

Alexis Fawx 20:23

Oh yeah, somebody that knows I'm a gardener that's kudos to your fan on that one. Or to your audience on that yes, I garden indoor and outdoor I love growing cannabis. Especially I like popping up from seed I've The reason why I like growing cannabis is because it's such a key plant really communicates with you you know when needs water you know when it needs nutrients you just have to watch it and look at it in such a good plan to learn from but I will grow anything I've men's just noticed my artichokes actually coming back through the weather's nice wenli here in Vegas. I've got a hydroponics garden going in my living or my plant room which is a debit tomato plants was going wild oregano I love growing a lot of my own herbs and stuff because I like to make my own teas but I literally if I can if I get a seat I'll try to grow it I love gardening

Nick VinZant 21:18

your favorite marijuana right now

Alexis Fawx 21:23

favorite I guess probably favorite strains with their asking

Nick VinZant 21:27

I think that's mean yeah yeah well

Alexis Fawx 21:32

yeah it's funny and they all have such weird names anymore like you know I just people give me a lot of weed so I smoke when I'm given

Nick VinZant 21:44

just because that's

Alexis Fawx 21:47

where it kind of goes along with the podcast and the comedy show because it is cannabis friendly and so people would like to get you know me promote them on my show or have them I don't have me try it out promote their item but as far as strains go like I've just I don't even pay attention really anymore I kind of like pay attention to say okay, I look at the terpenes and I look at like what I've been told and and kind of go by that like okay well I wouldn't want this to make me a little bit more hungry or I want this to make me a little more tired or or depends if I'm being creative I might you know want to go more to diva dominant and that's more just I don't know there's I don't really, as far as naming strains I went through like a Sunday driver. That was my favorite for a while I went through a whole kick of Sunday driver. But and then there's jack and it was like old school.

Nick VinZant 22:36

Ah, that's pretty much all the questions I got is are kind of anything that you think we missed, or what's coming up next for you.

Alexis Fawx 22:43

Um, well, I mean, definitely go out and buy my coffee Hi, AF coffee calm. We're collabing again with the another beer astronomy l works here in Vegas. We're tapping the keg on October 16 at corys, which I'm really excited about. But yeah, and our first beer went did so well. We're going to be canning it. So my coffee is going to be on part of a can of beer, which is really neat. I never thought that was going to happen. But it did. I don't know like like i said i'm My dream is just keep popping up and coming true. So I'm pretty darn happy. Yeah, and check out our podcast

Freestyle Cliff Jumper Jay Briggs

The first time he jumped he was hooked. Now, Cliff Jumper Jay Briggs travels the world looking for 100-foot cliffs and a rush of adrenaline. We talk freestyle cliff jumping, conquering fear and cannonballs. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Halloween Songs.

Jay Briggs: 01:26ish

Pointless: 27:06

Top 5: 40:52ish

https://www.instagram.com/brggsy (Jay Briggs Instagram)

https://www.facebook.com/brggsy (Jay Briggs Facebook)

https://www.tiktok.com/@brggsy? (Jay Briggs TikTok)

Interview with Cliff Jumper Jay Briggs

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, freestyle cliff jumping and Halloween songs.

Jay Briggs 0:22

After I jumped like the first couple times, I was like, holy shit. This is crazy. Like this is insane. I kind of want to go higher. I'm always scared. Everybody's always scared. So it was a long way down and you're excited. You're scared and if you're not scared, you're probably there's something wrong. Oh, you have to. You can't just do a cannonball and not tell anybody like you're screaming Cannonball and it's your job. But

Nick VinZant 0:48

I want to thank you so much for joining us if you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So I think that pretty much everybody at some point in their life has jumped off something fairly high into water. Our first guest though, takes that to an entirely different level. He's been around the world jumping off cliffs, sometimes more than 100 feet high. And doing some just amazing tricks in the process. This is freestyle Cliff jumper j Briggs How did you get into it? And what I mean by that is like when did you really get hooked? Not like the first time you went but like man this is my thing.

Jay Briggs 1:35

I know you said not the first time but kind of the first time was actually when I was like whoa this is super sick because like I was I've always been an athlete like my whole life like after high school and sports and it like I was just went to a community college so I would got really into like competitive gaming like in would go to tournaments and stuff like that and just like to compete like that competitive edge to make you feel like athletes still. But when I was like 22 I bought a GoPro and I was like I gotta do something cool. It's like I'll figure it out. And I saw some random girl on my Instagram that I went to high school with she posted that she was like near these cliffs. Oh, that's really cool. Next weekend I drove two and a half hours up there with a couple friends and we are like the edge of a 20 foot cliff it's like whoa this is huge but in hindsight right now that's nothing like I would do it nice clothes, whatever. But after I jumped like the first couple times I was like holy shit. This is crazy. But this is insane. I kind of want to go higher and so literally I was hooked like and from then on when I was 22 so seven years ago I every like I go a little bit higher. Like as soon as I get home like cool that's a little bit higher. Where can I go? What's cool, what's better let's whatever and I immediately start doing that and then I I have an effect.

Nick VinZant 2:46

What was the Why did you get hooked though? What was it about it?

Jay Briggs 2:49

It was something super new because like once you started to get kind of like higher and it's like it's almost like like even when it's 20 feet like essentially it's like it's almost like the rest of your life super adrenaline Holy shit. And you think about it you're like okay, maybe I shouldn't have done that 20 feet not so much but when you get up to higher stuff like 60 7080 100 100 plus feet you know you really hurt yourself. So it was like I got really hooked because it was so exhilarating it's like almost like you're not supposed to do it doesn't mean you can't why not but it like it was just such a like an adrenaline rush and you're just like I need to do that again. And then like but once you do 20 feet like 20 times okay that's there's no more adrenaline here so you kind of have to go for higher you got to go for bigger you got to do different tricks and so it just became an obsession to chase that that feeling of just something that not too many people get to do so

Nick VinZant 3:41

like when does it become dangerous? At what height Are you like? Okay, now now we got to stop messing around for me

Jay Briggs 3:49

specifically. It's like 60 feet where I'm like I should probably be a little bit more careful. But like it depends on your skill level likes like an art like an average viewer of yours specifically like who doesn't do this very often like 15 feets kind of a big deal because like you I mean it's not a huge deal but like you can still hurt yourself like a lot of people when they do it they like land with their arms all out and they slap their arms moved on you know like they are like when they jump and they plug their nose and they start leaning back and then on the back for 15 feet that's gonna hurt so like for me who's somebody who's like super controlled and a lot of my friends are too you know, like 50 feet 60 feet or like yeah, if I flop it's gonna suck but like now I should probably take a little bit more serious and make sure I don't mess anything up. Like when

Nick VinZant 4:33

I think of flopping I'm thinking like a belly flop and I would imagine that that would kill you

Jay Briggs 4:37

now. I've so when I was in Slovenia about a month ago, so there's there's this hotel on the side of a river that let us put a trampoline on our balcony and jump off the the trampoline off their balcony into the river and that was like 40 feet below, right? I flopped pretty bad straight to my back doing a trick I've never tried before and was spitting up loves About a day, so you're not going to die. But it's like I've watched a girl break back from 40 feet. And because she like she landed in like seating position and just compressed her spine, right? If you don't do it right, if your body's not, if you haven't trained for it or whatever, it's gonna suck. I've, I've seen people flop from over 100 feet, and they come out totally unscathed. I've seen people flop from 40 feet and break the back it, it all depends on everything, right? It depends how you landed depends on what kind of water you're in, like, if you're in quarry water out in Vermont, where it's flat, it's gonna hurt a lot more if you land into into, like the froth of a waterfall is like the waterfalls,

Nick VinZant 5:38

I guess, you know, the big, the kind of the question that that I would have is, you're gonna push it, you can push it? How do you know? How do you keep yourself from pushing it too far.

Jay Briggs 5:49

It's all internal. Like, there's a lot of cliff diving in cliff jumping is visualization, like when you start to get up to these high cliffs and high jumps and stuff like that. Or even if it's not even like as high, but it's like something that's like, either kind of sketchy or unique, or whatever it may be like, specifically, there's a place in NorCal, I'm not going to disclose the name, but there used to be a crane that would go over the water. It's like an old gold mining claim that had a crane. And people jump off at about 80 feet. And at that time, I've jumped over 80 feet multiple times, but I've been back to that place like four times. And every time I got up there, like I just wasn't feeling correct. I couldn't like I couldn't visualize what I was going to do safely. Like, every time like I went through my head, like what trick I was gonna do, like something would go wrong, and my hands on my pool of time to back down. So a lot of the times it's just visualization. It's how you feel that day, there's been times where I've backed down from jumps that are like 40 feet, so I'm just like, you're not feeling it right now. If something feels off, I'm gonna step back. Because a lot of the times if you push back then you're like, Yeah, I don't really feel that good. But I'm just gonna do it anyway, like that. So it's a lot of just mental in your, in your head, how you feel on that day is kind of where you kind of start and stop. Well, at least for me.

Nick VinZant 7:02

So it's not one of those things where like, Oh, yeah, I'm a little scared. But I got to push through this. It's like, oh, if I don't feel it,

Jay Briggs 7:08

come back now. Cuz I'm always scared. Everybody's always scared. I mean, there's times where I'm at like a 40 foot cliff, not really that scared. But like, even when you're at like 100 feet, it's always scary, right? So it's like, a long way down, and you're excited, you're scared. And if you're not scared, you're probably there's something wrong. Because you need to be afraid of what you're doing when it comes to cliff jumping like this, like, and especially when we're up 100 plus feet, which we do all the time, it's, you need to be scared, it's good to keep yourself in check. Knowing that like, even though you're scared, like, you know, your body's gonna take care of it type of thing. being scared is normal. But if you're like, I'm not visualizing, right, I'm not feeling what's going on right now. I'm gonna just step back.

Nick VinZant 7:49

So is there a special way that you're landing? Or am I learning the same way, if I go off a diving board and my buddy's backyard,

Jay Briggs 7:57

when it comes to stuff like what we do, it's Yeah, it's fee first. You can either land a little bit forward, and like, it depends on how high the jump is, obviously. But say you're like 80 plus feet, you land a little bit forward, that can hit you in the jaw and knock you out. If you don't do it correctly, it's happened, I've seen it happen. Or if you land a little bit back, you can slap the back of your head, or you can slap and you can really hurt your spine if you land kind of like with your butt out. So it's like it's always you need you try to be straight up and down every job.

Nick VinZant 8:26

Really? Yeah. So what what kind of in the community is more impressive to do like a trick off a 40 foot jump? Or to just go higher? What's kind of the main thing that people are trying to do?

Jay Briggs 8:37

It's, you know, that's an interesting question, because it's both right. You want to do tricks from the highest you can but also what think what people don't understand doing flips off a high cliff is way easier than just straight jumping from a hot because the thing about jumping just straight is horrifying. And I'm telling you every flip jumper in the world will tell you jumping straight is so much scarier than doing the flip because like when I'm doing a flip my mind's occupied. I'm thinking about stuff where my feet whereas my body, where's the water, looking at stuff. And I'm thinking the whole time, right? So by the time I see the water, my cool, I got like, milliseconds and cool, I'm done. Cool. Everything's great, right? But if I straight jump, I'm just staring at the water the entire time, and it feels like it's twice as high because I jumped off like a 60 foot or a straight jump a few months ago when we were in Oregon. And just because the takeoff is super slippery, like I couldn't get my footing right to do the trick I wanted like it just didn't feel comfortable. So I straight jumped in. And it felt it was only 60 feet and I've jumped it like multiple times before but it felt like it was like 200 feet tall and like I got butterflies because just straight jumping is terrifying compared to doing flips.

Nick VinZant 9:50

I never would have thought that.

Jay Briggs 9:51

Yeah, most people think it's the opposite. Like isn't doing trip. No, it's way easier. It's way funner being doing straight jumps is stressful. I don't know I hate they do it sometimes to scare myself like we do it sometimes just to like, let's let's, let's freak ourselves out Well, let's just do it straight down.

Nick VinZant 10:08

I always remember you know, like when you because you know, you jump off something and you jump off something and it's pretty high, and then you jump off something else and you get like that where you really get going like oh, yes hi.

Jay Briggs 10:21

Yeah right because it happens a lot like I've definitely experienced a few times it's it's what's called flow state my, my roommate Nick actually made a flow state documentary about cooking up in and it's an hour and a half feature length film on YouTube, right? And it's I describe it in that as well. But it's like when you're in the flow state, your mind is just in this in the zone essentially right? And you shut everything off and there's times where you go for these big jumps. And it's completely silent until you hit the water. And it's like you don't hear anything. You don't hear people cheering you don't hear the rushing of the waterfall or anything. And the only thing you hear right when you hit the water Okay, we're good we're clear back in the back to normal we're good and then you come up and you're excited whenever like during the jump like it's kind of when fear shuts off as soon as you step off the cliff because you're you're you're already past it you've done the hard part. Now it's just getting to the bottom safely it gets you everything shipped off it's silent. It's kind of crazy

Nick VinZant 11:18

how much like how much of a depth of water do you need

Jay Briggs 11:23

for something big like that we aimed like for a minimum of 15 feet we we've jumped off stuff more shallow and it's sketchy we jumped off this 80 foot cliff once into about like eight or nine feet of water and horrible idea we did it anyways stupid it was like when we were really young into the end of the scene and it was it was stupid and when you hit and you're just laying down on the bottom in the sand because you're you've got as far as you could it's not good but you so you aim for about 15 feet that gives you a good enough stopping point because even if you do Touch bottom likely you won't touch it

Nick VinZant 11:56

hard. Yeah,

Jay Briggs 11:58

yeah and a lot of the times like with us we wear shoes or not anymore really barefoot mostly but you wear a lot of wetsuits and stuff when it when you come to high heights like that because it's a it's a safety thing. Because say you were to hurt yourself, you float back up the top if you're unconscious if you're in a wetsuit, you'll float to the top because they're super buoyant. So we wear those on big ones in case you hurt yourself and you need essentially assistance right? So wetsuits really slowly down in terms of in terms of like how deep the water

Nick VinZant 12:29

I was wondering about that because I saw some of your Instagram videos and everybody was wearing a wetsuit and I just assumed the water was cold and I kind of was I kind of thought like these guys are so tough but they're worried about some cold water

Jay Briggs 12:41

never for cold water unless we're doing like winter jumping and we do winter jumping when it's like snowing right and it's then you're like wetsuit because it's cold type of thing but usually when we get to high heights we wear a wetsuit strictly for safety factors

Nick VinZant 12:54

is it when you look at it like is it hard to find good places to be able to jump are they just everywhere

Jay Briggs 13:01

depends on how creative you are also like when we went to Slovenia right they don't have a ton of jumping spots but if you know people and you can jump off their their hotel balconies or if you find it insanely cool bridge to jump off the yachts sweet right? But if you don't know what you're looking forwards Yeah, it's really hard. And if you don't know what you're looking for, you don't know like what to look for. Like in the beginning when it comes to like how shear the cliff is like, does the water like do you read something online that says like, no, it's a really deep pool. Whatever. If if you know what you're looking for, it's pretty easy, but it's it's not if you don't know what you're doing.

Nick VinZant 13:37

Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted question?

Jay Briggs 13:39

Yeah, let's get into the weird one. Let's do it.

Nick VinZant 13:41

Better better jump. Cannonball er can opener.

Jay Briggs 13:46

Can I tell you a funny story about a can opener? Yeah, we're so we're in this place in North Cal and we're at this spot. And this guy was drunk and just clipped up and which is a horrible mix. Right? And he's there and he goes, I'm gonna go to the 60 footer and do a can opener. I'm like, absolutely don't do that. One you've been drinking too. As soon as you reach for your knee, all your weights going to go back and you're going to flop you're gonna really hurt yourself like 60 feets, like no joke. And he goes, Okay, okay, I won't do it. He goes up there. He does it anyway, he lands flat on the back ruptures his frickin spleen. And that's it. And the funny thing is that this spot is right behind the hospital. Like about two miles behind the hospital, so we hiked to the dang hospital. Like, I frickin hate. can openers after that. So Cannonball is the straight answer for me.

Nick VinZant 14:33

Do you have to I feel like you have to call it out though. Oh, you have to?

Jay Briggs 14:38

You can't just do a cannonball and not tell anybody like you're screaming Cannonball and it's your job like

Nick VinZant 14:44

that's the way to do it. Um, easiest trick that looks hard. Hardest trick that looks easy.

Jay Briggs 14:53

Man. that's a that's a difficult question. I feel like specifically for me There's a lot of tricks that are are really easy to like my friends that do the like cliff jumping are also like skiers professional skiers and they'll do stuff like off access and what I mean by that is like you can either do a front flip or a backflip or twist whatever, but they'll kind of go like shoulder over knee type stuff. And it just it turns your body in a way that like I can't understand so sometimes they look really easy and I can't even touch them. I can't do it. So that's the hardest trick that looks easy but the easiest trick that looks or I want to say it's a gainer right it's not something crazy but that's what I do all the time and it looks really easy but like no it looks hard I guess because like you're running forwards you're going backwards everybody always like Aren't you afraid of hitting your head on the cliff? never the case because

Nick VinZant 15:48

I mean if you do it yeah you're way past it by that

Jay Briggs 15:51

right but like people always ask them are you ever hit your head on the cliff or anything? It looks hard, I guess to some people but it's pretty easy and that's the one I've done my entire coaching career that's like I do it off every single Cliff but it's just my favorite.

Nick VinZant 16:07

Our most Cliff jumpers actually good divers and I think the person means by like Could you go competed? USA Swimming trials or something? Absolutely

Jay Briggs 16:16

not. Almost none of us are capable of that. We even really classify ourselves as freestyle Cliff jumpers versus like classically trained divers because you have like these Red Bull events that are everybody's toes pointed. Everybody's judged on every little maneuver, right? But freestyle is a totally different thing in terms of like, you're doing stuff off access. You're doing you're doing stuff with more steez and more layout where they're how many flips how many twists? How straight can you be so we would fail hardcore because we're not following their guidelines at all. Right? They want to see how straight and poised you could be or as freestyle like us, they want to see how cool how sick how different Can you be,

Nick VinZant 16:59

but is the like, do you have that same level of body control?

Jay Briggs 17:04

I'd say me specifically I don't think so. But there's a few people this in this community that can absolutely let would be able to I feel take them on in terms of having body control. Like there's some people like grab a wall read heart read chase rainford, right and be that have ultimate body control that can do any flip any twist and compete with the best of them, but it's gonna look way different. Even though the trick is the same. Like say you go for a double half, right, which is one front flip. And then another front flip with a half twist, right? Having somebody who does a freestyle background versus somebody who is a classically trained background, it would make it an entirely different look. It's It's so it's really interesting,

Nick VinZant 17:46

best type of rock to jump off of

Jay Briggs 17:50

something with a waterfall that's the best one not a rock specifically, like I don't know, I'm not a geologist, but anything where there's a waterfall next to you and you're jumping like into the froth of the water that's the best

Nick VinZant 18:01

best cliff jumping spot in the US best in the world.

Jay Briggs 18:05

I'm gonna say this because it's already blown up otherwise I typically keep these to myself. There's a whole thing with the internet that if you put if you geotag a spot like on Instagram it like especially when you have a lot of followers it gets blown out blown out of proportion the wrong people go there, they literally ruin it to get shut down. So it's like a lot of jamming you kind of keep it to yourself, but this one's already heavily regulated. Have a su by it's the Indian Reservation in the middle of the Grand Canyon. We went there I went back there was 2016 only when we left with 150 people it was this insane event that we went with and the water was beautiful we stayed down the Grand Canyon for five four or five days and jumped everything there with like the world's greatest projectors at the time and I would consider that one of the greatest programming places in the world and in the United States it's incredible it's I have tickets to go back next year they sell out at bid within the first half hour every year that they're on sale and they're it's an incredible place.

Nick VinZant 19:06

Is it just because of like what what is it about it is it I mean obviously it's a beautiful area.

Jay Briggs 19:11

There's there's so many factors for me that the this that like get me there, like for one the sheer beauty you have one you're in the middle of the Grand Canyon, right you have these incredible rock orange rock formations, and then the water is this like Gatorade blue color because of the minerals that are in it. So it provides for an incredible landscape. Other than that, there's cliff jumping spots anywhere from like 20 feet to 130 feet. Technically, you're not supposed to jump. Really any of that they kind of just let people do it, but they don't. They don't want anywhere near the 100 foot or in the 130 footer. We kind of do that. And then the only thing it's like, it's so fun for just vibes in general like outside of cliff jumping, right? Like there's camp spots where they're like, but like they have picnic tables in the river where you can just sit there and Eat food like while you're like waist deep in the water and it's just beautiful so it's like a lot of things like and to be fair um not a lot of people get to experience it like not the standard people that you that are going to make the 12 mile hike in and then stay there for four days and then hike 12 miles out like nobody really does that that's probably also I should have mentioned it's really difficult to get

Nick VinZant 20:21

Is it is it hard on your body? Like could you you can do do 60 footer right can you just do this all day long are you like I got one or two in me

Jay Briggs 20:31

for like 6070 footers like you could do those a few times 510 times and like be like, whatever in your body and be sore the next day like your body's had a lot it's a lot of impact right? But when it comes to stuff like 100 110 110 plus type stuff like I'm usually like a one and done person I'll just do it once I enjoyed it. I had a great time it was incredible and I probably won't do it again.

Nick VinZant 20:53

Will you be like Will you be sore the next day off of 100 foot jump

Jay Briggs 20:59

yes and no I have sometimes it just depends on how long it's been because there was a stretch of time like in like 2018 where we were jumping off like 90 to 100 footers like every other week for like five months just killing it and then so it like my body's used to that point. But if I do it for a while if I don't do it for like three months, four months, six months, and I go to jump off like a 90 foot or 100 footer like yeah

Nick VinZant 21:24

can you make a living off of this?

Jay Briggs 21:27

Yeah, you can it's really really difficult. It's you're really relying on sponsorship money is what it is you're not getting paid by some sort of cliff diving association or Red Bull to go do this stuff. It's basically what sponsors can you get and how can they help you fund your endeavors really, there's only I only know a couple people that are able to do it full time and not actually have a job.

Nick VinZant 21:55

How many times has your swimsuit come off when you hit the water

Jay Briggs 21:59

it's never came off but so the problem is is that they rip from when you hit the impact and your shorts are filled with air and they're hitting the water there's the air in the water like or feuding essentially and so I have shorts all the time that just rip up the sea aside all the time. And it's like there's been times right where I'm one time the pool can't release anymore. Luckily I have a great swimsuit sponsorship that just says they've been sending me swimsuits for the past five years. Animoto they're out of the Netherlands they're an incredible company and they're great guys and they just send me stuff a couple times a year just to fill me up on

Nick VinZant 22:36

stage. best piece of Cliff jumper lingo

Jay Briggs 22:43

oh man that's a good one. I think it's an old surfer term and we've loved to use it and it's called hit in and it's when you when you when you eat shit essentially so like dude you got towed a pit right? It's like I really enjoy like cooking. I'm trying to remember if there's any one that cliffjumper term actually I pointed right this I don't know if anybody how many people in the crypto community really know this but there's a trick that I named is called the triple hope sex really and it's funny because my girlfriend's name is hope I named after her because it's hilarious because I used to always make fiber and just every time so he's like, Oh, I'm like yeah hope so. just random so I named it randomly and it's where you do a front flip a front half to a backflip so it's three flips with one half twist right it's really difficult.

Nick VinZant 23:35

Oh I thought you were like stopping in mid air I was like how do you do the front flap and then I slept with a

Jay Briggs 23:41

half and then a backflip and then I named that the triple hope stuff so that's a piece of cliff jumping lingo that I named and a lot of people call it that and they put me like you see people do it on Instagram captions did a trip did my first trip hope to my first trip hope Saks whatever, but I find that I just want to have I'm proud of that moment and I haven't contributed an insane amount of steps in the journey community besides like helping pioneer like new spots and stuff but that's something I got that's nobody can take that away from me.

Nick VinZant 24:10

Does she appreciate that? Oh,

Jay Briggs 24:13

she's she's she's such a good sport about everything. She's She's incredible.

Nick VinZant 24:19

The other part of that is worst piece of cliff diving lingo lingo. You're like God people can't stop saying.

Jay Briggs 24:27

Worse piece of I think what I hate the most, and it's I think some of us coast jumpers do that. So there's cliff diving, right? And then you have these kids that trampled that come from trampolining into cliff diving because it's kind of like a new step up and they use like, instead of saying like, dub half or triple half, they use the terms of triples and flip this off a cliff and I can't stand it. So Mike wrong sport, man. You're in the wrong sport. You're talking trampolines. We're going to clip that we're not doing it. No trif isn't doing job pass Tripathi. We're not using your terms and I that's something like, I know it's super minor. It's not gonna like the guys it just bothers the crap.

Nick VinZant 25:10

I will say this is a person who knows nothing about it and just hearing that like, Oh, that's annoying, right isn't as you can tell. You're trying too hard, right? The lingo hasn't come naturally, you're forcing the lingo,

Jay Briggs 25:25

right. So it's a totally different community. And

Nick VinZant 25:28

I don't like what's the holy grail?

Jay Briggs 25:31

I really feel like there's not one Holy Grail. I feel like in terms of like cliff diving spots, it's I have a super high place I told you about that's, to me the most incredible place you could get to, like for cliff jumping. But in terms of like cliff jumping itself, I feel like there's no one specific thing. I feel like it's everybody trying to do something new, and create something new that's never been done, whether it's a new flip a new trick, whatever. I think that's really the drive for a lot of people just trying to get as versatile as possible.

Nick VinZant 26:01

That's pretty much all the questions we got, man. Yeah, is there anything else you think we missed or anything like that? Well, I'm

Jay Briggs 26:07

gonna leave everybody with a message. If it gets edited out, like I don't care. Take the time to travel with your friends. Because going out of the country for us, like with your, with your best friends, is some of the most like unforgettable memories. So if you're 20 to 2530, I don't care if it 45 or whatever. Like, going out of the country with your friends, and just having an insane time and doing it's just doing random stuff and not being like, yeah, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna stay in a hotel, go stayed in Airbnb with 15 of your friends and go have a frickin blast and just go out, stay out all night, burn yourself out and have hella fun, because that's the best.

Polygraph Examiner John Grogan

John Grogan knows if you’re lying. As a professional Polygraph Examiner, he’s tested everyone from infamous criminals and celebrities, to cheating spouses and lying employees. We talk lie detector tests, how to tell if someone’s lying and the only way to beat a polygraph test. Then, we countdown the Top 5 TV Shows We’d Like to Be On.

John Grogan: 01:35ish

Pointless: 21:45ish

Top 5: 37:03ish

https://www.instagram.com/liedetectorguys (John Grogan Instagram)

http://liedetectorguy.com (John Grogan Website)

Interview with Polygraph Examiner John Grogan

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant. I'm coming up in this episode, the biggest lies and the best TV shows.

John Grogan 0:22

It's the best truth telling tool that's out there. It worked by looking at microscopic changes to blood, sweat and breathing as yes or no questions are answered in a specific pattern in almost every big criminal case you've heard of they have taken polygraphs and failed and that's why you didn't hear about them. There is no way to beat a polygraph now, short of bribing an examiner and people try that quite often.

Nick VinZant 0:49

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest can tell if you're lying. He's been a polygraph examiner for nearly 20 years. And he's given lie detector tests to everybody from infamous criminals, to celebrities, to cheating spouses. And not only does he have some great stories about the lies he's been told, but also all of the things that I kind of thought about lie detector tests and how they worked. Not really true. This is polygraph examiner, john Grogan. The first question that I would have about polygraph ng is, does this really work?

John Grogan 1:39

In most states, you cannot become a police officer without passing a polygraph. You can't join any federal law enforcement agency without passing a polygraph. It's the best truth telling tool that's out there. Someone comes up with a better one, someday we'll all change to it.

Nick VinZant 1:56

How does it work?

John Grogan 1:59

It works by looking at microscopic changes to blood, sweat and breathing as yes or no questions are answered in a specific pattern.

Nick VinZant 2:08

So it's basically relying on the person to be nervous or anxious or something like that.

John Grogan 2:14

Well, all people are nervous taking a polygraph. That's why we surround the questions of importance, whether it be cheating in the relationship or theft at their work with questions we know they're telling the truth. So the computer has an example of what their body does at this moment, when they're sitting there mad, nervous and upset, but they're truly telling the truth.

Nick VinZant 2:36

Or I guess how accurate would it be? If I told 100 lies, it's going to catch all 100? Or it's going to catch like 95 of them. Like what kind of a polygraph

John Grogan 2:45

is limited to four questions maximum, we did more than that it would be unfocused. So that's part of why we can't use 100 question analogy.

Nick VinZant 2:57

How can we Why is it limited to four? Well,

John Grogan 3:00

all of our polygraph structure comes from the federal polygraph Academy that used your tax dollars for the last 50 years to study polygraph and try new things and modify things. And they found the longest test should be as a 10 question script with 20 seconds in between each question which then totals four minutes to get through one through to the end of the other. And by then that's when your arm is starting to hurt a little from the blood pressure cuff and maybe you're starting to think about the pain instead of the questions you're being asked.

Nick VinZant 3:38

Does it become inaccurate after after a certain amount of time?

John Grogan 3:42

Well, if they're no longer focusing on the questions, then yes,

Nick VinZant 3:47

if you're doing a polygraph test, when do you kind of get to the getting so to speak the like, when would you say like Okay, did you do it?

John Grogan 3:55

is today monday? No. 20 seconds later is today? Wednesday? Yes. 20 seconds later. Do you know who took the money? No. 20 seconds later is today friday? No. 20 seconds later. Did you take the money? Well, we're halfway through the 10 questions script.

Nick VinZant 4:16

Man, it's that fast, huh? No, there's

John Grogan 4:19

20 seconds in between each to let the body calm down from one before we hit you with another.

Nick VinZant 4:25

I guess my impersonate or my interpretation of it was like you're in there for hours with somebody just banging away at console when somebody

John Grogan 4:33

says the test is going to take an hour or two. It's three parts. The pretest is where we explain the equipment and help you develop your one to four questions. The next part, the test is only three four minute chart collections. It's fairly fast. And then the third part post test is discussing the results.

Nick VinZant 4:54

Now how much of this is kind of up to your interpret interpretation as the examiner or Kind of reading tea leaves so to speak? Or is this black and white? Yes or no.

John Grogan 5:04

Now most computer polygraphs come with computer scoring that takes that power away from you of being too easy or too hard on somebody.

Nick VinZant 5:13

So the computer scoring like how does that work?

John Grogan 5:17

It's comparing your blood sweat and breathing on something we know you're telling the truth, to what your blood, sweat and breathing get on the important question. And also on a third question, third type of question.

Nick VinZant 5:30

What's the what's the third type of question?

John Grogan 5:33

It's in what's called a C question. And it's really too involved for this effect to take a week of a polygraph school to study that third question.

Nick VinZant 5:44

Now that here's the problem. Now I'm so interested in what the third question like can you give me an example of what the third question would be?

John Grogan 5:51

Well, if I'm here, because you're accused of stealing money at your employer, and the employer wanted to write for questions they might be Do you know who took the money? Did you take the money? Do you know where the missing money is? Now? Did you help anybody take the money? That see question might also be a theft question, but from a different time in your life. It might be prior to working here. Did you ever steal any money from someone who trusted you in the federal polygraph Academy? In all the money and time they spent is found that that's a good question to ask as a third type of question during a test.

Nick VinZant 6:31

Now, Will these results do they generally hold up in court?

John Grogan 6:35

Well, I do them for immigration court, which is federal. That's where most court ones are used in federal court because the US government is the biggest users of polygraph in the world. A lot of people don't know a lot of people are getting their immigration thanks to passing a polygraph test.

Nick VinZant 6:53

I didn't know that at all. Wow. Is there any examples of a major crime, felony murder, etc, in which somebody has been convicted solely off a polygraph test?

John Grogan 7:08

Well, New Mexico for example, they allow polygraph is evidence the same as any other evidence with no special procedure. Other states, you either need both sides to agree to before the test, or have the judge override it.

Nick VinZant 7:25

When when you kind of score somebody based on whether or not they're telling the truth. Is it it's a probability like there's a 90% chance that they're lying, or 10% chance that they're lying? Or how does that work?

John Grogan 7:37

There's two levels of accuracy with a polygraph. The first is the blood sweat and breathing is for devices attached to you. That's pretty much 100%. Because it's just medical equipment, truly reading your blood sweat and breathing changes. Then the other level of accuracy is when we take the results and make a call pass or fail. And that's held to be over 90% accurate. They get the 90% to 95% is true later, other evidence appearing or confessions. They match it to what the polygraph said and 9.5 out of 10 times the polygraph had the correct answer.

Nick VinZant 8:19

Is this would you say like looking at it in terms of court cases, is this growing in its acceptance about level or declining and its acceptance in use.

John Grogan 8:31

Usually in communities where you can't become a police officer without passing one. Those are the areas where most judges allow them in court. If it's important enough of a tool to let somebody become a cop. Based on that, then it certainly should be usable for evidence and polygraph even if it was only 90% accurate. They allow other evidence in like eyewitness testimony you say it was a purple car, I say it was a brown car. Yet that's allowed in his evidence. And that's eyewitness testimony is wrong 50% of the time,

Nick VinZant 9:04

I feel like I'm going to do a really bad job framing this question. So I'm going to hope that you kind of understand what I mean by this. But can it pick up on say, lies of omission in the sense that like, Did you eat the sandwich? And no, I didn't eat the whole sandwich but I ate 70% of it. Can it kind of stuff up?

John Grogan 9:27

That's why we have to be very accurate on the questions they need to be yes or no answerable. Three to 19 words seems to be the best. And no ands ORS or commas. So for example, I might ask you Did you kill that man and you're thinking I didn't kill him the bullet I shot out and killed him. So that's why we asked did you shoot the man? Or did you shoot the gun that shot the man, you've done this before.

Nick VinZant 9:53

That makes a lot of sense now but let's say that you had somebody that wasn't as experienced in yourself. And they didn't frame that question correctly, like the way that you framed it, would it still pick up that somebody was kind of committing a lie of omission that like, Hmm, I didn't kill the guy, I just pulled the trigger and the bullet did it. If somebody who wasn't as experienced as yourself asked a question in that way, would the system still be able to tell that they were like?

John Grogan 10:24

Well, the reason it's called a lie detector, not a truth detector. An example is, there's a homeless guy that lives downstairs from my office, and he tells people, I am Jesus Christ. If we were to do a test on him, he wouldn't fail. He is not lying. Now, we're not saying he's Jesus Christ, we're saying he's not lying. He truly believes it to be true.

Nick VinZant 10:48

So could somebody who let's use a dramatic example, kill someone, if they just absolutely believe that they didn't do it? Even if there was like video evidence that clearly shows them? They did it? If they didn't believe it? Can they pass the test?

John Grogan 11:04

Yes, it's not something they can train themselves to do if they were so drunk or blacked out and really don't remember it. They will pass but if they probably playing games, no, it will catch them their sweat at their fingers will go up dramatically. And we'll we'll call it a lot.

Nick VinZant 11:21

It couldn't just be one of these things that I sat in a room before I took this and just convinced myself over and over and over again, even though I like if if there was any internal thought in my mind that I had done it, I would probably get caught by the by the system.

John Grogan 11:37

If you know you're lying, you'll fail. In fact, one of the questions on the final exam, but most polygraph academies are kind of sociopath or a psychopath be tested? And the correct answer is, if they know they're lying, they will fail.

Nick VinZant 11:54

Are you ready for some harder slash listeners submitted questions? Sure. So the big one, obviously, is going to be Can people fake it?

John Grogan 12:02

No. Back in the old days until the 1990s. computerized polygraphs didn't exist. It was a roll of chart paper with four moving pens. And it was a struggle and a lot It took hours back then because we had to write furiously as a chart paper was moving. And when it was done, we had to use rulers to make measurements. And with computerized No more ink or paper problems. It's amplified and achievements got scoring software that sees things better than our own eyes did. So there is no way to beat a polygraph. Now short of bribing an examiner and people try that quite often.

Nick VinZant 12:41

What's the most amount somebody has ever bribed you with?

John Grogan 12:44

People have offered 100 to $1,000

Nick VinZant 12:49

did that seem like a reasonable amount for that case? Or did you feel like they should have bribed you with a lot more?

John Grogan 12:55

Well we would never take a bribe so it doesn't matter the amount but let's say a guy his wife found out he was cheating and she would not give them another chance so he's got no benefit of answering the truth tour. They come in and say Mr. I'll give you $500 just guarantee me to pass when we say now we can't even test for you now that you've said that.

Nick VinZant 13:17

So that so the I guess the lesson I would take is bribe the bribe the examiner and then you don't have to take the test kind of right.

John Grogan 13:26

I would bet 99% of examiners wouldn't take the bribe

Nick VinZant 13:30

most interesting legal case you've been involved

John Grogan 13:33

in examiner's do a lot of the tests you see of high profile people accused of killing their wives and whether or not the polygraph would have been admitted in court isn't important to them it when they release it to the public for public relations reasons and almost every big criminal case you've heard of they have taken polygraphs and failed and that's why you didn't hear about them

Nick VinZant 14:01

really so basically if like it's a big case and you don't hear about the polygraph they've probably

John Grogan 14:08

they've probably probably took one and failed.

Nick VinZant 14:11

You do a lot of these things obviously for court like you mentioned immigration court and stuff like that. But now what kind of stuff do you do on the on the civil side?

John Grogan 14:20

On the civil side, not criminal but civil?

Nick VinZant 14:23

Or sorry, I I should have phrased that differently. Um, like personal stuff. Hey, is my spouse cheating on me? Nothing to do with nothing.

John Grogan 14:32

Almost 90% of our work is husband wife, boyfriend girlfriend, gay couples thinking the others cheating? How much does it cost? Anywhere from 145 to 1000. It's the same test whether you pay $1 or 1000. The computer polygraph doesn't know what you charge what you paid. So it's just whatever the examiner charges based on Are there other examiner's in his or her area and then some culture are known for asking certain questions. Also, there are certain cultures that want to know, was I really the first guy you had sex with? is mine. Really the biggest one you've ever seen certain cultures out

Nick VinZant 15:16

there, this is kind of a broad question. But in your, in your experience are most people generally lying or most people generally telling the truth?

John Grogan 15:22

About 5050. I do a lot of failed urine tests from military bases, where guys and gals want to say, I did not knowingly ingest whatever chemical, your analysis says I used. And they're ordered, go get a private polygraph. Because if you don't pass one, you will be out of the service very shortly.

Nick VinZant 15:44

And that's about 5050. Like sometimes they really did these

John Grogan 15:49

things, we fail them and they'll sometimes they'll say, Well, I don't like your test. Okay? I'm not saying you're a liar, but I'm saying you failed a polygraph test, which usually means the same thing.

Nick VinZant 16:00

So obviously, you always go by the test. But can you After all, the your experience? Can you pretty much tell at this point, whether somebody's lying or not, before you even look at the test?

John Grogan 16:12

I can tell only while I'm testing them as I watched them live on the computer screen, but looking at them personally. No, I can't tell

Nick VinZant 16:20

you. Is there somebody that stands out in your mind? And obviously you don't have to name names or anything like that. But is there anybody that stands out in your mind that it was like man, that person was a good liar?

John Grogan 16:30

No, people that are good liars, they lot of people that are guilty are willing to take polygraphs because they think they're such a good liar, they can beat a polygraph. And then we show them on the screen. After they fail a couple of times, we say we're going to turn on a screen so you can watch yourself live. And they see what their body does on the first couple of questions. And they can see when we get to the important question, what a major difference it is yet they thought they were in control of their body.

Nick VinZant 16:59

You know, some of the things that I've always heard of like you can tell somebody's lying if they look around, or if they blink a lot or anything like that. Is there any truth to that kind of stuff?

John Grogan 17:07

while they're studies that say when went out? Ask you have you ever stolen anything since you've been an adult? If you're while you're thinking of your eyes go to one side it means you're truly trying to remember and the other side it looks is means you're trying to make up an answer.

Nick VinZant 17:24

What's the biggest lie somebody has ever told you? It could

John Grogan 17:27

be but a lot we work for a lot of marijuana dispensary. So those are all cash businesses. They can't get a bank account. Sometimes they take in 100 or 200,000 a day. An employee can take 50,000 and not even be known for a couple of days. So Bell saying no, I didn't take it and we see they're wrong. And when we tell them they're wrong, that's when they say we'll give you a big chunk of money if you say that I passed

Nick VinZant 17:54

best scene in a movie depicting someone taking a polygraph test.

John Grogan 17:59

Well people talk about that. Folks movie I can't remember the name a guy using an antique polygraph. And that's back when people used to put a tack in their shoe to try to interfere with polygraph results.

Nick VinZant 18:14

Oh, that's one of the oceans movies isn't it? It's like a gambling but

John Grogan 18:18

but there was one of those it's Meet the Fockers.

Nick VinZant 18:21

Oh right. Right. Right. Right. was that? Was that in any way so somewhat accurate?

John Grogan 18:29

Um, it's how we did it in the 80s before computerized came out?

Nick VinZant 18:34

What's the worst polygraph scene in a TV show or movie where you went off? That's not anywhere near accurate?

John Grogan 18:41

Well, we see them wiring to the fingers and putting them backwards where the moisture devices are touching their fingernails instead of their fingerprint areas, things like that.

Nick VinZant 18:53

What advice would you give to me or to anybody listening if they were about to take a polygraph test?

John Grogan 18:59

to do your best you need to answer yes or no with your mouth only no head movements or body movements. If you shake your head yes or no, it'll make your body change the same as if you had lied. So we just want the truth we don't want you to fail due to moving so answer with your mouth only.

Nick VinZant 19:18

Um, that's pretty much all the questions that I have. Is there anything that you think that I missed or anything like that?

John Grogan 19:25

Sometimes people ask us what if he uses drugs? Is that going to change the results? polygraph just to comparison test. So if they take a drug and it slows their breathing or blood, it's also going to slow it on the other questions, not just the client questions, and we're still looking to see if the client questions have a bigger reaction than the known truthful, or the third type of questions. There's no drug that can help someone pass as long as they can still walk and talk. The drug won't change anything.

Nick VinZant 19:58

How did you get into this

John Grogan 20:01

I was a regular private investigator and started getting more and more calls for it. In most counties, in most states, there's less than one polygraph examiner per County. For example, California has 58 counties, there's 10,000 private investigators, but there's only 50 private polygraph examiner's. Why is that? Why? It just doesn't attract people. They make movies and TV shows about private investigators, because that's exciting. They don't make them about lie detector people.

Nick VinZant 20:35

But you would think that at some point, that there would just be enough of a demand that people could like, man, there's this is an open area, I could jump into this. How come?

John Grogan 20:46

It is a profession that those in it, try to keep others out. They tell them Oh, it's too hard to learn. Oh, it's boring. The equipment's too expensive, because they want to keep the work for themselves.

Nick VinZant 20:58

How expensive is this stuff? How expensive is equipment,

John Grogan 21:02

there's four brands of computer polygraph. It's kind of like comparing Honda Toyota Nissan, and maybe Kia. one's a little less known, but probably still just as good. What you get fit in a shoe box and a cost you four to $6,000.

Nick VinZant 21:17

That's not a huge startup cost. Not not in the grand scheme of but the schools

John Grogan 21:21

are 10 weeks long, and a lot of people don't have that time to put into a school. There's only town in the whole United States.

Taxidermist Allis Markham

Part scientist, part artist. Allis Markham is one of the world’s premier Taxidermists. She specializes in bringing exotic animals back to life for museums and science centers. We talk Taxidermy, interesting animals and the growing science of Nassology. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Things You Should Always Keep.

Allis Markham: 01:23ish

Pointless: 29:45ish

Top 5: 42:00ish

https://www.preytaxidermy.com/pages/about-prey (Allis Markham Website - Prey Taxidermy)

https://www.instagram.com/allis (Allis Markham Instagram)

Interview with Taxidermist Allis Markham

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, award winning taxidermy, and stuff you should always keep,

Allis Markham 0:23

we're taking their skin off, like you would peel an orange. And then we're creating a structural representation of what's inside of them. Occasionally, I'll take what's called a death mask. And what that is, I'll make a very careful mold of the face. When I see the similarities when I scan animals, and I noticed the similarities to humans, it's much more jarring than the differences.

Nick VinZant 0:49

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest is part scientist, part artist. And she specializes in bringing exotic and everyday animals back to life from museums and science Center's she's one of the best taxidermists in the world. And she's won all kinds of awards. This is taxidermist Alice Markham. So is this more of an art or more of a science,

Allis Markham 1:26

that's what I love about taxidermy is that it sits in a place between art and science. So I have to initially when I'm working on something, you know, you're very much a scientist in taking it all apart, right? And then you really have to utilize artistic skills to reassemble the specimen. But then scientific ones to know how to make it biologically accurate. So you get to be both. And that's the fun of it.

Nick VinZant 1:54

So I know nothing about this. And I'll be honest, like when I used to go to museums and places like that, I didn't realize those were real animals. I thought that this was something that they made, like in graphics, art department or something like that. You're you're using real animals, right?

Allis Markham 2:11

Yes, absolutely. So what will happen is basically is an animal will die these days, we're not so much going out to collect things like they did in the 17 and 1800s. Mostly today, an animal will die at a zoo or be founded, unfortunately, animals get hit by a car, and then an institution will acquire them, right, they'll put them in a freezer is a fancy way to say. And then they will come to me, I'll pick these up whole frozen, and then I will taxidermy them, right. So we take the first part, as I said, was taking them apart, right? So we're skinning them, we're taking their skin off, like you would peel an orange. And then we're creating a structural representation of what's inside of them. So there's no bones, there's no organs, the eyes are made out of glass, all of that. So really, the only thing that's real on them is the skin. I mean, there are exceptions, right? In birds, you're going to leave in some of the bones. But for the most part, taxi domain, right, the arrangement of skin taxidermy, it's just that we're just arranging the skin, the rest of sculpture,

Nick VinZant 3:26

I grew up so in small town, Kansas, and when I think of a taxidermist, like I think of Bob's taxidermy down the road, and I always heard it as referred to as like, hey, go get the animal stuffed. But is, is that what you're doing? But on a much higher level? Or is this a completely different kind of thing than like, Gus, who could do the bobcat you shot for 20 bucks down the road, so to speak?

Allis Markham 3:53

Well, Bob's taxidermy and Gus, they're doing essentially what I'm doing. They're not stuffing anything. In fact, fun fact. If you're like, if you use the word stuffed or to stuff around taxidermist, like, Bill, them's fighting words. I don't come in. Yeah. I mean, it's kind of like, I'm trying to

Nick VinZant 4:18

disrespectful. It's like, it's an oversimplification, right. Oh, yeah,

Allis Markham 4:21

exactly. Because we're not stuffing anything. What we're doing is again, like we're creating this inner sculpture. Now look, some people are going to go to more trouble to create that inner sculpture and bring a lot more art to it than others. Right. So you know, if it's like someone who does hunting trophies and all of that, even within that there's different levels. Yeah, there's someone you can take some things to and very cheaply get something done, and you'll get a cheap product back. But that's like any industry, right? You're going to get what you pay for texted or misses the same thing. But the difference I guess, between somebody who does trophy work or commercial taxes, as it's called, and then museum people is that we're always kind of doing custom work. Everything is, you know, we need it to outlive us. So it's different in that regard. But it everybody is. It's still everybody's still artists, right?

Nick VinZant 5:18

How did you get into this? Like, Was this something that you found yourself in? Or was this something that as a young girl you thought, taxidermy?

Allis Markham 5:27

You know, it's funny, it's something I kind of came back to. I grew up in Indiana and Florida, and I loved nature and outdoors. And I would find bones and just be fascinated, right? I mean, I was just all of that, like coming home with like lizards in my pocket and stuff. And you did a lot of art growing up, did a lot of sculpture. And then somehow, as an adult, I ended up in marketing, right, I worked for Disney in social media marketing. And I was there for a while. And I ended up making good enough money to quit. Good enough money to be like, this is not what I want to do. I mean, I really looked around, I was director level at Disney in my mid 20s. And I was miserable. And so it looked around, I was like, What do I want to do? And I'd been collecting taxidermy for some time, and like, kind of playing with maybe wanting to learn how to do that, and loved the Natural History Museum. And I answered that question for myself and being like, you know, what, I want to work in museums. And I want to be a taxidermist. So I really set out to do this. I didn't like find myself in it. Um, but so then I quit my job at Disney and I went to a brief taxidermy program up in Montana, got back stopped the museum, taxidermists here in LA it natural history museum, and like, talked my way into an apprenticeship. I don't even know how, and yes, over a decade ago,

Nick VinZant 7:02

in terms of like a scientific, so to speak education, like how long do you have to go to school, go to training, apprenticeship, that kind of stuff?

Allis Markham 7:10

So the answer to that is, depends on how quickly you learn. Some people come to taxidermy from an art background, right? went to art school, or just are really good artists. Some people like my mentor, he's a zoologist, who has some amazing artistic skills, right. So it just really depends. I mean, I didn't. I didn't go to school for this. I teach at Occidental College. I don't even have an a college degree. I don't know if they know that. No, they know that. Now, yeah, Oh, I forgot to tell them. But you know, people come from different things. But what I do have is, you know, I apprenticed at the museum under my mentor. For several years, I got to work alongside Kimball Garrett, who's one of the world's leading ornithologist, right? So I have a trade job. And people don't really this is a trade job, even if you're working at the highest level. So but does having a degree help? Oh, absolutely. That'll help you get hired and work at a museum or you know, whatever it is, so, but it's certainly not required. You could just be really good at it and really motivated and get a really good apprenticeship. That's kind of how things are done. I will say, you do want to get an apprenticeship is the way to do it. And I've been lucky enough to have a great one. But I've also traveled and worked under other taxidermist all over the world. And I've had people come here to learn from me,

Nick VinZant 8:43

we kind of touched on it a little bit. But I know that obviously every single animal is going to be different. But let's say you get in a cat, dog, whatever. Like what, how do you do it.

Allis Markham 8:55

So with anything, let's say I get in, get, let's just go with a cat. So I'm like, let's say it's a bobcat. So I get in a bobcat, right, and it's frozen, and it's dead. Initially, I need to take reference. So if you have all these measurements, sheets, and if you go to my Instagram, and you scroll down, you'll see like a measurement sheet. And I'm measuring all these details on the face, the body, all of that. And I will also take a bunch of photos. Occasionally I'll take what's called a death mask. And what that is, is I'll make a very careful mold of the face. And then take that mold off, fill it with plaster and I have a replica of the face. So I'll do things like that. And all of that references giving me a lot of information because now I'm going to take it apart, meaning now I'm going to remove the skin from the rest of the body of this Bobcat. So you know I'll make an incision there's a few different ways to skin a cat therefore And, and then I'll kind of again, I'll peel the skin off like you're peeling an orange, right. And then I end up with a carcass and the skin that are separate many times I'll take the carcass and I'll take a tracing of it on like butcher paper, I'll take it apart all of that. And then I will take the skin and the skin of that cat gets turned into leather. This is a chemical process that's known as tanning. So it just turns it into leather, just like your shoes or anything else except it's got a face. Yeah, so that's turning into leather. And while that's being turned into leather, then I will take all of that reference I have. And I will start to make what we call a form or a mannequin. So I need to replace everything that was inside right in the pose that I want. So the skins off in buckets being tanned right, now I've got a few different options, I can carve something I can utilize all the the reference that I have, and I can hand carve something out of foam. It's a rigid foam, it's called polyurethane. It's like a styrofoam only harder, and I can sculpt it that way, I can order what we call a commercial form, if either taxidermy supply websites, and you can get pretty close to the size and the pose that you want, and then someone like me would alter them, right, like kind of cut it up, carve it a bit chisel away. Once I feel like I've got a pretty good form, right, I'll take the skin. And that'll go over the sculpture, I'll have hide paste in between the skin and the form, I'll have glass eyes, I'll put clay on in the face, like in different ways to make different muscle, great create expression, and the whole thing gets sewn up. And then I let it dry, right. And then it has a spa day, right? Just like you would groom a dog or something, I will take it and shampoo it, condition it blow dry it off everything like that. And like brush everything with a dog brush. And then there's finishing work, I'm going to paint certain things, you know, cats can have a cute little pinky, red nose, I'll paint that, you know all those different things. So that was a really short description of how that would be done.

Nick VinZant 12:25

First of all, that's fascinating. But why not use the bones? Like why couldn't you use the bones in it? How come? They don't?

Allis Markham 12:32

That's a great question. So they used to use the bones up and into until like the 1960s or so. That was before we really were using any type of polymer right in this. The bones are made of calcium, and over time they break down. So if you look at older taxidermy, you'll see sometimes it's like kind of collapsing in on itself, what they would do is take the bones and go over them with burlap and plaster. So over time, this will become brittle. And it's also extremely heavy. So it's just we don't need to use the bones. You have an understanding of anatomy enough that the bones don't really need to be there.

Nick VinZant 13:19

Did this taxidermy last that long?

Allis Markham 13:22

text? Are we Yeah, I mean, I've repaired things, you know, or gone in the museum and done maintenance on some things that have been around since? Yeah, like the 1800s. That should last a very long time.

Nick VinZant 13:35

I really thought you were gonna say like 20 years.

Allis Markham 13:41

If something's done, right, like there is taxidermy that only last 20 years, because someone was like, we don't need to take off all the fat. And then bugs come and eat it. Like that certainly happens. But yeah, if you go, I mean, there's taxidermy from the 1800s, early 1900s. And some of it still looks amazing. today. If you go to the Field Museum, there's a gentleman who's considered the father of modern taxidermy, anti ramas, named Carl akeley. And his I mean, his tax form is there. It's from the late 1800s. And what's incredible, gosh, yeah.

Nick VinZant 14:15

So like, okay, when you're doing something, how accurate Do you have to be save the nose on this animal is two inches to 2.15 inches? Like, do you have to get it to 2.15 inches? And if it's 2.14, that's not good enough? Or do you just have to get it pretty, like where somebody can eyeball test?

Allis Markham 14:35

I mean, you know, it depends, right? So what is your viewing distance, so you want to get it as close as possible, but when you're working in a museum to and let's say you're doing 4050 pieces for them and you're on a budget and whatever, you know, you can always spend the amount of time on one piece that you would like to or whatever. I work in millimeters. I get as close as I possibly can, when things dry, they shrink down a little bit. So you can't always control for certain things. But I mean, you should get I mean, you're working with an organic specimen that would sit at a certain size, so you should be able to get pretty close. I mean, if you're far off the mark, then like, that's a problem. But if you're within a few millimeters, depending on what it is, I think that's it's very acceptable.

Nick VinZant 15:28

Do you I mean, this may be some of my personal feelings coming in there. Does it ever feel weird? Like this was a living animal?

Allis Markham 15:36

Sometimes, um, you know, I certainly haven't lost my respect for every animal that comes in the door. Some things Hit me harder than others, though. You know, mountain lions, because they get hit by cars. When I get one of those, it kind of bums me out. But because it's just such a, I mean, they're bigger than me. I'm a tiny lady. So a lot of times are bigger than me. And it's just like, wow, and you kind of see how they died. And all that and knowing that it's because of, of people is upsetting. Same with just like, I got it some albatross. And they're just stunning dream birds of mine. But, you know, I think the real differences is I don't often take on pets. Just because it does feel different. There's an emotional weight to working on somebody's pet versus a wild animal. And there's a lot of time, you know, extra time you put into it with a domestic animal. And those, like, those, like they hit me hard. Because I you know, I love animals, I have dogs, the whole thing, and it just feels different. And yeah, I'm kind of losing my words here. But it really does feel different when it's someone's pet.

Nick VinZant 16:56

Putting all humbleness aside, why are you good at it, basically.

Allis Markham 17:00

Oh, why am I going to taxidermy? Um, you know, I think it's because I don't put a lot of ego into it. I'm really excited to learn. I'm always learning, right? I work in a lot of different animals. So every time I sit down is usually a different animal. I'm not cranking out like, you know, 50 pelicans a year like No, do this. It's all It's all right. So if I'm not willing to learn, or keep learning, then all my birds are going to look like this one bird, all my mammals really like that one mammal. So I have to keep evolving and keep learning. And I think another part of that is not just on this specimen. But there's a lot of people with way more experience than me. There's a lot of people with way more knowledge than me and more skill, and am I willing to put aside what I think that I know, and actually learn from them. So I, you know, I'm grateful every day to allow myself to feel stupid and just listen to other people. You know, I think I'll do a lot of work on researching things. I'll do a lot of reaching out to other taxidermist and be like, hey, how did you get the blood out of this seagull? Like it's, you know, things like that. So yeah, just just learning.

Nick VinZant 18:22

Okay. Are you ready for some Harder, harder slash listener submitted questions?

Allis Markham 18:27

Sure. Yeah, all taxidermists are pretty much batshit. Crazy. So really, yeah, myself included. Well, we all kind of work alone, like you got to be pretty. Okay, with being different if you're going to sit down and work with dead animals, and you've got to really not give a shit what people think about you for starters. That's true. You know what I mean? Because everyone has things that they say. I mean, I've been called like, Norman Bates, Cruella de Vil. Like all of that, you know, I get all that everyone thinks like, I'm a mortician. So I think you got to be not care what people think about you if you're going to be a taxidermist, and then you actually have to be able to sit down and do the work of taking something completely apart. Just to put it back together again. And so it looks exactly the same. Which is crazy when you think about it. Like what an odd thing to do.

Nick VinZant 19:22

Yeah, he's kind of when you think about it, right? Like,

Allis Markham 19:25

yeah, I do get a ton of work on this just so it looks like it did in the first place.

Nick VinZant 19:31

So many good slogans for taxidermy taxidermy. We don't give a fuck. Back, but back to the listener submitted questions. Easiest animal hardest animal?

Allis Markham 19:46

Whoo. That's actually really good question. Okay, so the easiest animal to do. Oh, you know what, armadillo. I'm gonna put a caveat on this hard animal to take apart right? You get an R armadillo. And if you're familiar with them, right, they have these like shields going down their back. annoyingly, they are connected to the spine. So you kind of have to hollow them out like you're like you're hollowing out a watermelon or something just not as juicy and way too stinky and they can have leprosy. So imagine a watermelon like that. You're welcome. And then, but, you know, so that's hard, but when you put them back together, they are, everything is shaped by that shield. So there's no feathers to groom, there's no hair to lay in the correct position, whatever. So, I mean, not that I would do this, but I have a theory, you could just fill them up with some spray insulation foam and call it a day. I you know when I say that, like it'd be a funny experiment, and I think they would have been perfectly fine. And I'm not one to say things like that. I'm a perfectionist, but that has to be the easiest thing.

Nick VinZant 21:01

What's the one we like all my gosh,

Allis Markham 21:03

I'm quite probably a really delicate bird. I would say like a dove. A dove has a very thin skin. So a dove. If you were to skin something like let's say a j just a blue j, they're, they're pretty feisty, and they have a really tough skin just the way that they are right. It's like wet paper towel. But a dove is like skinning wet one ply toilet paper. It's like if you look at it wrong, it's just gonna fall apart. In fact, holding the skin up. If you're just to hold the skin up lifted, its own weight would break it. It's just extremely delicate. And then the feathers just want to flat fall out. So you can end up with a pretty big mess on your table and not a lot of bird.

Nick VinZant 21:54

Is there one that like, Is there an animal that like can do it?

Allis Markham 21:58

I mean, I thought I wouldn't be able to do baby hummingbirds. But I did. I was surprised when those turned out and they're on my Instagram. They belong to Occidental College, I did a little baby hummingbirds in a nest. And the mom is like hovering and feeding them. And I'm really proud of that that was there the size of insects. They're really small. But yeah, I'm happy about those

Nick VinZant 22:24

animal that made you go, oh my gosh, that's what this thing looks like when you opened it up.

Allis Markham 22:30

I mean, I'm going to take that back to the armadillo. Those are pretty weird when I opened it up. But I will also say, sea lion. So sea lions are pinnipeds. And they have the weirdest, like when I skinned out the flipper, one of the front feet of a sea lion. It looks like a human hand with the longest fingers you've ever seen. But so human looking. Oh, it was just when I see the similarities when I scan animals, and I noticed the similarities to humans, it's much more jarring than the differences. Is Sony.

Nick VinZant 23:13

The same? Yeah, I mean, we are all descended from eventually at some point, the same thing, right? It is crazy.

Allis Markham 23:20

We're all the same machine. We're just configured in different ways. But if you look at the wing of a bird, it's the exact same bones as our hands and our arms. Right? It's just it's the same machine it's just configured a little differently for whatever that machine is doing.

Nick VinZant 23:37

prehistoric animal you like a crack at

Allis Markham 23:41

Archaeopteryx. It's like an ancient kind of, I'm gonna get in trouble for this, but it's an ancient, it's like a paleo bird. But then the paleontologists dyno people are like, no, it's a dinosaur. I don't know I'm probably gonna yelled at by one or the other of them. But Archaeopteryx so for some

Nick VinZant 24:00

reason, for some reason, I really thought you'd say woolly mammoth. I feel like

Allis Markham 24:05

oh, they're just so elephant like, and I feel like they're so well understood that, you know, I like a challenge. And that'd be really fun to do, but it would be really similar to, I would say, an elephant of today, whereas an Archaeopteryx is like, way different. And I'm such a bird nerd. I feel like if I didn't name a bird, it would just be a bee cheating on on birds or something.

Nick VinZant 24:34

Um, I don't know what that one is supposed to mean. Oh, this one just says is this a growing or a shrinking industry?

Allis Markham 24:44

Are you asking if it's a dead art? To me a little pun. Um, it's growing at but I think the part of it. So what I think is shrinking is I think a lot of trophy hunting is shrinking. You're just not getting a lot of people out. There. Hunting is As much as you did, but what I think is growing, is people interested in learning about it for museums and art. I'm basing this anecdotally on the amount of students that I have. I was teaching through Atlas Obscura online, you know, during the pandemic, and I'll probably do that, again, I have over 300 students in one of my classes from around the world. So 300 students willing to pay money to spend three consecutive Saturdays learning taxidermy online. That's crazy. I've also had the pleasure of going to Australia to teach, you know, 50 different students there. I've had, you know, I've taught over 1000 individual students in my in person workshops. And if you just go on Instagram, you know, that's where I mostly AM. There's so many, I mean, especially women, I'm getting into taxidermy that you didn't see before. So that that's really starting to happen. And we're seeing a lot more diversity too.

Nick VinZant 26:10

Okay. Here's the question that you either always get asked, or no one has ever asked you but always wonders this. could you do this to a person?

Allis Markham 26:20

Yeah, I always get asked that. So I, you know, my answer is this taxidermy, of an animal looks best when that animal is covered in fur or feathers. Let's talk about why. If you have a leather handbag, it's been tanned just like a mammal skin would be tanned, right? It's gone through that same process I talked about before, it doesn't have fur on it. So it looks like leather. So if we take a person, and we do that same process where we turn the skin to leather, and it doesn't have fur on it, they're going to look like that handbag, with eyes and a nose and a mouth, but the skin's gonna look leathery, right?

Nick VinZant 27:03

Like a seven year old Florida retiree is what I'm imagining just burned in the sun.

Allis Markham 27:10

Yes, exactly what I was thinking of. So it'll look like that. Um, there are some things you could do. There's a process called wax infiltration. It's similar to like the body worlds thing where it's plasticization. You know, but it's a really difficult process. It's very slow chemical process, where essentially, you're inundating the skin with a paraffin wax. So it'll look more like a wax museum situation. So you could do it. Um, but it would take a long time, be very expensive. And then if it got too hot, they would melt a little. So I wouldn't want to do it.

Nick VinZant 27:49

Do you get asked that question. A lot. And how do you feel about getting asked that question like, Do you worry about people because they constantly asked her? Do you feel like that's a natural part of people's curiosity?

Allis Markham 28:01

I mean, I feel like that's a natural part of people's curiosity, because you're looking, you're like, can that happen to me? You look at animals, and then you imagine your own body and what the process would look like on yourself. And so I actually like i don't i think it's an interesting question. I it tells me the person's like actually kind of thinking about it. They're internalizing it and thinking about it.

Nick VinZant 28:25

That's pretty much all the questions I have, is there anything else you think we missed? Or what's coming up next for you?

Allis Markham 28:32

if we missed anything, I'll say like, what's coming up next in my world, and we working on a couple different nature centers in Orange County, I'm excited about that. I have a big backlog of work I need to catch up on before that, because I was not someone that thrived in COVID. I was wildly depressed. So you know, so I'm catching up on all of that. And I'm very open about that. Because I see people on Instagram being like thriving and COVID. I'm just like, did not. But um, yeah, so I'm just here catching up on work. And I have a new puppy. I mean, he's like nine months now. But he I think he's still puppy. He's giant. So yeah. Okay. And then they'll go champion. Oh, so this one last thing, too. And also, I have in May, the World Championships of taxidermy are coming up again. So I'm getting ready for that.

Optical Physicist Dr. Greg Gbur

Is what you see, really the way the world looks? As an Optical Physicist Dr. Greg Gbur studies that and more. We talk the latest in optical physics, the possibility of invisibility, coherence theory, meta materials and why movies are wrong about lasers. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Celebrities You Don’t Wanna Share a Name With.

Dr. Greg Gbur: 01:51ish

Pointless: 31:23ish

Top 5: 47:36ish

https://skullsinthestars.com/ (Dr. Greg Gbur’s Blog)

https://twitter.com/drskyskull (Dr. Greb Gbur’s Twitter)

https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300231298/falling-felines-and-fundamental-physics (Falling Felines and Fundamental Physics, Dr. Greg Gbur’s Book)

Interview with Optical Physicist Dr. Greg Gbur

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant. Coming up in this episode, the latest in optical physics and celebrities, you don't want to share a name with,

Dr. Greg Gbur 0:24

I would say we can't completely say we look exactly the way we think we look. Because a lot of it depends on how our brain interprets stuff. There are predictions that we should be able to build computers that are really based on quantum physics, that can do things that are traditionally impossible.

Nick VinZant 0:46

Could there really be an invisibility cloak,

Dr. Greg Gbur 0:48

it may be in principle possible to do it, but in practice, we will probably never make one as good as people would like to see them. On the other hand,

Nick VinZant 1:01

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So I don't really know very much about optical physics. But I was fascinated to find out just how big of an impact this has on nearly everything around us from light and how we communicate to the future of computers, the possibility of invisibility, even the idea of is the way that we see the world. really how it looks. Our first guest is a professor of optical physics at the University of North Carolina. This is Dr. Greg Gabor. What is optical physics? I don't I don't know what that is, honestly,

Dr. Greg Gbur 1:52

optical physics is really just understanding the physical nature of light and what it is and what it can do.

Nick VinZant 2:00

I don't know what light is, it's something I've never even thought of like it's it's, it's light. What do you mean what?

Dr. Greg Gbur 2:07

Well, yeah, that's a question that's really obsessed scientists and philosophers for centuries. Nowadays, we consider light to be a collection of massless particles that carry energy and momentum, but also have wave like properties. So if you've ever heard the quantum physics, discussion of wave particle duality, light fits that bill when you're looking at, when you're looking at light, your your eyes are collecting a bunch of light particles, which we call photons, that travel through space, behaving like a wave as they're traveling to your eye.

Nick VinZant 2:49

I have no idea what that means. Is, is, I guess my question would be like, Am I too dumb?Or have you guys not quite figured it out?

Dr. Greg Gbur 3:00

I would really say that we haven't quite figured it out yet. And part of the reason for that is when you get down to studying things on that small of a level, the rules that we're used to in our day to day life no longer apply. So the way things behave in our daily lives is very different from the way things behave on this atomic level or below for centuries, or 1000s of years. Nobody ever went any deeper than that. They said, well, light travels in straight lines from place to place and reflects off of shiny surfaces. And when it goes into something like water, it changes direction a little bit. And it took a lot of research for people to realize that light has wave like properties that it acts that it acts in some ways like water waves rippling on a pond or sound waves traveling through the air. And then for about 100 years from 1800 to 1900. People were convinced that light was exclusively behaved like a wave. And then in 1905, Albert Einstein said, Well, no, actually sometimes it acts like a wave. Sometimes it acts like a particle. And we still don't completely understand what that means.

Nick VinZant 4:17

us not completely knowing what it is, is does that have a big, everyday kind of application? Or is that more of an academic exercise?

Dr. Greg Gbur 4:28

more of an academic exercise. So the mathematics and the theoretical idea, understand our theoretical understanding of light is really good. We have computer simulations so we can simulate the behavior of light in all sorts of stuff. And that's made its way into computer games. For instance, there's so many computer games now that have built into their engines, realistic, light interactions, again on this sort of daily scale so you get very realistic lighting effects. The place where things get troubling is just trying to understand what exactly it means and how it fits into a bigger picture of how we should view the universe. But that's still an open question for really, almost every atomic particle or small particles on that sort of tiny atom sizes. We know we can very well describe mathematically what they'll do. But the rules that we've created to study this don't completely make sense.

Nick VinZant 5:36

Like how does this kind of translate into my everyday life,

Dr. Greg Gbur 5:40

most of the study of light that's relevant to everyday life life these days is the wave properties of light. So there are things like, like fiber optic cables, for instance, that are sort of forming the bulk of our communication system with the Internet, and telephone communications, and so forth. All of that requires an understanding of the wave properties of light, largely because we're squeezing the light through these tiny optical fibers. And you really do need the mathematics of the wave properties of light to describe what it's doing. So from a practical sense, a lot of the optical engineering that's being done takes advantage of a good knowledge of the wave properties of light, those quantum particle properties of light. Those are things that really still are not, I would say, in everyday usage. A lot of that individual quantum photon stuff is still in the realm of physics research, as opposed to applications.

Nick VinZant 6:51

I never, I guess I never put that two and two together and thought that fiber optic cables meant that we were sending messages by light. I never, like I just assumed we were it was like electricity or something. I didn't know that what we were actually doing. That's so interesting. And I'm okay, to kind of put things in perspective, like, on a scale of one to 10. One, we know nothing, like we don't even know where this light is coming from or anything. And 10 we got this thing locked down, we got all the answers to every question you can think of? Where do you think that we would be at with light right now?

Dr. Greg Gbur 7:29

Um, I would cautiously maybe say around an eight. We understand the physics of light, we can control light to an incredible extent now we have technology, we know how to produce it, detect it manipulate it. But there are these sort of fundamental unanswered questions that potentially could lead to some surprises in the future. So. And in fact, I like to characterize at the beginning of this new century, around the year 2000, people started working with the concept of what are called metamaterials materials that are not found in nature, but that you can in principle construct in a laboratory. And these metamaterials can have very unusual effects that you don't see in nature, and that people previously thought were impossible. And I like to describe the history of optical physics is that we've spent hundreds of years if not 1000s, if you want to go back to the ancient Greeks, we can go 1000s, but we've at least spent hundreds of years asking, What can light do? Like what are the limitations? What are what can we do with light? What Can't we do with light? And since the beginning of the 21st century, the question is changed a bit? We're now a lot of people are more asking, how can we make light do whatever we want it to do? The idea of a metamaterial really started in the in the late 90s. And the the ideas is that most of the time, when we're trying to do optics, we're working with natural materials like glass. And the optical properties of those materials are really dictated by the natural chemical composition of the material and its natural structure. And then people started saying, Well, what happens if we change that structure on a really small scale on a scale comparable to 10s or hundreds of atoms? Well, it turns out that if you can do that, if you can manipulate the structure of that material on that scale, you can you can make that material have very different optical properties and do very strange things. And that's sort of the birth of this idea. metamaterials is wow, if we, we if we can manipulate the structure of the material on this really small scale, we can do all sorts of things that we previously thought were not possible. However, in general, for for visible light that we can see with our eyes, we still don't know how to very efficiently make metamaterials and it and fabricate them efficiently so that we could use them for commercial devices.

Nick VinZant 10:34

You mentioned the light that we can see with their eyes like what percentage of light can I actually see,

Dr. Greg Gbur 10:39

I don't know about percentages. But visible light is a really small part of the total electromagnetic spectrum. So electromagnetic waves that I was talking about visible light that goes from our reds to our violets. That's what we call the visible range that our eyes are sensitive to. And then on the on the red end of the scale, you go through infrared light, and you go through microwaves, which are another or another type of electromagnetic radiation. And you go all the way down to the low end of the spectrum are radio waves. And if you go on the other end of the spectrum, after violet light, you have ultraviolet light, and then it goes, then the energy of the individual photons goes up and you have x rays or higher energy, all the way up to gamma rays, which you get out of nuclear reactions are very high energy, photons.

Nick VinZant 11:48

Okay, this is probably getting into a little bit of a different kind of subject. But what, you know, the human body in the brain is very, very adept at kind of doing the things that we need to do, why wouldn't we be able to see that? Like, what would be the reason that the, our evolutionary history said, Nah, don't worry about that stuff? You don't need to see that?

Dr. Greg Gbur 12:04

Yeah, that's a really that's a really good question. An interesting one. And I don't want to I don't want to speculate too much on evolution. But my understanding, and my guess would be is that most of the materials that we that most of the most matter that we see, in the real world, is most clearly visible in that in that range of visible light. Well, two things, first of all, things are probably most visible in that visible light range. So it's sort of the ideal range of colors are the ideal range of wavelengths, since we're talking about light waves, for us to see. And the other part of it is the sun. The sun gives off radiation over a large range of wavelengths. But it's really the peak is centered in that sort of yellow region. And it gives off infrared radiation as well, as well as ultraviolet, but it gives off far less of that.

Nick VinZant 13:11

But okay, this would be like, my dumb guy. Question, right? So if we only see these certain wavelengths, is there chances that there are just things out there? Like there's a Blimey be super dramatic to make a point, there's some giant animal that's can only be seen in ultraviolet light floating around in the sky. And it, there's 1000s of them, and we just don't see it, right. Like, I'm being dramatic. But I think you really get my question, right? Are there just all kinds of things, potentially big things that are just,

Dr. Greg Gbur 13:43

we just don't see it? Funny thing is, since I'm actually writing a book on the subject of invisibility right now been delving into the science fiction, and there are a lot of science fiction stories that are predicated on that idea. There's a classic story by Ambrose bierce, called the damned thing which is about a monster that is colored outside the visible spectrum. And there's another there's a novel called the sinister barrier, which is a very bleak novel, which is exactly this premise that the Earth has actually been controlled by these invisible beings, probably since our beginning our existence and then some scientists managed to see into like the infrared and realize that there are these creatures all over. Though the reality is and this goes back to what I was saying about the structure of matter, is that ordinary materials pretty much everything that we see in nature, is at least somewhat visible in the visible light spectrum. And that has to do with the structure of atoms themselves that pretty much every atom And combinations of atoms are at least partly visible or, or significantly visible in that visible light range. And I don't know that there has ever been found any material that somehow there, I don't think there's any material that I've ever heard of that is completely invisible in that range. It's just outside of normal, it would be outside of chemistry as we know it.

Nick VinZant 15:28

So you're saying there's a chance?

Dr. Greg Gbur 15:32

I've learned? I've learned not to say never, because I can get myself in trouble by saying that too.

Nick VinZant 15:39

Are you ready for some harder slash listeners submitted questions? Since you mentioned it? We'll start with this one. could could there really be an invisibility cloak? Like, could something like that exist? Could we make that someday?

Dr. Greg Gbur 15:54

I'm still I'm still at the level of saying that. It may be in principle possible to do it. But in practice, we will probably never make one as good as people would like to see them. On the other hand, ever there there have been a number of fundamental physical limitations that people have noticed about the idea of making an invisibility cloak. And very recently, in fact, I think it was in late 2019, early 2020. Some researchers came out and said at least one of those major limitations that we thought was kind of a hard physical limitation could be, in principle overcome. So I'm a little more I'm a little more on the side of well, maybe it could happen, though, the technical challenges and making it work are still pretty big. I would think.

Nick VinZant 16:59

This leads us into our next question, best depiction of invisibility. Harry Potter's cloak, Wonder Woman's plane, or the Invisible Man.

Dr. Greg Gbur 17:10

Oh, mmm. That's an interesting question. I would throw out Harry Potter's cloak just because it's magic, Wonder Woman's invisible plane, maybe a good depiction, because I could imagine that, at least all the depictions I've seen have really shown it is just a very transparent craft. That would be very hard to see, which seems plausible. The Invisible Man is sort of an interesting one. Because the, in the original story, the premise is that a person chemically makes themselves completely transparent, and completely invisible, I should say. And that doesn't really seem possible to completely change your chemical composition, and still be alive. But a few years ago, there was some chemists that came out and said, we've made this we have this, we came up with this chemical that will turn a a dead specimen almost completely transparent. And then in a press release, they said, We'd like to try using this and a lesser dose on some living creatures to see if we can get it to work. So I don't know if they've ever succeeded. But people are still trying it. It's it's kind of fascinating how, especially these days, no matter how ridiculous an idea seems, and science fiction, there's probably somebody out there that said, I should give this a try. Maybe this will work.

Nick VinZant 18:46

It's always the thing, like you never know, maybe you actually turns out to be really easy, right? Like, all we had to do is connect the wire. Boom, that's it. That's it. Mmm. Do things really look the way that I think they do? Or is that just our brains interpretation of it?

Dr. Greg Gbur 19:04

It's an interesting question. And I don't have the best answer for it. But it is one at one way I can look at this. Because this is something that personally drives me crazy is you may notice that depending on what sort of camera lens you use, you can look very different in photographs. Because a wide angle camera will give you one look and a narrow angle camera will give you a different look. And, of course, my self conscious self at times looks at certain photos and he goes oh, that's horrible. And then I'm like, I don't look like that. It's like Well, I'm using a wide angle, phone lens really close to my head. So my head looks huge. So to some extent, yeah, perception and our visual system. We can't I would say we can't completely say we look exactly the way we think we look because a lot of it Depends on how our brain interprets stuff. This is sort of a weird question that I asked myself at times is, how do I know that the colors that I'm seeing are the same colors that everyone else is seeing?

Nick VinZant 20:14

But we have a test, right? We have something that could say, No, this is red. Do we do well?

Dr. Greg Gbur 20:23

Well, that's what I mean is that physically, we know what red is, we can talk about it in terms of the wavelengths of light and the combinations of colors. But I'm really thinking about, is that picture in my brain of what red is? Or any other color? Would that agree? If I could magically jump into somebody else's head? Would would our brains interpret that the same way? It's one of those things that like, I like to think about it for about 30 seconds, and then like,

Nick VinZant 20:56

I can, like, it's Wednesday, me, and I can't throw my whole brain for a loop about the nature of reality in my existence. This is just too much for me. Um, this is way above my head. What is quantum noise and coherence theory?

Dr. Greg Gbur 21:13

Let me start with coherence theory, because that's one of my specialties. So what it really comes down to is, when you're looking at a light source, like an ordinary light bulb, you're seeing what looks like a steady stream of light, or you look at the sun or a star, you're seeing a steady stream of light looks pretty constant, you know, barring power outages, or fluctuations of power, or whatever. But really, what you're seeing is a light wave that is fluctuating really, really fast, much, much faster than you can see with your eye. And in fact, much faster than we can detect with, with most detectors. And coherence theory is a subset of optics that is all about asking, How do the random fluctuations of light affect how it behaves? It's an essence. It's really analogous to statistical mechanics or thermodynamics in physics. So statistical mechanics is all about, you have a box that's got that's filled with gas. If you look at that box of gas, you know, on average, it doesn't look like anything's happening in there. But they're all these. They're all these atoms bouncing around, or all these molecules bouncing around. And then the question comes, how does that how does that though? How does all of those motions have all of those different atoms and molecules? risk? What How do all of those combined into the behavior that I'm seeing at a particular time? And coherence theory is basically the optics version of that it's saying, okay, when I look at a light source, I'm actually seeing all the, what I'm really seeing is, is the average of a bunch of random fluctuations of light. And how do I, how do I study the physics of that? How do I relate what I might, how do I relate what I'm seeing to the random fluctuations or the other way around?

Nick VinZant 23:24

Then makes sense to me, right? Like light is actually going like every direction and all the time. But somehow my somehow I piece it together is like, Oh, it's coming from that light bulb? Yeah. Is that kind of

Dr. Greg Gbur 23:37

a little bit? Yeah, you can think of two is that when you're looking at a light bulb, or the sun, you're really looking at the output of a bunch of atoms, a large number of atoms that are all radiating independently. They're all doing their own thing. It's like a bunch of people in a room randomly shouting words out. And when all those people randomly shout out words, on average, you're gonna hear something. And the question then is, what do you hear? What is the AV? What is the average sound made by all of those noisy people?

Nick VinZant 24:15

Let me follow that. Let me follow that up with a brilliant question of best use of lasers in a movie.

Dr. Greg Gbur 24:21

I'm still going with gold finger using a laser beam to slice James Bond and half is still probably my favorite, though I also should give a shout out to the movie real genius because that movie, Val Kilmer way back when it's all about graduate students, basically studying optics and trying to make a really big laser. And it is depressingly accurate. Clearly the writers of that movie knew something about grad school and about lasers and physics.

Nick VinZant 24:54

Like if we, okay, science fiction kind of stuff, if we somehow invent laser blaster Like, what's that? What would that really look like? What movie would you say like, Oh, that's, that might actually be what that would look like.

Dr. Greg Gbur 25:08

So far, I'm not sure any movie is really captured it well. And part of that is, is that lasers can be incredibly dangerous, but their danger comes from dumping a lot of energy in a location at one time. So you know, you can burn a hole through something. But what lasers don't have, which you see it a lot of movies is they don't have a kick to them. Like if somebody gets shot with a gun, the bullet makes an impact and knocks them backwards. And in a lot of movies involving laser blasters, and so forth, you'll see the people get knocked backwards by the blast. But a real laser doesn't do that. Because the the photons, the light particles don't have any mass. So they don't have a lot of kick to them in comparison with a gun. So if you shot someone with a laser gun, you might burn a hole in them, but you wouldn't knock them flying.

Nick VinZant 26:11

So you would just be shot and you'd still just be standing there with a hole in your chest. Yep, but you still be standing in exactly the same place. Pretty much um,

Dr. Greg Gbur 26:20

I should say that light does carry momentum, momentum being that kind of oomph of motion that when one you know billiard ball hits another, it knocks it away, because the one ball transfers the momentum to the other. Light does have momentum, it does have a little bit of a kick to it. But it's a very small amount of kick pretty much negligible on a day to day basis. Which is why when you go out on a hot day, you know you don't open your front door and get blasted back into your house. On a sunny day.

Nick VinZant 26:48

Will we ever be able to travel past the speed of light or get anywhere close to it?

Dr. Greg Gbur 26:53

Everything that we know about physics right now says that we won't get past the speed of light and that that is a fundamental barrier. And everything that we know about Einstein's relativity in the speed of light suggests that it would be pretty close to impossible to get a spacecraft even close to that speed like I once mistakenly put when I was a starting Professor I once mistakenly put as a homework problem for students. I said, Okay, calculate the well like the fraction of the speed of light that the space shuttle went. And it's just this ridiculously tiny number. Our fastest craft have not even gotten close to the speed of light yet. However, again, I can say there's there's, we know, we know a lot about physics in the universe. But there's still plenty of things that we don't really understand things like dark matter and dark energy that make up a ridiculous fraction of the universe that we can't even see. So maybe somebody will figure something out in the future.

Nick VinZant 28:12

Imagine you're going to like meet the your idol. And you've got to wow them with one light fact. What are you going with?

Dr. Greg Gbur 28:21

Okay, I've got a good one. So it takes roughly about two square meters of sunlight, properly focused to melt rock. Wow,

Nick VinZant 28:36

you can even even from here on Earth 93 million miles away. Like it's still

Dr. Greg Gbur 28:44

you know, there's now you can find videos online of these places, I believe they call they're caught. It's called a solar furnace where this is exactly what they have is they've basically designed a big, probably a mirror to concentrate a lot of sunlight into a little spot and they can plop, plop an actual piece and they can plop a piece of metal in there and melt the metal easily and actually just melt stone. And you know, so when you're out sunbathing, you can think about how you know there the sunlight that you're encountering is is pretty intense. Really.

Nick VinZant 29:23

Last question, Where do you what do you think the future holds?

Dr. Greg Gbur 29:28

Well, in my own areas, it seems like the big things that are starting starting to come around is some quantum technology of using quantum physics to do calculations and to do cryptography. So, because because individual atoms the physics of individual atoms is so radically different than what we experience on a day to day scale, there are predictions that we should be able to build computers that are really based on quantum physics that can do things that would, that are traditionally impossible, like solve mathematical problems that would otherwise be impossible to solve or break codes that would be impossible to solve. And there are already commercial devices that claim to use quantum technology for quantum computing. I'm not exactly sure how effective they are not. But that that would be one guest for where your we might see things going is a lot more of a push to adapt quantum physics into our technology.

Etiquette Coach Kelley Yates

Etiquette is more than just being polite. It’s a code of behavior that can take you to the highest levels of personal and professional success. A code Etiquette Coach Kelley Yates (Lady Etiquette) can teach you. We talk proper etiquette, the secret habits of successful people and when it’s time to stop being polite. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Rude Things People Do.

Lady Etiquette Kelley Yates: 01:51ish

Pointless: 24:59ish

Top 5: 39:43ish

https://ladyetiquette.com (Lady Etiquette Website)

https://www.instagram.com/the_lady_etiquette/ (Lady Etiquette Instagram)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuDByTAPN9HqG3mlCSq7adg (Lady Etiquette YouTube)

Interview with Etiquette Coach Kelley Yates - Lady Etiquette

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, we're gonna get a little classy, and then get a little trashy.

Kelley Yates 0:21

I started working for aristocratic families. I was a nanny, I was a real life Mary Poppins, they have success because they have good communication skills. They're able to inspire people with their charm. And that's what etiquettes about. It's almost like magic. And if when we use the code of polite behavior, we are successful. Absolutely. It's a reflection, especially with children, you have to start them off young, because children are a reflection of us.

Nick VinZant 0:56

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest is a coach who has recently seen demand for her services skyrocket. And I think that's because not only have we kind of forgotten how to interact with each other, but also because she's really found that having good etiquette, deportment, being polite good manners, is not just the thing that we should be doing, not just the way that we should treat people. But it's really been found to be the key to both personal and professional success. This is etiquette coach Kelly Yates, known online as Lady etiquette. Do you think that people generally have good etiquette now? Or have we really kind of slacked off?

Kelley Yates 1:57

Oh, gosh, that's a great question. I think it's become a lazier society. And it's much more needed now than ever before. And there's a lot of interacting on social media. So when people see each other, they find it hard to look each other in the eye and have a conversation. It's more in demand now than ever before. In fact, I'm very busy.

Nick VinZant 2:19

Why is that? Like? How come you think that you're kind of services have ramped up?

Kelley Yates 2:24

Well, as the code is trending right now, I'm sure you've noticed on social media. There's a lot of people out there. Now talking about etiquette, which is a wonderful. But it's it's something that's classic, it's timeless, the code of polite behavior would never go out of style.

Nick VinZant 2:43

Why do you think it's important? Like, why did we develop to this?

Kelley Yates 2:47

Well, gosh, could you imagine if we went around in our daily life without saying, Please, and thank you, and just being rude to people? We wouldn't get very far would we? And if when we use the code of polite behavior, we are successful. And that's why people come to Lady etiquette because they want to be successful in their social business life.

Nick VinZant 3:10

Where do people kind of when they when we look at etiquette, like where do people generally mess up?

Kelley Yates 3:16

Um, I think being impatient, not being courteous to people. just rude, rude people, they mess up, they don't take the time to learn, you know, to be polite and considerate of other people's needs.

Nick VinZant 3:33

Do you think that like, Are our people going to have trouble once we finally kind of get out of all of these zoom meetings? And yes, zoom interactions and that kind of stuff? Have we kind of forgotten how to interact with each other?

Kelley Yates 3:48

Yes, I think I think a lot of people have what's never what what is time? This is people. Do you want to have a conversation? And, you know, that gives you confidence and inspires people around you?

Nick VinZant 4:01

Uh, no, I would agree. Right? Like if somebody says, Thank you to me, then I'm generally much nicer to them. Yes, it is. Here's how kind of manners fuel everything right?

Kelley Yates 4:12

Absolutely. It's a reflection. Especially with children, you have to start them off young, because children are a reflection of us. You know, you can start from a toddler, you know, when you you are feeding the toddler, their lunch in the high chair. The toddler is looking at you. They make make eye contact, they smile at you, they giggle and when you feed them, you know, you get them to say please and thank you and that's where it starts. And children watch everything.

Nick VinZant 4:46

Can we go too far though, right where like, everything has to be this kind of I'll use the word I don't mean it but like stuffy, super kind of traditional all kinds of stuff. Like, how did that? How does that kind of traditional fancy way? meld with the modern, more relaxed way? Like, how can we do that?

Kelley Yates 5:10

That's a great question, Nick. I think that's one of the biggest misconceptions about advocate, as years ago, did was more for high society. And especially if you went to a finishing school, it was where high society attended. But modern etiquette really is for everybody. It's not, I've got all kinds of people come into lady etiquette, for example, I have people from an elderly lady, to a four year old to a tattoo artist. And I think that's wonderful. And that really is what modern etiquette is about. It's for everybody. It's not just for high society, these strong interpersonal skills just give you more confidence to be successful in your life. And that's what it's all about.

Nick VinZant 5:57

How did you get into this?

Kelley Yates 5:59

I guess, it was a gradual process started right from when I was a child, I think I remember being captivated. We were all huddled around the TV, my family, watching Princess Diana's wedding. And I was just enchanted, you know, with all the pomp and protocol. And, of course, it was such a worldwide event, everybody was talking about it. And I think that really planted the seed. And then when I grew up, I started working for aristocratic families. I was a nanny, I was a real life Mary Poppins. And I taught English. And I travelled extensively, I worked in the Middle East, and, you know, saw how important it was to watch, you know how different cultures interact and see the difference, you know, because every country has their own code, polite behavior. Then, when I came to America, I started working in the five star hospitality industry. And that led to VIP hospitality. So I've had very unique opportunities in life, that led to finding lead yet. For the most part, it was watching, observing successful people, you know, interact. And one common thing they all have in common is that they, they understand etiquette. And I believe that without a doubt, that is why they are successful.

Nick VinZant 7:35

Do you think that's the etiquette in and of itself? Or are they successful? Because there's kind of an organization in a system that they have applied to their lives, right, like they do things the way that they should be done? Is it etiquette? Or is it general mindset behind the etiquette that you think has made those people successful?

Kelley Yates 7:56

It's everything, yes. But you cannot be successful in life. If you You are not polite to people. And you have these strong interpersonal skills. If you think of all the world leaders, or the most successful business people, that's one common thing they have. They have they share is they are able to be they they have success, because they have good communication skills. They're able to inspire people with their charm. And that's what etiquettes about. It's almost like magic. You know, it's charm. It's, it's not. It's not like a magic wand, though. It's not the fairy godmother effect, but it is this magic ripple effect. But it takes work and dedication and passion.

Nick VinZant 8:49

Is it difficult to learn the things that people should be doing to have proper etiquette? Or is it difficult? Just to remember to do them to have the patience to kind of do it right. Like is it so I guess it's difficult to learn this skill? Or is it difficult to practice this skill?

Kelley Yates 9:06

No nose at all. It's it's I make it fun. Actually, if you have noticed on my Instagram, I show some reels, what not to do and what to do. And my classes are fun to keep people's attention. And it's not difficult at all You just but you have to practice it. I'm not a believer at all. I don't like that saying fake it till you make it for example. You know, you really have to really be real. And otherwise people will know if you you are being disingenuous.

Nick VinZant 9:39

When people come to you like what we've kind of talked about etiquette in the broad sense, but what are they generally looking for, like, how do I act at dinner? What should I do at a business meeting? Like what are people generally looking for when they come to you?

Kelley Yates 9:55

Well, we we offer a lot of different classes, you know, dining etiquette, childrens etiquette, you name it. But the recent trend it seems to be I get a lot of leaders asking me how to be more feminine. And I do have a poisoned department class that I designed to help women feel more feminine and confident. I teach leaders departments as well, it's adequate. Are you familiar with DEP?

Nick VinZant 10:22

The word I have heard people say it, but I've always been too afraid to ask what it was because I feel like I should have known what DEP is

Kelley Yates 10:32

yes. Well, it's, it's very important. It's your courage, your posture? How do you walk with grace, how you sit, how you carry yourself gracefully? And it and it works hand in hand with etiquette?

Nick VinZant 10:45

Why would now why would so many people be interested in that? Like, what what is it about? But like, obviously, you're talking about, you know, the when somebody kind of walks into a room, why would a lot of women be coming to you for that?

Kelley Yates 10:57

Well, I have noticed as a woman, there's been, you know, the last, this has been coming out for the last 30 years, you know, very extreme feminists pushing back on femininity, and making women less confident in business, you know, thinking that a woman has to be successful in business, if she had cuts her hair short, wears a man suit, when that's not the case, it can actually have a very negative effect on a woman and take her confidence away. What I have observed is that a woman is much more successful in business when she embraces her femininity, which is very empowering. You will see those of the successful women, you know, you don't, I'm not talking about being a bimbo, far from it. And you don't have to be, you know, certainly a man in business, you have to be, you know, smart, feminine. And it's wonderful nowadays, we do have women that, you know, can be a CEO, run for president. But the fact of the matter is a woman still wants to be treated like a lady and women are interested in femininity, because femininity is it's very empowering. And it gives a woman confidence and inspires people around them.

Nick VinZant 12:21

Do you think that now is that? Is that a backlash against kind of the feminism movement? Or is that more just a case of like, Look, over time, we kind of got away from these things?

Kelley Yates 12:31

Well, I guess back in the 1950s, I would have been a traditional, more traditional feminist, you know, but nowadays, it's become quite extreme. But now people are realizing, you know, we still need to be women.

Nick VinZant 12:48

When when a man comes to you, what are men generally looking for?

Kelley Yates 12:53

Well, everything you know, of course, some recently I've had a lot of inquiry about chivalry, I do. Teach chivalry, chivalrous, demeanor, decorum. Dating etiquette, how to act on a date. What to expect. dining etiquette, business etiquette.

Nick VinZant 13:18

Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? Absolutely. Go ahead. In what place? Do you generally see people lacking the most etiquette and I'm not talking about like a physical location, but in like an aspect of their lives? Where would you say that people lack the most etiquette

Kelley Yates 13:37

department? Actually, I would say because a lot of people don't know how to carry themselves properly. And there's a lot of people you know, that walk you see them walking, for example, like Charlie Chaplin with the feet out, or they walk with their feet in like a pigeon. You will notice it now. soon as you walk into a supermarket, you're walking through the mall. Just observe people how they walk, I can help people within this area. And it can really change people's lives. because it not only helps you with your health, but your confidence.

Nick VinZant 14:12

What's kind of like big for a man or for a woman what's like your advice for like a quick fix, right? Like, Hey, I walk this way, what's the quick fix for men and women.

Kelley Yates 14:22

Try to walk in a straight line. a straight line, head up your chin parallel to the floor, shoulders back. And just take your time. Don't over swing your arms, like a propeller, or a bird getting ready to take flight. And you try to go the length of your foot with each step.

Nick VinZant 14:47

That seems kind of short for like for I guess when I'm thinking of myself walking. I feel like this kind of short for a man. Is that short for a man?

Kelley Yates 14:57

Well, if you want to pick up your speed That's perfectly fine. But I teach at lages. One one foot length. Okay,

Nick VinZant 15:07

so we talked about places where people have the least and what kind of place and again, not a physical place, but like an aspect where people generally pretty good,

Kelley Yates 15:16

people are getting more cognizant with their dining etiquette. Now, realize the importance of it, especially in business. You know, when people go out on business and they, they want to sit down and relax and get a business deal, and they don't want to be worried about where to put the napkin.

Nick VinZant 15:34

How important in your business of etiquette is being British? Because I feel I will feel like I would listen to somebody who is American a lot less. But since you're British, I feel like that's extra. Like, oh, oh, yeah. Does that help? Being British?

Kelley Yates 15:53

Yes, I'm not going to lie. It does help. They love the British accent. It's very popular in America. And it's a compliment. And, incidentally, I think this is what people are lacking nowadays, is giving a good compliment. And a lot of people don't know how to give a compliment. They actually compliment. For example, I often have people leaving comments on my Instagram. Oh, that's a beautiful dress. Or I love your hand back. But Doesn't it sound a lot nicer when you say? Oh, you look You look beautiful in that dress. You know if you're if you're wearing a nice suit. Oh, I love your suit neck. Doesn't this sound much better? Nick, you're looking very dapper today. I must say

Nick VinZant 16:47

it dies. Yeah. Cuz you're complimenting the person rather than the thing.

Kelley Yates 16:52

Exactly. They are complimenting that the object and not the purse. Yeah,

Nick VinZant 16:58

I can see why. Because you're basically saying like, as opposed to, Hey, your clothing that you have on is nice. You're saying you as a person made a good choice? Yes. And it makes people feel more special. What is your biggest pet peeve when you see when you see people doing things like what just drives you nuts? Like, oh, you can't do that.

Kelley Yates 17:23

I see a lot of people holding their wine glass the wrong way. Doesn't really drive me nuts. But it's very common. You see it all the time in the movies, for example. And I think when I watch people in the media, politicians, public speaking, I do see something that really annoys me. They're over gesturing their hands like this. They're very, very flamboyant. And it's so it's like, you know, the Italians, which is part of their culture. It's great for the Italians. But here, no, it's just over the top. You know, and that annoys me, especially when I'm watching people, you know, making public speaking you know, there's they are, you know, they could be so much more professional, if they just use their gestures, when they really want to emphasize something. And not constantly, like an over zelia salesperson that you see on a, you know, a bad TV commercial.

Nick VinZant 18:34

What is some bad etiquette that you do that you are trying to correct? Like, you know, you're not supposed to Lady etiquette, but you do it? Yes. You do.

Kelley Yates 18:48

What, gosh, you know, that's wonderful question. I don't want to tell you really, because nobody will come to me from business. No, no, seriously, no, I'm not perfect. You know, etiquette, it's a bit like yoga. You have to practice it every day and be real. Not disingenuous, because people will pick up on it. Especially children, they notice everything. But let's say what annoys me about myself. Sometimes I get very excited. And I can talk too much when I'm excited. I guess that's what it is. I can't talk until the cows come home

Nick VinZant 19:41

the one you know like I think you and I are in pretty good agreement about like the need for etiquette The one thing that I would wonder about though is like can you be can you become so proper, so prim and proper, that you kind of lose your personality?

Kelley Yates 19:57

Yes, well, I'm I'm still myself. I haven't, you know, a naughty side to me, but the etiquette keeps me balanced. It's not about being stiff at all. That's the biggest misconception with etiquette. It's about being confident and inspiring those around you to just be more kind, respectful, courteous, and graceful. It doesn't matter where you go in life, you know, etiquette is needed. And it's everywhere. It's you're surrounded with. If you look, the checkout clock in the grocery store, for example, you know, don't be so focused on your groceries when you're going through. Look up. Look, look at the grocery at the checkout clerk. Thank him or her?

Nick VinZant 20:46

What is the biggest controversy in etiquette? Like you and your etiquette colleagues? Like what are you guys? What's the big controversy? In etiquette? Is there a controversy? Like, oh, you should do this? No, no, I think you should do this.

Kelley Yates 21:03

Just the misconception that it's only for a certain class of people. etiquette is classless it's for everybody. controvert controversy? Oh, I guess you could say that, you know, there's certain mindset that believe that etiquette is you always have to be nice, perfect. You know, you you know, it doesn't mean that if somebody is bullying you, for example, you know, you don't have to be nice. Now, of course, you don't bully them back. But you don't you know, ethic, it's not about being a doormat. And etiquette gives you confidence to stand up for yourself. In any given situation.

Nick VinZant 21:55

That kind of fee feeds into our next question. Best way to politely tell someone to eff off. Oh, yes, I love that one. Are you you're saying it nicely, but they know what you're really saying? Like, what's the best way to tell somebody that

Kelley Yates 22:15

but it depends on what they're, they're they're doing as well. You know, to annoy you. Um, you know, it's there. For example, if there you have to, we have to have an example here, don't wait. Because there's so many scenarios. If somebody is making fun of the way you look, in more ways than one, then I would say to Shay, you know, I would look at them, perhaps and say you might want to take a look in the mirror before you judge other people. And work away.

Nick VinZant 22:53

Good burn. It's good one.

Kelley Yates 22:56

Walk away, you know, we have a saying in England is while you are beneath contempt,

Nick VinZant 23:02

at what point in an email chain? Do I no longer have to use the person's name? Like Do I have to say, Hi, Kelly. Hi, Kelly. Hi, kill every single email, or what point can I drop off? Is this question?

Kelley Yates 23:15

Yes, yes. You don't need to. It's always nice to use the person's name. But after the, you know, the third email, you know, it's a reply. So you don't need to use the name. You're just having a conversation.

Nick VinZant 23:29

Another another one that came in. If a meeting starts right out if a meeting starts, let's let's use this one. We you and I recorded this at 10 o'clock. Should I be right at 10 o'clock? Or should I actually be a little bit early or a little bit late?

Kelley Yates 23:46

I would say minimum five minutes before for a zoom meeting. I myself like to be there 10 to 15 minutes. That's what I recommend. But minimum five minutes before

Nick VinZant 23:59

that. That's really all the questions that I have. What's kind of coming up next for you. Where can people reach you? I know you offer classes.

Kelley Yates 24:06

Yes, we have online classes, children's classes, poisoned deportment for leaders. And I have an afternoon tea class which is online. We have video coaching. I'm very busy with video coaching. And I can be reached at the lady etiquette on Instagram. Or I'm on YouTube at lady etiquette. I did want lady etiquette I confess for Instagram but it was already taken.

Olympic Race Walker Robyn Stevens

Forget what you’ve seen on TV because Race Walking is nothing like what it seems. Robyn Stevens is a 14x National Champion who just got back from the Tokyo Olympics. We talk Race Walking, the secret to swinging your hips and getting annoyed at slow walkers. Then, we countdown the Top 5 Ways to Get Around.

Robyn Stevens: 01:47ish

Pointless: 28:36ish

Top 5: 52:13ish

www.WalknRobyn.com (Robyn Stevens Website)

www.instagram.com/robyndesign (Robyn Stevens Instagram)

www.facebook.com/dreamngold (Robyn Stevens Facebook)

Interview with Olympic Race Walker Robyn Stevens

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, fast walking, and slow moving,

Robyn Stevens 0:21

I got there a few days after the opening, we had to miss the opening ceremonies. But I watched them from home which with my mom, which is really special because I used to watch all the Olympics growing up with her, our body are using all of the muscles, we're engaging all of the muscles but a sprinter, a middle distance runner and a distance runner are utilizing but all at the same time. And then our turnover is as quick as it bout of like between a 408 100 meter runner, I'm totally walk pretty fast. I know I get really annoyed when I'm in the shopping, you know, the grocery store and like, Oh, yeah, I can't. It's a big pet peeve.

Nick VinZant 1:02

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So I don't think I've ever had my preconceived notions about something shattered more than by our first guest. Because whatever you think about race walking, speed walking, it is not, not what I thought it was. It is so much more interesting, and so much more physically demanding than I ever would have thought just by watching it on TV. Our first guest is a national champion and Olympian who just got back from Tokyo. This is race Walker, Robyn Stevens. So you're just back from the Olympics. How was it?

Robyn Stevens 1:50

It was great, obviously different from most years. But since it's my first Olympics, I didn't know any different. I think we're the only event that could have spectators just because we were outdoor and there's a lot of space. So it was really cool seeing all the locals come out and hearing them cheer and it's a good experience.

Nick VinZant 2:11

When did you arrive to the opening ceremonies were on Friday, like when did you get there?

Robyn Stevens 2:15

I got there a few days after the opening, so we had to miss the opening ceremonies. But I watched them from home, which with my mom, which is really special because I used to watch all the Olympics growing up with her. So it was kind of cool to see an opening ceremony that I'm supposed to be walking in for the Olympics I made but with my mom's I could see her crying and all excited. So that was that was like a different type of special.

Nick VinZant 2:42

One of the things that kind of jumped out at me and if Wikipedia and online is correct, that you were a little bit older for most than most first time Olympians is is racewalking a sport that kind of is conducive to that.

Robyn Stevens 2:56

Yeah, so racewalking we don't usually hit our peak until late mid 30s to early 40s. Yeah, and, um, I don't know I. So I took a few years off from the sport I retired in 2004 came back in 2000, officially 2016. And what encouraged me to come back was I had learned that one of the Olympians that I had watched, I didn't realize she had made her Olympic debut at 42. So when I learned that that inspired me to come back because I was thinking, Oh, yeah, it's too late. Because I was also before I retired, I was a runner and a race Walker and nationally ranked, but in both so I was in that runner mindset of Oh, okay. Yeah, like, it's, it's obviously too late. And then when I learned what her age was, it encouraged me like, okay, you know, we'll see what we'll see. We'll explore. But in in race walk, it's pretty common. I mean, for Spain, there's a his use Garcia, who has made every World Championships and Olympics since he was a youth. And he was 52, I believe, at the Olympics this year.

Nick VinZant 4:07

What is it about it that people can continue to do that so much later in life, athletically speaking,

Robyn Stevens 4:13

I think there's a couple things a lot of people, at least in America haven't heard of it. It's not it's more prevalent in southern America, in Europe and in, in all over China and Japan, it's super popular. But I think it's also because it's low impact. And so the body can handle a lot more and recover faster. Because our Olympic distances up until this year was 20k and 50k remain. So the 50k had two options, the 50 and the 20. The 50 is longer than the marathon. And then the women have the 20k. So we have a lot of we're doing a lot of distance, and we're probably doing that every other month. Sometimes depending if we're really active with the World Challenge events, then we're going to be Doing that often now, you'll see like, I've read a lot in magazines where they're like, Oh, you know, I can't believe this marathoner is going to do you know, two, two marathons back to back a month apart? And I think it's because yeah, they're they're absorbing so much power. Yeah, on their knees and their joints and everything where it's not unheard of, for us to be able to do that just because we can. We're putting our heartbreak. It's just as high as a runner. We're doing its justice, like, we're asking a lot of our body, but because of the low impact, or able to bounce back a lot quicker.

Nick VinZant 5:31

So the demand is the same, but the toll is not correct. Yeah, that's well, that's really interesting. So how did you get into race walking,

Robyn Stevens 5:41

I started in junior high, I had ran across country racing Dixon, and had a beat a little boy that in the race, that youth coach had wanted to humble. And so she came over and she was a club coach, and I had only Ranbir, junior high, you know, for the school system, I never heard of club track and field. And she came over and she was just like, Hey, you know, I run a club team. I'd love for you to join. If you stick with me, I believe that you have enough talent that you could make an Olympic team and even get into any college that you could ever dream of. And that was enough for me because I'd always wanted to go to college, and I'm the youngest in my family. So I was doing everything to keep you know, the way that a student and yeah, volunteer for clubs, and I would do everything to cover my bases in case they didn't have enough money left over for me, though, my mom's like, I would have always made sure. But you know, just in case, just in case, right, yeah. Yeah. So when she said that, I was like, oh, okay, I'm gonna, you know, I'll join. And since it's a club team, they, they purchase, all those events, you know, are going to have all of the events that are in the Olympics. So she would teach all of her athletes, every single event that's in the Olympics, so all of us learned throwing all of us learn race walk, all of us learn, you know, the only two that she couldn't teach us was hammer thrown pole vault, because there was no access to the the items on steeplechase because there was no staples. But we all learned race walk. And that's how I learned about it. And she would i would do the the mile the 800 the four by four and the race walk, but there was so much time between that 800 in the mile and the beginning of the race and of track needs cousin youth track take? Yeah. Yeah, that I would get really bored. And so that my muscles when get, you know, lazy or the two mile or get stagnant, she would have me jump in the race walk so that it could keep me limber, and, you know, flexible, two mile and not getting too bored.

Nick VinZant 7:46

No, like, why are you a good race Walker,

Robyn Stevens 7:48

I think I just picked up on it from all the years of dance that I had done. I started dance class when I was two. And when she discovered me, um, I wasn't competitive dancer, I was doing, you know, competing in the area in the local area. And I think just with all of that just years of, of dance, I was able to take to it, it was nothing. It didn't feel any different from you know, like, a lot of people are like, Oh, don't you want to run or? Or, you know, how do you race walk like that doesn't make you want to just break into a run? I'm like, no, it just it feels like a like an athletic endurance dance. So it just feels it definitely I don't get it confused with running.

Nick VinZant 8:31

It's it's one of those things that now that you mentioned it like there is some swiveling of the hips there, right?

Robyn Stevens 8:36

Yeah, yeah. So like a former coach of mine, Susan Armenta, she used to say, at a madang game, but if I didn't have enough hip flexor, to remind me just to relax into the hips,

Nick VinZant 8:47

is it just walking fast, like if I was in a hurry, and I want to walk fast, it's the same way that I would walk faster, is there a whole different kind of technique to it?

Robyn Stevens 8:56

Oh, there's a whole technique to it. So usually, if we're going to teach youth how to or beginners will say like, just pretend that you're at the pool. And they say, you know, the snow cone place just opened up and everybody's jumping out there, like don't run, you know, walk, don't run, and you're trying to hurry over to it. So that's how you start, you know, walk as fast as you can to get there. But to not get thrown out of a race. There's two rules, you have to land with a straight leg, and then keep it straight until it passes underneath the hip. And then but one foot has to be on the ground at all times. And that's how it different sheets from running obviously. So you can get sometimes confused because when you say that people will start walking like a Frankenstein. And, um, but that's where I like to just incorporate the dance if you're thinking of them, but I am gay. You land at the straight leg, drop that hip, let it pass as you're pulling that back, you know, your other leg through and then you can bend that last one as you're straightening the other one and then that's how you get that that smoother ride. them,

Nick VinZant 10:00

it seems like a sport that would be easy for somebody to cheat.

Robyn Stevens 10:04

No. So we have minimum five judges on a course at all times, unlike the distance running, we have to be on. So for 20 Ks, it's going to be a 1k course. And for the 50k 35k can either be a 1k or 2k course. So that way that there's always a judge that can see us and there's five to seven judges at all times, they have to have certification, the proper rolled athletic certification, at least three of them have to be like a level three, and an A world athletic certified. And then there has to be by that. So for the one foot off the ground, there has to be by the judges I and there's like a fourth of a second that the human eye can't see. So if you see if you slow down videos of professional racewalkers, if you've like, watched the Olympics, and you slow it down, and you see a side profile profile of us, or if you see pictures, you might see like, oh, they're cheating there, I see them, they're just a little bit off and right, not by the judge. So that's the key is like by the judges, I because they're not going to be able to see that seconds. Now we're not doing that on purpose that just happens naturally at the speeds that we're going and it's just going to go up so you can there's ways to get these, it's just like soccer, or you can get dq except for in soccer, you have to be misbehaving. And, you know, pissed off the referee, and re swacch we're not talking necessarily but we can, you know, the the judge has two paddles, they can give us the yellow is a warning, that is a courtesy, they don't have to give us that. That's just to let us know, we're we're in danger of getting red carded, and if we don't fix it, they're gonna read cardus on each judge can only give an athlete one red card. And that's how they they keep from over bias because you know, they like another athlete. And then three red cards, if they're not using a penalty zone, will dq the athlete, if they're using the penalty zone, like at the Olympics this year, some people may have noticed, you know, we had a strong pack of the top six. And then all of a sudden, there's this heat, like all this drama at the end of the race, where the person who was supposed to be in third, she already had two red cards. And she but she really wanted that second place. So she pushed it and she got pit lanes. So the pit lane, they don't always have to use but they had decided to use that for and this is going to become more normal for the Olympics. And that's where she's put in a pit penalty box for two minutes. So virtually two minutes gets added to her time as you sitting there and that that pit box. So she ended up 11th. So she was a favorite to you. She's from Brazil, she's actually a friend of mine. She was a favorite to metal. And then because she really wanted that. So for her, you got to appreciate that grit. She just pushed it a little too much and then got pit lanes. And then same with the gold medal favorite. She got she had red, two red cards going in got pit lane, and then she ended up third was supposed are supposed to be second. but ended up third she was the gold medal favorite. And so like there's so those rules make it so it's hard to tea because there's people watching us all the time. And the last 100 meters you can get dq whether or not you have previous red cards. So that's why you're not gonna see too many of us. Like this is one of the things I love to doing when I was running competitively is I love strong kick. So I still like to do that with race walk. But I have to be really careful because judges, if you if you switch if you significantly change your pace, and because if you change your pace, your technique might change a little bit too. And they don't like that. That's what I like about it. Because it's a it's such a technical strategy type sport, too, you have to have strategy, and you can't all you sometimes have to sacrifice. Even if you have a lot in the tank physically, you have to sacrifice that or sacrifice a higher place just to stay in the race. Because it could mean if you sprint at the end, it could mean that that chief judge doesn't like how you look. And they'll just throw you out that last time your leader.

Nick VinZant 14:20

Oh, yeah. So you could be like, technically perfect, exactly how you're doing it for the entire time. And then if you're in a tight race at the end, and you just speed up a little he can just go euro. Wow. So you really got to like maintain your whole speed. That's kind of

Robyn Stevens 14:39

like I'm doing a constant body scan the entire time. There's no checking out mentally,

Nick VinZant 14:44

you know, you're talking about it with these people who are the best in the world and they're still getting red cards during these races. Is it one of those kinds of things where people are gonna push it and see how much they can push it. Like you want to be right say that there's a line and you Want to be right up against that line without crossing it? Right? Because it would seem like if you perfected a technique, then you wouldn't ever be in jeopardy of getting fined for it or getting penalized for it. But then because people are getting penalized for it all the time, they must be like pushing right up against that all the time. Oh, is that how it works?

Robyn Stevens 15:18

Yeah, we're pushing the last part of our training is just figuring out where we can, how much and what that feels like to push that line and know that we're, we're technically sound and most of us at that level where we are technically sound, but, you know, judges are human and, and different judges have their preference on what they like, and what they consider good technique there, you know, so, you know, we might be fine in one country, but then another country's judges, like they interpret the rules a little bit differently. It's really not that like, if you're going those speeds, you're, you're probably going to get carbs, because you we are going super fast. I mean, we're going sub seven, the women are going sub 715 per mile pace, the men are going sub seven minute pace, you know about 650. So we're we are going fast. So one of the things that will push for is how you know, it's almost like you've aced it, if you can walk, you know, the two cards is almost like a badge of it's not a badge of honor. But it's like, it's like you know, you you know you're pushing yourself. Because if you're not getting any cards, maybe you know, it's almost like Well, are you pushing yourself enough?

Nick VinZant 16:32

It's that old saying like, if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying.

Robyn Stevens 16:37

Because we're not cheating on purpose. Like the cards are all pushing it a little bit.

Nick VinZant 16:41

Yeah, yeah, you're bumping up against that edge. Now

Robyn Stevens 16:44

that these they're trying to figure out for myself, because I crossed the finish line was so much energy still left in the tank? Because I'm trying I'm still trying to figure out what it feels like to push that edge with the energy that I have. So

Nick VinZant 16:59

no is can I ask how, um, how tall are you? I'm just under five, three. So is that is that an ideal height? For a race? Walker is like something Oh, you'd be you would be the best in the world. If you were only five, four, like you're too tall for a race Walker? Is there? Is there a certain body type for it?

Robyn Stevens 17:17

I'm not really I think the shorter tend to do better, just because the taller athletes are gonna stick out more. So if they're particularly bouncing in their spec, they're gonna stand out to the judge because they're towering over the shorter. But if you're technically sound, that's no big deal. So

Nick VinZant 17:35

it's kind of like a being smaller as a blendin advantage as opposed to like a bio.

Robyn Stevens 17:39

Yeah, because we can have a quicker turnover. So I guess, because our fastest walkers in the world are for the minister Japanese, for the women, it's the Chinese. And then South America has a lot of strong walkers. Spain has a really strong program. And a lot of a lot of that is like we're shorter. You know, like, those cultures are shorter in height, or like my height. So you know, between my height and maybe 554455. So are the women. Um, so I think it does help. I mean, there are successful tall athletes though,

Nick VinZant 18:20

right? It's harder, it's like, not this quite the same, but it's like gymnastics where it's definitely beneficial to be a certain size, right? kind of thing. So

Robyn Stevens 18:29

yeah, I mean, I am someone who believes that if you have a will and you have a passion for you know, being good at a certain discipline, it doesn't matter what you look like you're gonna be you're gonna be able to pull it off.

Nick VinZant 18:42

Are you heart ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions, sir. Do racewalkers trash talk each other?

Robyn Stevens 18:51

Oh, probably more on the men's side. I believe the women are more. We just focus on what we need to do. So we're either going to be friends or we were just in our own little we just kind of keep to ourself on race day. But the men definitely like to have like playful, playful banter with each other and,

Nick VinZant 19:09

um, can you spot a good Walker out in public? like can you see somebody like rush rushing to catch a bus? That goo they got good form?

Robyn Stevens 19:17

Oh, yeah, totally. I mean, that's how a lot of us racewalkers who ended up in the sport got, you know, headhunted is you know, a coach sauce or someone saw that, oh, you would make a great race Walker. I see it all the time, when when we're training out on you know, on the trails, and the bike trails. Sometimes kids or other people will try to try to mimic it or try to, you know, go along with us. And there are times where I'm like, wow, actually, that's really good.

Nick VinZant 19:43

You should do a pretty good

Robyn Stevens 19:45

you're doing pretty well. And I had worked with some some other people who were just wanting to learn it, but uh, probably weren't, wasn't like thinking anything about it like seriously, and then I saw them like, wow, you know, If you weren't so successful at what you're doing, you know, if you weren't such a successful actress, you'd probably be in pretty good or a soccer but you're making way more money as an actress than what we make.

Nick VinZant 20:11

Can you make a living straight off of racewalking?

Robyn Stevens 20:14

You can a very humble living. I'm very, very humble. So like, the average that we might make is, at most, and on average, the most that we might make is 25k. really couldn't live in Silicon Valley on it. But it would be like really living like a conservative way. Like we're making like 2025 to maybe 50k with the bonuses during Olympic year. So like with a, you know, with that, but it's all in it's not salary, we don't get salary. So it's all based on winning, what would be your top speed? Like you're going to sprint? All out? Like how fast can you How fast can you walk? Ah, we don't normally race anything faster than a mile. And once we hit the elite level, it's not often we're going to be doing anything less than that. 3k like two miles. But there is like, once a year, there's the Melrose games, where we'll do a mile and so that's the only thing I can judge off of the fastest that a male is gone is a 531. And the fastest a woman is gone is 618.

Nick VinZant 21:29

That's like 10 or 11 miles an hour. And if I'm going trail walking or something like that, like I'm hauling ass at three miles an hour. That's incredibly you know, pretty quick.

Robyn Stevens 21:41

So what's interesting for a lot of like, when, so our body are using all of the muscles were engaging all of the muscles, but a sprinter, a middle distance runner and a distance runner are utilizing but all at the same time. And then our turnover is as quick as it bout of like between a 408 100 meter runner.

Nick VinZant 22:03

Wow.

Robyn Stevens 22:05

So actually orders race walk really well. A lot of sprinters like take to it quickly.

Nick VinZant 22:12

Just because of the turnover ratio. Yeah. I was really thinking that it was gonna be like five miles an hour, which would be a 12 minute mile, but it's basically double that you're talking like 1112 miles an hour walking?

Robyn Stevens 22:24

Yeah, cuz, you know, during the 20k, I averaged about 715 per mile.

Nick VinZant 22:30

Wow. Yeah. So that's like seven and a half miles an hour. Do you? Okay, next question. Do you generally walk fast everywhere you go.

Robyn Stevens 22:39

I'm told I do. I never really noticed. But my, you know, I'm short. So my dad always seemed super tall to me, because he's six one. And so when we would go camping, and hiking, we do a lot of camping and hiking. Growing up. I was always constantly trying to keep up with them. Because I talk a lot. And I'm trying to, you know, tell them my story that I couldn't keep up with them. So my best friend Ashley, she always just likes to she'll laugh about it because people always she's shorter than me. And people are always like, why do you walk so fast? And he's like, Well, my best friend is a professional race Walker. And I always have to try to keep up with her in the hallways in high school. So I think the key is like if you're around someone taller than you, I think you're just going to naturally be a faster Walker everywhere because you're just trying to keep up with the taller walkers. So I'm told I walk pretty fast. I know I get really annoyed when I'm in the shopping. You know, the grocery

Nick VinZant 23:39

store? Oh, yeah, I can't. It's a big pet peeve. Oh my god, that would be awful. If you were like walking in a crowd like, Oh my god,

Robyn Stevens 23:49

I can't stand proud. If they can't walk fast. You know, I don't like the the idle, especially the packs that walk in like groups of five or Oh, yeah, they're all on their phones. And they're just walking super slow. It's like can you walk single file or learn how to walk faster?

Nick VinZant 24:05

We asked the same question to both a decathlete and some ping pong Olympians that we had on. Where do you feel like racewalking ranks in the Olympic hierarchy hierarchy of sports? Like in my mind, you're going to have 100 meter sprint like that's, that's the Olympic sport, right? That is the thing. And then at the bottom, you're going to have archery or something. Right? Like where do you feel like so you're talking about all the events? Not Where do you think that like race walking, but in terms of like the coolness factor, like if this was a Olympic high school? Where do the race walkers rank?

Robyn Stevens 24:44

In my mind, or where do they actually rank because that's pretty low in in most people Unless Unless you're from Japan, or from Spain or from parts of you know, South America or from Russia. You know? racewalking is ranked pretty low. But I think it's because. But a lot of people, most people don't understand what's going on. And once you understand what's going on, it's really fascinating. And it's really interesting. And that's why I've gained a new appreciation for baseball because I used to think baseball was super boring. And I'm like, how can people think race walks boring when people watch like four hours of this just people standing around on a field, I also think that with race walk at the elite level, I mean, since we're using all the muscles of like a sprinter, middle distance, and distance, and distance runner, our build is going to be similar to a dancer or no, I used to get mistaken for a gymnast when I was younger. And I just think that like the musculature is just really aesthetically beautiful. And when you see when you see it done, right, it's gorgeous. Just seeing what the body can do when it's finally trained.

Nick VinZant 26:01

So that's pretty much all the questions that I have what's kind of coming up next for you.

Robyn Stevens 26:06

So next, we have a possibly depends on the Delta variant like, Yeah, what happens with that, we have a 10k, in quotes equality in Mexico. And we were supposed to do one in Monterey that got cancelled because of the COVID. And then, after that, and November, we have the men's national 35k, because the women already had ours in February or January, February. Normally, in January, we had to postpone it to February. So we have the men's 35k that mix getting used to or getting ready for. And at that race, they'll either have another 35k just to open one for the women to qualify for worlds, or a 20k just for for us to do for points because now everything's about either the super a standard or qualifying for by ranking. So you have to hit a certain time for quality ranking position in the world. So So that'll be in November that we're planning for the second week of November in San Diego area. And then January will be the men's and women's 35k nationals for 2022. Wow.

Nick VinZant 27:21

So that's what's next. I missed this one who is the Michael Jordan of racewalking. Michael Jordan of race walk. Like who's better? Who's the best? The best ever?

Robyn Stevens 27:34

In my eyes, it's gonna be his Seuss Garcia of Spain. Because, like he is the true goat of race walk, because in my eyes, because I mean, some people would argue that is Jefferson Perez. Some people might argue that, you know, it's somebody more current, but I think that will his use Garcia is correct. I mean, he was at the Olympics at 52. He's made every Olympic team in every world seen. He's been in the top like, I think his first one was in 1990. It was a couple years after Nick was born in 1990 No, I think it was 1991 or whatever. But I mean, he's been doing that ever since. And he's always in the top 30 like now because he's in the top 30 now, but back then it was like the top eight.

Adult Film Star Lexi LunaLexi

Lexi Luna is a teacher. First she taught in schools, now she teaches on-camera. Educating men about sex and women about empowerment. Go behind the scenes as we talk adult films, OnlyFans and the secrets of pornography algorithms. Then, try not to get “caught” as we countdown and new Top 5.

Lexi Luna: 01:53ish

Pointless: 40:54ish

Top 5: 56:44ish

www.iwantlexi.com   (Lexi Luna Website)

https://onlyfans.com/lexilunaxoxo (Lexi Luna OnlyFans)

www.twitter.com/lexilunaxoxo (Lexi Luna Twitter)

www.instagram.com/beyondlexpectations  (Lexi Luna Instagram)

www.lexicams.com (Lexi Luna Cam)

www.textlexiluna.com (Text Lexi Website)

Interview with Adult Film Star Lexi Luna

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, adult films, only fans and times you don't want to get caught.

Lexi Luna 0:22

And then once I started transitioning more into mainstream porn, my fans were very excited because they're like I really loved your feet but I really likes you to get back to. Now the reason that there is so much taboo in porn is because that is what people are searching. We are making porn specifically based on the Google searches the Pornhub searches searches by gender searches by age group searches by everything, it seems as though we are going towards more censorship 100% of the time, but sex workers prevail, and we are used to being censored and finding away Because ultimately, the product we have is so good that it won't ever go away. You can never censor it to the point where it's gone.

Nick VinZant 1:09

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest is a teacher. She used to be an elementary school teacher. But now she educates people in a different way. Teaching men about sex, and women about empowerment. This is adult films, and only fan star Lexi Luna, two quick notes. One, I kind of messed up my portion of the audio just a little bit. And two, only fans recently had some big news that I felt like we had to talk about first. And then we'll get into the rest of the interview, which is just absolutely fascinating. Normally, we wouldn't necessarily start this way. But I think with some news that came down yesterday, we kind of have to when you look at what only fat only fancies decided to do, what's your reaction to that?

Lexi Luna 2:03

Honestly, it's kind of a shelter in place reaction, because we don't actually know what's going on. And there hasn't been all that much, you know, told to us by only fans, there's not been an email sent out to creators, there's only been this article. So we don't really know anything. So I'm just kind of continuing business as normal. And making sure that my email list is strong, and my fans know how to reach me in case something happens. But right now, it's a lot of speculation. And I really don't want to, like feed into that any more than we need to. Because, you know, there are a lot of creators who will who stand to lose a lot. And without knowing what the official word is. fear mongering isn't gonna get us very far.

Nick VinZant 2:48

Quick little follow up on that side. Like, I guess thing that for me kind of looking at it from the outside is I don't get it. Yeah. Like, it seems like this is McDonald's ban banning hamburgers in some way. I mean, I don't think you are overly dramatic, but like, why what's what would be the reason in your mind.

Lexi Luna 3:07

So the reason this is happening is because MasterCard is pushing them. The payment processing for adult, anything is tricky. And that's really what it comes down to is the these, you know, evangelical groups, shall we call them are pressuring MasterCard to do this and to get rid of what they assume is something immoral and illegal, which it's not. Either of those things is just, you know, people have different paths. And you would think that such Christian people would be able to understand that not everybody does the same thing. And not everybody's interested in the same things. And that that's okay. And then we should embrace people anyway. But it seems like you know, in the adult industry, in the porn world, we are a lot more accepting of people, whether they're the same as us are different from us, then a lot of these groups are and you know, their entire mission is to get rid of internet porn, which is futile, it's never gonna happen. We're not going anywhere, we're just gonna build another platform somewhere else and people will come to us. So really what this comes down to is payment processing and MasterCard being told to figure it out because there are a lot of instances of things that shouldn't be happening on these sites as well. But that's not what the majority of this is.

Nick VinZant 4:21

Looking way down the road because we haven't quite scheduled like when this episode is going to come out. But is this such a thing? like okay, only fans shuts down? We just move here. Is this really going to be a long is this really going to be that big of a thing moving forward?

Lexi Luna 4:37

Um, yes. And no, I mean, you know, a lot of a lot of companies are kind of looking at this like, Okay, well, what what is the next move? Where is the industry going? And there are so many of these companies now, you know, only fans really blew up, especially during quarantine when people were lonely and didn't have, you know, anything else to do and the government was supplying a lot of extra money to people to be able to live and the first thing people are gonna spend money on is the thing To make them feel good, and that's porn, you know, because we're all in survival mode. So we were all trying to comfort ourselves in some way. And a lot of people found comfort talking to us. And you know, getting a little bit more of like a social piece on that. But you know, looking down the road, who knows, I don't know which platform I'm going to just yet, you know, I'm weighing my options, I know that my fans will follow me just about anywhere I take them. But I know that's not true for a lot of performers, especially people who are pretty new to the industry, you know, this is my sixth year in adult. And I just have a different perspective, I have a different fan base. And I know that I'm secure. But I don't know what payment processing is going to look like, if if this is a precedent that MasterCard has set, how many more sites will get hit with, I don't want to process your payment anymore. And if people can't use their credit cards, they're certainly not going to, you know, participate in, in a different way. I mean, they're talking about age verification, uploading IDs for the users, and for the performers. And I just don't see a lot of people, consumers wanting to put their identification picture of them holding their identification into a system like that, not for porn.

Nick VinZant 6:09

Yeah, I don't really like, Look, I am a American male and have all this general proclivities that an American male has, but I'm, I'm not going on to Pornhub with a picture of me holding my ID, that's

Lexi Luna 6:23

not gonna happen. Like, it's crazy. And you know, but if MasterCard says, This is what you have to do, nobody's gonna do it. So it just naturally dissolves. So then they don't seem like the bad people, even though they absolutely are.

Nick VinZant 6:34

You mentioned that you got started six years ago, how did that come about? Like what made you get into the industry,

Lexi Luna 6:39

I was really tired of what I was doing in the education world, I taught kindergarten through fourth grade for five years prior to my parlay into the adult world. And you know, I taught over two different school, or two different states, I taught so low socioeconomic, high socioeconomic, I taught charter schools, I taught in public schools, I tried a little bit of everything in five years. And ultimately, after five years of experience, I was making $35,000 a year, which is barely enough to live. So I kind of just got fed up with the whole, the harder you work, the less money you make in education mantra, and I had been dabbling in the fetish world a little bit here and there. And I've gotten with a really great group of people who taught me a lot. And I learned a lot about how to do different fetish acts like impact play, I learned about different fetishes. And that's kind of how I got into this, like, mindset of this is really cool. And this is a part of myself, I would have never discovered had I not, you know, gone to this club and met these people. And then it became more of like, a, okay, well, on Fridays, I have classes and maybe I'd be interested in going to see one of those classes to see because, you know, I'm an educator, and I love to learn and, you know, let's, let's see what, what's behind this a little bit more. So it just kind of naturally led me to be on a website called fetlife. And I got approached there for some did recruiter and they told me, you know, the whole Oh, you can make so much money, which like I see through that I'm 26 at the time. So this is not like you can't romance me with the numbers because I actually am thinking logically about what this could potentially be. It felt very credible. And I felt like, Okay, this is a real industry. This isn't just somebody trying to, like, get a mass group of people to do a scam or something like that. And this was in April that I got approached, and I was like, school's over in May, like I could do this over the summer. And then if it doesn't work out, I could just start again, teaching and it doesn't work, right, looking back. Like that's just not how it's gonna work, right? Um, so I was like, whatever, I was the most junior teacher, my contract didn't get renewed for the next year because I was very expendable to them. And it kind of left me with this, like, Okay, this is it. This is like, every path is cleared for me to do this. I don't have a job next year. And I really am not upset about it. And so I was like, fuck it. I'll take I'll take the leap, you know, big risk, big reward. And I did my first deed June 3, and I never looked back

Nick VinZant 9:10

was was the first scene what she thought it would be like,

Lexi Luna 9:13

nothing at all. Like what do I thought it would be like, first of all, it was for a company that is very heavy BDSM but like the females are in charge, like it's very femme Dom oriented. And it was like strap on play. It was beating a slave and a latex dress like it was a lot. But it wasn't new to me because again, my experience in the kink world and learning all these things made it possible for me to even be able to do that safely with somebody else.

Nick VinZant 9:39

When would you say that you kind of went mainstream.

Lexi Luna 9:42

I'm not too long after that. I did focus more on the fetish side of things for a little while because it's kind of where I was comfortable. I was familiar with foot fetish. I was familiar with domination. I was familiar with all these different pieces. And a lot of people who were brand new to the industry aren't necessarily that familiar with it. They just kind of do what the director says. But that's kind of where I started showing my personality and kind of capturing my fans. And then once I started transitioning more into mainstream porn, my fans were very excited because they're like, I really loved your feet. But I really likes you to get back to you know, that's naturally. But yeah, it just, it was such an easy transition. For me, I feel like fetish kind of cushion the blow a little bit to like this big leap. And I felt like I was much a part of a much smaller community inside of this adult industry. So it really was, I think the perfect transition for me to go from one to the other.

Nick VinZant 10:42

Kind of makes sense. I honestly don't know what impact play is. But I would imagine that if you're kind of at this level, it's easier to to go down to this level, so to speak, in the mainstream.

Lexi Luna 10:54

Impact is anything like hitting like, oh, whipping anything that makes an impact? Oh,

Nick VinZant 11:00

that makes sense. That makes sense.

Lexi Luna 11:03

And it's there's a big variety, when you really think about how many different things you can use to make impact there. The toys are really like there's a there's a fetish about that. And like the leather and all the different things that these toys are made of. I haven't I have alligator whips. I have rubber, Spanx, lagers, I have a lot of different types of stuff. And that's also kind of the fun part is like having tools. And you know, me as a teacher, like, I love office supplies, and it's kind of the same thing, like those are the office supplies of the fetish world. It was really fun. And you know, it like gave me something else to do. And that's something that was like, exciting to learn about. And I think that's really where this all stems from is that I'm just curious.

Nick VinZant 11:47

So here comes like the person viewing it from the outside kind of right. But did you ever regretted like, because it doesn't seem like once you take this step?

Lexi Luna 11:56

There's no going back? Right? At the beginning, I don't think I realized that there was no going back. I didn't realize how quickly and how massively like you are out there. There is no reeling it back in. Like, once you've decided to be on the internet, you are on the internet there. There's you know, and once I click it was probably like in the first month I was a roller coaster where I'm like, Oh, my gosh, what did I do? Do I really want to do this am I going to be successful, because ultimately, there's no guarantee that you're successful, there's no guarantee people like you, or your brand, or what you do. And there's a lot of, there's a lot of potential that you'll get harassed, and there's a lot of potential that you know, you'll never be able to hold a regular job. She says an air quotes, again, because this stuff is really easy to find, especially if you do a lot of it. And to do to be successful, you have to do a lot of it. So it was a little bit at the beginning, I was a little unsure. But then once I started like being like, fuck it, I'm owning this, I'm doing this, I'm making a business out of this, I want nothing to do with anybody who isn't supportive. And like, this is my life, I get to make my choices, I am responsible for my happiness, not somebody else. And once I got to this, like peace of empowerment, then it just like there was no stopping me. And you know, five years, six years later Now I'm has 100% happy with what I've done. I can't wait to continue doing more and figuring out the nuances of this industry because boy, does it change often. And the ebbs and flows. And it's exciting, but it's also secure. Like, I know, this isn't going anywhere. Nobody can take this from me. And I think that a lot of people can't say that about their job.

Nick VinZant 13:37

Good for you. Thanks. For you. I guess that is one kind of question. We were talking about a little bit like no going back from the only fans perspective, and I wanted to hear what you had to think about this. Because look, here I am, you know, middle aged 3030 year old guy, my What is my What do I know about this kind of stuff. But I kind of wondered like, for for people who got into it during the pandemic and were on only fans were was suddenly so accessible? Do they really know what they were getting into?

Lexi Luna 14:08

Right? I don't think so. Because I don't think they saw it as being on the internet. They're not on Pornhub. So they're not porn stars. But your content is on the internet. And people have probably already stolen it and put it on a tube site and are making money off of you. Like that's the reality of being in porn. My content that I make today is stolen tomorrow. And because I have ways to track my content, I know where it's going. And I can take it down DMCA Digital Millennium Copyright Act, is the protection within the United States that allows me to say hey, that person has a video of me that's my content, take it down, and the website has to comply. So that's a little bit of like the protection legal side of this. But that doesn't matter in Europe. That doesn't matter in other countries because this is an issue erican law, you know, and people are viewing you all over the world, places you don't even know. So, you know, it's I don't think they knew what they're getting themselves into dabbling a little bit to supplement your income is not really how sex work works. Like this is kind of an all or nothing thing, especially with the age of the internet. Maybe there was a time when porn stars were the girls that were on VHS tapes, and that was like, they were like, wow, unattainable. But now we are accessible. We are your friends, we can together, we spend hours a week together, talking getting to know each other. This is a relationship. And I think that that is the part that more junior content creators haven't learned yet or haven't realized, is kind of what makes this interesting and what makes them have a job.

Nick VinZant 15:51

Do you like that aspect of we'll use only fancy as an example. But whatever this platform like evolves into, do you like that aspect of it more where you're kind of interacting with people more? Or do you like it more where Hey, I make this video, I put it on the internet, I cash my check. I mean, obviously, I'm oversimplifying, but like, what are those, which I love,

Lexi Luna 16:09

I love connecting with my fans, I always tell people that lexy Luna doesn't exist without fans, like my persona, my character doesn't exist if people don't consume it. And the way that people consume it is by feeling a connection. I mean, that's what humans do. And because I feel 100% empowered, and 100%, like this is something I chose to do on my own terms, I love to connect with people who are like, I love your content gets me through tough times, you've really helped me during this depressed period of my life, like I get these kinds of feedback from people, and it's really, really fucking great that I can help people like that, because I was never able to help my students in a way that I can help these people. And my fans, because that's what that's just how the education system is mean, you know, you don't really get to help people, you just kind of get to maintain the status quo of what education means in America. So to me, it's been so rewarding to like, get the feedback. Because, yeah, when I was teaching, maybe in 15 years, a kid would come back and be like, Oh, you were so influential in my life? Maybe. But I get that kind of feedback from my fans daily. And it's really great.

Nick VinZant 17:24

Do you for the devil's advocate kind of question on that side, though? Do you ever feel like these people might be engaging in a relationship with you that they're never going to have in real life, right, like, because they might be creating fantasies in their head, like, hey, look, she's my friend, she told me Hi, today,

Lexi Luna 17:39

right? That's the part where is it, there's a fine line. And I am very upfront with all my fans. And I make sure that I'm constantly reminding them, I'm a fantasy. And this is really fun to dabble in this, but this is not something that is real, you know, and we can have this relationship, and we can do all these different things. And yeah, it is fun to sit on cam and shoot the shit and have inside jokes with the people who are on there, from the previous can sessions and all that kind of stuff. But ultimately, I cannot supplement a real in person relationship for them. And when, when or if I feel that that is starting to happen with a particular fan, I cut it off, because it's not fair. I'm I'm just not going to feel responsible for, you know, people just locking themselves in their house and talking to me online. Like there's a, there's definitely a piece of that, that I and that's my internal struggle is like kind of checking in and making sure that, you know, we're still doing this fantasy roleplay piece, and we're not actually creating a meaningful relationship that's going to come to pass.

Nick VinZant 18:43

Which one is generally more financially rewarding for you the only fans aspect that kind of an aspect, or is it for the more kind of mainstream producers kind of stuff,

Lexi Luna 18:54

it's tricky, because they're really interwoven, only fans is instant. Whereas working with bigger companies, I might make less money for the amount of time I put in, but they can also promote me in a much bigger scope than I can promote myself. So you know, for example, rozzers has millions of followers on Instagram, they put a picture of me and my scene that's coming out, I'm instantly my rank on Pornhub increases, because people are searching me because they're like, Oh, yeah, I love Lexi. Why haven't I looked at her stuff, let me go on Pornhub and search her. And that increases my rank, which increases my visibility, which increases my only fans revenue yet. And this is all kind of working together, which is why it's really important to diversify. And to make sure that not all your eggs are in one basket because things like this can happen. And you know, if something were to go away and you can no longer process payment as of October one, you know, you have to be prepared. You're running a business,

Nick VinZant 19:53

how many hours a day a week, whatever, however you want to define it like how much time would you put into it.

Lexi Luna 19:58

It's almost constant Not only do I manage the only fans, I also manage a texting and calling and video chatting platform called sex Panther at techflex, Luna calm. And it's, you know, the the text comes straight to my cell phone. So I am literally in touch with fans all day every day. There is no time where I'm not working. But my job doesn't feel like work. So it's really, it's really exciting to just be on call, but be in total control. If I wanted to shut it all down for a day, I absolutely could. But I don't need to because I don't feel stressed out by my job. I don't feel like I'm putting in 60 hours a week and getting nothing in return. So it's just to think that in my life, this has been the career that I've had the longest is just kind of crazy, like I'm 32. And I'm in my second career, and it's going really well. It's kind of nuts, isn't it? Right? Like I could never feel this way from education or education of children. I can feel this way educating adults, I teach guys how to lick pussy. I teach guys on how to have open relationships and how to communicate with their partners, and all these really important social skills that nobody ever teaches us. And I teach people that it's okay to want sex. Like that's a totally human normal thing. And we have been suppressed so much. And it's so taboo to be horny, like, get the fuck out of here.

Nick VinZant 21:22

Do you? Do you ever feel like though like, Okay, this 24 seven sex like Do you ever get just oh my god? Yeah. Does that ever get to do Sorry? Does it? Sorry, we I think we were both like, Well, yeah. But does it ever like, okay, does that affect your personal life? Or like, Look, I've done all this all day. I don't really feel like doing this right now, you know, is that does that take a toll on generally not only Europe, but like people who work in the same industry? Are you just worn out and like, a job becomes a job at some point, just don't want to do my job

Lexi Luna 21:56

when I'm not right job. To some degree. Yes. But also, it's not sex job all the time. Sometimes it's chitchat, and it's not sexual at all. Sometimes it's very sexual. Sometimes. It's actual penetration. Sometimes I'm on set for 12 hours, and it's just like, a really long fucking day. And yeah, that's when it kind of does feel like work. And it's like, Can we just say the lines to do the fucking and go home? Like, you know, so for sure, there are those times, but the benefits definitely outweigh the risks, and it's far more of the excited can't wait to come back to work. Part than it is the I'm exhausted and don't want sex part. You know, like, everybody gets tired for sure. But it's not always a physical tax. So it doesn't always feel like, you know, I don't know if that makes sense. It does. Right.

Nick VinZant 22:50

Like, it's not. How do I say this necessary? Right, like, it's not always just, I can't say this to another person who's not my wife. But it's not always just like, pounding away. Yeah, there's other parts too.

Lexi Luna 23:08

Right. Right. Right. And especially as a female, like, I can I consume sex in a different way. And I affect me differently than it affects a male counterpart. And, you know, that's also part of it. Like, I get a lot of the emotional and like, foreplay kind of stuff fulfilled, talking to my fans and knowing that, like, they're so into me, and this is like, that's hot to me. So it doesn't have to be sex to be sex.

Nick VinZant 23:36

Um, are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? So I submitted questions. Okay, cool. We do we got some, um, what is your favorite kind of scene? What is your least favorite kind of scene?

Lexi Luna 23:49

Great question. My favorite kind of scene is a scene where I get to be what they call the instigator. I'm the woman in charge. I'm the one kind of pushing for the sex. I'm the one who's like, making making like the scenario happen the way that I want. So very empowering. Very, like exciting for me to just, you know, I don't know just put the pieces in play. Just Yeah,

Nick VinZant 24:13

just go for it. Right.

Lexi Luna 24:15

That's definitely fun. My least favorite kind of scene is any scene where I feel as though my scene partner or partners are not as interested as I am in like, either getting the job done or making a great scene or you know, whatever. And I I want to have everybody that I work with want to be there 100% and if they're giving off vibes that they're just like, I'm kind of only in this for the paycheck and don't get me if the camera's not rolling like I'm not into that.

Nick VinZant 24:48

So that's why I always kind of wondered and like, you see people having sex on camera and stuff like that, like are they generally kind of into it like are this is like okay, alright, seem to we're doing this stupid. As you know what to do, let's go with move it like,

Lexi Luna 25:03

it definitely depends, I bring a level of intimacy to my scenes before the scene starts, I talked to my scene partners. And I'm like, I, like tell them the things I like and don't like sexually and ask them for the same and like flirt a little bit and get, you know, get the juices going. And it's fun to, like, let's not take out the human element of this. It's fun to connect even for an hour when we're doing the scene. And it's, you know, I'm open to that I don't feel like it's disingenuous to have a short term connection. So I think I put a lot of performers at ease with that, because it's like, no, like, this can be fun, and we're gonna have a great day. And I think that's the teacher. And me, too, is like, making people feel comfortable. And, you know, welcome. So, yeah, I definitely think it depends on the people involved. But there is some acting involved. For sure, I guess. For sure, but it's also fun to act over act the like passion, because you know, it's gonna be so great when it comes out. And then that kind of feeds into the actual having the Pat actually having the passion to bring to the to the screen. So it's kind of like a cyclical for sure.

Nick VinZant 26:15

Your favorite title. Like the favorite title that you had, and it can be cheesy, or it can be actually good.

Lexi Luna 26:24

Okay, I'll give you one of my, my own videos that I've recorded. And then one of professional scene. My favorite one that I've come up with is a three way girl scene that I did in Hawaii, and it's called Maui, munching.

Nick VinZant 26:45

This is pretty good. Pretty good, right? Yes. That's an immediate thought is like that's the best pop as possible title that you could have come up with for that kind of. Now, you mentioned, there's no way to improve it.

Lexi Luna 27:00

Now. If there's not it's perfect as is. Yeah, I'm trying really hard to grasp that something really a different title. It's not there.

Nick VinZant 27:08

No, I don't even need to know anything about that. I know exactly what that is. Yeah. Any of the scenes into this another question any of the scenes that you have an outright like, you know, there's always the pizza delivery guy. Has any of that ever happened to you in real life?

Lexi Luna 27:27

Okay, so no, but yes, but no. It's not like a typical scenario, but I did seduce a girl is similar to the way that I have seduced girls in videos. When before I was ever in porn. I had no idea. But I didn't really like get the hint that she was dropping, because like, you know, I don't know anything about this. Like I'm newly in my sexual revolution. And it was a girl I met at one of the kink events that I went to, and we just started hanging out and she would like come over to my apartment and we would listen to like glass animals. so bad. But I ended up bucketed with a strap on and that was fun.

Nick VinZant 28:09

Yeah, and it's weird how people are always people, right? Like, you still can't pick up hints.

Lexi Luna 28:13

Nope, I am the worst at flirting. I do not know if anybody's ever interested in me. I like rarely look people in the eyes. I walked on the street like I'm so fucking shy, which is not at all what you would think if you saw my videos. But yeah, it's

Nick VinZant 28:28

this is like, so since she was just in here, my wife and I the other day we're trying to find like, just normal. Like, what would you call it? like normal? Not like, like sexual porn. Do they not make that on? Me theme? Yeah, right. Right guys pound out girl. Like, how can they stop making like, hey, a couple would like to enjoy this a couple. How come they stopped making let me

Lexi Luna 28:57

give you first of all a website that actually might do this for you. It's called Walesa. b e LL. e. s A. They do more of the like couple fun sweets romantical like I think that is more what you're looking for it now. The reason that there is so much taboo in porn is because that is what people are searching. We are making porn specifically based on the Google searches the Pornhub searches searches by gender searches by age group searches by everything like Pornhub breaks it the fuck down. They tell you what people are looking for what kind of search terms they're interested in. And how many of them milk number one category. Huge category just thank you American Pie. That's literally when it started. And ever since American Pie coined the term milk porn has been raking in the cash doing milk porn. And you know when you really think about it, we are just a reflection of society. So people are searching things like fucking your stepmom and fucking your stepsister and all that kind of stuff. That's because if you think about the family dynamics in American families, American households, there was a period of time where a lot of families were getting were transitioning, and there was a divorce. And then there was a new girlfriend, and then there was that girlfriends, kids, and now it's a blended family. And it doesn't seem wrong, because those aren't your relatives. So like, you know, when when you're in that developing age, and this happens to your family, the urges are there, and then that's very long lasting, like sex is a very powerful tool in our brains. So I don't think that it really goes away. So then that's always that like, dirty thing that makes you horny.

Nick VinZant 30:46

Are porn stars generally good at sex? Like you would say, like, Oh, yeah. Cuz you would think that they would be really good. But are they really good? Are they like the NBA the top of their game? People at it?

Lexi Luna 30:57

That's a great question. I think that's depends on the performer. I, when you look at porn, you see everything. That's not how real sex goes. So we are opening to the camera a lot so that you can see the penetration so that you can see all the action that's happening. So in. In real life, having sex with a porn performer, not on set is a great experience. having sex with a porn performer where you're constantly spread open, and in these awkward positions and showing your tits all the time. And like in these, like acrobatic positions, is not the best sex. Think about how much of sex you can actually see when you're having sex. Not a whole lot. So if you can see it, that means that there's separation between the people and there's, you know, light can enter and you can actually see what's happening. And because of that it makes for achieving orgasms very challenging, because it just doesn't feel super comfortable. Now, yes, we do come on set, because after a certain amount of fucking, like, your body's just gonna do it. There's just a point of no return where you're like, Alright, even though it's uncomfortable, we're going

Nick VinZant 32:07

to talk target enough, you're going to hit an event.

Lexi Luna 32:09

Exactly. I wouldn't say that. But I would say that any, any person who listens to their partner and pays attention to their partner is good at sex. That's what makes people good at sex. It's not that they're good at like, physically having sex. It's paying attention that makes for the best sex

Nick VinZant 32:30

partners. will will will people who work in the industry, will they like, watch other performers and be like, Oh, I really like what this person does there. I want each other's technique. Oh, fuck yeah,

Lexi Luna 32:41

that is how I learned to do what I do. There was that there comes a point where I'm like, okay, I don't I know, understand how she looks so fucking beautiful. And I feel like I'm like a hyena over here. You know, so you watch. And then the good male talent also knows how to position you and how to open you up and how to hold your arm. So you were just balancing on each other. And so you're not like, trying to hold yourself up and open. And like, there's definitely an art form to it. And but yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's tricky.

Nick VinZant 33:14

It's tricky. It's tricky. Oh, what is your most interesting fan request?

Lexi Luna 33:20

I have a fan who really likes for me to get on cam or do a custom video where I use a dildo, and it has to have balls. And I take my makeup brushes and my hair and I tickle his clock with it. So I'll take my makeup brushes, and I'll brush on the balls in the shaft and I'll say Tickle, tickle, tickle. And then I'll take my hair and I'll wrap it around the caulk and stroke it like a hair job. And that is probably my most interesting request.

Nick VinZant 33:47

You don't have to say their name. But on a scale of one to 10. Like let's say one is somebody who's like not famous at all. 10 we're talking about like, Tom Brady level famous. What level would you say is the most famous person who is trying to get into your direct messages? That's pretty good. That's a great question. That question. I love it. You can name names if you want to. Oh, no, no, I would never i i

Lexi Luna 34:21

i would say like a level six payments, but only once and it was kind of prompted by an event. So it wasn't like, it wasn't like they were trying to slide in and be like, hey, you don't you DTF right. But

Nick VinZant 34:36

yeah,

Lexi Luna 34:36

yeah. Not not super famous. But I'm also like, I do not give off the vibe of slide into my DMS like at fucking all. And I think that it comes across. And you know, I've closed my DMS actually because unless I follow you, because I get a lot of spam.

Nick VinZant 34:56

Yeah, I had imagined that you would get quieter, quieter. have interesting messages that would come through.

Lexi Luna 35:03

Oh, hey, wait, I forgot to tell you my favorite title. That isn't my own. So I did this VR scene. And it was basically like, my new husband and his ex wife is having a garage sale of all his old shit. Because she's like selling off his stuff. Because you know, he's keep crossed her, and it is called a bargain bangin.

Nick VinZant 35:30

Have there ever been any instances though, where like you or somebody, you know, was getting ready to do a scene and you're like, this is this is too ridiculous. This is too ridiculous.

Lexi Luna 35:39

We take ourselves that seriously. And often the names aren't part of the script, like the they don't know ahead of time. Typically. Sometimes they do depends on the company. But you know, it's that's the thing. People are always like, Oh, just like in the porn title, or in the porn movies, like, like, everything's so ridiculous. It is ridiculous. That's what makes it fun. And that's like, do not take this too seriously, really don't like it's meant it is entertainment. It is a fantasy. And it's fun. And I think people sometimes are like, try to, you know, reach that reality piece a little too much. And that's when like, you're only hurting yourself. Because we're all just having fun naming lista

Nick VinZant 36:25

Do you think that there will be more censorship, censorship or less censorship in the future?

Lexi Luna 36:33

That's tricky, because it seems as though we are going towards more censorship 100% of the time, but sex workers prevail. And we are used to being censored and finding away Because ultimately, the product we have is so good that it won't ever go away. You can never censor it to the point where it's gone. And I think if politicians just teamed up with us, instead of trying to erase us and our voices, I think that would be a lot better for everybody involved and a lot safer. And it would, it could be regulated differently. You know, like, every, all of us also don't want under eight teams on our sites. 100%. Like, we are all on the same fucking page when it comes to that kind of thing. But taking away the incomes of sex workers, the way that some platforms have done is just there's no need for it, that it's just a malicious way to like run policy, and, you know, foster acesta, which is the legislation that has been really tricky for us as of late and, you know, I'd say in the last four years. It doesn't make sex works safer for anybody that the way that it claims. All it does is, you know, marginalize and ostracize people who aren't in the top 10% of porn performers or who aren't, you know, who are not online sex workers, their in person sex workers. So really, working with us would be a lot more beneficial to to society as a whole than working against us.

Nick VinZant 38:08

Why statement? Okay, big question. Okay, Tanya, send me this. Well, she didn't send me this question. But she mentioned this favorite Nintendo Switch game. Oh,

Lexi Luna 38:20

I had this really. I had this love affair with roller coaster tycoon, where you build a roller coaster theme park. And it's like, you build all the rides, and you build the shops and you get more people to come to your stuff. And you can watch them do all the rides and stuff. It's like, it's like, like watching this like maze of people like little ants in your park. And it's really cool. And you can pick people up and drop them other places. And I love it. But lately, I've really been into Mario Kart. And but I don't play online because like, I am not that good. And these kids online will fucking destroy me. And then they'll be like, you suck. I can't handle it. So I just played like a play by myself.

Nick VinZant 38:58

Mario or Mario or Zelda. Mario is in the game. It's

Lexi Luna 39:09

Poppy. And it's fun. And like I have I'm looking I'm in my living room add like seven different plush toys that are Mario and, like, I love the clean graphic design of it. And I really like that. It's like light hearted like, there aren't scary games. I'm not like, I'm not a gamer girl like I just, you know, I don't I can't handle too much stress. If my hands are sweating. I'm fucking done. Like I can't do

Nick VinZant 39:30

it. That's all the questions that I have. Is there anything else? You think we missed her kind of? Next for you.

Lexi Luna 39:36

Oh, man, I just finished a project called cusecs. It is it was a mainstream project where I got to play an 80s sex goddess and I suck people into my alternate dimension. It's really cool. It's unfoldment features. So hopefully gearing up for a second one, a second episode or third episode of that. I plan to maybe start filming Mainstream court I don't know, it's tough right now because you know, COVID, and testing and all that kind of stuff, we are all traveling or flying across the country to shoot and stuff like that. So it's just, I'm kind of staying put right now. But I am, you know, trying to figure out the next platform because as we know, October one, the porn part of the porn platform is departing swiftly. So I'm curious to hear what the actual statement is, and to see how this all happens. But right now just making content for my fans connecting with them. camming doing all the great stuff that I've always done, because ultimately, we got through it, we always do.

Slapfighting Champion Koa Viernes

Koa Viernes is the undefeated champion of Slapfighting Champion. Everyone he's faced has either tapped out or been knocked out. We talk Slapfighting techniques, internet fame and his quest to take a fringe sport mainstream. Then, we countdown a special slap-worthy Top 5.

Koa Viernes: 01:30ish

Pointless: 22:18ish

Top 5: 42:21ish

https://www.instagram.com/da_crazy_hawaiian (Koa Viernes Instagram)

Interview with Slapfighter Koa Viernes

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, slap fighting and slab bubble offenses,

Koa Viernes 0:21

the drive that I have now to be the best slap fighter is unparalleled. And I don't think I'm going to lose, you know, people might see it as you know, reckless and, you know, idiotic and all that. But, you know, I see it as an opportunity to create a sport. Anyone can be a software, anybody, you know, you want to try it, try it out if you if you got the character, if you got the willingness to continue, surround after around and you can become a thing.

Nick VinZant 0:55

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So you've probably heard of slap fighting, or at least seen some videos of it online. At the very least, you have to admit, it's interesting. So we wanted to know more about the people who are participating in this sport. Our first guest is an undefeated slap fighting champion. This is co v arnaiz. So slap fighting, like how did you get into this?

Really, really, I got into it by watching YouTube. It was just a thing that I thought, you know, at first, I was like, I can do that. And then I was working. And on my break, I saw on Facebook that there was a slot for a competition on down the road from where you know where I live. And I contacted my wife and I said, Hey, I kind of want to try and do this. So she was like, go for it. You know, she's super supportive of me whatever stupid things that I do. The rest is history, man. I just decided to do it.

So you had no like you just showed up yet never

Koa Viernes 2:15

know. The first one that I did was a hillbilly versus a crazy wine versus hillbilly hippie. And that's one that you know, a lot of people recognize me for. For me, I'm a big critic of my own technique. So it's not my proudest performance, but it's the one that got me probably got me to where I am now. Because it's a went 21 rounds. And he was a tough guy. He was a really tough guy out of all my stop fights. You know, no one went 21 rounds with me. So kudos to him. And the drive that I have now to be the best lap fighter is unparalleled. And I don't think I'm gonna lose, you know, and if even if I do, I'll take it like a champ. You know, I asked for a rematch. But you know, slot fighting is a thing now. And a lot of people don't understand that it's gonna be a thing. It's not going to stay a spectacle.

Nick VinZant 3:19

What about it drew you to it?

Koa Viernes 3:22

So savagery, the rawness just just being being able to actually do that. I mean, some, some will say is kind of like evil in a sense, but really, it's it. It's no less fun than going in there in a boxing ring and doing the same thing to somebody. But this time, they're, you know, they're not trying to move their head back and forth and stay away from your punches. So really, it's it's, it's who got the best chain. Really, that's, that's really what it is. And I'm right now on you know, I'm the best at it and taking on challenges, you know,

Nick VinZant 4:03

from what I've seen, right? Like, is there anything more to it? In a sense, it's just around is he slaps you, you slap him?

Koa Viernes 4:11

Yeah, it's a coin toss. And then you get as soon as you get slapped by opponent. Um, you get a minute to recover and a minute to to answer back. And, and that's the basic rules of it. Sometimes you have around limits or five rounds, seven rounds. And sometimes you go unlimited rounds. And I've done a bunch of them. Super fun, but you know, people might see it as, you know, reckless and, you know, idiotic and all that. But, you know, I see it as an opportunity to create a sport,

Nick VinZant 4:50

from the outsider's perspective is like, man, why are people doing this? Right? Like, what would be I guess what would be your answer to that question?

Koa Viernes 5:00

Wow, man. Um, okay, so when you when a boxer respected boxer because I respect the art of boxing, if he comes into the ring and he gets hit really bad, you know, and some of them they get knocked out this really is to test your, your, your willingness to keep on going, you know, and you know, people might say oh man, the CTE and you know, brain damage and all that, but all these guys that are doing, you know, MMA, boxing, kickboxing, they're getting hit in the head tube. You know, it's not, it's not a contactless sport, you know, it's to say that there's a lot of things that you need to take into account, like, I gave myself a limit, you know, I've got I've got two more years to do this, and then I'm going to slowly work on work my way into boxing. And, um, you know, we'll see that how that goes. But, you know, this is not a lifelong career of mine. I just, I want to turn it turn it into a sport, I want to be a pioneer. I want to when they say oh, slot fighting is stupid ball, and then they look oh, check Did you didn't know about the crazy Hawaiian who tried to make it legal, we'll try to make put license behind that try to get physicals done before that even even the sport, you know, even before you walk up onto the table and risk your life. I'm not just a competitor, you know, I'm trying I'm reaching out, you know, to people that that are reaching out to me, and I'm trying to figure something out where, you know, who knows, it might be an Olympic sport all I don't know.

Nick VinZant 6:51

Who knows? You never know, right? Or you never know, I guess any sport. When it starts out, you're kind of like, what is this? Like people on the water taking a boat back and forth across obstacles? Well, I guess that's now an Olympic sport of kayaking, right? Like, right, everybody, I guess everything's kind of strange when it starts out, right, right.

Koa Viernes 7:10

I believe it's most strange to have this because people love it. And people love to hate it. And it's, it's some that, you know, that will drive a conversation for hours, you know, and I'm here to I'm here to make a splash in that you know, and be and be the, the one guy that stepped up because right now, all slot fighters all I want to try stop fighting. And they don't realize that, you know, right now there's no money and stop fighting. You know, and, and, and the people that are doing it right now is doing it strictly for the sport and it to be a thing. And when the money comes, that's when everybody's gonna be like, wow, this wasn't such a bad sport.

Nick VinZant 7:54

So is there like, do you have it? Is there a technique to it? Are you just, I'm just gonna do this as hard as I can. Right?

Koa Viernes 8:01

I have a little story behind that. So the first one I went to, I literally came off the couch. Well, really, I was working construction, but I really wasn't doing anything. Nothing really to prepare myself for that. So if you watch that video, you're like, wow, you know, whatever. But, um, I watched that video and, and I watched it over 100,000 times. And I every time I watch it, I'm just disappointed. Because I didn't have any technique, I didn't have any any aim. I didn't have any respect for the sport. So I watch it over and over again. And I promised myself like, I'm not gonna make myself look stupid like that again. So I'm gonna have a technique. So a lot of my technique is we're already I'm already over 200 pounds and power really ain't got nothing to do with it. Um, it's, it's your speed at this size is just really it's your speed and your aim. And as soon as you get all that down, and you know, you'd be you'd be knocking them down, one after another, but uh, it's it's not like boxing or MMA where you got to learn a whole bunch of techniques and all that. It's really simple people overthink it. And, you know, it's, it's a simple, easy sport, and I like to capitalize on that. And that alone.

Nick VinZant 9:29

So is there is there a rule in terms of like, Alright, cuz you're slapping somebody, but I can hit you with my fingers or I could hit you with my whole hand. Or I could kind of like, hit you in my palm. You know that hard part or like your palm? Right? is there is there a way that you have to hit somebody?

Koa Viernes 9:46

So um, for me, by experience, your whole hand counts as a slap. So your palm your fingers in this whole area, anything below your palm Wouldn't be considered, you know, clubbing or hitting with the wrist. And really, if you hit, you know, if you hit and you hit you with your fingers, it's kind of a missed hit. The aiming part about it is is 100% where it's at, but you know, don't tell everybody.

Nick VinZant 10:23

Where are you aiming for? Like, is there a specific part of somebody's face? Oh, man, you're gonna. Yeah, today is a secret.

Koa Viernes 10:32

Is it a secret? No. I mean, really? It's right under your, your bottom lips. Right? It really is your chin like, yeah, if you put your hand right here, the bottom of your palm really has to sit right here. Oh,

Nick VinZant 10:50

you want your palm? Like, if somebody took their hand and put it right underneath the side of their bottom lip from their palm? That's where you're really aiming. Okay. Is it like snaps their head around? Huh?

Koa Viernes 11:02

Yeah. So, I mean, that's what I'm doing. But I'm sure those are gonna do that. But a lot of people don't realize, you know, it's not just it's not how much of you know landscape you can cover when you slapping people. It's really where where their button is. And everybody has one, you know, I won, you know? And it might be just the way you have to hit me. I don't know. But that's that for me. I practice more on my accuracy now more than ever. And every everything after the hillbilly fight has been a knockout. Anyone can be a sapphire. anybody you know, you want to try try it out if you if you got the character if you got the willingness to continue, surround after around and you can become a thing.

Nick VinZant 11:55

But how much does having another large person smack you in the face over and over again? hurt?

Koa Viernes 12:03

Oh, well. That's why that's why, you know, I got I still got a lot more secrets. But um, you know, if I don't knock you out on the first one, then you you deserve to hit me. And that's how I think like it, if you win the coin toss. You better knock me out. If not, then I'm gonna hit you hard after you hit me. So really, it's the feeling of having somebody slap me is almost exhilarating. Like in and in a sense where? Okay, it's your turn. Here you go. I'm giving you a free shot. Yeah, and it's my turn after that. And it's, it's, it's a mind game when you're up there. It really is. It's more of a mind game than anything else. Because if you break down your opponent before you even slap or you get slapped, you know, it's kind of a win already. And that if you guys losses long without getting a knockout, then really the judges are gonna gonna look at who was more of a character and who was who gave more of effort and who stand who stood there while somebody slapped them and slapped about it or something or scream that then you know, and there's no other person like me in the sport. That's what I that's what I think I mean, there's there's some big big guys and they got you know, they got their techniques, but believe anybody out there has character or made a character or you know,

Nick VinZant 13:42

yeah, sure they can slap and all that but just to make a character out of it. That's hard. And will you will you flinch or anything right when they're hit like what's the trick is the trick to the muscle up when they when you're about to get hit or just to completely relax?

Koa Viernes 13:57

I won't I tense up every bone every muscle in my body. Mostly my back muscles in my neck muscles and my my shoulders and I kind of tense up without looking like I'm tensing up. Yeah, no, and I'm really at the at the point of impact. I'm almost going into it and you can't really tell when they slap me but um, my, the opposite side of you know, the direction they're slapping me if they slap me on my right side of the right side of my face. my left foot is really really bog buckled down to the ground and willing to let that come all the way through me and not just stop right here. You know, I'm really when they when people hit me I would like to stare at them in their face and just take it without you know and scream at them after Like, it's weird, US guy, US bigger guys, and, you know, Polynesians and all that we're a bit will be built different really. And um, you know, I believe that one day in this sport we're gonna dominate, you know it weight has a lot of a lot to do with it too, because if you can swing as much weight as you can, and hit him where you think their button is, then then your last long are most of the people you're up against bigger than you are same size or smaller. I'd say half of the guys that I've went up against are bigger than me. But the smaller guys are really not that much more smaller than you know.

Nick VinZant 15:39

What's the next aisle? Okay, so in the moment you're getting slapped the adrenaline is up there. But what's the next day like? Cuz I mean, you did just get like slap in the face as hard as another person can hit.

Koa Viernes 15:49

Really, there was only one slap fight that I walked away that I had to recover from. It was the first one. I was probably swollen for a week. And and then it was back to normal. But every flat fight after that I really, I have to after the slap fight. I went to go and get some food Oh, my wife. Is this, like a lot of people? You know, they they're like, oh, how do you eat and you your face swollen, but my face only really went swollen once. And the rest of them were just like kind of red. You can't really tell cuz I'm a little darker. But you know, it it. It stings sometimes, but you know, it's not really unbearable. And it's fun. Like I said, it's fun to me.

Nick VinZant 16:44

Do you know, do you have to hit? Can you just like, hit somebody on the same side of the face over and over again? Or do you have to hit one side then hit the other side?

Koa Viernes 16:52

Well, there's right now there's promotions that are popping up all over. I'm one in Miami, one in California and one away on me. One in New York, Poland Russian Russians, obviously, but every one of them has their own set of rules. If you get penalized for doing some that you're not supposed to do, then some of them they go, Oh, you get slapped again, you get a warning. And then the next one is a penalty. And you would have to take two slaps both meaning lose a turn.

Nick VinZant 17:25

Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? Yes, I'm done with that. Better Way to slap forehand or backhand?

Koa Viernes 17:37

Uh, I've never really slapped somebody on my with my backhand. Without that would be, you know, that would kind of almost be the same but not really. You got knuckles involved and, and all that. But I would like to try something to hit someone with my backhand, you know, because I've, I've opened hand people before, so that'll be that'll be a fun thing to do. To say that I did at least

Nick VinZant 18:09

when you're in competition, is it better to be able to slap hard? Or is it better to be able to be able to take the slap? What's more often, I guess, being able to hit or get hit?

Koa Viernes 18:22

I strongly believe that anyone can knock anyone out with the right, you know, technique. I feel like it's it's taking it. That's more like defenses win championships, like this kind of the same thing.

Nick VinZant 18:38

Can you tell by the sound? Like are there different sounds a slap is going to make the you're like, Oh, that's a good one.

Koa Viernes 18:44

I can, I can. So when it's just kind of a third. It's more of less of an open hand and more of a cup. And a lot of people do that. That's that is legal. You just can't you just can't do that. You know, it has to be kind of like that. And the open your open hand is is a is more of a high pitch kind of you know and yeah, that that more of a sudden or a cupping? That's more of a thud and yeah, I can I can identify what exactly how they slept and how they landed with just the sound if you play the whole one two different sounds I would I would get it.

Nick VinZant 19:39

Guaranteed best slap you've ever seen in a movie or TV show?

Koa Viernes 19:45

I'm thinking the office never watch the office. Yeah, I know it's Yeah. Yeah, do I got slapped? Oh, Angela, who would you say is a better proportionate slapper men or women? Like if they were if we were all if we if men and women were the same size Like who? Who's the better slapper? Um,

Nick VinZant 20:18

who was how hard when it for men and women were the same size? Who's a better slacker? Um,

Koa Viernes 20:26

I say the one with the bigger chin. Um,

Nick VinZant 20:29

one last thing for me, man, where do you think this? Like? What's kind of the future? Where do you think this goes?

Koa Viernes 20:35

I really believe in my heart that this sport will go further than most people think it will. And, and I have high hopes for it. You know, I'm, there is a production company that that I'm in contact with that, dude, we're just gonna do a documentary series about in slot fighting and how I train for it. So, um, I think that'll be the start of a big change in the sport because no one understands like we were just average blue collar people know I work at Costco is ups and Amazon. Like things that normal people do. And, you know, when people see that they're gonna be like, What in the world? They're wise, they're gonna be like, Hey, I'll be a slap fighter.

Nick VinZant 21:32

Gobi is lap five. Right here. Just mow the lawn.

Koa Viernes 21:36

Yeah. Go get out there slap some man. No, I really and I couldn't do it without the support of my wife and she wholeheartedly believes me as much as I believe in myself. And, uh, you know, if I do get knocked out in the sport, man. Good job. I want to get up and shake his hand. Give him a hug. And tell him good frickin job. No, it's my turn.

Master Bladesmith Liam Hoffman

Before he was a Forged in Fire Champion, Liam Hoffman spent years failing over and over again. We talk bladesmithing techniques, $8,000 knives and how lightsabers will impact his business plans. Then, we countdown a special “Sharp” Top 5.

Liam Hoffman : 01:38ish

Pointless: 24:30ish

Top 5 Sharp Things: 42:17ish

https://www.instagram.com/hoffmanblacksmithing (Liam Hoffman Instagram)

https://www.facebook.com/groups/488427804697345 (Liam Hoffman Facebook)

http://www.hoffmanblacksmithing.com (Liam Hoffman Website)

Interview with Bladesmith Liam Hoffman

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody, welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, Master blade Smith's and our favorite sharp stuff.

Liam Hoffman 0:21

But I do think that you should suffer to a healthy amount of suffering is good for you. And learning. I think that a lot of people who are first starting out, get down on themselves too quickly about their progress that they're making. Because if you were to look back at my progress, it's pretty horrible compared to a lot of people's. So when steel is red hot, it is rapidly oxidizing, just like rust. But that rust is, like I said, quickly, rapidly peeling off of the hot steel and it falls on to you. I want to thank you so much for joining us. If

Nick VinZant 0:57

you get a chance, like, download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest has a fascinating story. Because not only does he do something that is just incredibly interesting on how this gets done, but he's also somebody that has gotten so good at his craft, that his knives and axes sell for 1000s of dollars, and he's a forged in fire champion. But before any of that, he spent years failing over and over and over again. This is Master bladesmith. Liam Hoffman, how did you get started in this? What drew you to blacksmithing?

Liam Hoffman 1:41

Simply boredom. You know, I'm in the mountains of North Carolina and right on the Tennessee North Carolina line. So there's it's either you growing up, it's either drugs or something creative, pretty much because there's no nightlife or anything like that. So you just have to find things to do. And I, when I was young, about 13 years old, I started hammering on a piece of steel, not knowing what I was doing. And then it just evolved from there.

Nick VinZant 2:09

When was when did you make like, what would you would call your first real blade?

Liam Hoffman 2:15

Probably not till I got out of high school. So I had, which was probably seven years ago or so I had been blacksmithing for around four years before I got out of high school. So I wasn't very proud of what I was doing until probably five or six years in

Nick VinZant 2:32

is that now is that normal for a lot of people? I mean, is it usually take that much time? No,

Liam Hoffman 2:37

no, a lot of people are really confused when they hear me talk about that, because a lot of people see what I'm doing now. And then they just assume that I started that way or it was like really quick for me. But there's so many people that are beginners who are coming up to me now like wanting me to look at their work. They've been doing blade smithing and blacksmithing for a few months, and their work is better than mine was four years in. And I had a very slow start to stew it to it and then it picked up exponentially.

Nick VinZant 3:08

What How come this, how come the start was so slow?

Liam Hoffman 3:11

I would say mainly because I was just so ignorant about everything. I was 13 years old. And I'm also very shy. So as a kid, I wasn't very outgoing towards adults who may have known more about blacksmithing than me, so I was pretty sheltered and what I knew about everything tool knowledge is how to use normal tools or how to ask someone for advice. So and I wasn't until I got to high school that I started really like getting more exposed to blacksmithing community and and taking off from there.

Nick VinZant 3:43

I guess I'm not I'm not entirely sure how old you are. But I guess this is kind of before like the YouTube era where you could essentially just look, Google it and figure out pretty much everything right?

Liam Hoffman 3:52

No, I was I'm 20 I just turned 25. So when I was in high school, I had the YouTube, all the all that type of information. And so I was just trial and error trying to figure things out. But maybe I'm just not as good as a lot of other people. And that's why it took me so long. But I think that a lot of people who are first starting out, get down on themselves too quickly about their progress that they're making. Because if you were to look back at my progress, it's pretty horrible compared to a lot of people's in terms of like the technical aspects like you didn't get it the forge wasn't hot enough.

Nick VinZant 4:30

You didn't hit it with another enough strikes, or you didn't have like the artistic capabilities.

Liam Hoffman 4:36

I didn't know what good work were supposed to look like, which is what I've told a lot of people before is that you don't know what good work looks like. If you don't know what good work looks like. If you have no example then you don't know what you're striving for. I say it's a lot easier to tell in person. What work should look like when you get to hold a knife that's made by Master, then to see something on YouTube 99% of blacksmiths or knife makers that you're going to meet are like top notch guys, they're going to share everything with you, they're going to invite you in, they're going to cook for you, they're going to camp out with you hang out with you and share everything with you. And I wasn't really exposed to that early on.

Nick VinZant 5:20

Do you think looking back on it? Was that a good thing or a bad thing. Uh,

Liam Hoffman 5:26

I don't necessarily think that that specifically was either a good or bad thing. But I do think that you should suffer to a healthy amount of suffering is good for you. In learning. I, when I'm teaching people, I often try to show them the wrong way to do something so that they then understand the right way to do something. If you're only showing the right way to do something, then you don't actually understand why that's the right thing. So it's important to go through hardships and suffer and make mistakes. And then you can say, Oh, I know why that's a mistake. I know not to do that. I know not to do this. I know how that mistake happens. And now I know how to prevent it.

Nick VinZant 6:07

So that so that we have a better understanding of the difference between something that you make, and something that we can go to Target and buy, right like, what's what's the difference between a knife or an axe that you make, and something that I can go pick up for even like a high quality, something like I'm paying 100 bucks for this kitchen knife. Like what's the difference?

Liam Hoffman 6:27

Basically, everything, every single part of it 100 knives, sorry, $100 for a kitchen knife is not a lot of money. Maybe for target it is but my kitchen knives are insanely expensive. But blade Smith's who specialize in high end kitchen knives, I mean, you're talking about a three to 10 plus $1,000 kitchen knife, not $100, a $300 kitchen knife. And so when I say everything is different, I'm talking about the shape the design, the geometry of the cross section, which is the cutting edge, the spine, the types of bevels, where it's a flat grind, a convex grind, a hollow grind, a combination of a hollow grind, or a flat grind. The ergonomics of the handle, if it's an integral style handle, if it's a full tang, if it's hidden Tang type handle, there's everything the materials, the heat treating, which is the way that you process the material. And then of course, just the design, the design, the ergonomics of the knife is everything is different about it. And then when prices go up from there, you're mainly looking at brand and reputation because with high end blacksmithing high end knife making it is art. So you are paying for not just a utilitarian functional piece you're paying for someone's brand someone's art someone's reputation someone's experience.

Nick VinZant 7:56

Is it like one of the things if I did a blind test and I pick up your knife and I pick up somebody else's knife like that the mass produced 1am I noticing the difference? Like oh, my that's that's the second I pick it up really? Yeah, you should be able to Yeah. Is it different? The feel of it, the weight of it are all of the above

Liam Hoffman 8:17

all of the above? Yeah, without even looking at viewer in a blind test, I think that someone would be able to tell the difference between most production knives and most custom high end knives. Of course, there's gonna be some knives, you know, on the spectrum that might be closer to others. But there really is a huge difference between a an actual masterfully made high quality knife and a factory made knife. That's

Nick VinZant 8:43

I guess that's kind of surprising to me, because I would be under the impression that like a computer can do just about everything better than a human. Like, we haven't figured out a computer program that can design a knife that's better than one that that you can make yet.

Liam Hoffman 8:59

That's not necessarily it. So there's Yes, maybe we have the capability of doing it. But is that profitable? Is and then if you take like, we were just talking about the functionality aspect out of it, you have art, you have brand, you have reputation, and that's not something that a computer has. It's not personable, so people will spend X amount of money on my knives and axes, not just because the X or the knife is good, but because people because I made it because it's one of my axes.

Nick VinZant 9:32

Are we better at this, like blacksmithing as a whole? Are we better at this now than we were 1000 years ago? Or did we kind of have to re learn this skill? Better and what way? I don't I don't even know enough about it to even clarify it. I guess

Liam Hoffman 9:50

so like yeah, so I would say that. Shoot, I don't know uh, in terms of technological metallurgical processes were better now 100%. So when you, when you heat treat a piece of steel, that means that you, you change the properties of that steel. So you can have a piece of what's called high carbon steel. And that steel can be in a kneeled state, which is a soft state, I could bend it over my knee, if I had enough leverage, or that steel could be in a hardened and tempered state, which would be total opposite of that that same piece of steel could be hard enough to hold the knife edge. So and then, of course, you have different alloys of steel, there's hundreds of different types of steel, which is like it's like a recipe. It's like baking, you have iron, carbon, and manganese are three main ingredients. And then you can add other elements to that. And they didn't have that back then. So I would say that modern day steel selection, and our understanding of how to heat treat steel is far better than it was just 100 years ago, much less 500 years ago. But in terms of the artistry, I honestly haven't seen any advancement there, maybe, maybe we've degraded, you can look at pieces from 300 years ago, especially in the Middle East area, that are more ornate than I, I find it difficult for me to think of someone off the top of my head, a modern day maker that could make some of these pieces that were made 300 years ago without electricity. So I don't think that we have gotten any better in terms of what I would consider craftsmanship.

Nick VinZant 11:38

I don't know how much of like a historian of blacksmithing you are. But was the art ever kind of lost. Yeah, right. Like we had to relearn how to do these things.

Liam Hoffman 11:48

Absolutely. I'm not much of a historian on blacksmithing. But I do know that there was kind of a lull between early 1900s and the 1980s, where we got really into mass production, importing, and that type of thing, where the blacksmith was like a thing of the past, it was obsolete. And there was a long period of time, probably close to 60 years, where no one was really into blacksmithing as a hobby or anything. It was just seen as like this old thing that you don't, what's the point in it. And then there's something that people call like the blacksmith renaissance in the 1980s. And there was a resurgence of guys, and men and women that came forth and became began blacksmithing again, and they did have to relearn a lot of things and dig up a lot of things. And then there was another lol again until about seven, eight years ago, and it's just exploded.

Nick VinZant 12:48

Like say you're going to make a knife or an ax. How long of a process are we talking for you to make one

Liam Hoffman 12:55

depends on what type of x. So if I'm making like a production x, it takes a lot less time than if I'm doing a custom type of X a one off type of x. So when people come to order an x from us, we have a catalog of products, there's like eight different models, for instance, that you can order. If someone comes to me and says I want this x to have this specific shape with this specific length handle, like I won't do that type of thing. So you can either order what's on my website or you can't, or go elsewhere. Because I'm not interested in doing custom types of work. But whenever I get spare time away from production, that's when I can be more creative and just make whatever I want to make in a call that like a one off type piece people would see that more of like as an art piece a collector's piece, something that's more desirable and an X like that, or a knife like that could take anywhere from not very long at all, which I would consider maybe eight hours to it could you could be talking about a 60 to 80 hour project.

Nick VinZant 13:58

Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? Sure. Yeah, bring it on. What is the most important tool in your workshop?

Liam Hoffman 14:08

The forge because you can't do anything without steel being hot. There's lots of alternatives to an anvil or tongs or a hammer but there's not many alternatives to a forge which is what hits the steel up.

Nick VinZant 14:23

How many times a day or week do you think to yourself man this forge is hot?

Liam Hoffman 14:31

I'm probably at least I don't know. It's always hot the other day it was 105 degrees and and that's that's what like ambient temperature outside being 75 it's not hot where I live if I couldn't imagine if I was on the on the in a desert or down in like Texas or Florida or something. That'd be so horrible. But even in my climate where it's not that hot, it's like over 100 degrees. With humidity also on top of that in the summer and yet it's it's hot as it's horrible. You burn yourself to

Nick VinZant 15:09

like the I mean, it's getting burned something that's going to happen pretty much all the time. More than anything ever like really serious,

Liam Hoffman 15:16

huh? No, not that serious. I have all my digits and everything. But yeah, I've gotten burned really bad lots of times, just from like a spark coming off or sparks are, sparks aren't gonna hurt you, it's what's called, The most common type of burn is going to be from something called scale, which is it's a flakes of steel that come off of the workpiece while it's hot. So when steel is red hot, it is rapidly oxidizing, just like rust. But that rust is, like I said quickly, rapidly peeling off of the hot steel and it falls on to you. And that oxidation is called scale. And that scale is very hot. And it is a almost every time you forge you're going to get a scale burn.

Nick VinZant 16:04

Were you more excited or nervous when you got the call from forged in fire?

Liam Hoffman 16:10

Well, I've had multiple calls from them, the first couple I wasn't interested at all in doing because I didn't think that I was good enough to make myself look good on TV. I knew that if I was going to go on on TV unfortunate fire, I needed to be confident in myself and be ready for it. I wasn't just going to jump into it. So I had a couple of calls. The first couple seasons that they aired, and then the call that I decided to go on to the show. I was I was more excited than I was nervous. I don't get super nervous with a lot of things. And I prepared myself really well. I'm pretty logical and methodical. So like, I mean, I trained. I had all these scenarios in my head, I was like I was there to win it. I was there. I was there to not play around. So I wasn't super nervous about it. I knew what I could do. And I was just excited to try and win it. And you ultimately want it What did that kind of what did that do for your business? nothing but good. So before, before I was on the show, my business was already doing really well. I think we had like a 10 month backlog before I went on to the show. And then I went on to the show. And it's just been ridiculous ever since

Nick VinZant 17:33

what is the most durable thing you've ever cut through

Liam Hoffman 17:36

this terrible thing? I think this is I can get into this a little bit. But like a common misconception when a market is a marketing trick that knife companies or knife makers will use is to take a knife that seemingly shouldn't cut through something and then cut through that object like cutting through a nail with a knife. And I was like, Oh, well cut through a nail with a knife. And you can change how durable a blade is based on the geometry or the thicknesses and the cross section of the edge of the knife. And so what that means is that I could take a chef's knife, which is supposed to be really good at cutting tomatoes, which is a difficult thing to cut well. And I could change the angle that I sharpen it at to be able to cut through a nail. But does that mean it's going to actually work? Well as a kitchen knife? No, it's going to suck. So it's like a marketing misconception scam when you see someone cutting through some like crazy objects, so I don't have anything that I'm like, Oh, I can't believe I cut through this crazy hard object or anything like that. It's more like, Okay, if I make an axe that's designed to do this specific task, and it does that specific task. Well, that's what I'm proud of. Or if I take a chef's knife in it, I would say one thing that I was really proud of was taking a chef's knife and cutting through a tomato without holding the tomato in my hand cutting through it horizontally on a table without the tomato moving. That's a really difficult task because the knife has to be thin enough and have the right geometry to it.

Nick VinZant 19:12

This kind of segues a little bit into that how do you feel watching those infomercials on TV where they advertised knives? It's just I don't even know how to react. It's horrible. Yeah, it's just joke. Are you like what What irritates you about it? You're like, Oh, that's not the right handle. There's no way that blade can do that. Like what are you muttering to the person next to you about that infomercial?

Liam Hoffman 19:40

It's not it's just not even worth your breath. This is all just horrible. It's all wrong. It's all wrong. Yeah, it's just like for an educated consumers that. Like I said, it's like a gimmick. It looks good if we don't know. But then what do you know it's like this is just so bad in so many ways. What blacksmithing item Do you enjoy making the most? I would say axes, axes and knives. I like forging axes. And I like the finish work on knives more so like knife making high end blade smithing is not a lot of forging, it's more finished work. It's the sanding, the grinding the woodworking, the polishing the elegant shaping. Whereas axe making is primarily this, the primary skill lies in the forging, not as much the finishing. So if, if I'm talking about what I like to forge most is probably going to be an axe because it's more interesting, more difficult. A knife, not as much of a challenge to forge but it is a lot more involved in the finish work. Most Expensive knife you make or most expensive item, you make the least expensive item you make, like at least expensive acts that I make this I think around $220. And that would that's like a 12 inch long, little camping hacks. The most expensive thing that I've sold, which is actually just recently like a couple weeks ago, was a knife for $77,250. And that was a hunting small hunting type knife but it had in custom engraving work on it that was not actually done by me. It was done by a friend of mine named his Instagram name is the hand engraver. His name is Ivan Watson. And then I had a fancy handle on it. And it was one of those things where this knife was it was actually the last of this design that I was ever making. So that increased its value. My prices can range anywhere from a couple $100 to around $8,000 right now.

Nick VinZant 21:56

Last two from me, what is your favorite historical sword knife or axe? Hmm,

Liam Hoffman 22:03

I wouldn't have to put it in like a category of Persian Persian style knives from the late 1700s or mid 1800s. Those are to me the most ornate beautiful shaped, detailed knives that

Nick VinZant 22:23

that I've seen. favorite fictional one.

Liam Hoffman 22:27

I don't know I I'm not much of a fantasy knife guy. And I get a lot of requests for fantasy types of swords and knives from like video games and stuff. But I've never really never really been interested in that. So I don't think I have a favorite one.

Nick VinZant 22:43

We do have a question that says How do you feel about lightsabers?

Liam Hoffman 22:49

I feel like that would be great. If if it was real. Yeah, that'd be great. It'd be super helpful. I think in a lot of ways.

Nick VinZant 22:58

You could definitely make stuff a lot faster. Good and shit. Yeah. Yeah, I could. I could heat up stuff be great. But would that hurt your business though? Because I'd have a hard time buying a knife. If I could buy a lightsaber. I'm gonna be honest with you.

Liam Hoffman 23:12

Right? I mean, people's probably still gonna want a knife or an axe for the novelty even if they can cut a tree in half with a lightsaber. And be faster.

Nick VinZant 23:23

You are a businessman. Um, Oh, I missed this one. Do you have time for one more? Yeah. What advice would you give to a young blacksmith? Somebody just starting out?

Liam Hoffman 23:34

I would say to not lose sight of the big picture. Be persistent, do not give up so easily. And understand that suffering is just part of the process and it's going to help you in the long run.

Nick VinZant 23:49

That's all the questions I got man. Is there anything else you think that we missed or what's kind of coming up next for you?

Liam Hoffman 23:57

Just just constantly busy, got lots of stuff going on. I would say that if if anyone wants to find out the types of things that we're doing on a day to day basis, you can follow me on Instagram, which is Hoffman blacksmithing. or on Facebook. We have a closed Facebook group, also Hoffman blacksmithing.

Professional Arm Wrester Michael Todd

With 20 National Titles and 16 World Titles to his name, “Monster” Michael Todd is one of the best arm wrestlers of all time. We talk arm wrestling techniques, how to get really strong, broken arms and more in this episode. Then, we countdown a special arm themed Top 5.

Michael Todd: 01:08ish

Pointless: 26:03ish

Top 5: 39:35ish

http://monstermichaeltodd.com (Michael Todd Website)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCarJKBV9GEpXRHrw4bEEhHA (Michael Todd YouTube)

https://www.instagram.com/monstermichaeltodd (Michael Todd Instagram)

Interview with “Monster” Michael Todd

Nick VinZant 0:11

Hey everybody welcome to Profoundly Pointless. My name is Nick VinZant coming up in this episode, strong arms and the best body parts.

"Monster" Michael Todd 0:21

I am not genetically gifted to be predisposed to be good at armwrestling I just have a disgust for losing that most times outweighs my opponents desire to win. So I got into a lot of compromising positions and matches which is the reason I have lost over nine and a half inches range of motion my right arm, my right elbow has been fractured over 70 different times by L roll is horrible. The X rays terrific.

Nick VinZant 0:42

I want to thank you so much for joining us. If you get a chance, like download, subscribe, share, we really appreciate it really helps us out. So our first guest is one of the greatest athletes that you might not have heard of. And he competes in a sport that we all have done at one time or another. This is professional arm wrestler, monster Michael Todd. So is this something that you set out to do? Or was this something that just happened?

"Monster" Michael Todd 1:12

I grew up in Arkansas. I actually was a martial artists first. So I dad took me to see Karate Kid. And I said I've got to take karate. So I started taking Shota current karate then I switched over to Taekwondo. But I actually thought growing up I was gonna be like a martial arts action hero guy thought that's what I was gonna do. I thought I was gonna be in movies and I was going to be kicking everybody's butt and turned out mess around in high school used to always arm wrestle my dad when I was 15 years old. I finally meeting my senior in high school, I could pretty much beat everybody. I was an English Driver's Ed and votec I was taking auto mechanics and they pointed out a guy and said that guy right there a second state. You got on a cafeteria table and meetings I usually go to this tournament of the Swain county fair 31 years ago that I've won 21 world titles 36 National trial 36 national titles enough for the year 30 plus times.

Nick VinZant 2:02

Why are you so good at it right? Are you just unnaturally strong? Is it like the lever of your arm? What Why are you good at it?

"Monster" Michael Todd 2:10

I am not genetically gifted to be predisposed to be good at armwrestling I just haven't discussed for losing that most times outweighs my opponents desire to win. So as a kid, I was pretty strong. You know, I didn't have a real good hand and risk because I didn't do a lot of manual labor. I wasn't the hate Holland. You know, country arkansan guy I was kind of, you know, more laid back chillin watching TV and stuff. So I had a strong arm. And for a long time, throughout my career, my arm was very, very strong. My head and wrist was weak. Or so I got into a lot of compromising positions and matches, which is the reason I have lost over nine and a half inches range of motion my right arm, my right elbow has been fractured over 70 different times. my elbow is horrible, the X rays terrific. But now, the last 11 years I've really focused on my hand and wrist a lot. So

Nick VinZant 2:57

you see what I mean? When I think of armwrestling I'm just thinking of my arm right? Like I've arm wrestled before, but I wouldn't ever say I know what muscles I've been using. Like what's the dominant muscles that you're using when your arm wrestling somebody

"Monster" Michael Todd 3:12

What you're trying to show right there you're trying to push sideways arm wrestling is not a pushy sport. Most people start off arm wrestling, just against her dad or friends or whatever thinking it's just push your opponent sideways. armwrestling pulling sport. So the biggest muscle you're going to use is your back. But it doesn't matter how strong your back is, if your hand and wrist isn't strong enough to support it, it won't matter. So what you want to do is you started to sit in the table hands in the center of the table, left or right. And on go you want to pull your opponent to you as quick as you can get to be you the betters and give you more leverage and then less leverage. And so if your hand and wrist isn't strong enough to support that pressure, you're in and wrestle, you open up your own arm, you expose yourself to your opponent. It's funny because people think there's so much technique involved in there is like if I take two people, I take a set of twins and I teach one how to arm wrestle. He's obviously gonna kill the other. But that doesn't mean that it's all technique and not strength. Strength is so subjective. Someone will look at a guy who's gonna make benchpress or big squat, big deadlift, like that guy strongly. You just know how to arm so you just know the technique. Though his benchpress deadlift or squat muscles are stronger than my arm wrestling muscles are highly developed.

Nick VinZant 4:15

Are you pretty strong though? and other things right? Like, obviously you're very strong arm wrestler, but are you like is your squat great is your bench. Great.

"Monster" Michael Todd 4:24

I've done a 585 squat a 605 deadlift in the 520 minutes. But I've had so many injuries right now I'm probably afford 25 minutes, probably maybe a 495 squat and probably a 550 deadlift, but I don't do those. I'm 48 years old. I've been competing for 31 years. I don't do a lot of those traditional powerlifting moves anymore. What I do is I train just one day aren't one day back one day like one day shoulders one day inside each one of those workouts I do armwrestling specific exercises.

Nick VinZant 4:55

What are some like what's an arm wrestling specific exercise,

"Monster" Michael Todd 4:59

I have a two inch thick pipe that I slide over in the bar, and I roll up weight this way down, I roll up laid back that way, outside of a pulley system, there are certainly cable a handle and an armrest and table in front of a pulley system. And I mimic armwrestling with this specific handle that's going to make it you know, use my technique which is outside top row. And I'll do that and then I'll take battle ropes and it's funny because people are looking at my battle ropes in my training circuits and like Oh, you're not doing the battle ropes, right? I'm not trying to do the battle ropes for cardio. I'm trying to do the battle rope. So it blows up my hands because they're two distinct veterans of blows and the teacher Hands up. So my circuits like it's so funny. Right? You must work out all the time. I work at about 15 minutes a day. It's just the hardest 15 minutes you've ever seen. But it worked out because it's non stop. I set a timer and I don't stop until I'm done.

Nick VinZant 5:46

But he's one of like, is your dominant hand bigger than the other one from just all the injuries or from the work or

"Monster" Michael Todd 5:54

am I right upper arm is what happens during the my left my right lower arm my forums about three quarters.

Nick VinZant 6:00

So why why is that like what did you Is it

"Monster" Michael Todd 6:04

so I got into very bad positions with my hand compromised with wrestling my arms from my hand wrist or weak getting very bad positions instead of laying the mesh go I just pulled through. for 20 years I didn't have health insurance. So I'd never looked the doctor I just had an injury and I just kept training. Eventually when I did have health insurance, my left elbow, the doctor misdiagnosed me in 2010 that I had a partially torn ligament and when it was I said I had a torn muscle when it wasn't a partially torn ligament I had a world title match and love that drove in radio power minute time limit ripped off the bone likes to match rows of the form level dislocate six inches. I come back home and have to do surgery. And while they rescue surgery like x ray my right arm. And that's what he told me I had over 70 fractures in my right elbow.

Nick VinZant 6:47

What What was that doctors face like when he saw X ray

"Monster" Michael Todd 6:50

x rayed my right arm the response to the doctors. That's the worst I've ever seen. Cannot frame that picture. But I'm a wall. Or I don't understand how you have musculature your arm your arm looks like what I would have when I would expect a 300 year old man's arm to look like

Nick VinZant 7:04

why not switch to the other arm like for armwrestling purposes,

"Monster" Michael Todd 7:09

have won 21 world titles and 36 national titles that are damn near split right down the middle about 5050 Now what that means is the left hand competitions not as stiff as the right hand competition because there's a lot more right handed people. I've never been over on them one of the world's left handed. I've won numerous world titles match titles, but I have been over on the one in the world right in the middle of all the arm wrestlers walking the face here, in the main right hand,

Nick VinZant 7:32

is there a huge difference between somebody dominant hand in their off hand Usually,

"Monster" Michael Todd 7:37

it varies from person to person. What has happened over the years and how I got started on wrestling left hand was in 1994. I went to the national championships in Windsor locks, Connecticut, and the first time they ever had left handed in the nationals and left hand was on Friday. Right? It was on Saturday. Well, I couldn't stay to watch people on rest without me. So I'm gonna head into the left. And that's how I got started on the left.

Nick VinZant 7:58

When you when you look at a lot of people who you know professionals like yourself who are at the very top, is there usually something like a physical trait that they share besides just pure strength? Right? Like, is there a leverage thing like the forearm is shorter than the right i think he I don't know enough about anatomy to actually ask this question.

"Monster" Michael Todd 8:18

Question the best way I can. Normally, the elite guys gonna have big strong dominant hands. I don't have a massive hand. I have a thick, thick and meaty can training it but it's not a massive here. I'm six foot three, but I don't really have long leavers, right. Devon Larry, who's six six has got like 6869 liters. The longer lever is better. A lot of people think they're shorter arms better the longer lever. Normally the longer lever is better if you know how to use it. Right. But yeah, big forearms, big hands, wrists. You don't see a whole lot. I mean, I'm a guy who does a lot of traditional weight training. A lot of arm wrestlers just do armwrestling specific stuff. Now if you go to Eastern Europe, which is where they're very, very strong, and Eastern Europe, and some of the top competition in the world is from there, especially under the 220 pound weight limit. They pretty much dominate armwrestling once you get the super heavyweights, the top 10 in the world, five of us are from North America. So but we're all older, like I'm 48 746 30 petards 48. Dave take into this 47 agents in his 40s. I mean, now my training partner Cory West, we call him the gorilla. He's my height, maybe a little bit taller, and he's born and 20 pounds. I got to be able to reach down and grab the padlock and just snap it off his bare hand. He's a free

Nick VinZant 9:38

man. Now you guys are all older is that because of like old man strength basically, or just experience

"Monster" Michael Todd 9:45

a long time? We don't really have like Cory is the one who just turned 31 last week. I feel like he's the future specifically for North American armwrestling but he very well could be random on the world. At some point. He's just he's a man. Massive, massive human being. And he's just, he loves it. He tore his left bicep deep super fit last year bone, Dave Chafee and Idaho. And prior to that, he was training he was consistent, but he wasn't hungry. He was patient about his his progress. Now he's hungry. He wants to hunt down everybody. That kid is, watch out for him, he's he's gonna be something special.

Nick VinZant 10:19

This is my knowledge about weightlifting and things like that, right. But it's much different, like somebody negative strength is so good, right? Like, you can't maybe not be able to push something off of you. But you can keep it from coming down. Like how difficult is that to get somebody's arm to move in a way that they don't want it to move?

"Monster" Michael Todd 10:39

Well, that's what's interesting about armwrestling versus any other traditional weight training, strength, sport, whatever, you're going to get someone else's power, right. So you're applying a certain force, they're applying a certain certain force. And it really comes down to who's strong in these specific areas. So at a world class level, we all know the techniques it comes down to who's stronger, but it could be who's stronger in their, in their pinky muscle or their you know, first finger their thought we just depends on whether you can get that that. So I'm an outside arm wrestler, I'm a top row or open top row, whatever. Some people are trying to get to buy them real hard on you gets turned into a book. And I'm trying to open their hand and open the rest up. So it's just those counter pressures? It's, it's a lot of fun. Is it physical chess?

Nick VinZant 11:24

How long like when you're doing a specific? Is it like, I know you go through rounds, but like, how long is the average round going to last?

"Monster" Michael Todd 11:33

Okay, so most matches are pretty quick. I mean, 1020 seconds or less. I'm the guy that has the multiple minute long matches, like I've had a 10 minute match before I had a seven minute match to who. And then I was like round two or five rounds. So I'm known for having those very, very long war is brutal. And that's why I say my disgust for losing outweighs my opponents desire to win when they say go if I can keep you from killing me. That is my master lose after that.

Nick VinZant 11:58

It's just a growing sport. Is this a diminishing sport? Is it staying the same? like where do you see the future of arm wrestling going,

"Monster" Michael Todd 12:05

though, for years, like I said, I started in 1990. We missed out on the 1996 Olympics, we were supposed to be demonstrations for we got beat up by women's beach volleyball, obviously, you see why? And then we never really got another shot at it. You know, we were at we were in the Goodwill Games, done a few different things like that. I do think it's gonna follow a similar path to UFC, hopefully, and I'll tell you why it's growing. Now, while we're probably in the biggest growth of armwrestling ever, although there has been on you know, ESPN, or it's been on a was the ABCs wild world of sports, or over the top, all those different times where armwrestling could have taken off. It's because of COVID traditional sports were not being seen. So people went to the internet and they found arm wrestling. In arm wrestling right now is probably in the biggest growth curve has ever had. And that's why my wife and I, we were three weeks into a six month tour across the United States in a wrapped RV. So we pull up in this wrapped RV that screaming picture me on the side of it. We put up the arm wrestling table, we just take on all comers. So three weeks into six months, we're gonna hit all 48 states.

Nick VinZant 13:06

Are you ready for some harder slash listener submitted questions? Let's do it. What's your favorite pump up music to get ready?

"Monster" Michael Todd 13:15

My favorite pump up music I like I feel like a monster from skillet.

Nick VinZant 13:18

That's pretty good. Right? But do you like it? Because your nickname is monster? Or do you just like the song

"Monster" Michael Todd 13:26

a little bit about a little bit about it just gets me fired up about it.

Nick VinZant 13:29

Who is the Michael Jordan of armwrestling. All Time all time. And if you say to you,

"Monster" Michael Todd 13:36

greatest of all time is always going to be Jon Corzine. He dominated in the era of armwrestling that will never exist again. So he basically went 20 plus years with very few losses took on people from all across the world and different weight classes didn't matter. He was a six foot two 120 pound guy most of his career. And this word is not it's evolved so much since then no one will ever be able to know we'll be able to go that long without losing, knowing to be able to take because they're real freaks out there. Now. I would, I would say that I'm among the greatest of all time because I've won every have won the World Title, every professional league that's existed in the last 1015 years. I have taken the losses over the years, but jomres is definitely the greatest of all time. Probably one of the best ambassadors to sports ever seen is definitely from Canada, the 20 year Special Forces badass dude. And then I'm, you know, I've done my part. I've traveled the world. I've done a lot of things and had a lot of fun. But there's there's a lot of Legends out there. It's just an honor for me to be considered among the best that's ever done it so that's cool. Now Can

Nick VinZant 14:40

this be this can just be a full time living for most professionals?

"Monster" Michael Todd 14:44

No, it cannot. Who knows it might in the future. With the social media platform with YouTube, Instagram, all that stuff, a person now could build a brand big enough to where they could live full time through, you know, through YouTube money. As sponsors or whatever, just sort of armwrestling, I may have made a half million dollars in 31 years, I couldn't work. I have had an amazing life, full of life experiences to have a lot of interesting places. But a lot of interesting people made a lot of amazing friends. But as far as you know, the monetary side of the sport I might make for you to get out here. So

Nick VinZant 15:22

still, as long I mean, man, I'd rather make that doing what I liked. And, you know,

"Monster" Michael Todd 15:27

yeah, I mean, I'm blessed right now with this tour, right? This tour is really helping us out. And with the connections and people meeting, you know, there's different opportunities that are being presented, there may end up being I actually got called the other day, there's a reality TV show that was put out, and it's the first seasons gonna hit a lot of success with it. And then I had like me to be involved in the second season, which the celebrity edition, I'm like, oh, you're considered me a celebrity. Alright. I thought that was the weird right there, they still consider me a celebrity with the wind. So you never know, man. I'm just we're not promised tomorrow. I want to live my best day to day and do everything I can to get to traveling, I say to my wife, who's my best friend and my two dogs, and I'm blessed right now.

Nick VinZant 16:08

So what do you like about it? Right? Is it the competition, or the winning or just the overall armwrestling in and of itself?

"Monster" Michael Todd 16:16

Well, here's the deal. I've been doing it for 31 years, I've done it for two thirds of my life, basically. So it's just part of me now. It's something that when I was younger, I fell in love with a one on one. I mean, the thrill of victory is amazing. Hate, hate the way it feels to lose those. So that's what, that's why I say my disgust for losing weight, my desire to win because I just hate the way that feels. But I think a lot of is just, you know, the camaraderie, the family the I took my first loss in three years recently in Dubai. And that took so much pressure off me. Because with social media with YouTube, if you take a loss, even in practice, people just tearing you apart, you know. And now, I mean, I took my first professional loss and three years. Yes, I'm hungry to avenge that loss. But right now, I'm just enjoying the fact that I don't have all the pressure. Now I'm still the who champion still the yo yo champion for the arm warships, I still hold several world titles, because it was a non title match. But it was a match that was important to me, you know, come out on top that day. But now with this tour and everything that we're doing, I'm just blessed to be in a position to where I can go out. I can armrests on half on.

Nick VinZant 17:29

When do you generally know that like you've got you've got you've got a guy

"Monster" Michael Todd 17:33

who they say go and I don't get into like I got your ass. It's not always gonna be that way. But most of the time, if I can stop the match, I'm gonna. I'm a very I'm very good at that. As long as I'm in the match, as long as there's not a huge discrepancy in strings, as long as the string is close. I'm almost always

Nick VinZant 17:52

Is it pretty weight dependent, right? Like somebody comes in and this is 125 pound person like, this isn't even a competition for me. But then somebody else could come in and 500 pounds a night you got no shot? Is it weight dependent at all kind of like boxing or

"Monster" Michael Todd 18:08

now the like my stepson. 270 pounds. He's 17 national champion. He does all the same techniques. I know. Obviously, he can't be he because he's 170 pounds. So in that aspect, yes, strength, I mean, the weight. But the strength is not always determined by how much you weigh, right? Like, I'm a 270 pound guy between 260 to 80. Just depends on how much take me. But my string is going to be the same now as it would be if I was 300. Probably, in most, like I said, my training partner for under 20 pounds and he's an animal. But you know, I keep my bank pretty hard so that the gods 500 pounds I'm not worried about it is not going to change the outcome. As long as this handle rested in front enough to stop my pronation. Or my crack that respect. Sounds good.

Nick VinZant 18:57

How many people's arms Have you broken?

"Monster" Michael Todd 19:00

I've never broken anyone's arm. I had a horrible God's hand when he broke his arm. I didn't break and I was holding on to him and he dove in his arms now. So it's very easy. It's sad. But if you get the bad position and you put the right amount of force, your arm will snap. And I was just holding on to this dude, kind of train him and he just don't come outside moving inside moving into his shoulder in front of his hand and snap his arm.

Nick VinZant 19:23

Is it when that happens? Like is it quick like that? Or is it one of those things like, like I bet like a bad board. You can feel it going and then it goes.

"Monster" Michael Todd 19:31

Sometimes you'll try to stop a match when you see him get into a bad position. And sometimes you just can't stop it before it snaps. All right. This

Nick VinZant 19:38

one's I think this one's gonna be pretty obvious, but if it's not, go ahead and tell me best arm wrestling scene in a movie.

"Monster" Michael Todd 19:45

I don't know if you remember the movie plot where the dude's wrist snaps you know, years ago and my wife's gonna tell you it's gonna be the one from what is it the vampire movies? What is it honey? Twilight? Fly light yeah when seems to be party Breaking Dawn Part Two. She just came to tell me she heard she are in the interview where Bella gets her strength and she she beats the dude over the stone and breaks the stone she pins in. I don't know what was gonna be obvious what was what did you think?

Nick VinZant 20:15

I was? I guess I phrased it incorrectly I was saying I was gonna say best arm wrestling movie which obviously has to be right.

"Monster" Michael Todd 20:22

That's a movie would definitely be over the top. They've made a new one. That was like a Korean movies. I've watched on a plane called champion who wasn't bad. It wasn't bad and they've made a new movie. It's like a female armwrestling thing you know, things got dot Jones who's one of the best female wrestlers of all time, and I cannot remember the name of it golden or maybe maybe go norm and something new I think I don't know what it's been what platform has been released on. But over the tops. Definitely the best arm wrestling movie and I actually enjoyed it. I watched it because even armrests I was just a semester slow and faint when I was thinking like 1984 or something like that when it came out 8586

Nick VinZant 20:58

is it? Is it realistic in any way? Like what do you think about the realism of over the top?

"Monster" Michael Todd 21:04

Well, a lot of the scenes were a real movie. I mean, they did desktop tournament conferencing actually on that tractor truck. So they went around filming, and Marvin Cohen's a buddy of mine, he's the one who did all the products that will get that whole thing going. So a lot of is very real. Because those things were actually taken out of the actual tournament.

Nick VinZant 21:20

There's this meme. I think I can ask this question directly. Have you seen this meme of Arnold and Carl Weathers where they're like locking hands like that? redditor Yeah. Who went? Who do you think would have won that arm wrestling?

"Monster" Michael Todd 21:34

Man. I don't know. I met Arnold. I've never met Carl. I'm guessing Carl probably has a bigger hand. Now. Obviously Arnold had the bigger arm with Carl had a bigger hand and bigger wrist. I'd say Carl might be

Nick VinZant 21:49

he was a professional athlete, too. He's a professional football player, wasn't he?

"Monster" Michael Todd 21:53

I don't know what he was. He just he always had an amazing physique. You know him and Rocky and I don't know if you ever saw action Jackson.

Nick VinZant 21:59

Yeah, dude, I've seen x. Talk to me about x Jackson, man, but

"Monster" Michael Todd 22:06

I got watched every be rated martial arts movie. I don't know if you saw best of the best. Or the last dragon. I got the glow.

Nick VinZant 22:15

Okay, so your nickname obviously monster Michael Todd is the best nickname. Who else do you think though has a great nickname?

"Monster" Michael Todd 22:22

Oh, man. Well, no limits, Devin, Larrett. You know, when I did meet him in 2018 and all the hype leading up to that match. I started hashtag and I'm your limit everywhere, right? And after I paid him in round five, I'm like, limit right but no limits. What it is is he's a massive human being he's for me. He's six foot six. He's got very long labor's and you've heard the adage, lever big enough you can move the world in. He is that guy. He is genetically gifted to be great in this sport. And he is he's a professor of what he does. He's very, very good. He picks everything apart. So no limits make sense for him? Because if you take a big bad, strong version, that dude he almost has no limits, right?

Nick VinZant 23:07

Why is it? Why is it so important? How big somebody's hand is specifically the hand.

"Monster" Michael Todd 23:12

But if you have a long fingers, you get to wrap farther around your opponent, right? So it's about control. So if I can take your hand and control where your hand goes, it doesn't matter if your weakest link I can handle the risk of I can take that control that doesn't matter who your boss is how big your back is. I'm taking the way that the spot that all that power translates through

Nick VinZant 23:32

last time that you ran into somebody whether like a celebrity somebody that we have known or just a random person, where you were like, oh, wow, they could they could they got it.

"Monster" Michael Todd 23:42

It has been a while. You do do you do run into those people that like, if you talk to Devin, Larry, he says Shaq has the most potential anyone's ever armwrestling but Shaq's seven foot two and his hand is enormous, you know? Yeah. And that guy grabbed odd teach him how to arm wrestle. He just said his natural power was ridiculous. What's weird is you say you're doing a beat the champion, you're doing a armwrestling thing in a fitness Expo. Those fitness models are really strong for some reason. We're like, they're way stronger than bodybuilders most rock climbers are always strong mechanics, carpenters, pipe fitters, anyone who just works with a hands.

Nick VinZant 24:19

That's really all the questions I got, man, what's kind of coming up next for you.

"Monster" Michael Todd 24:22

We'll be on the road for the Northwest portion. That's gonna be about a four week tour. Hopefully we're collaborating Brian Shaw, you know, we're talking about sauceman stuff with him getting at least 684 100 plus pounds. So that'd be a great guy to get on the table. And he's got world class grip strength. So if I could teach him how to armrests, I think he can be pretty good. And we've brightened up the South Dakota go to Mount Rushmore. I've never got to go there. And that just so happens. We'll be there right in the middle stages. So probably take the wrap up. So we got we bought an h2 Hummer that we're about to get wrapped to match the RV. So we pulled the Hummer behind it. So some of the places we can't get to we'll just take the Hummer in, and we had our massive table thrown off the back end. So I figured we'll take The army down to Sturgis, do a beat the champion gets some bikers. That should be fun. And then we'll go over to Yellowstone have a great time, we got to finish up next month tour. Stan, everybody who's one of the strong bodybuilders ever. He's training john Jones for his next fight. So next time you're in Albuquerque, come in for a workout, some good workout image, john Jones and maybe getting a cage around john john living in a black kick. So that's the second tour. And then we got four more legs. I'll be at that half for Eddie Hall fight in Jacksonville set the bright teen so I'll be that'll be part of our MidSouth tour. So I'll go go do some stuff The Undertaker, then I'll go to Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and up in Jacksonville, do some stuff there and come back to Atlanta, maybe have a practice. And then we'll fly back into the man October 2 third for the charity weekend event.