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Don't Look for Dirt · Not Right Now

• 0:00
  The Muppets wrote a tweet or some shit being like, "If anyone is an honorary Muppet, it's Tim Curry." And I'm like, "That's it. That's the recognition."
• 0:07
  If the Muppets say if anyone's an honorary Muppet it's you, put it on the tombstone. [upbeat music] Welcome to Not Right Now, the podcast about parenting through all of this.
• 0:20
  We'll be talking about/crashing out over topics like... Soccer snacks and sea level rise. While the Arctic melts, question mark. Cleaning out uneaten lunch boxes again at 4:00 PM or 10:00 PM every day.
• 0:34
  Youth sports and other camp signups you forgot about and won't get into anyways. And is there such a thing as unstructured time anymore for anyone, for me? It's not an advice show.
• 0:44
  It's a you're not alone, and you're also not crazy for screaming in the shower kinda show. I'm Claire Zulkey from Evil Witches. And I'm Quin Emmett from Important Not Important.
• 0:55
  You can find details on anything we talk about in the show notes or at our website NotRightNow.show..show.
• 1:02
  And if you like what you hear today, please share it with a parent who needs it, or who might laugh and tell their kids to be quiet, and then drop us a nice little five-star review.
• 1:10
  And reminder, you can send questions or feedback to questions@notrightnow.show. [upbeat music] Okay. Can I ask you a question? If you were looking at, for example, Lego sets online for maybe yourself,
• 1:28
  and you saw below it, "Even more, explore more impressive Lego sets for adults," would you be like, "Yeah, that's me," or would you be offended?
• 1:39
  Would I be offended that it was targeting me as an adult- as a le- adult Lego person? Yeah. Are they calling you old? No.
• 1:46
  I'm thinking it means, like, this is a very complicated, expensive piece that you're not- Mm-hmm... gonna let your three-year-old work on, I guess. It's... And- and it's t- targeted you. You know, it's like Disney.
• 1:57
  I think Disney must know who are Disney adults versus- Mm-hmm... Disney kids. Mm-hmm. So are you offended? Were you feeling targeted by it? No, I was like, "Thank you," that I would love to be this guy.
• 2:06
  He's wearing a very comfy sweater. He's got a very gray beard and man bun, and he's putting together the Enterprise 1701-D, which is great. Yeah, that's- that's become very mainstream.
• 2:15
  First it started with my semi-autistic lesbian cousin- Mm-hmm... who is a big Lego person, and she would be posting her big builds on Facebook. Mm-hmm. And that was, like, you know, maybe 10 years ago.
• 2:27
  And then it's the dads who love to build alongside their kids. And then I saw on Instagram this couple, this kind of aspirational older Black couple who, they Lego- [laughs]... together side by side. Mm-hmm.
• 2:40
  And so I'm like, oh, so it's becoming, I think, more, you know, of an adult thing as we get older, which is great, 'cause we're gonna need someone to give all of our kids Legos to someday.
• 2:48
  So maybe you can have them when they grow up and move out. When we moved all our shit out for the renovation, at one point Dana came downstairs and said...
• 2:56
  'Cause occasionally I would have a bin I push off in the corner of little gifts I found for the kids to keep until Christmas or something like that. Mm-hmm. And I just gotta hide it away.
• 3:03
  And she goes, "Hey, the guy, the movers found a bunch of fucking Lego sets that haven't been built upstairs. W- do those go with the gift stuff?" I was like, "No, those are for me. Those are for me." Mm-hmm. Yeah.
• 3:12
  "I just don't have a place or, or a time yet." And she was... I was surprised. She was a little horrified, which sh- I'm, like she should have seen coming. Strange. But- Yeah, plastic not for thee, but yes for me.
• 3:24
  The opposite of what you s- what you normally see. Mm-hmm. We actually, I had a lot of self-control last weekend because James was going to a birthday party, and I was like, "What do we want for your friend?"
• 3:35
  And he said, "Legos." And then I, I was like, "Oh, we gotta get him some Legos."
• 3:38
  Then I was like, wait a minute, I know we have a box in the basement that was like a, you know, a repeats, and I had it in the donation bin.
• 3:45
  And I went and wrapped it for him, and then I looked twice at the invite and it said, "No gifts." And I- Mm... almost was like, well, fuck it, I already wrapped it. But I was like, I'm gonna obey this parent.
• 3:55
  But then as a, as a side thing- Mm... by the way, I was kind of mad at James, and this is not a parent I know that well, so I dropped him off at this party.
• 4:02
  And I was kind of waiting near an adult who I thought was the mom of the birthday boy, but I wasn't quite sure to say, "Here he is, thanks. He's going home with th- this other family."
• 4:12
  And then she was so busy, and I was so, I wanted my time alone so badly that I just left. So I'm trying to figure out how bad, how rude is it to drop your child off at a party without engaging with the adults in any way.
• 4:24
  Did you already know them? Lightly. They were new last year. I talked to them at a thing. Are they, I mean- I don't know...
• 4:30
  I'm not gonna ask are, like, are they witches, because it's a high bar, but did, did they seem okay? [laughs] Yeah. They seemed- I don't know. Yeah. I'm like- Yeah... here, you invited them. You didn't invite me.
• 4:41
  You invited them. Here they are. Right. I'm not here anymore.
• 4:43
  And I know that other parents have dropped their kids off at my kids' parties, and I never saw them, and I can't remember who was who, and I'm not keeping track, so I'm hoping that they'll do the same. Doesn't matter.
• 4:53
  Time is, time is fleeing, where I may be thinking about this now for months, and then I'll bring it up with them, and then they'll be like, "What are you talking about?" And it'll be weird. So- Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm...
• 5:02
  um, it's like now or never where I say, "Thank you for the party. And by the way, I wrapped a box of Legos if you want it or not. Still there, so." Right, if you need it for whatever, or put it in the closet for- Yeah...
• 5:13
  somebody. Do you think we deserve to know how to talk to whales? No, absolutely not. We're going through all my tabs now. No. We should leave them alone.
• 5:21
  Yeah, I think that's- Why would they wanna t- why would they wanna talk to us? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I think you're right. Did you look up that song, the Boneless Wing song, or did you talk to Oliver about it?
• 5:30
  No, I didn't fucking look it up. I didn't have a chance. He wasn't answering my questions, so I didn't. But I will ask later. I will. Okay, 'cause- Do you b- what do you think? Do you think he knows it? Maybe.
• 5:40
  So here's, here's how this went. Paul was bopping around the house going, "You took a bite of a boneless wing," and I was like, "What is that?" And he said, "It's this song that's going around."
• 5:52
  And I was like mildly curious about, is this something where this came from someone who is a bad person who should be in jail, or is this like something that's re- With a knobs... related to... child pornography.
• 6:04
  I have no idea. Mm-hmm. So I looked it up and it was both interesting and so boring at the same time because it was some guy named Zach D. Let's see, boneless wing Zach D. What- Zach D videos.
• 6:16
  I'm not even gonna look this up 'cause it's not even... It's more, maybe more interesting or more boring if I describe it, but there's some guy who makes...
• 6:23
  There's some guy named Zach D who makes videos, and there was a video about a guy who choked on a bone- boneless chicken wing and it turned it into a song, but then the song got memed and turned into other songs and now it's blown up all over, you know, these social media platforms that teen boys are on.
• 6:41
  But how long do you think this has been around for? How long, how old do you think this song or this meme is? Is this the first time you heard it? Yeah. Had James heard of it? Good question.
• 6:50
  I don't know if he had heard it. I'm gonna say no, but I'm not... No, he did, 'cause he mansplained to me. I was trying to tell Steve where it came from and James corrected me, so he knew.
• 6:59
  Okay, so this is not just a high school thing then? Fascinating. A week. Yeah. Almost exactly. Really? I, yeah, if you look up- I'm on it. If you look up boneless wing- I-... or choke of bite of boneless wing- Mm-hmm...
• 7:11
  it's on Know Your Meme and it seems like it c- came out in the world August 17th or so. And I just was like, what is music? What is anything? 'Cause at the same- What is anything?
• 7:23
  'Cause I also, I think I texted you about this. Paul knew the song Zombie, the Cran- Cranberry song because it was on the radio. I listen to terrestrial radio. Mm-hmm.
• 7:33
  And they were playing it and he said, "Oh, I know this song." He said, "It's on like YouTube transformation vid- gym transformation videos," which I presume are like videos of- Zombie? Yeah. Yes.
• 7:46
  And I know, 'cause I was like, well first of all I know that song is about- Oh... isn't it about like Irish terrorism and war, right? Sinn Fein or- I'm pr- pretty sure. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I'm not 100%, but I'm pretty sure.
• 7:59
  I both remember it being like a protest song and also we made fun of it when it came out 'cause it is sort of so, you know, with your g- guns and your bombs and your bombs and your guns and it's such a, you know,
• 8:12
  defiantly non-catchy song. But also it's The Cranberries. I, I don't know if I'm articulating r- it right. Do you remember it? Am I s- explaining this correctly? Like, that you're- 100%. Yeah. Yeah, okay.
• 8:21
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I don't know. I was like, that's hilarious. So I explained it to Steve and he got so mad.
• 8:28
  He gets so mad when Paul learns about music from our era or earlier through the internet the way Paul loved some song by, by The Smiths and, and I was like, "Remember the Badger song?
• 8:43
  Like the, the badger, badger, badger, badger?" And he was like, "Yeah." And he was trying to claim that that is good music [laughs] you know, the way that, you know, his dad was like, "Only Benny Goodman is good music."
• 8:56
  Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So- Mm-hmm... anyway, those are, that's the cultural, part of the cultural zeitgeist that's been on my mind the last couple days.
• 9:03
  I'm just trying to think about the person who, I got no shade for, for Zombie.
• 9:08
  About, but about the person who were they training a- and that was their song and they were like, "I need people to know what my training montage song, what I was hearing the entire time"? Or
• 9:19
  did they have their reel and just go, "I haven't found it yet. I ha- Thunderstruck, no. You know, Dirt All From Our Shoulder, no. I got it. Zombies by The Cranberries" and, and they were like, "That f- that's my MO.
• 9:32
  That's my journey." I, I still don't know how the song Pretty Little Baby by Connie Francis became like a, a memeable song.
• 9:40
  I don't know if that's one that your kids have sung or talked about or anything like that, but that's another one where that's a 50s song I wanna say, late 50s, you know. And I have no idea.
• 9:50
  I'm just so out of the- It had to have been used in something... I, it. Right, but who, why? I don't know. I mean, it's great.
• 9:57
  I think it's cool that it's, you know, genres that they would have never other otherwise uncovered, especially these lady artists or lady singers and things like that. But I don't know.
• 10:07
  I also was, you know, we talked about, a little bit about Dolly Parton on our, on our chats and I was talking to Steve about admitting kind of shamefully, and I don't know if y- 'cause you're from Virginia maybe this is different for you, but we were saying that there was a time where Dolly was like in our culture more of a punchline than an icon.
• 10:28
  A big boob lady. Like more, like literally like a Jay Leno punchline kinda thing. And we were trying to discern when she mainstreamed and we all were like, "Oh, it's, she's not just like the lady with the big boobs.
• 10:41
  She is an icon, a talented legend. You know, not just in on the joke. So smart, you know, and so giving." Like th- does this ring true for you or d- did, was she always St. Dolly and never anything less?
• 10:55
  What's wrong with you? [laughs] I'm from the Midwest. Look, is Williamsburg part of the South? I mean, kinda, like in some ways. In some ways a lotta not. Ton of country music exposure, things like that, but I, you know,
• 11:10
  Dolly was... I have always loved Dolly for the music. Well, here, here, you know what my entry into it was? Can I tell you?
• 11:17
  One night a friend and I stayed up late and we rented two mov- we went to Video Update, which was our fancy thing before Blockbuster and we rented two movies. We were, I don't know, we were young.
• 11:28
  Alien and Bodyguard and they're both tremendous, P.S. And I had an Uncle Pete who had always told me, "You're gonna love Whitney Houston. She's incredible."
• 11:39
  And that song is amazing, I Will Always Love You, and I discovered via like my parents' old stuff that it was not the original. As much as it's great, they're two different versions. They're fantastic.
• 11:49
  It was a fucking B side for Dolly and I think that's how I found my way into Dolly's music for the first time, but I loved it. Jolene is a banger. Like that is just good music, but I love all the rest of it.
• 12:01
  So yeah, I don't know. I, I wasn't aware of the-
• 12:05
  Bigger philanthropic stuff until later, and she was great 'cause she didn't always really toot her own horn about it necessarily, but, but other people told that story, and then eventually Imagination Library became impossible to not know about.
• 12:18
  Especially it's not just, like, giving away books. Like, she built this m- enormous...
• 12:23
  She and everyone sh- who, who works with her built this enormous infrastructure of the way they negotiate these things and ship them and all this stuff. It's crazy. So yeah, no, never a punchline for me.
• 12:32
  Claire, she was a- [laughs] She was always, she was always the one. I wonder if it was... Because growing up maybe in Chicago I remember it was really standard when people would say, "What kind of music do you like?"
• 12:43
  And it... People would say anything but country, and country had a stigma, and we... And it- I get... There's a lot of bad country music. There's also a lot of bad other music, but Dolly's, yeah. Well, we just...
• 12:54
  I, I don't know. It just was not a mainstream thing, and, like, a weird side note is that my parents took my brother and me on, like, a tour of the South, or maybe a couple tours of the South when we were younger.
• 13:02
  But we went to the Grand Ole Opry, and I saw Porter Wagoner perform. Of course, as a kid I had no idea who this guy was, anything like that. Mm-hmm.
• 13:10
  He's just an old guy, and here we were at a weird place my parents liked while we were stopping between Civil War sites. Mm-hmm. But yeah, I don't know. I, I think my theory is that country music got more mainstream.
• 13:20
  I think camp culture got more mainstreamed as well, and I'm not sure what the tipping point was obv- and then obviously, like, the merchandise, things like that. But you know, she was never, like, a bad...
• 13:31
  I loved Steel Magnolias the minute I became aware of it, but I was just trying to place, like, where she became sort of a universally beloved saint. And thank God she did because I don't know.
• 13:42
  I saw on Reddit people are trying to think of who will die, who else is left alive who will, like, people will be so sad about when, when they die. That'll be universally mourned? Yeah. I don't know. No. I didn't...
• 13:54
  The one I thought was interesting that I didn't think of was Michael J. Fox, and I was like, that's a good one because- Hmm. Mm-hmm... he, he's provided pop culture entertainment but also done good for the world. Mm-hmm.
• 14:04
  Mm-hmm. And I don't think he's known for having some hot take, you know, or- Mm-hmm... something that discounts him as a person. That's an interesting one. Someone said LeVar Burton. Now I'm just getting sad.
• 14:14
  I would love to not think about these things. Sorry. No, it's fine. Yeah. These are just my heroes. Yeah. No. I mean, LeVar Burton, yeah, Reading Rainbow, right? Like, that, that's it. It, it, uh... Something.
• 14:24
  I also saw something about, while we're on that subject, about Tim Curry who also passed away this y- this week at age 80.
• 14:31
  The Muppets wrote a, wrote a tweet or some shit being like, "If anyone is an honorary Muppet, it's Tim Curry." And I'm like, that's it. That's the recognition. If the Muppets say if anyone's an honorary Muppet, it's you,
• 14:43
  that's it. Put it on the tombstone. I was originally thinking that I have to show the, my kids Steel Magnolias. We started watching it a couple years ago and, and had to pause it for some reason, didn't pick it up again.
• 14:52
  But then I was like, maybe we should show them, show them Clue. Maybe we need something that's- So good...
• 14:56
  I'm not sure what the, you know, obligatory someone died movie to show them this week, but yeah, it is, uh, it's- Rocky Horror Picture Show.
• 15:03
  I saw Rocky Horror Picture Show, this is so weird, in my Catholic youth group that I belonged to. We had a lock-in one night, and we had a double feature of Rocky Horror and Blade Runner, which- [laughs] Yes.
• 15:16
  And I've never been tempted to rewatch either movie another, again. I love them both separately but equally. Wow. Wow. Yeah. All right. Which one did they play first? It might've been Rocky Horror actually. Hmm. Mm-hmm.
• 15:27
  And I didn't, I didn't love it. It was just... It, I think it was so manic. It w- and that's how, kinda how Baz Luhrmann movies, I- Oh, yeah... they run by me. I, I didn't like Moulin Rouge.
• 15:37
  I'm just, it's, like, too crazy, and I felt that little way a little about Rocky Horror, but, um- I get it.
• 15:42
  I mean, Tim Curry's entrance in Rocky Por- Horror is, is up there on the list of greatest entrances of all time, but I get it. I get it. Yeah. Now, weird pivot. I don't know if I have a good transition to this.
• 15:55
  Bill Gates? Well, ki- fir- first, yes, Bill Gates first, but also we both had, as parents, our kids' school send home an acknowledgement/semi-blessing of them using AI in school. So talk about that for a moment.
• 16:09
  Oh, yeah. Hold on. Let me find this fucking thing I sent you so I can reference it, 'cause it, it both seemed very specific and also not at all. So let me read mine. Mm-hmm.
• 16:21
  This was up in the classroom, and as I said to you, I do not put any of this on the teachers. So it says, it's a stoplight, and it says, "Can I use," this was in a middle school, "Can I use AI on this?"
• 16:31
  Red, restricted to your own work. AI tools are not permitted for the assignment, and work must be your own thoughts and words. Yellow, yield to teacher directions.
• 16:41
  You can use AI for specific parts of the assignment such as brainstorming, but the core content and conclusions should be original. I've already got so many questions. Green, go for it.
• 16:52
  You are allowed to utilize AI tools freely to assist in your assignment as long as credit is given. How is that different from yours? James worked on the... He k- I, he already had a report due.
• 17:04
  Last week was the first week of school, and they only started on a Tuesday, and he had a, a report due on Monday about an explorer. His was Louis Joliet.
• 17:13
  And it said you can use AI for your research, but you have to back it up showing, I think, confirm that it came from something else.
• 17:21
  And I never want to go to curriculum night at school except this year because I wanna know- Mm-hmm... and I think you mentioned this is probably the teachers getting ahead of that. Now, w- is the...
• 17:33
  When your kids get an assignment, is this red light, green light thing gonna be, like, it sh- be a part of it? Like, how, when does this- It's a really great question. So I'm not sure, and for a couple reasons.
• 17:44
  One, that's the first time I've seen one of those signs. But, but again, I do believe it is teachers trying to get ahead of it, however standardized that is.
• 17:52
  Two, our school system doesn't really, and I, I mean, I don't know about high school yet, but at least through middle school doesn't really do homework. And they, in fact, stopped...
• 18:03
  Elementary kids as of last year don't bring their lap- their school laptops home because they were being such pieces of shit about it and forgetting it and all that s- kinda stuff.
• 18:11
  So the point is I don't even see them interacting with the content that much, like, myself to be honest. Hmm. Hmm. I imagine they'll be given some longer assignments, and it'll probably be spelled out like that.
• 18:21
  Hey, this is one of those specific ones, I would think. But- Man, I mean, the second you get into the yellow yield, it's like, what is it? What is the core content? Yeah. Well,
• 18:31
  I, I was pleased with myself 'cause my parents have not one, but two encyclopedias at their house. Yes. They also, they have also the Britannica, and I was so...
• 18:41
  First of all, I was mad at James because he was in trouble for sneaking Paul's phone in the mornings and then lying about it like an idiot.
• 18:47
  I- God forbid he ever learns how to lie 'cause it's very convenient that he's really bad at lying about things that have very obvious finger- like, fingerprints and breadcrumbs all over them. But- Quite literally.
• 18:57
  Uh-huh. Yeah. So anyway, I was already mad at him, and I was like, "I don't like the idea.
• 19:03
  You're already in trouble for using the internet too much, and you're not gonna use AI to do a research paper about someone who's been dead for hundreds of years already." Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
• 19:11
  So I had my dad pull out the, the book, the world book, which smelled like, I don't know, did your parents ever have these growing up? Oh, hell yeah. We still got them in storage. Yeah. No, they're fantastic. Yeah.
• 19:22
  I, I kind of was like, I wanna look up how these are made, what the glue is and the paper is that makes this smell.
• 19:27
  But so, on the way to his putt-putt birthday party, we stopped at my parents' house to pick up this encyclopedia, and it was a w- it was a good experience to learn already 'cause I was like, "Work on your paper."
• 19:39
  And James was screaming from the other room. His favorite hobby is screaming from another room. He says, "It's not in the book. Jolie, it's not on the world book."
• 19:46
  And then of course I looked it up and I realized that he doesn't understand looking up by last name.
• 19:51
  So I was like, you already learned something that you wouldn't have learned if you had used AI, which is like learning, like looking things up by last name.
• 19:57
  But isn't that wild that they haven't j- I know it dates us, but also everyone, though I feel like that was one of the very first fucking things we learned. Yeah. Yeah.
• 20:05
  So anyway, so my da- now my dad is trying to pawn off the encyclopedias on us. Mm-hmm. And on the one hand, I'm like, this would be helpful.
• 20:13
  On the other hand, I have no space because of all the toys that you keep giving our kids, so we have nowhere to put the encyclopedias. So anyway, for the time being, we are s- able to stave off AI for the moment.
• 20:26
  But also, I can't lie, I have used AI with regards to my kids' school a couple of times.
• 20:32
  Paul used to have a science teacher who, she was a really nice person, but she would send these insanely long emails about their science projects, and I would ask Chat, "Can you please summarize this email for me and tell me what the action items are?"
• 20:44
  Mm-hmm. 'Cause I don't have time to read all this. Okay.
• 20:46
  And then last year when I was furious that James had to do a group project due the day after Christmas about King Tut, the explanation for the project was like two back-to-back pa- or two, a double-sided piece of paper, single-spaced, and I was like, these kids can't even read these directions, l- let alone do this project.
• 21:04
  So I also put it into Chat and I was like, "Can you boil this down into a timeline and action items of what hap- has to happen when, including what will happen, what has to happen when they're all together and apart?"
• 21:18
  And I'm not proud of myself, like, 'cause I could have, I suppose, done this all with my own brain, but also why should I have to do this with my own brain when it's not my project? I don't know.
• 21:28
  Have you ever succumbed to these things? But also, like, you're, you're graduated. Yeah. You're done. Yeah. You've done the thing. You've written books. [laughs] Right. You, you have four fucking jobs. I, I don't know.
• 21:37
  I feel like you're allowed to now, you know? Okay. Thank you.
• 21:40
  I feel like, no, I, but my point is like, th- there was a study, and again, these things are incredibly small and early, and God knows how poorly they're run, and not to come out on whoever ran this particular one, but just a general caveat.
• 21:53
  There's a study, and everyone breathlessly reported. Mm-hmm. It was like kids who used AI did better on homework but then did terrible on the fucking tests because they didn't actually learn anything, right? Yeah.
• 22:03
  And, and that's what I mean. It's like, did I barely graduate? Sure. Well- That was for different reasons. I just chose not to, to do a lot of the things.
• 22:10
  But when forced to learn, like, there was, it was a, the only way out was through, man. That was, that was it. Do I still, I mean, I joke to Willow all the time about my, the other show or something I write.
• 22:22
  I record it, and then no offense to my guests, but like, it's gone.
• 22:25
  That's probably 'cause of CTE, but you know, it's also just like college exams, like, need to, like you were for an hour and a half a professional on fucking rocks or whatever. Right. You know?
• 22:37
  But at least you learned it. Right. You were capable of applying it, and look, I think there, some of these things can, can do incredible things, right?
• 22:45
  And as a parent, again, it should make life easier in some way, but it's not like you're outsourcing conversations with your children to it, you know?
• 22:54
  It's- Well, and I think that we, a lot of us have these like, at least I'm not, and, and I imagine the things that we are doing are someone else's at least I'm not, 'cause I do know a mom who used Chat to help her talk to her son about something 'cause her son has some, you know, neuro spicy this and that, and some personality this and that, and she and her husband were at a wit's end, and they were like g- they sh- they fed Chat the situation that they were in, and Chat was like, "Why don't you try coming at it from this way?"
• 23:21
  And it worked. And on the one hand, you're, you could be like, how could you use, you know, AI to talk to your kid?
• 23:29
  On the other hand, is that worse than just like banging your head against the wall and both of you guys being- No, it's not... furious at each other? What- whatever tool's required.
• 23:38
  You know, it's more like it, it, it's, again, it's like the, the famous hardcore pornography thing.
• 23:44
  It's like, I feel like you personally and generally, proverbially would know the difference between like I have fully outsourced my parenting to I'm asking for help.
• 23:57
  I'm trying to, if this thing has really fucking read and then destroyed all the, all these books, right, for, to know authors, but right now I need to figure out how to talk to my kid about something functional and important and foundational, might as well try.
• 24:12
  Right. And then of course that comes back to the whole thing of well, maybe that's the only thing they can use is like GPT with ads because they can't afford to go to a child counselor of some kind or whatever, you know?
• 24:22
  Yeah. So h- did you read this Bill Gates piece? 'Cause I actually have not yet, and, uh, it's like- Not the whole thing, no. Okay. I, let me just give you the context of just like where I was when I became aware of it.
• 24:32
  I was Making slow cooker beef stew, or this Korean beef d- dish, because I, I've been working on finding recipes that are not serve immediately, 'cause James comes home one time from football- Mm-hmm...
• 24:44
  and Paul comes home another time from crew. Mm-hmm. And I'm listening to this Annie Jacobsen book about biological warfare, which both makes me want to have a panic attack and- Mm-hmm...
• 24:56
  run out the glass, through a glass door. Or also it just weirdly makes me laugh, 'cause I, I'm like, "What am I... Why are we even... Who ca- There's..." Whatever. I don't know how to explain this.
• 25:07
  As if her book on nuclear war didn't push you over the edge enough. You're like, "Let's get weirder." Yeah. Yeah, yeah, 'cause I'm like, "All right, you know what? I am gonna put this plastic plate in the dishwasher.
• 25:16
  YOLO. Who cares?" And, and then my friend Kelly and I are texting about keeping snacks in the house for our kids, our hungry kids, and that's... And then she's like, "And then Bill Gates..."
• 25:27
  And I was like, "Not right now." [laughs] Literally, what? I was like, "What the fuck? What does he have to say?" And she, n- I looked it up and I was like, "Oh, the Epstein Island guy?" The Ep- What? So what?
• 25:38
  I was like, "So does he have any solutions for us? Is that, is that what this column is about? 'Cause if not, I don't wanna hear about it." So please fill me in. What am I missing? Bill Gates is a nuanced subject, right?
• 25:50
  I think this guy was really hoping that all of his, to be clear, incredible philanthropic work in the post-Microsoft years, using all that wealth and getting all these other people to give money, and truly doing incredible things in global health and, and some in women's health around the world, would how he would be remembered, instead of, you know, being basically like a corporate pirate in the early days.
• 26:17
  I don't think he realized, like, a, a third act was gonna come to light, which was his wife divorcing him, at least in part because apparently of his ties to Epstein in whatever way, which is just a fucking red flag.
• 26:31
  Does that mean he is incapable of commenting on his own
• 26:38
  probably really informed but still subjective perspective on how quickly AI is going and, and kids and life and what we should be prepared for and what we shouldn't? No.
• 26:49
  I mean, I can't imagine anyone with more w- w- accumulated wisdom. At the same time, I do really feel like, and I've been running into this a lot later,
• 27:00
  a lot lately, and, and he's obviously not a standard Boomer with technology. But parents have always been historically mad at kids about new stuff, rock and roll, whatever it is, right? CDs.
• 27:10
  I'm running into more and more folks of that age who are really completely detached from how quick things are moving. Mm-hmm.
• 27:19
  And not just technology-wise, but how quick, again, these technologies are immediately accessible and embedded fully into every child's life. Mm-hmm.
• 27:32
  Whether it's the complete takeover of the classrooms, right, from, from the Google education stuff, which I, I know we've talked a little bit about too, the IA- AI stuff that they turn on without even telling the schools or the teachers, the YouTube throughout the day.
• 27:48
  It's, it's crazy. I don't think people realize it has become their, not just like a second language, it is their primary function. Everything else revolves around it. Your family time with them
• 28:00
  is the exception to the rule now. And so, yeah, look man, if he was a fucking Epstein guy, you know, burn in hell. Go fuck yourself. Thanks for all the philanthropic stuff as well. Thank you for your wisdom.
• 28:12
  But I, I am much more [laughs] interested in the scare stories of, of people our age who, who work in tech, who do not let their kids get on fucking computers at all. Mm-hmm. That is
• 28:23
  more compelling to me, even if it's anecdotal in some way. That's interesting. In his piece, does he talk about Microsoft's embrace of AI? 'Cause Steve talked about that as well.
• 28:31
  He was like, 'cause I was talking about the, you know... And I know, you know, being a pervert doesn't mean you are, it negates your expertise on technology.
• 28:40
  But Steve was like, it's not like- No, all those things can be true. Yeah. It's not like his company is not also perpetuating it. But again, I- No, 100%. And, but by the way, it's applicable to everything.
• 28:49
  It's, it's, it's you, how you don't realize how big these things are. Like, Microsoft has been, for the past 20 years, like, one of the biggest suppliers of information architecture for fossil fuel systems.
• 29:00
  And so every time you hear, "Oh, they're doing carbon-free," it's like they're literally powering. Mm-hmm. And so you can have a guy who's associated with m- the most notorious pedophile of all time.
• 29:11
  How he's associated in practical terms, who fucking knows? Did all this stuff, global health, whatever. And I know we talked about this a little bit offline, like the accessibility of deep fake porn stuff
• 29:27
  is instant and universal- Mm-hmm... and can ruin anyone, anywhere, at any time, and all of these companies are responsible for it. And it's like- Mm-hmm...
• 29:34
  at some point you should have started your fucking article with that. Mm-hmm. Like, look at what we've done. Yeah. So does the article include advice for everyday people on what they should do? I didn't get that far.
• 29:47
  Okay. I didn't get that far. No, but I just think it's interesting timing. I don't know if you saw, did you see The Odyssey yet? No. I'm, I kind of like have turned a corner where now I'm like, three hours?
• 29:57
  And also- No, I get it. I get it... I just read Cersei, so I'm like, sort of like- Ugh... "I just read about this guy." Like- That fucking book is so good.
• 30:03
  There's an interesting commentary, and it's totally true, which is Christopher Nolan's last couple movies are guys in power having to come to terms with a, something big they did, basically. Oh.
• 30:15
  And realizing what a, how bad it is. Mm-hmm. And, and for The Odyssey, it's like he's the one who came up with the horse, and then it destroyed civilization, basically. Oh.
• 30:22
  Like, there's this whole thing about Zeus's rule, right? Which is in, it's in the b- I mean this is a 3,000-year-old story, which is treat your neighbors how you wanna be treated, essentially.
• 30:30
  And it's like, well, they broke it. They said, "Here's a gift. We're giving it to you," and we came in and we destroyed your city, right? That breaks all the rules.
• 30:36
  And they're say, and he's like, "From now on, I have negated- That role for everyone. Like, I did this. And it's the same thing as Oppenheimer, right? Yeah.
• 30:45
  Which is just, look at this incredible scientific achievement, which is like, I am now the destroyer of worlds. And I don't know how if you're someone like Bill Gates.
• 30:52
  Again, these things, they're gonna find medicines we've never known about that are gonna help people, all these incredible things. Something will bypass chemo, which is like the world's worst trade-off.
• 31:02
  But in the meantime, I don't know, man. [laughs] Yeah. It's, it's fucking gnarly. It's awful. Yes. No, I think about that as we...
• 31:11
  Well, that's like our whole podcast ethos is like on the one hand, we are like trying to help our parents age in place and dealing with, God, I was just in the, someone's, like the Alzheimer's Reddit yesterday, and someone said his par- his mother had forgot his name for the first time.
• 31:24
  Mm. Like dealing with that. Yeah. And then at the same time grappling with this AI stuff with kids, and you don't know even where to begin, like what the, the diet is.
• 31:32
  Also, I just found this a funny, like I don't know if, just like a flavor. Did you watch The Devil Wears Prada 2? Did you happen to watch that? I haven't seen it yet.
• 31:40
  And just to dis- disclose, one of Dana's best friends is the writer of both of those. Okay. And I love the first one. Go ahead. I love the first one. I did not think the second one was very strong. I, I mean- Okay...
• 31:53
  I just, it was, you know, it's nice to see everyone again. Sure. I don't think... But may I spoil part of it- Oh, by all means... before we continue? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. For sure.
• 32:00
  At the end, the magazine gets bought by a character who's obviously based on Mackenzie Scott or Melinda Gates. Mm. It's the ex of some tech guy. Mm-hmm. And, and it's kind of the, I don't know.
• 32:13
  It's great in the world of the magazine where you're like... And also PS, you know, a- the Anna Wintour in this world is a good guy that we wanna see saved for some reason, and n- Mm... no comeuppance for her. So
• 32:26
  that's another flavor of this. In the meantime, the girl power.
• 32:29
  Let's, you know, find a rich lady to save, you know, possibly print/journalism, but also, you know, the driver behind diet culture and fast fashion and all these things. That's, wow, this is so not fun.
• 32:41
  This is so much... This is why kids- No, but-... don't wanna ever listen to us. No, but I mean, it's so, it's, you know, we're wa- we're, we are rewatching Friends with the kids. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
• 32:50
  It is fucking hilarious still. These people at the peak of their powers in the end of season one, season two, et cetera, et cetera. They're so goddamn funny. The ratio of Black people in that show
• 33:02
  to fat jokes in that show- Mm... is insurmountable. Yeah. And it is glaringly obvious, and you're like, "Goddamn. Okay. You know, that's not fucking great." Look, was TGI Fridays a, a, a, a better,
• 33:16
  you know, a four-course meal of, of diversity on TV? For sure, but holy shit, man. But it's important to revisit this stuff and, and look at it and go, "Okay, but what now i- are we..."
• 33:30
  It's this idea of, you know, with any of these AI things, whatever it is, it's always about the user. It's the people who, who, who program them.
• 33:36
  Even if we're Anthropic, so we don't even know how it's making decisions now, but we have this constitution and, and this and that. It's like, yeah, but it's always about us.
• 33:44
  It always comes back to us, whether it's we're, you know, not putting people of color on screen in, in Friends, or it's, you know, your fucking chicken wing thing.
• 33:52
  It's, it's, it's every- we're capable of everything, but what are we capable of, of doing with it? And to me, again, that kinda comes back to this idea of, of why I wanted to talk about the Dolly thing.
• 34:05
  And you mentioned- Oh... Bill Gates and, and all this.
• 34:07
  It's in a world where anything is possible, everything is possible, everything is happening all at once, we're trying to keep our dementia parents from stay offline, but also don't trip over this thing, and remember our name as much as we can control.
• 34:18
  And the same fucking things with our kids. Who can you proactively and consciously expose your kids to that is a good role model? That they care about, by the way, 'cause they don't want...
• 34:32
  Like I, I, w- you were talking about don't meet your heroes, like on our, on our list. Well, I, I kinda meant the, the, you know, the inverse of, of that, which is- No... yeah.
• 34:40
  But I was really thinking about that, 'cause like I, as a kid, I, I think about the pe- you know, I've met a handful of like kind of famous people in my life.
• 34:48
  And I d- was as a kid got to meet Michael Jordan briefly, just like for, it was like a meet and greet inter- like a autograph thing. Not like I interviewed him. And this is pre-championship ring.
• 35:00
  And like it's hard to top him, right, in terms of a kid icon, right? In our age? Yeah.
• 35:06
  But then, you know, time passes, and you watch Last Dance, and you learn more about kind of his psyche and gambling and just kinda his vibe.
• 35:21
  And you're like, as a sports hero and as a capitalist, like yes, like what a hero. On the other hand, is he like Steve Kerr out there, like trying to- Mm... speak up on behalf of the little guy?
• 35:33
  Like Charles Barkley, you know? Even, you know, Dwayne Wade, like speaking up for trans rights. Oh. But that's not... But again, also I'm aware that my kids don't wanna hear that.
• 35:42
  Like they're, you know, 'cause also 2% of sports people, I made that, that stat up- Mm-hmm... are probably traumatic in some way. You know? [laughs] Well, that's the thing. Knowing that we are all flawed.
• 35:52
  I don't believe in the original sin thing. We all fuck things up. We all do all those things. We're not all Oppenheimer or Odysseus or, or fucking Bill Gates or whatever.
• 35:59
  But, but, but the vulnerability and the flaws are important, too. It's when your kids realize you're real people, too, and you're like, "Oof."
• 36:05
  But that's why I have always loved this idea of even if I do a terrible job of it sometimes, my number one job is to not give my kids my shit, right? Mm-hmm.
• 36:13
  It, it's to deal with my shit on a, on a parallel track and hopefully more quickly, while the helping them maybe m- get ahead of their own. You know? Yeah.
• 36:22
  Like my youngest has more self-awareness of his mental health struggles than I did three weeks ago, and certainly more tools, even if he's like cognitively not capable of, of, of applying them in the moment, right?
• 36:33
  Mm-hmm. You know, what does someone learn from Bill Gates making a bazillion fucking dollars? And m- most young kids don't realize, he was the richest guy in the world for 20 fucking years, right? Yeah.
• 36:44
  And we thought that was, like, as much as you could make, and then he decided to give it all away. Wow.
• 36:49
  And he convinced Warren Buffett to give it all away, and all these other people, and now it's going in the opposite direction. Mm. And but also, what is the history of guys like that?
• 36:56
  You know, all of our national parks, all of our museums, were all these billionaires who, if they had Twitter, to be clear- Mm-hmm... would have a pretty bad fucking track record. Right.
• 37:07
  I am sure they were all like, "Boy, it'd be great to have slaves right now- [laughs] "To build these railroads." Yeah, yeah. Exactly, yeah. Re- Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, like- But how do you measure it, right?...
• 37:16
  into libraries, but also, yeah But that's why I think people call Dolly 1 of 1. Again, I'm sure she had stuff. I'm sure she had shit, but I don't know, man. 300 million books is hard to measure against.
• 37:25
  I was getting so mad 'cause I was on... And I don't wanna know anything bad about her. I don't wanna hear about it. Yeah, yeah. But, like, they were, on, on Reddit- Mm-hmm...
• 37:31
  someone h- posted an interview with her and Perez Hilton, and he was trying to get her to agree that Jessica Simpson did a bad job covering 9 to 5, 'cause she forgot her music, and Dolly was, like, not having it.
• 37:43
  And I was like, that's just so satanic to try... Literally like Satan, to try to convince someone that everyone knows...
• 37:51
  To trick someone who everyone knows is good and loved to say something bad about someone who is trying to pay her homage. It's not like Jessica Simpson was, like, doing a fucked up thing to begin with. Like- Mm-hmm...
• 38:02
  and, you know, and it's not like Jessica was like, "Yeah, I did a bad job." I was like, what person would... You know, I don't even know how to describe it.
• 38:09
  This inverse of this double tearing down of trying to trick someone and r- get them on record of that. I was like, that's such a horrible- What the fuck is wrong with you?... spirited... Yeah. Yeah. I don't know, man.
• 38:18
  In a world where there's good guys and bad guys, and a lot of nuance and gray area, and we all make mistakes and stuff, I don't know. I, like, draw my, I draw my line on, did you harm someone? Mm.
• 38:29
  E- even if it wasn't directly, was it knowingly, right? Uh-huh. For example, it's why I had 100 friends not talk to me after Spotlight came out, once I sent it to them all. I was just like, "This is the institution."
• 38:39
  Like, if, if Dolly had embezzled a million dollars from somewhere, I would still be like, "And she gave 300 million books to kids." Yeah. Right? And all this money to kids to graduate in her hometown, all this.
• 38:51
  So I'll be like, "I'll forgive the embezzlement." Yeah. Did you harm someone? You know, that's a tough one, man. That, you're just like- Well-... that's, that's fucked. Like, knowingly.
• 38:59
  And I mean, and that's how a lot of this big tech fuck is, big st- when you see these court cases, like the Meta one this week, which is so complicated.
• 39:06
  It's so complicated in 1,000 ways, but at the root of it is they knew the whole time. Mm. And that's how the fossil fuel stuff is. That's how we got the smoking guys, is they knew the whole time. They wrote it down.
• 39:16
  Mm-hmm. And they were like, "Yes." Mm-hmm. "More of that, please." That's why- Yeah... that's why I don't forgive people.
• 39:21
  Well, and the thing with kids is that not too many of them appreciate things that are good that last, because their brains are not developed yet. They're, and they- Of course...
• 39:29
  so my kids still think Jeff Bezos is cool 'cause he's rich, you know. And they still think Michael Jackson is cool, and the Michael Jackson thing is, I don't even wanna get into that- Mm-hmm, mm-hmm...
• 39:39
  'cause I just re-watched, I just watched this Netflix series about the trial against him, and I was like, God, I forgot how psycho people were in terms of defending him.
• 39:46
  But, you know, you don't wa- like, they're not gonna listen to you if you're like, "Dolly was"... Like, you know, she gave... They're like, "Books are free, and they're boring."
• 39:54
  Like, why would I care about free books, you know? Or if you were like, "She was a union girl." They'd be like, "What's a union?" You know? So I don't, you know, they have to figure...
• 40:03
  I, the time will come when they start to appreciate...
• 40:05
  It's just like when your mom, I don't, I don't know if your mom ever did this, but when your mom was like, "When you find a good sweater, buy five of them," and you know. But as a kid, you're like, "I hate that.
• 40:14
  I wanna buy 100 of many different things, and throw them all away the second I get bored of them- Right... so I can get 200 more." Right. You know. I don't know.
• 40:22
  A- again, this is a complicated one, but I do feel like we're touching on a million different things and bouncing around, because all of this is ever present now, right? Mm-hmm. There is no, "Oh, I read it in..."
• 40:33
  So I was reading a really great book. This author and poet I love, H- Hanif, wrote about Tribe Called Quest. Mm-hmm.
• 40:40
  And he was talking about how when we were young, you know, there was, like, Rolling Stone magazine, there was The Source for rap fans, and that, the, a, a bi-semi-monthly or monthly magazine could literally break news, right?
• 40:54
  Mm-hmm. And that was your connection. That was your only outlet and source of the news, was The Source, right? Mm-hmm. And now we're inundated with all the time, and that is both much worse and much better.
• 41:08
  'Cause you see things like the Cleveland Browns this week deciding that someone who has 27 counts of all of the different sexual things lobbied against him, they said, "We're gonna make him our number one quarterback."
• 41:21
  Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah. And, and that's where I just go, I'm out, and if you are going... I mean, if you're, like, still cheering for them, fuck you. If you're- Mm... buying that j- like, I'm out. Yeah.
• 41:31
  You have all the information. You have all the information. Right. So again- And women's basketball, meanwhile, should not, like- Ugh. Jesus Christ. Such a fucking bummer. Uh- Can't have anything. Can't have anything.
• 41:42
  It drives me fucking crazy. It's hard, and again, like you said, and my kids say it all the time. They're like, "Oh, I don't want the fucking nuance. Can I not have it- Mm-hmm... for right now?" Mm-hmm.
• 41:51
  So Oliver loves the Dodgers, 'cause he was born and raised in LA and all this. He doesn't not like other teams, so I'm trying to make him hate the Yankees, as he's, as he is due.
• 42:00
  And, you know, the, one of the primary owners of the Dodgers is the same guy who owned the Lakers, who bought them for, like, $10 billion and then had to sell them out of nowhere a year later for more money, because apparently all of it is fake.
• 42:13
  Mm. And I start... [laughs] And he was like, "I heard this thing about the Dodgers." I was like, "Oh, yeah, so?" And he was like, "No, no, no. The point is I don't wanna... Can I just cheer for the players?
• 42:21
  Can I just have that?" Aw. And I'm like, "That's totally fucking fair." Yeah. Right. I mean, 'cause we all wanna think we're good guys.
• 42:27
  Someone was saying on, again, on Reddit, they were like, "Why are White Sox games more diverse than Cubs games?" And people were like, you know, "White Sox are for the people. Cubs are for the rickets."
• 42:37
  And then someone was like Well, you have to be kidding yourself if you think Jerry Reinsdorf is, you know, pro-Palestine or something like that. Uh-huh.
• 42:44
  You know, so, you know, we all wanna think we're good guys and in the end, you know, you know, we're all driving cars that like all tie back to the Holocaust in some way. Wow. I- Oh, oh, 100%. Hitler's favorite car.
• 42:55
  It's like I drive my school bus around town. Mm-hmm. You know, and everyone's excited about it. Yeah, the people's car. When they put...
• 42:59
  Do you remember VW, and I'll find it on YouTube and put it in the show notes, when they put out an ad about heritage of their cars, but it started in 1946? [laughs] Like- Ooh. Yeah... you fucking people. Like- Got it...
• 43:12
  Jesus Christ. [laughs] Yeah.
• 43:13
  And there was some other s- oh, some other company that I didn't even realize, like some just mechanics company that's still around, I can't remember which one it is, but they like were, had a factory just like chugging along right next to the, you know, next to one of the concentration camps.
• 43:26
  Siemens. I didn't realize that- Uh-huh... Siemens was just la, la, la, right there. Yeah. You know? Yeah. And yeah, and it's just hard not to just yell at kids constantly. Look, here's the struggle.
• 43:37
  Who can we genuinely say this is a good guy? This is, Dolly was this, right? This is where it comes from is, again, Black people, everybody's like, one of one, she's incredible, this and that.
• 43:47
  And, and we're all going with everything else. Mm. Bill Gates, like what the fuck?
• 43:53
  Who, who can we do it in this struggle where again, it's been put on parents, most of whom have no time to look into this stuff or don't know all the background of all this stuff.
• 44:02
  Who can you literally point your kids to or when everyone's like, "Oh, MrBeast has raised all this money", and you're like, "Yeah." Yeah. "But, you know."
• 44:09
  I, I don't know, but you don't wanna ruin everything for them, but you do wanna help them increasingly understand, I guess, that there's, there's nuance to it. Yeah. You know? I, I don't know.
• 44:17
  Well, and it helps that also Dolly, just for us in general, I will point to the camp thing again that like- Mm-hmm...
• 44:24
  you know, she was rhinestones and she was big hair and she was very visible, which is really fun for the eyes. You know who's not? Greta Thunberg, you know? And Mackenzie Scott.
• 44:34
  These are like, these are people doing important interesting work, but they're not a shiny thing to look at, you know?
• 44:41
  And they, they're not making TikToks or in, you know, doing things with Muppets, and so that's the hard thing too is can you be a superstar who is also good, you know, at the same time?
• 44:51
  Is that, that's even harder to square. So I don't know if I told you this, I tried to get Olivia Rodrigo tickets. Did I mention this? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I t- Yeah, you told me you were trying to get them. Yeah.
• 45:00
  Yeah, I tried to get them for DC late. I usually just, either I get things right away, but now concerts are impossible 'cause the system's so fucked and Ticketmaster is such a monopoly.
• 45:09
  But I'll just go on StubHub, try to figure it out, and I was like, "It'll be a fun thing for all f- five of us. Ride the train up, it'll be great." $12,000 for five tickets on StubHub. Yeah.
• 45:18
  That's all, and that was all that was available. And I was like, "Absolutely not. Absolutely not under any condition." Now, does she see most of that? No.
• 45:25
  I mean, what, do, do artists now make most of their money off of touring? Yes, which is broken as it is, and she'll make a lot like Taylor Swift did from, from her big tour.
• 45:36
  But at the same time she's throwing this huge concert festival this weekend, I think. Mm-hmm. Something like that out in California. Daisy Chain. Mm-hmm. Yeah, Daisy Chain. None of them are making money off of it, right?
• 45:47
  L- literally, they're not being paid. It is all going to these community organizations and women's rights and reproductive rights organizations and stuff like that.
• 45:55
  And again, that's like a measurable thing where I think Dolly had this, a similar self-awareness to go, "Well, I'm gonna use this." Mm-hmm. Right? How do I u- how do I immediately put it to use?
• 46:05
  Whoever, Olivia Rodrigo herself having come up, you know, she's been famous for God knows how fucking long now. Mm-hmm. And whoever else she's working with
• 46:14
  said, "We're gonna have this tw- 22-year-old girl, right, do this really impactful thing." Mm. I don't know how you were 22. Right.
• 46:22
  But I, I was and beyond that very fucking dumb and would not have figured out anything like that. Yeah. No, I was a shithead. Yeah. Um- No, I was a child...
• 46:28
  and to me, again, like she's gonna do dumb, she's gonna do dumb shit. She's 22. Are you f- or whatever it is, are you fucking kidding me? But like- She's dating a PE guy. That's like her sin right now. 100%.
• 46:39
  And she's doing this whole thing, right? Yeah. And at every one of her concerts they do, and Ariana did the same thing when, when Dana and the girls went to the Ariana concert. Again, is she perfect? No, of course not.
• 46:49
  But she is steadfastly like signing people up to vote, doing reprodu- you know, all this kind of thing where you're like, does it all equal out in the wash sometimes? Sometimes. Mm-hmm.
• 46:57
  Sometimes it doesn't, and sometimes it's- Yeah... like Dolly, a clear winner. Yeah. And- Well, it's interesting. I wonder if this will ever tie it back to mental health. I got, you mentioned the mental health thing.
• 47:06
  I got an email from Paul's high school where I went to high school.
• 47:10
  It's just so interesting to compare high school experiences now compared to then, and it was like right off the bat a suicide awareness kind of curriculum and program that they have in place there, and I just was like,
• 47:22
  like kind of... In some ways you're, it's always ba- it's always kind of sh- whatever the word is to get an email from your child's school with the word high school, I mean, with the word suicide embedded into it.
• 47:31
  Jarring, I s- I guess. You're like- Jarring. Jarring. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. And I haven't talked to Paul a lot about suicide. We've talked about it a little bit, but, you know, I was like, this is cool.
• 47:41
  I'm, I mean, in terms of I'm glad they are this part of the conversation. Mm-hmm. But, you know, I, as I feel like there's, if there's one sure thing that is a mental health boost, it's helping other people.
• 47:53
  And I mean, that just sounds cheesy, but it's not even to be like, even if you're just being selfish, if you're like, "I feel depressed, what's something I can do?" Help someone else. That makes me feel better.
• 48:04
  Forget the other people, you know? Yeah. And I don't know if and when kids start to realize that, that it is, there's a boon to you- Yeah... that is just simply pleasurable. No, it's, and it's super measurable.
• 48:14
  People talk about it all the time, and that's what, you know, I, I, there's a very famous tennis player named Arthur Ashe, first Black guy to win US Open, I think, from Richmond. Fantastic.
• 48:23
  Every crossword puzzle person knows Ar- Arthur Ashe. Oh, yes. Mm-hmm. Good, good point.
• 48:28
  When LA was burning a year and a half ago, now, whatever it is, not applicable to LA, but I, you know, people are like, "Well, what do I even do if I'm in LA or outside of it or whatever?"
• 48:37
  And I used one of his quotes, "Start where you are, use what you have, do what you can." And, and that, you know, is a very easy thing to Help kids learn about doing something that they can see help someone.
• 48:52
  Packing lunches or, or donating stuff, whatever it is. But also is immediately accessible to them like everything else. Again, like wherever you are, there is, there's something you can help with.
• 49:03
  But also that it, it, it, it benefits someone, and your, and your help is helping the people who are there every day, right? Mm. As I always tell them, these teachers are not in it for the money. They are in this
• 49:16
  mostly for the love of the game. Mm. Right? And that's why I don't let them buy their own supplies and all that shit, is because it's just... Guys, it's crazy. But, but those are the people doing it every day.
• 49:24
  And again, are they flawed? Of course they are. But I don't know. Uh- Whoever sent that suicide note is, that's a service. That's- Yeah... they didn't do that shit when we were growing up.
• 49:33
  Speaking of school supplies, we should put a link in the show notes this time that Smitten Kitchen, Deb Perelman, she runs this school supply, uh, spreadsheet just through her newsletter, and you can just click on it, and there's all these teachers around the country have put links to their Amazon wish lists.
• 49:48
  And I always go just to choose a Chicago one, and I just, you know, fill it up a little bit, you know, with stuff. And there's a...
• 49:56
  I chose someone in a Chicago school, I think on the Southwest Side, and they were asking for these books.
• 50:00
  There's a book series called The Mister Z or Mister Z something or other, and I was like, "That's me," so I have to buy them these books.
• 50:06
  But anyway, 'cause, you know, I, like, it's just like the dopamine hit of shopping for Amazon, but then you're like, "This will go to someone else," and it's fun to think about it showing up at their house.
• 50:15
  But if, you know- It totally is... if that's the thing.
• 50:16
  And that's when we, I get a, we'll once in a while get a call from, from either an associate of or representative of some family office or someone who's like, "Okay, but I, where do I put this client's money to use?"
• 50:27
  'Cause they're trying to get these tax things or whatever it is. And I've just gotten to the point where I'm like, "I don't care where it came from." Like, I'll, I'll tell, I can't control where it came from.
• 50:38
  I can't control everything else they're doing with their life or their investments or their businesses or whatever, but I will take that fucking money, and I will put it towards a place that I know is measurably impactful.
• 50:47
  And it's like Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, whatever. Is Amazon a fucking nightmare? Yes. Does it enable teachers,
• 50:54
  and does Google enable w- through a Google Sheet, teachers to put in an Amazon wish list and you can buy all their supplies from? 100%. Yeah. Right? That wasn't possible before.
• 51:04
  Uh, this is also a good moment to shout out DonorsChoose, one of my favorite organizations in the world. That's usually a little more specific than just snacks and stuff, but it's amazing.
• 51:12
  Well, circling back, so who is a hero that you've met that either was a good or like, you know, or in retrospect not as good hero? You said don't meet your heroes, so who is a hero that you've met?
• 51:24
  Well, no, that's the idea, right? And like you, you know, again, all these years in Hollywood.
• 51:28
  Before that, I was in sports, and you meet these people that have a bunch of money, and, and, and by the way, some have no idea what to do with it, and people just take it from them. And some use it for, for good.
• 51:36
  Mookie Betts is a fantastic guy. A great place to look is Major League Baseball gives out the Roberto Clemente Award every year. Again, I've written about Roberto Clemente too. Amazing player, amazing humanitarian.
• 51:48
  And the players who get that, it's pretty measurable. These are good people. It's a lot of the Central and South American players who are taking their money and going back. They're helping Venezuela, all these things.
• 51:59
  M- Mookie has won it a bunch of times. He's a fantastic human being. One of my current favorites is definitely José Andrés. This is a guy who just feeds people. Mm.
• 52:07
  And has built such an incredible organization and infrastructure. Again, like Dolly's, it's one thing to say she gave away 300 million books. It's another one to step back and go, "Hold on a minute.
• 52:17
  What does that fucking require?" For, for World Central Kitchen, José Andrés's organization, which is again, so many people, and people who step up in these places.
• 52:26
  After any disaster or during these wars, when they send an email and they go, "We just, we, we gave out a million meals this month," I want you to take a step back and try to understand what that requires in anywhere.
• 52:38
  In Colonial Williamsburg, much less in fucking Palestine or, you know, Nepal this week. I'm sure they're on their fucking way. Mm. You know? But how? How do you- Mm... where is the food? Who's making it?
• 52:49
  It's fucking incredible, and that's where I'm... Someone was like, "Yeah, but he was a dickhead about a restaurant in DC." I'm like- [laughs]... "I don't fucking care." Yeah. "I don't care. I don't care." [laughs] Yeah.
• 52:58
  So that is a guy that really just checks a box for me. I got to meet E. Jean Carroll a couple years ago. Mm.
• 53:05
  And, and I've loved her for a long time, 'cause she just used to have an advice column in Elle Magazine- Mm-hmm...
• 53:11
  which my mom used to subscribe to, and she'd give it to me, and I just loved reading her work, and she had such a fun voice, and she was such a cool journalist. I mean, she still is.
• 53:20
  And back when I had my old blog, zulkey.com, I used to just do a Friday interview with people I thought were interesting or aspirational, and I asked her if she'd do one with me, and we spoke on the phone, and she was just everything you would want her to be.
• 53:32
  Just like- Ugh... sort of daffy, but intelligent and kind- Right... and generous and full of great stories and encouraging to me.
• 53:42
  And I, this was really at the start of my career, and we would kinda email a little bit back and forth, and then she started her Substack. But then she sued Donald Trump and put herself out there, you know, and was...
• 53:55
  and stood down all of this terrorism, basically- Fully...
• 53:59
  in the face of, you know, of these f- possible, you know, she had to say she had written these things about, you know, think, rape being sexy in this one quote she had, and, you know, these d- or the pla- you know, going to this dressing room with him and still saying, "Even though she might not be the perfect victim, there she is."
• 54:18
  So anyway, a couple years ago, Substack was having some event in New York, and I was like, "This is, this is a great reason to buy a ticket and go to New York."
• 54:26
  And I went, and I met her, and I didn't say hello, who I was at first, but she was looking at my face, and she was like, "I know you." And I was like, "I'm Claire Zulkey."
• 54:36
  And she, there's a picture of her screaming and saying hi to me, and it was just- That's fucking awesome... like everything you could want. She was just, you know, she's just the man in woman form.
• 54:46
  And so, and it just makes me so happy that it's an older woman- Mm-hmm... who could take down Donald Trump, 'cause you know he hates that. He hates that some woman who is not his type- Mm... take, you know- Mm-hmm...
• 54:57
  that to him. Makes me so happy. I think that's fantastic. I wanna see that picture. Okay. That's so cool. It's okay.
• 55:02
  Yeah, and there's, and there's plenty, there's plenty more incredible folks out there, and they could be doing it on the smallest scale, ge- you know, genuinely.
• 55:10
  Find a teacher of the year in your district and go fill up her cart. It's probably her. Guys don't sign up for it anymore.
• 55:16
  There, there's some really amazing folks out there, and, and again, it's a bummer it's on us to find them, but there are platforms that let you find them, again, like that spreadsheet, and Donors Choose, and all these other places.
• 55:28
  It can just feel, when we lose Dolly, that we lose a lot of the hope, because we're so surrounded by everything else that is both either bad or so nuanced that you feel like, "I don't wanna, I don't wanna know.
• 55:40
  I don't wanna know. I can't- Mm... I can't do another one." But there are amazing people out there, so let's, we can leave it at that. And there's amazing parents- Yeah...
• 55:48
  and people who could be parents, and people who aren't parents who just help with kids. There's all kinds of shit, you know? There's Dolly. Yeah. You know? Um- What's your kids' favorite song by Dolly?
• 55:57
  If they, if they chose one, if you let them pick a Dolly song, which one would they pick? I mean, we're bl- we're blasting 9 to 5, like, a lot. Yeah. [laughs] You know, that's pretty fantastic.
• 56:05
  We'll do some duets and breakfast around Islands in the Stream, obviously, obviously. Yeah, it, it depends.
• 56:11
  I Will Always Love You, we generally pick the Whitney version, but that's usually for me so I can hit the high notes. Mm, of course. But, I mean, any of them. Dolly's fantastic. I, my kids always liked Joshua. Sure.
• 56:23
  'Cause that's about her... Like, I feel like that's, I like, it's a very, almost like a children's s- song, where they meet- Mm... like, she meets a scary man and he turns out to be nice, you know? Yeah.
• 56:31
  I mean, but also, again, and you can read about her history, and it sounds like Abraham Lincoln shit and stuff, but listen to Coat of Many Colors. Mm-hmm.
• 56:37
  And now everyone's kind of using it in this metaphorical way to describe all the different ways she affected the world, right? Mm-hmm.
• 56:42
  But listen to her tell this, like, incredibly intimate, vulnerable story about growing up, and you're like, you can't make stuff like that up, you know? Yeah. Yeah. So I appreciate it. We will
• 56:56
  try to live up to the example at least, if not the scale, as much as we can. Yes. [upbeat music] That's it for this week. You're gonna make it.
• 57:14
  You're doing great. Or you're just doing it, or just you, period. Just stop right there. But for more, you can hit subscribe right in your podcast player of choice.
• 57:24
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• 57:31
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• 57:39
  Head to notrightnow.show for more, or send us feedback, questions, horror stories, doxing, whatever it is, at questions@notrightnow.show.
• 57:52
  [upbeat music] Welcome to Not Right Now, the podcast about parenting through all of this.
• 58:23
  We'll be talking about/crashing out over topics like- Soccer snacks and sea level rise... will the Arctic melt, question mark? Cleaning out uneaten lunchboxes again at 4:00 PM or 10:00 PM every day.
• 58:37
  Youth sports and other camp signups you forgot about and won't get into anyways. And is there such a thing as unstructured time anymore for anyone, for me? It's not an advice show.
• 58:47
  It's a you're not alone and you're also not crazy for screaming in the shower kinda show. I'm Claire Zulkey from Evil Witches. And I'm Quinn Emmett from Important Not Important.
• 58:58
  You can find details on anything we talk about in the show notes or at our website, notrightnow.show..show.
• 59:05
  Uh, and if you like what you hear today, please share it with a parent who needs it or who might laugh and tell their kids to be quiet, and then drop us a nice little five-star review.
• 59:13
  And reminder, you can send questions or feedback to questions@notrightnowshow.show.