Latest / The Delicious Culture with Jon Francois / ADHD & 2026 Midterms Are Delicious w/ Shantae Howell

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ADHD & 2026 Midterms Are Delicious w/ Shantae Howell · The Delicious Culture with Jon Francois

• 0:00
  Are there no white women named Keisha? I haven't
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  Shante's should be owned by Black women only?
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• 1:10
  Hey, delishies. Grab a plate and taste the delicious
• 1:13
  culture. I'm your host, Jon Francois. Just keeping
• 1:16
  it all together. We are feasting on lifestyle,
• 1:19
  food, and pop culture with Washington, D .C.-based
• 1:22
  strategic creative director Shante Howell. Shante,
• 1:27
  I got to publicly apologize for the wait because
• 1:30
  I had a... Uh, so I, I think I emailed you saying
• 1:35
  I had a disaster in the kitchen. And then before
• 1:38
  we started recording, you were just like, oh
• 1:40
  my God, what are your kids like? And I'm like,
• 1:42
  no, no, no, no. This is, I don't have no kids.
• 1:44
  This, I mean, it sounds like a disaster, right?
• 1:47
  Cause it's like, oh, like, you know, the eight
• 1:48
  year old, I'm trying to get them to school and
• 1:50
  Cheerios. But no, it was just, I mean, myself
• 1:53
  and I problem. So I, um. I have a Keurig that
• 1:57
  I use for my coffee and the descale light has
• 2:02
  been on for the longest time. And I think that
• 2:04
  procrastination has come to bite me because instead
• 2:07
  of my Keurig working normally and loving me because
• 2:10
  it knows that I need my coffee every day, it
• 2:13
  decided to just hum like and then spew out water
• 2:18
  for a few seconds and then just not spew out
• 2:21
  coffee. So I don't know. I mean, have you had
• 2:22
  this issue? Do you have a Keurig? Do you have
• 2:25
  issues like this? where you're just like, oh
• 2:26
  God, where's my caffeine? Yeah, I used to. I
• 2:30
  am now since a medicated ADHD girly. So I really,
• 2:33
  I really don't mess with coffee anymore. But
• 2:36
  I will go get a Vietnamese coffee every now and
• 2:38
  again because I love, love condensed milk. It
• 2:40
  is the best thing ever. I used to sneak it from
• 2:43
  my mom and hide the cans under my bed. So it's
• 2:45
  just like a little bit of like adult version
• 2:47
  of that nostalgia. Vietnamese coffee? I never
• 2:51
  heard of this. Tell me about how this is awesome.
• 2:55
  Um, you know, I'm not the qualified person to
• 2:57
  tell you. I just know there's condensed milk
• 2:58
  in it. And from the moment I had my first sip,
• 3:00
  I knew it was there. And I looked it up. And
• 3:02
  that is that is like the tentpole of Vietnamese
• 3:05
  coffee is condensed milk. So, OK, so how do you
• 3:07
  discover this? Do you just go online and just
• 3:09
  be like, hey, what coffee has condensed milk
• 3:11
  in it? And that is for me. No, I was you know,
• 3:14
  I wanted some pho. It was like a weekend. And
• 3:16
  my boyfriend and I were both kind of like exhausted
• 3:19
  from the weekend. We were like, OK, I want pho.
• 3:21
  I also want coffee. I'm going to get. coffee
• 3:24
  from the Vietnamese place because like we're
• 3:26
  not going to do two Uber Eats. The money is not
• 3:28
  it's not stacked like that. And then the research
• 3:31
  was retroactive. So I'm very I'm very grateful
• 3:33
  for the happenstance. So specifically, what does
• 3:37
  condensed milk do to the Vietnamese coffee? Like
• 3:40
  because like I mean, I used to put milk in my
• 3:43
  coffee, but now I just drink it like straight
• 3:44
  up black. And if I were going to do it, I was
• 3:46
  going to do like almond milk. So what is what
• 3:48
  does condensed milk do? Have you had condensed
• 3:50
  milk? So it's one of those things where I know
• 3:53
  of it and it comes in like room temperature cans
• 3:57
  and normally people use it for cooking, right?
• 3:59
  Yeah. It's almost like, think about if milk was
• 4:02
  a caramel, like that's what it tastes like. It's
• 4:06
  so good. It just like is a sweetener, I guess
• 4:08
  I'd say. So like I know that it's something that's
• 4:12
  often used to like dip for churros if you're
• 4:15
  not using like strawberry or chocolate. It's
• 4:18
  something that, like, my family is Jamaican,
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  so we use it a lot in, like, porridges and things
• 4:22
  like that. It's just, it's so, so good. So good.
• 4:25
  Yeah. Do you know what the caffeine content is
• 4:27
  like in Vietnamese coffee compared to, like,
• 4:29
  regular American coffee? I think it's high. I
• 4:31
  think that's part of why they use condensed milk
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  to, like, balance out how high it is. But it
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  does what it needs to do. Okay. So it's, like,
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  80 to 130 milligrams. Okay. And compare it to
• 4:43
  American coffee. Sorry, I'm just doing real -time
• 4:47
  internet searching right now. People need to
• 4:48
  know. Okay, so 60 to 95 milligrams is American
• 4:51
  coffee, and Vietnamese coffee typically contains,
• 4:54
  oh, now it's saying it typically contains 100
• 4:56
  to 180 milligrams of caffeine per cup. Yeah,
• 4:58
  yeah. What? Yeah, too strong. I need to get on
• 5:02
  that Vietnamese coffee. Is it, like, expensive
• 5:03
  because of how much caffeine it contains and
• 5:05
  how, like, especially tasty it is? I find all
• 5:08
  things to be expensive these days, especially
• 5:10
  because, like, am I able to cuss? Is it okay
• 5:12
  if I cuss? It's a podcast. You never know. I
• 5:16
  am. I am a cooking ass bitch. So I need food
• 5:18
  to be good to buy it out. And coffee is like
• 5:21
  the thing that I will I will get that out. But
• 5:23
  sparingly, again, because I don't have all the
• 5:25
  time. So, yeah, I just it's one of them is fourteen
• 5:30
  dollars, but that's on Uber Eats. They have some
• 5:33
  other things. Buy one, get one free. And so I
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  say it's a wash at the end of the day if I'm
• 5:37
  already not cooking. You are a spokesperson for
• 5:40
  Uber Eats right now. So, I mean, I used to do
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  that delivery thing for Uber Eats. I mean, now
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  I'm an Uber and Lyft driver because I find it's
• 5:48
  a faster, easier way to make money in Burlington
• 5:50
  and Vermont here. But, yeah, so how often are
• 5:56
  you doing your Uber Eats? We don't need to talk
• 5:59
  about that. It's more often now than it used
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  to be. So you said you're a cooking ass bitch,
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  but you're saying that you basically have Uber
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  Eats every day like it's water. I wouldn't say
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  every day. I would say right now it's two to
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  three times a week. The biggest thing is like
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  my boyfriend and I moved from Chicago to D .C.
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  in July. And I feel like that. kind of transition
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  has just put me in a space of like trying to
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  figure out this kitchen, which is smaller than
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  the one that we had, like trying to find places
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  to get groceries from the closest, you know,
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  stores, Target, and I won't be going there. So
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  there's just like a few challenges that have
• 6:30
  come up that have disrupted it, but I'm back
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  on my game. Two to three times we got up, the
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  worst. But it's definitely more than I used to
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  do. I used to bully my boyfriend because that
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  is his most used app and now it's one of mine
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  too. Yeah. What led to the move from Chicago
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  to D .C.? Not to make this whole podcast about
• 6:49
  that man, but he is finishing up his doctoral
• 6:53
  program in clinical psychology. And they have
• 6:56
  like a year of internship slash residency. And
• 6:59
  so that's where he got placed. So we're here
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  now. And you as a strategic creative director,
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  I'm assuming like a lot of your work can be remote.
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  So you could. move anywhere? My job right now
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  is wonderfully remote. At the time when he was
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  kind of going through the application process,
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  I was needing to look for a job anyway because
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  I was in a contract role. So I kind of was just
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  like, I will look remotely and in the DC area
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  and see, you know, also if there's a few New
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  York jobs that will let me just come up once
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  a week instead of doing a full hybrid schedule.
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  So it worked out where I did land a remote role.
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  So it was perfect timing. Wonderful. Wow. So
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  I mean, you're a cooking ass bitch. Let's get
• 7:37
  back on that. Like, what do you like to cook?
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  And also tell me the sort of learning curve that
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  you're figuring out with your kitchen there in
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  Washington, D .C. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. What do
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  I cook? Right now I have duck in the fridge.
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  I'm trying to get into some different things.
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  But I am big on lamb chops. I can do a really,
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  really good butter chicken. It is so, so good.
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  Yeah. Made some lobster tails yesterday, which
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  I feel like is like one of the most. most unexpectedly
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  simple things. And restaurants, again, they don't
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  season their shit. And I'm just like, I need,
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  I need a little bit more on this. So I'll do
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  like, what do I do? Like a lemon butter honey
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  wash with a little bit of Old Bay. Yeah. And
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  just kind of like mix it up. Sometimes I'll do
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  like a little truffle oil and garlic. Really,
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  really big on pastas too. So yeah, I run the
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  gamut. I run the gamut. And I try and get new
• 8:30
  seasonings every now and again too. So you lived
• 8:32
  in Chicago. You're in D .C. now. I mean, these
• 8:35
  are some of the most like blackest cities in
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  the state. How do they not how do restaurants
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  not get the assignment that they need to season
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  their food? You know, I think lobster tails are
• 8:45
  like kind of the exception. Sometimes if they're
• 8:48
  in something, I'm never complaining. Like the
• 8:50
  lobster mac and cheeses have never failed me.
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  But just like a lobster tail add on, if you're
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  going to get like steak that one time a year,
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  there's no seasoning. There's none. Why? Exactly.
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  That's what I said. That's what I said. That's
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  where you got to take matters into your own hands.
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  All right. Oh, and also because I just have to
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  make everything about me. The Keurig disaster.
• 9:15
  And this is something that should happen to like
• 9:18
  an eight year old child. I did not know my bag
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  of Cheerios was open from both ends. So when
• 9:25
  I put it back in the box, it started just like
• 9:28
  pouring out from the bottom. And I just had Cheerios
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  all over the counter and the floor. It seems
• 9:33
  like something that a kid would do. So I understand
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  why you're just like, oh, wait, this guy must
• 9:37
  have kids and he's just going through it. But
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  like, no, I have cleaned it up, but I mostly,
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  you know, we have, you know, four dogs and two
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  cats here. I mostly let three of our four dogs
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  just go to town on it and just eat it off the
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  floor. And yeah, because, you know, dogs will
• 9:53
  eat anything. And Cheerios seems like, yeah.
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  Do you have pets? My boyfriend has a cat. Her
• 10:00
  name is Nova Buttonsworth Jennings III. She is
• 10:03
  very disrespectful. She acts like she pays rent,
• 10:06
  though now she actually costs $75 a month. But
• 10:09
  she's lovely. She's beautiful. So you say your
• 10:12
  boyfriend has a cat. Do I take it that you're
• 10:14
  not crazy about the cat? No. I love her, but
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  I've been told I met him a month after he got
• 10:20
  her, which was literally four years ago. So I
• 10:24
  feel like I am mummy, but I respect the boundary.
• 10:28
  I respect the paperwork. Yeah. By the way, your
• 10:31
  camera is like doing like a sort of like a wavy
• 10:34
  ship thing. Is everything okay? Or yeah, yeah.
• 10:36
  It's like, is it just having a hard time staying
• 10:40
  steady? It's the new Mac. I don't want to talk
• 10:42
  about it. I don't know how to turn it off. I've
• 10:44
  tried to turn it off in Teams. I hate it. I hate
• 10:46
  it so much. Okay. Just a disclaimer for anybody
• 10:49
  watching on YouTube in case they're just like,
• 10:51
  oh my God, is Shantae on some kind of like a
• 10:55
  wavy yacht ship right now? And she's about to
• 10:59
  jump off into sea. It will be worse if I sneeze.
• 11:03
  It will be worse if I sneeze. So hopefully I
• 11:06
  can spare you all of that. Oh, you know what?
• 11:08
  If you need to sneeze, you need to run out of
• 11:10
  the room, go to the bathroom, do it, and then
• 11:12
  come back. And the camera followed me all the
• 11:15
  way there. So are you saying the new Macs are
• 11:17
  just not steady cameras and they're just making
• 11:22
  people seem like they're like kind of like, you
• 11:26
  know, waving back and forth on a ship? Honestly,
• 11:29
  I thought it was a Teams feature because I, in
• 11:32
  my previous roles, I've used like a lot of Google
• 11:33
  Meet and Zoom. And this is my first time being
• 11:36
  on Teams. And so I was like trying to go through
• 11:38
  those settings and stop it. I did not realize
• 11:40
  it would do this with Riverside too. So I'm assuming
• 11:43
  it's like the actual device if it's not the software.
• 11:46
  Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, well, fuck all that.
• 11:50
  I'm glad it's not your fault. And I, and at least
• 11:54
  I don't feel bad because I was talking about
• 11:56
  this to my wife. I'm a very like physically animated
• 11:58
  person and I've watched back some videos of episodes
• 12:02
  of this podcast where you could just see like
• 12:05
  a lot of shaking on my camera because I'm just
• 12:07
  like, I'm just like a fucking. psychiatric patient
• 12:13
  in a straight jacket. Speaking of which, tell
• 12:16
  me about your ADHD journey. I was going to say,
• 12:17
  and then you add coffee to that. Yeah. So you're
• 12:21
  on that Addy Adderall. And I, so as someone,
• 12:26
  so look, I mean, you're kind of not alone. I,
• 12:28
  I hate saying this, but like, I feel like I have
• 12:31
  undiagnosed ADHD. I'm screaming. Well, when you
• 12:33
  said the Cheerios thing, I was like. Wait, what
• 12:37
  about destroying Cheerios in the kitchen is a
• 12:41
  symptom of ADHD? Is that you opened it from one
• 12:45
  side and forgot that you did that and then opened
• 12:47
  it from the other side. Like that is a very,
• 12:49
  that's a very... That's debatable. That's debatable.
• 12:56
  Maybe I did open it from one side and forgot.
• 13:00
  It looks like a new box of Cheerios. It looks
• 13:03
  like it hadn't been opened yet. Because you opened
• 13:06
  it from the wrong side? Is that what happened?
• 13:08
  Yeah. Okay. You're getting snippy with me, Sean.
• 13:11
  I'm sorry. I'm just saying. Okay. Okay. Yes.
• 13:15
  Yes. You're calling me out. That's totally fine.
• 13:17
  Um, I, um, I take a, so I'm, I'm, I'm, I've been
• 13:21
  back on antidepressants for like the past year.
• 13:23
  So I take like a Zoloft substitute. So, um, I
• 13:26
  mean, I've been told that sort of could help
• 13:27
  with ADHD and anxiety as well as depression,
• 13:29
  but, um, tell me your ADHD journey because specifically
• 13:33
  with Adderall, all I know about it is like, you
• 13:37
  know, Kim Petra's singing it in a song and like,
• 13:40
  you know, I don't know, you hear about people
• 13:42
  in high pressure, high stress jobs like Saturday
• 13:44
  Night Live taking it to like, you know, stay
• 13:47
  focused and be stimulated as they're trying to
• 13:50
  get through their high pressure jobs. So tell
• 13:52
  me all about that. What's your journey? Yeah,
• 13:54
  well, I'll be honest. I call it Adderall. I started
• 13:56
  on Adderall. I'm now on Vyvanse because people
• 13:58
  don't know what Vyvanse is. But I got diagnosed
• 14:03
  in April after, again, lovely boyfriend was like,
• 14:07
  huh, have you ever thought about the fact that
• 14:09
  you might have this thing? I was like, what do
• 14:10
  you mean? I work a job. Like, I'm so focused.
• 14:13
  My grades have been good. And then I think things
• 14:17
  just started happening. I feel like a lot of
• 14:20
  like diagnostic things started to get on the
• 14:22
  Internet. And I think being able to. understand
• 14:25
  what it means to be high functioning and have
• 14:28
  ADHD was super clarifying for me. I went to a
• 14:32
  French school for like the first probably like.
• 14:35
  eight -ish years of my education. And so I was
• 14:38
  like learning math in French and learning history
• 14:40
  in French. And I think that was in some ways
• 14:42
  really good for my brain because it gave me two
• 14:44
  things to focus on at once. And then when I started
• 14:47
  going to other schools, it was like, okay, my
• 14:50
  book is in front of my textbook and I'm reading
• 14:52
  and trying to listen to the teacher because I
• 14:54
  know what the teacher is saying because I'm predicting
• 14:56
  the answer and I'm getting it right. And so I'm
• 14:59
  like, oh, I can read. And then all of a sudden
• 15:00
  I've missed the thing. And so now the next thing
• 15:03
  I'm like getting wrong and trying to figure it
• 15:04
  out. figure out how to catch up. So it's one
• 15:06
  of those things where like it didn't really,
• 15:07
  I think, clock to folks during the time that
• 15:10
  I was like going through school. But now thinking
• 15:14
  about all of the things in adulthood that I'll
• 15:17
  forget, that I'll maybe ruminate on and think
• 15:20
  about over time, it tracks. And I think when
• 15:25
  I got diagnosed, the person that I worked with
• 15:28
  said, you have severe ADHD. He said, you are
• 15:31
  allergic to boredom. Yeah. And I was, yeah. Okay.
• 15:35
  And I am so pleasantly surprised that it was
• 15:39
  your boyfriend that kind of opened up this conversation
• 15:42
  and got you to look into that. Because, I don't
• 15:46
  know, I mean, speaking as a man myself and the
• 15:48
  whole stigma around how men, especially Black
• 15:52
  men, I don't know, what race is your boyfriend?
• 15:54
  Oh, yeah, he's at Howard. And yes, they have
• 15:56
  a sprinkle of other folks, but he's Black. Okay,
• 15:59
  okay. Well, I mean, not all Howard University
• 16:02
  people are Black people. 0 .2 % matters too.
• 16:09
  Write me something positive, negative by the
• 16:12
  email. And I think that stands for electronic
• 16:15
  mail if you were born in 1922. You could say,
• 16:20
  John, I love your conversation with that quail
• 16:23
  farmer. John, I hated your conversation with
• 16:26
  that chapstick plugger. I haven't interviewed
• 16:31
  somebody like that, but if I did, then that would
• 16:33
  be worthy of hating because that stuff doesn't
• 16:36
  make sense. I don't even know if I could curse
• 16:38
  in these call to actions. Email me anytime, thedeliciousculture
• 16:41
  at gmail .com. This is probably my undiagnosed
• 16:47
  ADHD working at play because literally I'm thinking
• 16:50
  about like mentioning the fact that maybe my
• 16:54
  ADHD came into play when I diverted with the
• 16:57
  Cheerios comment because I was like, oh, I got
• 16:58
  to tell her about that. Yeah. But also there's
• 17:01
  this bowl, this empty bowl that I have to put
• 17:03
  in the sink. That's like right over. Like, yeah.
• 17:05
  So it's it's I think I get I think I get your
• 17:08
  struggle. But you know what? Let's get back to
• 17:11
  focus. Let's get back to focus. What I meant
• 17:13
  to say was, yeah, men, especially Black men,
• 17:17
  you know, stereotypically, we're not typically
• 17:19
  the ones to want to open up the conversation
• 17:21
  about mental health and medication and what to
• 17:24
  do to solve that. So talk to me about that, because
• 17:29
  your boyfriend seems like a unicorn in that space.
• 17:34
  Yeah, he's the coolest. I also think there is...
• 17:38
  I don't know, like he is actually in that space
• 17:40
  as a professional as well. So I think he's had
• 17:42
  to navigate that a lot. But also, I know from
• 17:45
  what he's told me, like that was kind of intrinsically
• 17:47
  in him growing up. But in many ways, I do, and
• 17:52
  like the other Black men that are in our community,
• 17:55
  yes, there are some folks who are a little bit
• 17:56
  more resistant, but I do find folks to be relatively
• 18:00
  open and interested in this era of life. And
• 18:04
  so it feels like one of those things sometimes
• 18:06
  where I'm like, this is what the internet thinks,
• 18:08
  but like in actual life, people have more sense.
• 18:11
  And I feel that about the gender wars. I feel
• 18:13
  that about the diaspora wars. Like, I think there's
• 18:16
  just a lot of... vitriol on the internet and
• 18:19
  a lot of like head -butting and talking back
• 18:21
  and forth. And that is by design. But yeah, there's
• 18:25
  a lot of folks in my life who like one of our
• 18:28
  friends came over and he was like, yeah, I think
• 18:29
  I have ADHD too. These are some of the things
• 18:31
  I've gone through. Like folks, I feel like are
• 18:32
  really. And also, you know, as women are being
• 18:36
  more open and seeking mental health, like they
• 18:38
  have partners that are supporting them and also
• 18:41
  introducing them to stuff the same way that my
• 18:43
  partner did with me. So, yeah, I would I would
• 18:46
  hope it's less less of a stigma than it seems,
• 18:50
  hopefully. Yeah. You know, I do get the sense
• 18:53
  that. There is more of a reflection in our community
• 18:58
  that like, I don't know, whatever we've learned
• 19:01
  from older generations may not apply so well
• 19:06
  to today, which is like, oh, just keep on pushing
• 19:09
  on and don't talk about it because you don't
• 19:12
  want to weigh people down and be a burden on
• 19:14
  other people and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 19:16
  You know, I look, you know, speaking as myself
• 19:18
  coming from a Haitian immigrant family, like
• 19:22
  so you have that double thing of like, you know,
• 19:24
  the black thing, but also the immigrant thing
• 19:27
  of just like, nope, just keep pushing ahead.
• 19:29
  Don't really need to talk about it. Oh, my God.
• 19:31
  If you take medication, you might be a crazy
• 19:33
  person. Like it just, you know, all that stuff.
• 19:35
  That's really. not true. And I think especially
• 19:39
  since, you know, the world being the way it is,
• 19:42
  like, you know, it being so politically divisive,
• 19:44
  people can't afford anything from their housing
• 19:46
  to their groceries to gas, like, and just how
• 19:49
  it makes us easily spiral downward. I think,
• 19:52
  I think, yeah, it's been, you know, we've had
• 19:55
  plenty of time to just kind of look back on what
• 19:59
  we've been told to learn, keep pushing forward
• 20:02
  and seeing the evidence that, no, that's not
• 20:04
  really. working like we're losing our minds and
• 20:09
  you know I don't know you know we're looking
• 20:12
  at a bag of Cheerios that's open from both ends
• 20:14
  in the kitchen and just being like oh my god
• 20:16
  I want to kill this thing like and then when
• 20:18
  it gets to that point like you gotta reflect
• 20:20
  you gotta be like alright maybe go into therapy
• 20:23
  maybe look into medications maybe see what I
• 20:26
  can do to benefit my mental health so you know
• 20:30
  yeah I mean speaking as someone who's been in
• 20:32
  therapy for six years has you know recently been
• 20:35
  medicated for the past year or so it's uh it's
• 20:38
  good it's good so i'm glad that the internet
• 20:40
  is not reflecting what you see in your own space
• 20:44
  because as you know the internet can be a bit
• 20:46
  dramatic oh i hate i hate her i stay away from
• 20:49
  her for the most part which is like it's it's
• 20:53
  it's not i'm not gonna say it's cringe it's just
• 20:55
  like i never thought i'd be the girl who was
• 20:57
  like i'm on linkedin every day but like you might
• 20:59
  get left on read on Instagram because I'm just
• 21:01
  I'm not there. And by the time I come there,
• 21:03
  it's seven days after you sent it and maybe the
• 21:05
  post is not available. And so we're just going
• 21:07
  to move on. But yeah, it's the Internet is the
• 21:10
  Internet is wild times. My therapist actually
• 21:12
  is Haitian as well. And he's he's a man. And
• 21:16
  I think it's been interesting to to like I love
• 21:18
  when people get therapists of the opposite gender.
• 21:21
  And again, I think with my boyfriend, I was like,
• 21:23
  oh, maybe I want a man because like they're a
• 21:25
  lot more direct. And I've had. female therapists
• 21:29
  in the past and I felt a little bit more coddled.
• 21:33
  Really? Like, yeah, yeah. And I've been through
• 21:36
  some shit. And I think those therapists were
• 21:38
  with me while I'd been through some shit. But
• 21:40
  in trying to work with them on the other side
• 21:43
  of the shit, I was like, I feel like you are
• 21:46
  like softening the language a lot. And I didn't
• 21:49
  feel like I was being held as accountable as
• 21:51
  I needed to be. Interesting. Yeah. And I needed
• 21:55
  that. I needed that. Wow. I mean, I've had a
• 22:00
  couple of male experiences. You know how it is.
• 22:04
  When I was in college, they have the counseling
• 22:06
  center. So I've had a few males that way. Some
• 22:10
  that have smelled really bad for whatever reason.
• 22:13
  They smelled like they... And I'm sorry, this
• 22:15
  is a podcast. We're going to get explicit. But
• 22:17
  they, yeah, they smelled like they took a shit
• 22:20
  in a diaper and just decided to come in and start
• 22:22
  talking to me. But you know what? As long as
• 22:25
  you're calm and nonjudgmental, then yeah, that
• 22:28
  shit diaper smell, I'm going to tolerate it.
• 22:31
  This was in college, you said? This was in college,
• 22:34
  yeah. So you can imagine me being in my early
• 22:36
  20s just being like, oh God, you smell, but no.
• 22:39
  Maybe it's a me thing. Because you're more insecure
• 22:42
  when you're younger about your... your beliefs
• 22:44
  on how people should smell. Yeah. And I think
• 22:47
  the thing is, too, like they don't pay them.
• 22:49
  Like it is actually slavery to me. I say it all
• 22:52
  the time. They do not pay them up until you get
• 22:55
  to the point of like doing your year of internship
• 22:58
  or what's the other thing that people call internship.
• 23:02
  Before that, you are literally all of the therapeutic
• 23:04
  training that you are doing is for free. So like.
• 23:08
  That person might have been going from their
• 23:10
  night job into this because they have to get
• 23:11
  a certain amount of hours, but they still have
• 23:13
  to pay for their housing. I would still do the
• 23:16
  shower in between. But that's probably what's
• 23:20
  going on. Yeah. Clean up them dingleberries.
• 23:23
  A little bit. A little bit. But anyway, again,
• 23:27
  ADHD. Let's get back to the point here. Yeah,
• 23:33
  I mean, I've had male experience. Well, OK, so
• 23:35
  one smelled and then there was another experience
• 23:38
  where it was like this was outside of college
• 23:41
  where I could get free therapy in exchange for
• 23:45
  logging a certain amount of community service
• 23:47
  hours and me producing. And volunteering at my
• 23:53
  local public access television station in my
• 23:55
  hometown of West Hartford, Connecticut. That
• 23:57
  count as community service. But the guy was just
• 24:01
  not helpful at all. It's literally like I remember
• 24:05
  day one coming in and it was just like all the
• 24:09
  other days with him. You know, he's just finishing
• 24:12
  munching on his peanut butter and jelly sandwich,
• 24:14
  listening to his NPR on his big ass black stereo
• 24:17
  boombox of a thing. And then I sit down and then
• 24:21
  he just looks at me. He just looks at me just
• 24:23
  waiting to say something. And that was it. Like,
• 24:26
  because like, you know, my current therapist,
• 24:28
  Barbara, for six years, like she's actually an
• 24:30
  interactive conversational human being. Like,
• 24:32
  oh, how are you? How you doing? And what's the
• 24:34
  latest on the IVF journey with you and your wife?
• 24:36
  Like, you know, this and that. But this guy is
• 24:39
  just like. Yeah. And there was one time where
• 24:44
  he was sleeping. Oh. Yeah. He slept during my
• 24:48
  talking. Because he's like, oh, because I don't
• 24:53
  know, maybe maybe there's no incentive for him.
• 24:55
  Maybe he's not getting paid because it's free
• 24:57
  therapy. Right. So he's probably not getting
• 24:59
  paid for this. Right. So he could just munch
• 25:01
  on his peanut butter and jelly sandwich, doze
• 25:03
  off while I'm talking about my terrible life
• 25:05
  and my parents splitting and all that stuff.
• 25:07
  And then, you know, you know, he just wakes back
• 25:10
  up and then checks his watch and it's just like,
• 25:13
  oh, OK, I think time's up. Therapists have different
• 25:15
  styles. And you have to be willing to do the
• 25:19
  work to find the right one. Like the therapists
• 25:21
  that I've worked with in the past, they were
• 25:22
  great. And maybe I also could not hear what they
• 25:26
  were saying sugarcoated because my mom was super
• 25:28
  harsh with me. So maybe that's my own thing.
• 25:31
  And maybe I just needed something different.
• 25:32
  Like it's not to say those therapists were bad.
• 25:35
  The snoring, I would say, is a different approach,
• 25:38
  but I do know some people will sit there to direct
• 25:40
  the conversation because you don't have a lot
• 25:43
  of experience having to direct things in your
• 25:46
  life. And so they're like, practice here. And
• 25:47
  they won't tell you because sometimes you'll
• 25:49
  walk into an awkward situation and have someone
• 25:51
  who you need to talk to who's not giving you
• 25:54
  much. And they're like, practice here. But they're
• 25:55
  not going to tell you that. They're just going
• 25:56
  to do it and see how you respond. Yeah. Yeah.
• 25:59
  I was uncomfortable by it. I was just like, where
• 26:01
  do you want me to begin? You're not saying anything.
• 26:06
  It just, I think, brought about my worst instinct
• 26:10
  of just being a rambler, as you can tell from
• 26:12
  the discussion here. It's interesting you say
• 26:17
  that you don't like the female therapist because
• 26:19
  you thought there was a little bit of coddling.
• 26:21
  I don't know. I mean, as someone who has a much
• 26:27
  more fruitful relationship with females in my
• 26:30
  life, more so than males, like I have a lot more
• 26:33
  female friends than male friends. I'm the type
• 26:37
  of person that just likes to get into more substantive,
• 26:41
  vulnerable conversation that... more likely you're
• 26:44
  going to be able to have with females than with
• 26:46
  males. You know what I mean? Like, I'm not going
• 26:48
  to give a shit much about, you know, fucking
• 26:50
  cars and sports and whatnot. So, yeah, I don't
• 26:55
  know. You know, my therapist, Barbara, for the
• 26:57
  past six years, I just feel like she's just been
• 26:59
  a very wonderful, nurturing, patient listener.
• 27:06
  you know, very opinionated, pushes back on things.
• 27:08
  Like it's, you know, it's just, I don't know.
• 27:11
  It's just a nice balance that I have not found
• 27:14
  from a male therapist. I think with the limited
• 27:16
  male therapists that I've had, it's been a more
• 27:19
  stoic presence with maybe a little layer of,
• 27:24
  oh, maybe like you're showing some. emotional
• 27:27
  sympathy here toward my drama as a young kid
• 27:31
  trying to figure out what the fuck life is. But
• 27:33
  yeah, I don't know. It's interesting that you
• 27:35
  say that. I mean, because I kind of assumed that
• 27:38
  like the same one for a lot of women where it's
• 27:40
  like, oh yeah, a lot of women therapists or women
• 27:43
  prefer women therapists because of just that
• 27:45
  nurturing understanding quality. Maybe there's
• 27:47
  instances where women with male therapists and
• 27:50
  the male therapists come off creepy or perverted.
• 27:51
  I don't know. I don't know. But your experience
• 27:54
  is your own experience and I'm glad it's happening.
• 27:57
  Yeah, I would also say like I did like those
• 28:00
  therapists a lot. I think I just there are certain
• 28:03
  times in your life where you need different things.
• 28:05
  I think when I was going through it, I did need
• 28:07
  nurturing and support. And then there came a
• 28:09
  time where I needed more accountability and I
• 28:12
  needed that accountability to sound a certain
• 28:14
  way. I also like most of my friends are women
• 28:17
  and I have a few friends who are queer men, but
• 28:20
  I don't really have straight guy friends. So
• 28:21
  it's also like. I have one brother who is seven
• 28:24
  years younger than me who I'm not going to guidance
• 28:26
  for anything. And I kind of I think was looking
• 28:28
  maybe to fill a gap in like the kind of perspective
• 28:32
  that I understood because I really have only
• 28:35
  ever understood that perspective from dating
• 28:37
  men. And I think it was helpful to have that
• 28:41
  because like. Yeah, I won't get into daddy issues,
• 28:45
  but my father is somewhere wandering in Jamaica
• 28:48
  and I haven't met him. So it's just it's nice
• 28:51
  to get that support in some way. My father's
• 28:54
  wandering somewhere in Haiti. Look at that. Look
• 28:56
  at that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I've met him.
• 28:59
  So him and my mom, they split when I was 18.
• 29:04
  And, I mean, it's so weird, like, because him
• 29:07
  and my mom, they both, like, born and raised
• 29:10
  in Haiti. They didn't meet there. They both separately
• 29:13
  had their journeys in Haiti. They both separately
• 29:15
  immigrated to America, and they just happened
• 29:17
  to meet at this church in Hartford, Connecticut.
• 29:19
  They had me, they had my sister, they had my
• 29:20
  brother. Boom. Um, and I don't know, somewhere
• 29:23
  along the way, I guess my father had this, uh,
• 29:26
  this sort of epiphany of sorts that whatever
• 29:31
  he wanted to do, he wasn't going to be able to
• 29:34
  do in America. So he decided to just reverse
• 29:35
  course and go back to Haiti, which is a completely
• 29:37
  stable country right now. I'm being sarcastic,
• 29:41
  of course. But, um, yeah, no, I mean, I haven't
• 29:44
  seen him since the age of 18 and I'm now 30.
• 29:51
  So I get it. I get it. I totally get it. Without
• 29:54
  having to go too much into daddy issues, I totally
• 29:57
  get it. Yeah. Oh, my God. There's so much I want
• 30:00
  to talk to you about. This is the problem with
• 30:02
  ADHD people because it's just like, oh, my God,
• 30:04
  there's so many directions we can go in. If you're
• 30:06
  going to spiral, I'm going to spiral too. We
• 30:09
  will just spiral all day. Someone's got to be
• 30:11
  a steadying force. Someone's got to be like the
• 30:12
  moderator on The View or I don't know. You're
• 30:14
  the host. It won't be me. So you're running a
• 30:19
  trade business. You know that the phone always
• 30:22
  rings at the worst possible time. Why? The solution.
• 30:26
  You are office staff. You are office staff is
• 30:29
  an AI receptionist that answers for you day and
• 30:33
  night. It will talk to your customers, knows
• 30:35
  your services and prices. It'll check your calendar
• 30:38
  and even books estimates near jobs you already
• 30:41
  have that day. The details will... I'll be texted
• 30:46
  to you. You don't have to worry about it. You
• 30:47
  are office staff takes care of the texts, the
• 30:49
  emails. It's only 99 bucks a month. Even better.
• 30:53
  If you try it out, your first month is only $10.
• 30:57
  Go to you are office staff .com. Once again,
• 31:00
  that is you are office staff .com. God, I am
• 31:07
  supposed to keep things together. Um, you are
• 31:10
  in DC. Yes. And we are just coming off, uh, a
• 31:14
  quite a historic midterm. Hold on. This is what
• 31:21
  was in my notes, right? Yes. You see? Because
• 31:24
  if ADHD people didn't have notes, we would be
• 31:28
  in an institution somewhere. You need to have
• 31:30
  notes to guide you in the right path. I'm so
• 31:33
  self -conscious about this ADHD stuff ever since
• 31:36
  you mentioned it. I'm so sorry. No, no, you're
• 31:39
  good. You're good. You called me out. I need
• 31:40
  to be called out on the Cheerios fiasco. So thank
• 31:42
  you very much. Of course. But yeah, like. Tell
• 31:46
  me what the vibe is like post -midterms in D
• 31:50
  .C., the nation's capital, where all the political
• 31:52
  shit happens. And also, if you want, tell me
• 31:56
  about your thoughts on the results. Because I
• 31:59
  have to say, disclaimer for the audience, we
• 32:02
  were supposed to record another day, but Shantae
• 32:04
  emailed and was like, oh my God, John, we got
• 32:08
  to reschedule. I was up too late watching the
• 32:10
  midterm results. And I literally responded like,
• 32:12
  oh my God, yay! I was doing the same thing, too.
• 32:16
  Let's do this. This is perfect. I was actually
• 32:18
  going to think about asking you about your thoughts.
• 32:20
  Oh, amazing. So I don't want to assume where
• 32:26
  your politics are. You can. Sorry. I mean, look.
• 32:31
  I mean, look. How many Black women in D .C. are,
• 32:34
  like, Trump supporters? Yeah, no. There's a lot
• 32:37
  of them, right? Despite the numbers. But anyway,
• 32:40
  so two -part question. And I don't care. I mean,
• 32:45
  you're on the Addy. So you could remember both.
• 32:48
  Answer both for me. One, D .C. and what that
• 32:53
  climate is like post midterms and as the results
• 32:57
  were coming in. And also your personal thoughts
• 33:00
  on how the results came in, how it turned out
• 33:02
  for Democrats. Yeah. So I I stay at home a lot.
• 33:08
  So I have not left the house to give you much
• 33:10
  of a perspective on how DC is feeling. I might
• 33:12
  do that tonight since my mask is already on anyways.
• 33:16
  But in terms of my perspective, I'm very happy.
• 33:20
  I'm very pleased. I think it was hilarious to
• 33:24
  watch. Like, I regretted not making it into a
• 33:28
  drinking game. Like, it just, it was so good.
• 33:31
  It was so nice to just watch the seeds keep flipping
• 33:33
  also as we, you know, we hit the majority. I
• 33:38
  am, I think, cautiously optimistic. I can't remember
• 33:42
  who it is, but whoever said lawyer up, music
• 33:45
  to my ears. Let's see. The interesting thing
• 33:48
  is literally all of Trump's people in his inner
• 33:51
  circle are just like, yep, Democrats are going
• 33:54
  to investigate the shit out of us, so get them
• 33:56
  lawyers. But no, someone actually said it on
• 34:00
  Twitter. And I hope they stand by it. I hope
• 34:02
  they stand by it. I hope they proceed. I am very
• 34:07
  big on Dateline. So whatever trial TV like that
• 34:10
  needs to be a Dateline episode that needs to
• 34:11
  be a series. So I will be tuned into that. And
• 34:14
  I think I also just want folks to like continue
• 34:16
  to stay educated and be aware. I am a little
• 34:20
  bit positive and a little bit doom and gloom
• 34:23
  and saying that, like, I feel like we've been
• 34:25
  through this before, maybe not in our generation,
• 34:27
  but we need to start realizing. And by we, I
• 34:30
  mean, everyone who doesn't look like us, that
• 34:32
  the great. you know equalizer is the economy
• 34:36
  and the moment you're like i'm in a good spot
• 34:38
  but i don't like that this person that looks
• 34:40
  like that is in a good spot too that's when we
• 34:42
  all get fucked so like if we could just please
• 34:44
  consistently get it together and realize that
• 34:46
  instead of continuing to go through these cycles
• 34:48
  because like that's how we got reagan's bullshit
• 34:50
  that's how we got bush's bullshit um and so we
• 34:53
  could you know be in a really great era and hopefully
• 34:56
  get you know a great person in presidency but
• 34:59
  like let's not forget what this era of trump
• 35:02
  brought and end up back here in 20 years please
• 35:05
  i fucking beg that's that's how do you feel shantae
• 35:09
  i want to go back to what you said about dateline
• 35:10
  i'm caught about that because i'm like because
• 35:13
  i mean if you're referring to dateline nbc like
• 35:15
  all i know about it is that like oh they had
• 35:19
  a happy marriage and then he decided to murder
• 35:22
  her so are we gonna see Dateline -style murders
• 35:26
  between the Democrats and Trump going into 2027?
• 35:28
  Is that what you're predicting? What's going
• 35:30
  on? What do you mean by the Dateline thing? I
• 35:31
  mean, it could be that. But, like, they covered
• 35:33
  Epstein. They covered Diddy. I think, like, you
• 35:36
  know, they'll do some sort of, like, you know,
• 35:38
  special reporting. And also, there are people
• 35:40
  who are dead. I watched House of Cards. Someone's
• 35:43
  dead somewhere. And that's, you know, that wasn't
• 35:46
  an accident. So, I'm sure that'll come up with
• 35:49
  something. I have watched House of Cards, too.
• 35:52
  Yes. I mean, look, yeah. I mean, in terms of
• 35:55
  people who are dead as a result of the Trump
• 35:57
  administration, sure, you could go to the January
• 35:59
  6th attacks. You could go to the insurrection,
• 36:02
  I think is what we call it. Yeah. And then...
• 36:05
  Terrorism. Terrorism? It was terrorism. Oh, the
• 36:11
  war in Iran? You could lump that in. Domestic
• 36:14
  terrorism with the ICE agent bullshit that happened,
• 36:17
  especially in Minneapolis earlier this year.
• 36:19
  Yeah. Yeah. Unfortunately... Unnecessary death
• 36:24
  has happened as a result of this administration.
• 36:26
  So I totally get you with that. OK, so I got
• 36:31
  to ask you later, like your whole thing about
• 36:33
  like not leaving the house, because I met you
• 36:35
  out of the house. I met you at Podcast Movement,
• 36:37
  the industry conference in NYC in September.
• 36:40
  So that is a contradiction to what you just said.
• 36:44
  Monday through Friday, Monday through Friday,
• 36:46
  I'm pretty home. Because I work from home. So
• 36:48
  it's hard to be like, oh, look, the sun went
• 36:50
  up and then it's now down and now I'll leave
• 36:52
  the house. Why are you a homebody? It's because
• 36:55
  D .C. is just a bunch of like fucking political
• 36:58
  junkies who just are stressed and annoying to
• 37:00
  talk to? No, I think working from home makes
• 37:05
  it hard to have like an inspiration to leave
• 37:08
  the house. And if I want to work somewhere that's
• 37:10
  not home, I'm automatically spending like $30.
• 37:14
  I am still recovering from the cost of moving.
• 37:18
  Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so pricey.
• 37:20
  So I'm just like, I think I'm just containing
• 37:22
  myself on the weekdays and on the weekends I
• 37:23
  leave. But yeah. Yeah, yeah. I used to work in
• 37:26
  radio and radio had me relocating a lot. So that
• 37:30
  was a big reason why I decided to stop working
• 37:33
  in that industry because it was just like, oh,
• 37:34
  no, I don't know how much I can afford to do
• 37:36
  all these cross -country moves every one or two
• 37:38
  years. Like 10K every time. Yeah, yeah. Goddamn,
• 37:43
  man. I'm trying not to spiral here. I'm trying
• 37:45
  to keep focused. As your camera is going up and
• 37:50
  down. Um, what do I think? I am keeping us out
• 37:53
  of focus. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's okay. No, no,
• 37:55
  you're good. You're good. You're good. Uh, what
• 37:57
  was your question to me? Like, where are my thoughts
• 37:58
  about everything? Oh yeah. So. Look, I mean,
• 38:03
  there was a lot of polling leading up to the
• 38:06
  midterm day where it was like, oh, the political
• 38:09
  environment's looking bleak. We could be looking
• 38:11
  at a blue wave. I had a co -host who I used to
• 38:13
  work with on this podcast a while ago, as early
• 38:16
  as late last year, saying like, no, it's going
• 38:19
  to be a blue wave. I've been talking to people.
• 38:20
  It's going to be a blue wave. And then that blue
• 38:24
  wave turned into, it's going to be a blue tsunami.
• 38:25
  It's going to be a blue bukkake tsunami. It's,
• 38:27
  oh my God, like, it's going to be great. And
• 38:31
  I was, as you had mentioned, cautiously optimistic
• 38:35
  because we've seen this. ride before where it's
• 38:39
  like, oh, my God, Democrats are projected to
• 38:41
  win. It's going to be great. Like, you know,
• 38:42
  obviously, 2016, Hillary was projected to win
• 38:46
  by big numbers. And then that obviously didn't
• 38:49
  happen. And then 2020, Joe Biden did win. And
• 38:55
  arguably, that was because of Trump's handling
• 38:57
  of COVID. But he didn't win by as much as maybe
• 39:01
  polling experts predicted that he would win by.
• 39:03
  And then we had 2024. Where, like, all right,
• 39:08
  we went from Joe Biden and Donald Trump, and
• 39:10
  it was pretty much Donald Trump's election to
• 39:13
  win after that disastrous debate with Joe Biden.
• 39:17
  And then Kamala came in and injected some new
• 39:20
  energy into the campaign. But it was still an
• 39:22
  unpopular administration, and a lot of polls
• 39:25
  were showing Kamala and Trump pretty neck and
• 39:27
  neck, so it could have gone either way. But I
• 39:29
  was sort of thinking, like, oh, maybe it's edging
• 39:31
  toward Kamala. you probably remember what happened
• 39:34
  that night in 2024 it was a bloodbath for democrats
• 39:37
  it was just like every it just seemed like every
• 39:40
  single state county whatever went for republicans
• 39:43
  and trump won the election again so um coming
• 39:46
  into this midterm even though like the environment
• 39:49
  just looked very shitty for trump in terms of
• 39:51
  his handling of the iran war uh how it's made
• 39:53
  gas prices insanely high groceries blah blah
• 39:56
  blah um i still came in with that little bit
• 39:59
  of skepticism that like, eh, maybe we're not
• 40:01
  going to do as good as they say we are because
• 40:04
  the polls are always kind of off. Um, and then
• 40:08
  Tuesday night happens and it just like one after
• 40:13
  another Democrat one here, Democrat one there.
• 40:15
  I mean, let's just go through them. Uh, we had
• 40:18
  some historic red state upsets that Republicans
• 40:23
  should easily have gotten, but I mean, those
• 40:26
  people there, I mean, they're and they're rural
• 40:28
  states like, you know, Kansas, South Carolina,
• 40:31
  where there's a lot of farmers, a lot of agriculture
• 40:34
  going on there. And diesel prices are a big part
• 40:38
  of it. And Trump made that skyrocket with the
• 40:41
  Iran war. So, of course, those people that voted
• 40:43
  for him are just like, what the fuck? Like, we
• 40:46
  thought you were for us. So. Yeah, the fact in
• 40:50
  Kansas, I mean, my God, the what was the Reverend
• 40:53
  Adam Hamilton defeating incumbent Republican
• 40:56
  Senator Roger Marshall? A Democrat hasn't been
• 41:00
  a senator in Kansas since 1932. I'm curious about
• 41:05
  the Carolinas because my boyfriend's from South
• 41:07
  Carolina. We've also spent like some time in
• 41:09
  Charlotte. I had a friend's bachelorette party
• 41:11
  there. And Charlotte, for being a very progressive
• 41:14
  city, like I still I still saw a couple Confederate
• 41:16
  flags. So the Carolinas like. It absolutely fucking
• 41:20
  shocked me. The Republican pundits who were like
• 41:24
  kind of back and forth on these shows, I was
• 41:25
  like, when you're not talking, I see the depression
• 41:28
  on your face. And I love that for me. They're
• 41:31
  like, oh, shit. Yeah, I think it was I was listening
• 41:34
  to Pod Save America, the podcast and their commentary
• 41:37
  about it. And they may have mentioned there was
• 41:40
  a point where. even president trump called in
• 41:42
  because look i i thought that it was going to
• 41:44
  be kind of 2020 style where he was just gonna
• 41:46
  be like no this is rigged and we won and blah
• 41:48
  blah blah but no he took the other uh toxic trump
• 41:53
  approach which is i wasn't on the ballot like
• 41:56
  which is the opposite of what you said before
• 41:59
  so which one is it right he said along during
• 42:02
  this midterm season pretend i'm on the ballot
• 42:04
  pretend i'm on the ballot like it's me people
• 42:06
  kind of did yeah but Then he's going to pretend
• 42:09
  that he didn't say that and say, well, no, literally
• 42:11
  I wasn't on the ballot. And that's the reason
• 42:13
  why all these people lost, because they were
• 42:15
  just terrible people. They weren't me. So whatever.
• 42:17
  Democrats won. That's fine. I'll work with them.
• 42:19
  And Greg Abbott from Texas can suck my dick.
• 42:22
  Like, it's just we've never seen a president
• 42:25
  who not only is just so bad at taking accountability,
• 42:29
  but also is. just non -hesitant with throwing
• 42:34
  his own party under the bus like this is just
• 42:36
  something that we've never seen before but yeah
• 42:38
  going back to south carolina uh what was the
• 42:41
  situation lindsey graham he was the senator over
• 42:43
  there for a long time he died and his sister
• 42:47
  uh was tasked to fill out the remainder of his
• 42:50
  term and then had the audacity to you know be
• 42:53
  uh in the running for a full term as if she's
• 42:56
  qualified for anything and um voters were just
• 42:59
  like no this just Smells like unearned nepotism.
• 43:03
  And they voted for the Democrat. And what we
• 43:09
  have Maine, my northern New England neighbor,
• 43:12
  just a few hours away from me in Vermont. Wow.
• 43:15
  You know, Susan Collins, even though she's voted
• 43:18
  with Trump a lot of the time, I mean, she's been
• 43:20
  this sort of like rock in the Maine Senate since
• 43:23
  the 90s. And to just see her just get to a point
• 43:26
  where it's like, yep, no, the climate's not looking
• 43:28
  good for me. I'm going to concede the election
• 43:30
  to Troy Jackson. So now Maine has a Democrat
• 43:34
  senator for the first time in like 30 something
• 43:36
  years. And then you have, of course, Ohio and
• 43:38
  North Carolina with their wins. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
• 43:42
  Especially Ohio. Like, tell me about your thoughts
• 43:44
  on because that was between Dr. Amy Acton. Is
• 43:50
  she a doctor? You know, you have the list in
• 43:52
  front of me. I don't. Let's just call her Amy
• 43:55
  Acton. Amy Acton ran against Vivek Ramaswamy
• 43:58
  for the Ohio governorship. And you're familiar
• 44:02
  with the terrible ad that Vivek ran toward, what,
• 44:07
  Amy Acton's? Estranged mother, she appeared on
• 44:09
  the ad. Oh, you know, I don't know if I saw that
• 44:13
  one. The one that got me was... How did you not
• 44:15
  see that one? It was all that was being talked
• 44:17
  about. Okay, the one that got me was in Georgia
• 44:21
  where he... What did he say? He was like, oh
• 44:24
  my God, deport or departed? Did you hear that
• 44:27
  one? That was the one... Oh, was that a... If
• 44:29
  that was a Georgia -specific ad, then I... No,
• 44:32
  I did not catch that. I just know... That's...
• 44:34
  Yeah, that's the one that hit my timeline. So
• 44:36
  maybe they happened around the same time because
• 44:38
  I did not hear about that one. Wow. Deport or
• 44:40
  be departed. Deported or departed, which I'm
• 44:44
  like, do you mean as in dead? Is that what you?
• 44:47
  Yeah, I think there's no other way to interpret
• 44:50
  that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, but no, I mean,
• 44:54
  you know, the fight between Amy Acton and Vivek
• 44:56
  Ramaswamy, Vivek going low blow and, you know,
• 45:00
  putting Amy Acton as a strange mother and saying,
• 45:02
  hey, she's a liar. And then finding out the backstory
• 45:05
  of the fact that this woman ran away with a pedophile
• 45:10
  rapist and believed him over her own children,
• 45:14
  lost custody of her own children because of that.
• 45:18
  It's about as long as you could go. And Vivek
• 45:20
  was just like, fuck it. Like, politics is a dirty
• 45:22
  game. I got all the money in the world. I could
• 45:24
  still win. And he clearly did not. People just
• 45:26
  saw that as a morally reprehensible decision.
• 45:29
  So, yeah. But anyway. Oh, my God. All right.
• 45:36
  So you're like me and you're like, I need to
• 45:38
  have a podcast with people I can talk to so I
• 45:41
  don't feel so lonely and weird. But you don't
• 45:44
  know. where to find guest after guest after guest.
• 45:47
  You're like me. Maybe you're releasing a podcast
• 45:50
  episode once a week, twice a week. It is a consistent
• 45:54
  beast that needs to be fed. And that's where
• 45:57
  Podmatch comes in. Podmatch gives you a wide
• 46:01
  pool of guests to choose from based on your specific
• 46:04
  type of podcast, based on the specific type of
• 46:07
  guests you're looking for. They give you three
• 46:09
  matches every single day to choose from. And
• 46:12
  guess what? you publicly release those interviews,
• 46:15
  you get paid from Podmatch. As long as, of course,
• 46:18
  you prove it. Don't be, you know, talking to
• 46:22
  yourself and claiming that you talked to Bob
• 46:25
  Johnson from the milk company when it's just
• 46:29
  you, scammer. Podmatch. Get paid to release interviews
• 46:35
  from guests found through their platform. Join
• 46:38
  Podmatch using the link in my show notes. My
• 46:44
  God, we got to talk about the fact that there
• 46:46
  is a governor that's about to be sworn in in
• 46:49
  Georgia named Keisha. That's what I keep hearing
• 46:52
  online. Like Keisha. And I love her name. What
• 46:56
  is her name? Keisha Lance Bottoms. Yeah. What
• 46:59
  are your thoughts about that? Because I. I don't
• 47:02
  want to assume because for all I know, you could
• 47:04
  be an Indian white woman. Are you a black woman?
• 47:08
  Do you identify as a black woman? Yeah. Yeah.
• 47:10
  So I hate because I feel like this is a question
• 47:13
  that like a fucking white political pundit would
• 47:15
  ask you on one of those cable talk shows. But
• 47:17
  as a black woman, what does this mean for you
• 47:19
  to have the first black woman governor in U .S.
• 47:22
  history in Georgia of all places? Yeah. It is
• 47:27
  exciting, but it's also one of those things where
• 47:29
  until I'm reminded, I'm like, oh, only now. And
• 47:34
  so, yeah, it's it's I don't want to take away
• 47:36
  from the win and the excitement and the joy of
• 47:39
  it. And also like. Black women are overwhelmingly
• 47:42
  involved in politics. Black women are overwhelmingly
• 47:45
  showing up to the polls. Black women are overwhelmingly
• 47:48
  supporting communities across the country. We
• 47:51
  know that when Black women make more money, they're
• 47:53
  pouring more money into their communities more
• 47:55
  than any other kind of demographic when they
• 47:57
  come up. And so, like, it is really disappointing
• 48:00
  that we're just now getting to this point because
• 48:02
  if that is the case and, like... terms of how
• 48:05
  we move as individuals, as politicians, the amount
• 48:08
  of impact that can be made, given that that is
• 48:11
  like the principle and values that we carry is
• 48:13
  just like the sky's the limit. And so I hope
• 48:17
  she is able to really, you know, make the change
• 48:20
  that was promised during her campaign. I know
• 48:23
  some of those changes aren't always, you know,
• 48:25
  things that you can single -handedly shepherd
• 48:27
  forward, but I would love to see this, you know,
• 48:30
  not be a first, but not the last. Are there no
• 48:34
  white women named Keisha? Because, like, literally
• 48:36
  all the Internet has been telling me is like,
• 48:38
  oh, my God, I got a governor named Keisha. It's
• 48:41
  like, like, I mean, you probably know better
• 48:44
  than I do. Is Keisha like a very hardcore black
• 48:48
  woman name? I mean, I don't I haven't met a white
• 48:51
  Keisha, but I have heard of white Shante's and
• 48:54
  it pisses me off. Why? You think Shante's should
• 48:57
  be owned by black women only? Absolutely. Absolutely.
• 49:00
  I'm very confused when I see that. Yeah. Yeah.
• 49:02
  I want you to see my name on a page without my
• 49:05
  face and know what it is like. That's that is
• 49:07
  very I'm very proud of that. Now, specifically,
• 49:09
  why? I'm going to I'm going to task you on this.
• 49:11
  Why should only Black women be named Shantae?
• 49:14
  What is it about Shantae that like evokes like,
• 49:17
  no, this is this is this is for us? I think it's
• 49:21
  just too creative. Like, yeah, I think. It's
• 49:25
  not Morgan or Ashley. Yeah, like take it from
• 49:29
  the Bible or take it from, you know, Europe where
• 49:33
  you came from and leave the creative shit alone.
• 49:36
  Like, I know you didn't come up with that. It's
• 49:38
  not yours. I know you heard it and you liked
• 49:40
  it. Go back to Appalachia with your fucking,
• 49:44
  I don't know, Joshua's and your and your Roland's
• 49:47
  and your Garth's. Yeah. Leave Shantae alone.
• 49:51
  It's like, I can't remember what the name of
• 49:53
  his restaurants are, but like Rick Bayless has
• 49:55
  a bunch of restaurants like that are in Spanish
• 49:58
  and like influenced by different kind of Hispanic
• 50:01
  Latino cuisines. And I'm like, you're a white
• 50:04
  man. This is not. Where's the Italian food? Exactly.
• 50:08
  Stay in your lane. A little bit. Yeah. Yeah.
• 50:14
  That's like one of the many lily white men in
• 50:16
  Vermont coming up to me and saying, hey, you
• 50:19
  know what? I'm going to open a Jamaican restaurant.
• 50:21
  What do you think about that? Oh, please. I'm
• 50:24
  going to open an Afro -Caribbean restaurant.
• 50:25
  And I am saying this as a white man who's only
• 50:28
  been around white people in Vermont all my life.
• 50:31
  I want to scream. If I'm going to a Jamaican
• 50:33
  restaurant, I want to be disrespected. I want
• 50:36
  you to be annoyed if I did not say what I wanted
• 50:38
  properly. I want you to ask me and then roll
• 50:41
  your eyes as if you did it. I need it. I need
• 50:44
  it. Yeah. Oh, my God. I've been procrastinating
• 50:47
  so much. There's this Jamaican restaurant in
• 50:49
  Burlington about an hour from where we live in
• 50:52
  Richford here in Vermont. And, yeah, I mean,
• 50:54
  my wife and I, I mean, we recently had Afro -Caribbean
• 50:58
  food from this place in Manchester, New Hampshire.
• 51:02
  I loved the vibe going in because it's just tiny
• 51:05
  restaurant. You got the Black woman with the
• 51:08
  hairnet. She's like cooking. Like she just had
• 51:11
  this air of like, all right, I'm a hardworking
• 51:15
  wife and mother of maybe five, six, seven children,
• 51:19
  whatever the fuck. And I could throw down in
• 51:21
  the kitchen because I have to because my kids
• 51:22
  got to eat. And I just realized, oh, shit, I
• 51:25
  could make money out of this. So let me do that.
• 51:26
  And oh, my God, it was it was the best thing
• 51:29
  ever. And and keep in mind, like I look. I got
• 51:32
  a white wife who is born and raised here in Vermont
• 51:34
  and has been used to all the bland unseasoning
• 51:37
  of foods. And yeah, no, she throws down with
• 51:41
  all those, what do you call those? Seasonings?
• 51:46
  What's that? Is it seasonings? Yeah, yeah, seasonings.
• 51:49
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. But also I was just going to
• 51:51
  say like, oh, she loves a good ethnic cuisine.
• 51:53
  That's crazy. I just feel, too, like if you colonize
• 51:59
  the world and your shit is still, like, I just
• 52:01
  don't, I don't understand. Right? If you're going
• 52:04
  to colonize the world, at least put some seasoning
• 52:07
  in your food and make it taste like food. Yeah.
• 52:10
  Yeah. That you can borrow. My name, leave it.
• 52:13
  Yeah. I got a crush on the newly, or the incoming
• 52:17
  governor of Texas, the Democrat, Gina Hinojosa.
• 52:23
  What did you think about that? Because I kind
• 52:25
  of thought. Yeah. I mean, that was probably the
• 52:28
  biggest shock of the night, listening to the
• 52:30
  results on the radio. It's just like, oh, my
• 52:31
  God, fucking Texas is fucking blue. I mean, not
• 52:34
  only has Greg Abbott been there for however long,
• 52:38
  but here's a white man in Texas, this Republican
• 52:41
  stronghold. You would think that Gina would be
• 52:43
  up for a challenge there. But no, this Latino
• 52:46
  woman wins in the fucking state of Texas. And
• 52:49
  then you have James Tallarico, who, yeah, is
• 52:50
  a white man, whatever, but he's still a Democrat.
• 52:52
  A Democrat hasn't won the Senate there since
• 52:54
  1988. So what are your thoughts about that? Because
• 52:58
  it's just so bizarre to think of Texas as a blue
• 53:02
  -leaning state now. Yeah, so many thoughts. I
• 53:05
  think one thing that's really interesting to
• 53:07
  me, I used to work at Meta, and I think the tech
• 53:09
  boom in Austin played a really big role over
• 53:13
  the years since Texas also starting to look a
• 53:15
  little bit more purple and look more purple with
• 53:17
  people who have money. Because a lot of folks
• 53:19
  who are going to TikTok or TikTok, Meta, like
• 53:23
  other tech companies that... kind of transform
• 53:25
  that hub. I had to go through Austin to do my
• 53:29
  training for Metta, even though I was based in
• 53:31
  Chicago. And I do think it played a really, really
• 53:34
  big part. There's folks now who I know from that
• 53:37
  time period when I think when I started at Metta
• 53:39
  was about 10 years ago, and they're still there
• 53:41
  and they have families. And so they're infusing,
• 53:44
  you know, money into the economy. They're donating
• 53:46
  to the politicians they believe in. They're advocating
• 53:48
  and doing what they need to do. And I think that
• 53:50
  played a really huge role. I also. Saw it TikTok
• 53:53
  yesterday. It was kind of, like, breaking down
• 53:55
  the voters. And it's really interesting to see
• 54:00
  because, like, Latino voters did vote for her
• 54:04
  more than Greg Abbott. But it's still kind of,
• 54:09
  like, 60 -40. Whereas you see, like, Black folks,
• 54:13
  like, I think it was, like, Black women were,
• 54:14
  like, 92%. Black men were, like, 89%. And so
• 54:17
  it's still interesting to see, like, okay, if
• 54:20
  this person... was not maybe aligned with this
• 54:23
  demographic, but still had the same policies.
• 54:26
  Like if this was just a white woman, would she
• 54:28
  have gotten elected versus being Mexican? Yeah.
• 54:33
  So I think those are some of the things that
• 54:34
  I'm like kind of dissecting in my mind and interested
• 54:36
  in as folks kind of are breaking things down.
• 54:39
  Yeah. I mean, look, I know that another part
• 54:42
  of it. You know, the Latino vote going from Trump
• 54:47
  away from Trump, you know, they probably have
• 54:51
  been the ones affected the most by the ICE agent
• 54:54
  situation that's been happening over the. over
• 54:57
  this year so um that might have also played into
• 55:00
  uh them just being like no fuck it we're gonna
• 55:03
  you know go bold and and elect this uh wonderful
• 55:05
  latino woman and we're gonna see what happens
• 55:09
  um and then uh yeah no i went about it i i lived
• 55:13
  in iowa for a time for a radio and uh the the
• 55:16
  democrat no no it was great it was great no no
• 55:19
  no And I know, like, look, I mean, I was born
• 55:22
  and raised in a pretty diverse area of the Hartford
• 55:25
  area of Connecticut and, you know, Black, Haitian,
• 55:28
  whatever. Like, you would think, like, why the
• 55:30
  fuck would you want to go to Iowa? It was because
• 55:31
  I was in radio and I was just trying to get a
• 55:33
  job anywhere. And I ended up spending a year
• 55:36
  and a half in this really wonderful college town
• 55:38
  of Decorah, which is just very liberal, very
• 55:41
  open -minded and had the best experience, gained
• 55:44
  a lot of great community. The governor who's
• 55:47
  about to be sworn in, he is from Decorah. So
• 55:50
  that makes it all the more special. Yeah. I mean,
• 55:53
  so I've even though it's been like a decade since
• 55:55
  I've left Iowa, like I just still have this connection
• 55:59
  of like. That liberal hub that I was a part of
• 56:02
  that has wanted some Democrat representation
• 56:04
  for quite some time. And finally they got it.
• 56:07
  So, you know, big's up to them. Yeah, I'm so
• 56:10
  sorry, Iowa. I used to have to, not have to,
• 56:13
  my ex was in Iowa when I was in college. And
• 56:16
  so I would be on the Greyhound or a mega, what
• 56:19
  is it, megabus to go visit him. And so maybe
• 56:22
  I just from those memories. Tell me more. What?
• 56:26
  Oh, God. Um, yeah, we were we were best friends
• 56:30
  in high school and then started dating in college.
• 56:33
  And for some reason, I was the only one who went
• 56:35
  to visit, even though he had a car. So I was
• 56:37
  on that Greyhound bus. One of them caught on
• 56:39
  fire, actually. What? How? The engine. The engine
• 56:43
  caught on fire. And you were in the bus. Yeah.
• 56:47
  And we like got let out the bus. Thankfully,
• 56:50
  it was like we were coming back to Chicago. So
• 56:52
  it wasn't at the Greyhound stop yet. But like,
• 56:54
  I think the train stop was like 10 blocks away.
• 56:57
  And got out, was like looking at the fire. And
• 57:00
  then it kind of like had a little mini explosion.
• 57:03
  I have to find it in my Snapchat reels if I can.
• 57:06
  I don't know. I probably deleted it or it's gone.
• 57:08
  And did you want to go to a Greyhound bus ever
• 57:10
  again? After that, I would be traumatized from
• 57:13
  Greyhound. No. Yeah. Yeah. Woo. All right. So
• 57:16
  it's not even so much like the people of Iowa.
• 57:18
  It's just so much like the experience. The stress
• 57:21
  of traveling there and almost getting blown up
• 57:23
  by a Greyhound bus engine fire. Yeah. And that
• 57:26
  person was pretty awful, too. The person I was
• 57:28
  going to go visit. So it just all was bad. So
• 57:30
  did he. So he's based in Iowa, right? Like he
• 57:33
  lived there? He went to school there. Oh, just
• 57:35
  went to school there. OK, gotcha. OK. And you
• 57:38
  worked for Meta? The like Facebook, Instagram
• 57:40
  Meta? I did. I first worked for them and. 2017
• 57:46
  and 2018. And I was like, this is, I don't like
• 57:50
  this. What did you do for them? How did you get
• 57:54
  the job? And why did you leave? Yeah. So I got
• 57:58
  messaged by a recruiter. They were essentially
• 58:00
  building an office in Chicago and looking for
• 58:02
  folks in advertising. I was at a PR agency that
• 58:06
  was not a great time. They were working me like
• 58:09
  12 hours a day. And I thought PR was like fun
• 58:12
  and like, you know, influencing kind of the culture
• 58:14
  part of the news a little bit more. But I was
• 58:16
  really just shipping out Kleenex boxes to reporters
• 58:19
  that did not want them. So when they emailed
• 58:22
  me and were like, hey, would you like twice your
• 58:24
  salary and like a normal work schedule? I said
• 58:26
  yes. And was, yeah, basically consulting agencies
• 58:29
  on like how to optimize their ads on the platform.
• 58:33
  found myself to be like more of a creative spirit.
• 58:36
  So then I shifted into more of a creative practice
• 58:38
  and did like branded content at Vox Media and
• 58:40
  things like that. And a couple jobs later, the
• 58:44
  one that kind of got my deep dive into podcasting,
• 58:47
  I got laid off after four years of being there.
• 58:51
  And Meta had a contract role on their creative
• 58:53
  team and I needed a job. And I said, I will go
• 58:56
  work for the devil for a little bit again. So
• 58:58
  I went to do that from When was that? July of
• 59:03
  2025 until like April, May of this year. And
• 59:07
  have you seen the social network, the social
• 59:09
  reckoning as someone who used to work for Meta?
• 59:12
  And is it pretty accurate to whatever work culture
• 59:15
  comes from there? It's not what I experienced,
• 59:18
  but I think I didn't experience it because I
• 59:21
  I was like out. I was. I was there once it kind
• 59:27
  of left Silicon Valley and like started to have
• 59:30
  hubs in other places. And I think from what I
• 59:33
  remember of the social network, is the social
• 59:35
  reckoning the new one? Cause I do want to watch
• 59:37
  that. Okay. Okay. I need to watch that. I have
• 59:39
  not seen that yet, but yeah. Okay. That's. The
• 59:43
  previews, I was like, because I would, again,
• 59:45
  I don't be on Instagram like that. I would love,
• 59:48
  let's boycott that next. But I don't think people
• 59:51
  will because there's too much money involved.
• 59:54
  Yeah, to my understanding, whereas the social
• 59:55
  network, and I saw it like years ago when I was
• 59:57
  in Iowa, fittingly enough, that was like, you
• 1:00:00
  know, the rise of Mark Zuckerberg, this young
• 1:00:02
  kid, how he discovered Facebook, how he made
• 1:00:04
  it be what it is. The social reckoning picks
• 1:00:07
  up like, what, 16 years later where it's like,
• 1:00:10
  you know, Facebook is this big thing and now
• 1:00:11
  they're dealing with like, I don't know, like
• 1:00:13
  political misinformation and all that shit online.
• 1:00:16
  So I'm interested. I mean, look, I'm a big fan
• 1:00:18
  of Aaron Sorkin from his work with the West Wing
• 1:00:20
  and the newsroom and blah, blah, blah. So like
• 1:00:21
  that for me, regardless of how I may feel about
• 1:00:24
  Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook, like I think that
• 1:00:26
  might be an interesting movie to dive into. The
• 1:00:33
  Delicious Culture with Jean -Francois, proudly
• 1:00:35
  hosted by RSS. Why not join them if you are starting
• 1:00:39
  a new podcast? And especially if you are like
• 1:00:41
  me, you were with a hosting provider for a certain
• 1:00:44
  amount of years. You were like, ah, I am tired
• 1:00:47
  of doing this for free and not making any money.
• 1:00:50
  And I want to go to something like RSS where
• 1:00:52
  I can make money very easily. RSS only requires
• 1:00:56
  10 downloads for you to start monetizing. How
• 1:00:59
  about that? A great way to start your podcasting
• 1:01:02
  career. Start today with the link in my show
• 1:01:05
  notes. So break down strategic creative director
• 1:01:11
  for me. That's what you are. Break that down
• 1:01:14
  for me in layman's terms. And how did you even
• 1:01:18
  get to this point where you found out this was
• 1:01:21
  your calling? Yeah, so I think I've had roles
• 1:01:23
  that are like... Strategic or strategy. So I've
• 1:01:26
  been like a creative strategist. And then I've
• 1:01:28
  had roles where I'm a creative director. And
• 1:01:30
  so I just wanted to put that together because
• 1:01:33
  I think folks can be either. you know, thinking
• 1:01:36
  about the insights and the human kind of truths
• 1:01:40
  that are inspiring a concept or they can execute.
• 1:01:43
  And there's a lot of folks who can do both. And
• 1:01:45
  I feel like oftentimes you can kind of get pigeonholed
• 1:01:48
  into one or the other. And it's not that I necessarily
• 1:01:50
  always need to be doing both, but I do have a
• 1:01:53
  perspective and I want that to be known. So I
• 1:01:55
  kind of try to make sure that folks understand
• 1:01:58
  that, like, I'm not just going to. take a brief
• 1:02:00
  and be like, it is what it is. Oftentimes I'm
• 1:02:03
  going to challenge it and be like, well, you
• 1:02:04
  are saying that you want, you know, for to cast
• 1:02:08
  this creator, for example, but you've told me
• 1:02:11
  that your audience is like 60 % people of color.
• 1:02:15
  Maybe you should consider out of the three creators
• 1:02:17
  that you're casting, having one to two people
• 1:02:19
  of color. Just, just a thought. Just a thought.
• 1:02:22
  Maybe you should think about how that comes into
• 1:02:24
  the storytelling instead of it just being like,
• 1:02:26
  okay, we're putting this person in and we're
• 1:02:28
  not allowing them to infuse their personality
• 1:02:30
  or their culture in whatever way. So those are
• 1:02:32
  the things that I think kind of make up the work
• 1:02:35
  that I do. And it can be a challenge sometimes
• 1:02:38
  because I find myself pushing back in spaces
• 1:02:40
  where it should be obvious, but it's not. You
• 1:02:45
  and I met indirectly, and I mean... And what
• 1:02:48
  I mean by indirectly, I was in the audience and
• 1:02:52
  you were one of our session speakers at Podcast
• 1:02:55
  Movement, one of the leading industry conferences
• 1:02:57
  about podcasting. This happened in New York City
• 1:02:59
  this past September. Can you recap for us and
• 1:03:05
  specifically for me, since I have the memory
• 1:03:07
  of a goldfish, what that session was? how you
• 1:03:14
  felt about it and how you felt about podcast
• 1:03:16
  movement in general. Is this another ADHD thing
• 1:03:20
  where it's like. I have no patience for asking
• 1:03:23
  one question at a time. Let me just like bundle
• 1:03:24
  like three or four questions all at the same
• 1:03:26
  time. That must be an ADHD thing, right? Because
• 1:03:28
  I'm noticing it a lot more and more. That's what
• 1:03:31
  I tend to do. Yeah. And the memory that, no,
• 1:03:33
  but it's okay because I, you know, my brain can
• 1:03:35
  track it. Okay. Podcast movement things. I did
• 1:03:40
  a session on how to pitch your podcast. The job
• 1:03:42
  that I'd gotten laid off from was me at being
• 1:03:45
  at a global podcast company for four years. And
• 1:03:48
  I headed up the creative department across the
• 1:03:50
  year. U .S., Canada, and Mexico. And so I did
• 1:03:53
  a lot of pitching podcasts on behalf of creators.
• 1:03:56
  I did a lot of working with our content team
• 1:03:59
  to figure out what shows we should be acquiring.
• 1:04:01
  A lot of audience development work for when we
• 1:04:03
  did, you know, brand new, net new podcasts. I
• 1:04:07
  wanted to kind of for the smaller creators that
• 1:04:10
  have been in the orbit of like folks that I was
• 1:04:12
  talking to and in conversation with, I wanted
• 1:04:15
  to give kind of a talk and provide a resource
• 1:04:19
  on ways to, you know, potentially land a network
• 1:04:22
  or a brand deal, because I feel like when I was
• 1:04:25
  at that company, I had to. do things that were
• 1:04:29
  in the interest of the business and helping like
• 1:04:32
  those smaller creators who are kind of getting
• 1:04:34
  their bearings is not necessarily aligned with
• 1:04:37
  like the most capital value towards the business
• 1:04:40
  I was working for. But I had all of this knowledge
• 1:04:42
  and none of it is like NDA things. It's just
• 1:04:45
  like strategies, ways of thinking, structural
• 1:04:47
  things, pricing guidance that folks wouldn't
• 1:04:51
  have otherwise. And so that's kind of what I.
• 1:04:54
  focused on and it was 20 minutes so i couldn't
• 1:04:56
  do everything but i i came out with like a a
• 1:04:59
  guide as well um and yeah podcast movement was
• 1:05:02
  interesting i'd been going that's a good that's
• 1:05:06
  the consensus among everybody it's just this
• 1:05:07
  mixed feeling of like it was it was interesting
• 1:05:10
  it was different yeah i'd been going for years
• 1:05:12
  because i was at a podcast company for four years
• 1:05:15
  um And I think it's really nice to be able to
• 1:05:19
  go not with an employer personally because I
• 1:05:22
  hadn't had that experience. I'm not a fan of
• 1:05:25
  like I understand for the space and I think it
• 1:05:28
  was like very intentional, but I'm not personally
• 1:05:31
  a fan of like the headphones on situation. I
• 1:05:34
  think it can be really distracting. Like I felt
• 1:05:38
  like I had to yell all the time because I didn't
• 1:05:40
  have headphones on and I could hear everyone
• 1:05:42
  else's sessions. Um, but I think like a lot of
• 1:05:45
  really cool people came together and I think
• 1:05:47
  it's like, it's definitely evolving from what
• 1:05:50
  I experienced and getting less corporate. And
• 1:05:52
  I think that's really good. Yeah. Uh, so to recap
• 1:05:55
  for our, uh, delicious out there listening and
• 1:05:57
  watching, and, and this was already kind of explained
• 1:06:00
  with, um, uh, with the episode that I had with,
• 1:06:02
  uh, what's his name? Rich from the two guys on
• 1:06:04
  a plane podcast, who I also met at podcast movement.
• 1:06:07
  Um, but yeah, I mean, this was my very first
• 1:06:10
  podcast industry conference. Uh, was this podcast
• 1:06:13
  movement um to what i understand um they had
• 1:06:18
  some new ownership some new management come in
• 1:06:20
  and decide that all right we're gonna like revamp
• 1:06:23
  the format and have it be opened up to the podcasting
• 1:06:26
  community like hey pitch us what you think would
• 1:06:29
  be a great 20 minute session we'll put it out
• 1:06:32
  to the audience for votes whoever gets the most
• 1:06:33
  votes gets to uh be you know a speaker at their
• 1:06:37
  own session at podcast moment they're gonna have
• 1:06:39
  20 minutes with an audience you were obviously
• 1:06:41
  one of the winners congratulations it was a great
• 1:06:43
  session yeah you did you get there uh at terminal
• 1:06:47
  five this indie music concert venue with very
• 1:06:50
  poor lighting uh sure i mean if you want to see
• 1:06:53
  like a rock band and And sort of this like very
• 1:06:56
  dark, like, you know, rebellious lighting vibe.
• 1:07:00
  And you want to dress up and make out with somebody
• 1:07:01
  in the back room somewhere and not see them or
• 1:07:03
  see you. Like Terminal 5 is great for that in
• 1:07:06
  New York. But for a podcast industry conference
• 1:07:09
  where you want to take good pictures, you want
• 1:07:12
  to be able to see the people that you're trying
• 1:07:13
  to network with in the hallways and in the room
• 1:07:15
  and such, a lot of people had mixed feelings
• 1:07:18
  about that. And going back to the headphone thing,
• 1:07:20
  for those listening and watching, if you remember
• 1:07:22
  during the pandemic, there was these big silent
• 1:07:26
  disco parties where instead of the music being
• 1:07:29
  on speakers and people actually interacting with
• 1:07:31
  each other and hearing all the same thing. It
• 1:07:33
  was everybody had their own headphones and were
• 1:07:36
  kind of socially isolated, blah, blah, blah.
• 1:07:37
  So podcast movement sort of took that because
• 1:07:40
  it was, you know, Terminal 5 was a very small
• 1:07:43
  room. I understood it. A lot of people in this
• 1:07:45
  very small room. So it probably would be hard
• 1:07:47
  to hear each speaker do their thing. So we all
• 1:07:50
  had the silent disco headphones where it's like,
• 1:07:52
  oh, you know, if you want to go to this session,
• 1:07:53
  you know, turn your headphone to this channel,
• 1:07:55
  turn your headphone to that channel. And yeah,
• 1:07:58
  I mean, you know, there were some audio issues.
• 1:08:01
  Some speakers were not heard well. Some speakers
• 1:08:04
  had to speak up more. And there, I think, was
• 1:08:09
  sort of a sense of isolation that you kind of
• 1:08:11
  don't want at these conferences, because whereas,
• 1:08:13
  you know, you don't have your headphones and
• 1:08:15
  you're kind of in a room amongst people and you're
• 1:08:17
  all hearing the same thing. And this sort of
• 1:08:19
  like, I mean, you know, the voice fills the room
• 1:08:21
  and, you know, versus like if you're on your
• 1:08:24
  headphones, it sure. Like, you know, we're listening
• 1:08:27
  to podcasts. We're always on our headphones anyway.
• 1:08:29
  Like, but but it did have this sort of feeling
• 1:08:33
  of. oh, I feel like I could watch this conference
• 1:08:37
  virtually at home with my headphones on. It doesn't
• 1:08:40
  seem to be that terribly different from it. And
• 1:08:43
  then also, yeah, I mean, the fact that whereas
• 1:08:46
  like Podfest Expo in Orlando, Florida, which
• 1:08:48
  I want to go to in January, whereas that is like,
• 1:08:51
  you know, they have the conference at this big
• 1:08:52
  hotel and then you can also stay at the hotel.
• 1:08:54
  So there's a great way to like, you know, continue
• 1:08:57
  your networking with other people. You know,
• 1:08:59
  the Terminal 5, it's a music venue. Uh, and then
• 1:09:02
  people had to like book a hotel somewhere else.
• 1:09:04
  So like you had this brief moment in time where
• 1:09:06
  you were trying to connect with people, but also
• 1:09:09
  sort of isolated with these headphones. And then,
• 1:09:11
  you know, the day is over by like four or 5 PM
• 1:09:13
  and everybody goes off in their separate directions.
• 1:09:15
  Uh, some people have a hotel that's five minutes
• 1:09:18
  away. People like myself have a hotel that's
• 1:09:20
  fucking 30 minutes away. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:09:23
  And so it was, uh, It was a it was an interesting
• 1:09:26
  experience, but you were phenomenal, which is
• 1:09:29
  why I want to talk to you. Yeah, I feel like
• 1:09:33
  I conferences need to be in like hotels. And
• 1:09:37
  I think it was like. Things try to be modern
• 1:09:40
  and all of these things and bring in tech. And
• 1:09:43
  sometimes it's just like, I want to be in a breakout
• 1:09:45
  room. There can be 20 people. It can be a small
• 1:09:47
  room. That's fine. But I think that intimacy
• 1:09:49
  is really needed. I think it also makes people
• 1:09:51
  feel more comfortable asking questions. You can
• 1:09:54
  actually come up to the speaker after if you
• 1:09:56
  don't feel. Comfortable asking a question in
• 1:09:58
  front of everyone during the formal Q &A, like
• 1:10:00
  that's just such an important part of like actually
• 1:10:03
  being able to network and be connected to folks.
• 1:10:06
  And when there was audience interaction, some
• 1:10:07
  of the sessions that I went to, it was this weird
• 1:10:10
  thing where it's like, oh, I have my headphones
• 1:10:12
  on, but someone has to come up to me and give
• 1:10:13
  me a microphone. So am I keeping my headphones
• 1:10:15
  on while I have the microphone on? Like, you
• 1:10:17
  know. And then you can hear yourself. Yeah, right.
• 1:10:19
  It was just, I don't know. It was interesting.
• 1:10:22
  And we'll see if they'll have that same format
• 1:10:25
  again. next year? Because I know next year they're
• 1:10:28
  going to be doing it in New York again. I don't
• 1:10:30
  know if I'm going to go if it's that same exact
• 1:10:32
  format. I, again, definitely want to go to PodFest
• 1:10:35
  Expo. Are you going to be there or not? I mean,
• 1:10:38
  I didn't know about PodFest Expo. I did, though
• 1:10:41
  it was late, ADHD. I did submit for a session
• 1:10:45
  at On Air Fest in New York in February, so I'm
• 1:10:48
  hoping that comes through, but I have to check
• 1:10:50
  out PodFest. Oh, yeah. I've heard about On Air
• 1:10:53
  Fest in Brooklyn. That's one of the other big
• 1:10:54
  podcasting conferences. I was considering going
• 1:10:57
  to that, but that is, that's a pricey one. Yeah.
• 1:11:02
  Okay. So once we get off of here, I will give
• 1:11:05
  you a code that I got from a headliner. It's
• 1:11:10
  like, I think it's this audiogram service that
• 1:11:13
  I used to use, but they're still bothering me
• 1:11:14
  with emails. And they were like, oh, hey, use
• 1:11:16
  this code to get a free ticket to PodFest Expo.
• 1:11:18
  And I was like, oh, wonderful. Love that. Yeah,
• 1:11:20
  right. Like I'm traveling from Vermont and I'm
• 1:11:22
  trying to save as much money as I can. So I want
• 1:11:24
  to give you the same code because we all need
• 1:11:27
  to save money. Because as you know, as you know,
• 1:11:30
  being being black in America means that we don't
• 1:11:32
  have the right to afford anything. Exactly. Exactly.
• 1:11:35
  That's why in the house you get it. Oh, man.
• 1:11:40
  The key brands that you've worked on as a strategic
• 1:11:42
  creative director. I'm looking at your website.
• 1:11:44
  It's fantastic. You're like, oh, I've worked
• 1:11:46
  with Acast. I've worked. Have you worked with
• 1:11:48
  Kleenex? Yes, I worked with. I was like at the
• 1:11:52
  agency that represented them. But yeah, I've
• 1:11:54
  worked with a ton of brands. I think like Tresemme,
• 1:11:57
  Ancestry, KitchenAid, Fanatics, Xfinity, Nissan.
• 1:12:02
  Like there's so many brands that I've worked
• 1:12:05
  with. I can't even name them. What's the most
• 1:12:07
  memorable brand relationship experience that
• 1:12:10
  you had, whether positive or negative? Actually,
• 1:12:12
  you know what? ADHD, positive and negative. Oh,
• 1:12:15
  gosh. And if you can't call them out, that's
• 1:12:17
  fine. Don't worry about it. No, no, no. KitchenAid
• 1:12:21
  is actually both in some ways. They had come
• 1:12:25
  to us with a brief and like wanted to celebrate
• 1:12:27
  their, you know, 100 year anniversary. They shared
• 1:12:30
  a bunch of like historical facts and insights.
• 1:12:31
  And the thing that was most interesting to me
• 1:12:33
  on like the sheet of things that they said was
• 1:12:36
  like the the company was actually named by like
• 1:12:39
  an executive's wife. And I was like, OK, what
• 1:12:41
  what is her actual name? They don't know her
• 1:12:43
  name. That was never recorded. KitchenAid Johnson.
• 1:12:47
  No, literally, literally. But apparently they
• 1:12:49
  gave like the device to a bunch of, you know,
• 1:12:53
  the executives' wives to test. And she was like,
• 1:12:55
  oh, this is the best KitchenAid I've ever used.
• 1:12:57
  I don't know what it is, but like, this is amazing.
• 1:12:59
  And they're like, I don't know what KitchenAid
• 1:13:00
  is. Can you explain what KitchenAid is to me?
• 1:13:03
  Yes. It's not like a whole cookware brand, but
• 1:13:05
  their big thing is like the mixer, like the big
• 1:13:08
  $500 mixers that are like beautiful colors. Like
• 1:13:11
  that is, that's their bread and butter. Yeah.
• 1:13:14
  And so I was like, OK, let's dive into that a
• 1:13:17
  little bit more. I think it's really interesting
• 1:13:18
  because my ex at the time was a woman in the
• 1:13:22
  food industry. There are so many women in the
• 1:13:25
  food industry that don't have like a lot of power.
• 1:13:29
  They're not promoted into certain positions,
• 1:13:31
  despite being like the overwhelming majority
• 1:13:33
  of folks, despite women, you know, also being.
• 1:13:37
  such nurturers and often being the cooks in their
• 1:13:40
  homes. Even when you watch like all of the cooking
• 1:13:43
  shows, so many of these guys are like, oh, my
• 1:13:45
  mom's recipe, my mom's recipe. But I just thought
• 1:13:48
  it was so interesting that women are able to,
• 1:13:50
  you know, be the cooks and be expected to cook
• 1:13:52
  in the home, but aren't able to elevate to these
• 1:13:55
  leadership positions. you know, the same rate
• 1:13:58
  as their male counterparts. And so we did a film
• 1:14:01
  that highlighted three different women. Don't
• 1:14:04
  remember where they're from, but I think one
• 1:14:05
  was in London and then two of them were local
• 1:14:07
  to the States who were kind of like the first
• 1:14:10
  of their name or the first in their field in
• 1:14:13
  some way or another. And I thought that was a
• 1:14:15
  really interesting and cool way to honor her.
• 1:14:17
  And that's why we did it. And that was the inspiration
• 1:14:19
  for it. So that's what I mean when I say strategic.
• 1:14:21
  The thing that was frustrating about that, and
• 1:14:24
  this was not because of the brand. because of
• 1:14:26
  the internal team I was working with. I was advocating
• 1:14:30
  that there should be queer representation and
• 1:14:32
  representation of Black women as well because
• 1:14:35
  the industry is overwhelmingly Black and it's
• 1:14:38
  overwhelmingly queer. And I got pushback that...
• 1:14:44
  You know, this is not what the film is about.
• 1:14:46
  Mind you, this was in 2020. The film was something
• 1:14:50
  that we were developing throughout, you know,
• 1:14:52
  January through May. It came out in June of 2020.
• 1:14:55
  And we all know what was happening in June. And
• 1:14:57
  now you have this film about women in the food
• 1:14:59
  industry that has no Black women. Isn't that?
• 1:15:01
  Isn't that wild? Incredible would it have been
• 1:15:05
  if my team would have just been open to putting
• 1:15:08
  forward like I said, let's just include one recommendation
• 1:15:11
  of someone. And following, I was no longer invited
• 1:15:15
  to meetings about the production of the film
• 1:15:18
  idea that I had. So that was that was a tough
• 1:15:21
  time. Yeah, that sucks. Those people don't deserve
• 1:15:25
  you. And I hope you have your comeuppance by.
• 1:15:29
  talking about it on this podcast and just basically
• 1:15:32
  giving them middle finger because that's what
• 1:15:34
  they deserve I do it all the time yeah right
• 1:15:36
  take this middle finger and stick it where the
• 1:15:38
  sun don't shine exactly exactly yeah John Francois
• 1:15:45
  here from the Delicious Culture Podcast, where
• 1:15:47
  we have the most entertaining, delicious food,
• 1:15:51
  pop culture, and lifestyle conversations with
• 1:15:53
  a variety of guests. You know it. You love it.
• 1:15:56
  If it provides value to your life, whether you're
• 1:16:00
  at home washing dishes or you are on the way
• 1:16:03
  to work or school and you need that company,
• 1:16:05
  I ask you to consider that value. by donating
• 1:16:10
  what you can. Yes, I'm asking for your monies.
• 1:16:13
  Donate whatever you choose, whatever you think
• 1:16:16
  I'm worth. I'm a one -man operation. I got to
• 1:16:18
  pay for things here. The editing software, the
• 1:16:20
  mic, the home studio space, everything is not
• 1:16:25
  free. As you know, here in America, at The Delicious
• 1:16:29
  Culture through PayPal and Venmo. Once again,
• 1:16:32
  at The Delicious Culture through PayPal or Venmo.
• 1:16:35
  Any donation is much appreciated. Thank you.
• 1:16:41
  Shantae, I got three delicious questions I ask
• 1:16:42
  everybody on The Delicious Culture, and I want
• 1:16:45
  to go to there. So let's start with the first
• 1:16:49
  one. Oh, God. How am I doing without coffee so
• 1:16:53
  far? Am I okay? Am I manageable? Yeah, but I'm
• 1:16:55
  not a good judge, so ignore me. That's true.
• 1:17:00
  I'm just going to ignore everything you have
• 1:17:01
  to say. Unreliable source, yeah. Right, yeah.
• 1:17:04
  Forget it. I'm going to ask you a question and
• 1:17:06
  then just, like, not even give a shit about what
• 1:17:07
  you're saying. Oh, sorry. Just ignore me. Yeah,
• 1:17:09
  we're going to stop now. What's a delicious meal
• 1:17:13
  that you've had lately? Oh, gosh. I was late
• 1:17:19
  on Sweetest Day, which people do not know as
• 1:17:22
  much. Do you know? Are you familiar with Sweetest
• 1:17:24
  Day? No, because I'm like, what? Spell that for
• 1:17:28
  me. And what the fuck is that? OK, it's like
• 1:17:30
  sweetest. So it's like for the sweetest person
• 1:17:32
  in your life. It's like the guy equivalent of
• 1:17:36
  Valentine's Day, though, like Valentine's Day
• 1:17:38
  is gender neutral. But it's funny because my
• 1:17:41
  boyfriend was like, yeah, I didn't hear about
• 1:17:42
  this in the South. And my best friend is in Philly
• 1:17:45
  and I was telling her about it. And she was like,
• 1:17:47
  don't tell my husband about this. But it's essentially
• 1:17:50
  like where, you know, if your partner is a guy,
• 1:17:53
  then like you treat him. So we went to a steakhouse
• 1:17:57
  and like the food was so, the food was so good.
• 1:18:01
  The food was so good. We had steak. I think we
• 1:18:04
  got, yeah, we both got Wagyu steak. There was
• 1:18:08
  like a beautiful bone marrow butter. So good.
• 1:18:11
  The mushrooms, incredible. Lobster, mashed potatoes.
• 1:18:15
  So good. So good. Fancy, well -balanced. Mm -hmm.
• 1:18:20
  Bone marrow butter. Yeah. Because I'm imagining,
• 1:18:24
  like... Take someone's human bone and put hot
• 1:18:27
  butter on it. Describe bone marrow butter for
• 1:18:30
  me, because I don't clearly, as you can tell
• 1:18:32
  by me, by me guessing, I don't know what that
• 1:18:34
  is. How does bone marrow butter work? I don't
• 1:18:37
  know how they make it. I don't know if they get
• 1:18:40
  the bone marrow and like because, you know, there's
• 1:18:43
  like bone marrow dishes all the time, too. But
• 1:18:46
  it's it's I can't. I literally had them put the
• 1:18:49
  rest in a box and I try not to do that. I try
• 1:18:51
  not to do that because I try to act. appropriately
• 1:18:54
  in public. At home, no. At home, if there's food
• 1:18:57
  on the plate and you're not finishing it, I'm
• 1:19:00
  going to finish it because we don't waste. But
• 1:19:02
  I literally was like, can we box the butter?
• 1:19:04
  Can we box the Bearnaise sauce? I want it all.
• 1:19:06
  I want it all. And I still have some in the fridge.
• 1:19:09
  But yeah, I don't know how they make it. I just
• 1:19:11
  know it's good. Yeah. Yeah. You know, bouncing
• 1:19:16
  off of, you know, you don't waste food. So, I
• 1:19:20
  don't know. I wonder if this is like a black
• 1:19:21
  -white thing because like... with uh my wife
• 1:19:25
  she uh what i i think she had mentioned growing
• 1:19:30
  up in a home where uh you know she was you know
• 1:19:34
  like oh yeah your food your food your food your
• 1:19:36
  food um because you know don't be wasteful and
• 1:19:39
  because of that like she's just like no like
• 1:19:41
  i i she she has a thing against like you know
• 1:19:45
  being forced to finish your plate yeah like oh
• 1:19:48
  if you're genuinely full then it's okay to throw
• 1:19:51
  the food away whatever and but i you and i are
• 1:19:54
  the same thing where it's like no no no no you
• 1:19:56
  gotta gotta eat you gotta finish it up or you
• 1:19:58
  gotta have leftovers and blah blah blah and sometimes
• 1:20:01
  it's like it's ridiculous like like if it's like
• 1:20:04
  chips and salsa it's like oh no no no there's
• 1:20:06
  one chip left let me put it in the fridge and
• 1:20:08
  you know so um i wonder Is there white privilege
• 1:20:14
  associated with that? Is there sort of like a
• 1:20:17
  survival mechanism with Black people where it's
• 1:20:19
  like, yeah, no, we don't know when our next meal
• 1:20:22
  is going to come in, so we better not waste this
• 1:20:24
  at all? I think like you can have a similar trauma
• 1:20:26
  point and treat it differently. Like I know for
• 1:20:28
  my boyfriend, he's like, I want to be able to
• 1:20:31
  eat my food at my pace and I don't want to feel
• 1:20:33
  forced to eat. And I'm like, well, if it's been
• 1:20:37
  on a plate for two hours, now it's mine. But
• 1:20:39
  I also realize my mom. Her motto was anything
• 1:20:45
  that stays too long serves two masters. So if
• 1:20:48
  I left food for too long, it's now hers. And
• 1:20:52
  I think that's where my shit came from. It's
• 1:20:54
  like, I'm going to eat this before anyone else
• 1:20:55
  eats this because I'm hungry. Gotcha. Okay. Okay.
• 1:20:59
  So, so I apologize. I think we're talking about
• 1:21:01
  two different things. Um, you know, uh, so, uh,
• 1:21:04
  yeah, yeah. So I'm, I'm talking about like the
• 1:21:06
  importance of, uh, finishing, uh, your, your
• 1:21:09
  plate versus throwing it out. And you're talking
• 1:21:11
  about like, oh no, if you're not going to finish
• 1:21:13
  your food, okay, fine. I'm going to have it.
• 1:21:15
  And my wife is more. She's more than accommodating.
• 1:21:18
  She's like, yeah, no, if you want to finish my
• 1:21:19
  food, that's fine. I have a weird thing about
• 1:21:21
  like, no, like, you know, because your food,
• 1:21:24
  like it just like, you know, it doesn't have
• 1:21:26
  that same like fresh warmness to it. It's now
• 1:21:28
  cold and it's now germy. And, you know, so that's
• 1:21:33
  that's a me thing that I need to go to therapy
• 1:21:35
  for. Well, that's that's I think that's why it
• 1:21:37
  became related in my head, because he'll say
• 1:21:39
  that and then the milkshake is still there the
• 1:21:42
  next day. And I'm like, well, I could have finished
• 1:21:44
  it yesterday. And I can't finish it today. So
• 1:21:46
  now it's getting thrown away and he's fine with
• 1:21:47
  that. But I'm like, but it was it was so good
• 1:21:50
  yesterday. Isn't it fascinating when you leave
• 1:21:52
  milkshakes just sitting there for like a day
• 1:21:54
  or two? It just turns into milk, but like milk
• 1:21:57
  that tastes like ice cream. I haven't had a day
• 1:21:59
  or two old ice cream. That's very brave of you.
• 1:22:02
  No, no, no. I mean, like, OK, no, no, no. If
• 1:22:06
  you let it curdle like in room temperature, that's
• 1:22:08
  bad. Don't do that. I've never done that. I'm
• 1:22:10
  talking about like because I've been. Because
• 1:22:13
  I've been crazy. I probably have, like, put,
• 1:22:15
  like, a McDonald's milkshake in the fridge or
• 1:22:16
  whatever. Just like, yeah, yeah, let me just,
• 1:22:17
  like, you know, wait until the next day. And
• 1:22:19
  then, of course, it's, you know, you know what
• 1:22:21
  happens with anything when you save it from McDonald's.
• 1:22:23
  It just, it goes from no food to, like, oh, this
• 1:22:25
  is really not food. Yeah. With a milkshake, though,
• 1:22:28
  like, I prefer that because sometimes I'm like,
• 1:22:30
  why is it, why is there so much of, like, a tug
• 1:22:33
  necessary? Why are you fighting me? You are meant
• 1:22:34
  to be had. So I like when it's a little milkshake.
• 1:22:37
  Don't you hate that resistant milkshake? That
• 1:22:39
  milkshake that is so fucking thick? Why are you
• 1:22:43
  fighting me? Right? Friends. Like, no straw can
• 1:22:46
  do it. It's just like, you know, it's just like
• 1:22:49
  just trying to suck on a piece of toast from
• 1:22:52
  a straw. Like, you can't do it. It's just this
• 1:22:55
  dry, thick, resistant thing. And I have no patience.
• 1:22:59
  Actually, this is a funny story. I once was wanting
• 1:23:04
  ice cream. I took it out the freezer. It was
• 1:23:07
  too hard to, like, scoop. And so instead of,
• 1:23:11
  as my, at the time, seven -year -old sister pointed
• 1:23:13
  out to me that I could have done, I took a knife
• 1:23:16
  and I stabbed the ice cream and I ended up stabbing
• 1:23:19
  through it into my hand. What? Yeah. That is
• 1:23:26
  dangerous. Yeah. You were so, but I applaud the
• 1:23:30
  determination. You were like, no, I want to eat
• 1:23:32
  this ice cream. I'm going to do whatever I need
• 1:23:34
  to do. And the universe was just like, you know,
• 1:23:37
  you could just like put it in the sun for like
• 1:23:39
  two minutes and just scooped it up. You would
• 1:23:41
  have been fine. Exactly. Exactly. But what is
• 1:23:43
  patience? What is patience? To an ADHD. What
• 1:23:46
  is patience? Oh, my goodness gracious. Yeah,
• 1:23:49
  no, no. I've certainly accidentally sliced off
• 1:23:52
  my hand and thumb. I know what you mean. Yeah.
• 1:23:56
  Not to the point where I have no hand, but like,
• 1:23:58
  you know, I used to like do. Cutco Kitchen Cutlery.
• 1:24:02
  I used to be a salesperson. I had this situation
• 1:24:05
  where I had a sales presentation and I was being
• 1:24:08
  very clumsy with it. And I accidentally sliced
• 1:24:10
  off a good portion of my thumb while the presentation
• 1:24:12
  was happening. So it was this awkward thing of
• 1:24:14
  like, hey, buy this knife, but also I'm bleeding
• 1:24:16
  a lot. It works that you're like, I'm talking
• 1:24:20
  about the sharpness of the knife and see it went
• 1:24:22
  through me. Exactly. The sharpness of the knife
• 1:24:25
  works. And also please buy from me because I
• 1:24:26
  may die if you don't. Yeah. Yeah. I need this
• 1:24:30
  for the hospital bill. These are delicious things
• 1:24:32
  to talk about, which takes me to our next question.
• 1:24:35
  What's your delicious pop culture obsession?
• 1:24:38
  Anything you're watching, listening to, or reading
• 1:24:40
  that you love and you want to share? Oh my gosh.
• 1:24:43
  Reasonable doubt right now. That last episode.
• 1:24:47
  I've heard of this. What is this? It is produced
• 1:24:50
  by Kerry Washington. Incredible cast on Hulu.
• 1:24:53
  It essentially is like starring this woman named
• 1:24:57
  Jack. She's a Black lawyer in L .A., has gone
• 1:24:59
  through a lot of things throughout the past three
• 1:25:01
  seasons. We're now on the fourth. She's like
• 1:25:03
  recovering from a pretty serious injury. I'm
• 1:25:06
  like trying not to spoil too much for people
• 1:25:07
  who need to binge. And maybe dealing with some
• 1:25:11
  substance things. And the last episode was just
• 1:25:14
  like, it was so good. So good. Could not recommend
• 1:25:17
  enough. Yeah, Kerry Washington, you know, I think
• 1:25:21
  the earliest thing that I saw her in was The
• 1:25:23
  Last King of Scotland with Forrest Whitaker.
• 1:25:26
  And, I mean, look, I'm sorry. I was young. And
• 1:25:31
  if I see Kerry Washington at the age that I was
• 1:25:34
  at, having this very... animalistic sex in a
• 1:25:39
  cave with like this white man. I think it was
• 1:25:41
  like James McAvoy that was in the movie. I'm
• 1:25:44
  going to respond. I'm going to respond and say,
• 1:25:46
  you know what? You're a good actress. I haven't
• 1:25:51
  seen it and I'm just going to stay away. Well,
• 1:25:54
  that's not the whole movie. The whole movie is
• 1:25:55
  really Forrest Whitaker and his Academy Award
• 1:25:57
  winning performance. But yeah, no, Carrie, Carrie,
• 1:26:00
  I mean, look, if you have a specific fetish for
• 1:26:05
  And I'm not saying I do. I'm just saying for
• 1:26:07
  anybody out there that has a very specified fetish
• 1:26:11
  for black woman and white guy sex. That's that.
• 1:26:15
  That was a good scene. That was a good scene.
• 1:26:17
  I don't want to feed that. We just have to feed
• 1:26:20
  that. Interracial marriages are fine. Interracial
• 1:26:24
  sex and love is fine. I'm in an interracial marriage.
• 1:26:27
  I mean, I think it's fine. I think it's fine.
• 1:26:30
  The fetishization, though, I'm like, this is
• 1:26:33
  true. That's because there's a line. Yeah. No,
• 1:26:38
  no, no. I don't want to go on Pornhub and be
• 1:26:40
  like, oh, yeah, you know, I'm a milkman and I'm
• 1:26:42
  trying to get my black queen. You know, like
• 1:26:44
  we're not we're not we're not doing that. We're
• 1:26:45
  not doing that. Please. All right. Anyway. And
• 1:26:51
  then Scandal. My wife is a big fan of Scandal.
• 1:26:53
  She's she's all about the Shonda Rhimes universe.
• 1:26:56
  And Reasonable Doubt. Isn't she with someone
• 1:27:01
  else who's a notable actor in that show? Because
• 1:27:03
  I feel like. I've seen her make the rounds. I
• 1:27:05
  know she was on Sam Sanders' podcast recently
• 1:27:07
  talking about this. Yeah, let me find. You know
• 1:27:10
  what? I'm going to look it up, too, and I'm going
• 1:27:12
  to be faster than you. I'm sure you will because
• 1:27:14
  my connection is ass right now. I mean, look,
• 1:27:17
  it's been going great so far. You haven't frozen
• 1:27:19
  or gotten out lately. And that is when we jinx
• 1:27:22
  it. More chestnut. I always forget his name.
• 1:27:26
  Michael Ealy was in, like, an earlier season,
• 1:27:28
  too. Yeah, there's a lot of good folks. gotcha
• 1:27:32
  the who is so is it the the hulu legal drama
• 1:27:34
  series reasonable doubt morris chestnut isn't
• 1:27:37
  it let's talk about morris chestnut for a moment
• 1:27:39
  because um i don't know if i've seen morris chestnut
• 1:27:42
  and anything ever since like because there there
• 1:27:45
  seemed to be like sort of a 90s 2000s like black
• 1:27:48
  sort of romantic comedy era where it's like uh
• 1:27:52
  miss what was that movie mr love jones or mr
• 1:27:55
  like love jones love jones yeah love jones But
• 1:27:59
  no, he's sort of in that universe where it's
• 1:28:01
  like, oh, like Morris Chestnut, Taye Diggs, Lawrence
• 1:28:05
  Tate. You had Love Jones. You had The Best Man.
• 1:28:09
  Oh, my God. Brown Sugar is probably my favorite
• 1:28:12
  black romantic comedy ever. And then I think
• 1:28:17
  Charlamagne Tha God was saying for a while that
• 1:28:18
  he looked like Morris Chestnut. So there's that,
• 1:28:20
  too. Oh, that's a thought. Wait, wait. But you
• 1:28:25
  know what Charlamagne looks like, right? Yeah.
• 1:28:28
  I think they're pretty actually, they're similar.
• 1:28:30
  They're similar. I'll give him that. Now, does
• 1:28:33
  he have the same sex appeal as Morris Chestnut?
• 1:28:35
  That's debatable. But like, you know, if you
• 1:28:37
  put them side by side, it's like, okay, they're
• 1:28:39
  sort of similar. I see what he's saying. No?
• 1:28:41
  No. If you have to call it out, it's a no. I'm
• 1:28:44
  sorry. Are you saying this as a big Morris Chestnut
• 1:28:47
  fan? I mean, I like him. I wouldn't say like
• 1:28:50
  I'm like a fan, but I like his work. I just,
• 1:28:53
  no. I can't remember who someone someone recently
• 1:28:58
  compared themselves to Rihanna. And I was like,
• 1:29:00
  don't don't do that. Yeah. Don't hurt your own
• 1:29:03
  feelings. Why are you doing this? Yeah. It's
• 1:29:05
  like those love is blind contestants lately.
• 1:29:06
  I don't know if you watch that show. Not anymore.
• 1:29:09
  Since I've been medicated, I realized that was
• 1:29:11
  just kind of like. Yeah. But all the ones who
• 1:29:18
  are like, oh, yeah, I look like Megan Fox. You
• 1:29:20
  have dark hair and blue eyes. So do. I'm sure
• 1:29:24
  millions of other people like that's not that
• 1:29:26
  does not the Megan Fox make. First of all, these
• 1:29:30
  people don't understand the assignment because
• 1:29:32
  the point is that we're supposed to like get
• 1:29:34
  to know each other through these pods sight unseen
• 1:29:36
  and no discussion about physical appearance until
• 1:29:39
  you like you actually see each other. But people
• 1:29:41
  just can't wait. They're so anxious. They're
• 1:29:42
  like, you know, I kind of look like this. And
• 1:29:45
  in the love is blind Boston season that me and
• 1:29:48
  my wife are watching this fucking just. serial
• 1:29:53
  killer uh smiley creepy uh connecticut rich uh
• 1:29:59
  sort of white guy um he always describes himself
• 1:30:02
  like oh kennedy like people say i'm kennedy s
• 1:30:04
  people call me kennedy as a nickname and when
• 1:30:07
  the girl meets this guy she is being kind of
• 1:30:11
  awkward and like, I don't know what to, but like
• 1:30:14
  she does the talking head moment with the producer
• 1:30:16
  and she is so hung up on the fact that he looks
• 1:30:19
  more like Mitt Romney than Kennedy. And I'm like,
• 1:30:22
  and I'm just sitting here like, okay, I mean,
• 1:30:24
  yeah, I know like Kennedy's a Democrat and Mitt
• 1:30:25
  Romney's a Republican, but they still sort of
• 1:30:27
  had that same sort of like white rich guy, New
• 1:30:31
  England aesthetic. So I thought that was very
• 1:30:34
  funny. But you disagree. You think Kennedy and
• 1:30:36
  Mitt Romney have a different thing? Not to be
• 1:30:38
  like, you know, I would love to be like all white
• 1:30:41
  people look the same. But like I just I just
• 1:30:43
  would not. I would not say that they look close
• 1:30:47
  enough to each other where that's OK. I'm having
• 1:30:50
  a thing with my white wife lately where she's
• 1:30:52
  she's literally saying all white people look
• 1:30:54
  the same. She like she's just like she cannot
• 1:30:55
  tell white guys apart anymore. And I'm like,
• 1:30:57
  I can. Sometimes I can't. I do. I get I get I
• 1:31:02
  get the like Ryan Gosling versus whatever the
• 1:31:06
  other one. Ryan Reynolds. Yeah. Like that. That
• 1:31:10
  is a very hard thing for me to distinguish. But
• 1:31:12
  like those two, I just you can see you can see
• 1:31:17
  the. Sorry, this is inappropriate, but I think
• 1:31:21
  you can see the like, isn't he Mormon or like.
• 1:31:24
  Who? Mitt Romney. Oh, yeah. I don't know if he's
• 1:31:29
  actively Mormon, but yeah, I know Mormonism is
• 1:31:31
  part of his story. Okay. Like, you can see the
• 1:31:34
  Republican -ness. You can see the Mormonism.
• 1:31:37
  Like, John Kennedy, you can see that his family
• 1:31:39
  had, like, you know, a little bit of... Yeah,
• 1:31:42
  yeah. You know that there was something illegal
• 1:31:44
  recently. That's all I'll say. There was something
• 1:31:49
  illegal recently? Didn't his family, like, used
• 1:31:52
  to bootleg? Who? Kennedy or Romney? Kennedy.
• 1:31:56
  Kennedy... The Kennedy family is, I'm pretty
• 1:32:00
  sure, like pre that political era. Oh, yeah,
• 1:32:03
  yeah, yeah. I know what you're talking about.
• 1:32:04
  The claim that Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. made his
• 1:32:07
  fortune as a prohibition bootlegger is a widely
• 1:32:10
  repeated myth not supported by historical evidence.
• 1:32:13
  So AI says you're wrong. Well, it's AI. AI of
• 1:32:18
  all people. But fair. It's fair. It's fair. It's
• 1:32:20
  fair. As long as I'm not building narratives.
• 1:32:23
  Yeah. All right, so Reasonable Doubt from Kerry
• 1:32:26
  Washington, a wonderful actress. I will have
• 1:32:29
  to see that show. Thank you for recommending
• 1:32:31
  it. She's not in it. She's a producer, but she's
• 1:32:32
  not in it. So it's like the show that she made,
• 1:32:36
  but it's great. It's great. It's like her vision.
• 1:32:39
  You know what I'm thinking of? I'm thinking of
• 1:32:41
  that movie that she did with Ben Affleck. For
• 1:32:43
  Netflix. That's what I was confusing. I thought
• 1:32:45
  that's what you were talking about. But you're
• 1:32:47
  recommending something that's produced by Kerry
• 1:32:49
  Washington, but not starring Kerry Washington?
• 1:32:51
  Correct. Yes. That is... And guess what? She
• 1:32:54
  probably makes more money off of that, too. I'm
• 1:32:56
  sure she does. Yeah. But I was also excited.
• 1:32:58
  I was thinking like, oh, my God, I'm going to
• 1:32:59
  see some Kerry Washington. But no, I'm only going
• 1:33:01
  to see her in the executive producer credit at
• 1:33:03
  the end of the episodes. And that's fine. It's
• 1:33:06
  at the beginning if you don't skip through so
• 1:33:08
  you can see it sooner. That's such a boner shrinker
• 1:33:11
  anyway. Oh God. Yeah. Someone, someone. Yeah.
• 1:33:18
  I think, I think SNL made that joke about Hillary
• 1:33:20
  Clinton and I, the, the, the, the term boner
• 1:33:23
  shrinker has just stuck with me ever since. So
• 1:33:25
  anytime, anytime I, I get let down by something,
• 1:33:27
  I'm just like, ah, fuck, that's a boner shrinker.
• 1:33:30
  Mike Cheerios fell on the floor. That's a boner
• 1:33:32
  shrinker. Yeah, yeah. Shantae's like, no comment.
• 1:33:38
  I don't know what I was getting into. This is
• 1:33:42
  no longer HR friendly. Yeah, I know. I know.
• 1:33:47
  But hey, the Democrats winning the House and
• 1:33:49
  the Senate and possibly holding Trump and his
• 1:33:53
  administration very accountable going into 2027.
• 1:33:57
  Possibly investigations going on. Possibly the
• 1:33:59
  end of the Iran war and gas prices going back
• 1:34:02
  to normal. All this possible optimism. That's
• 1:34:05
  a boner grower. I'm screaming. We'll take it,
• 1:34:09
  I suppose. Anywho, last question. What is a delicious
• 1:34:15
  thing that's happened in your life lately, Shante?
• 1:34:19
  I would say, it doesn't sound the most delicious,
• 1:34:23
  but trauma therapy is something that I started
• 1:34:26
  recently. It doesn't sound it. It is delicious.
• 1:34:29
  By the way, you're like the third or fourth guest
• 1:34:30
  that has mentioned therapy as a delicious thing.
• 1:34:32
  It is a very delicious thing. But tell me your
• 1:34:34
  therapy journey. Go ahead. Yeah, I have been
• 1:34:37
  going to therapy on and off for like nine years
• 1:34:40
  now. It's been some couples therapy, some individual
• 1:34:42
  therapy. And so I have been with my individual
• 1:34:46
  talk therapist for like a year and a half. And
• 1:34:48
  then after moving to D .C., I was like, I want
• 1:34:51
  to get a little bit deeper and was interested
• 1:34:53
  in EMDR, found a trauma therapist and just feel
• 1:34:56
  like some of the things that have felt stuck
• 1:34:58
  for a while are finally coming out. And it's
• 1:35:02
  been a really hard process. really grateful to
• 1:35:06
  like understand myself better um and just be
• 1:35:09
  able to navigate things and not hold on to them
• 1:35:12
  so much there's stuff that used to feel like
• 1:35:13
  pain that now where i now that i like get where
• 1:35:16
  it's coming from it feels like oh this is a small
• 1:35:19
  annoyance that like actually isn't that big of
• 1:35:22
  a deal and it's just made life a lot more beautiful
• 1:35:24
  so uh describe emdr is that like electroshock
• 1:35:27
  therapy what is that it is uh i've movement Something,
• 1:35:32
  something. So it's not necessarily with light.
• 1:35:36
  Internet search. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what
• 1:35:38
  that's for. I am not auntie Google. Eye movement
• 1:35:42
  desensitization and reprocessing is a structured
• 1:35:44
  psychotherapy method designed to help people
• 1:35:46
  heal from the emotional distress and symptoms
• 1:35:48
  caused by disturbing or traumatic life experiences.
• 1:35:52
  So, okay. So they have you move your eyes in
• 1:35:54
  weird ways to figure out like why your childhood
• 1:35:56
  was traumatized. Is that what it is? It's not
• 1:35:58
  even move your eyes in weird ways. It's like
• 1:36:00
  they there's an element of like body tracking.
• 1:36:03
  So it's noticing, OK, if you talk about certain
• 1:36:05
  topics, you are no longer using eye contact or
• 1:36:09
  your eyes kind of flitter a little bit or you
• 1:36:11
  tend to look up. And those are usually signs
• 1:36:14
  that like there's something there that like you
• 1:36:16
  can't access or you haven't fully processed.
• 1:36:18
  And so some of what she's doing is like noticing
• 1:36:21
  that there's like a wand. That's literally just
• 1:36:25
  like a stick with like a little orange thing
• 1:36:27
  on it. And she's saying like, OK, when I mentioned
• 1:36:31
  like your grandma, like, do you feel where do
• 1:36:33
  you feel that in your body? When I mentioned
• 1:36:34
  your mom, where do you feel that in your body?
• 1:36:36
  Like what memories coming up for you? And it's
• 1:36:38
  just a really great way to like process through
• 1:36:40
  things that you maybe haven't had the space to
• 1:36:42
  really dive into. So, yeah, it's been really,
• 1:36:45
  really helpful and really hard, but worth it.
• 1:36:47
  That's beautiful. I'm so happy for you. Therapy
• 1:36:51
  is a thing that everybody needs. Yeah. And, you
• 1:36:54
  know, we definitely know people are in our life
• 1:36:56
  that need it, but refuse to get it. Don't we
• 1:36:59
  all? Yeah, right. Especially being people of
• 1:37:02
  color. It's just, I mean, how much time do we
• 1:37:04
  have? Like, that's what I think. Yes. We'll end
• 1:37:08
  how we started. Yeah. Yeah. This was a delicious
• 1:37:12
  moment of time. I know we were all over the place,
• 1:37:15
  but this was the ADHD orgasmic experience that
• 1:37:19
  I was hoping and expecting and loving. And I
• 1:37:23
  wish you the best in whatever you're doing with
• 1:37:26
  your life. I hope you're doing valuable things.
• 1:37:29
  And please remind everybody where they can find
• 1:37:31
  you, how they can follow your website, your socials,
• 1:37:34
  everything. How they can stalk you. Please no
• 1:37:38
  stalking. There's not much to see. I am at shantahowell
• 1:37:43
  .com for work things. I'm also on LinkedIn for
• 1:37:46
  other work things and work -esque jokes that
• 1:37:50
  I hope HR doesn't see, but maybe would not get
• 1:37:53
  me far. So yeah, that's me. Can you give me one
• 1:37:56
  of those jokes? I posted the SpongeBob meme of
• 1:38:00
  like him sweeping something red up off the floor
• 1:38:03
  and was like last night, yesterday morning as
• 1:38:07
  a GIF. And, like, I don't know. That's how I
• 1:38:10
  feel. So, it is what it is. Red states, we're
• 1:38:14
  sweeping off the dust and we're starting blue
• 1:38:16
  for 2027. Exactly. I wish I could have changed
• 1:38:19
  this tie to be blue, but it is what it is. Oh,
• 1:38:22
  yeah, that's true. Spongebob is a fucking Republican.
• 1:38:24
  My God. Yeah, a little bit, a little bit. God
• 1:38:27
  damn. And he's queer, too, but he hates himself,
• 1:38:29
  which is awesome. He's a self -hating queer Trump
• 1:38:34
  supporter. Yep, yep. One of them gays for Trump
• 1:38:37
  that I hear about online. Exactly. Alleged. That
• 1:38:41
  is a breaking news story. SpongeBob is a self
• 1:38:44
  -hating Trump supporter. That's the episode title.
• 1:38:47
  Who might have turned Democrat after that gif
• 1:38:50
  that you just posted. Hopefully. Maybe he realized
• 1:38:53
  the error of his ways. Yeah. Yeah. As many have.
• 1:38:56
  May they not forget. We will remind them. Yeah.
• 1:38:59
  All right. We got to get out of here. Until next
• 1:39:02
  time, everyone. Let's deliciousness ring. Okay,
• 1:39:09
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• 1:39:30
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