Latest / Literally, the Worst Podcast / 10: The Secret Lives of Private Equity Hires

Transcript

10: The Secret Lives of Private Equity Hires · Literally, the Worst Podcast

• 0:19
  SPEAKER_04: All right, welcome to Literally the Worst.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_04: The podcast where we talk about things that are the worst.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_04: I'm Anna.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_04: I'm Lauren.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_04: And Lauren, what is your petty this week?
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_03: Petty.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_03: Your petty thief.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_03: Let's see here.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_03: The when rolls of tape don't have a tab to help start them.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_03: And so then it's like you have to dig and dig and dig and dig, and then you get only like a little slice of it, and then you waste so much of it trying to just like even it out.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_03: That happens with packing tape.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_03: There was a new washi tape that I had that it was doing that.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_03: I was just like, why?
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_03: Why is it going to be this way?
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_04: Would like to believe it's a capitalist conspiracy to get you to spend more money on tape.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_04: Cause why wouldn't it be, to be honest?
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_04: Maybe not the washi tape, but right, but the packing tape.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_03: Packing tape for sure.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_03: Scotch has it out for you.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, definitely.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_03: Even uh duct tape, because sometimes it's just like so like gorilla tape, I think, is worse.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_03: You try to get a start and it's just in short.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_03: So tacky.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_04: Just like, what are you doing?
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_03: What are you doing?
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_04: What?
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, I don't need this level of complication in my life.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_04: No, but you do need to spend twice as much money on tape.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_04: Because if you don't, how will they make a profit, Lauren?
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_03: Grow, grow, grow, baby.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_03: That's the goal.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_03: It's tapes version of what is what is the oh, I can never remember the word where stuff is planned obsolescence.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, yeah.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_03: Tapes.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's tapes plans.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_04: Planned obsolescence strategies just don't work.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_04: So the possum mug has made an appearance.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_04: It has.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_03: It's a possum on a mug.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_03: With a possum on the bottom, too.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_03: And the little miniature one of it sits right next to my.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, because nobody knows about this.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_03: It is probably the height of a quarter.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_03: Probably less than a thumbnail size of a quarter.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_03: Thumbnail-sized mug that looks just like this possum mug.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_04: It's a fully functional mug, too.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_04: Like it is an actual mug.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_04: You could put coffee in it.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_04: It's just one thumbnail's worth of coffee.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_04: Which we know is not enough.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_03: Like less than a thimble, volume-wise.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_03: And uh yeah, so I I put my I've started putting my morning anxiety med pill in there.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_03: And so then I know if I've taken it or not.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's great.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_04: You shoot it back like a tiny cup of coffee, like a coffee shop.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_04: It's great.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_04: That's wonderful.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_04: I love this.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_04: This is great.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's awesome.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_03: What about you?
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_03: What's your petty?
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_04: My petty is that the ARC browser is being shut down in December.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_04: And wait.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_04: They have been working on a new browser that is AI first for two years now, maybe a year and a half.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_04: And I have refused to download it, hoping that they would just buy it.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_04: Well, the CEO, uh one of the co-CEOs of Atlassian attempted to buy it, and I it apparently fell through because they're shutting it down.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_04: So uh Arc is going away, and I'm mad about it.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_04: Wait, what's what's the value prop of ARC?
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_04: I don't I don't even know what this is.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_04: It it was the first browser to market that had vertical tabs, and everything that has had vertical tabs since then, and tab folders, and like anything you put in a folder stayed around.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_04: Anything that you didn't closed out every 24 hours, so it was like a way to keep things organized.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_04: And uh yeah.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_04: You everything that has been come to market since then copied Arc.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_04: And Chrome now has vertical tabs, but I was like, I refuse to use Google products as much as I can, even though Arc we're in on Chromium.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_04: I know.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_04: And yeah, so I have to make the switch and I have to move all my tabs, and I'm not thrilled about this.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_04: No, no.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_04: Where are you moving?
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_04: Zen, which runs on Mozilla.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_04: So Mozilla, oh my gosh.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_04: A lot of the same features except, and this is Betty.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_04: The when you opened a new tab in Arc, it gave you this little box.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_04: And you could click on the box and it would take you to that tab.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_04: Zen has the little box, but if you click on it, it does nothing.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm like, what is the point of the box if you click on it and it doesn't take you to the tab that you just opened?
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_04: And that's awful.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_04: I don't like that.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_04: Nope.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_04: So I'm in Zen kind of begrudgingly because of that.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_04: But uh I'm like, okay, alright.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_04: And Zen's also a community project.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_04: So if you want to support a community-based browser that really values privacy and is built on Mozilla, which is the browser company that owns Firefox, you could support them by signing up for it.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_04: And then if they continue, maybe they'll fix the box.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_04: So just throwing that out there as a as a bonus.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_04: Fix the box, y'all.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_04: Fix it.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_04: Fix the box.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_03: Need uh t-shirts that say that.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_03: Fix the box! Yeah.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_03: With no context whatsoever.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_04: People are just like, what are you talking about?
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_04: It's just it's the box that says new tab opened.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_04: Fix it.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_04: People are like, what are you talking about?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_04: I'm like, this is very niche.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_03: I should not have to explain this to you.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_03: You should just know.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_03: You should be on board with this and on board with fixing the box.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, this is fascinating.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_04: To the extent that you're not, you're against us.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_04: They're just like, I have no opinion or dog in this fight.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_04: I've never used this browser.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_04: That's your problem.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_04: So get on board, folks.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_04: Get with the program.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_04: But if you are looking for a better browser, Zen is, except for the box, pretty good.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_03: So good to know.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's one of the things in the long list of items of like, how do I migrate away from Google?
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, what is her name?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_04: She has a whole series on moving away from Google.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_04: Dgoogling.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_04: It's on Substock.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: D Google.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Oh.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think it's Turn Off the Faucet.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, what a great name.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: She basically has a way of like uh I'm gonna have to find it.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: I'll put it in the show notes.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_04: Um but basically has a bunch of articles on decorporatizing your shut off the faucet?
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_04: Shut off the faucet.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_04: Nope.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_04: Turn off the faucet.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_04: This is just gonna be a podcast of me.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_04: Anna's search history.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_04: Googling things for six hours.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_04: You guys are welcome.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_04: Best podcast ever.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_04: Rate and review, subscribe, by the way.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_03: Uh yep.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, this does feel like the perfect time.
• 9:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yep, yep.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_03: Every every review, every subscription, every follow helps.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_03: If you want more of this Or share it with a friend.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, all of those are options, so Yeah.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_04: I'll find it and put it in the show notes.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_04: But yeah, did you know that Michael's at the craft store is owned by private equity?
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_03: Did that happen when they started listing products from Blick?
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_03: Uh no, it's been further back than that.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_04: Who owns Michael's craft store?
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_03: Because I got really confused when I was like, wow, their inventory really like beefed up, and then I saw ships from Blick, and I'm like, well, now that means I can't go pick it up in the store.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_02: Correct.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um privately held is all it says.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: I would like to know who owns it though.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Wikipedia.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: Who privately holds it?
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_00: It looks like back in two thousand twelve is when this really is not clear.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Unclear.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, nope, nope, nope.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_04: March 2021.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_04: Sorry, I had to read three paragraphs of the history of Michaels.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_04: And then we got there.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_04: March 2021, the Michaels Company is agreed to be acquired by private equity company Apollo Global Management.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_04: Ew.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_04: We suck the life out of everything.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_04: Uh, yep.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_04: Yep, yep.
• 11:45
  SPEAKER_04: So 2020, as of 2021, they are owned by private equity.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_04: Which not a fan of.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_04: Not a fan of.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_04: Sad.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_04: But I'm like, the alternative now is Hobby Lobby.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_01: Which is worse.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_04: Worse for other reasons.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_04: I'm like, okay.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_03: Alright.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_03: Well, that's why I'm like, okay, Blick, are they private equity owned?
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_03: I hope not.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_03: I didn't think so.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_04: They're privately owned, but not.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_03: I was like, they're privately yeah.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_04: Blick.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_04: Well, that's Well, I don't know.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_04: They changed they changed their name.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_04: Because it used to be Dick Blick.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, which is part of the website still, or they're shipping or something.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_03: I'm just like, ew, this is I don't want my art supplies shipped in a box that says Dick Blick.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_03: But they're it makes me think of like croc gibbets.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_03: Ew.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_00: I know, I'm like this is gross.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: So no, they're just owned by themselves.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, that's for that.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_04: Its parent company is Dick Blick Holdings Inc.
• 13:13
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, since 1911.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_04: That's awesome.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_04: 1911.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_04: Robert Metzenberg purchased the company in 1947.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_04: And it would appear that his grandson, Robert Bukesbaum, became CEO in 1996.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_04: And I think is still the CEO.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_04: Huh.
• 13:43
  SPEAKER_00: So that's impressive.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_03: That's one heck of a run.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_04: 1947, under the same ownership.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_04: And they bought Plaza last year.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_04: Not just our local plaza.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_04: Olive Plaza.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_04: All of 'em, yep.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_04: In 2026.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_04: It feels like it was a year ago.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_04: I think they announced it over a year ago.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_04: Maybe that was just this year.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_04: That was probably just this year.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, I hope not.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_04: Alright.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: Well today I thought we could talk about our escapades in private equity.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: Oh.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_04: Excuse me.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_04: Do you want to talk about your escapades of private equity?
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_03: You're like, no, I still work there.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_03: I don't want to lose my job.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_03: Oh Lord.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, meh.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_03: No, happy to.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_03: Happy to.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_04: Let's see.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_04: So my last day with my current company is next Friday, October 30th.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_04: And we are excited about this.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_04: And I would just like to talk about my what I learned about private equity having.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, thank you.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_04: This is great.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_03: Love that we can do sound effects now.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_03: It was like awesome.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_03: I should never have shown more than the sound effects.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_04: There's a whole menu over here.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_04: If you just click on it, there's all this stuff.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_04: Um yeah.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_04: So the company that I when I started, the company that I worked for was owned by private equity.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_04: It had been started and founded by uh a woman in South Carolina.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_04: She had grown it to about a two a four million dollar business that made two million dollars every year, which is pretty great.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_04: That's impressive.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and then I think I think her best year ever was two and a half million dollars profit, which I was like, that's wonderful.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_04: Um then, then fast forward, she sold it to private equity, thinking that they would help grow it, and thus began a multi-year saga.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_04: I think she sold it in 2022, so it was owned by private equity for three years.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_04: And their goal was to basically just throw stuff at the wall until they found something that would grow the company to as big as it could get in seven years, and then they would sell it to someone else.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_04: And so the whole goal of their firm, in quotes, was get it, get acquire companies, do whatever it took that they thought might work to get them to a place where um it would grow.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_04: And in the time that I was there, so I've been there for two years, in the time that I have been there, we have had keep in mind at the largest it was a team of 40.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_04: We have had one, two, three, four, four quote unquote reductions in force.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_04: Because we never fire people.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_04: We just eliminate positions and then hire people back with a slightly different title.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_04: Um, it's super gross.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_04: So we went from a team of 40 to a team of 25, and um people would basically be hired and then let go six to nine months later if they were perceived as not performing.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_04: And there was never because it wasn't technically a firing, because we don't fire people, it was always considered a reduction in force.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_04: So a layoff.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_04: And I don't know, that probably happened to, I mean, 15 people at least in the time that I've been there.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_04: And oh my gosh, more than that.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_04: Probably well, yeah, but we had multiple like people turnover in that time too, and then we'd hire somebody else.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_04: Um and so that from what I have observed, both in this company and other privately held private equity companies, that's how they operate.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_04: That's what they do is push for growth, grow at all costs.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_04: The goal is to basically get to a point where you can make an exit.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_04: The goal is not long-term ownership.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and because of that, they don't really care if there's instability in the staff, or the culture is crappy, or it's a miserable place to work, or they offer the best benefits, or et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_04: They don't really care about any of that.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_04: What they do care about is whether or not the company is growing.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_04: And to some extent, profit margins, because you have to have at least some margin to be able to sell it to somebody.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_04: If it's not making any money, it's going to be harder to sell.
• 19:36
  SPEAKER_04: So with all of that in the mix, um as you watch things like customer service get crappier, or even there was a story not that long ago about rural hospitals being acquired by private equity and shut down because it's cheaper to buy them, sell them basically for parts and then shut them down than it is to keep them running.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_04: And private part of private equity too is that you balance your portfolio by being able to write off a loss.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_04: So if you can offset some of your growth with a loss, there are businesses that they purely buy to write off as a loss.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_04: And so if your local hardware store, your local whatever that's been open for years and years and years was bought by a company and then promptly shut down six months later, that is typically what private equity is trying to do.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_04: Um, if you've noticed, and I've noticed this about Michaels, is Michaels used to be a super clean, very well-stocked, very uh like nice store to shop at.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_04: And in the since it was acquired by private equity in 2021, that has basically not been true.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_04: And it's because private equity doesn't really care about the quality, and if it eventually fails, it's okay because then they can write it off as a loss.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_04: And so that is what happened to Toys R Us.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_04: Toys R Us was acquired by private equity and then shut down.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_04: Um really because they don't they don't actually care about the stores.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_04: It's just a line item on a spreadsheet.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_03: Um it's not about the the products, it's not about the customers that are being served.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_03: It is only about the money.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_04: And I would say private equity is kind of like the gross underbelly of capitalism that's been, and we've talked about the industries that it's impacted before, like veterinarians and tax prep and all kinds of other stuff, but um Funeral industry.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_04: The funeral industry has been another one lately where they are buying up locally owned uh funeral homes and flipping them or shutting them down, trying to do budget funerals to make more money, cutting the quality of what they offer in terms of funeral services, caskets, selling lower quality caskets at the same or higher prices, which is just wild.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_04: Like it's wild to think about um the lack of ethics that have to be involved in something like that.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_03: Huh?
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_03: Let's exploit people when they're at their most vulnerable.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_03: When their brains are at their most offline.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_03: We can do that.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_04: This is our path to billionaire.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_04: Um no.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_04: And I joke about that because I'm like, it's not possible to it truly at this point.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_04: I believe it's like not possible to be an ethical billionaire.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_04: Someone somewhere had to get exploited to have that amount of wealth.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_04: And it even if you just inherited the money, the person that you're inheriting it from probably did something unethical to get there.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_04: Yes.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_04: Whether it was At a minimum, the labor was extracted at an unfair price.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_04: Right, exactly.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_04: Probably because if you're in the hotel industry, you hired undocumented people to clean for pennies.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_04: Or you and that was the only way that you could really afford to get where you are today.
• 23:44
  SPEAKER_04: Um so yeah, I'm I'm leaving this company largely because of how they've treated people, um and just watching the never-ending cycle of people come in, oh it doesn't work out, they're let go.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_04: And that was a revolving door pretty much every quarter the entire time I was there, which has been wild.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_04: Uh because yeah, our last reduction in force was in July.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_04: Um my gosh.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_04: And I don't think there will be another one this year, but that one was large.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_04: It was like 12 people at once.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_04: So yeah.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_04: So what's your experience like?
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_04: What can you talk about?
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_04: What do you want to talk about?
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_03: I know.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, what what can I talk about without oversharing?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_03: Um, well, I mean, the organization I've been at for 10 months.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_03: Eight months.
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_03: It feels like an eternity, but I started at the beginning of March.
• 24:59
  unknown: Yeah.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_03: So eight, nine months.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_03: So it just is.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, felt like an eternity.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, so they are they were purchased by their current private equity uh I think two or three years ago.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_03: And in that time, there have been multiple rounds of layoffs.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know if they're calling them riffs or not, but yeah, there were, I think, two this year since I've been there, and there was possibly a third right before that, or right at the end of 2025.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_03: So it's a very similar thing.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_03: Um as far as like where can we yeah, where can we make ourselves more profitable?
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_03: Where can we cut costs?
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_03: Uh another another item was they they stopped our uh 401k match, I think in May or June.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_03: It was like right after you got there.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I had hardly been there and I got that email.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_03: I was like, oh, that's not good.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_03: Uh again, they said it was part of a like they had some bills coming due in Q3, and so they needed to make sure they were they had enough cash and they wanted to try to avoid an additional layoff, which okay, appreciate you trying a variety of things before we cut more people.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_03: And also it's just it's never a good sign.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_03: Um, I do know this year there is a huge imperative on like we must grow revenue.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_03: We must grow revenue.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_03: And uh in the interview process, it was kind of it was made very clear that uh this was a make or break sort of year.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_03: And so yeah, it's just been fascinating with that.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, because everywhere I've worked, it feels like we're always chasing the short-term numbers.
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_03: Um, but at least some places tried to build a mid-to-long-term strategy and keep that in mind while they were making those decisions in the short term.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_03: And I think that's what this company wants to do, but there's so much pressure to chase the dollars in the door because there's all of the focus on revenue right now.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_03: And so it's just like, oh, well, we can look at customizing all of these different things, which I'm like, no, if we customize everything, like if we customize a version for all of these customers, like it's gonna take forever to get the actual thing out the door, and it's gonna delay that midterm revenue further because we're spending all this time trying to chase the short-term revenue.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_03: So it's just, and then that leads to shiny object syndrome because then everybody's got a new idea for something else that we might pursue, and then it just distracts everyone and takes time, and then there's extra conversations that we don't need to be having.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_03: Like that's coming up right now.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, we don't need new initiatives right now.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_03: We don't even have enough bandwidth to do the stuff we need to do now.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_04: And it's like this is an industry that maybe we could just squeeze it in over here.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_04: Exactly.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_04: On the downtime.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_04: In the downtime.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_04: And we all have margin time where we're not actually doing anything.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_04: We'll just use that.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_03: In between, yes, in between projects.
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_03: That's when a lot of this work happens.
• 28:42
  unknown: Yeah.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_03: But like this is a this company's been around 40 years or something, and they've not been, I think it's only been a small percentage of time that they've been private equity owned.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_03: And so, and like they have a lot of folks that have been there for decades.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_03: And so there's a lot of institutional knowledge, and then there's also a lot of like customer and industry knowledge.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and a lot of those people got laid off too.
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_03: So then there's the challenge of like, well, now we have a bunch of engineers that don't understand the systems that were built and how architecture was structured.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_03: And so then all of the new stuff we're trying to build, we think we know how long it's gonna take, but then we get into the code base and we're like, oh crap, it's actually gonna take longer and we can't solve it the way we thought we were gonna solve it because so many people that knew how everything worked are is gone.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_03: Uh are gone.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_03: Are gone, yes.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_03: And it just, it's the layoffs, cutting the institutional knowledge.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, oh yeah, they don't care about can we keep up with the with what the customers are needing, or like, oh, I think I can probably share this because I think it's pretty well known.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_03: The private equity that owns this organization has a rule that like 70% of your engineering resources have to be offshore after like two years of ownership.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_03: And so that was a big part of the layoffs.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_03: It was getting rid of a bunch of people here and outsourcing.
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_03: And uh so that also makes it hard to build new things and grow.
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_03: Uh yeah.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_03: So it's just that it seems there's in private equity, there's a lot of times that ownership is just like, yeah, well, figure it out.
• 30:41
  SPEAKER_03: Like, yeah, your sales cycles in this industry are five to seven years and you have to grow this year, figure it out.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_03: And uh yeah, it's uh it's painful to watch.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_03: It's painful to watch because it's just like we're scrambling, trying all the things, hoping that it's gonna work, and you know, at the end of the day, like it's hard because I don't see much of a reason that people should be giving it their all, because it's not like even if you're one of the ones to like save the day, there's no guarantee you're staying.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_03: So because again, it doesn't like they genuinely do not care about the people or the products.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_03: So yup, that should be interesting.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, it's uh it's it's a mess.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_03: Will not be said when it is time for me to do something else.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_04: It's unfortunate too, because it's like you could take a different approach, which is instead of burning everything to the ground or slashing it just to try to eke out a little bit more profit, you could figure out like how do we make sure that it's a great place to work first, and then from that like maintain growth and have good accountability structures in place, and but it's almost like it's all the accountability sort of for some people and none of the reward for everybody else.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_04: So a few people take on high risk and everybody else kind of suffers through like because I'm sure nobody owns equity.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_03: I would say I don't I don't think so at this point.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_03: Um yeah.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's it's sad to watch.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_03: And like there are some folks, and I'm just like, why?
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_03: Like maybe it's the the long-term incentive plan that's driving some of it, but I'm just like, why are you putting yourself through this level of stress for this situation?
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_03: I I it's mind-boggling to me.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_03: Uh like we've got people yelling in meetings regularly now because they're so stressed and they don't know.
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_03: I'm just like, uh, excuse me, is this is this really worth it?
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_03: That's I can't answer it's not.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_03: No, it's not.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_03: And uh, and of course we're not properly staffed, not just on engineering, but just in general, because so many people got cut, and when they set up the new structure a few years ago, they like there's like two people doing the job of probably seven.
• 34:05
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, of course it's not gonna win when you put when you create this sort of environment.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, it's just it's sad to watch.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and it makes me angry.
• 34:20
  SPEAKER_03: And then somehow I have to still I'm still choosing to show up every day.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_03: Like, okay, we're gonna do this.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_03: We gotta make the money today.
• 34:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, gotta stay employed.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_03: Employment, insurance, those things are good.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_03: And it's just another one of those.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_02: It'd be nice to make my way to greener pastures.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_03: Oh yes, I have.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_03: I have.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_03: I dreamed last night that I was living in Italy.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_03: And a pasta maker in a tiny village.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_03: It was great.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_03: Made it for all the tourists.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_04: Making pasta sounds I would eat I'd eat some pasta.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_03: Mm-hmm.
• 35:08
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_03: And it tastes delicious and it's fresh.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_03: Oh my gosh.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, so that sounds great.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_04: I think the other thing too is I'm like, Italy is such a small country by comparison.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_04: You could like tootle around Italy and Right.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_04: It'd be like tootling around Tennessee.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_04: I know.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_02: It'd be great.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_04: It's like, oh, I'm gonna drive from southern Italy to northern Italy.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_04: It's like, oh, okay, I can do that.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_04: I could probably do that in a day or two.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_03: Makes sense.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, because Tennessee's what?
• 35:46
  SPEAKER_03: Memphis to Nashville's three hours, Nashville to Knoxville is four or three?
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_03: Four?
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_03: Solid day.
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, one day.
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_03: Working working on an exit plan of some sort.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_03: Either to the middle of nowhere in the US.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_03: I still think we should do a compound.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_03: I'm totally in for that.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_03: I might have found a third person that would be interested.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_03: Have to find some land.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yes first.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_03: Land, and then we have to have money.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_03: And then some kind of articles of something.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's true.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like whatever.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, maybe we just want to cult.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 36:35
  unknown: Yeah.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: Cults are easier.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: Less paperwork.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I like that.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_03: It's just you just write it write it in blood.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_03: I will I will stay here forever and give you all my money.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_03: And give you full control over all of my assets.
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_03: So.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I mean, I could probably sleep if we slept on the floor.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_03: Could probably sleep ten people on here.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, they'd be like shoulder to shoulder, but can you imagine like ten people covering my rent?
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_03: Like that's a great way to start.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_03: And then we could see how many could fit in your place.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, I could fit a lot.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_03: You could fit a lot between dining and living room.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_03: Mm-hmm.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_03: Like I'd I'd give up my art studio and working area.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_03: I'd put it in my own bedroom if I could have ten people that lived in here and I never had to interact with them in like the living room or anything.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_03: They just have to stay in there.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_03: They have a mini fridge and a hot plate in here.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_04: No, you don't.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_04: No, no, no, no, no.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_04: You don't get to use the dishwasher.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_03: You probably have to start off with something better to lure them in rather than you start with a roommate.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_04: And they get the whole room.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_04: And then you slowly convince them like, okay, you are now gonna have a roommate in your room.
• 38:15
  SPEAKER_04: And then you just slowly have to.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_03: That would make your life better.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_04: If you didn't, if you weren't alone at night.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_04: They're like, yeah, I don't want to be single.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_04: And it's like, no, no, no, no, no, no.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_03: Not not that kind.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_03: No, I'm not, I'm not gonna help you with that.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_03: I I can't figure that out for myself.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_03: I'm not gonna help you with that.
• 38:37
  SPEAKER_03: Like, we're gonna we're gonna find you somebody to snuggle up on a yoga mat next to you.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_04: Like, wait, why are you taking my bed?
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_03: Well, you don't want to sleep in the same bed.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_03: Like, nah.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_03: Nah.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_03: It's just and like, you know, why can't we?
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_03: Japanese floor beds are a trend again.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_03: So I can't even have a twin of my own.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_03: It's like, nope.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_03: No, we gotta start like uh training ourselves, like acclimating to the floor.
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_03: Why is that?
• 39:12
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, no reason.
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_03: Just it feels important.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_03: Why do you still get to sit on the couch?
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_04: Because I bomb it.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_03: No, you can't sit in this chair.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_03: Where do I get to sit on your yoga mat?
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_03: It's up against the wall in the corner, so you have two walls to choose from as a backrest.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, best cult ever.
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_04: I I started getting all these YouTube videos about people who got rid of all their furniture and just live on the floor.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm like, okay, this is fine for you.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_04: Why are you trying to show this to me?
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_03: Like, what what's the value here?
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_03: Like, I know practicing getting up off the ground is good.
• 40:08
  SPEAKER_03: Uh huh.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that is good.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_04: But do that every day.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_03: But do we really need to do this?
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_04: I was just like, I don't, I mean, if you have chronic pain of some kind caused by your furniture, sure.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_04: Then perhaps it's time to get rid of it.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_04: Rid of the furniture.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_03: I can make sense of that.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_04: But uh it doesn't seem to be that this was the problem.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_04: It's just like, yeah, no, we just aren't gonna do this anymore.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_04: I'm like, okay, cool, well.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_04: I agree it's probably physiologically better for you.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_00: And sure.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_03: Also, then, like, do you really need eight, nine foot ceilings at that point?
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_04: Like, no, you could probably just have five foot ceilings.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_04: You just kind of walk because you're just crawling in there all the time.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_04: Like, why?
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_04: There's no need to stand.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_04: You just crawl from one room to another.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_04: You have everything else in your apartment lowered.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 41:21
  unknown: Yeah.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_04: Less square footage.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_03: That's a that's another way to save money.
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_04: You're probably not going to have a dishwasher though, so.
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, but that would be another way to like do roommates.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_03: Stack.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_03: Like we could have levels.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_03: You get the floor tier.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_04: I think it's three and a half feet tall until next time.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_04: Next time someone leaves, end quote, you can move up.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_03: Oh man.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_03: When was the last time someone left?
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_04: Well, Pete didn't last very long, so.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 42:09
  SPEAKER_04: Oh no.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_04: You're saying that like he didn't have a choice in leaving.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_04: He didn't.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_04: Nope.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_04: Where's Pete now?
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_04: Lives out in the back somewhere.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_03: Yep, he got downgraded to no shelter.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_03: Nope.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_03: Didn't had to DIY his shelter.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_03: He's taking a dirt nap.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_03: He loves the fall when the leaves fall off the cheese trees and he can burrow into them for warmth.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_03: Oh no.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_03: Great cult leaders.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_03: Uh leave us a comment if you want to join our cult at the end.
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_04: And you could always send us, and so we don't have to start a cult, you could send us a coffee.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_04: There we go.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_03: I like the link.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_03: That link is in the show notes.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's great.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_03: Um or if you want to live in the corner of my second bedroom on a yoga mat.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_03: Let me know.
• 43:15
  SPEAKER_03: You'll just need to cover all of my rent.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_03: It's fine.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_04: You're gonna get some emails from some weirdos.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_03: Just weird things and be like, shouldn't have opened my mouth.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_03: Nope.
• 43:28
  SPEAKER_04: Super, some super weirdos are gonna crawl out of the woodwork for that one.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_04: Oh cool, cool, cool, cool, cool, cool.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_01: So what's your what's your good thing this week?
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, my good thing this week.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_03: Um the Soul Tarot deck uh and a book that goes with it, Tarot for the Wild Soul.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_03: I I pulled a card and I got the Queen of Swords uh for like the Month.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_03: So all about, yeah, like kind of showing up boundaries, like what's mine, what isn't mine, like where do certain things end, and I begin and all of that.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_03: So, but it was just it was such a gentle, kind way of just being like, hey, this might be a time to take a look at, you know, what's yours and what are your defenses?
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_03: And I'm like, oh boy.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, that's fun.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_03: But it's just so gentle.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_03: And uh then the cards, like the deck itself is gorgeous.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_03: Um the Queen of Swords is this little stone house with like rose bushes and bramble.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_03: Uh it's just it's so pretty.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_03: And so it's been sitting on my desk.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_03: Just a little reminder.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_03: So yeah, I'm very glad I purchased that deck finally.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_03: Yep.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_02: What about you?
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_04: Watermelon lime olipop.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_04: That stuff is delicious.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_04: Yum.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_04: That sounds good.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_04: It tastes like summer.
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_04: But not in a like because they have crisp apple and that tastes like fall.
• 45:15
  SPEAKER_04: But it it's like a summer beverage, but you could drink it all year round.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_04: It's so good.
• 45:21
  SPEAKER_04: Light, crisp, refreshing.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_04: I was like, man, this is delicious.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_04: So highly recommend giving that a try if you haven't.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_02: Uh does it have like the probiotics in it?
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_02: Is that what Olipop is about?
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_02: It's also got, well, yeah, I guess it's prebiotics.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_04: Prebiotics.
• 45:43
  SPEAKER_04: It's got nine grams of fiber per can.
• 45:46
  SPEAKER_04: Oh lord.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_04: Okay.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_04: So if you need more fiber in your diet.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_04: That's why it's become a thing.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_04: Got it.
• 45:53
  SPEAKER_04: This'll do it.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_04: Yup.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_04: You will have some fiber in your diet.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_03: Ooh.
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_04: Believe that.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 46:00
  SPEAKER_04: Crisp apples really good.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_04: Banana cream is really good.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_04: You wouldn't think it's good.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_04: It tastes like a banana-flavored rent in the best way.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_04: It's just like, yeah, thank you.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_04: Fascinating.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_04: So that's good to know.
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe I'll have to try Olipop again.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_03: Need nine grams of fiber.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, you don't want to slam that thing.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_04: That feels no, it's a it's a slow sip experience.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_04: Or you're you're there will be repercussions.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_04: You might might have some gas, might have some bloating if uh if you slam it.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_03: Don't slam it.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_03: It just makes me think about that last camping trip we did, which was now a long time ago, and the bean quinoa that I had.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_03: The whole bag of because I was very hungry.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_03: And then it was like 40 hours later.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 47:01
  SPEAKER_03: I was just like, oh package.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_03: Dear Lord.
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_03: My poor system.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_03: I was farting all night.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_03: So bloated exactly.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, at least the the tent.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_03: I had a nice little mesh that it could move.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_04: Hotboxing yourself in the tent.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_04: Oh no.
• 47:30
  SPEAKER_04: Oh no.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, that was that was a lot of that was quite a lot of fiber.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_04: I bet it was filling that.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_03: It was.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_03: It also took like years to eat because it was so much chewing.
• 47:44
  SPEAKER_03: You're just like, this is this is a lot.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_03: This is a lot of things happening right now.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_03: Have about my fill.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_03: But I but I need this.
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_03: Because I need the fuel for tomorrow.
• 47:59
  SPEAKER_03: And it's cold tonight.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 48:02
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, and I actually didn't overpack on food.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_03: And so I didn't have loads of options.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_04: You're like, oh man, this was a great option for all day.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_03: Quick little quick little trip.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_03: Oh Lord.
• 48:20
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_03: Anyway.
• 48:22
  SPEAKER_03: Well, this has been a gem of an episode.
• 48:27
  SPEAKER_03: We watched each other Google things.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_04: Let me Google that for you.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_03: Discussed fiber.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_04: We could just rename this podcast.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_04: Let me Google that for you.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_04: And that could be our podcast.
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_04: It's just one person asks a question, the other person has to Google it and do all the research.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_04: In real time.
• 48:48
  unknown: Oh.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_04: Do we edit as a part out?
• 48:50
  SPEAKER_04: No.
• 48:51
  SPEAKER_04: You have to listen to the dead air.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_03: The silence.
• 48:56
  SPEAKER_03: As the Google.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_03: You have to check to be like, did it freeze?
• 49:00
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_03: They're just searching the internet.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_03: It's fine.
• 49:04
  SPEAKER_04: And the hmm.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_04: As we learn things.
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_04: Yep.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_04: Oh man.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_04: If you like silence, this is the podcast for you.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_04: Oh man.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_04: All right.
• 49:22
  SPEAKER_04: Silence or random stories.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_03: Where can people find you on the internet?
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_03: I live on the internet at LaurenMHight.com.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_03: I almost said dot gov.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_03: LaurenMHight.com.
• 49:38
  SPEAKER_03: H-I-G-H-T.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_03: Dot com.gov.org.
• 49:45
  SPEAKER_03: Creedthoughts backslash.
• 49:49
  SPEAKER_03: www.forward slash creed thoughts.
• 49:56
  SPEAKER_03: I actually I have a I have an Instagram account that's called creedthoughts.gov.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_03: I don't post anything on it.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_03: But one day I was just like, I want that handle.
• 50:11
  SPEAKER_03: Creedthoughts.gov.
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_03: And I think it's.g-U-V.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_03: And it's like spelled out Creed Thoughts D-O-T-G-U-V.
• 50:21
  SPEAKER_01: I can't remember.
• 50:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'll have to go check it.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_03: But yeah, that's where you can find out about uh end-of-life planning and support services for folks that are navigating the loss of a loved one.
• 50:37
  SPEAKER_03: Creed thoughts.gov.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_04: Are the creed thoughts included in the death services?
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_03: They absolutely can be.
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_03: Great.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_03: Okay.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_03: That's a by request, but it's free.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, it's free.
• 50:54
  SPEAKER_03: Okay, that's great.
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_03: Oh no.
• 50:56
  SPEAKER_03: No, that's just a civil service.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 51:00
  SPEAKER_03: That's why the doctor I do that work pro bono.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 51:04
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_04: Oh Lord.
• 51:07
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, that's great.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, cool.
• 51:08
  SPEAKER_04: Cool, cool, cool.
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_04: This is good.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_04: You can find me at Anashmonk.com, A-N-N-A-S-C-H-M-U-N-K.com.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_04: C-O-M.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_04: And yeah, there you can sign up for my free self-guided audio poetry retreats.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_04: And if you want to sign up for an upcoming event, you can find those on the events tab.
• 51:37
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh.
• 51:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's exciting.
• 51:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_00: Love this.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you should sign up because it's awesome.
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_00: Do it.
• 51:47
  SPEAKER_03: Our one lessons.
• 51:48
  SPEAKER_03: Sign up and you get a free corner of my apartment.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_03: For 24 minutes.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_04: First person to sign up gets a free 30-minute no rent situation.
• 52:03
  SPEAKER_04: You can try it out for free.
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_04: I'm really lonely.
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_04: I just want some more friends.
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_04: Why do you make your friends sit in the corner?
• 52:18
  SPEAKER_03: How much are you willing to sacrifice for me?
• 52:21
  SPEAKER_03: Fair.
• 52:22
  SPEAKER_03: Fair.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_03: There we go.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_04: We have to test uh loyalty from the beginning.
• 52:28
  SPEAKER_04: Well, yes, that actually is an important point.
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_04: How loyal are you gonna be?
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_04: You're gonna be super loyal?
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_04: You're not gonna be super loyal.
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_03: Exactly.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_03: So just Alright, let's we should end this madness.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_03: Alright, that's it.
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_04: Till next time.
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_04: Till next time.
• 52:51
  SPEAKER_04: Bye.
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_04: Bye.