Military Creator Con Commentary, Military Mental Health, & Some Not-So-Sea Stories

Today, I sit down with Imani Mclemore to break down my experience at the first-ever Military Creator Con and what this event says about the future of military creativity, veteran entrepreneurship, and community building. We unpack what stood out most from the conference, from the speakers and networking to the events, sponsors, and the growing momentum behind a space designed for veterans, active duty members, and creators to connect.

Throughout this conversation, Ms. Mclemore helps guide a broader discussion about military identity, why so many service members lose touch with their hobbies, and how the daily demands of military life can drain people mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. I also talk about why conferences like this matter, especially for veterans transitioning into civilian life, building businesses, launching podcasts, writing books, and trying to rediscover purpose outside of uniform.

We also get into some of the deeper issues that continue to affect the military community, including leadership culture, underappreciation, career translation, suicide prevention, addiction recovery, and the need for stronger outreach to active duty members before they hit a crisis point. This episode highlights the importance of giving veterans practical resources, creative outlets, and real support systems that help them rebuild their lives with direction and dignity.

Along the way, we also share a few "sea stories" and laughs, from military haircuts to hair dye at Walmart.

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*Couple O' Nukes LLC and Mr. Whiskey are not licensed medical entities, nor do they take responsibility for any advice or information put forth by guests. Take all advice at your own risk.

Transcript

 Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of KA of Nukes. As always, I'm your host, Mr. Whiskey. And I have just gotten back from about a total of maybe 50 hours driving on the road to military creator con and back. What an amazing event. There was a lot of things that went better than expected. Some things that didn't go as well. It's a first year conference and so today we're gonna break down military creator con one. What went well, some takeaways and the number one thing I can comment on is Dallas has the most heinous infrastructure set up I've ever driven on in my life. Driven drove, I don't care, I don't know what was going on. Speed limit was nice. Like the average speed limit is 75 miles per hour, so that was nice, except oftentimes it was the case where I had to cut across. Like five lanes from an entrance ramp onto an exit ramp in like 300 feet. But before I get any further, I got introduced today's co-host Imani Macklemore. You have met her before if you're a frequent listener of the show. If not, she is a creator Future podcast host, possibly, maybe, possibly. And she is a graphic designer. She did not go to military career con, but I brought her on here to break up the monologuing and ranting and you know, the success stories and the failures and everything in between with her dialogue. And she'll actually be guiding the conversation with her questions about the event. Imani. Upcoming birthday, by the way. Happy birthday in advance. Yes. Happy early birthday for me. My birthday is May 2nd tourist season. Oh my God. If you're into astrology or not that stuff, why don't look at me like that? I don't, I didn't. I didn't even look in your direction. I didn't look in any direction. Yeah, but your face was just like, oh, here we go. It was, well, it was the, she's one of those faces, but, alright, alright, alright. It's fine. It's fine. Anyway, Ms. Angel numbers I did want to ask, it's anti weights. We can, we can start with what, well, I guess just talk about, you know, what questions do you have regarding military creator con? Well, I mean, this is probably dumb for me to say because obviously there's conferences for just about everything. They have conferences. I've literally seen conferences for dentists and bus drivers. Yeah. So like nothing shocks me now from furry conventions to Lego Builders to Star Wars LARPers. We have seen it all. There's, my Little Pony conventions. Oh yeah. There's not much that has been untouched. True. But I'm glad that there is a convention for all veterans and military people to come together to speak on, you know, what they went through, what their business is like, et cetera. So, and obviously we all know Mr. Whiskey here is a veteran and, and please remind me, 'cause I have a memory of a goldfish. How long you been, how long you've been in the military? I was in for three years. And then. Separated for medical issues. And that was one ongoing theme, which was, I was the youngest veteran there. Every other veteran was like 50. Dang. No, no. There was, there was plenty of younger people too. I think that was actually, for me, the most impressive part was I got to shake hands and have a conversation with an active duty member who is about to retire at almost 30 years of service. Mm-hmm. And that's, that's a lifetime. Yeah. You know, it is mind blowing to have met people. As I jokingly mentioned in my standup comedy performance and military creator con who have served longer than I've been alive in, there was plenty of people who had served several decades much more than the 20 years commitment. And it's so interesting because there were plenty of veterans I met who were like, I, I did two years, I did three years, I did four years out, or I did my contract and got out, or I made it halfway. And then the mental health couldn't, you know, make it the rest of the halfway. I've met people, you know. Who share their regrets, but also no regrets. You know, people who made it 16 years, 17 years even. I've seen people leave at 19 years with just that one year left. And you know, we got to share a lot. And I, I will say there are other military conferences out there if you are looking for that kind of stuff. I'm not sure if it's still happening, but at one point there was military influencer con I believe there are also some more financial based military conferences. I think the, the goal with this one was really amazing, kind of being open to all creators, but that was also for me, the biggest letdown this year. And it's not because of the design of the conference itself to a degree, but just because of it being a first year event, which was the lack of attendees who were more so artists. So we had a lot of podcasters, business owners. People who did that kind of stuff. The part that I hope to see more of in the future as the conference continues to grow is more creators like photographers and videographers, but more specifically sculptors and painters and artists. Especially I wanna see more active duty presence there as well. But I think that it was a lot of business owners and entrepreneurs in general. Now, mind you, a lot of these entrepreneurs also do artwork, but there weren't too many people, if at all, who their main gig was just like pure artwork. And I think that's something that we definitely want to highlight more, which is like, Hey, here's this sculptor or wood, carver or metal worker who is military, and here's like the story or messages that they're putting out through their work. That's good because I know. And I think this is pretty common when it comes to veterans or anyone in the military. We forget that, you know, they're human. It, it's, it's kind of sad because you, you would think the moment you get into the military, you kind of lose your sense of identity, you lose your sense of self and you just make the military your whole persona after that. So sometimes it worries me, especially because I do have a little brother who's in the military, he's in the Navy, so he's stationed in Guam right now. And there are times where I do worry about, you know, especially 'cause he got in so young, I don't want him to lose his sense of self, like his sense of hobbies and all that. Like, he loves video games, he loves art, he loves, let's see, actually, he likes bikes. He actually got a bike not too long ago. It's just whenever I see retired veterans, it's almost like they. They don't know what else to do. Once they get out, it's like, oh, well, well I, I'll take it a step backward and say it starts in the active duty section. Mm-hmm. So what I personally witnessed and experienced was that a lot of people, especially in the nuclear operator field where you're working longer hours, this goes for security personnel, for galley workers, for, for anyone. But what we saw was vegetation is the main word I'll use for this vegetation being people didn't want to get off and explore base or participate in their hobbies because what they had was just this emotional, spiritual, mental and physical drain. So that when they got home, they're like, I don't want to do anything. Like work exhausted me so much. And it's not even just like the manual labor aspect of it. Most of the time it's easy enough. It is the being at work all day dealing with higher ups and people in your chain of command who are just. Like you mentioned, I've had military leaders call me and people I know government property say that you know, our level of humanity is defined by our rank that we are scrubs who can't talk to people of a certain rank because we're nobodies. You know, I've had people on my podcast who were called E-Nothings I think that that culture leads that vegetation. The other thing that we see are some hobbies becoming negative coping mechanisms, people doing video games and nothing else. People doing sex or sleeping or alcohol and nothing else. We've seen this vegetation goes either binging one particular or some hobbies in a negative manner, or not having anything at all. And I think one of the things that we were trying to encourage at Military Creator Con, or at least me personally, what I was really putting forward in my social media videos and a lot of interviews I've done in conversations was. You can still have a life while in the military. At least that's how it should be designed. A lot of chains of command function it as a full-time job and lifestyle rather than a separate entity. And so what we see is people are just stuck at work 24 7. And I think that vegetation is one of the biggest regrets too. I know a lot of veterans, myself included, who regretted it. You know, we leave and we're like, man, I was stationed in x, Y, Z location and I never tried this restaurant or went to do this activity. Like people who were stationed in Charleston regretted not exploring Charleston or you know, wherever it may be. And I think that is the issue. A lot of people also, they're like, oh, we only, there's nothing to do off base. It's so boring because all they're thinking about is drinking. Like, that was the standard in the Navy at least. It was like what made a a chain of command area great was like, oh. Are there bars near the base? Otherwise it's not worth it, you know? And I think that's one of the big misconceptions. I think that's one of the issues for sure. And I think that it's so important that people support one another in continuing to pursue their hobbies. Even if it's to a small degree, maybe you don't have as much free time to pursue it. But I think there still are opportunities to do so, and people just choose to shut down when they get home. Even when I went to visit my best friend in Japan, you know, there was a lot of days where he was off of work. He's like, I'm sorry man, I just don't have the energy to go out and do anything. And I think it's hard to push through that, but you know, it's about momentum. I think once you start to vegetate or give up on your hobbies, you quickly shut down to maintain that cadence of going out and keeping that excitement and energy. It's difficult and, and there are organizations like the MWR set up to help plan those trips for you to make it easier to just tag along. And I think people need to take advantage of that. And I think there are so many opportunities through nonprofits and other organizations for both active duty and veterans to get out and do that stuff or pursue their hobbies to get free. I mean, there are nonprofits that do free lessons for painting, for photography, for singing, for comedy, writing for active duty and veterans. You know, you just have to research this stuff. And I think that's one of the biggest things is people don't realize how much is out there. And that's what we talked about in Military Creator Con, the importance of us as podcasters and authors and community leaders in the military space, providing resources and information. We've seen now a lot of active duty podcasts or military podcasts about benefits, about websites you don't know about and all kinds of stuff starting to trend now. That's pretty good. I didn't even know that, honestly, because like I said, I have two members. My stepdad, he has been retired. He was in the Navy for 24 years, so I can only imagine. And I've also had family friends that have been in the military for just as long. My uncle, he, well he is not my biological uncle, but he's a close family friend. He's actually in a motorcycle gang. And not, not in a bad way, but basically him and his military buddies, they created a military gang and, well, is gang the right word? 'cause it, it, it sounds like, I know what you mean. I mean, we call it like, I mean we, we call, we got like E four Mafia, we've got like Filipino mafia, we've got some people call them gangs like, what, whatever they, they call it the Sergeant Gang or the Goon Platoon. Like I've heard all kinds, I've heard all kinds of names for different military groups, so I get what you're saying. They might need to change that one. Yeah, it's ba basically what I'm saying is him, my, my uncle and his military friends create a biker gang and they give back to the community. And one of the things is that I think they went to a school and I think one of the elementary schools, and what they did is that they gave all the kids like rides on their motorcycles. And I thought that was cute, and I thought that was really sweet. But also they do other community service like feeding the homeless and all that stuff. So it, it's just whenever I think of, and I, I'm probably just going on on a rant, but that's great that you guys have a space because it's ironic how you guys. Put y'all lives on the line for civilians and y'all made so many sacrifices. You're leaving your families, you, you, you're, you're making so much, you're, you're doing so much for us, and yet y'all are the most unappreciated, unappreciated people, and that's kind of messed up. And underpaid. And underpaid, underpaid. See, I, I'm not gonna lie, there was a time where I actually thought about going into the military because one, I wanted to travel for free and or go to college for free because obviously the government pays for all that stuff, but I didn't realize all of the negatives that came with it. And I think that's also another thing that people don't talk about when you go into the military because people think like, oh yeah, I'm just gonna be here for this long. And now I'm gonna get out. But then now that you've stated all the negative parts about being in the military and what it costs, it kind of makes you rethink. Not saying that's necessarily a bad thing. 'cause I'm pretty sure there's good things about it too, but I just know that, and it's, it's just ironic, especially when you guys travel a lot. 'cause see that's what I thought. I always thought that because you guys travel a lot, y'all explore where you guys are stationed. But then it's, but that's the idea. That's supposed to be the beauty of it. And a lot of people don't take advantage of it because of the, the mental and emotional drain of the daily lifestyle. And another thing too is like a lot of things obstruct you from doing, doing what you want. And I, I'm not saying it's the most restricted lifestyle, but there have been plenty of times where. You know, your leadership just makes it difficult for you to want to do anything or to do what you want. And I know one thing too is like, you talk about, like, people look at it as, alright, if I just do X, y, Z amount of years, I'll get a, b, c benefits. But it sounds like a short time. But I will say that we say in the military, like the, what is it? Like the days are long, but the weeks are short. You know, and I, I always expressed, at least personally, and anyone who's military can chime in if they want. I felt like time was doubled, at least as a nuclear operator, working on weekends, studying on weekends, doing overnight watches. You know, when you're awake for more than the average person, you're actually, you physically have, or like perceptively, you have more time, right? Mm-hmm. Because when you're only sleeping two to four hours a night and you're spending much more time. Then you're actually doing more. So time often felt doubled, especially when you're working weekends or holidays when everyone else is sleeping or partying. You know, it really does make time feel like it goes by so much longer. And people will say, well, it's only four years. You know, that's not that bad. Well, I know a number of nuclear operators who committed suicide after just a few months, you know, so it's like that four years is a lot longer than you think. We know many service members who have committed suicide well before four years. And I, I don't say that to make it really dark, but that's the reality of it. You know, that was one of the things that we talked about at Military Creator Con. It wasn't really addressed too much on stage, but in between the networking, you know, everyone I talked to about suicide prevention, about addiction recovery knew multiple service members who had committed suicide or dealt with addiction. And again, it's something that is very common in the civilian populace. And in fact, I have guessed on podcasts speaking about. Suicide statistics in children, right? So we know it is not just unique to the military, but rather it is more increased in that area, in that field of expertise. And unfortunately, what we see too is that the focus so much in the civilian world is on combat deployed veterans who do have an increased chance of suicide and addiction. But that is in addition to the already increased chance that all military members have. And so when we focus so much on the combat veterans and active duty members who are only a small portion of the military in comparison to all the other, you know, jobs and lifestyles, you often miss what we need to work on. I think one thing that Mil military creator con emphasized was really community and collaboration and using resources to amplify veteran voices. I know the talk I gave was specifically on. The power of podcasting to do so. And one thing that we've talked about as well, other people talked about were books, nonprofits, different events. I think the biggest issue, and this is for all military events and programs, not just military creator con, and it's not a fault of the conference itself, but it's the lack of reach to active duty members. It is hard to reach them because as we already discussed, most of them aren't going out of their way to find these events. Most people who are active duty are gonna look at a conference on a weekend and be like, that's my only free time. Am I going quote to quote them wasted at a conference? Or, you know, why would I want to go talk about military stuff on my day off, right? Mm-hmm. But I think it's imperative that we reach the active duty people because like. Intervention versus prevention. And if we can have active duty people show up more in this space, and if we can reach them more, it'll help them avoid a lot of mistakes. When it comes to, like I talked about getting out and started a veteran owned business, different stuff that I paid for that is waived for veterans. Right? For not doing proper research or, you know, setting up your path. Unfortunately the, at least from my personal experience, what I went through and what my friends who served have gone through the program set up to help you transition just are not effective at all. And that's one thing that veterans. Are much better at than the active duty personnel who teach that stuff because they've actually transitioned out. Many of them have helped other people transition out, and there's much more to it than it seems, especially when not only is your identity now obsolete because you are no longer whatever, x, y, z rank you were but oftentimes your job doesn't translate over either. I've met plenty of military personnel who their job just doesn't translate into a civilian world equivalent or adjacent. Really, because see, I thought, you know, 'cause I've been applying to jobs, we all have been applying to jobs 'cause the economy is just, what the hell is inside this point. But basically, I always heard that, you know, veterans always get, you know, higher rankings when it comes to applying for jobs because of the benefits you guys get. So is that necessarily true or it doesn't really matter at this point, especially the way everything is going right now. I will say yes and no. I would say that's more on general skills rather than specific skills or, or rather than skills, really qualities. So you look at, like, people will say a veteran application and say, all right, this person was in the military, meaning, and they assume, and this isn't always the case, but in general, that that person can follow orders, that they have a hard work ethic, that they can endure much harsher work conditions than what the civilian populace is gonna dish out at them in most cases. Right, right. So it is more of an overall quality of character rather than specific skills. If you're still lacking the specific skills for the job, it doesn't necessarily matter. 'cause I could have a candidate a, who has years of civilian experience doing X, Y, Z job. Or I could look at candidate B who is a veteran but has minimal skills in the job and it's like. I'm sure they'll learn fast and they'll do their part, but it's more beneficial and less time consuming to go with someone who has these skills. Like for example, I had a veteran on my show. His job was shooting airplanes down with a rocket launcher, and this was pre nine 11. Right? So there was very little to do with that post service. I've had plenty of people who, what they want to do in life has no relation to their job in the military because the billets were full, they couldn't get the job that they wanted or they got cross rated or something like that. Right. One of my best friends, he wants to be a car mechanic and you know, he ended up being a cs, a culinary specialist, you know. Oh. Just because of the way things lined up. Another thing that is interesting to note is that a lot of people lose their passion for whatever craft they want to pursue because of the military. So a lot of mechanics and I think that's why. My buddy became a culinary specialist because his recruiter said, listen, if you become a mechanic in the military, yes, it'll give you all the skills to do the job, but it will kill your passion for wanting to do anything mechanical ever, and you'll not want to work on cars when you get out. So, I mean, that's not always the case, but I have often heard that, that it kind of, the military version of what you want to do will kill your passion for what you actually want to do. In some cases, it might make you more excited or give you the skillset you need, and you have to just kind of take it as it is. But you know, I've met plenty of people who are like, I never want to do anything similar to my military job again, because of all the negativity associated with it. Dang. 'cause I thought that, you know, the whole point of doing your passion is to never feel like work again. Like that's why they say, oh, do what you love, and then you never have to work a day in your life. Right? But if you try that in the military doing what you love. Is not something that you love because of the way the leadership treats you, because of the way the military structures are it there? There are people I know who pursued something in the military that was something they loved and they loved the way that they did it in the military, but that isn't always the case. In fact, that's more rare than not. You know, I know people, like people who love to cook, who were like, oh, I'm gonna become a culinary specialist in the military to get experience making that food every day. Not in unique quality, in batch quality killed their passions. Mm-hmm. Just being in the kitchen every day, all day, pumping out batch qualities and quantities of food. They were like, I just don't wanna be in the kitchen anymore. Like my passion was to make meals, not. Food. Does that make sense? Right. Because in the military, you're not making gourmet meals for people. You're feeding 3000 plus people. Wait, wait, let me stop you there, because I could be wrong. Anybody can correct me on this, but like, I, I was scrolling through the Instagrams and I've seen videos where, you know, if you're getting like, I mean a good meal, I'm talking about steak, lobster, baked potato, that means you're about to, you've just been extended, so it's true. Well, well it depends. So like on at nuke school at the time, and other people can verify this, I'm not making up if there was a suicide or suicide, we got steak and lobsters, right? Like usually if they do bust out that good food, this is true. I've seen it on, on social media. That's wild. And, and most of the stuff you see on social media. Is is true. Not all of it, obviously, but like most of the military memes that you'll see that you're like, there's no way this is real. It usually is. I mean, we, we've had people who were like, all right, steak and lobsters and then the Captain comes on the one MC. So ladies and gentlemen, you've been doing a great deployment. I'm so proud of you. Or we are gonna be extended here for another three months. You know, it's like, and the idea that like, it's too much. It, it just doesn't work anymore because it's like, well, you know, people caught on, like, you can't, like, the whole point was to catch us off garlic, like having this good meal. They rolled out the cake, they got the chocolate chip cookies and the mac and cheese. The and cheese you. But now people just dread that. Like they, if they see it, they're like. No, you gotta be kidding me. No, it is like the, the, the day, the dread. And I mean, I, I had a gentleman on my podcast many episodes ago who they got extended on a submarine and they only had lima beans for every meal for like two weeks straight. But, but the chef helped them out. He made them look like steak. He made them look like pancakes. No, he made them look like mashed potato. No, I'll crash it. Nah. He was like, and the guy was like, to this day I still can't eat lima beans. No, I wouldn't either. It is like, I, first of all, why did you have so many lima beans on standby first? Yeah. Is that like a staple crop in bro? In case of extension, bro. Seriously? Like they have it in a glass case, right? Yeah. And you like, you gotta break it with a hammer. It says, in case of extended deployment, I kind of wanna know how the lima bean steak looked like, because heaven forbid if I See, listen, I had a cauliflower steak once and it was one of the biggest upsets in my life. Oh, I was about to say, I thought you were gonna say it was delicious. 'cause I was like, listen, no, they covered it. The way they made it taste like steak was they just covered it in like curry powder and other seasonings. No, and it tasted terrible. In fact, you can find a picture of me on, on, on Instagram at couple of nukes where I'm just like. Shameless plus given the, the stinkiest eye, because I was like, this cauliflower steak was bad. They had some kind of, they had some kind of sauce with it. It was like a green basil dipping sauce or something like, like, at least gimme some A one steak sauce. Or Peter Luger, you gotta gimme something to on a cauliflower. Listen, it's supposed to be a steak in my mind, right? So at least gimme some steak sauce. Wait, wait, how big was the cauliflower? Like, was it actually the size of a steak or, yes. They like melted it together. You've seen this picture? I gotta pull it up for you now. Yeah, you, you probably need to do that because listen, what you talking about? Listen, listen, listen. I, I'm not hating on vegans and vegetarians. Do what you gotta do. It's your dietary choice. But listen, I'm from Texas, born and raised. I gotta have my steak and if I bite into it and it tastes like a vegetable. Everybody is getting these hands. I'm sorry. Well, I knew, I knew that it was a vegetable. So to clarify, it was not like a surprise dish. I know, but there's some people that that are like, here's a cauliflower steak. And I'm like, no, don't do this to me. Not saying I don't like my vegetables. Oh my goodness. You're right. What is that? See, see? Nah, I don't know about this. Y'all. They toasted it brown. They toasted it brown. So it looks like a steak. Y'all look the image, it does not look like a cauliflower. See, I was thinking it looks like it looks more like a chicken, to be honest. Right? Like, guys, you need to post that. Seriously, it is posted. Oh, it is? It's been posted. It's been posted. Well, yeah, guys, look for that picture because looking at it, and it was on my deployment, it Mm, the Margaritaville. So you don't even get a real steak, that's why. Well, no, they had real meat. I just wanted to try that option because the only other option was like, like pork or something. I, I didn't want the other option from the, but that's neither here or there. This is supposed be about military creator economy. Okay. That's my bad. Where they did. Not serve cauliflower steak. They did serve lunch each day, which was one of the best conference experiences I've had because a lot of conferences, they say, all right, you've got X, Y, Z amount of time to lunch, go break off. And what happens is the retention rate goes down because some people get stuck in traffic, there's nowhere to eat nearby that's affordable. Or they go eat and they're like, ah, I'm just gonna skip the next few sessions and then come back for the after party. So having the catered lunch onsite was tremendous. But the food was good, it was included, so that was really awesome. That was one of the highlights. I would say actually all the events at Military Creator Con were phenomenal. The casino night was amazing. So how it worked is you walked in and you got $2,000 of fake money. You know, so you walk in, you get $2,000 per person. To Tibet, which was really cool. You didn't, you didn't have to put any money down. You just walked in. And if you lost that, then you lost it. But if you won, you won. You know, I know. I personally won between my fiance and I, we won $20,000. It was her first time ever playing roulette. And the dealers were super, super fun. We were all laughing and joking. No free drinks was, was the downside. What, you know, hey, they'll give you free food, but not free drinks. If you're gonna have on a casino night, really? If you're gonna have fake money, then they should have at least given out fake drinks. Mocktails. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. Mocktails. But that cost money. So at least gimme water that looks like, like, tell me it's vodka. Here's a vodka cranberry, here's your vodka, sir. It's just a water. And that's also not $2,000. Yeah. But no, it, it was really fun, you know, and they had a little bar in the corner so you could, you could buy your drinks if you wanted, but. I didn't drink. I was in the zone and made 20,000 between her and I. Her first time playing. How it worked, which was really cool, was for each $1,000 you had, you got a raffle ticket. Mm. And at the end, they drew these raffle tickets for some huge prizes. I mean, the one barbecue giveaway was like hundreds of dollars, if not thousands of barbecue stuff. It came with a grill, a triple XL bag of charcoal, like different sauces and stuff from one of the sponsors. They gave away a painting. They gave away different masterminds and digital sessions valued at hundreds of dollars. They gave away gift cards. I did not win the gift card I wanted. Which one did you want? They had a hundred dollars Lyft gift card and a hundred dollars Uber gift card. Woo. Now gas is four 40. You know, I wanted that a hundred dollars Uber gift card. Okay. I was looking at that real close, honestly. Yeah. I was like, I need that. Especially if I go back to Japan, it's like, yes, sometimes the train is, is super convenient, but there are times where I'm like, I don't feel like transferring trains three times and being shoulder to shoulder with people who are looking at me like they hate me 'cause I'm American. I was like, sometimes I just wanna hop into Uber and call it a day, but not on my dime. But if I had a hundred dollars Uber gift card from from when, so the moral of the story was I didn't win $20,000 in real life and I didn't get the Uber or Lyft gift card. Hey, well now see, listen. 'cause if your fiance was able to get you $20,000 on our first truck, we going to Vegas. No, no, no, no, no, no. I gave her $500 to play and she lost it all. And I gave her more money later on that she made back, and then a guy gave two grand to her just because she was my fiance. So, yeah. I, I, I say that. That's, that's pretty good. No one's gonna give you free money like that. I'm just saying, even though. Right, right. But point being is I, I wish I won 20,000 hash that, that would've been amazing. I would've bought a drink for everyone that in the, in the casino then. Exactly. Forget the mocktail. I would've bought everyone a, a bottle of warrior dog spirits, warrior dog spirits, which was one of the highlights. Warrior Dog. You tried that last night? Yes. What did you think it was? It was pretty smooth also. But you're right. It's probably better if it's chilled. Forgive me, I'm not, I, I, I'm not a whiskey connoisseur, but, well, the bottle you tried was the one that I had in the car for the past, like, yeah, five days on the road. It went through 10. Well, I don't know. I don't know if it crossed any state lines. We won't say all that on, on the air, but allegedly. It was legally transported to Mabo in domicile here in Florida, but exactly, it, it got a little warm in the process. Yeah. Because one, one of the times we were driving it was such, so I, I, like I said, I, I drove about 50 hours total between everything and every day was like the most different weather possible. Like at one point it was 40, at one point it was 93. At one point it was 82. Like, I don't know what the states were doing. Like, so we went through Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi Louisiana. Well, we went through every state twice, but yeah. Alabama, we passed a lot of interesting towns, Niceville, and of course, of course I had to wonder if the people there were nice or not. I'll tell you what. Mississippi had the friendliest people ever. Like we took photos of people outside on the sidewalk. Couples trying to get, you know how it is, you see someone trying to take a selfie and you're like, clearly that selfie's not gonna get what they want. So you're like, Hey, can I take your picture? Some of the nicest people ever. I mean, they're shaking your hand. Hey, how are you doing? What's your name? God bless you for taking our picture and I'm gonna name my first kid after you. Like, they were real friendly. Oh, they were real friendly. That, that's the southern hospitality. Right, right. They were friendlier than Georgia or Alabama or Florida. Florida's not real southern state. Anyway. It didn't, it, it's south enough. If that makes sense. Don't get into an argument with me. 'cause I had a woman argue with me about Maryland being a southern state. Yeah. Geographically, honey, it's, it does up north, it's north. Well, geographically it does qualify as a southern state. By what do you mean requirement? Because I believe it is south of the Mason, Dixie line. However, culturally south, it's not a southern state. And weather wise, they say it is not. They pop up there. They say what they're, they're not, they say pop up there like soda pop. Yeah. Like, you know how I think that's just like a old fashioned term, like soda pop. They, they say like, different regions of this country. The way we say soda is completely different. Like down here in the south we say soda. No, we say water. Or we say coke. Like, oh, do you want a coke? Not necessarily a coke, a cola, but like just a Coke like soda. Well, in the South you can also have people say you want coke. And it is true. It's actual Coke. Yeah, true. But the whole point is like up north, like Midwestern states, they say like pop or soda or something like that. Like I just Mm. To say Maryland is south. That's Mm. Because if I see a Maryland and I have, when I see, see a Maryland, a Marylander No. Or Maryland dish about, what do you call them? A Maryland date? The, the, the Marylands. The Maryland. The Maryland Lenders. Yankees. What? I don't, that last one's kind of a slur. It did. I didn't make thes. It. That's, you can't pull the, I didn't make that word up card. I didn't because, because I could say that about a lot of words that I'm not allowed to say supposedly, but to say I didn't make it up, I just use it. I don't make the rules here. It's just no 'cause to say Maryland is south or because it's a southern region from a different part of a northern state that's just like, well, she said coffee. She said like c coffee. Yeah. That's not, she said, the way she said it was was, that's not even south. It sounded like Boston. Which, Boston. Yeah. So it was, it was just, that was a terrible accent, guys. I'm sorry. Yeah. It as good as your British accent. A British accent's not that bad. I at least give us a sample. Was that British or was that American? No, I'm trying to, I'm trying to get ready. Oh man, now I'm nervous. 'cause now I'm trying. All right. I was about say o May, but that's kind of sound Australian, doesn't it? No, because I'm thinking, okay. No, hold on, hold on. It did sound Australian. No, it it, it kind of did. It kind of did. Hold on, hold on, hold on. Oh, 'cause I said, 'cause I was in a meeting and I was just like, because we have British people at our jobs. He's a publisher. And. I was like, oh, isn't he British? Or, and that, like that. Oh. But if I go to Hibachi and put on an Asian accent, accent, I get called racist. Yes. This is interesting how, oh, but if you go to work and you talk British to the British people, that's not, I'm talking British though. Okay. I can do British accent. It's just like, oh, you wanna go inside for some same crot? Like I sound What, what, what? What's a region? You're you're leaving me gutted. I I'm gobsmacked right now. Gobsmacked. I just stop. Okay. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It's okay. We, we got off topic. There was, there was a different podcast I was on long, long ago where I, I attempted to do an Australian accent at the request. Actually, I was requested not to do it, but I mean, if you tell someone, you know how it works, but Yes. Well, I will say that is that is something I am wondering if military career con is going to open up to. Other militaries or if it's going to stay strictly US based. 'cause I have been to a couple different military events that were open to militaries around the world. And I will say it is definitely a unique experience to, on the rare occasion, I have talked to people from other militaries especially you know, I talked to some people from around the British region. Australian region. It was actually on a cruise where they did the military gathering and they were talking about the difference in veteran and military pride in Britain compared to America or Canada compared to America. And it is interesting hearing how, I will say, as much as we talk about American military members being underpaid and underappreciated, looking at it compared to some other countries, I do think we had the most veteran acknowledgement. One of the things I will say is. Who was it this one gentleman. He was like one of the people in charge of cruise events on the, the cruise I was on where I actually gave a, a speech in the middle of the, of the military celebration about suicide prevention and community. He said basically, like, one thing that stands out to him is like, you can find a veteran in America. Like they have their hats. Mm-hmm. Like most veterans have a hat of where they served or where they, he said whatever country it was from. I don't remember at the moment, but he was like, we don't, we don't have that. Like, there, like there's no memorabilia or anything. There's no like, thank you for your service. Like maybe they do certain events or parades or like. Whatever, or a lot of them talked about how the military is the, the focus of military is more on the ceremonial guard rather than the active duty Navy and other branches and stuff like that. So it was interesting having these conversations and I definitely am interested in knowing if James and Marah, the founders of military Creator con plan on opening it up or trying to insight members from other militaries to come and have those discussions. It's definitely something to look into. I know there are a couple British ships that have docked in America. Before that actually where I was stationed, the sailors would go onto the British ship 'cause they had a bar and I think you were allowed one beer a day or something like that. Whereas the American ship, we had Georgia's Java, the coffee shop, but we did not have. You had to pay for it. Oh my goodness. You gotta pay for your own stuff on the ship. Right? I thought the coffee shop on the ship was free. Like I know that may might sound stupid upfront, but it it like, it does the fact that you, some of, some of the places you have to pay for your haircut and other, other bases, they're included. Like, it depends, like if you got your haircut on the ship, it was free. But apparently the, the barbers, like that was one thing at Nuke school. I don't think there was a free barbershop, like the Nex barbers you had to pay. And when I first got to base it was $9 for a haircut, which was like, nothing. All right, whatever. Yeah. I mean, you only pay me 3 cents an hour, so that's a lot of hours of work, but then when COVID ended, they're like, oh, because of like some, when I say bowl, I mean bowl reason, they're like, now it's $21 a haircut. I was like, how you go from $9 to 21 hair Like it had. Is that, that's more than doubled that that. Right. I like, I was like, okay, $9 a haircut every, and I was getting haircuts a lot in the military because like you could only have two, two inches in bulk. Four inches in length. Yeah. So those were the requirements at the time. They may have changed since then. By the time it was two inches in bulk, four inches in length. Mm-hmm. Was like the maximum. So to maintain that, you gotta get a haircut pretty often, or you don't, but then you look strange. Like I've seen the people who, it's fine, I've seen people do some, you can't have faddish, they call it faddish hairstyles. Faddish, yes. It's not what you mean. It just means like flashy or stylish really. That was the words faddish. Hairstyles in while in, you know, the service and stuff. I thought she could at least like have some form of self-expression. No, that kind of defeats the point. Like I, I mean, I get it. No, like I was almost in a pickle because this I was, how did I put this politely? I was at a barbershop, barbershop, barbershop, barbershop in Norfolk, Virginia. Right. In Portsmouth. Mm. It was called like cool cuts with Ks. Oh, right. So, so y'all, y'all picking up the vibe I'm trying to put down. Right. And he tried putting lightning bolts in my fade and I was like, now, now pause. Pause. You can't be doing that. What I mean, and he knew I was in the military too. What if it was small? Like, no, just, just a tiny zep. I could have been like, but Chief, I'm an electrician's make nuclear operator. Exactly. I mean this is, it's, this is God's rate. I gotta represent, it's on brand. But no, they I remember that one time they gave me. How do I describe this? I don't wanna make it a racial thing, but they gave me like a very black haircut. Like, no, like, it looked like it was not something for white men. I dunno how to describe it. Like, it was like a square top with a fade. Mm-hmm. And I just remember looking in the mirror, I was like, bro, you was about to come back out looking mixed. I was like, I, I know I, well, I had been on the beach a few days, so I knew I was a little bit darker, but I, I don't think I was darker Have to qualify. Sorry. Like, listen, listen. Okay. And I'm not saying it looks bad on, on any particular people, but I was just saying it was not for me, bro. Like, okay, listen, not that I didn't want it, it just, I looked bad when whiskey gets, but it's hard to have a good haircut in the military in general. I just, wow. Sometimes I, I wonder. Well, no, I, I get it. It's, the military is cold, it's cut, like, you know, you gotta be uniform. But I thought, like, I guess because I watched Cadet Kelly when on Disney Channel, and I thought there has to be some form of self-expression, like, come on. But I guess, well now if you're a woman, you can have long eyelashes. They've extended the length of eyelash. Ooh. Because it, they had minimums in that. I think they extended, I didn't know those minimums on eyelashes, or, sorry, maximums. Maximums, yeah. That'd be crazy. Like your eyelashes have to be at least this long. Right? That's they cannot exceed at x, y, z length. Okay. I think they extended those, blah, blah, blah. What I will say is the most ridiculous story, I was in a Walmart. Not a sponsor. Shout. Shout out to Mallory Ryan who does Walmart Conservative clothing fines. Check her out. She was one of the speakers at military creator con, super awesome woman. Amazing story. He's gone through a lot of hardship back to back miscarriages and a lot of different hardships she's going through. In the algorithm kind of pushed her down because she couldn't post as frequently, so please go support her and hopefully she'll be on the podcast. But that being said, I was at Walmart. Mm-hmm. Me and the boys two active duty guys and me. I was, I had just gotten out and we were doing a road trip from Texas to Pensacola to Augusta, Georgia. We go to Walmart and we came straight from church. 'cause these guys, this, this guy, he was actually my yeoman in bootcamp. Mm-hmm. Right? So we go way back. And he's one of those Catholic Catholics, like super strict. Like, like Orthodox Catholic. Well, I was, he goes to Mass in Latin. Okay. Mm-hmm. He says the Hail Mary like 150 times a day. Right. He's like super strict. That's dedication right there. Now we went to a Catholic mass because, because of him and stuff, I was the only guy who donated money. I don't, I don't, I'm not a bragger, but I was like, we had a beef about that. I was like, Hey man, I'm attending your mass and I'm giving my money, like how you ain't even gonna put out your pocket? I was like, I just got out. I ain't got a job. Like you two have a, you got the active duty pay. CTI. Mm-hmm. Well anyway, so we're Walmart. This is gonna sound so ironic. Now. We came from Catholic Mass to buy Jack Daniels. Wow. 'cause we're going to the beach and we got watermelon Jack Daniel bottles. Oh, they were so good. One of the best drinks I've ever had. I mean, it is a very casual drink. Right. It's like a C Grahams kind of thing, not a sponsor. Like just one of those coolers that you take to the beach. Okay. I think this was a beach where you're allowed to bring alcohol. So for story sake, I'll just say this, so we're dressed up in our church clothes, you know, we've got the nice dress pants, a nice dress shirt. What I wear to the beach anyway, to be honest, because when you rip off a dress shirt on the beach, it's much more stunning than if you show up in a tank top and take it off. Right. It's all about the show. Mm-hmm. Well, we're in line and there's a guy behind me and then there's a girl behind him and I say, girl woman. She's like maybe 18, 19 I guess. And she has picked me Girl Energy for anyone who's familiar with that. And she's, she kind of leans past the guy in front of her. She is like, oh no, do they not have Apple Pay? I don't have any money. I only brought Apple Pay that this, this is verbatim. I'm not making this up. Okay. Right. That's how she said it. And the, and the two friends I'm with, they're like, oh no, this is kind bait or something, we gotta go away. But she starts talking to me and of course, out of all the guys, 'cause the other two guys have like, never talked to a woman before and they were kind of like freaked out about it anyway, she was like, oh no. And I was like, no ma'am, they don't have Apple Pay or whatever. And she is like, can I ca, I can send you money online if you buy it for me. It's hair dye. I'm in the Navy and my chief says it's not even on both sides, even though it's a natural color and he's being a jerk about it. And he wants me to dye. So I looked at her hair and she had dyed like a ginger color, like Auburn. Wow. And one, her left side was slightly, slightly lighter than the right side. And honestly, like you couldn't have really told known unless she told me. Mm-hmm. So I knew she was telling the truth that some Navy chief was like, mm, your hair's too uneven. You gotta dye it because that's just how they are over the most. We got national threats going on, we've got like, actual work is not being done right. And this guy's worried about her hair being slightly lighter on the left side, near the end, and the right side. Like he should be busy with his boat. Boo. Not focusing on this 18-year-old girl who just joined the Navy. Now her hair slightly more ginger on one side, but he decides that he's gonna send her to mast if she doesn't dye her hair basically to court. Oh no. Right. That's how, like, do you not have anything better to do with your time? Yeah, I feel like, and I, I'm not gonna defend people who dye their hair wrong in, in the Navy, but like, this looked natural, right? I mean, this was just a guy who was picking a fight to pick a fight to, to give someone a hard time. And it just kind of like ticked me off. So I knew she was telling the truth. Yeah. So she was like, oh, can you, can you buy this for me and I'll send you the money online? And I was like, well. I don't think she's lying. That was a very specific story. Mm-hmm. And it's something I personally witnessed while in the military. So she's telling the truth. You or Ginger? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like I, I saw, I've seen people go to mast for the silliest thing sometimes, and I was like, okay, it was like 17 bucks or something. And it wasn't the most expensive, nor the cheapest hair dye. I was like, all right, whatever. I mean, worst case scenario, I lose 17 bucks. 17. Yeah. So I got it for her and then she cashed at me and she, she's like, you guys look so nice. Like, where did you wear, what do, what are you dressed up for? And I was like, oh, we just came back from mass, now we're going to the beach. Have a little, you know, drinking and swimming or visiting Pensacola. And she was like, yeah, I'm in the Navy. I'm, whatever rate it was, you know, some introductory rate. And she was like, me and my girlfriends got an Airbnb rented for the whole weekend. You should come over. And so she starts talking to me. And long story short, I was completely oblivious. But the other two guys were listening and then they walked away at some point. 'cause they were like, we're not saving him. But basically she said some things that implied that she was trying to hook up with me. Yeah. And it went over my head. I was just trying to help her dye her hair because, you know, she wanted to be a jerk about it. But yeah, I didn't realize this. And then, I mean, I told the guys, I was like, we should go. And they're like, what? No, we're not going to hook up with a bunch of random Navy girls. They probably have STDs. I was like, what are you talking about? Hooking up? I was like, they got a beach house all weekend. What if they have free food and drinks and it's right on the beach? I love how that's what your thought was. Yes. I was trying to get free food. I was trying to get free food. I was thinking, I was thinking specifically about brownies, but then it's like, oh, they might put weed in the brownies or whatever they do nowadays, they might put fentanyl in it. I'm not taking, no, I don't, I don't trust brownies at parties no more. All right. People put acid and shrooms and all kinds of stuff in brownies. Yeah. But if they had a Carville ice cream cake, not a sponsor, but they're very good. Right? True. But that's so total side story from, from MC, but Right. But the fact that chief was like, you better even out that hair. I'm sending you the mask. That's so stupid. I didn't think it was that stupid. Like it is not like, it was like one side was ginger and one side was brown or blonde. Like it was a slight difference because she was already, I think she was already like naturally, well she may have been a blonde, but she may have been a ginger that just wanted to go darker or something. It was just so dumb. Mm. But we went to the beach and minded our own business and you know, we never heard from her. So that was that. Probably because they walked away and acted lame, but it's fine. Probably kept us outta trouble. Probably. Probably. Because, I mean, you already paid for hair dye like. In order. It did to me that, that that's kind of, I was just doing a good deed. Mm-hmm. I wasn't trying to get anything out of it. Yeah, well she was willing to like give you something more than that. I can't pay in money. Right. I can't pay money. But she did. She cashed out me. So even though she so she could, so she could have bought the damn hair dye. Well you think about it. No, she couldn't have. So what You can't Cash app Walmart. Oh. Oh wait. Yeah. 'cause she said she did well so she had the money. She said all she had was Apple Pay and it take Apple Pay. I don't know. To be honest, they think she just did it to strike conversation though. I think that's exactly, which I mean really helps my ego to think that women are pretending to have financial crisis just to talk to me. Yes. Heaven forbid that I can't spend my $17 on this cheap hair dye. Someone please save me. I'm trying to buy this cheap hair dye because my officer says one side of my hand. Did somebody call for me? Well, it's just like the military when duty calls you have to serve. Would you do that for an ole like, oh no, I can't, I can't pay for my knitting needles or something. What? Knitting. Knitting needles. Why crochet? So I, I wouldn't know, I don't know the price of knitting these days, but it's just so, so if a old lady said like, oh, I have this, you know, pair pay, apple pay, like, can you help a, can you help a poor old lady like me? It's like, I'd say that's a trap. That's a plant because, oh, that's a trap. Because what old people don't have cash on them. Oh, you right. Well, old people don't have cash on them. I just said, what, what if she wants to be hip? She's trying to get with, get with the time. My grandkids set this up for me. Yeah. She got the newest iPhone. She was like, I I, they made me some kind of Facebook account. Yeah. And, and then the way they hold their phone, they hold the phone like this, like they squint and then they. And the text is like size 100 font. Yes. It's like, it's like they're reading their text like one word at a time, and then their, their, their ringtone is like blaring loud. Oh lord. That's funny. So our military creator camera review Yes. Did not happen at all. I'll have to name the episode of something different. Well, but yeah, I mean, that's a fun military story. I don't, I don't share often. I actually just thought about it the other day when I was passing through Pensacola, Florida. I was like, I should call her. I'm just kidding. I was just kidding. Her hair is probably a different color by now. Anyway. So Stop blonde this time. I couldn't find her, but if I did, I'd tell her. Her hair looks a little uneven on one side. Yeah. But it's on the other side. Right, right, right. It's like, ah, man, you fixed one side, but now the other side's bad and yeah, maybe we could go to Walmart together and Yeah, fix your hair, but, but you gotta go to Mass first and then like get Jack Daniels and then Right, right, right. But you gotta, you gotta re you gotta re, I gotta take her into church first to see if he should catches on fire. Right. Gotta make sure. But no, I think, you know, that Military Creator Con was an excellent event. You know, I was very humbled by the feedback I got on my comedy performance on talking on just my overall presence and contribution. Contribution, bless you. Contribution. So I think it was a great time and I definitely look forward to next year's Creator Con being a much bigger thing. A lot of the things that I felt like were lacking, or really just the fact that it was a first year conference and. The things that were lacking were because of just attendance. And we had a great attendance. We had a lot of speakers, a lot of their supporting members, a lot of sponsors. But I want more active duty people, more veterans and more civilians to get involved who work in those spaces, especially those who are more creator focused. And that would be my one biggest feedback was I felt like a lot of the talks kind of overlapped in topics. And I hope that next year, now that we're getting the feedback from the talks, which they were all great talks, don't get me wrong, but that we would hit some more unique angles and continue to branch out, but also stay within what we're trying to do here. I think it was a great event and I look forward to the future of it. And. I know that James and Mara and everyone involved with putting it together are fully committed to making it a bigger and better event. And I would say for a first year conference, it was an extremely successful launch, especially compared to a lot of conferences that try to launch. So next year, I can't wait. I'll have to buy yet another hat instead of boots. Mm-hmm. You gotta, and they gotta be bigger. Oh, you gotta get that 10 gallon hat right? Oh, you can do like Doug Diva do. Right? I gotta come back with, with a larger hat, a larger brain, a bigger heart, and some extra, extra large cowboy boots. I gotta get ones that like, have a couple inches on the bottom. So I'm just walking around. Everyone's like, whoa. Only about be, I'll be six foot tall. It's the Mr. Whiskey Texas Edition. Mm. Yeah. But I think the conference is gonna be much bigger next year. And I think that the. Promotions for it ahead of time, the interviews, everything is gonna be just so much greater. And I think that for it's first year, it's at such a good place already and it's gonna really launch significantly. Well, okay.