Latest / My Favorite Things / My Favorite Things Episode 23: Writer and Podcaster Amanda Monthei

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My Favorite Things Episode 23: Writer and Podcaster Amanda Monthei · My Favorite Things

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Amanda Monte, thanks for being here.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's good to be here.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: Excited to chat about this.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_00: Can you tell people a little bit about who you are?
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: Totally, yeah.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm currently in Missoula.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: I moved here last summer for the University of Montana MFA,
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: the Creative Writing Program,
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: going into my second year on Monday of that program and trying to soak up
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: the last bits of Missoula's summer in the meantime.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_01: I lived in Bellingham, Washington before that.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: I have been kind of writing and podcasting and,
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know, yapping a lot for the last 10 years or so.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of that yapping has been about wildfire.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: I have a podcast about wildfire called Life with Fire.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of my, like,
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: writing friends are surprised to find that I'm not writing about fire at all
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: in my MFA program.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Writing about growing up in rural northern Michigan and all of the strange things
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: that that entailed.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, that's kind of what I'm working on now.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's my writing project at the moment is sort of memoir-esque about my upbringing
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: in northern Michigan and doing a little bit of sort of personal narrative blended
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: with like natural history, blended with family history and some research.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's been really fun.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's been really chaotic and unorganized.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: And every time I look at my draft of this big project, I get more overwhelmed.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: So other than that, that's basically what I have going on right now.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: I did work in fire for a few years.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of where this fire obsession came from.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, just trying to write as much as I can.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: That sounds like a lot of people's creative process, honestly.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: If you were hyper-organized, I'd be suspect.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: Are you sure you're in the MFA program?
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's weird.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: As you know,
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: this podcast is called My Favorite Things,
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: so we have a list of your five favorite things in chronological order
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: as you experience them.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about them.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: This first, this first one is called Booter Crunk by Rage Films.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: I have no, I have zero exposure to this.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: So can you kind of explain what it is before we get into how you, how you encountered it?
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_01: This was,
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: this is a wild card pick, but I,
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: it came to mind a couple of days ago when I was thinking about just this concept
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: and this episode that, yeah, this like podcast idea you have.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: So Wow, that was a weird way of saying that.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_01: The question that you gave me about my happier things,
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: and I was like, what has helped inform kind of like who I am as a person?
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_01: And like, what were some of the early sort of cultural touchstones of my life?
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: And Rage, yeah, this booter-crunk ski film from Rage Films, I think it was made in 2005.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I can talk more about how I encountered it at first.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah,
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_01: it's just this it's like kind of a classic mid 2000s ski film and it's just kind
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: of off the wall.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: There's there were so many songs in that film that I,
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_01: will hear kind of randomly now and it'll like give me just this insane dopamine hit
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: because I just watched this film so much when I was
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: in like my early high school years.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: It was like my first sort of exposure to like ski culture
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: because I had never watched a ski film before that.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: So that's a little bit of the background on that.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I haven't watched it in probably 10 years, if not more.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_01: So I can't, like, explain exactly.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: Like, my memory of it is pretty, like, fairly limited.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: But I just remember it was, like,
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: this profound, like,
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: moment of realizing, like, that I kind of wanted to be embedded in ski culture, too.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: I was, like, really obsessed with, like, park skiing at the time.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I just – that film kind of – Like opened up the world a little bit for me as
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_01: a ninth grader in Michigan.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, I feel like it kind of set off this series of wanting to work in the ski industry.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: I was obsessed with the idea of becoming like a ski journalist until...
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: Fully like halfway through college because of like sort
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_01: of like I think this just set off that sort of that sort of domino effect of
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: of like, oh,
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: this is something this this is like,
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: you know, a world that I'm really interested in.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: And like skiing isn't just kind of like these these tiny hills in Michigan and like,
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_01: you know, there's an opportunity.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: For this, yeah, I don't know.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: There's, like, just an opportunity.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: There's so much more out there, I guess.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: And in 2005 in Michigan,
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_01: I guess, Booter Crunk by Rage Films was, like, my mechanism of finding that out.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: So where are you skiing in 2005 in northern Michigan?
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: What's the name of the mountain?
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: Nub's Knob, my home mountain in Harbor Springs, Michigan.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: I love that place.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: I was spending, like, in ninth grade.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't have my license yet,
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_01: obviously,
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: but I was just getting rides with friends and, like,
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: Having my parents take me there on the weekends and was really grateful
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: that there was like,
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot about,
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: I had a past thankfully,
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: but I also remember like starting to ski in Northern Michigan.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I was so grateful that there were like opportunities to go out
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: with ski club early on,
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: like in elementary and middle school,
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: we had a ski club that would go out every Thursday.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: And it was like,
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: everyone would go because it was fairly inexpensive and you'd get like a lesson and
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: a free rental and, you know, some food at the cafeteria.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I just, yeah,
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot about that early period of learning how to ski and going skiing
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_01: with my friends and that developing into,
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: yeah, just like being kind of obsessed with it when I was in high school.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: And that sort of informed a lot of my decisions in college and like wanting
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: to move out west was sort of informed initially by like by skiing
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: because I just I was kind of my my access point.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_00: Do you recall, did Buddha Crunk come into your life via like a DVD copy that somebody gave you?
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: Or how did we get there?
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I went to Breckenridge with my ninth grade boyfriend,
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: who I think more importantly, I went with his sister, who I was best friends with.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: And I just happened to be dating him at the time.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: He was like my first sort of boyfriend in ninth grade.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of crazy that my parents let me get in a car with his entire family and
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: And we filled like an expedition,
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: I think, like their parents, like three rows of seating.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: We had two friends with us.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, there was me and then him and his sister and then his parents.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: And we like drove all the way to Colorado from the Midwest.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: And it was my first time really like, you know, anywhere west of the Mississippi.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: And we were like at this They just kind of let us loose in Breckenridge,
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_01: and we were able to do whatever we wanted.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: And we were at these ski shops,
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: looking at the twin tips at these ski shops, the twin tip rentals.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: We were like, whoa, you guys have rental twin tips here?
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's crazy.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: In the Midwest, that's not something that was happening.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I just remember going to ski shops,
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: and that was, for some reason, the film that called out to me was Booter Crunk.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: So you bought it.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I bought it.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: Bought it with my, yeah, I don't know, my chore money, I guess.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: Did Breckenridge feel big compared to Nob's Knob at all?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was pretty wild.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: I remember I had to sit middle,
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: I was in the middle row in the middle seat between my boyfriend and his friend
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: and all I could see.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: Was like when we were driving up the canyon to Breckenridge,
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: it was my first time seeing mountains and I was like desperate to like look out
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: the windows, but I like couldn't really lean over to see them.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: So I was like leaning forward and looking out the front window
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: and just being like blown away by mountains for the first time.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: Like I'll never forget driving up, I guess, whatever that highway is, but yeah.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly up to Breckenridge and just being like, oh my God, this is crazy.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you're in it.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: So you have you guys watching this this DVD while you're there skiing?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: No, I don't think we've watched it.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: We did have a TV set up in the back.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: It was like a tiny little TV with a VHS like thing.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_01: And then we also had video games set up and I never played the video games.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: So I was just surrounded by other people by like My boyfriend
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: and his friend playing video games on this tiny little TV.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like thinking back,
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: it's crazy that that that road trip,
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: like just thinking it's it's like a fever dream thinking about that road trip now.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: First time out West.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: Can you name any of the songs offhand that were in the in the film?
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_01: There's that banquet.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, what is it?
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_01: I forgot who the name or what the name of the artist is.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: Let me see.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's banquet.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: Block Party, Banquet.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think that,
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: I can't remember specifically,
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: but I think that was the song for one of the only female riders.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was actually a snowboarder in the film.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I just remember that scene and that was an insane,
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_01: I can't remember exactly why it was so insane,
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: but I just remember it being explicitly memorable.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and yeah.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: And then I just progressively picked up more.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: I got, you know, picked up more and more ski films throughout my high school years.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: But, and then like, you know, like Shane McConkie and like, yeah, Cody Townsend.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: And there were a number of other like films and, um,
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: segments that I remember being really kind of infatuated with,
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: but, but that was the first one banquet.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: And then I think, uh, one of the LCD sound system, uh, songs, I can't remember which one, but.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: Every now and then they'll pop up on like a 2000s playlist or something.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll be like, oh, dang, just like a potent dopamine hit.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_00: You have to stop and have your moment of nostalgia first.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: Now I can go on.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Number two is Ernest Hemingway's Nick Adams stories.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: Are we out of high school at this point?
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: Are you reading them?
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: When is this?
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: That would have been like senior year, I think.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe like early college.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't know how it was introduced to me.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: But the book centers around, it's sort of like auto fiction almost.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, yeah,
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: Nick Adams,
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: all of his adventures in Horton Bay,
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: Michigan, which is pretty close to where I grew up, about an hour or so away.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know,
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: he's like,
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: it's all these short stories and they were just so captivating
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: because they were centered on an ecosystem and a landscape
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: that I was really familiar with.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_01: And it was the first time I think I'd ever experienced that,
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: where I was reading something that I could really deeply Connect to on a sort
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: of place-based,
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_01: like I know what that landscape,
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: I know what he's describing because I've like been there and I've also,
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: maybe not had as fun of adventures as Nick Adams,
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_01: but like certainly I could just like put myself into these scenarios
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: because I was familiar with the places that he was talking about.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that was just,
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_01: the reason that one was so profound,
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: I think was because it was the first time I'd really like seen myself in literature
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: and like seen and felt something resonating at like such a,
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: like, Deeply personal level.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah,
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: kind of really informed,
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: like to this day,
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: sort of I think informs what I'm hoping to do with my,
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: like with like a memoir,
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: with like the essays that I'm writing about Michigan,
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: just to like,
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: just remembering that even if something feels like deeply specific
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_01: and deeply personal,
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: in fact,
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_01: like if you can expand it out,
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: if you can talk about You know,
• 12:01
  SPEAKER_01: the ecosystem,
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: the natural spaces that you're in, like people will be able to resonate with that.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe even if they're not familiar,
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: hopefully even if they're not familiar with those places,
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: but even more so if they are.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah,
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: that one was,
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_01: that was just something I think, yeah,
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: early on,
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: I don't feel like I read, you know, I didn't read enough in middle and high school.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like I was, I like, it wasn't super, it wasn't really modeled to me.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't something I was really like, Focused on.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like my,
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_01: some of my teachers were encouraging, like, you know, encouraged us to read.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: And obviously we had to read for some of our classes,
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_01: but like, I feel like I was not reading in my free time that much.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it was because I wasn't finding anything that I was really engaged in
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: and like excited about.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that was the first book that I just like ate up.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: I read it so fast and I was like, I want more like this.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think I read, yeah,
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: like The Big Two-Hearted after that, I think that was actually part of the book.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was like a collection of short stories that included The Big Two-Hearted.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, that was kind of a turning point and just like enjoying myself while I'm reading.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: Was it this one?
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: In Our Time?
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_01: No, it was called The Nick Adams Stories.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah,
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: So the full collection.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, yeah.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: Was there,
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: were you in high school,
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: were you like having the feeling I want to get out of Michigan or were you?
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: Was it?
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: So was there something about Hemingway kind of celebrating that area of the country
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: that made you feel like, I don't know, how did it make you feel?
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think, yeah, I...
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_01: I knew like I think that was why the ski films were so powerful was
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: that it was like introducing me to these other places in a way
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: that I hadn't experienced before.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: So I was like, oh, I can't wait to get out West.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait to be able to ski out West.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: And that kind of progressed that sustained through college.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: But I do think reading that book,
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: it was like it gave me a deep sense of pride in like where I was from.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that I've carried that even though I've moved out West
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: since I think I've carried that pride.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: In a way that I'm like,
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: I actually, like,
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I would have understood,
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: or I don't know that I would have,
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: if it would have been this profound if I hadn't read that book.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: I think like,
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: especially like a literary pride,
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_01: like I think it introduced me to the idea that like,
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_01: there is a pretty like strong sort of canon from this area.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know,
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: there are a lot of folks who were inspired,
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: who are, who did really exceptional work while living in this area.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, like Jim Harrison, Tom McGuane, Ernest Hemingway.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I think just being introduced to like the first of those,
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_01: I've eventually I've since sort of like read the others,
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: but just being introduced to the idea that like somebody was writing
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_01: about somebody has written about this place and about this ecosystem and about
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: the types of things people do here.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah,
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: I guess that was pretty profound in terms of just making me feel that sense of pride
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: about Michigan.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I was just having coffee with an old professor of mine from
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: the university here this week, and the Nick Adams stories came up.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: I can't remember if he's still,
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_00: he's teaching them maybe in a course,
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: as part of a course,
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: but he was saying there's a guy in Michigan that claims to be able to take,
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_00: like he knows exactly,
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: he's figured out which river is Big Two-Hearted River, and we'll take you there.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure how correct that is, but do you have an idea?
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm familiar with this.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: So like, yeah, the Fox River is like what the Big Two-Hearted was about.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_01: And the Fox River is like,
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know much about the Fox other than that I've driven over it many times to go
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: to college in the UP.
• 15:58
  SPEAKER_01: And whenever you're like driving over it,
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_01: you can sense just like how miserable it would be to fish this river.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's just so swampy, so overgrown.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you look down and you're like, you wouldn't even want to bring a fly rod in there.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: It would be, it would be a gong show.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and so like, yeah,
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_01: I have to imagine that was kind of a miserable experience,
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_01: but yes,
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_01: I've heard, I've heard about, and maybe it's different when it's off the highway.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe there's some sections that are a little more forgiving that you can't see from
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: the, from the highway and Semi.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: But, um, yeah,
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's, Yeah,
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_01: it's just like, it's cool that it has that sort of literary history in that area.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: And it was cool to find that out as like when I did,
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_01: when I was feeling like this deep sense of like, I don't belong here.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I really need to, I want to leave.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so yeah,
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: having that book sort of changed my perspective on it at that sort
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: of formative age was important.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: Do you think the Hemingway voice influences your writing at all nowadays?
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think so.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: I try to, I try, I wonder about this.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: I wonder like where,
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: I read a lot of like very weird,
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: like I read a lot of Chuck Klosterman when I was in high school.
• 17:19
  SPEAKER_01: I don't really know how or why I found Chuck Klosterman in high school.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like Sex Drugs and Cocoa Puffs.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: I was like obsessed with like that style of writing in like 11th grade.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: Again, at this time,
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like,
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: I wish somebody when I was like a little sponge
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: who was like just seeking out anything,
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: In terms of reading,
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_01: in terms of like books that resonated with me,
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: I wish somebody had been there to like sort of guide me
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: because what I was finding was like, like,
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: not to say Chuck Klosterman's bad,
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: but like, I just feel like actually I informed my voice.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: Like,
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like my voice was formed quite a bit by reading books like that when I was
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: in high school,
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: like kind of cultural criticism,
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: like sarcastic,
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: or like,
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: I don't even know,
• 18:00
  SPEAKER_01: like that tone of reading really It did inform my early voice
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: and I think still has some influence, which is so strange to think about.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I read a bunch of Chuck Klosterman, like Fargo, Rock City, Killing Yourself to Live.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of stuff in there that still comes up in my memories from time to time.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't know.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't shoot on Chuck Klosterman.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: No, and I think it was so fun to read when I was that age.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact,
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: I've read,
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to think of the book that I read recently of his,
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: but I kind of love that that is what has informed my voice.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like of all things I could have found my way into, I'm really grateful it was that.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's just like,
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: when I think back on how random that is in the grand scheme of being in the Midwest
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_01: and Not being interested in cultural criticism or not even knowing what that is at
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_01: that time.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: And like finding my way into these books of essays, like so strange, so random.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know how I found out about it either.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: I found out about his stuff.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was reading like Spin Magazine and stuff at the time,
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_00: but I feel like somebody recommended the book Fargo Rock City to me,
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: which is a great title, you know?
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_01: Totally.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but yeah.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, moving up to,
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: moving up about 100 years or 80 years,
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_00: we have the writing of John Jeremiah Sullivan,
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: who is a longtime journalist for,
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think now like the New York Times Magazine,
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: but written for all the fancy publications.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_00: And you specifically listed a couple stories here.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want to talk about Yeah,
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_00: do you want to talk about the first one or do you want to talk about his in general?
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever you want to, however you want to take this.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, totally.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: I was like introduced to John Jeremiah Sullivan in college
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: by like hands down my favorite professor of my undergrad,
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: Josh McIver Anderson, shout out.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: He was my nonfiction professor for a couple of years and he had us read Pulphead
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: for one of his nonfiction classes.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember just like reframing my entire concept of like what nonfiction could be.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: And like has stuck with me
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: and I obsessively am like always Googling John Jeremiah Sullivan to see like
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: if he has released new stuff because he's sort of like,
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_01: he's sort of under the radar now.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like he doesn't release new things very often.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'm kind of always keeping tabs because I just have loved almost everything
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: that he's put out since then.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like he did a piece about this plumber that came to his house.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was for Harper's and it was just like hilarious.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like I read a piece about his from like a trip to Disney World that he took
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: and A lot of it feels a little David Foster Wallace-esque
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_01: where you're combining personal narrative with research and then just being part of
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_01: the story yourself.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's very personal, very observational.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_01: So that's what I loved about Upon This Rock, which is one of the pieces I shared.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_01: I first read that again in 2012,
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_01: probably,
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_01: and it just completely,
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_01: again, reframed how I was thinking about nonfiction and what nonfiction could be.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's hilarious.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's deeply engaging.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's very humanizing.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's very empathetic.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_01: I just really appreciated how he braided all these things together and had the tone
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_01: of his writing,
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_01: his ability to sort of,
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know, just be a part of the story and kind of embed in what he's doing.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: The Ballad of Jishi and Elvie is another one that I thought was...
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: Just a really good example.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's like more journalistic,
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: I would say, than – yeah, definitely more journalistic than Upon This Rock.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: But it's very like – like he's almost kind of rewriting history as he's writing this piece.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like he's being – he's like part historian.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: He's like part of the research process,
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_01: part of like developing what the history of these two women,
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: these two like women who sort of reshaped early blues music in Wisconsin in like
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: the early 1930s.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: Like, he's the one that's doing the research and, like,
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: it's – or,
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_01: he has a team of researchers, but he's, like, kind of, like, shaping this story.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of it is speculative.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: I think he does a really good job with,
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: like, speculative nonfiction where he's, like, maybe they did this.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like, maybe this is what this would have looked like.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: When they were riding on the train into,
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: you know, Milwaukee or whatever, like, this is what they would have been seeing.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: They would have been seeing this flooding that, like, occurred that spring.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: They would have experienced this is what the lake would have looked like at the time
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: that they arrived.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: Like, Stuff that you, it's just like kind of exceptional how expansive nonfiction can be.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I think he's really, he's just really extraordinary at like expanding those boundaries.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, that's my, that's my ode to John Jeremiah Sullivan.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: I also just think he's hilarious and I love like his,
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_01: the way he interprets and like interacts with the world and you can see that
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_01: in his writing.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's really special.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't, he's not afraid to sort of embed himself.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: I was just, um,
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: this morning,
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: reading the beginning of, uh,
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: upon this rock trying to remember
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_00: it from the book that I'd read 10,
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: 10 years ago or whatever.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: And he likes it's,
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: it's about Christian rock festivals and he,
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: Goes on,
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_00: this is like 2004,
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: he goes on like an internet message board to try to,
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: he's like,
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: you know what would be great is if I could get some of these young people to ride
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: to this music festival with me over several days and we'll go there,
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: I'll just kind of embed myself with them and he talks
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_00: about how he's just like completely underestimated how young the fans are
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: on this festival.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: I'm this message board and they all think he's a pedophile because he's like,
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: I was thinking like, you know, people up to the age of 28 would be good.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: And it turns out these people are like 12 and 14.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: And they're like, I don't think my mom would think that was very like cool, but I would go.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: And he's just like, oh my God, what am I doing?
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: And they all like gang up on him in the, in the chat room.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like it just escalates and he's like, oh my God.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: And then he's like, I got to change my whole program now.
• 24:06
  SPEAKER_01: Like I can't go to that one anymore.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: So where are you going to school and what are you studying when this comes up
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_00: in your nonfiction class?
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what's your major at that point?
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was at Northern Michigan University in Marquette, Michigan.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I was doing,
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: I think, yeah,
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: I was an English writing degree with a creative nonfiction focus with,
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: I think, a journalism minor.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: So from an early, yeah,
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: from early on in my, like, well, I mean,
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: I made it to an English writing degree by way of International studies, photography.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think I tried history for like a semester.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_01: And then I eventually made my way into writing because I had been a writer.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_01: I had worked.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: I had like done a bunch of stuff for our high school yearbook
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: and our high school newspaper,
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: which I think it's exceptional that my rural high school in northern Michigan had
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: a journalism program that was like not only like Really strong,
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: but also was like award winning at the national level.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: We would go to these national awards and get like best of show or like,
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: you know, best photography or whatever it was.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so I'd been writing for that class and it sort of helped frame up where I wanted
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_01: to go when I was in college and trying to decide what I was doing.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, I ended up in English writing and yeah, graduated in 2013.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: So it's been like
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: It was 12 years between undergrad and my MFA, which proved to be pretty intense.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, that's the backstory on that.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so in those intervening years,
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: how do you think this work actually informed what you were doing with yourself
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_00: between graduation and entering the MFA program?
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: Or actually, did it lead you to the MFA program?
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: I think it did lead me because I think that I was trying,
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm still like trying to do this style of work,
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: like ideally,
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: but I struggle with, yeah,
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_01: I struggle,
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: I was finding that I was struggling with long form writing,
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: longer form,
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: like a lot of the essays that I write are like under 2000 words,
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: like before I got into the program,
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: I was doing like almost what you would call like flash nonfiction,
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: like short little essays,
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: And some reportage,
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: some attempts at braiding reportage with like personal narrative
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: and like being embedded in the story.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: I like have a few stories I'm really proud of that I did kind of pull that off,
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: but I had so many, I have so many more ideas.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I think like, I don't know.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: I think like my dream coming out of college was like,
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just going to go I'm just going to go do John Jeremiah Sullivan stuff.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just going to go do David Foster Wallace stuff.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to go see like,
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to go to these weird festivals or like,
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know,
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: NASCAR races and like,
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: just like observe people and talk to people and like write great magazine pieces
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: about these like obscure Americana festivals and events.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: And like, that's, I think that's still weirdly there.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, it's, it's buried.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_01: I think I just like wasn't really I wasn't really doing that.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't doing the style of writing that I thought would be like the most fun
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: because I think the style of writing I want to do requires,
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: you know, like some longer form and just like more involved work.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: Like I I'm trying to learn how to just stick with ideas until,
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_01: until I reach a point where I'm I feel happy with the product,
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: like I think Even Sullivan talks about spending a year on a story,
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_01: and he hyperfixates,
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_01: and he just locks in, and this is what he's thinking about and focusing on.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm kind of interested in that, in getting to a place where I can do that.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_01: I think the problem will be also making money, but...
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_00: I was going to say,
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: you can't compare yourself to people when they were in the golden age
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: of print journalism.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's so true, yeah.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I would say he was probably trending out of that,
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: but there were people who write for The New Yorker,
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: and they deserve this,
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: but they just write six stories a year,
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: and they get pretty close to six figures, I'm pretty sure.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: So when you're like, I spent a year on this, you're like, well, how much money were you making?
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: Nowadays,
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: it's very hard to get paid for something that you're like,
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: I want to go to this music festival.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: And they're like, okay, cool.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: We'll give you 500 bucks.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_00: And you're like, well, okay.
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they'd never get you the 28-foot RV, that's for sure.
• 28:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right?
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I know.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: I know.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_01: Always a tough balance, though.
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_01: because I can subsidize some of that work a little bit with other work on the side,
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: communication stuff.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: But you just end up tapping so much of your creative...
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_01: Of your limited creative capacity.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: I can't even imagine living in a world in which you could just focus on writing all the time.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: Advice I was not able to follow from my Uncle Danny was you can marry more money in
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: a minute than you can make in a lifetime.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I do think...
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: Not that we should be like putting people under a microscope,
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: but sometimes when you're like, how is a successful writer do it?
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: If you have that one key piece of information where you're like,
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_00: oh, their partner has a real job with health insurance.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh, well, that would make it a
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_01: lot easier, you
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: know?
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: So it's like.
• 29:49
  SPEAKER_00: But we're not in that camp at our house.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a little bit more scrappy.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_00: But anyway, that's just a joke.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think it's a good strategy.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_01: I've been, you know, kind of, I've been attempting to explore that strategy.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: I think
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_01: that I'm actually just like only dating like commercial fishermen
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: and like seasonal workers, which is not the Is this all
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: through the same app?
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, number four, Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: This is a famous book,
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: but for people who have not read it,
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: can you kind of describe what happens in the book?
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's the year after her husband dies.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I read this book the year that my stepmom died,
• 30:48
  SPEAKER_01: which was like probably the it was absolutely
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_01: the most like profound grief I'd ever experienced.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: And that was 2014.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so my yeah, like my stepmom passed away.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_01: I was living at home.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_01: This was after college.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_01: This was, again, the time when I was like desperate to move out west.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I was thrust into this this situation where I was like helping out at home.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_01: I have I have four young half-sisters.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: Three of them are my dad and my stepmom's daughters.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_01: And so I was just in the thick of it,
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_01: kind of doing a lot of caretaking and dealing with grief of my own while also kind
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: of managing the grief of my sisters and my dad.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm writing about this right now, so it's front of mind.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I just remember reading that book and being like, Again,
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: kind of similar to the Nick Adams stories,
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: just being like, whoa,
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_01: somebody has written about an experience that I'm having and it actually reflects
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: in some ways my own experience and it makes me feel less alone.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's the whole thing with writing and reading is just wanting
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_01: to feel less alone in these moments where you're like, this is so much.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: And so it was, it was so much.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_01: And so reading her book and reading about her Grief and how she was managing it
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_01: and how she was thinking about it and processing it.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I think I read a few reviews of it this morning just in preparation
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: and people were calling it really cold,
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_01: like she was not very emotional in her relay and in her processing of her grief.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_01: I can't remember that part of the book.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: I don't remember the tone being cold, but I remember it being deeply resonant.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: I remember it being like,
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe that's a reflection of how I grieve too,
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_01: but it was just the first book that I read where I was like, oh,
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: this is deeply emotionally resonant in a way that I didn't even know was possible.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it was maybe the first time that I realized
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_01: that I could write stuff like that,
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: that the grief I was experiencing could also be that for somebody else.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's just a formative thought to have.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: And really empowering to feel that way when you're reading a book that like as
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_01: a writer where you're in a burgeoning writer, like a young like baby writer.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I have unique experiences of grief that I think could be useful to write about.
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I did write about it.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_01: And it was like what I was it was the only thing I was writing about
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_01: for like five years of my life because it was so much to process.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_01: And like those essays that I wrote and posted on my like website and had people
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: who I didn't know, like friends of friends.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_01: Um, cause I would just post it on like Facebook,
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_01: but I'd have like friends of friends be like,
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: this was,
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: this was such a, like,
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: this was a,
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: this was an,
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_01: the way that you've explained grief,
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_01: like really resonates with how I experienced grief or like,
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: I really appreciated this.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_01: Like, this is also how I felt in the,
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_01: after, you know, my stepmom passed away, like people who are really close to us.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_01: So that I think really resonate or it really built just like having read that book
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_01: and then having like felt empowered to write about my own grief.
• 34:03
  SPEAKER_01: And then having people respond to that by saying things like this resonated
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_01: or like you've captured something that I felt too was like in that early period
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_01: of being a writer felt so powerful and felt so energizing.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, this is all I want to do now.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: I just want to like write about these like hyper,
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_01: like hyper nuanced experiences that are like hyper,
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_01: hyper specific experiences that like actually are still going to resonate
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_01: with people.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know,
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_01: Bringing these emotional – bringing these vulnerabilities and like the emotions
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: that I've experienced like to the page and just seeing what happens.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_01: And like sometimes it falls flat and sometimes it doesn't.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I just like think that all started with that book.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think that's like kind of when I teach writing workshops,
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_00: they talk about like,
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: that's what we're that's what we're trying to do is just find a collection of words
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: to describe something so that it can make people feel less alone,
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: you know, when they read it so they can say me too, you know, and.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: Because people say like, oh, I'm just another person who's done the same thing as other people.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: Should I even write about it?
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, of course.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: You think we need more love songs?
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_00: There's going to be more love songs this year.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_00: People just keep making them.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_00: And we keep embracing them.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, your story matters too.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: And she also was like, her daughter was in a coma when her husband died or the dad died.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: And then And then also her daughter died, I think, before the book came out.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think so.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: It was like a pretty back-to-back battering.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_01: I couldn't remember the exact specifics,
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: but I was like, I think her daughter was also a big part of the book.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's rough.
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_00: Did somebody give it to you or recommend it because they knew what you were going through?
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_00: Or do you remember how you encountered it?
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_01: I don't remember.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_01: At all, which is weird.
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_01: I think I had read Joan Didion in college.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'd read like Slouching Towards Bethlehem, maybe the Blue Album and some of her other essays.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: And so I think I was like probably Googling books,
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_01: like books of essays about grief or something to that effect.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think I also stumbled on, I can't remember when this was published.
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_01: It might've been quite a few years later,
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_01: but a book by, there was a, David Sedaris wrote a book about grieving as well.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I remember like really liking that book as well.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so I don't know how I was finding these other than maybe
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_01: that I was actively like seeking them out.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know that people were recommending them to me because I lived in, yeah,
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: Indian River,
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: Michigan,
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: like not a literary place,
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_01: not a lot of, there's not a community there for that, like that I've found anyway.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe it's changed since then,
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_01: but at the time I feel like I was like really,
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_01: I felt like, Yeah,
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_01: I felt really isolated in that experience and in like not having the resources
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_01: to really know how to process it.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_00: Shout out to Joan Didion for that.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, Joan.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: The master of writing many, many things, let alone like grief.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_00: We have the same late crusade pan,
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: I realized, because somebody did some story about cooking pot.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, oh, yeah.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's the one thing I have in common with Joan Didion.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: Because apparently she threw these like amazing, I think Thanksgiving dinners.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_00: And there's actually like documentation of like her process of doing this.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'll try to find it and send it to you.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_00: But I encountered a few last year because a friend is like going through
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_00: a Joan Didion phase too for some reason right now.
• 37:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's a canon event.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone's got it.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a documentary, a Joan Didion documentary.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_01: That I watched a few years ago.
• 37:58
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, is it good?
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_01: It was really good.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think I watched it during COVID or something, and it was just like exactly what I needed.
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: Jon has just been there for me in all of the moments.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the center will not hold.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there's-
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to look that up.
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'll put that in the show notes as well.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_00: Number five, King Gizzard, live on KEXP.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_00: And you put in this song specifically, and I'll link to the song.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_00: When are you...
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_00: I think this is nine years old, as it says.
• 38:42
  SPEAKER_00: So it was put up in 2017.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_00: What's going on in your life where you found this...
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_00: Video or did you actually hear it on the radio?
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't hear it on the radio.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think I found it until like 2021,
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_01: but it's become,
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know that I have anything super profound to say about this one other than
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_01: that it's become my like hyper fixation song that like when I turn this on,
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_01: when I hear the opening beats,
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_01: like my brain just is like writing mode and it's only whatever,
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_01: five and a half minutes long or something.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_01: I wish it was like 48 minutes of them just doing like this song over and over and
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_01: over again without any YouTube ads.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_01: But I just get into a mode with this song.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I saw a few weeks ago, I think this might be a fake thing on the internet.
• 39:29
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_01: But like Stephen King, it was like a thing about Stephen King listening to Mambo No.
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_01: 5 a bunch to get into the writing mood and how it was like so annoying to his wife
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_01: that she was like threatening divorce.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_00: I would murder him.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my God.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_01: But I read that and I was like, oh my God.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_01: Billabong Valley by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard on KEXP
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: in 2017 is my mambo number five.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I want it.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and I do this too.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I just,
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: I just did the exact same thing to my wife,
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_00: like five days ago,
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: like one weekend I was like, yeah, I'm just working on this thing.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: And she was sitting across from me at the kitchen table.
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_00: This is after Jay went to bed and I'm not going to say the song,
• 40:07
  SPEAKER_00: but like, I finally shut it off after.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: Cause I was just, I'm just hammering.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, yeah, okay.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_00: And she had had headphones on.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_00: She just goes, finally, Oh my God.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_00: And it was like a repetitive instrumental.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, anyway.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_00: But it's a tactic for sure.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know if this is a YouTube premium feature,
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: but if you just like right click or double click on the video,
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_00: there's a thing where you can loop the song.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_00: But I have YouTube premium, so that might be why.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: So there's no ads.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm kind of wondering if that would like put me into psychosis or something.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think I would just get lost in it.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like I would just like not even realize.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: What was happening?
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it would be like five hours later and I'd be like, what happened?
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_01: What just, what did I just experience?
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, that might be very productive too, right?
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: Like we finish a book in that amount of time.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so this band,
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_00: do you like, did you know about them before you, before you found this KEXP set?
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_01: I think I was like looking them up on YouTube and that was one of the first things
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_01: that came up and, uh, um, Yeah.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_01: And it's just this specific recording of this song.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: Like if I listen to that song on Spotify,
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_01: it doesn't hit nearly as well as the recording that I that will like to.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't know.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_01: I like I don't have like any specific crazy things to say about King Gizzard and
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_01: the Lizard Wizard other than I've seen them live once.
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_01: It was a great show.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_01: I love their like The breadth of the work that they do.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: I love that each of their albums is so wildly different.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_01: I love that they're experimental.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think this was a microtonal album.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: Don't ask me what that means,
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: but I feel like it gave it this great, I don't know, this great vibe.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_01: It felt very almost like kind of Middle Eastern or something.
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_01: You can tell there are so many layers of influence in all of their different albums.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not a huge,
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know,
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: Is there like a deadhead term for King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard people?
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_01: There probably is, but I'm not that person.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_01: I just love their live recordings specifically of this album.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 42:18
  SPEAKER_00: I guess we should maybe dive in and talk about what KEXP is and what live KEXP is.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_00: As a person who lived in Bellingham for a long time, could you describe KEXP?
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like it's such a unique...
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_00: Radio station.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_01: I wish I could.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like there is this enormous cultural...
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: It has a really enormous cultural place in Seattle, specifically.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's the NPR station.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_01: They do some...
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_01: I can't remember the name of the woman who's in the studio.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_01: Why can't I think of her name?
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_01: But I feel like I love her voice.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: She's just...
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like such a calming voice.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: The shows that they bring on, the artists that they bring on, like I will discover an artist.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: I'll put them,
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'll look them up on YouTube and like KEXP will have done a recording
• 43:12
  SPEAKER_01: with them like eight years ago.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, damn, they're
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_00: on it.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't know like a lot beyond that.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_01: Other than that, again,
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_01: every time I find a new artist,
• 43:21
  SPEAKER_01: they've already found them like five years ago, eight years ago.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_00: There's a band, I'm blanking on the name of it right now, but they thank Cheryl and KEXP.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's Cheryl.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_00: Cheryl Waters.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: They thank Cheryl at the beginning of their show for basically making their career.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_01: it's Nation of Language.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_01: Is that the name of the band?
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's a phenomenon.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_00: They've been to the building in Seattle where they redid the building
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_00: so they would have this huge performance space and a coffee shop and a record store
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_00: and people just go there and hang out.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_00: When you're like, oh,
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: radio stations are struggling,
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_00: they're all being bought up by like Clear Channel or whatever.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: And KEXP is just thriving.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's unbelievable.
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_00: And they said,
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_00: one of the other hosts,
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was John in the morning,
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_00: said during a Jose Gonzalez show that they built the new space because,
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 44:22
  SPEAKER_00: Basically,
• 44:23
  SPEAKER_00: they had no even green room for the artists to come in to like hang out
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_00: before he like Jose Gonzalez was like sleeping in his car or sitting
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_00: in his car waiting to do this show.
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_00: Because typically what I think what they do is they the artist will be playing
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_00: a show that night somewhere in Seattle or the next day and they'll do a few songs in
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_00: the studio and it has turned into this just...
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_00: It's an incredible thing that you can find so many incredible musicians on it.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_00: I actually was in,
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_00: I got to be in the room,
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: not whatever it's called,
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: like the control room or something, when Andrew Bird was there.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, sweet.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because a friend had a meeting there and she's like, do you want to go to KEXP?
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, yeah, for sure.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like, oh, yeah, Andrew Bird's here.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_00: It like...
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like, yeah, and I was so blown away because I'm a huge Andrew Bird fan.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_00: And then they gave us some tickets to the show that night, which was awesome.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I know.
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_01: That's a story.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 45:17
  SPEAKER_01: Dang.
• 45:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, no, I have a thing.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: The banter back and forth with some of the musicians in Cheryl,
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_00: like Ben Gibbard specifically, is like homies with her and like they chat.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I love that.
• 45:30
  SPEAKER_00: Which is really interesting.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the chatting has actually become part of,
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_01: like, the hyper fix, the hyper whatever you'd call it on these recordings.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_01: Like, because at this point, I just have, like, a playlist.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_01: It just plays all of the recordings back to back, basically.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_01: And at this point, like, yeah, Cheryl Waters, her questions and their responses to them.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, it's like part of the music at this point.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's just like kind of the whole program.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, I wish I had more to say about that one.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_01: But, yeah, it's just been it's just been.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_01: I'm obsessing over.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like when I need to like lock in, it's like, that's the first thing I do.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: Do you ever think like maybe in 10 years,
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_00: you're going to look back and be like,
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: you're going to hear this,
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: like this song and be like, oh my God, this was grad school.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_00: This is my grad school writing song.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of love when that happens when you forget about a song
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_01: and how obsessed you were with it for a year.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_01: And then you,
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_01: and then you hear it again and it's just such a potent,
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_01: like, Like, I don't even know, dopamine experience.
• 46:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, literally takes you back.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_01: Here's a song that is so attached to a specific era of your life and be like,
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_01: how did I forget about this for the last 10 years?
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the massive nostalgia trigger.
• 46:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_00: This was fantastic.
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_00: So we have for your favorite things were Booter Crunk, Hemingway's Nick Adams stories.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_00: I love the juxtaposition of those two.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_01: A sentence that's never been said before.
• 46:55
  SPEAKER_00: Booter Crunk and Hemingway.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_00: So Booter Crunk,
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_00: Hemingway's Nick Adams stories,
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_00: the writing of John Jeremiah Sullivan,
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_00: which I will link to Pulphead in the show notes,
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_00: which is the collection of a bunch of these stories.
• 47:10
  SPEAKER_00: Joan Didion's Year of Magical Thinking and King Gizzard Live on KEXP.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for doing this, Amanda.
• 47:17
  SPEAKER_00: This has been super fun.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that was a great time.
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thanks, Brendan.