People at the Core
From The Greenpoint Palace bar in Brooklyn, New York writers and bartenders, Rita and Marisa, have intimate conversations with an eclectic mix of people from all walks of life about their passions, paranoia and perspectives. Featured guests could be artists or authors, exterminators or private investigators, or the person sitting next to you at the bar.
People at the Core
Not Shying Away From the Awful Edges: Tré Miller Rodriguez On Grief, Ghostwriting, Love and Loss
The night can bend a life. Tré Miller Rodriguez walks us through the moment everything changed—waking to find her husband gone—and the choice to pick up a pen before the pieces even settled. What starts as an obituary and a eulogy turns into a grief memoir that refuses to look away, from the strange etiquette of wedding rings after widowhood to the first shaky attempts at desire and dating. Along the way, Tré names “grief brain,” the fog that shields you while it steals your year, and shows how writing, friends who take clear direction, and unlikely moments of comedy make the unlivable livable.
The story widens with a reunion that feels cinematic: the daughter Tré placed for adoption finds her on Facebook at eighteen. Four years later, during a 21st-birthday bar crawl, Tré meets Jorge in a hidden speakeasy and the next chapter begins. We talk about what it takes to protect a true story when Hollywood tries to sand it down—why a network-friendly version can lose the texture that makes real lives matter—and how to say no until the right partner shows up. Tré also opens a window into ghostwriting and modern media: building thought leadership, drawing boundaries around your byline, and using AI as a tool without giving up your voice.
We end where joy sneaks back in: travel hacks from Tokyo to Seoul, asking bartenders for the real map, negotiating onsens with tattoos, and letting trips serve as relationship stress tests that make love sturdier. It’s a conversation about craft, honesty, and the courage to hold your own narrative—through loss, reunion, and the odd belly laugh that arrives right on time. If this resonates, tap follow, share it with a friend who needs it, and leave a review so more people can find the show.
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Listen to Tré read from her memoir Nov. 18th from 7-9pm as part of the Palace Reading Series (206 Nassau Ave., Brooklyn NY 11222)
Tré Miller Rodriguez:
Splitting the Difference: A Heart-Shaped Memoir
"When Other's Day Became Mother's Day" - Huffpost
"A Husband Lost, A Daughter Found" NYT
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From the Green Point Palace Bar in Brooklyn, New York, writers and bartenders, Rita and Marissa, have intimate conversations with an eclectic mix of people from all walks of life about their passions, paranoia, and perspectives. Featured guests could be artists or authors, exterminators or private investigators, or the person sitting next to you at the bar. This is people at the core.
SPEAKER_02:Alright, we're gonna roll into this. We've been uh pre-convo getting all amped up for this session. Oh yeah. Yeah. Is it on right now? Are we recording? We are recording. Okay, big girl. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Awesome.
SPEAKER_02:We just went down a rabbit hole of toxic men.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Fun. Yeah. So we're gonna pivot with a delightful woman. Um Trey is actually a regular at the bar. Um, that's how I met her. And I'm assuming you too. Yeah. Unless you were like practicing running.
SPEAKER_01:Practicing running. I've never rained in my life. I knew it was a joke.
SPEAKER_02:Unless like you're out there warming up on the track.
SPEAKER_01:I wish. I would love to.
SPEAKER_02:I I would love to, yeah, I would love to do that with you. Yeah, me too. Okay. Okay. Springtime. Um, too bad it's gonna be fall and raining. All right, so our guest today is Trey Miller Rodriguez. She is a storyteller with two decades of ghostwriting, PR, and branding experience. She is a UC Berkeley graduate like myself, and the author of Splitting the Difference, a heart-shaped memoir, which she shares her experiences of being suddenly widowed at 34 and soon after reuniting with a teenage daughter she had placed for adoption. Her published essays have appeared in the New York Times, Marie Clare, Red Magazine, Modern Lost.com, and more. Among these topics she explores with zeal are grief, adoption, fashion, neurodiversity, and travel. Trey's visited 30 plus countries and makes her home in Brooklyn with her husband, Jorge, with whom she runs marathons, chases sour beers, and devours every season of Rick and Morty. And somehow the Rick and Morty combo opened up to toxic men. And that's that's that that was our pre-seg.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, and here I am with a tattoo of a of a of an animation created by a toxic man.
SPEAKER_01:I gotta be honest though, before we really get into it, Rick and Morty, that I think it was the first or second season when they do that um um Intergalactic Television? Well, no, the um uh Mazzy Starr sequence when they play Mazzy Starr when he digs up his own body and it's just so brutal and beautiful, and just like it's just I don't know, it kind of blew my mind. Like it was the first time I saw a cartoon that made me cry because it was so emotional and just like what the fuck am I watching? Why is this happening? You know what I'm talking about though, where I do, I do.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, um, and there's been a few, there all it seems like it's always a season finale where they do that, and Rick is you know, part of his whole brand is having no feelings, being inappropriate, cursing at his grandchildren, giving them Molly, like it doesn't seem like he has any um boundaries or emotions that we could connect with, and then and then one of those moments happens and you're crying at a cartoon. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I know, exactly. And it usually is like two in the morning. But I just I'll never forget that scene. Like it was you know, years ago because it's been on for so long, but I just remember seeing that and just being like, what is going on? This is brilliant and beautiful, you know. I'm glad Dan Harmon isn't canceled.
SPEAKER_03:Me too.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, community was incredible, he's a great writer.
SPEAKER_02:Um, you know, you just always hope that people weren't fucking closet dickheads, at least to the or not to the people around them, but also then making it to the public arena of what yeah, behind the scenes assholes they can be.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, your heroes.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, how disappointing. Well, speaking of writing, okay. So we usually kind of start on like how most of our guests are not actually native New Yorkers. I think we've got named mm, maybe two or three, and kind of go over the origin story of how you came to New York, but your book really kind of tells that story um of how you came here with your your husband at the time, um, and traces your journey from California uh here. And yeah, I mean I don't want to give the the book away, but yeah, let's let's just kind of segue.
SPEAKER_03:Um it is a grief memoir. Someone dies. Um so yeah, let's see. My my journey to New York, uh born and raised in California, specifically Pasadena, and the desert.
SPEAKER_02:Did your family have any um station?
SPEAKER_03:Not my family immediate, but uh lost lost an ex-partner, um, my college boyfriend. Died in the Palisades fire. Yes. Um and I had a few friends who I went to school with in Pasadena who lost their childhood homes. Oh, still the same homes that we like had sleepovers when we were in the sixth grade. So a lot of a lot of loss uh last year or this year. It feels so like it feels like a long time ago. I have thankfully have been to a lot more weddings this year than funerals. So that's good. Um hopefully the tide is turning. Um but yeah, so I was I was 30 years old, I was doing PR um on the West Coast, and I was in New York for a press trip for a beauty brand. So I was here for a week doing a couple events, and uh my cousin was supposed to be my date for one of the uh events at like you know the Time Warner Center or something, and he sent a proxy, and that proxy ended up introducing me to Alberto at the Soho House. Um, we ended up leaving together. I rescheduled my flight. Um, we had six by coastal dates after that, then we got engaged and we met in May 2005 and we are married living in New York um by August 2005, end of the month. So eight dates from meeting to marriage. No, I wouldn't I wouldn't necessarily recommend um that timing. Um, however, in hindsight, if we'd have dated for three years, I would have been widowed shortly after our wedding. Yeah. So I'm kind of glad that um I just embraced the impulsivity. Yeah. And um against all the odds, moved across the country with you know, four boxes of clothes and two two chairs, everything else I sold or threw into storage. Wow. Yeah. And it was a fairy tale. It was a fairy tale. It was a fairy tale. Um, but uh yeah, three and a half years later, one terrifying March morning in 2009, I awoke and he did not. Um and I remember, that's funny, uh I remember after you know, people say a lot of things. I've actually got a chapter in the book called Dumb Shit, People Say. Um, and that was sort of my way of processing the insensitivity that was unfolding in front of me, often in very public situations. Um, you can't control what people say, but you can control what you do with it. So I would just whip out my phone, or if I had a notebook on me or Moleskeen, and I would just write it down. And the friends around me were like, oh bro, you just made it into the dumb shit list, which is great to have some friends uh, you know, making light of it. But um, I remember that people would ask me, When are you moving back home after this happened? People from California. Oh my god. Oh, because now your life is absolutely over. This is right, it's exactly like I couldn't make it on my own here, or I would have no um interest in that. Um the first time I came to New York, I knew it's where I wanted to live. And I started playing. You did the minute you got here. The minute I got here.
SPEAKER_02:So um because you're a mover and shaker, you got the you got the vibe.
SPEAKER_03:I don't want to spend my life in a car like I did in in LA. Yeah, you know, you just you spend your life in traffic um and try not to be angry about it. But I don't even let my parents pick me up from the airport when I visit because I know they're gonna come with road rage, and it's just I haven't seen you in six months. This is not the interaction that I want to have at the beginning of the visit.
SPEAKER_02:That's that's part of what keeps me away from from Southern California, especially specifically.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I don't I don't mind San Francisco. Yeah, no, no shade to to NorCal. Um Salesforce could be. Well, if you just know when you know too, right?
SPEAKER_01:When you you know, when you get somewhere, you just kind of have this feeling of, oh, I belong. This this feels like home. Yeah, New York does have that. Not for everyone. You know, I've had a lot of friends move out here that uh were not successful or did not enjoy it at all. But then other for people like us, it's like, oh, this feels nice. Slow down. I can walk everywhere, I can wave at my deli guy, I can wave at the butt, you know, you know everyone.
SPEAKER_03:I can pet all the dogs, yeah, all the wombers, all the Zeldas. Yeah, it's um it's it's it's its own vibe.
SPEAKER_02:And I think maybe like unconsciously, you were not going to give up on a place and make it your own and like reinventing yourself in a place rather than going back to something like just given an opportunity for another another phase of your life, another stage, exactly, and recreating your identity now as as a single person in the city. Um it's been it's been a minute. It has, though.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, the the traumatic event that informs the book happened 16 years ago. Yeah. A lot has changed.
SPEAKER_02:Um still love New York though.
SPEAKER_03:I do still love New York. And you know, I was just thinking, like, you know, you know you're in the right place when you're still taking pictures of the sunsets, you're still you're still doing things like I or saying things like I can't fucking believe I live here. Yeah like that is when you know you are in the right spot. Even even if you forgot your umbrella and you step in a puddle and you know, you lose your subway card, like all these shitty things can happen in a single day, but none of it is directed toward, I don't feel like I direct any of that toward New York. It's not New York's fault, any of those things are which I think is the difference between loving where you live and and not loving where you live.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, you also, I must say, I don't know if our listeners can experience your energy, but you also have beautiful, lovely, bubbly energy too. Like, I mean, you've been through so much and you're still so shiny. Well, and you know, no, but but it you know, you're strong and beautiful and inside and out, and I think that that is awesome, and that helps being a new, you know, that you it's good to have that as a New Yorker because resilience this town can bring you down. Yeah, resilience, exactly. Exactly. So going back to the book a little bit, um, what I'm sure you get asked this all the time, but what and when did you decide to finally write about it? Because I I know for me personal experience, like um I've been starting to write a little bit about my trauma and and publishing books about it, but it took me a long time. There are certain subjects that I've never been able to touch yet, or I'm slowly getting into it, but my writing has always kind of it starts out from afar, and then you start to get it really into the writing of what happened. So when were you when did you feel like you could do that? Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_03:So I actually started writing this memoir almost immediately. Okay. So part of it was organic. I had to write the OBT for the New York Times for him. I had to um write the funeral program, I delivered the eulogy. So in those first like eight days, there was a lot of writing, also a lot of crying and a lot of drinking, and a lot of running around and not sleeping. And of course, when that when that chaos sort of calms down and you're by yourself, it's almost worse, right? Um what I found was um the experience of writing took something that was so uh terrifying and it broke it down to words, punctuation, it's paragraphs, control. Control, right, control over something that you had absolutely no control over. Um and you know, the right the act of writing was uh familiar to me. I was a publicist and a writer at the time. Um and but I also knew that if I wanted to preserve the memory of Alberto and remember what this first year of loss was like, I was gonna have to write. Um I I didn't I didn't want to forget uh 2009 to 2010 as as awful as it was. Um I had had some experience with that, and I touch on it in the book. Um when I was 19, I lost my 18-year-old brother in a car accident. And, you know, even though I was a writer, albeit unpaid at the time, um I found I found journaling that year to be exhausting and uh and tough. And and I don't think, you know, I hadn't had any therapy at 19 years old yet. Um so I didn't know, well, you know, that's that's because it is tough, and that's where the work starts, is diving into stuff that you don't want to talk about. Um but at 19 I was introduced to a phenomenon that I call um this is not its its technical name, but it's a grief brain. Um and that is your your brain, your brain right after a loss like this is trying to help you not lose your keys, not lose your job, not you lose your fucking mind. Um and and if you are not consciously trying to record your feelings, your thoughts, your hopes, the events that are happening around you, there's a very good chance you're gonna you're gonna miss that whole year. Yeah. Yeah. So I knew it was important for my sanity. I'd also been through this before and said, if I mean it's not like you not like I consciously said, well, I'm I'm definitely gonna do the first year of grief differently. It was more like, oh, I don't want to forget this year the way I forgot 1994.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, where you almost like block it out. You just become an auto. Your brain shuts down.
SPEAKER_03:Operating system is is doing the work, it's trying to process this loss that it can't really grapple with. So almost all of your waking and sleeping time is your brain trying to help you to come to grips with this, which means you drop the ball in so many other areas of your life. And you lose friends. I was really lucky, and I hope it comes through in the book, to be surrounded by people who supported me. And often I would just tell them how to support me, and they they would show up. Um, if I could use my words, they would they would use their feet and their heart, and I'm grateful for that.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Wow. Yeah, it took it took a village. I did not do it by myself. Of course, of course.
SPEAKER_01:But I mean to like it's very impressive for you to go right into the writing, you know, like uh almost a soothing mechanism of of and and also a distraction, you know.
SPEAKER_03:Um that's it I will I will tell you, because we're double-clicking on this, yeah. This did start from a yes, everything I just said, and for the first month, every night, I mean, I'd work my way through a bottle of wine, and I would call people to just I didn't really want to be alone in my apartment. I didn't necessarily want to be anywhere else, but something would happen. I would just feel the the twilight would come on, and you're just sad. And so I would start calling people, and I'd you know, start with the the West Coast and or the East Coast, work my way to the West Coast. And I remember one time I was just talking to somebody and it was just to not be alone with my own thoughts, and I was very conscious suddenly of why I was doing this, and and I was like, you know what? What if I just don't make that drunk dial tonight? What if I just word vomit onto the page instead of onto all my people who are probably a little tired and we're only a month in. Right. Um, and and and to be fair, uh a dear very dear friend of mine, Tony Papa, who's in the book, um probably about four or three or four months into my grief journey, um, he he suggested I start a Tumblr. Um because he was reading my my tw my Twitter feed and my Facebook posts. Um and he was like, maybe, maybe, maybe start formalizing. Maybe formalized it a little. And I was like, what's a Tumblr? Um so the the so the book began, I began sharing the book way before I had an agent, way before really the manuscript was even done. Um so that and that was kind of helpful because you think you have a really perfect piece of writing, and then you get it into a new format. It's outside of Word, it's suddenly in that little box on Tumblr, and you could see you could see things you couldn't see in the other format or even reading aloud. So I think using, and you know, back then Twitter was 180 characters, like there was no leeway. Um, and I found distilling my my words down to like Twitter length sentiments um helped me eventually become a a tighter, better writer. Right.
SPEAKER_01:So I mean that makes sense. They say the same thing with Hemingway, actually. In the war, he started writing um based on um telegraphs. Telegraphs, yeah. And that's how he came up with his pattern of writing was just short, short to the point, yes, gotta do this. I know.
SPEAKER_03:Was he the one that in invented like the six-word memoir?
SPEAKER_02:Or something that became it in in in all writing workshops, I think that it's the um it's the baby shoes for sale on never used never been worn.
SPEAKER_03:Never used, never worn. Yes, yeah, yeah. The implication of loss at the end of that sentence is just it's galling and an incredible feat of writing to get that conveyed in six words.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah. And so subsequent to the the memoir, you were kind of continued on this as kind of someone who's really open on writing about and confronting and repackaging grief, I guess. And I guess was it cathartic or did it feel like you were just picking at a scab? Cathartic. Yeah. Yeah, cathartic. Because you felt like you were helping others or processing your screen. I wrote the book.
SPEAKER_03:I am not sure I would have written this book if this book already existed. Right. But, you know, 1300 people sent me Joan Diddian's, you know, Year of Magical Thinking, a book I'd already read myself two or three times, and even seen performed on stage by Vanessa Redgrave. Like I didn't need to read that book again. Also, I felt at that moment that I had very little in common with Joan's experience. She was in her 80s, she was rich, she'd had, you know, a a life and a half with her partner. And I I just I bristled at the um at the comparisons. Yeah. Um, nobody was talking about how weird it is to be this age, trying to figure out if you take your ring off or you leave it on, because you know, you leave it on, you get questions about how long you've been married, and then you've got to answer it to strangers, right? But then you're taking it off and it feels a little bit betrayal. Yes, and then that feels strange, and then you maybe put it on the other hand, and and you know, anyway, these are um all the all the things that were not uh discussed in Joan Dideon's uh memoir of grief, and I just went straight in everything from like the first time I masturbated after becoming a widow to you know the terrible awkwardness of dating. Um, you know, when somebody, you know, somebody knows you and your body so well, just the fumbling teenageness of it all, going and realizing, oh, this again. Oh my god. Yeah. Not we were done with it.
SPEAKER_01:The concept of starting over in general, right? Yeah, of course. 100%. Yeah. 100%.
SPEAKER_02:I kind of want to jump ahead while we're doing this. To to Jorge. So you have remarried. I do know your husband. We both know your husband. Spoiler alert, listeners. Um it's not all tragedy. Uh yeah, can you give us a little breakdown of the origin story of I would love to do that? This new phase in your life.
SPEAKER_03:All right. So, um, and this this phase is not covered in the book. This is probably a a future, a future memoir, a future modern love column. But um my daughter I met, I reunited with at 18. Um, and I lived in New York, she lived in in uh the South. Um, but I I told her I could not host her in New York until she was 21 because there's just too much fun stuff to do. Exactly. And I do not want to be responsible for her getting roofied, alcohol poisoning. Like, what kind of momming is that, right? So just you know, boundaries. So she decides to come to New York for her 21st birthday. She's gonna spend it with me, of all people. Um, I have this whole night planned. I keep telling her this is a marathon on a sprint, we're not doing shots. We can do that later this week, but not tonight. Um, so into a wonderful meal at the Ace Hotel, and then I took her to like very, you know, New York-y, take her to the Gansavort, take her to Hogs and Heifers when it was still there. Love it. Um, made our way to uh Bathtub Gin, which is a coffee, uh coffee spot by day, and it's a speakeasy in the back um by night. And uh so this was like the fifth place that we went, and my daughter is, you think I have energy? Yeah, she's the extrovert, just she's just it's my 21st birthday. She's just kind of like running around the bar with all this all this delight. And uh Jorge was there. I didn't know him at the time, but he was there with his friends uh from California, and he was like, It's really your birthday, and she's like, Yeah, it's my 21st. And he added another, kindly added another whiskey to his order. And when he handed it to her, I'm observing all of this, like I'm not getting in the way. I just want to make sure she doesn't get roofied um and uh and that this guy isn't a creep, um, or any of his friends. Yeah. Um, so she takes the the tumbler and she's about to throw it back clearly like it's a shot, and he's like, yo, yo, you know, that's fancy whiskey. That's for sipping, not for shooting. And I'm like, oh my God. Thank you. That's what I've been screaming all night. Um so he asks me how I know her, and I tell him funny story, 21 years ago tonight. I placed her in her adoptive parents' arms, and 17 and a half years later, she friended me on Facebook. Now we have matching tattoos, and she's here for her 21st. Like, he just laid it on him. He just laid it on him. Just laid it on. Oh, and oh, it gets better. It gets better because apparently he was not put off by that. Um, he did he did tell me that he had that was we man, we covered a lot of ground in that that very short exchange before we even had the first kiss.
SPEAKER_02:You go, you go hard and fast. Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_03:So go on, and then um so I had um I had handed him my uh business card, just like my a bookmark with my uh book cover on the on the front of it, and he sees Rodriguez and he's like, Oh, sorry about the divorce. And I was like, Yeah, you mean the deaf? And he was like, Okay, yeah. Um, so I think maybe he thought I was a little put off. So he uh called my phone right in front of me to make sure I hadn't given him a fake number. Um wow, confirmed, and he had to had to go on to the next place to entertain his friends. But after he left, I told my daughter, man, I should have kissed him. And and she's like, not too late. He's probably still getting his code together. It's code check out there. And I was like, I should do it, and she she totally goaded me on. So I opened the door and I saw I made eye contact with one of his friends who's now one of my very close friends, and she's like, you know, basically for the listeners who can't see my gesticulation. Um she's she's tapping really absurdly on Hory's shoulder to get him to turn around and look toward me. And I give him a little come hither once he makes eye contact with me, and I pull him into the speakeasy, and we have our first kiss. Wow. Wow. Um and then our first date was like four or five days later, um, the day after Lori had already gone back to Charleston, where she lives now. So I love that she's part of our origin story. So right. And the and and really there's there are aspects of our lives that seem like they should they should have already intersected. We lived in many of the same cities almost at the same time. Um we went to high school 60 miles away from each other. So when we go back to California for Christmas, like it's not it's not complicated. It's not as complicated as you would expect. Um, so yeah.
unknown:Wow.
SPEAKER_03:60 miles away for high school, and we meet at a bar in Chelsea, New York. Serendipitous. That's crazy. And when was that? That was my daughter's birthday, her 21st birthday, which was December 29th, 2014.
SPEAKER_00:Damn.
SPEAKER_03:Wow. Yeah, yeah.
unknown:Wow.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. And I was the maid of honor in her wedding uh two years ago. Okay.
SPEAKER_02:Right before you flew out.
SPEAKER_03:That was so incredible. It was very, very surreal. So yeah, we've been in each other's lives now for 14 plus years, long enough to like have some fights, which is which is crazy and exciting. I remember when I was uh working with the editor at the at the Times on my modern love column, he really wanted conflict. Daniel Jones. He's like, we need to introduce conflict, and he kept trying to like force me to admit that my daughter and I hadn't gotten along even once. And I'm like, I don't know how to explain to you that I have only spent, I've only I've only hung out with her eight times. We don't have time for fighting.
SPEAKER_02:You're in the honeymoon phase.
SPEAKER_03:We're still in the honeymoon phase, exactly. Somewhere around 10 years, yes, we had we started to have disagreements about things, or I really wish she would fill in the blank here when when one of us would stay with the other. But these, you know, I've I have probably one of the most yeah, that's just the most incredible relationship in my life is the one that I have with my now 31-year-old daughter who I met at seven, or I met on her 18th birthday.
SPEAKER_02:That's insane. Yeah, I mean, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. I mean, are we gonna work on this collaborative script for the movie?
SPEAKER_01:Are you guys working on an adoption script? Well, that is a good question, though. Have you had any offers? I have you I mean, you must with this book.
SPEAKER_03:I really had high hopes. Um, Evil Ongoria signed on as producer um probably like seven years ago. Yeah and uh I forget what the name of her production company is, but it's within the the canopy of NBC Universal. Um but the script and the notes from the um the network, I feel like the the person that they hired to write it, I was consulting, the person they hired to write it was is capable. She's great. Her name's Kat Koro, she's done a bunch of amazing things, very female-centric. Um, but they kind of took a gritty story and they tried to make it look like a sitcom. And and I could already picture like the How I Met Your Mother set and the laugh track. And the laugh track. Even though we're we're not really doing that anymore. Yeah, but um, you know, it just it it just no. It it was not this is not a family-friendly story. This deserves to be on HBO. This should be on, you know, Netflix or Apple. This is not, this is not made for this is not PG.
SPEAKER_01:So was that your decision then to pull out kind of thing?
SPEAKER_03:I think we all knew once the first script was created that it just no. So they held on to it for another year, they optioned it for another year, and then and basically optioning just means they have the option to hold to basically hold it and not allow anyone else to buy it. So um, so you know, there's there there's a pilot, um, there's a pilot treatment that's been written. Um there that I I worked with like two two very, very talented friends uh all in the film industry. We wrote it, COVID happened, a lot of a lot of things changed. My film agent uh you know got consolidated, lots of people lost their jobs. Like I just I don't know. And since I would say since COVID, I really haven't moved forward with trying to bring it to the uh to the screen. To be fair, I was busy stepmoming and wifing again from 2019 on.
SPEAKER_02:Um but I I think the story could be up to date.
SPEAKER_01:You know, I feel like that would be you know, for a full a limited series kind of thing where you really develop it into no you just I just keep no, I just keep thinking about that um that this American Life episode where that young young guy writes his first screenplay and it's just very sentimental, really deep, really passionate about I don't even remember what it was about because it changes. Do you guys know the story where he I mean he it was his his baby, you know, his his project, and it's gorgeous. And they finally pick it up and um they start working on it and they start rewriting it, and I think it was either about like love lost or you know, just something very passionate, something very passionate to him. And by the end of the rewrites and everything else, it ended up being dirty dancing sequel, Havana Nights. Oh my god, like the worst, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02:Sorry, don't shit on Diego Luna.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, but it was like straight to D. It's about the only thing you can't shit on in that movie. Yeah, like straight to DV, you know what I mean? Like this poor guy, but I highly suggest listening to. The episode is hilarious.
SPEAKER_03:Havana Havana Nights, I'm pretty sure it was shot in Puerto Rico.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So I don't know. I just think of you know, I always think about that one, like horror story, because I'm working out a screenplay right now, too. I just think of the horror stories of people taking it and then the studios just hacking it. Yeah, hacking it to down. And for you, this is your life story. I mean, this isn't something you just made up. This is this is real life. Yeah, this is not dynamics.
SPEAKER_02:Well, I I know that like Eddie Huang uh had signed off on um Fresh Off the Boat, which became a sitcom, and he was not happy. Oh, he did not like he divorced himself from that and was vocal about disagreeing. Because it made it palpable for a white audience. Right. One it I would say that would be one of my critiques. It made it palpable for a white audience. My husband is ethnically Taiwanese, and so some of these similarities that I've seen with the family play out, while as his family was a little more well, they spoke English and more affluent. But seeing some of these similarities and watching it being much more accessible. Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_01:You lose I mean that's that is the world we live in, unfortunately.
SPEAKER_03:The hope is eventually for you, for you, for me, we find a writing or we find a producing partner that comes with enough um power that they can they can protect your story from the hacksaws.
SPEAKER_02:You got money for on location filming in Mahaka? Hit me up. Yeah, hey, girls for you. Can I you don't need to guess?
SPEAKER_01:That's all I gotta say. Bring that box up so much. Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02:It's euphoria, but ethnic and bilingual, and on location. And they're a little older, they're not actually teenagers, so we don't have to worry about that.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, there is hope. You know, they've done things like high maintenance. I mean, there are people that do it's just dying for dying for sex. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_03:How did I not sweep all the enemies this year? I watched it three times, it was incredible. Also based off a podcast, ladies. Oh, I just got goosebumps.
SPEAKER_02:Michelle Williams in that one, so the brief synopsis is she knows that she's going to die, and she leaves her husband and she explores like she's never had an orgasm, and then so with another human, with another human. And so the whole show is about her coming to terms with dying and the process of that and finding her orgasm with another person. And it's so smart. The acting is fucking beautiful, and it deals with so much real crunchy stuff.
SPEAKER_03:And I does not shy away from the awful edges and yet finds like gives the characters and the audience room to laugh in these really sad, horrible situations. And God bless Jenny Slate for the comedic value she brings to every scene. Um it was just incredible. I have I have no notes. It's just wonderful. I'd like my my story to turn out the city.
SPEAKER_02:Fair chemistry and Dead Like Me. I think with Christina Applegate and um Linda Cartonelli. Cartinelli, yes. I always mess up her last name. Um yeah, the same like the chemistry and just the the relationship between two adult women dealing with tragedy. And while Dead Like Me gets a little more farcical, um, it's still a brilliantly written show and dealing with icky stuff.
SPEAKER_03:Icky stuff, full front and center.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah. Speaking of, do you have any not icky stuff? It's like I probably uh yeah, like are you working on anything? Are you back? So I know that you ghost write. Are you still actively doing that? I am and how does that feel as a writer, like being someone else?
SPEAKER_03:So I don't I don't mind it at all. Okay, there are some areas in which I feel like I would want my own byline and I wouldn't want to grief, maybe adoption, fashion. Those are all areas in which if you Google me, I'm gonna have bylines in those industries, um, in those spaces. Um, but I I'm I'm writing on the behalf of uh CEOs that really just don't have time to write their own stuff, or they're busy writing a book, but they need to start seeding the content ahead of time. So writing their their Forbes fortune HBR articles, it doesn't feel like treason to the to the writer and me. Also, I'm getting paid for it. Yeah. Um and you know, it's not not super important for me to be a thought leader in the areas of creativity, innovation, uh, or even neuro exclus or inclusivity. So um, those are areas in which I write for clients. Um I know I know a fuckload about all of them, but I don't feel like I want to write a book about any of it. Right. I'll edit their chapters. I sometimes ghost write their whole chapters. Um female and uh male clients.
SPEAKER_02:Okay. That's just a world I'm I'm not familiar with. Like I know the concept of it. Yes.
SPEAKER_03:So it's it's a wonderful way to um get content out there now that you know publications like I say publications, that's I'm that's really dating me. Media outlets like Forbes, you know, they used to have all these on staff writers who created all their content. Now they get thought leaders like my clients to sign on to do at least, you know, 12 articles a year. And you're not really they're not really getting paid. I mean, once it hits like 10,000 views, you start to get some some pennies for the eyeballs. But but basically they have their business model is free content.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I was just saying.
SPEAKER_03:So that has opened up as a writer and a publicist like a whole new world. Because back when I was doing PR for a living, 2008-2009, you you couldn't just, oh please let me let me give you a piece from my client's point of view. They're like, that's pay-for-play. Right. It's not pay-for-play anymore. It's it's content. Wow, that's interesting.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So these people who are signed on to do these, they're paying you to create the content for them. And basically, it's pitching their brand, double downing on their name.
SPEAKER_03:It's it's using it, you are you're talking about issues that or or areas of business that they want to own and be a thought leader in. So I mean, some sometimes if they get busy, you're suggesting like, hey, what about this and this? Like, you really want to push, you know, humor for the next year in terms of your workshop. So what if we do an article all about how you know humor increases knowledge transfer? Or just I'm just throwing stuff out there. Totally. Um so you know, you can kind of um and you know, and all those things build the brand of the person you're writing for so that if when they do get to the place where they're writing a book, they've already got content. They've already got content.
SPEAKER_02:Um you were aware of like all of this? No. Okay. I'm like, I know like the thing.
SPEAKER_03:We can offline we can like offline and talk about.
SPEAKER_02:Right. Um whatnot. But you are the IRL and actually doing research and coming up with I mean, I use the robots like everyone else.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, I can now write four articles in a week instead of one, right? So or four articles in three days instead of one. Um it I mean, I I I feel like especially when you hit writer's block, or it's that last paragraph, you got to tie it all together, just the feeding. Feeding it in there and seeing what it spits back at you is rarely, it's rarely perfect in its first draft, but it gives you something strong typically to build on. Um and sometimes sometimes that's all you need. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, full disclosure, we do AI for the episode summaries that go onto our our website. I personally lose sleep over writing the two lines that I put for Instagram, because that's where my personal writerless writerliness comes in. But honestly, like my energy wants to come into these conversations and preparing and doing research to be able to have these conversations. That at the end, like the summary is not where I get excited. No. Um, and generally, honestly, it does a really fucking good job. I do do the titles whether anyone likes them or dislikes them.
SPEAKER_03:I am a fan of alliterations and I know people hate them, but I think I think all the titles are great, and I did not know that the um that the summaries were AI generated. I do feel very authentic.
SPEAKER_02:I do edit them. Good job. But it's it's pretty surprising how how good they can be. Right. Um, which freaks me out. But the titles and the Instagram things, those are 100% me. But yeah, and I felt weird about doing that as a writer, but I'm like, this is not what gets my goat.
SPEAKER_03:Well, and and everyone else is doing it, which means the level of productivity um and the volume of content is just expected to be higher. Your clients expect you to utilize that instead of charging them for that's the unfortunate part though. For the time, it's like if I'm charging them for, you know, this used to take me eight hours. It takes me like 2.5.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, we'll edit that in. No, it's okay.
SPEAKER_03:I I'm I'm I'm pretty I'm pretty open, kimono, about that. Like if anything, it's the value that we're bringing. Like, all right, give get we can do more. Yeah. Give me more. I was gonna say just have more bandwidth now.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, right. Fascinating. I yeah, it's a world that I I just think of celebrities. Oh, I came out with my memoir. And we know Smokey did not write it.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. Oh, I'm sorry. Is that was that not common knowledge?
SPEAKER_02:I didn't know she had a book. Yes.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, good, great. Yeah. Oh fuck. I mean, I always knew that that was happening, but now it's like seeing the wizard behind the curtain. Right. You're the wizard behind the curtain. I didn't know that.
SPEAKER_02:And she's so cute. And you were yeah, it was like punching. Okay. Um recently, so we've been trying to schedule this, this, uh, this episode for a minute. Um, but you were traveling. That's your other love. And you've been to a lot of fucking places, over 30 countries, right? And I was trying to count mine, and I think I'm like at 20 plus, 20-ish. Um so do you just travel for fun? Do you just do this? And the vibe of I mean, being a writer and organizing your thoughts, are you that way traveling? Like, do you plan everything?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, you're not a spontaneous like well, I leave room for spontaneity, okay, but I I think when you get to a country, especially usually going a place you don't speak the language, right? Right. And you know, how's the Wi-Fi gonna be in places like Morocco? Not good. Right. Um, so you know, you do your research. Doing the research ahead of time and then you know, booking the you know, somebody to give you a walking tour of I just go with Morocco, of Casablanca, where you're eating food along the way that you know is is is local, and you've got someone who's who's bilingual who's who's sharing the cultural uh importance of where you are and and what you're seeing. You've also got representation, which if you're a blonde girl whose shoulders and knees might be showing in Morocco, it's good to have representation because everyone's really covered up as a female. I I did not quite double-click enough into that country actually before we went. It's one of the only places where I felt I am woefully unprepared for this trip. I had a big, huge deadline uh right before, and I was just working right up until uh we left on Christmas Eve. But um, so yeah, it's typically I book Airbnb experiences. I really like it's like you know, go to go to Mexico City and you know, hop on a rented bike and stop at three or four places, including like the best place to get a choro, and it ends at like Frida Kahlo's you know, childhood home, which they've already gotten tickets so you don't have to stand in the line, like all these sort of hacks to um to make it so that you spend as little time queuing as possible.
SPEAKER_02:Okay, uh cool. And how do you pick where you go?
SPEAKER_03:I mean, often it is like where the dollar is uh the week, like is stronger. So, you know, we went to Japan a couple times because wow, your money goes went really far there in 2024 and um 2023. Um now it seems like they've they've figured it out, everything's starting to get expensive again. Um but yeah, so it does tend to be places that either we haven't gone to and we're interested in going to. Um or where where does our money go the furthest right now? Right. Um cool. So what some of the favorite places? Some of the favorite places. Um we just got back. Well, I would say you did a panic trip. Tokyo, I would just say like Tokyo is just like its own planet. It's just no place I've ever been on Earth. And and the more we've now been back a couple of times, and it seems like every time I go, just you realize how much more there is to see every time you start to get a little bit deeper. You start to meet business owners who thankfully are are way more bilingual than you are. Um, and we have um one of our one of our favorite things to do when we connect with a bartender or a server in a country that we're traveling through is we ask, where should we go next? But like, not just like don't don't send us to the place that the next tourists should go to. But where are you and your friends? Where do you do after drinks? Yes, exactly. We did the same thing. And that's how that's how we have discovered some really, really incredible um off the beaten path spots. So yeah, Seoul um was amazing, same way and and a little more friendlier to tattoos. Well, actually, completely friendly to tattoos compared to Tokyo. Yeah, yeah. We were not allowed to do the onsen uh at all. There are some tattoo-friendly or safe spaces. So the on sons are are the um the um but tattoos are a holdover from the Yakuza days where um, you know, they I guess in order to maintain public safety, there were rules about having tattoos because at that time you only had a tattoo if you were a gangster. Right. And even though it's uh it's a pretty outdated rule, um, you know, Tokyo's big on their uh kind of double down on tradition.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Yeah, a little bit. Yeah. And rules of societal engagement.
SPEAKER_01:So let me get this right. In Tokyo, you can't show tattoos at all.
SPEAKER_03:You can, but you just can't enter, like um, you can't go to a pool at a hotel unless you put on a rash guard. And if you've got them on your legs, you gotta wear like a wetsuit. Right. Which just again takes the complete point out of getting cool in the pool when it's a hundred and ten degrees uh in Tokyo, which it is in August. Right. Um I didn't know that.
SPEAKER_01:I didn't know that that was still a thing. I mean, I I'd heard, you know, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:As far as I I because we researched going, uh we were going to go last year, and then I read that the World Expo was going to be there. And I was like, I'm not a big crowd person, and this is I think not what I should be doing uh when the entire world is coming here.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, no, pick a pick a different week. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So so while the yen was, you know, uh the dollar was good and the yen was down, uh I the crowds were up, and so we went to Thailand and so.
SPEAKER_03:Oh good. I that is on the list. So how was it?
SPEAKER_02:Loved it. Loved it. Hot as fuck. What what time of year? July, August? We were no, we were there in February, March. Oh, is it oh it's opposite land, that's right. We went I think it's all the time. Oh yeah, yeah. I think it's just all the time. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Um Jorge and my first trip together, I think I was still auditioning for we were we were exclusive, but maybe I was auditioning for the part of wife and stepmom. Um, but we uh we went to Hong Kong uh together and then we side tripped to uh to Vietnam. And it was yeah, it was a you can tell a lot, like you can tell a lot from the kiss, you can tell a lot from traveling with people, what they're gonna be like. Um because you know, there's there are a lot of things out of your control when you travel and you get to see stress, it's hyper stress.
SPEAKER_02:And what are your skill sets of dealing with being being uncomfortable, of not knowing what's happening, of being lost, sure, of things going awry.
SPEAKER_03:Um or just even, you know, like you're in very close proximity and you've never really shared a bathroom for longer than like one or two nights, and you're in a foreign country. Like travel, how does that go? Yeah, we've all got it's either that or it's the constipation, right?
SPEAKER_02:So first trip to Taiwan, I didn't ship for five days.
SPEAKER_03:Like these are not ideal um circumstances to spend with someone you're trying to impress, but it's super crucial that you see these sides of each other, and you you know that's how you that's how you know is this is this gonna be somebody who who can roll with me? Yeah, can I roll with him?
SPEAKER_02:And and obviously things worked out.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, things worked out. We figured out the bathroom situation.
SPEAKER_01:That is an important one, though. I remember uh traveling with my boyfriend uh and our very first trip was Puerto Rico, and I got food poisoning in this tiny hotel for three days. I mean, you know, I won't go into detail, but you can understand. And I'm like, this man is gonna leave me. It was our very first vacation, you know, and he stuck. He stuck around five years, you know.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, he saw you probably at your absolute worst. It was like, I think I want more of that. Yeah, exactly. Absolute worst. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, exactly. Well pooping and loving, yeah. I know, exactly. Travel, bathrooms, grief.
SPEAKER_02:Just a lighthearted comedy. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly.
SPEAKER_02:I mean, poop's funny. I mean, fart jokes, we're still grown and we still laugh at a good fart joke. We do. Yeah, that's true. Or a good fart. Or a good fart, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01:You're like, are you okay? Well, should we do a question?
SPEAKER_02:Okay. I always now we're at the divided middle point and I don't know So you know this is where we just yep exactly.
SPEAKER_03:But I did not realize it was comes from a box. Literally a box of Yeah. I I kind of just thought you just had random pieces of paper like a raffle.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, that would have been cute. I like that. I don't like that. Uh it was weird.
SPEAKER_03:It was a weird phrase.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. Uh-oh.
SPEAKER_02:I don't know. Based on your face, I'm gonna say no.
SPEAKER_01:I say keep going then. Yeah, that was not a good that was not a good face. Marissa's making faces as she pulls out the question.
SPEAKER_02:Do you have any all right? When did you last throw your head back in laughter? I feel like just now. Talking about fart jokes.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I would say that. Um, let's see. I feel like there was an SNL episode skit very recently that I threw my head back and laughed my ass off. Um It was it Bad Bunny was in the skit, but I may have had an edible, so I may not remember exactly what skit it was, but it was it was rolling on the ground laughing at that level. So I enjoy a I love I love a good belly laugh. Yeah, me too.
SPEAKER_02:Um so you got a thing for Latino men. Do you speak Spanish? Do they speak Spanish?
SPEAKER_03:I can get around.
SPEAKER_02:Um you can get drunk, you can get laid, you can get fed and go to the bathroom.
SPEAKER_03:Yep. Oh yeah, easily. And I I mean I feel like going into almost any country, I I'm a pescatarian, so I do try and uh figure out how to say can I get this without meat. Yeah. Not just fish, but also like because people don't think like, oh, this is a beef-based broth. Or I I have learned when I go to places like um, well, anywhere in Asia, I take these uh enzyme pills every day. Just basically just make sure because I already my ramen is gonna be full flavor whether I ask for it to be not. Or it is. It doesn't matter. I know I'm gonna be eating meat whether I want to.
SPEAKER_02:My my mother doesn't eat meat, and my my abuelo would always make beans, but he'd cook them with bacon. Pork, of course. This is the best kind of beef. Not for her. Yeah, and also chicken is not meat. No, it's not. So you know, that's just yeah, no, they senchiladas. No, they're there's yeah, yeah, it's just it's just chicken. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think you just kind of have to adapt, right? Occasionally. Yeah. Pivot. Pivot, yeah. All right.
SPEAKER_02:Do you have a laughter story, my queen?
SPEAKER_01:Um, no, never well, you know, I have been um recently rewatching Modern Family, and I'm getting some belly laugh there. I mean, I think w when I look back on that show, I it's just it has done a lot for a community that it it really started to it it introduced family lives to middle America that I don't think had ever seen before and got to like normalized. Normalized exactly, exactly. But I've had some belly laughs at probably high on edibles, I'm gonna be honest.
SPEAKER_02:Ken and I rewatched it probably two years ago. I think while we were traveling, just like as a backdrop, just to like have something on and like decompress from so much stimuli. Uh and it really, it's it's a brilliant show. Thinking like I really want to be in a writer's room, I want to work on some good television. Um all right. This okay, we're just gonna do it.
SPEAKER_01:All right, we're doing one more.
SPEAKER_02:Let's do it. What would your ideal pornography be like? Oh my god, that threw me out.
SPEAKER_03:Well, I'm definitely not gonna tell my stepdaughters to watch. I know. Are we to listen to this podcast?
SPEAKER_02:I don't know. Do we need to put a radiance? I mean, I always hit explicit, but this is surprising. Okay.
SPEAKER_03:You know what? This is actually you've read my book. So this is probably not a mystery. Instead of answering, based on what you read in the book, take a wild guess.
SPEAKER_01:Oh boy, that's a lot of pressure.
SPEAKER_03:I can't do that for me.
SPEAKER_02:I don't even want to answer myself, but I thought it would be a good thing.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, so for the for the listeners who haven't read, there is there is this there is a story about the first night Alberto and I met, and there may be some MDMA involved. There also may be some spanking involved. Oh, we're going at like that.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, I this is this is awkward. So yes, I would say like just spanking porn. That's my jam. You like spanking.
SPEAKER_02:I like a so tagline off of that. Everyone read the book. I do like I do also like a good spank. And rest in peace, Drake, my dog. Oh, you're bringing your dog into porn?
SPEAKER_03:Wow, this is I can't wait to see where this ends up. Definitely don't tell your dog.
SPEAKER_02:I hated spanking. So he would hear spanking anywhere. Oh, in the bedroom. I see that. And he would be so upset. Even just like walking by in the kitchen, I'm like, oh, your butt looks so good, and I'm just smacking his butt. And it upset Drake so much. So I I don't I I have been trained not to spank because my dog would be very upset. Uh booby.
SPEAKER_03:I don't know about like porn, but like I guess I mean I I would imagine you probably could not play spanking porn with the sound up if that dog was still around.
SPEAKER_02:And I don't know if that would be as satisfying because I like this, just like a good high five, the sound.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. That popping sound. Same. Yeah, it's really satisfying.
SPEAKER_03:And the response too. I don't I don't like being like the porn where the woman has no response where she's just taking and like I I don't want to beat someone. Yeah, yeah. Some some sound effects uh on the spank spank E are appreciated.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:How about um how about you?
SPEAKER_01:I yeah, I honestly I haven't had sex in years, so I don't even know.
SPEAKER_03:We're talking about porn fantasies?
SPEAKER_01:I don't know. I you guys, I just don't know. I like I gotta be honest, that all the meds I'm on, I don't really have that part of my brain anymore. Does that make sense? So your porn be like somebody knocks on the door. So I takes my meds away and makes me healthy, and then cars are distributed.
SPEAKER_03:Your porn is that someone comes over and cleans your house for free. Yeah, exactly. Your dog died.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that sounds fucking awesome. I love that. Yeah. So I mean, I'm sure, yeah, I love a good rom-com. You know, I guess I guess my my porn is more like PG. Like I like the meat cutes and all that kind of stuff. And then, you know, and listen, when I say I haven't had in years, that doesn't mean I haven't had a lot of you know what I mean. Like I really fulfilled that in my 20s. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like, I so I think now I'm just the older I get, I just kind of whine. Yeah, I think it would be walking my dog and cleaning my apartment and cooking me dinner, you know.
SPEAKER_03:No shame in that.
SPEAKER_01:No, I think that's awesome.
SPEAKER_02:I'm getting dinner tonight. Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_01:I'm gonna get it delivered. The porn's getting delivered tonight, guys.
SPEAKER_03:I can't wait to see what the AI summary of this conversation, right? It was gonna be a pot of gold at the end of that. Summary for sure. I agree completely.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Well, I guess on that note, a little porn. We'll just um everyone enjoy your day. Hopefully, this uh storm the this disrupt to other people. Yeah, exactly. Um, let's plug the book one more time.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, splitting the difference, a heart shape memoir. Um buy it on Amazon or any independent bookstore.
SPEAKER_02:All right, awesome. And we'll put that punk foot notes. We'll we'll keep you posted. Yeah. All right. Indeed. Love it. Thank you so much for having me. So fun. Love y'all. All right, love you to you. You didn't even have to pee yet.
SPEAKER_01:I know. Well, I do. I'm just didn't want to say it.
SPEAKER_02:I'm trying to be good. Love.
SPEAKER_01:All right, bye.
