Latest / Normally / Normally Podcast: How to Marry, Meal Prep, and Make It Through College

Transcript

Normally Podcast: How to Marry, Meal Prep, and Make It Through College · Normally

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Hey, guys, we are back on normally the show with
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: normalist takes, Go with the News gets weird. This week
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: a special Vacation week edition, Independence Day edition where you
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: guys get to ask us whatever you want. I am
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Mary Catherine Ham.
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: And I'm Carol Markowitz. I'm so excited for this. I
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: love hearing what our listeners kind of think of us.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Yes, good, bad, and ugly.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: We were saying this before we started rolling. But there
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: are a lot of cooking questions. I feel like people
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: think that we are capable in the kitchen.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: That's nice of them.
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it is nice of them. Look, I love to cook, actually,
• 0:39
  Speaker 3: but yeah, I love.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: To cook, and I love that that comes across to
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: be real. So yeah, let's get into it all right,
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: Mary Catherine, what's the meal most requested in your homes
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: and what do you enjoy making for with your family
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: for dinner?
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: Okay, so I would have to say, and I know
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: this does not put me solidly in the MAHA coalition,
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: is it? Oftentimes? Because I have four children, I am
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: not so much a cook as an improver of frozen food.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: Like that's really my I'm like, oh, here's some frozen broccoli.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: But I put like a little bit spicy, spicy. But
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: there is a running list of things that I make
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: that every single person in the house eats and enjoys,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: because big, that's really bad.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: I was trying to think of something like that, and
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: I don't know that I have one.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: You know, Yeah, there's only a couple for us. And
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: one is this like like Middle Eastern chicken shorma that
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: is chicking thighs in the oven, very simple, really complicated
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: spice combination, which is, yeah, it's wild that everyone eats it.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Every single kid in the family. Dad likes it. I
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: like it. So that's one founded on Instagram. Thanks instagramzing uh.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: And then we had one the other day that was
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: egg roll in a bowl, which is just sauteed cabbage,
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: spices and ground beef sauteed, and you know, he dressed
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: it up a little bit sure like everyone was eating it,
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: and I was like, am I hallucinating? You're eating peppers,
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: cabbages and beef.
• 2:13
  Speaker 3: Okay, amazing.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, in my family, I would have to parse something
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: out for someone and it's super annoying.
• 2:20
  Speaker 3: I think the thing I.
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: Came up with is I make a roast, just a
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: Korean style roast with like Asian spices, and people in
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: the family all eat it to varying degrees. My nine
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: year old is super complicated. We say that he either
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: is like a ninety dollars dinner dish or like a
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: ninety cent it's either chicken nuggets or lobster for him,
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: there's really no in between. What regular people eat is
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: not adventures to him at all, So he a lot
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: of the times will have the chicken nuggets or a
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: corn dog as we the four of us have dinner
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: without him, We.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: Have one of those as well, where she's like either
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: very you know, she eats what we put in front
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: of her because it's basically required in our house for
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: the most part to try, you have to give it
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: a try. But she's definitely prefers like very bland kid
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: foods until you put a very expensive steak in front
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: of her and he's like absolutely same here.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the nine year old is also all kinds of
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: wago everything for sure, oysters, but not like grilled.
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: Chicken because that's crazy, you know.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Okay, when will you share your pimento cheese recipe?
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I know a lot of people think I'm
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: gatekeeping on this.
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: Yeh, gatekeeping.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: I don't mean to gate keep, but it is my
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: father's family's recipe, so I should technically ask him before
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: I put it out to everyone. Say a friendzy, you
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: are gatekeeping. I know, well I have to ask him first,
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: that's all about. Yeah. I think he would be like, yeah,
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: that's fine. I just would run it by him, and
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: I haven't done that. But it is a five generation's
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: old South Georgia recipe. And here's the thing, it's not
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: complicated at all. Is that people get a little too
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: fancy with the pimento cheese and they think they have
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: to do a lot of things to it. You don't
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: have to do a lot of things to it. The
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: main thing that we do is that we grate the
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: cheese in two different sizes, so it changes the texture texture.
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, that is my only sce. You send me
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: that recipe right after this.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: I will and I will clear it with my dad
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: and then when I tell you guys, you're going to
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: be like, that's just very easy. Yep. But it's a
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: crowd pleaser.
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah for sure.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: Another food question, Biscuitville versus Bojangles.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, here's the thing. Biscuit Ville if you're not familiar
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: with it, Carol, which I'm not.
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it is another.
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: Regional chain that serves biscuits. I had one. It's like
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: three and a half blocks from my house growing up,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: and I swear that establishment was never open. Now this
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: is possibly because it was only open for breakfast and
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: like all the like people who were detective, okay, get up,
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: want to go eat there, like construction workers would go
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: have Biscuitville and then be off. But I found that
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: in my teenager experience, which is mostly what I experienced
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: around Biscuitvill's, Uh, they weren't open when I needed them
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: to be open, whereas Bojangles.
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you need a reliable that's like, you know, most
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: of the game with fast food.
• 5:24
  Speaker 3: It has to be reliable. You can't like.
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: Really really really good grits, very good biscuits, solid food.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: Just I was never able to land on a biscuit
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: bill that was there when I needed it.
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's really the most important part. Look switching
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: from food to politics and dating, at what point in
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: getting to know someone should politics or general philosophy be
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: brought up. I know that it wouldn't work to be
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: with someone that doesn't have matching values, but don't want
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: to come on too strong right away. I'm just gonna
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: say it. You should come on strong right away.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: I probably did filter.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I just don't waste your time. It's really
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: it's not about them. It's not about what they think
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: of you. It's about what you think of them. And
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: I think you just get it out really early and
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: see what happens. You know, I was a conservative in Brooklyn,
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: and that was an unpopular thing to be, so I
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: would find a way to bring it up very early
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: in conversations with new friends, with anybody, just because I
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: didn't want to trick anybody into spending time with me.
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: And if you don't like that, that's your problem.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's that's probably smart. I'm trying to think.
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: I grew up in a very liberal town and everyone
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: knew I was the weirdo, so it just it was
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: kind of out there. Yeah, there were so few conservatives
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: that it was like, oh, well, she's the one who
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: does the weird thing. She's the aberration, right, but and
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: so everybody kind of knew it going in. However, in
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: new situations, I do think it's harder now for people.
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: So I'm very I'm sympathetic to the idea that you're
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: kind of dancing around it because I get being delicate.
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: I've tried to maintain many a friendship with many liberals,
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: mostly successfully over the years, and it does require a dance.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: But those are friendships, right. So in a dating to
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: marriage scenario, I think you want to be pretty careful
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: about what is worth the trade off and what is not.
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: And you also don't want to get into deep and
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: then find out some values are not a lot that
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: will go badly for you. You don't have to be a
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: jerk face about it, but you can make clear who
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: you are, right.
• 7:42
  Speaker 3: I fully agree.
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: I actually am a friend's daughter is a very traditional girl.
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: She's in her early twenties and she's looking for someone
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: to marry, and I said to her, I think you
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: should put, you know, like looking to be a chad
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: wife in your bio so that there's there's no mistake,
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: there's no like, you know, confusion about who you want
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: to be and what you want. And if you're not
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: in the political world, terms like that, you know might
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: not mean anything to you, but it just it signals
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: what you're looking for.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: I think I was in college and shortly after. I
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: was always very clear about my faith and that that
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: was important to me. And honestly, it was a very
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: good jerk filter for sure, because there are like people
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: do the calculation and they're like, hmmm, this is not
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: what I'm looking for, and if it's not what he's
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: looking for, yeah, move along, yeah, move along. So I do.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: I do think that can be helpful for filtering for
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: who you want.
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: We'll be right back on normally.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: Okay, this says high ladies love the podcast. My son
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: just deployed on the USS Jerald for He is twenty
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: seven years old uh an F eighteen pilot. Wooh, thank
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: you for his SERVI and awesome. This is his first deployment.
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: I live in super liberal loud In County, Virginia. I
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: am super sensitive about politics right now and don't want
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: to have any political discussions with any lives. What can
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: I say other than I don't discuss politics because I
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: can't handle anyone else's opinions right now that are not
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: pro military, preferably a two to three sentence hack for this. Thanks, yeah,
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: let me repeat, thanks to your family and him for
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: his service.
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: I can understand this being sensitive because you have a
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: person who's in the line of duty at this moment
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: and willing to put his life on the line for others.
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: And so if you're encountering somebody who thinks that that's
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: NBD or worse, thinks it's bad, that would very quickly
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: lead to bad interactions that and lost friendships. I think
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: I would advise. I mean one of the things that
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: I do because I live in a very liberal area too,
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: and I'm happy to have liberal friends, but not all
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: of them are level right, because sometimes you want to
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: be shared with other folks. I think you got to
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: have like your solid group of galfriends, either online or
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: in person, who do share those values, who you can
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: have those conversations with so that you can skip it elsewhere.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: But Carol, a nice way to.
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: See yeah, you know, I don't know about a nice
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: way to say it, but I'll just echo what we
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: said to the dating thing is that you don't want
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: anti military. You know, people in your life, in your
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: life while your son is serving, that's you know, crazy.
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: I look, I have topics that I think are touchy.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: If you want to bring down America, I'm just I
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: can't be friends with you like there are some lines
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: like if we have differences on tax policy, fine, but
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: if you're like America shouldn't exist, I mean, we just we.
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: Can't be friends. So I see that.
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: In the same place, I don't think you need to
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: worry about what to say to them.
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: I think you don't need those people.
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: And if they are anti military, they're ultimately just not
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: for you. Again, I'm big on cross ideological friendships, but there.
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: Are lines, and there are.
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: Some lines that I just don't think we should be
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: willing to cross.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Also, you could sort of speak the language of if
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: you if you wanted to head something off at the
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: pass and you're just like, you know, it may be
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: somebody who's just like medium live but isn't being careful
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: about the way they're going to talk about this, and
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: you can can you use therapy speak on them and
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: it just be like, you know, I'm really I have
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: a lot of anxiety about my son's and.
• 11:34
  Speaker 3: And I'm like turning that around.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I would just like to, you know, chat about
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: barbecue or football like that's that would be uh, that
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: would be my take. And if someone's just bent on
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: discussing possibles, I actually don't love that kind of relationship.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: If you're really really dedicated to discussing politics with me
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: in a casual setting where we're doing other things, that's
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: actually not a good relationship for me.
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right, that's exactly it.
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: And that goes for conservatives too, for like, you know,
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: I mean, you know, yeah, both ways for sure. But yeah,
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: I don't think you need to put up with people
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: who are wishing ill to your child. Really, I think
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: that's pretty clear. Yeah, will you be going on tour
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: at some point? Please come to Dallas. I'll just say
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: that if we are going on tour at some point,
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: we will be starting with a Dallas Cowboys game.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: Yes, I'll dare. I'm good with Dallas. I would love
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: to come to Dallas. But yeah, have you been to Dallas? Yes,
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: but only only a few times for too short a
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: period of time, so I don't get to see a
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: ton of it.
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: I really like it. I love Dallas.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: Seeing a Cowboys game as it is an American spectacle.
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: That's right, it's America's team. You could say it.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: I don't know all that.
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: Ka is shaking her head in disgust.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: Let's not go too far, but you know it is,
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: you know, big, and yeah, you know it is. Yeah,
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: also we have no plans, but also I do love
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: doing things live and they are so fun audiences, So yeah,
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: you would certainly considerate.
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: And we'll wear the Florida and Bojangle shirts in real
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: life that we have to have in the baby pictures.
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: All right, MK, we all know you attended the University
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: of Georgia.
• 13:28
  Speaker 3: What college university was your second choice? And why?
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: So fun story. I did not apply anywhere else.
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: What are you serious?
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Wow?
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: So she's like, I'm either going here or I'm not
• 13:43
  Speaker 3: going to college.
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: No, actually, it was just that my senior writis extended
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: to applying to college. And I liked the University of Georgia.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: It had a decent journalism school, It had a decent
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: football team. It had a lot of people, which was
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: something I was looking for because I felt that at
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: a small liberal arts school, I was maybe not going
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: to find my pool that I clicked with. So I
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: wanted big. I was comfortable with that, and part of
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: it was economic, which was I knew I was probably
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: going to end up at a state school. In my family.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: I kept my grades up so because knowing that the
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: my younger brothers were probably not going to get scholarships,
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: and I was like trying to keep the overhead low
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: for the whole fame.
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: So that's so older sibling, a very older sister.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: So I was always keeping those grades up. And I
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: had the goods to get into UGA, and I didn't
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: have a lot of money to be applying a bunch
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: of places that I wasn't going to end up being
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: able to go. So there was part of me that,
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: for pride's sake, wanted to be like I got into Georgetown,
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: I got into Duke or whatever, right, right, it was
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: sixty to seventy five bucks a location.
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I was feeling this to somebody recently.
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: I'm like, you know how you kids applying to like
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: fifty schools like I applied.
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: To four and that was extensive.
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: It was like a lot of money to do that,
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: and so yeah, I was I wasn't looking to spend
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: all that cash on applying to schools.
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: That's crazy. Same And so, yeah, did I lose out
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: on some of those bragging rights, Yes, I did, uh,
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: And I made the best decision, one of the best
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: decisions of my life, which was good to go to Uga.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: They gave me some scholarships, which was great. I graduated
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: with no debt. Did not realize that that basically made
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: me a twenty two year old millionaire compared to my peers. Right,
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: and I had a fantastic time, so there really wasn't
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: a second choice. I did get homesick at one point
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: in my first semester at school because everybody was like,
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: aren't you scared to go somewhere where you don't have
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: any friends. I was like, nah, because I don't think
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: about you before they.
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: Had there, yep.
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: And then I got there and I was like.
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: Oh, I don't have any friends.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: So I did apply for transfer to UNC at one
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: point I did not take it, and I'm very glad
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: that I didn't.
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: Wow, imagine if you went to UNC. I just can't
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: picture it.
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: Can I?
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: So it was Georgia all the way.
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that first semester at school is very, very tough
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: on folks, and I didn't find my people until second semester.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: I played lacrosse with them. Second semester I landed on
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: that club team and found all my people and loved
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: my life there. But man, that first semester was tough.
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely. I had a kind of a.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: Flip side of that, where my best friend and my
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: high school boyfriend both came to college with me. Basically,
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: my best friend went to another school in Boston and
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: my high school boyfriend went to school with me. That
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: also wasn't great because I didn't meet a lot of
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: people and I didn't try at all. And then the
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: next year, when both the boyfriend and the best friend
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: decided not to come back to Boston, I was all
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: by myself in my sophomore year, where everybody already had.
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: Solidified boats of friends.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: It was tough.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: It's the hard way to do it.
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: But I you know, I feel like I didn't have
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: any advice on how this is supposed to go and
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: when you're supposed to be friends and I don't know,
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: I say, I always say immigrant parents, they really did
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: not know what they were sending me into.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: We just throw you into the team. Good luck, right, Yeah, No,
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: I found the one The one thing that I did
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: benefit from is that because I had no friends first
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: semester and I was trying to keep my grades up,
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: I had a very early morning job. I delivered papers,
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: so I would get up at three thirty or four
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: every morning, seven days a week, and deliver papers, and
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: as a result, my grades did stay up. And the
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: other thing I did was work out, and so I
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: came home a lot different than my peers.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: No, that was another way that that first semester was
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: definitely tough, that freshman fifteen.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I went to the other direct because I just
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: went to the gym for like several hours a day.
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: Smart which is its own kind of issue. But yeah,
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: that worked out for me.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: Somebody else asks while at UGA, did you take classes
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: with Fink?
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: Oh?
• 18:14
  Speaker 3: I did, and what's your best think story?
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: So Fink is a Conrad Fink was his name, and
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: he was a professor at the University of Georgia of
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: newspaper journalism, and he was at one point the head
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: guy at UPI, which was the main competitor to the AP.
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: So the Associated Press is like the go to wire now,
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: but for a long time UPI was the I think
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: it's United Press International was the competitor to AP. So
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: they were almost of equal, you know, size and scope
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: back in the day. So he ran one of those,
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: and he was a I believe a Vietnam be crusty
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: old marine guy turned newspaper editor. I would say, like
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: kind of.
• 19:02
  Speaker 3: I love people like that. By the way, those are
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: white people.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: Fantastic like had no would take no guff off of anyone,
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: had no hair on his head and eyebrows out to
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: like four inches from his face. Guy. I think he
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: passed away several years ago. We stayed in touch. He
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: passed away several years ago, and I had emailed him
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: in between a little bit here and there. I don't
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: know how he would have done in the current era
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: of college students because he was a state talker. Yeah,
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: and he was a He was certainly a left of
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: center guy, but he was such a nineteen eighty five
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: to nineteen ninety five left of center guy that his
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: way of feeling in the world would not have been
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: welcomed by many. Gen Z and gen Z in particular.
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: Sounds like that, right, But I loved him.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: He actually recommended me for a job that I didn't
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: get one time, but it was very kind of him
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: to think of me. By the way, this is a
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: very sliding doors moment. He recommended me for the Augusta,
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: Georgia newspaper's op ed page as an assistant editor. But
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: I was like twenty four years old. Yeah, I probably
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: wasn't really qualified for this, but the op ed page
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: was the editorial page was conservative, and there were so
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: few of those, and there were so few of me
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: in the news business that.
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: He was, Oh, you're not the natural fit, right.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: He was like, Hey, this is Conrad. Do you think
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: you want to try this out? And so I went
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: and interviewed and it went pretty well, but I think
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: I was just too for what they were looking for.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: Didn't get that job, ended up coming to DC. So
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: the rest is history. But I always appreciated him thinking
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: of me and knowing this could be a fit, and
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: that he wasn't condescending or a jerk about my politics.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: He just knew that I thought differently.
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: Love it all right, We're gonna wrap it up with
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: one last question about college related stuff, and I'm gonna
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: punt this to you because I really don't know what
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: this means. Does Florida State belong in the SEC? What's
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: funny is when I read it, I was like, are
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: they challenging whether Florida State is in the SEC?
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: And then I googled it.
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: Okay, I are really nice.
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: Be nice, it's my Florida. Whatever it is.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: This is one of those things I have to be
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: nice because two of my really good friends went to
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: Florida State, including Shannon Bram is a nult, so I
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: have to be kind about it. One I will. I'll
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: give a disappointing answer, which is that the ever changing
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: tides of who belongs to what conference is a sports
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: story that does not interest me in the least. I
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: get overwhelmed by it because I'm trying to keep track
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: of Big Ten, which is now Big seventeen, and everybody's alliant.
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: I'm just gonna nod, like I know what I'm taught,
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: like like, oh yeah.
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: I don't. Here's here's where Florida State lost me. And
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: this is an this is an action it was taken
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: against the University of Georgia Bulldogs, is that they basically
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: checked out of the postseason game when they had a
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: perfect season and they didn't get awarded a birth to
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: the playoffs. And you're nodding still.
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, nodding and like drifting off. This is college football, right.
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: They basically were like, you know what, I'm not even
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: going to tell this story because I don't know I'm
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: getting the details right and it's boring you anyway. But
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: they basically said, like, eh, not interested in this postseason
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: game because we're too good for this. Wow, and a
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: lot of people didn't play and blah blah blah. Anyway,
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: you lost me there, like it's a it's a moment
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: where you just have to rally.
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: Sure, Yeah, I I you know, I'm going to just
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: say I agree they should have rallied.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: That season was twenty twenty three. It was the undefeated
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: season by the way, amazing.
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: Well, we're going to be back with the next episode
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: will also be some ask.
• 23:09
  Speaker 3: Us Anything questions and we're going.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: To get into some more political topics next time. But
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: thanks for joining us on normally. Normally airs Tuesdays and Thursdays,
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: and you can subscribe anywhere you get your podcasts. Get
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: in touch with us at Normallythepod at gmail dot com.
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: Thanks for listening, and when things get weird, act normally