Latest / My Favorite Things / My Favorite Things Episode 26: Writer and Running Coach Peter Bromka

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My Favorite Things Episode 26: Writer and Running Coach Peter Bromka · My Favorite Things

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Peter Bromka, thanks for being here.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for having me.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: I'm excited to be here.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Can you tell people a little bit about who you are currently?
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: I am, I like to say, a runner, a writer, and a coach in Portland, Oregon.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: I have lived in Portland,
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: I grew up in Portland, and then moved to the East Coast,
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_01: moved to California,
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: and then moved back over a decade ago, and yeah, love where I live.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: And a dad,
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: and a husband.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: And a dad, and a husband, and...
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: What would I say?
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: If you can see my background, you'd see a whole bunch of running stuff.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: I, a couple years ago,
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: transitioned from working in consumer insight consulting,
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: kind of helping brands,
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: engineers, designers understand people with my anthropology background.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: To going all in on being a running coach,
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: writing about running, podcasting about running, but man, that's a weird thing.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: And as I was building this office,
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: it was sort of like a light bulb moment of like, maybe my life and career changing.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Because I was sort of building,
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: this is my son's closet, which is designed to look, it's a cozy spot.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_01: But I realized I was like building...
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: A background that people could see on Zoom calls that was entirely my running life
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: and pieces of art and newspapers and prints and mostly about my running life,
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: which had been in the background of my consulting work for years
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: and just grew louder and louder and louder until the point where I was like, huh.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so yeah,
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: a handful of years ago,
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: I transitioned to becoming a running coach, which is how I spend most of my time.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_01: And then also trying to endlessly work on a book about the marathon,
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: about my own marathon journey,
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: which I hope to bring into the world in the next couple of years.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: How about 2027, man?
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: Let's do it.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: Let's do it.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: Where are your son's clothes?
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: This is not relevant to what we're going to talk about, but where does he keep his clothes?
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: My son takes after my wife,
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: and he's a very organized 11-year-old boy who keeps his clothes in his dresser,
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: which is right outside this.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's in his main room.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know,
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: whereas if this was my room,
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: I would be sitting on a pile of his clothes, you know, just so.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: He's like, and like...
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: I see it every week or two where I'll like drop a sweatshirt on the way out of here
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: to get a cup of water.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: And then he's like, hey, dad, do you think you could pick up that stuff?
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, man, I have so much respect.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm pissed off,
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: but then I'm more so respectful of how clean you are and how you want your life
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: to just be just so.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's incredible.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's not because of me.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: People are going to be asking him in like 10 years, like, what was your dad like?
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like, he's kind of a shitty roommate.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: He's kind of slobby, kind of slob.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: Kind of slob, yeah.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: Would you mind getting around to cleaning that up?
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: That
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: cuts deep.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: Cuts deep.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, as you know, this podcast is called My Favorite Things.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: So you have sent me a list of your favorite things.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm excited to talk about these because a couple of them are pretty unique.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: Starting with the first one, which is a huge slab of stone in my house.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: Can you tell us what this is for one thing and then move through it a little bit?
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_01: I am the...
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: Proud owner of a over 500 pound slab of basalt.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's a basalt column.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: I grew up in a household with a whole bunch of art all over the walls and all over the house.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_01: And I think when you're a kid, you just don't know anything better.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_01: That's just dad's basalt column in the front hall.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: And my dad is really into rock.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think in a different era,
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: he went to law school and at some point in undergrad took a geology course.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I think if he could have seen his way to a career in geology that was other
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: than just petroleum exploration or academia, he would have.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: But he has not technically worked in geology,
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: although he makes a whole bunch of art that involves...
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_01: Rock, glass, found pieces of trees.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_01: But do not call him an artist.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_01: Because if you call him an artist,
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: he's just like, it's a full rejection of any proposal that he's an artist.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_01: But back 40 years ago,
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: when he had a law office downtown,
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: he was like,
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: you know what I should do is go out to the gorge outside of Portland,
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: hire a Mason to break off a piece of a basalt column, which are beautiful.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then we'll bring it into Portland and then we'll cut the top at an angle.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_01: They form angles at the top naturally so that it's shiny on top.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: And that was sitting in our front hall of our house.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: From my whole life until my mom passed,
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: my dad moved out,
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_01: and I inherited,
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: I say over 500 pounds because it broke a hand truck on the way into our house
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: that was rated for 500 pounds.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_01: And we were able to get it into place in our dining room,
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: making sure that it's in line with the foundation.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's not like over something that over time might just break the floor.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Crash through into the washing machine.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a couple of things.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: It's beautiful.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's noteworthy because people are like, what?
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: What is that?
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, favorite things.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: I was scrolling the feed of this.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, you got some artists on here.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: You got some people with some really wonderful tastes.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, what do I have?
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: The beauty of owning a over 500 pound basalt column is you're never like, where did that go?
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Do I still have that?
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: Did I misplace it?
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: My dad's watched.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: There's so many little things.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: He also gave me a piece of rock from the top of Mount Kilimanjaro that I,
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: you know, every two years, I'm like, oh, shoot, do I still have that?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, it's still in my sock drawer.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_01: But like, it's so small,
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_01: you worry that like it could be gone.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: And In this case, it ain't going anywhere.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: How big is it?
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: Can you describe the directions of it?
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: Can you hug it?
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: You can almost hug it.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: And then it's like maybe four feet tall, three and a half feet tall.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: So it's about the size.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's about the height of a
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: hand truck.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: And then it might be exaggerating, but it.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's like up to my waist.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: So maybe a little bit shorter than that.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, it is solid.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, his other large rocks went other places.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: You could just like do stuff like that.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: There was a large boulder that was placed in the median between our house and
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: the house next to ours because when I was in elementary school,
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: he found a bigger rock.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we're talking the size of...
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_01: Smaller than like a small Honda.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, the size of a motorcycle if it was a orb of sorts.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_01: And he said to the neighbor like,
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: what if I brought in this rock and we just placed it right at the sidewalk and
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: So that's something that we had that stayed in place when we sold the house.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: Cause like, I don't know, it's hard to pick up.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: love this.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: I think it expanded my view of what art could be or how we could interact with,
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: as I've gotten older and reflected on what the meaning of things it's like,
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_01: it's expanded my view of what, yeah,
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: how you can appreciate the beauty of things and how you can incorporate them
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_01: in your life.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_00: I have questions about the legality of cutting out a basalt column.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: What was the situation?
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: This was from a quarry.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay, okay, okay.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we have other potentially illegally acquired stones, so we won't get into those.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_01: But in this case, I mean, my dad,
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: I can say it now,
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_01: when he moved out of the house,
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: he brought an enormous,
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: like the size of a large hiking backpack and Volcanic bomb from Mount St.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: Helens to Portland State University.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: Their geology department is like, I'd like to donate this to you.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: And they're like, yeah, that's illegally acquired.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_00: And he's like, no, I mean...
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: It was in my front yard.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's been on my bookshelf for 40 years.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_01: And they're like, sir,
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: just because you went up to Mount St.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: Helens in like 1985 and picked it up doesn't mean it's less illegal.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: So there's all sorts.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: What's the statute of limitations on stolen rocks?
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: We would not encourage people to do that frequently,
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: but it's pretty rare to do that type of thing.
• 9:30
  SPEAKER_01: So, yeah, that's not in my possession.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: Is there the slab of stone?
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: Was it something you threw sweatshirts on as a teenager and now it's in your house
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_00: and you throw sweatshirts on it?
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: Or is it like... Luckily, it's not the
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: dining room.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: it used to be like you put a sling a jacket over it on the way in the door and,
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: you know, and...
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_01: Then be like, I'm going to hang that up later.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: But now it's in the dining room,
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: so it doesn't really, it's not in the line of sight for, you know, making a mess of.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_01: But it is, yeah, yeah.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: So it gets treated decently.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's nice.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: I kind of want to meet your dad now.
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: He sounds like a character.
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, man.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he has a lot of, we got some art out front.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, man.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm trying to work on getting my head around a project of documenting his eras
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: of art while not calling him an artist.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_01: And there's so much stuff.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: I'll just say that he,
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: through seeing another artist's pieces,
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: he came up with this vision for like cinder blocks all put together,
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: maybe like three by two cinder blocks,
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_01: but then painted black and then small stones like gravel from
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: a gravel rock garden store in the center.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so he kind of sketched it out for me and he's like,
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: we'll put it in the median between the sidewalk and the curb.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, yeah, let's do it.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: So we built it out.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I kid you not,
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: like upon final completion, you know, like last little spray of like touching it up.
• 10:59
  SPEAKER_01: This was on a Saturday a couple years ago.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: My son's friend runs down the block and is like, oh, sweet fireplace.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, Will.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_01: And runs inside because it had not occurred to us that it kind
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: of looks exactly like one of those propane fireplaces that became popular during
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: the pandemic.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: And we're like, oh, God.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_01: It looks exactly like a propane fireplace.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: What are we talking about?
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: So that's another piece of art.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: Why does he not want to be called an artist?
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have a sense of that?
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's his deep-seated Catholic upbringing desire to not be overly indulgent woo-woo.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_01: He's like, this is this.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's beautiful.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's clearly a beautiful look at it
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: is sort of his prism.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't think he wants to...
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: Although he is a good writer,
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: like, use the words to describe, to try to convince you why it's meaningful.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: He just likes the verb, not the noun, basically.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: He's doing stuff.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: Well, number two,
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: I was hoping we'd get around to talking about running,
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: but this book,
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: Once a Runner by John L.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: Parker, is sort of, like, mythological in the... Yeah, okay, wow, that's a...
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_01: Is that one of the original first printings of that book?
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: This is early.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, man.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: This is the sixth printing.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: Can you describe what this book is for people who have no exposure to it?
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_01: So Once a Runner is a novel.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I think now that I'm writing a book, I'm way more aware of, like, why make a book?
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: Well, what are you trying to achieve?
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: And it's like, oh, yeah,
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: if you think of books as achieving something,
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: then it is,
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_01: in my mind,
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_01: the seminal text that's been written,
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: and I'd be happy to be proven wrong,
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: like be sent a better example of describing what it's like to be
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_01: a competitive runner pursuing faster times.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_01: And it is a novel which...
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: I was handed in high school when I was getting into track and field,
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_01: getting into being a distance runner and the identity of it.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: And there's just so many little inside references that the characters tease out
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: that I've never read anything that even comes close to describing what it feels like
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_01: to be like...
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: Pursuing speed,
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: pursuing,
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: turning your body into the form that can go faster and to be surrounded
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: by other people and to be pursuing competitive success.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so to me, it feels like the source code for in some ways of like, yes, this says that.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_01: And so I was taken aback.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was like five years ago coming out of the pandemic.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: I think it was like a Canadian running thing.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: Piece or someone wrote a piece being like,
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: why once a runner is like not all that it's cracked up to be or like
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: that people make it out to be.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_01: And it included things like the female characters are not very dimensional.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like, oh,
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: you mean when he sits in the pizza parlor and just like pontificates
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_01: to his girlfriend endlessly over a pint of beer about,
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_01: the meaning of running that didn't offer
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_01: her like a lot of dimension and like,
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: You're like, that was not the point of the book.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_00: The point,
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_01: like John L. Parker was not like, how do I dimensionalize college age women?
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: Just really not the point.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: Or does the character actually have to be likable?
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, does the character have to be likable?
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, reading it not as a teenager,
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like,
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: oh yeah,
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: there's whole scenes where he's just,
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: it's like a lot of elements of fiction where you're like,
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: I would probably consume this message differently if it was written as
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: an expository essay telling me how it is.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: But, in fact, you turned it into a monologue, and I'm like, I'm in.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, ooh, wait.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah,
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: there could be more tension,
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: there could be more character depth in certain regards,
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: but the reality is, in short order, he's trying to watch you...
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: He has some melodrama around...
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's not spoiling it that,
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_01: the main character gets in some trouble and then has to,
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: like, pull some shenanigans.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: But that seems like a way of keeping the plot kind of intriguing rather than
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_01: the main point,
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_01: which is how do I celebrate the beauty of this thing that, man,
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: when it came out,
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_01: I wonder if anyone had even attempted to... 1978 was first printing.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_01: So I have had to, like, upon...
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: Becoming middle-aged, reflect on like, wow, what a profound impact the book had on me.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: Just from describing competitiveness,
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: describing the identity of being a distance runner and all that stuff.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: So when people who are very lifelong runners or successful runners
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_01: of different pedigrees say like, oh yeah, I've never read that.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, whoa, mind-boggling
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: to me.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: But I get that it's a book written by a dude that...
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: 50 years ago.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: So like maybe it's not their style.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, yeah.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_00: So you get this book, you're like 16.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: Are you running the mile?
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'm
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: like in Oregon.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: So we run the 1500 and sometimes the 3000 meters, which is like just so geeky.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: you're not even running the full mile,
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: but it's the way Oregon heritage and athletics is.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like feeling, I mean,
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: I grew up a soccer player,
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: so you're feeling like an outsider and you're sensing all these things around like,
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_01: there's a whole scene where he talks about how he walks into a party and he like,
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: Kind of either clocks or greets people based on like, oh, that's Brendan.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like he's a 350.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: He's 351.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like by PRs,
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_01: like by personal bests,
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: you know, like and you're like, it's not as reductive as I'm making it sound.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_01: But it is when you're 16.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, yeah, totally.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: I know all of those guys PRs.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like I know exactly how fast they run.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: And this is really funny because the older I've gotten, the more popular running has gotten.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's become very popular to be like, no one knows your finish time.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's not even about that.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_01: You're the only one stressing over exactly how fast you run.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that is somewhat true the more people get into it.
• 17:54
  SPEAKER_01: But at its core,
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_01: if someone said, oh, so-and-so's broken 220, I'd be like, no, he hasn't.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: In the marathon, I'd be like...
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely not.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like I know for a fact he hasn't.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like it is like gravity that I know exactly how fast some of these people
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_01: have run.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: And that's like both I think there's beauty and truth to that.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_01: And there's also pettiness.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: So you have to like hold it in check the older you get.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: I was going to say you and I have a completely different relationship with running.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm here for people.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: My evolved adult self,
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_01: I like to say, as a coach, I like to say, I'm an effort snob, not a pace snob.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: People think,
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: because I've run some faster marathons,
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: like, oh, he must be only interested in this.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, no.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: I think people trying to break four, staring down 909 miles for four hours is beautiful.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: That's just one threshold to pick one.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: Do you want us to put your marathon PR in the title of this episode?
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: Writer, coach, and 219 Marathoner.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: 219 Marathoner.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's so douchey.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's the hard part.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_00: How do you...
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: I find that there's...
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_01: A whole spectrum of ways that people signal how they're into this stuff.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: And there's better and worse ways of like, come on, man.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_01: Like, don't be so on the nose.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we could talk about different things in the running world endlessly.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know how interesting this is, but I live in Portland.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: Nike is in Portland.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so a lot of my friends have worked with Nike.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: I worked there a decade ago.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: And there's a lot of hand-wringing over their demise.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_01: Their stock price is down.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_01: They've lost their way.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: Running is totally changing in all sorts of ways.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I said,
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: very fundamentally,
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: I said to some friends who work there, like,
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not sure what item you guys make that if a man walked into a pub,
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: Like I'm at a brewery.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_01: Someone walks in wearing that Nike piece that I would know and could clock from across the room.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like that guy's a real runner and he's really into it.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas there's so many.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: Things in the world now,
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_01: there's so many micro brands, I'd be like, oh look, that's a Cotopaxi light top.
• 20:19
  SPEAKER_01: I have a whole bunch of understanding of where that guy's,
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, and you make a lot of this stuff as well.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: Except for now,
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_01: since we met years ago,
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like,
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: if a guy's wearing one of your hats or a shirt,
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: then I'm just charging across and being like,
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: yo, tell me about how you came to acquire this, because that's awesome.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's a whole conversation, isn't it?
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for sure.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: So anyways,
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just like,
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: there's so many ways that people signal their values and what's important to them.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_01: And stating their PR off the top is not it.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: But, I mean,
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: there's probably a larger conversation about how,
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_00: what is the maximum age for being really competitive at something like running,
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: you know, where you do know everybody, you know, and like, oh.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Like,
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: are you still training?
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, but we don't need another road.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: No, because, well,
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: so now that I'm over 40,
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_01: I've gotten,
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: I've run some races that are technically in the Masters category,
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_01: and I have You can check back with me in a couple of years,
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: but I'm sort of soured on it because it feels like life is a bell curve.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_01: And I did a little bit of youth running and I know my friends did.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: When you're a youth runner,
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: you're either in like the 7-8 designation or the 9-10 designation or
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: the 11-12 designation.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like there's all these little, you don't expect to try to beat kids three.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: You might beat a kid three years older than you,
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: but like, you know, growth and puberty is a thing.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: And then I became a master's and I realized like,
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: oh my gosh,
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: these adult men are acting like little kids because they're like,
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_01: uh-uh, like he's in a different category than me.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: Like I won my category and I'm like, guys,
• 22:05
  SPEAKER_01: that ain't,
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_01: like we did not live for over 40 years to start to,
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: like men will pull up next to each other on the road and look and like double check
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: the bibs of like, are you, um, Are you over 50 or under 50?
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: Because if you're over 50, like I can, we could work together.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: But if you're under 50, then like technically we're competing and like snooze bill.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: So anyway,
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: I think I'm a big believer in like the beauty of working together,
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: hurling down the road,
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_01: down the trail and like,
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: trying our hardest and not getting too lost in these like micro designations
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_01: of what's, you know, I got a ribbon.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, man.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: Sorry.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: I tried to limit my running to, like, one of the five.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: You didn't.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: We got number three on your list is Sunrise Running, which
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_01: is... Oh, sorry.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: Two.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_01: You're right.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_01: But I have more depth there.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_01: I was like...
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: Thinking about all these things and giving a lot of thought and getting intimidated
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_01: by the awesome lists from previous guests.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_01: And then I was like, okay,
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: but just if I just like snap judgment,
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like watching a sunrise when you're running is I'm never not like,
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: well, that's awesome.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: Damn.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_01: It typically brightens my mood.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: I almost get sad during the summer where I'm like,
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_01: well, the sun comes up at like 4.15 or something.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to miss it.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_01: I'm going to be out there heading out the door when it's already bright.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: It's like, okay.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's still pretty nice.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's the summer.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_01: And then in the winter in Oregon,
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: you definitely have some runs,
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: depending on how early I need to get going, that you return when it's dark.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm sure you do in Montana.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: And it's like, well...
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: That could have been a little better.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: But importantly,
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's the next layer deeper,
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: which is like the collective positive impact
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_00: of that.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like when you see other people running Passing,
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: even just like someone sweeping a porch,
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: people I just think are like in their best light.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: They're their best selves typically at that hour.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, there's a lot of like waving to each other.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of, hey, have a great day.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, man,
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: how much better would the world be if people carried
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: that energy forward throughout their day versus the Sort
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: of afternoon traffic energy.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: So when,
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: I coach any number of people or friends who run throughout different parts of
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_01: the day and I'm like, oh wow, you did that long run at like 7 p.m.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: Or 10 p.m.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_01: I've coached people who really, 24 hours in a day and you can use them however you want.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm like, I...
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: It is an exceedingly straight white male privilege to be able to head out into
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: the darkness and feel safe.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: And yet,
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_01: I find most of the people who are troublemaking,
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: by 5.15 in the morning, it's pretty much died down.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: People are passed out on the street, and you're like, oh, going to give that guy some space.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas, man, I've done some runs at 10 p.m., and I'm like, this is not settling.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_01: This is...
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: So I think there's something around the sunrise that I'm like,
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure tragedy still occurs at that hour,
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: but much less frequently in my experience.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think there's a realization I had being in New York City where it was like,
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_00: there is a quiet hour here.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: There's very few people out at 5 a.m.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_00: or 6 a.m. And once the city wakes up, it's just full on until...
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: 2, 3 in the morning,
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_00: but it was such a revelation that there's an hour here where you can kind
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_00: of just do whatever you want.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's pretty cool.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_01: And the day's still running, still going on the tracks.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: People are like, I have an intention for the day, and we're still...
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I had a friend say, like,
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: So wait,
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_01: what you're telling me is if I run in the morning,
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: it's much less likely that life will intervene and derail my running?
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, yeah, man.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: I mean,
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: that seemed pretty obvious to me that any number of things from your own personal
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_01: to your family to life in general could derail.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: If you really want to get that run in like I do,
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: you do it early just because that's when you know you have the most control.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's what...
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: If I'm running and I pass by a man like...
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: Showered, shaved, in a suit, getting in his car.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, he has intention and he's moving through his day.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: And we can nod to each other or not acknowledge each other and it's fine.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: But there's a nice energy there.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_00: Have you kept up this practice throughout Will's entire life?
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because I'm like, right now...
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_00: I got to be here to make breakfast at a certain,
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: you know, the arising time of my four-year-old is pretty variable.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I actually, this is a larger conversation around like your priorities.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_01: I remember talking to you and you were like, yeah, that you ran in the afternoon.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like,
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like Brendan's saying that he prioritizes his creative projects
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: and I prioritized my running.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: I think we did.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: But I've switched now.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a morning runner now.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I mean, I've seen in some of your videos.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you got there before the sun comes up.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_01: When I look back at my Strava data, I used to run really early.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: I used to run at 5.15,
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: 5.30 when he was really young,
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: and then it got later, and now it's getting kind of earlier.
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, my wife will go do this or that, and I'm like, okay, tell me when I need to be back.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_01: And...
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, it never got later, if anything, it got earlier.
• 28:01
  SPEAKER_01: But I think I like...
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'm more of a morning person, I guess.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: And is Sunrise Running as a...
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_00: To define it as a creative work, we're just saying this is when you choose to do it.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think of it as...
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: Like, it's the thing that's propelling the day,
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: and so I'm like,
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_01: okay, you know, I have a thought, like, okay, how am I going to get out of bed?
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm going to make a plan for, like,
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_01: where I'm going to go,
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: what the route's going to be,
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: like, how I'm going to set my morning with intent to, like, experience something.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: And you have coffee afterwards or before this?
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_01: I have learned to make a large jar of cold brew, and then I consume, like...
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: An hour or two,
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_01: I guess,
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_01: in the morning because time is of the essence and bathroom stops are of the essence
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_01: and cold coffee is easier on my stomach first thing in the morning if I'm going
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_01: to move through that process.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: Definitely don't wait.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: I don't run without caffeine, but I wait for that.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: I found nothing hits as well as the big cup of coffee,
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: the first taste, but you can sort of splice it and get
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: a little bit of a two-hitter.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, man.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's a super junky behavior here.
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_00: I know.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_01: But the second cup of coffee we all know is not...
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like, as good as the first cup of coffee.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: But if I just sip, like,
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_01: an ounce of cold brew before running,
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: then you run,
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: then you, like, maybe shower, a tall cup of coffee really does still hit.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, boy.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's... You're selling me on it now.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, number four.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: The Belting Bronco, created by Zach Bryan.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_00: Can you describe this?
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: Because I was unaware of it completely until you put it in the list.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: So I...
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: Have love, hate, angst about Zach Bryan.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_01: I became a fan of his music five years ago or so.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not in any way saying I was into him before he was cool, but I do really enjoy his music.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: He is now so popular that when he came to Oregon,
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_01: he just played a football stadium at the University of Oregon,
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: which I think is emblematic of...
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: The experience of his music now, it's like going to a college football game.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not against going to a college football game personally,
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: but it's a very different energy for me than accessing music and lyrics and
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_01: the sound of his music.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_01: So I didn't go to that concert and I'm...
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_01: I wouldn't say I coast,
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_01: you know, it's just like more,
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm more like, oh,
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I want to be part of this fan base,
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_01: but I still listen to his music in the background for years.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_01: And then years ago, he,
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a big fan of YouTube algorithm,
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_01: live music,
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: like, you know, signing up for that journey and seeing where it leads me.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_01: And a couple of years ago, it led me to, I think it was around the pandemic.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_01: He came up with like a Bronco.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_01: Car, SUV.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_01: Him driving and then getting other musical artists to be in the back with
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: the recording equipment with multiple artists or, you know, multiple musicians.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: And there's, I think, like six to eight of them.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: I really got turned on to one with a group called The Benz that I'd never heard of.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_01: And we were talking about, like, wanting a reaction when you put something out into the world.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_01: I got super stoked on this particular lookup.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: Zach Bryan, Bronco, The Benz.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I really liked this musical act's rendition just sitting in the back
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_01: while Zach Bryan's driving him around.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: They've since done ones with other acts where they have a flatbed that
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_01: the Bronco's pulling because they want to get a drum set.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: They want to get some more elaborate stuff.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_00: But I like this.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure there's some producing and like tweaking of,
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_01: you know, the audio, but it feels very contained.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_01: Organic.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_01: Organic, yeah, and kind of beautiful in what you're witnessing.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know,
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_01: you have people on some of them like hand drumming on,
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: you know, I don't know musical that well, like a box, you know.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_01: The vocals of some of these artists,
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: you're like,
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: man, oh man, they're just, I'm in an AI, you know, auto-tuned world.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, they are doing that right there.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_01: I definitely have confidence that I'm hearing what they're doing.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, I,
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: sorry, we were talking about, I sent it to a bunch of people like, this is awesome.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_01: And like, very few got back to me.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: But I think it's like,
• 33:10
  SPEAKER_01: I've tried to realize I'm,
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_01: I'm definitely,
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_01: because I'm putting out Into the world, what I would want to receive.
• 33:17
  SPEAKER_01: It's not always what other people would want to receive.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_01: Even my writing is sometimes like,
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: here's 3,000 words diving deep into my guts about my psychology of
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: that running race.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: And I've learned oftentimes I write things that people are like,
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: oh, I'm definitely going to bookmark that for another time.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like, how are you doing getting back to that?
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I actually got into,
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: I have a podcast that's just me reading audio versions of some of my pieces
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: because my best friend, I could tell he was just never reading my pieces.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_01: He said he's an audio forward reader.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, okay.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and so, yeah, he's much more likely to.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: So, yeah,
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: sending people like a half hour, I mean,
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: I think people could put it on in the background of their life,
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_01: a YouTube video,
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_01: but I don't take it personally,
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: but that's through my own processing of that disappointment.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's a whole thing, though,
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_00: like knowing what kind of music somebody likes,
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_00: what time you send it in the day, and like do...
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: If you text them at the wrong time, are they just going to read it and never go back?
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_00: Probably.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_00: Should I email it
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_01: to them?
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_01: Should I?
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't want me sharing creative works to be a pressure and an expectation.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, yeah,
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: check this out.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: If you like it, you like it.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_01: I think that series, and I don't love all of the versions.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_01: I think there's like eight or seven to nine of them.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_01: But.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: I don't like them all equally,
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: but it's fun to...
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: And then also because we live in an algorithmic world,
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_01: if you say, like,
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: YouTube, I like this, like, it can be fun to see where it leads you next, you know?
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: Did you ever get into a takeaway show by the French?
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_00: Blogotech, I think is how it's pronounced.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: They would just do these, like, incredible live performances with legit musicians.
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_00: And they would be like walking down the street somewhere in, I assume Paris maybe.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_00: Or, you know, one of them was Aloe Black in this like cafeteria.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_00: And they, I think they did a version of, I need a dollar where it was drumming on the table.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody had spoons, I think, and these incredible things.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: And some of them were, there's an arcade fire one that's in an elevator.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, shoot.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'll send it to you.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: And then you can, they're like 15 years old.
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, right.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_01: See, I knew there was a cooler version, but that's okay.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: No, I don't know.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_01: I'm pushing forward.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_01: I'm not saying it's the original, but it's seamless.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know, Tiny Desk concerts are wonderful, but those are...
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_01: It sometimes seems like the...
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_01: The art is breaking out of the container.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_01: you're like,
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_01: I get that this is a quote-unquote tiny desk,
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_01: but, like, you're barely fitting all the members of the band in there.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: You've clearly, like, produced this within an inch of its life.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like, it's cool.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's good stuff.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: But, like, I'm not buying that it's...
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_01: So there's a simplicity and an organic, like you're saying, so...
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody did a piece a few years ago,
• 36:27
  SPEAKER_00: and it was like, Bob Boylan's desk is actually not that tiny.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: And they kind of guessed the dimension, and it was just like this whole thing.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, okay.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you're artificially lowering our expectations.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's like a big enough desk.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: Excellent point.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_00: Why do you think that captured your attention at that time that you discovered it?
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, I think...
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_01: I have listened to any number of live renditions of music online
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_01: because controversial take I listen to music while I write and I just try
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_01: to like jam my brain with I mean sometimes I'll listen to music really loudly just
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_01: to try to like beat back like the ruminating on which word would be correct to try
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: to like Get going.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah,
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: I liked this man's,
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: I liked the Ben's version specifically because I think there is a parallel.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's tough to be writing a book and being like, man,
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think what I'm saying to myself is it would be cooler if I was
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_01: a really talented musical artist.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like this is every writer ever.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's just me.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_00: Totally.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: I can't, so I just do the word thing.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm like, I'll just do the silent word thing.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I don't have the worst voice,
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_01: so I think doing audio versions is not horrible,
• 37:48
  SPEAKER_01: but it certainly pales in comparison to the effect on your emotions of
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_01: a musical artist, particularly with a great voice.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think the lead singer, I don't know his name, of the Benz has a stylistic...
• 38:06
  SPEAKER_01: Like raspy, honest voice that you're like, it's almost whiny actually.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_01: And it just like hits you in a way that feels very,
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_01: I'm often listening to music that feels like raw and real and like maybe can kind
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: of get me to like pry open my mind and my heart so I can pour as much onto the page
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_01: as possible.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, certain music helps me evoke that feeling.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, it's been helpful.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, for sure.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think there's, like, a...
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_00: I remember a study in a book I read years ago about, like,
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_00: being sad helps you be more creative, and, like, I...
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_00: Not to brag,
• 38:44
  SPEAKER_00: but I'm just not that sad that much anymore,
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_00: so I have to listen to sad music sometimes to get into the,
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_00: like, I need to feel something.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: What is it?
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's a documentary with Noah Kahn where he's like,
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_01: wait a second, but, like,
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_01: my life's going pretty well,
• 39:00
  SPEAKER_01: and I wrote a lot of that music when I was really fucking sad, so, like...
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_01: Shit.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_01: Do I have to go back to that?
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: Now I have rich guy complaints, which are not just, they won't resonate with as many people.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, for sure.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_00: Well, number five.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: I like this one.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_01: I think people know what this is.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think people are unfamiliar with it, but number five on your list is baking cookies.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: We finished with baking cookies.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_00: When did this become important, I guess?
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_01: I've always loved cookies.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_01: My father bakes cookies and would give them to people.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_01: He's a big believer in a secret family recipe I'll tell you all about,
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_01: which is the Nestle Tollhouse recipe with walnuts added.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_00: So I got a link to that.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: Do you know how many walnuts?
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's like two cups of walnuts, but here's the thing.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_01: There's two parts to this, and this is why it's a creative act.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_01: I love cookie dough, chocolate chip cookie dough, with walnuts included.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then I reached a point maybe a decade ago where I was like,
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_01: I like making cookie dough and eating it,
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_01: but man, there's this like, cookie dough's a 9 out of 10.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe a perfectly cooked cookie is a 10 out of 10,
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_01: but an overcooked cookie is like a 3 out of 10.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_01: So the risk to go from nine to 10 was a three.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so what I've learned is,
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_01: and it's picked up more recently because my son is old enough to get out all
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_01: the ingredients.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_01: And aside from some of the dealing with the hot pan stuff,
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_00: We'll make that a perfect cookie.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_00: Come on.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_01: Let's go.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_01: For years, I would be like, we don't really need to make the cookies.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_01: We could just,
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_01: this is not to be stated on the internet,
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: like eat the cookie dough from the freezer.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, people are like, what about the, it turns out it's not even the eggs.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's the flour people say that could be most dangerous.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_01: Like certain molds that couldn't emerge.
• 41:03
  SPEAKER_01: But I was like, okay,
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: if you take the Nestle tallest recipe,
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_01: which I don't say is perfect,
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_01: but it's, Really reproducible and is, I think, wonderful.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: And then you chop up walnuts.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_01: Have you ever seen that graphic?
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: I've searched for it where there's like six or eight cookies
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_01: and it's labeled like this one had more salt,
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_01: this one had less,
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_01: this one had warm butter,
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_01: this one had broken butter,
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_01: this one had... Oh,
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_01: it's really cool because it's like basically the same recipe
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_01: but they are just showing the chemistry involved.
• 41:36
  SPEAKER_01: And so I...
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_01: Years ago,
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_01: tried to make those cookies and did it with basically frozen butter
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_01: and they didn't really work.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like, oh, shoot.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, there's a lot of chemistry involved in the butter and then also in...
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_01: My son doesn't like walnuts, but we often ask him to include them.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_01: So he sometimes will basically pulverize them almost to a powder.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: Well, what that does is...
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: Walnuts in general add oil and they add richness and they add fat to the cookie.
• 42:07
  SPEAKER_01: But then if you...
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_01: Chop them up too finely.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_01: It basically makes like a much runnier dough.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's a variable.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have butter as a variable that can really vary,
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_01: and then you have walnut chunk size that can vary,
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_01: I committed to, okay, Will,
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: you'll make the dough and then you'll portion it and then you'll put it in the oven.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then let's say it says 10 minutes.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_01: I'm forgetting what How many minutes the recipe calls for?
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_01: You're going to want to get in there like two thirds into that and
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_01: then you're just going to sit in front of the oven and you're going to be ready like
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_01: with a hot hand to like the moment it feels, it looks as though it's solid.
• 42:50
  SPEAKER_01: You like you pull that thing out, you put it on and it cools on the pan.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_01: And so it just continues to cook a little bit.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_01: And you end up with these essentially cookie dough cookies.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like they're so soft that I'm like,
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: that to me feels like there's like a little bit of an adrenaline rush of like,
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_00: we got to go.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then you start to stop watching.
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_00: Like we had to eat these at exactly 327.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_01: Like, yeah,
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_01: you could get obsessive,
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_01: but also if you don't overcook them,
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_01: They hold that like barely a solid,
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_01: not a liquid consistency that makes it
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_00: kind of fun.
• 43:25
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas I can totally understand how real bakers would be like, no, no, no.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you know this, you dial this in and this in and this in.
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, for your oven, how many minutes?
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: I have no doubt that like actual bakers would scoff at this.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_01: But I find the creative act part is the wild nature of it.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_00: It does seem more fun and more free.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
• 43:48
  SPEAKER_01: We, yeah.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_01: Just in terms of pure joy when you're like, what stuff you're into?
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, well,
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_01: we've been into making cookies in this way that's both delicious and kind of risky.
• 43:59
  SPEAKER_00: And also it's like this three generations of iterations of it where you're like,
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: you're like,
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_00: well, grandpa would be really pissed if he saw you doing that to the walnuts.
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, let's get this done before he comes over.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and then Grandpa's not that mad because it's his grandson
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_01: versus, yeah.
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_00: Do you guys ever use a toaster oven for this sort of thing or not?
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_01: We have not.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_01: We have a toaster oven.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_01: I suppose we could, but that would be a real...
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you have to experiment a little bit.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you have to tinker endlessly.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because we get jars of vegan cookie dough from the grocery store a block away here.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_00: And that you can eat directly out of them.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, okay.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_00: Well, if your flour thing is...
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_01: I think we can trust.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_01: We'll just make two cookies,
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: you know, or
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_00: four or whatever in like these little pans in the toaster oven.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_01: You probably know what you're working with.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you probably have like for this toaster oven, it's usually about X number of minutes.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, for sure.
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_00: And they say, you know, exactly one ounce of dough, whatever, blah, blah.
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I weigh it and put it on there and it does work.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I think our toaster oven is way newer and way more consistent
• 45:13
  SPEAKER_00: than our old oven that's like has some weird cold hot spots and like just like,
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: yeah, it works.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't know.
• 45:22
  SPEAKER_00: Might be a thing.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_01: I think people should.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think making cookies.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone's always happy.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I love nothing where we brought some over to a dinner party and
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_01: And my buddy was like kind of tired or something.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_01: We're like, yeah, we have some cookies.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_01: And he was like, but are they like crispy or like overcooked?
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, no, not.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I know this.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_01: I was like,
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_01: I respect your suspicion and your like distrust
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_01: that we would have cooked them properly at home because you think I'm just going
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_01: to listen to what it says on the package for a number of minutes.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_01: But this was baked with care.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_01: I sat there with my face.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_01: I am an artiste.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_01: Creative act.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_00: You think this is not a creative act?
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's great.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, man.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: Man, that's fantastic.
• 46:10
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like that's a good one to end on.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm going to go through your list here.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, a huge...
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for coming on.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_00: This is super fun.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much.
• 46:19
  SPEAKER_00: That was great.