The Johnjay Van Es Podcast

What Do You Gain from Thousands of Hikes If Not Fitness?

• JohnJay Van Es • Season 1 • Episode 14

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Restaurateur Craig DeMarco (Postino, Le Grande Orange) has logged 4,600+ hikes up Camelback Mountain, not for fitness, but as a daily meditation that shaped his approach to parenting, partnership, and community.

In this episode, Craig shares the rituals that endure slow hikes, mindful practices, optimized sleep, and prevention-focused health, along with insights on marriage, parenting, and creating neighborhood hubs like Air Guitar. 

From meditation to music memories, it’s a conversation about living with purpose and building spaces where people truly connect.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay, so welcome to our podcast. This is a little bit different today because this podcast is a spin-off of our radio show. This podcast, I just like, I just talk. I just want to like, I'm not even gonna introduce you, you know, that we're just gonna talk, I'd probably say another thing, but this is Craig DeMarco anyway. And I wanted to have you on because yeah, you have all these great restaurants, but I just love your biohacking life. If it falls under the umbrella of biohacking, or is it spiritual? Well, what is it? What is because I know you you the retreats you do, and I'm gonna get into that, but also the fact that you hike camelback every day. Do you still do that?

SPEAKER_01:

A lot, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Did you do it today?

SPEAKER_01:

I think I did not do it this morning. I'm I had a long meditation this morning, but I I've been doing camelback since 1988. And I'm I haven't I've been counted every single hike, but I'm probably in the mid 4500, 4600 hikes, so over a long, long span of time. But and I always joke with people, you know, when I start hiking camelback, it was much lower in elevation. And I hike to the top and I drop all my emotional baggage, and now it's actually taller than it was when I started. So I I mean, I love that mountain so much. It's just it's so special to me. But do you time it? Have you timed it? I used to. I'm in 55 now and I can't hammer like I used to hammer. When I was in my 20s, I could go sub-20 minutes without much effort. But that was when I was doing it 300 days a year. Are you going Echo, Choya, both? I do Echo almost 99% of the time. I'll do Choya when the people in town that want to see a different perspective of the valley or a trail. But I love Echo Canyon.

SPEAKER_03:

Is there a hack to it? Because I know what like how do you handle it in the summertime?

SPEAKER_01:

Early, headlamp most of the time. Like four? Yeah. Yeah, 4 30. I'd get up there, 4 30, 4 45. You know, and again, not I'm not complaining, but as I get older, the doing it in the heat is getting harder.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

I could handle it in my 20s when it was 100 degrees, but now it's it wipes you out pretty good.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay, let me ask you this because you have you have two boys, right? Yep. Do you um they obviously know you do that? Did they ever go with you? Did you make them go with you?

SPEAKER_01:

When they were younger, we went up and it was great. I mean, it was really special to me. But I always told them, you know, I I by the time they got up to go to school or when they were young enough to remember, I had already hiked a mountain. Everything else in my day was just gonna be easier.

SPEAKER_02:

Right.

SPEAKER_01:

I already accomplished something substantial. Right. And that was kind of a message we had in our family. Get up and accomplish something in the morning. Set your day off in the right, in the right direction.

SPEAKER_03:

Right.

SPEAKER_01:

So I kind of used that was my that was my thing that I did, that really got me going for the day.

SPEAKER_03:

Now, did your father do that for you?

SPEAKER_01:

Wow, great question. My dad was a crazy entrepreneur and he was traveled a lot. He was a salesperson, so he's gone a lot. Um, I remember his hustle, I don't remember his routines. That's a great question. I'd like to ask him. Thanks for reminding me. I'm gonna call him when we get down here and ask him what his routines were when he was really getting after it as a as a younger adult with a family.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, for me, I remember my father always said, healthy body, healthy mind, and he was always exercising. There was a point where my my weight fluctuated when I was a kid. And I remember when I was like 14, he would take me to 24-hour fitness and we'd work out, but I think he was taking me there so that I would work out. So when when I got older and had kids, my weight fluctuated a lot. And I wanted to make sure my kids didn't have that problem growing up. So when they got to the age, my dad died of a heart attack in 66, and he was in great shape. So I was like, holy shit, I I gotta do, and I was I was 350 pounds. So I like got in shape, dropped some weight, and I thought, I don't want these three kids to go through that. So I started exercising, I started going into yoga, doing bicker yoga. And whenever they got in trouble, I would take them with me. That was their punishment, 90 minutes of bicker yoga, because I learned that from a woman in class. And then I realized I don't want them to associate being in trouble with yoga. So as they got older, I started doing orange theory, and I took them with me to orange theory classes, and it turned into this competition, and it turned into this great bonding for me and the boys. So now all three of them are in college, and all three of them on their own eat right, exercise, 9% body fat. You know what I mean? Not that we I measure it, but but I mean they just actually got it measured on their own. So I'm like, I always so I was just curious if your kids have taken that dad, I count back every day. I'm gonna go ride a bike today, or I'm gonna lift weights today.

SPEAKER_01:

We've always promoted an active lifestyle, we've always promoted clean eating. Um, so they've had that a lot when they were young. We had to be very careful though, not to, you know, be so in control of them that they felt like it they were obsessed about it. And a couple times I had to make sure that they could enjoy being a youth and they can go to Chick-fil-A. Sure. And they can, you know, that's what their peer group does. And so we weren't so rigid, but we did have a habit of a family of living clean and living healthy and being active. And I know and I watch some of your kids play sports, and it was important for our family, for our kids to be in youth sports. Same here. We even questioned sometimes whether we had them overloaded, running from practice to tournament to practice. At the end of the day, it decreased screen time, it kept them active, and the lessons they learned being on teams, those are the lessons you take with you for the rest of your life.

SPEAKER_03:

You're right. You're right, you're totally right. But would you say, like, let's take your camel back, you hike in camelback? Were you obsessed? Is that an obsession?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and everyone, everyone that knows how much I've hiked camelback and how much I love it, assumed it was for all physical benefits, but it really was the opposite. Yeah. You know, I've had some anxiety in my life, and it really helped me to one, you know, have an outlet to go up there and spend some time. And it's it's almost for me, it's meditative. Before I even really started practicing meditation, now I realize all those hour, hour and 10 minutes up and down camelback, it was a meditative practice for me.

SPEAKER_03:

I totally get it. You know, I stuck um I've been going to Cancun and Kabul getting stem cells, and I met this guy last year, about a year ago today, right around a year ago this time, um, and he's a huge hiker, and he's from here. And we connected while getting stem cells, and he was like, Come hiking with me. And because I had I have some calcium in my heart, and I've got to somehow figure that out, right? And one of the things to do for cardiovascular issues is cardio. And so I was like, Yeah, I'll go hiking with you. And I went hiking with this dude maybe two or three times a week. Uh, and it's just different. You're right. Like, my mind, it's just this peace, it's like it like lowers stress. Like, but like you hike alone, or you also ever hike with people?

SPEAKER_01:

I rarely go with anyone else because it's my practice. I think my wife joke about this, and I've hiked with her, but she knows it's what I do for myself. Right. And I have I have a little, again, routine and system, and over the decades I've changed. I used to listen to a lot of aggressive music while I was hiking, you know, just because I wanted to charge it. Now I'm I I I listen to content. Sometimes I don't listen to anything, I listen to my footsteps, really, depending on what I'm trying to how I want to live my day that day. But that's camelback. Do you do other hikes? Yeah, but camelback, we live again pretty close. Right. You know, I proposed on camelback, we got married on camelback. It's it's a special part of my life. Right. And it's close. But I when I do have a chance, when I'm traveling, we were opening a new postino in um Colorado in Westminster. And between the lunch and the dinner shifts on our friends and family events, I ran over and hiked Cinitas and Boulder and did a cold plunge in the river and had made it back before dinner service. So I'll work hard to find those opportunities. That's awesome. Yeah. Cold plunge of the river is different, isn't it? It's a it's a different deal. It's different like your cold plunge when the water's moving. That's a psycho cold plunge. It's a different deal.

SPEAKER_03:

I remember being in yours and feel like razors going across my chest. Dude, you know what's funny? I got, I went, I was in Cancun two weeks ago getting stem cells, and I I'm the in my own the doctors told me three days, no cold plunge, no sauna, no hot tub. And I'm like, I feel like it has to be longer than that. So I'm on two weeks of no hot tub, no cold plunge, and it's just messing me up. I need that cold plunge. I my new thing now, I love the sauna now. I've been doing the sauna for about a year and a half. I love the sauna. But let me jump back to the meditation. When you said you did meditation today, what was that and what started that? And how has it helped?

SPEAKER_01:

So I always, you know, dabbled with meditation through some apps or you know, my own exploring, and I really wanted to get more serious about an educated. So I started following this guy named Joe Dispenza, who I become a raving fan of. Oh, he's the one that was the Nashville thing. I went to a week-long retreat in Nashville, my first retreat with him in Nashville last year, and then I went and did it in um Cancun, another week with him in Cancun, and learned more about the practice of meditation, a lot of the science behind it. And I've been about on a year and a half now of a real meditation practice where I understand meditation differently than I used to. I used to think it was, again, any practice is beneficial. What I used to do was more like relaxation techniques. Now, to be able to meditate and really get outside of myself into my subconscious and lower my high-level beta brain waves down to alpha and theta and delta and understand how it really works. It's been an important part of my life.

SPEAKER_03:

How long is like is your meditation, like 10 years of meditation?

SPEAKER_01:

I do an hour almost every morning.

SPEAKER_03:

So will you meditate and also hike every once in a while, or is it one of those?

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, yeah, yeah, for sure. And if I if I don't do it for I like doing the meditation first thing in the morning again, start a routine and a start to my day to set some intentions, but if I hike instead, I'll I'll I'll pick up my meditation sometime else during the day.

SPEAKER_03:

And it's quiet, like can you do it in the office? Can you do it?

SPEAKER_01:

Where do you do it? I do it in my home office, headphones, mask, and uh completely sensory deprived. Because I think obviously you can just go a little deeper that way.

SPEAKER_03:

Uh-huh. And are you sitting uh on a pillow or you do how are you doing it?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I do sit. Um I will, I there's obviously different types of meditation. Sometimes in the evening I'll do it laying down, just trying to downshift from a crazy day. But in the morning I sit up, um, I have uh I have certain meditations that are guided that I follow, and they're all right around an hour. And you know, my good days, I don't have to struggle to to to drop into that that state. Some days I have to fight for it. And I'll when I finally get there though, it's it's so worth the effort. And you know, when I first started, your body's just raging, it's screaming at you, it doesn't want to do it, and it doesn't understand, and you want to get busy because you're used to being productive, and taming that kind of inner beast was my hurdle. I had to really be able to let my body rage and not take action. And I'm usually quick to take some action. I'm kind of a quick twitch person.

SPEAKER_03:

Are you going to sleep at a reasonable hour? Like to sleep, do you look at it?

SPEAKER_01:

I'm a nine to five sleeper.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

I usually go to bed at nine and I'm pretty much up by five.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay, so if you're up at five, when's the meditation to start? Five, ten. Okay, and dogs, family, wife, kids, they know dad's doing his thing, leave them alone.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and good news is my my family and pets don't wake up that early, so I usually don't have any trouble with that. But I mean I go directly to it. And like anything else, being disciplined and getting some reps in, like anything, you just get better.

SPEAKER_03:

But if you do get interrupted, is it a big deal?

SPEAKER_01:

I I don't care for it, but part of the practice is not making it a big deal.

SPEAKER_03:

Right, right. So uh I've been so my wife meditates. In fact, Ian, our friend Ian our mutual great friend, he got her involved. I don't know if he's tried to get you involved in this meditation group with uh the people in India.

SPEAKER_01:

I've logged on a couple times and done some um online meditations with him.

SPEAKER_03:

She does it every day with them, every day, right? We have six dogs. Sometimes, if it's the weekend, see when I get up at 3 a.m. and I'm gone, she can meditate, no stress, and the dogs are away. But on the weekend, I get up, I go do something, all six dogs will run and jump on her in the middle of her meditation and it messes it all up. But she just keeps going. Dogs are calling her, she keeps going. But that meditation is a different type of meditation, or do you do you like it? Is it totally different than your meditation?

SPEAKER_01:

No, no, it's similar. I think they all have some commonality between them. What I like about the Joe Dispenza teachings is during the retreat, the week-long retreat, you start learning how to meditate and education about it, and then at the end of the retreat, you do these walking meditations with your eyes open. So I can really, you know, I can practice that at any point in time. And I remember listening to an interview with Sting from the police a long time ago when he was talking about walking around New York City, and as he walked around, he could meditate. So I don't so those disruptions or disturbances really, if you have a healthy practice, you should be able to not be impacted them as much as like at my my older state where I would just get react to everything. I don't react to it. Yeah, you get interrupted, no big deal, and you let it go.

SPEAKER_03:

So well, it's like the guys that I was talking about with Ian and my wife. They talk about being in a beautiful state and always being in a beautiful state and trying to stay in that beautiful state. And I learned so much, I spent I spent four days with them in South Carolina over the summer. I was helping them with a thing that Ian and my wife got me involved in. Um, and it changed my life. Like I've really learned to look at things differently, right? It's not if if there's chaos or something happens at work, you don't freak out over it anymore, or do you?

SPEAKER_01:

I'm way better than I used to be. Again, it's still a practice, but I gotta tell you, Ian's given me many gifts, and that was one of them. He's he's really taught me a lot of things. One, you know, have a big vision, two, really pull things in the universe you want towards you. And you know, I've been at his house for cold plunges and breathing exercises, and I would say he he's introduced me to a lot of amazing things.

SPEAKER_03:

One of those things I want to get into is I wasn't is uh is uh the back thing we did. The oh yeah, right? What do you call that? Drop table. Is that what you call it? Because every time I told I tell somebody I do the drop table, I get they say, Oh, this. I'm like, no, no, no, that's not even close. Like it might even be illegal, right?

SPEAKER_02:

I don't know if it's illegal, it's definitely not certified or regulated, especially by the people the guy that did it to me, because you go to the girl, right?

SPEAKER_01:

I've done Max Van Orman with the same guy you went to, right? I've done him and I've went Ashton and Ashton Ashton and Dusty. And I've done Dusty's a couple hundred times. Wow. Maybe not that many, maybe a hundred times, 120 times.

SPEAKER_03:

I've done Ashton, let's say five times, and it is one of the most amazing things, especially when you go to his office now where he moved it, where it's like in a real estate office. Right. Right. And then you get this back procedure done that you think you should be willing out of there in a wheelchair, but you're not, and it feels amazing. But he's also uh it's such a is when you do it with Dusty. Do you get this moment where there's that moment where you think you're gonna die? Does it still happen?

SPEAKER_01:

I've always have a moment of hesitation, like I shouldn't do this, but I usually do it after body work in a pretty relaxed state. Okay. Had a high level of trust with her, right? You know, I've been in that environment, you know, where it wasn't so relaxed and with Max and with Ashton. Part I think the part of the benefit is the surrender, also. Right. Not only the physical part of it, but giving in. You're out of control. You're giving up your control. You're you're strapped down, there's no going anywhere.

SPEAKER_03:

You got the mouth guard in, you've got next thing. Yeah, uh, maybe we could post I'll post a video because I one time I took a video I posted on Instagram. I remember that video. Ashton was like, take that down. Yeah. Which is probably a mad. But I found a lot of benefit from it. Me too. Uh, but I'm I'm I get more scared every time I go. But but anyway. In fact, you know what? Sometimes he has um people come over, his patients come over and use my hot tub and cold plunge after a session now. I'm part of his routine. It's been a while, but but hey, um, let's talk about some of the businesses you have. Because is is the most recent air guitar? Because I think I texted you from there when I went, I was in Gilbert and I see that. Oh, that's Craig's place. I've been going there. I'm like, what the heck?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that's it. We're still trying to figure it out, but it's it's kind of this hybrid of a convenience store, meets a small grocery, meets a skateboard shop, meets a funky retailer. We're still trying to figure out what it is, its identity. And you know, East Valley is full of young families and youth sports, and we really wanted it to be a community center that happened to have all these fun products. So we're really getting that now. And like Sunday mornings, we have the Arizona Run Club there, 200 people taking off and and running, starting and ending there, and it's really becoming that place.

SPEAKER_03:

But how does that come up? Like where how long from when you someone had the idea to when you opened, and what how did that idea get pitched?

SPEAKER_01:

So it started out. We have a place over in Encaninas, California, and we have some friends that had a place there. And my partner, our partner, my wife and I's partner in the business, um, is the largest chevron operator in Arizona. They have 21 chevrons. And I was just intrigued about business, any type of business. So I always ask him about how his business works and inside his four walls and how the how the convenience store model works. And I always got intrigued by it because it's very high margin, very low labor. But convenience store experiences are all transactional, and there's nothing great, there's no design about it. It's just it's just a transaction. And we kind of sat around drinking margaritas going, what happens if you took a convenience store model and made it experiential and put good design to the building, it had a great playlist, and had people that actually delivered great hospitality, and you still carried those products, and that was kind of how it started, and then it kept evolving, and we bought a hard corner out in Gilbert and built an award-winning building and filled it full of really fun stuff, and now it's where does the name air guitar come from?

SPEAKER_03:

Is it are you writing things down on a chalkboard?

SPEAKER_01:

And this is this is the story. So my wife and I were in um Encinitas, or we're in San Diego, and he my partner was flying in, and we said we'd scoop him up at the airport. Flew in San Diego, and he we're in the car, and he jumps in the backseat. And I'm not making this up, Guns N' Roses Paradise City was on. And he's just he's he's got a great spirit about him. And he's like jamming on air car in the back seat. And my wife was hysterical. She's like, oh my god, we should just call this place air guitar. Because really, if you think of air guitar, it's it's more of a it's more of an action than it is a a word. It's it anything gets you to have a reaction and take an enjoy a pure joyful moment. So then we went and drank a bunch of margaritas and the name just stuck. It was like, all right, it's air guitar, and it means nothing really other than it's a funny thing to do when you're happy.

SPEAKER_03:

You know what's funny? Because I read somewhere that like Exxon, because you said your friend has the Exxon or Chevron, what's it have? Chevron? Chevron, yeah. Okay, because I heard Exxon was one, and same with Kodak, that those were uh marketing names that companies just came up with that don't mean anything.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Like but we were just being goofy and you know it wasn't literal, and now it's kind of got a brand behind it, and it's funny. But I remember when we opened, like we're partners in Legrande Orange Grocery. We opened Legrande Orange, and no one could figure that name out and what it meant. Right. You know, and now years later, it's just it's common now. Everyone's just like, yeah, LGL, Legrande Orange.

SPEAKER_03:

My wife was there today.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

In fact, last night we ate it this week. I had to go to this company function, and next door to the function was the herb box. Yep. That restaurant, the herb box. Yeah. We go in there, and my wife sees the food when she goes, Let's get that brownie right there. So we got the brownie. I go, This brownie's delicious. Where'd you get it? We got it from Le Grande Orange. I was like, wow, all right, very good. Crazy.

SPEAKER_01:

Le Grand Orange turned 23 years old in June. So June 3rd is was 23 years. It's coming up in 24, and Postino across the parking lot will be 25 years, April 4th of 26. So Postino's first? Postino's was first. Which one? Chris and I opened Postino Arcadia. What? That was first? April 4th, 2001. We rolled right into 9-11, crazy times. A year later, June 3rd, 2022, 2002, sorry, we opened up Le Grand Orange. So that corner, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Wait, was it that Postino first and then that LGO? Yeah. And then you started doing everything else? Those were the first two things you guys did? First two, yeah. How did Postino come about?

SPEAKER_01:

My wife and I um went to Italy for my 30th birthday with my parents. We were bumping around north of Florence in a little town called Luca that Chris Bianco recommended to us to go check out. Every little town we went to had this little wine bar, you know, and it was super casual, shorts, t-shirt, flip-flops, inexpensive wine, people just hanging out. We came back to Phoenix, it didn't exist. We were walking our dogs, we do boxer rescue, we're walking our dogs up and down Campbell Avenue because we lived over in that neighborhood at the time. And we walked by this old building that was a brick building by Phoenix standards. It was old, it was 1959. By Italy, that's you know, that's right. It's brand new. And we uh we pitched the landlord on the deal and and opened up Postino with really, really no idea what we were doing. And then a year later we did Le Grand Orange with our we still partners in that business.

SPEAKER_03:

And but when you open up Postino, are you there working in the restaurant? Or are you like, I just want to run, I just want to have the restaurant have other people doing?

SPEAKER_01:

I wish we had that option. There was no option. We opened up uh with no with no real capital in the bank. We were in debt, we had to do it all ourselves.

SPEAKER_03:

We were right, so you were in there making the food.

SPEAKER_01:

We were 16, 18 hours a day. Yeah, my mom was out in front. Chris and I were there, bell to bell, even more. And we did that for a good 17 years. And we uh we have a partner in that business named Lauren Bailey who's an incredible talent who contributed at a ridiculously high level, and then we we grew it. Now we've got 38 or 39 Postinos seven states. What? Yeah, it's crazy. Like yeah, but it 2024 years, and and a whole bunch of amazing people contributed to the success. You know, it's fun that everyone associates with it, and we get to take this credit, but there's a lot of people that have their fingerprints all over it. And we were one thing I'm happy about, we were humble enough to take the help, right? A lot of people, right? A lot of people you know. I mean, just the neighbors, our neighbors, our community. A lot of people, you know, Sam Fox helped us. It was it was great.

SPEAKER_03:

So when you went from Postino to LGO, same partners or even more partners, different partners?

SPEAKER_01:

Different partners, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

So is that weird?

SPEAKER_01:

No, no, I mean it's kind of like you know how the industry works. And we have we're partners in Chelsea's too with the partners from LGO, and they're not they're not partners in Postino, though. And then now we have some private equity partners in Postino to help us grow.

SPEAKER_03:

Are you gonna be like Sam and eventually just sell everything?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, we'll see. I don't I don't know. I I I'm so connected to it in terms of my heart and soul. Right. I I I really struggle with thinking about not being connected to it.

SPEAKER_00:

Right.

SPEAKER_01:

You know, I've had to also kind of address my identities wrapped up in there. It's kind of you know what we've done. And back to my comment earlier about Eric Guitar being a community center, that corner was important for the neighborhood. Right. We that's where the neighborhood came and we met people, and we've been around long enough now. We've had a couple who had a first date, ended up getting married, had kids, and now their kids work for us. That's special. Yeah, that doesn't happen a lot, right? You know, so and I could tell, I could, we could sit here for hours. I could just tell you of amazing moments that have happened inside the restaurants where people shared something special. And if we can provide that for the community, that means more to me than any amount of money will ever make.

SPEAKER_03:

So I'm pretty emotional about it. Yeah, I know. I get it. That's wonderful. That's amazing.

SPEAKER_01:

That's where I met Ian. I mean, I and when Ian had that one yoga up on 32nd and in uh Lincoln at the time, that was a community center. And those people after his class would come down to La Grande Orange, and it was LGO is something like we we go there every weekend.

SPEAKER_03:

Like we it's a perfect walk from my house. Even in the hundred degrees, we walk out there and try it. We'll move my wife and I will go to bed and we'll look okay. So tomorrow it's gonna get 100 at 11. So let's get to LGO around eight. You know what I mean? So we'll we do it's like we plan our days around. That's that's great, man.

SPEAKER_01:

We've got a partner there named Bob Lynn who's who's uh an amazing, he's amazing with food, and he helped develop that. I mean, he developed that whole menu. It's it's pretty remarkable.

SPEAKER_03:

I know Bob, he used to be my yoga class. Yeah, super talent. I can't push him to run the daybreaker longer than it was supposed to be. I was a big fan of the daybreaker. Big fan of your English muffins too, dude. Yeah, he's he's a super talent. Does he who where's that come from? Who makes is he makes the food? He he's the one Bob's like, these are how because these those English muffins, you know, I also love Overeasy, the restaurant Overeasy. And one of the big things in Overeasy when I do their commercials, I do love their breakfast. But it was like, hey, here's a new commercial. We now have English muffins from LGO. Like that's in the commercial, right?

SPEAKER_01:

Bob's a ridiculously, he's a ridiculously talented culinary person.

SPEAKER_03:

Does he have anything else besides LGO?

SPEAKER_01:

So he's partners, uh, we're partners with him at Chelsea's, but then he's partners in Ingos and Buck and Rider. Okay. And then he's got some other concepts. He lives in lots of not us. Okay. Bob does with with other partners. So it's kind of like, you know, we all have things, yeah. You know, we we have our upper projects, which is Postino, Windsor, Churn, Joyride, and um Federal Pizza. And that's with our partner Lauren Bailey. And she's our current CEO, and just again, I'm so fortunate to have so many talented people in my life that I get to learn from on a daily basis.

SPEAKER_03:

Is there a new project coming out? Or what's like what's the next one?

SPEAKER_01:

You know, we're trying to figure out what we're gonna do with Air Guitar. Again, kind of like Camelback, you know, when I was 25 or 30, I had a different energy level, and I love what we're doing, but it it's it's harder to work 16 hours a day, and I don't know really that I want to spend 16 hours a day grinding like we used to. I'm finding other things in life to enjoy.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, it's funny, I completely relate to you. I just signed uh another five years with my radio show. This doesn't start until January, and I'm like, I love doing what I do, I just love it. I can't see me doing anything else, but I also at some point need to chill, right? You start to have those moments where like I'm getting into meditation. Maybe it's just the evolution of guys, what happens to us, right? Because I feel very on par with what you're saying. Like I want to travel more. I didn't get the travel bug until recently. I was too afraid to leave. I was afraid that if I left and took vacation and wasn't on the air, something would happen. So I set it up where I could do my show from vacation. Um, and now most recently we went to Europe for a couple weeks, and I was like, what did I do? How did I I I gotta do this more often? In fact, when I would talk to you about Pete on this podcast, you were like, Hey, I forget where you were. You're like, We're in Europe like and I think you were there a long time, right? How long were you there this last time?

SPEAKER_01:

A week, a week. Oh, just a week? Yeah. I thought I thought it was longer than that. I got back and immediately got whatever was going around. So that's it delayed a little more. Yeah, we were in south of France with some friends, and it was amazing. And I'm very fortunate. Like, I've I've known my wife for 36 years, and we've been 38 years, we've been married for 26. She got me into traveling, she exposed me to so much stuff, and you know, being partners with your wife in a business is you know, it has its own challenges, but she's she's remarkable. And she was there in the beginning. I mean, she spent a decade in Le Grand Orange, bell to bell, like open to close. She was in there and every single day of the week. And we did this, you know, together, but she was we were we were aligned. And it now we're like, you know, we want to we want to explore the rest of the world a little bit.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, that's how my wife my wife's like, I want to go into safari. Let's go do that. I'm like, okay, eventually I think we'll get there, but I still want to do more. Like we were in Amsterdam, and uh, I don't know if you've done this yet with all your traveling, but I want to go back because I want to go to all the countryside villages, like what you did in Italy, like finding a place like Luca, but the am the the Dutch version of that. Have you ever done anything like that? Gone around Holland?

SPEAKER_01:

My wife is a crazy, amazing travel planner. We just did Amsterdam with my 15-year-old for his spring break.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh.

SPEAKER_01:

And and went uh, took some trains and went and saw some cool stuff outside of Amsterdam. And she she finds, I don't know, she's a she's a uh she's a researcher like crazy. So I I I'm the beneficiary of all of her researching and hard work. So whenever we travel, she finds the most unique things to do. But we talked about the kids too, like exposing your kids to that at a young age. My parents, we didn't have the financial means to travel like that when I was young, so it's fun to show our kids those things.

SPEAKER_03:

Did your kids work in the restaurants at all coming up?

SPEAKER_01:

So Chaz did when he was uh, let's see, started out at churn scooping ice cream when he was 16, then he worked at Postino, and now that he's in school, he just hit Chris and I up the other day with a restaurant business plan. Oh, nice. Yeah, well, you know, so yeah, so we're talking about that now. Pretty exciting. Uh it warms my heart that he wants to be entrepreneurial. Right. I was just hoping, I'm hoping both my kids find that path. No pressure if they don't, but um, yeah, so I just gotta figure out how to how to support him.

SPEAKER_03:

Are there any success books that you read coming up that helped you with your career and and life?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so my dad, when I was 18, gave me two Dale Carnegie books, How to Win Friends and Influence People and How to Stop Worrying and Start Living. And I think those are two of the best books ever written for an entrepreneurial lifestyle.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And I don't think about being an entrepreneurial business related. It's a lens you look through at life.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, my dad gave me those same books. He also gave me The Magic of Thinking Big by David Schwartz. Yeah. Fantastic book. And of course, Norman Vincent Peel, the positive, the power of positive thinking. I read those exact same books.

SPEAKER_01:

All those books. I read The Alchemist every January 1st. Never read it. Every starts my year off. Wow. It's and really it's it's less self-improvement. It's more about it's taught me or it reminds me to listen to my heart as I make all these other logical decisions to kind of check in.

SPEAKER_03:

So what are other things you're doing for your health?

SPEAKER_01:

Wow. Okay, so I've probably backed off on the on the biohacking type stuff. I don't know what else to call it. Yeah, I know, and I struggle with that too. I and I love the new things and you know, experimenting, like through our our peer group who hey, try this, try that. Some things worked, and I've kind of fine-tuned my lifestyle. I find now more a routine that in a pace is more important for me. You know, finding second gear, not being in fifth gear and foot on the gas, full throttle all the time. So things I can do to learn how to find the in between gears. Because I do believe and I love driving I love being driven, but when you're driven, you're going pretty fast and I think you're missing a lot of beauty in the world. And I think those are some things that enrich your life and improve your health if you slow down and find those joyful and beautiful moments. So I like using that.

SPEAKER_03:

But would you say before you do this, are you uh do you have ADHD symptoms? Are you going 100 miles an hour doing 10 different things?

SPEAKER_01:

I really like going fast. I really like stress hormones. I like the feel of it. I like everything about it. I like I like getting a lot of wins in the win category, I like solving problems. But at some point, if you don't slow down, I do think you miss out on a lot of stuff.

SPEAKER_03:

I think you're right. I think you're right. How do you handle screen time with you, with your wife, with your kids? I I think it's a it's an issue. It's I try very hard to not have my phone with me a lot.

SPEAKER_01:

Struggling with the kids because it it's just their life. It's their video games. Um again, awareness is the only thing I can share with them. For personally, I do a 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. digital detox. Half the day I'm off of a screen. That's my goal. It doesn't always happen. I leave my phone on for a case of emergency, but I really try to get off of the devices 12 hours a day. I go back to reading paperbooks, paperbacks or hardcovers, but books, not a device. Um, I only look at social media on Sundays for one hour.

SPEAKER_03:

That's it.

SPEAKER_01:

That's it.

SPEAKER_03:

Wow, that's strong.

SPEAKER_01:

It was hard.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

I found it impacting my life in a negative way. Like when I'm looking at Instagram at a red light, it's a bad thing.

SPEAKER_03:

That's yeah, you're right. You know what I was telling you that we walked to LGO. I always I leave my phone at home. I never take my phone with me. And then my wife and I play backgammon there in the back room. And um, whenever I get back, I go to my phone immediately. And it's so funny how I didn't miss anything. You know, but when you have your phone with you, you're you're doing this, you're doing that. You know, you said you're married 26 years. That's a long time. What's the what do you think? What are some tips to a successful marriage?

SPEAKER_01:

I know there's ups and downs, but I mean, I'm I probably learned a lot about communication from Chris. She's great at it and taught me. And, you know, we we've been we've been through and through plenty of therapy and the hard stuff. And, you know, again, at the end of the day, she's enriched my life on a daily basis. And you know, the moments that we're we have disagreements and and I feel those stress hormones coming up a lot of the times, you know, my resistance or my reaction probably made things way worse than they were. And again, that's part of my practice and why I'm working hard or is being disciplined as I am now to learn that a different side of myself.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. It works. You communicate, it works, you tell them how you feel. It's it's it's tough, I think, to evolve to communicate those things. You know what I mean? It's uh yeah, but marriage is marriage has got the ups and downs, but then when it's when it's going, it's going great, right?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and it's tough. This seems to be a time of life. I'm a good part of my peer group is going through her been divorced recently. So we're I'm living through a lot of that with them. But Chris and I again, I I not every day is flawless, but I have a high level of respect and appreciation for her.

SPEAKER_03:

That's great. You know, getting I want to I don't again biohacking, I don't want to get back to it, but I want to get to like so you're extremely active, extremely active with the hiking, the meditation, and do you have any pains in your body?

SPEAKER_01:

Okay, so yes, I've been very fortunate never to have a major or catastrophic injury, but I'm having normal wear and tear as I get older, so I'm changing what I'm doing. And I realized even the way I do things, a little more a little more flow than force. Like I used to hammer camelback, right? I'll probably pay for it at some time.

SPEAKER_03:

Where do you think you'll pay for it? Knees, back?

SPEAKER_01:

Knees, back. I mean, just overall, just when you're hammering away. I've I've traded out that for sure. So I take it really slow up and down. I've given up, you know, competing to just do it slowly. I spend a lot more time in the pool now swimming. That that's one exercise I think is a lifelong sport that you can always do. In fact, I was at the pool of the village uh earlier this year, and the guy in the lane next to me was 88. And he's just swimming back and forth, got out, big smile on his face, and I was chatting with him. And I'm like, you know, you're 88 years old. And it was actually his birthday that day. He was getting to swim, and it was super inspiring because I really want to be. I think that's the key to longevity. I know there's all this stuff that's you know science-based that the people are doing, but I think not having a sedentary lifestyle is one of the biggest things. So just staying active.

SPEAKER_03:

You're right. Uh, how often do you swim at the village?

SPEAKER_01:

I was swimming there, I was trying to do six miles a week. So swim six days, a mile a day. And I backed off a little bit of that. Um again, actually about my aches and pains. I had a shoulder I had an overuse left shoulder overuse issue I had to get some PT for. So I just got it back and I surfed this summer. So I'm gonna get back in the pool shortly.

SPEAKER_03:

But it again something you do by yourself when you swim.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And again, there's another it's kind of a meditative practice. When you're staring at the bottom of a pool for an hour, nothing but your your thoughts.

SPEAKER_03:

Right. No, I used to swim in high school and I d I've done the I went through some phases at the village where I would go and swim three weeks and then I'd stop. Something happened and I stopped. When you swim, do you flip turn or you touch the wall?

SPEAKER_01:

God so when I had this conversation yesterday, I am I am now a touch the wall guy. I knew I gave up. I don't know why, but I gave up the flip turn.

SPEAKER_03:

A little too much effort with the flip turn. You're not racing, right? But it does keep the flow going. But I'm a touch the wall guy now, too. I don't know if that's an age thing or not.

SPEAKER_01:

Funny question. And another friend asked me that yesterday. He's like, How are your kick turns? And I'm like, I don't know. I just I really just touched the wall.

SPEAKER_03:

Are you doing the crawl, the freestyle? Are you doing breastyle the whole time?

SPEAKER_01:

Any oh, the whole time. I'll do a little warm-up. I got some zoomer fins I put on. I'll kick it out with a with a kickboard just to loosen up, loosen my backup.

SPEAKER_03:

So that doesn't count for the mile. No. Okay. So when you're there, are you there an hour?

SPEAKER_01:

It's pretty much an hour in the water. I'm gonna get back to that. I love that. I love that. I think swimming is the best shape. I feel the best I ever feel physically is when I get out of the pool. Uh-huh. You got rhythmic breathing, you're oxygenated, you're really stretched out, and you weren't pounding on your joints at all. I know. It's just a great workout. I do need to learn some other strokes though.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, so you what else do you do? I mean, I can do I I swim in in high school, but so I could do butterfly, but I only did I get my heart rate going. Breast breaststroke, sometimes backstroke, but mostly freestyle. You know, back in the day when I was swimming, it was called the crawl. Do you wear a swim shirt while you're swimming? No, no, I don't.

SPEAKER_01:

I I just that's the one thing I do worry about. I mean, you you've been out here a long time, too. It's a lot of sun.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, also, what time do you go?

SPEAKER_01:

Mostly late morning, just because it's not busy. Oh, yeah, you're right. You're right. One negative thing about the village pool is that it has sides. There's no reverse, uh, there's no um negative edge. So there's five lanes there, and all the water bounces back, even with lane lines. It's a very textured surface in that pool when people are swimming. Like most pools, the water goes out and then returns down and comes back in. That thing doesn't, it just gets like an open water swim. So I don't love that about it.

SPEAKER_03:

But there used to be a place, was it off of Campbell? There was a pool. I think Brofi used to swim in. Yeah, yeah, it's gone. That was great. That was a great pool. I went there a few times and swam with the master class there.

SPEAKER_01:

Great pool.

SPEAKER_03:

Where'd they move it to? Where'd the where's the Brofi pool now?

SPEAKER_01:

I don't think they moved it.

SPEAKER_03:

No, no, no. I mean, I know they built apartments there, but they moved the pool. There's somewhere that offers that. I just don't remember. It might be somewhere in PV. I'm not sure. But yeah, your swimming is right. That's great. So shoulder, that's because for me, I'm feeling something in my left knee. I don't know how, I don't know why. You know, it's like things just start happening. That's kind of why I'm always doing the stem cells. I'm trying to, I'm trying to waiting for a miracle with these everybody I know that goes and gets these stem cells with me, they have this incredible experience and these miracles. And I and I'm doing okay. I feel like uh, you know, I don't sleep very often, so I feel like I feel like I'm um it's helping. I can't imagine what life would be like if I didn't do these stem cells, you know, maybe be falling apart, you know. But I don't know.

SPEAKER_01:

That's the thing, and you have these chronic injuries or long injuries. As soon as you start losing mobility, your lifestyle decreases. Right, right. So staying mobile is really the big goal. We went and saw uh, you know, a few Peter Diamondis's. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. We went and saw Peter Diamondis speak at UCLA, and he had a couple open openers for him. And one was a this gal, she was an orthopedic surgeon, and her biggest message was do not lose mobility. Do whatever you can to stay mobile. That's the one key to longevity. She L case studies were as soon as people lost their mobility, their whole life started declining.

SPEAKER_02:

Were you going there just to see Peter speak?

SPEAKER_01:

We went specifically to see Peter.

SPEAKER_02:

Didn't know she was going to be on. Like do you know him, or you were just as a fan?

SPEAKER_01:

It was a YPO event. Oh, the YPO event. And then you went with another couple.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

And I ended up through that lecture at UCLA. It was right when he started uh Health Nucleus with Craig Vettner. His company hacked the human genome. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

They have a place in San Diego, right?

SPEAKER_01:

Uh yeah, and I've been going for nine years now.

SPEAKER_03:

That's where they do the whole MRI on your body.

SPEAKER_01:

I've been going once a year for nine years. I've got nine years of the comp data.

SPEAKER_03:

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01:

And he Peter broke off and now he's partners with Tony Robbins at Fountain Life.

SPEAKER_03:

Fountain Life, okay. Right, right, right.

SPEAKER_01:

But health nucleus still exists. Right. And I'm I have we have a place there, so it's easy to go. Right. And I love it. I've got eight years worth, nine years worth of data now, and I can see baseline from year one, anything over nine years what's changed. And has anything changed? You know, I'm very fortunate. Uh not much. We I mean we've made definitely made some adjustments here and there.

SPEAKER_03:

That's where they see your because I've done the full body MRI, um, and that's where you see anything, everything, right? So that's what they do there, right? You do the full body MRI, do the blood work.

SPEAKER_01:

They used to have one and you just you'd be in it for almost a couple hours. Now they have one, and it was for all your organs, brain down, and now they have one just for your brain, an MRI, and then you go into a different MRI for all the other organs down your body. Right. And it's really the the imaging is so the technology is so great, right? And they can really uh I guess the big goal would be early diagnosis. Right. If you can catch something early, right, why not give yourself a better shot?

SPEAKER_03:

See, that's what I'm talking about. That's not biohacking. That's what I'm that's what I'm talking about. I don't know what to call that whole it it living cleaner, being aware. Like what do you call that? Because it's not, it's not, it's not biohacking, right? I I don't have a name for it.

SPEAKER_01:

But well, do you wear do you wear any wearables devices? Like wear rings.

SPEAKER_03:

I wear the I wear the whoop and I have an O ring at night. I put it on at night.

SPEAKER_01:

Do you make changes based on the data you get from that?

SPEAKER_03:

Not really. I mostly do it to monitor my sleep. And I I do I would do this to monitor my heart, my um, my cardiovascular when I'm trying to do cardio, because that's my problem. I've got a lot of calcium in my heart, and I need to somehow get rid of it. And because I'm I have a job where there's not a lot of sleep involved, I always monitor my sleep. And I actually that's not true. I do I do tweak stuff. Like I'll go, I'll go, okay, I slept four and a half hours here. I had 40 minutes of deep sleep. And not trying to be funny, but it's like we had sex and I slept better. We didn't have sex and I slept. Like I'm looking at, like sometimes I'll look at my wife and I'll be like, hey, I got about five hours, I can get five hours tonight, and I think if we do it, I might fall, I might have longer reps like she thinks I'm nuts. And I'm like, it's an experiment, play along. And she plays along. It's true. And I'm literally doing it for every doctor I've ever interviewed on this podcast. I ask him that, I've asked a sleep doctor, if if you're a guy and you have an orgasm before sleep, do you sleep better? And all of them say yes. And then I'm like, with a partner or with a stuff afflicted at work. I need to know. I need to put so believe it or not, with a partner, the pheromones, you're more connected, and there's there's something that uh there's something intangible there that helps you sleep better, right?

SPEAKER_01:

So, what else do you do for your sleep routine? Are you like blackout shades? Are you a certain temperature in the room?

SPEAKER_03:

Blackout shades, white noise, 68 degrees in the room. Uh, I wear the oil ring and I wear this at night. I'm unfortunately I have sleep apnea, so I wear a CPAP machine. I have a mouth guard because I grind my teeth, and then no doctor told me to do this, but I bought an oxygen tank and I have the oxygen tank 50 feet of tubing in my closet, um, but it's hooked up to my mask, so I sleep with oxygen at night. Um, and the machine makes a lot of noise and it bothers my wife, so I have to have it way far away. Right. Because I'm hoping the oxygen helps me sleep better to get a deep sleep. Um, sometimes I will get a vitamin drip before I go to sleep. I'll try to get all the vitamins, and then sometimes it might throw a little Benadryl or a little bit of tordol in there to help with the pain, any kind of body pain. But I'm just trying to look at what helps me sleep better because of the sleep apnea. And I feel that oxygen helps me sleep better. I don't know if that's smart. My doctor, I told my doctor, and she's like, why? I'm like, I don't know. It's only a small percentage of pure oxygen because also the aura ring monitors your oxygen level. Like last night I was at 100% oxygen. The night before I was at 99% oxygen, and I don't know why, because I had the tank. Maybe I need to turn up the tank. But I do a lot of weird shit, Craig.

SPEAKER_01:

Do you have a uh prepare for sleep routine, like getting ready, downshifting before you?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I put the phone away. I try not to be on my phone at all. Um, I take I have a bunch of vitamins, I take some magnesium, I drink some magnesium before I go to sleep. Um, I take some melatonin, I have a bunch of do you take vitamins?

SPEAKER_01:

Uh D, methylated B12, and one uh specific calcium because I have a little bit of osteopenia just because I've been so lean my whole life. And I don't do a lot of strength training. Just I don't, you know, again worrying about a slip and fall as I'm older.

SPEAKER_03:

So what okay, that's good. Uh weight I try I weight train five days a week. You don't so you don't lift weights.

SPEAKER_01:

I do lift weights, but recent only recently, and I'm not not a lot of weight yet. I'm just starting to more go through, I don't want to put a lot of pressure on my joints, so I'm just kind of I'm really starting slow. But I'm in the gym a few days a week.

SPEAKER_03:

Uh at the village?

SPEAKER_01:

Uh I've been going over the global.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay.

SPEAKER_01:

But um, yeah, the global is a whole nother.

SPEAKER_03:

It's a great gym. It's a great gym. Their equipment is fantastic. Beautiful gym.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, now I'm starting to learn. But I've been I've been 140 pounds for 40 years. I don't think I've deviated a pound in 40 years.

SPEAKER_03:

I weigh 110 pounds more than you.

SPEAKER_01:

Graduate high school this weight, and if I got on the scale, if there was a scale right here, it would be 140 pounds.

SPEAKER_03:

Did you grow up here in Phoenix?

SPEAKER_01:

Uh, since the seventh grade, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Where'd you go to school?

SPEAKER_01:

Marcos Deniza High School. Oh, yeah. That's a great school. I don't know about great schools.

SPEAKER_03:

I know the basketball coach there is great, the football program's been great. When I was there, it was a little rough. Oh, yeah, it was still rough, I think. But yeah, okay. Okay, where'd you go to you went to ASU?

SPEAKER_01:

We went to ASU, met my wife, yeah. In 88 at ASU, and yeah, a long time.

SPEAKER_03:

Wow. Don't see you, you don't, and then you when did you move and get the place in San Diego?

SPEAKER_01:

We got a place in San Diego in 2011. We both we wanted boys to be exposed to the beach, and they both surf. My both both my boys are really good surfers, like lights out surfing. And uh, and so they surf a lot. And then my oldest son goes to Chapman up in Orange, California. So he surfs, too. He's having a great time, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

So we were in we we go to La Jolla every year for the my wife's from La Jolla and here. Um, and this is the first time ever we had some friends in Del Mar. And so 4th of July. Um, actually, I um they told us about this market, never been there before, and I feel like this is a gold mine, and it's right along the lines of what you guys are doing.

SPEAKER_02:

It's that Seaside Market. I was there Sunday. It's a freaking that place my favorite grocery store in the country. It's unbelievable. You're not you're not kidding. It's unbelievable.

SPEAKER_03:

How does that I my the guy I know knows the guy, and I was like, you need to open one of these in La Jolla. And the guy said to him, he goes, Look, my life is great right now. I make a lot of money with this restaurant. I know my stress levels. This is it. This is all I need to do. But that place is fantastic.

SPEAKER_01:

I have thousands of pictures on my phone from that store. I literally was there Sunday with Chris. We did we we were there last weekend and we built a we had a pokey bar at our house. So we went there to get all the supplies. Right. It is truly it's a community center. It is. Have you had the crack? Oh I had it shipped over here. It's unbelievable, man. It is cool. That's a great place. Yeah, that I love I love North County, San Diego from La Jolla up and Del Mar. Have you been to Ken, sushi? My wife has. I have.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, we go there all the time. Yeah. Yeah, we go there. That's where we want to be right now with us, which we haven't done yet. With being as soon as we're empty nesters, we want to be do the San Diego thing Friday, Saturday, Sunday, right?

SPEAKER_01:

Just always go Friday, Saturday, Sunday because it's just a well now JSX is flying into Carlsbad. I know, I heard it's great. Yeah, right. Scott's still to Carlsbad. We're going back this weekend. We invested in a restaurant that's opening this weekend. It's called Chick and Hawk. And it's one of the partners is Tony Hawk. And the other partners is uh Andrew, who's the most amazing chef, and he's got a restaurant, pardon me, in Encinias called Mana. Uh-huh. Next time you're there, you have to go to Manna. I'd love to take you there. I'd love to go. It's my favorite restaurant in San Diego. Is Tony Hawk going to be part of the he's part, he's part of the brand. He's wow.

SPEAKER_03:

So you've met him, talk to him.

SPEAKER_01:

Um, yeah, yeah. In fact, um it's I I'd love to take you there sometime. It's gonna be a really cool place. It's kind of a chicken sandwich place, but way elevated. Great 80s skate culture um design. California skate parks came and poured the patio walls. Wow. Tony Hawk brought the birdhouse skateboard team to skate it. Wow, it was really neat. I'll I'll have to send you some pictures.

SPEAKER_03:

I'd love to see him and I'd love to go. But you know, are you familiar with Andrew Huberman? Sure. Because he's got Tony Hawk connections too. He used to skate. Oh, he's an old skater, yeah. Old skater punk rocker. He's an old skater punk rocker, and Tony Hawk's dad, like he was because you know his parents were never around. Tony Hawk's dad drove him back. I mean, I'm a huge Huberman fan, I'm a huge Tony Hawk fan, so that's crazy. I would love to check out that restaurant.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, it's really cool. My so when I was growing up here, my parents would drive us out to the Del Mar Skate Ranch in the 80s, and I saw Tony Skate back in the 80s at the Del Mar Skate Ranch. It's crazy, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay, wait, so if you're in so you're in the skating and surfing, you must be very much in the 80s music or alternative music from the 80s.

SPEAKER_01:

All that's my whole lifestyle. That's your whole lifestyle. It's so funny you Chris will tell you, like, it's all 80s and it's all alt 80s.

SPEAKER_03:

What what concerts have you been in or uh growing up? Which concert did you go to?

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, God. I mean, I I was thinking about this the other day. And again, like telling these stories when you're in your 50s, all the great shows you went to. Yes, yes. I remember again, this is an 80s, this is technically a little like 90, but I saw Nirvana way before Nevermind came out. They had a first album called Bleach, and I saw him at this little bar on Apache. Wow. With like 24 people. What year was that? Uh 90 or 91. But I remember seeing the Beastie Boys in '85. I used to go see Social Distortion. Okay, so here's Beastie Boys played celebrity theater with Run DMC in '85.

SPEAKER_03:

I by the way, I feel like Sabotage might be one of the greatest songs ever, ever written. It's one of my favorite workout songs. But I got to so I started in radio in 1990 at 91x in San Diego. You know that station, right? 91X?

SPEAKER_01:

I have a sticker on my desk right now.

SPEAKER_03:

Okay. So my uh I I I was I was so in love with radio. I thought it was the great, I was there all the time. I never I was an intern. I was going to San Diego State and I was an intern at 91x. And I was there with a night guy. His name was Mike Calloran, and he had ordered a Domino's pizza with everything on, with jalapenos on it, and I and I had never, and pineapples, and I was like, that sounds amazing. I and he goes, well, it's being delivered here in a little bit. When it comes, there's also a band coming. And he goes, When the band comes, can you let the band in? I'm like, sure, but what time's the pizza getting here? And he goes, probably around the same time. So I'm waiting. I see this blue and white Volkswagen bus pull up, right? And then I see the car, the Domino's pizza guy comes. Domino's pizza guy comes and I open up, I grab the pizza box, and there's these guys standing. I go, Hey, can I help you? Yeah, we're the band. We're here to see uh Mike. And I go, what band? He goes, we're Nirvana. I go, Oh, come on in. And I they follow me in. We sit down in the studio, me, Mike, and Nirvana, and we eat pizza. Isn't that crazy? They had year? 1990? Yeah, yeah. Isn't that nuts? They're probably touring on that bleach album. Yeah, I got tons of those. Same with Jesus Jones. I don't know if they're around. My first my first real job at the radio, I had to do three nights at Depeche Mode at Sports Arena in San Diego. Like all that music is my music, man.

SPEAKER_01:

91X. Mandatory Marley Mandatory Marley Mondays, was it? They played Bob Marley on Mondays and 91X. How about this? The Red Hot Chili Peppers played at Big Surf. Remember Big Surf? Yeah, eighth grade school summertime. We'd go to Big Surf. They played Big Surf in 89. That's crazy. There was a mosh pit in the sand at Big Surf. They had a stage on the beach. Ah, those were some, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I took interns, I was an intern, I took a bunch of listeners from San Diego to LA to the palladium to see Fishbone open for red hot chili peppers.

SPEAKER_01:

Love Fishbone.

SPEAKER_03:

All right. And then that's well, I'm glad we had that music thing, man. Yeah. One of my favorites is Party at Ground Zero. New Order was one of my favorite bands. I saw them way back in the day so many times. They weren't the most exciting band to see on tour, but but yeah, I love that music. That's great. And that's kind of that's kind of yeah, that's stuff playing air guitar all the time as well.

SPEAKER_01:

Kind of, you know, that that kind of seeps into the culture. I grew I grew up kind of Southern California skate punk, hip-hop, skateboarding, and you know.

SPEAKER_03:

So what's your favorite concert?

SPEAKER_01:

So uh the last tour that Beastie Boys did before MCA passed away, we went and saw them at Red Rocks, and we're in the front row at Red Rocks, and it was uh it was the most magical experience I've had being a Beastie Boys fan. And then the following, they were gonna go on tour again, and we had front row at Hollywood Bowl, but MCA got diagnosed with cancer and passed away. So that Red Rocks Beastie Boys show was how about you?

SPEAKER_03:

Best concert ever?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

You're the maybe it's because it's uh it's so fresh in my mind, but it was the one this is one of the weirdest things. My my kids are into hip hop, and Dutch, my youngest, Kanye, was coming to town. He wanted to go see Kanye, but Kanye wasn't performing, he was just gonna play his album. And we were at Footprint Center, and Kanye, it's sold out, and he's got his cell phone plugged in and he's just playing tracks off his phone and then singing along. I thought it was one of the coolest things I've ever experienced in my life. It was so and his kids were running around dancing, and he would just be like, he would play one of his hit songs, he would just play the hit song off his phone, everyone would go nuts, and then he would play instrumental and he'd start singing, and it was like, I was like, what? It was just so electric. And that was about two years ago. So uh, and maybe that's why because it's been so long I can't remember a lot of the concerts. But man, that that's you know who's a psycho, psycho Beastie Boys fan. And in fact, I what's the what's the guy's name? What's the DJ that came in later?

SPEAKER_01:

Mixed Master Mike.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, uh, in fact, he's gonna be a UV in a couple weeks, is Tommy Lloyd, UV basketball coach.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

He the greatest band in the world for him is Beastie Boys. We go back and forth about it, Beastie Boys people.

SPEAKER_01:

I got a shrine at my home office. I really do. You gotta send me a picture, I'll send it to him. So I almost I just had mixed master mic booked for our YPO holiday party, but then at the last minute, didn't think it would translate. You know, he's you know, he I love Mixed Master Mike. So we just we we swapped him out. We're getting now we got CNC Music Factory. Gonna make you sweat T U. Just a little more like, you know, jump to the rhythm. Jump to the rhythm. I don't know if Mix Master Mike Where is CNC gonna play?

unknown:

Where?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, we're having our YPO holiday party, and I had him booked for a millisecond and then changed my mind because I just didn't think anyone would get it. I love him, but I don't think anyone else it would translate to a holiday party with him just scratching and going crazy. That is nuts.

SPEAKER_03:

That is nuts. Oh my god. Have you seen the documentary of Beastie Boys? Oh, yeah. Okay, wow, that's that's I didn't know that about you. That's very good.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, huge fan. Um, when licensed yellow came out, I was in high school, it kind of changed everything, right?

SPEAKER_03:

I mean, it was like but like I worked every day. It's like when I leave here today, I got a treadmill in my house. I'm gonna get on the treadmill, and I do my little workout, try to get a couple miles in, but I always slide in sabotage. I think sabotage, and what's your favorite Beastie Boy song? Like sabotage is freaking amazing, it's just amazing. Everything about that song is amazing.

SPEAKER_01:

So that's in my list when I'm getting after it. But I remember waiting in line in Mesa at Tower Records for like hours and hours when their second album, Paul's Boutique, came out. I was in line waiting for the release of that album. And that album to me is a masterpiece. Like you you've heard other artists say that the samples on that album back before there was controls. It's really well. I'll listen to that when I get out of here on the treadmill. Did you go into radio right after college?

SPEAKER_03:

In college, well, I was in college. Yeah, there was a radio station at the college, and a buddy of mine dared me to try out for the job, and I did, and I was hooked. And how long were you at 91X? I was at 91X from 90 to 92. Um, in fact, I was at U of A, there's a restaurant there, and on the top of the restaurant inside, there's a 91X sticker. It says 91X, you're the X. Those, if anybody has those stickers, like this restaurant, I had a part of the, I was the guy that delivered those sticker style outlets. So if I see one anywhere, I know at some point I had that. Like I was an intern, I drove the van, I put stickers on people, I'd go to the beach and spray the tattoos on people, the Miss Michael Beach page.

SPEAKER_01:

Not things up. I will text you the million. I have a 91X sticker sitting on my desk at home at this exact moment.

SPEAKER_03:

Wow.

SPEAKER_01:

It's an original one, and I did it just sit, it's I have a whole bunch of stuff on my desk, it just sits there.

SPEAKER_03:

I used to uh there was a morning show they were called Burger and Prescott, and I used to just sit in there and watch them do the morning show and ask them how they did the morning show. Then I would have to drive them around for appearances and stuff. And you know, it was before MapQuest or before freaking Google Maps, and I would get lost trying to find my way around La Jolla or wherever these appearances were, and I would just pick the brain of these morning shows. Uh, because first of all, they were the ones making all the money, right? That but uh I'd love I loved every second of it and meeting all the artists and stuff.

SPEAKER_01:

So you must have been the hundreds of shows. I mean hundreds.

SPEAKER_03:

I've been I can't. Yeah, that's why I'm like I get to a point now where I I try not to go to concerts unless it's something special. And then here's the difference with the music we like. My wife is a yacht rock fan. So we go to every yacht rock or yachtly crew, which is amazing because it's not the artists, it's a cover band doing all these stuff. Have you been to Humphreys?

SPEAKER_01:

No, uh, I have not been to Humphreys.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, you gotta go to Humphreys.

SPEAKER_02:

We just went to the the Rady Shell.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, that's I've heard of that place. It's like a Humphreys, right?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, it's outside, yeah. I've been to Humphreys yet, though. Humphreys. We'll have to hook up this next summer when you're in the home.

SPEAKER_03:

We'll be there. We'll be there all most of the summer. Yeah. We're in fact, uh, in fact, we're going there soon. We're gonna, yeah, yeah, we're definitely. I'll text you every time I go there and see if just in case it works out. But thanks for jumping on the podcast with me. I don't know if I'm missing that feel. I I got sidetracked now. I don't know if I hit all the points we wanted to hit. But wait, wait, well with churn, the ice cream place. Are there recipes? Is it your ice cream? Who's ice where's ice cream come from?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah. I mean, they're all our our recipes that we own, and they're great, and churn's awesome.

SPEAKER_03:

And do you eat dessert?

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, dude, I don't gain weight. I I'm just kind of, yeah. Maybe I'm fortunate, but I am discipline. I don't eat a lot of dessert, but I like sweets. And do you drink coffee?

SPEAKER_03:

I no, I just started drinking coffee a couple years ago. In fact, I'm trying to so because my doctor told me coffee suppresses your appetite, right? So I fast. I don't eat till one in the afternoon every day. And I have coffee. And when I go to LGO, I'm trying to understand the coffee there because they have uh they have like four selections. Are you that involved? Do you know the coffee?

SPEAKER_01:

Not not well, and I'm not a coffee drinker, so it's not a good thing.

SPEAKER_03:

You don't even drink coffee.

SPEAKER_01:

No, not really.

SPEAKER_03:

I just started a couple sips of coffee. Two years ago, I just started drinking coffee. Never had coffee in my life until the day, and I think coffee is disgusting, but I like what it does. It definitely doesn't make me hungry. That blows that blows me away.

SPEAKER_01:

Two intermittent fasts, you don't eat lunch until one. Right. And then when are you done eating at the end of the night?

SPEAKER_03:

Seven.

SPEAKER_01:

So you have a six-hour window to eat.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And how many calories a day do you think you're consuming in those six hours?

SPEAKER_03:

I'm trying to do about 2400, 2500. I I got my body fat measured the other day. I was 12.9% body fat, which I think is pretty good for my age. Right, super healthy. Yeah. I mean, my kids are at 9%, but they're also 20, 21 in athletes. So I'm trying, I'd like to get my body fat down to for one day to like 9%, 10% for one day, just so I could. But there's a I I'm at 12% and I'm living a good life. I mean, you know, in in having 12%, I went to Cancun twice. I ate a lot of food. I was in London, I was in Amsterdam, I was in La Jolla, uh, I'm I was in Cabo, and I still was able to have this and eat and still stay at 12%. So I think I think I'm doing something right. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_02:

It's a really healthy percentage. I mean, yeah, yeah, I feel good about it. But thanks, Craig.

SPEAKER_03:

Thanks for jumping with the podcast. Happy to do it. Okay, so welcome to our podcast. This is a little bit different today because this podcast is a spin off of our radio show.

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Johnjay Van Es

Host