Got Sober, Left Hollywood, and Bought a Farm in Texas | Mike Catherwood | Game Plan ep.22

Mike Catherwood joins us for a wild, honest conversation about the road from addiction and early recovery to radio, TV, jiu-jitsu, and life on a farm in Texas.

We get into what actually makes people compelling on camera, why fighters are often the easiest people to talk to, how Mike went from Hollywood and entertainment media to raising animals in rural Texas, and the perspective shift that came with it. He also opens up about sobriety, losing friends to addiction, what finally got him clean, and the brutal reality of trying to help people who are still stuck in it. On top of that, we talk jiu-jitsu, Orlando Sanchez, live radio, the difference between podcasting and broadcasting, the state of media today, and Mike’s no-BS views on nutrition and fitness.      

If you like long-form conversations about mindset, culture, fighting, recovery, media, and becoming harder to fool, this one’s for you.

In this episode:
 • why authenticity matters in media
 • why fighters make great guests
 • leaving LA for farm life in Texas
 • addiction, recovery, and rock bottom
 • jiu-jitsu stories and Orlando Sanchez
 • how radio sharpened his on-air instincts
 • podcasting vs radio
 • Mike’s thoughts on diet, fitness, and social media health advice

Follow Mike Catherwood:
Instagram @mikecatherwood
Tiktok  @mike.catherwood


0:00 Why Fake People Lose Online
3:06 Why Fighters Make the Best Guests
4:33 He Left LA for a Farm in Texas
8:46 The Ice Storm That Changed Him
12:59 The Ugly Truth About Politics
19:16 Nature Doesn’t Care About Your Feelings
21:10 Why You Should Do Good Anyway
25:50 20 Years of Jiu-Jitsu Lessons
32:01 Orlando Sanchez: Greatness and Tragedy
34:23 Addiction Doesn’t End Well
37:27 The Motel Room That Changed His Life
41:19 What Finally Got Him Sober
44:16 “If You’re Tough, Get Clean”
51:07 From Janitor to Radio Host
56:26 The Lucky Break That Changed Everything
1:00:55 Why Radio Makes You Sharp
1:06:47 How to Stop Being Nervous on Camera
1:19:11 Why Radio Is Dying
1:27:00 Social Media Fitness Advice Is Broken
1:38:35 His Take on Ozempic

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Welcome back to another episode of Game Plan the Podcast. I'm your host, David Skol, and joined as always by our producer Juice. Yo. Today's guest is an author, farmer, podcaster, and radio host. Please welcome to the podcast, Mike Catherwood. Let's go. Yay. Again, thanks so much for coming over, taking the time out of your day. It's genuinely my pleasure, guys.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

I know I've been on the receiving end of this, and there is this uh internal feeling of, oh man, I have to be apologetic because this is probably a burden. But for me, you know, I I like to have conversations. I would have hoped to have made my living doing so. So for me, this is like a real pleasure.

SPEAKER_03 0:45

That was like the immediate vibe I got from you, is that like you were kind of paying it forward of like you've been in my position, our position, and you were willing to kind of come on, help us out, and and give us your time.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

So there's something to that. I mean, uh, yeah, I appreciate it, and I don't want to make it seem like uh I don't want to aggrandize what I'm doing as if it's I'm being so charitable to but there's something to that. You go like I think that it's it's representative of media as a whole, whether it be high-end mainstream stuff or people who are just starting on a podcast. The relatability is what carries people over because sometimes some of the most successful people aren't necessarily the most technically advanced broadcasters, they're not eloquent or uh they don't have the most uh incredible control of the language, but they're relatable. I mean, Mr. Beast is not the coolest guy in the world, but Mr. Beast is fucking related. He there's never a point where you're watching Mr. Beast with all those explosions and the amazing editing, and his production team is as good as they come, but there's never a point where you're watching him where you're like, oh, he's putting on an act, he's just this guy, and he's fully open about his Crohn's disease and uh not being great with the chicks and stuff. And you watch him, you know, I watch a lot of these um rather successful younger skewing creators with my daughter, she's 11. And I immediately will put my foot down on some of them because I'd be like, okay, this chick's throwing on 40 pounds of makeup and doing an act, and it's clearly just to kind of drive engagement, and then this person, this person is being him or herself, and it's awesome, and I support it, you know, and like that to me has always been the most uh universal factor into people who are really good at this job is that people can watch or listen and they go, I I relate to that guy. I don't necessarily know where that person's been. I can't I can't necessarily pull from my own experience to theirs, but I relate to him because there's a connection. He I feel like he or she is talking to me and not trying to be a character, you know?

SPEAKER_03 2:49

Yeah. That's why I love this format because like we kind of started it with a little bit of the idea of when you're done with jujitsu class, you'll just kind of hang out on the mat. Yeah, and we felt like we had like really cool conversations with our friends doing that. It was like we want to just have that kind of energy.

SPEAKER_00 3:02

I found that that's why fighters out of all athletes, fighters, I I'll okay, I'll I'll I'll pump my brakes a little bit, not out of all hockey players also, but out of all athletes, hockey players and and professional fighters, whether it be boxers, grapplers, or MMA fighters, they're usually the coolest people and easiest to deal with, even if they're genuinely scary or intimidating, because they're so fucking tired. I mean it, I mean it. They're so they can't even you if you're in fight camp or if you're preparing for something and and you're then gonna go later that day or earlier that morning, you're gonna go do an interview. You don't even have what it takes physically and emotionally to to put on an act. You're so raw because you I mean, people and people, I'm sure people you played high school football or you you did you you were construction. There's a lot of people out there that do really physically demanding things. When you look at like high-level fight, and I'm not even talking about UFC or like heavyweight champion of the world in box. I'm talking about like good amateur level. The the preparation that goes into that is so overwhelmingly demanding that it almost takes away that weird side of most that everyone I'm myself included, everyone has that where they're like self-conscious, weird, thinking, what does this person want to hear? What should I say? What shouldn't I say? You can't go through that because you're just so tired.

SPEAKER_03 4:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

And it makes makes for really cool people. Then, and like I said, sometimes they're it's not like I want to go hang out with them because they're they they scare me, you know. Valentina Shevchenko scared me, but I love talking to her. She was a very engaging person, she was very nice. But I the whole time she was in the room, I was like, this chick would fucking kick me. Like if I say the wrong thing, they're gonna fuck me up.

SPEAKER_03 4:53

Dude, going back to you said you have a farm. Yeah, dude, when did you get it? And just tell me everything about it.

SPEAKER_00 5:00

As soon as I moved to Texas, I had a farm. We moved from LA. I was born and raised in LA. My wife moved to LA to be an actor in 2000 something, early 2000s. She's from Seattle. And like every asshole from New York and LA that moved to a rural environment, kind of COVID pushed us over the edge. Um, and less for me about like the political aspects or the medical stuff that you believe, oh, the the the vaccine is this or that. It wasn't it was more of what my daughter at that time, who's five, six years old, is being put through, not by her own choice, and I had no control over it. I was like, fuck it. And I just left. And I didn't want to do a lateral move and go to like down, you know, move to Congress Street in Austin, and like I was like, Well, I'm I might as well. I would I live in Venice, and so I was like, Well, this is a fucking I'm just in Venice with people with accents, it's the same shit, same store, same fucking culture. As like, I'm going to rural Texas. I moved and I bought a farm and I moved, and I have goats and donkeys and chickens and guinea fowl and shit ton of dogs and cats, and um, and it's awesome. It's really, it's really awesome. It's another one of those things, like I was saying, when you get so fatigued from fight training, it kind of puts you back to your raw state. When you they're like anyone, and I I I I like to work hard, I like to to go after the things I I want in life. So I'm ambitious and I'm hardworking. I uh without being arrogant, I I like, I mean, I like to be busy and shit. But still, if you're busy and you're working in a in any kind of industry in like a um a more populated kind of um metropolitan environment, you have a lot of free time where you're like, what am I gonna do now? I gotta wait for this person to call me back about the production piece that we were working on. And so oftentimes you fucking Netflix and chill and you or you doom scroll, or you if you have animals that you know they're going to die if I don't take care of this, it keeps your life full of meaning, even if it's not something that's life-changing to everyone else around you. It may not be the coolest, it may not look awesome on Instagram or whatever. My my day from the second I wake up, which I have to wake up earlier than I want to, I have to go to bed earlier than I want to, all the because there's all these creatures who have who mean no harm to anything. If I don't step up, step my step up my game, if I don't meet those expectations, they're gonna fucking die. Yeah, and that makes your life really a little you you go to sleep at night with a little bit more of a of a comfort of like there's purpose to stuff, you know.

SPEAKER_03 7:39

I'm interested in how you even transition from like going from Venice to your first animal, and then I imagine it was like a progression, yeah, and then what kind of like things you learn.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

Well, the progression wasn't as slow as I would have liked it to be because my wife's an actor okay and successful, so she lives like King Joffrey, where it's like we're moving to a farm, so let's get 40 chickens right out of the gate. I'm like, oh fuck, we don't even have a farm, we don't even have a big a coop. Yeah, oh better build one. I was like, okay. The transition was more dramatic than I would have ever wanted it to be. Damn, but that's part of being a married man, you kind of, you know, and I I'm happier for it. I uh in the during the the process, I was like, What this bitch, but you know, I'm happier for it because I I if it was me, I would have I'd had th two two chickens and a and a livestock dog, but I have this gigantic thriving farm because of it, you know. Dude, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_03 8:35

What did you do during the ice storm? How did you take care of everything for that? That's that's super challenging.

SPEAKER_00 8:40

It's a great question. And I had no running water for three days, and you so I went on this whole rant about it because inspired by the freeze, which was for those of you uh outside of like certain states, you know, a couple southern states. This is about a week ago when it really hit the nexus here in Texas, and it was a rhyme when it really hit its peak in Texas. Uh and I had no running water, pipes froze, and I had to wash all the dishes, all the clothes, feed, give water and stuff to all the animals in a way that was not based in convenience. And you lose sight of it, even if you're not a completely vapid shithead who just lives on Instagram or TikTok, you lose sight of how amazing convenience has become, almost to the point of it zapping away our ability to grow. And I'm I'm now melting snow to give water to my animals, and I'm boiling that snow so that I can wash my own dishes. And I'm thinking to myself, like, fuck, this is very pure. It's very it's literally survival. I'm not worried about oh, well, this water doesn't taste all that good. I was like, well, I'll boil it again and drink it. Well, don't be a fucking little pussy. Like I got addicted to all of this massive convenience. Now, when the water came back on, everything's back to normal, and I have heat and the whole thing, and I'm not burning, uh, I'm not out in a in freezing weather with a chainsaw getting logs so that I could then put them in the stove to burn so that I could have heat. I went back to and I was happy to put on the heat again and everything, but it gave me a real high level of appreciation and stuff. And then I was mowing my lawn yesterday, and I'm like a this uh 19 acres, so you know I have a big kind of ridable lawnmower, and I'm riding the lawnmower and I'm doing the edging and I'm chopping down stuff, broken limbs on on big trees, and I'm chopping them down, and I'm like, how the fuck did my great-grandpa do this? Like, how did how did people in 1870 do this like like I'm doing without the riding lawnmower day in and day out? And it just made me go, like, wow, I A don't get neutered by modern technology, and B, you're capable of way more than you think, you're capable of way more than you give yourself credit for because all people were capable of way more than you think you're capable of a hundred years ago. All humans were way more capable with way less at their disposal. So, like everything happened, everything gets that. It it sounds Hallmark channel, it sounds a little corny, but everything in my life gets that burst of of like a like a little pre-workout, you know, where I was like, oh, I can have my own sketch comedy show because people went to war in World War I in a trench, yeah, where they were their buddies were dying of sepsis right next to them, and Germans were lobbing fucking grin and they're crawling through tunnels. Like people achieved way more than than you could ever wrap your head around. So you probably could too, you know.

SPEAKER_03 11:56

Like that is you have the craziest stark contrast of like LA life. I mean, what were you doing 2018-2019 compared to farming and yeah, melting snow?

SPEAKER_00 12:07

Uh making fart jokes on the radio for talking to people on Love Line, like pay getting paid to do what we're doing right now. Uh, that's what I was doing. TV, uh doing entertainment news, which is the most, and I could say this like with direct objective honesty, also at the same time saying people make fun of Access Hollywood, Entertainment Tonight, these shows. I I got I was working for these shows, Entertainment Tonight, Access Hollywood. For a long time I worked at Access Hollywood, TMZ, all these plays you can make fun because it's meaningless and it's and it's just kind of like junk food for the brain. Yeah, everyone there works really hard and they're really nice people, and no one has any kind of cuntiness to them. And it's like I I didn't want to do it as I was doing it. They pay you way too much money considering how vital that job is. Cool, totally true. Everyone I was around was so nice and so happy, and just living a quality life where people didn't really have that insane competitive BS that you find in a lot of other works of life that uh walks of life that actually are very meaningful. Cool, I agree. If you're for instance, there's nothing really more meaningful on a global scale or on a on a on a macro scale than say politics in a first world country. The people who are running the country, that's that the stakes are super high. But everyone in it, almost by nature of being in that job, is so fucking cunty and they're so backset, and they're so evil, and they're so hard, you know. And um, I have I have four or five really close friends and and people that I can can I trust, okay, that run the gamut from a guy you would you didn't know that I grew up with, it's just a buddy of mine, to Tom Morello, um, where they really ran the gamut of they gave up their life so that they could get into politics, be it on a state or federal level, because they wanted to make a difference. And uniform five five people off the top of my head, all of them came back to me and they're like, There's no, there's no hope. If you really if you want to make a difference, you want to like do things for the American people, like that's not what the system's about. Every one of them. My friend, my friend was a an attorney, my the best man at my wedding. He was an attorney on Capitol Hill. He was he's fiercely smart and he's a good guy. He's a smart, happy, good human being. And he worked on Capitol at a very high level uh on K Street for the federal government, and he just gave he's like, I can't do this. I can't, I can't do it. All that you think is going on is not what's happening. Whether you're super mega right wing or you're ACLU bleeding heart, it's like it's not what you think it is. Yeah, it's it's a bunch, it's a business like anything else.

SPEAKER_03 14:59

Yeah, it's stuff's terrifying.

SPEAKER_00 15:01

And I and you know what? I like entertainment news, uh, as stupid as it is. None of that. It it's it's hey, Sporty Spice wants to promote her new show. Cool. Hey, nice to meet you, Sporty Spice. It's kind of crazy being in the Spice Results. Yeah, it's fucking nuts. Tell me about this new show. There's no like people yell, you know what I'm saying? Like it's really out there. It's just really fucking like that.

SPEAKER_03 15:24

That's it's just so crazy that you're like a through and through Texan now. Yeah, you know, yeah. Like, did you ever see yourself being a farmer 10 years ago? Yeah, really?

SPEAKER_00 15:33

I I I always thought I would move to somewhere rural and be have land and have animals. I just thought it'd be like 80. I thought I'd retire to it, you know? Um, so I didn't think it would be in the middle of my life, but uh I'm I'm happy, I'm absolutely happy about it.

SPEAKER_03 15:51

Well, I mean, even just doing like some research on you and figuring out your kind of like past radio jobs, different things like that, I wouldn't expect that you would come in off the farm. So that's just super surprising and really cool because um I don't farm, but last year my parents got a ranch. So now we're working a ranch as a family, and uh it's really wholesome, like you said, and it's a great way to bond as a family. Yeah, it's brought us together in a completely different way than before, I would say.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

It really is because it it's all for it's all for the purpose of life and life thriving and life strengthening itself. Like that's the basis of all of it. Farming, gardening, uh, agricultural endeavors. Pardon me, I just proved you love the topo, but man, who does it ever? Some aggressive bubbles, man. It it's all it's all based in that, and you get like this real like I mean, it's corny as hell, sure. And there's some hipster in Brooklyn that's listening to this, like, yeah, but what I do is meaningful. Sure, I'm not talking shit. But when you and it doesn't change it doesn't change everyone else's existence at all. But when you wake up in the morning and after three or four days of kind of eyeballing it, you pull up that hen and there's little chicks poking their their beaks through the eggs, you're like, oh fuck yeah!

SPEAKER_01 17:22

Yeah, buddy.

SPEAKER_00 17:25

And then you go and you and then the roosters are trying to fight you. They're like, Don't get near my lady. I did it, bro. That's so I was cutting them, I was cutting a goat umbilical cord the other day, and it was like baby goat, and you're just like, oh, this is fucking oh my god, this is awesome, you know?

SPEAKER_03 17:43

It's really awesome. It seems like it it it puts things in perspective.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't make so much like okay. I don't know, I'm not gonna, I'm not one of these guys that like has a has an outlet, so then I'm gonna make it seem like I know how everyone else's experience is. I'm only speaking from my experience, but I am very prone to making way too big of a deal about stuff that I shouldn't be, and then making not a big a deal, big enough deal about the stuff I should. And when you're fighting a predatory animal or or shooting it or or running it away alongside another livestock dog to keep the vulnerable animals alive, or giving birth to an animal, you go like, oh, like whoa, whoa, whoa. All of the all the all the cards get shuffled in the right way, real quick. And then I go and I'm like, oh, this is my daughter. This is my I'm responsible. Let me what's going on in your day right now? Let me tell oh, yeah, she's being kind of like that. Well, yeah, babe, people are, you know, everyone has their own problems to deal with. Instead of going like, oh, what's this how many legs does this fucking dude have? Fuck this guy. Oh, I could escape from that Kamura easily. Fuck that. That's stupid. You just you start to get consumed with stuff that when I'm like, oh, I have a child, let me talk to her. My wife seems to be struggling with, let me go make sure because it all just gets the deck, just gets shuffled, you know, and you kind of yeah, remove yourself from the stuff, you know.

SPEAKER_03 19:12

It's only been like a year and a half that I've gotten way back into like going outside. I go to a lot of hunting trips and camping trips and stuff, but like I have to do it and get into a similar mindset. And now I'm dealing with the something you just mentioned about like hunting taking off the predators, yeah, is part of the ranching, is that like you have to kill some things or they're gonna kill other things.

SPEAKER_00 19:33

And I'm not I'm not like I I I I think it's weird sometimes. I'm a big meat eater, I'm a b I've hunted, I'm not like expert level hunter, but I I do enjoy it and I I have done it and will continue to do it, but I'm not also wantonly murdering things. I don't like I don't enjoy killing. I'm not a I'm but it it's necessary, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:54

And it's like been something I've had to confront. Yeah, it's like okay, there's certain things that like if I see them out there, like I'm supposed to shoot them. Right. And that's like makes me kind of sad because I'm uh at first and like in the hippie mindset of like, man, I just want all the animals. But there's certain ones like coyotes where if they're there around your chickens, you're not gonna have your chickens.

SPEAKER_00 20:13

And there's nothing personal about it between you and the coyote or the chicken, between between the coyote and you, like there the it just is. Uh that's one thing that I definitely can can dig my heels in and say that I've really developed and learned is that everyone has this notion, almost a Hollywood notion, that the universe and nature has an agenda. And the reality is nature is indifferent, utterly indifferent. We apply feelings to it. I have chickens, uh roosters specifically, that are such assholes. They fight the dogs, they fuck with our cats, they f they they elevate and put their claws into my chest. I was like, well, I feed you. What the fuck? That thing will live forever. I have these sweet little chicks that I love, and sure enough, that one day uh an owl just come and gank its neck. It's that has nothing to do with who's nature. Nature is indifferent, and so you just you do what you think is best in spite of that. In spite I I like um right before I moved, I was in Venice walking with my daughter. This kid comes up, he's probably 20, young, he comes, man.

SPEAKER_02 21:34

Man, you think I can get some cash?

SPEAKER_00 21:36

His eyes are his eyes are banking around in his head and everything. And I'm a drug addict, and I look at him and I was like, oh fuck. This guy's fucked up. Like this kid's really suffering, you know. So I go through my pockets and uh I give him I don't know, five bucks or something, you know. I I don't remember the exact amount, but I give him and then I stopped and I I said, Do you have a phone? He goes, Yeah. Pulls it out. I go, here's my number. Uh I'm in recovery. I've been clean a long time. If you need it, call me because you're you're gonna you're gonna die and things aren't gonna end well and you gotta make a he goes, Thanks, man, thanks, man. That's nice of you, man. And he walks away and I go, there's zero percent chance that that kid's ever gonna call me. He's gonna spend every cent that I just gave him and whatever he collects to go get high. And so it was probably meaningless that I did that. And I thought to myself, I thought about it, I really like ruminated about it. And I said, I don't think that we should do things that are good or righteous because it's gonna change the world. I think we should do it because in spite of the fact that it probably won't. Does that make you know what I'm saying? Like it doesn't change the fact that I feel like that was something I should do, even though there's more than likely it's not gonna make one bit of difference, is that if we all committed to discontinually doing it in spite of the fact that it probably won't make much difference, that will change kind of the course of how things are. It's the way I look at it. I I there there's there was a time and a place where the snakes at my old farm in in nor in like northern area, like Lago Vista area. Okay, the snakes were just decimating the chickens and the and the uh eggs, like eating them up. And they're so the snakes are so smart and so cunning. I had to respect the game, even though I was angry as fuck, I was always like, God, you hit out here in all all in this in the roof for all night just so that you could wait till you can get when I was not, I was like, gotta respect the game. So I would do plug up holes, elevate the chicken to elevate the roost where they were giving uh laying eggs and everything. And I was I was like, okay, this is only gonna make maybe no difference, but uh I still have I should do it, even though it probably gotta it's like you gotta try. Yeah, I gotta put in the effort, or else we all lose, right? If we just like resign to like, well, no, well, people have evil, everyone has evil thoughts, and we're all deceitful and we're all greedy, and we're all so let's just go with it. It's like, no, kind of push forward, even though it probably won't make much of a difference, you know. Like that's the way I look at it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 24:25

I feel like if everybody puts in just like a little bit of a little bit of good out in the world, you know, or as as much as you can, or as much as you know, like comes to you, I feel like again, it sounds coinry, sounds cheesy, but the world would be a better place.

SPEAKER_05 24:39

Right.

SPEAKER_00 24:44

So we go because we're we're all motivated to do things when there's when you can kind of when there's noticeable results, everyone feels motivated to do it. I guess it's kind of continuing to do what you what you deeply believe is right, even though there might not be those noticeable results. Yeah. It's like working with with kids in in jujitsu. It's the same you get there's things where you could you could teach someone a technique that looks really cool and they may catch people here and there, but it probably won't make them better overall as a grappler. You know what I'm saying? Like there's like little like like catchy submissions where you know from half guard you can slide out the back, maybe get them locked in, and then next thing you know, like that. Little little bit of a like a wristband, and you could tap a bunch of dudes. Okay, cool, that's cool, and you could go home happy that day, you learn something cool, but it's not gonna make you comprehensively like a much better grappler. And a lot of the stuff that you teach people that would make them a comprehensively better grappler, and I'd say this too on the receiving end, like a lot of the really boring, kind of monotonous shit. It's like, I don't want to do that. I'm kind of bored, I don't want to continue coming back to if this is the man. That's the stuff in the long run that I was like, oh well, at least now I can last two or three minutes before this ADCC champion taps the shit out of me. You know, like I could see myself growing. I'm not tap, I'm not doing this cool submission, but at least I'm surviving when Tim Kennedy puts his fucking forehead into my face, you know. At least I have a way of managing, you know. How long have you been training? 20 years. Nice, dude. I started training jujitsu way before it was cool. Yeah, that's what I've been training way too long to be a purple bill. I should be nice, I should be like Andre Galval, but I I'm just doing that's a that's a bad reference. I should be like I should be like I should be like a small Nikki rod. I should be but I because I I started training jujitsu when like I started training jujitsu when the tough guy at the bar still thought like that shit doesn't mean nothing. I'll come in and then I'll start and go like will you tell me that story again tomorrow? Show up tomorrow. Uh yeah I'd like to meet you, I'll introduce you to Orlando and Hamilo. And look you you're a tough guy, right? You've been in bar fights? Okay, let me give it a shot. Are you saying like Hamilo Bajal? I I started training jujitsu because I grew up with Orlando Sanchez. No shit. We grew up. I I grew up in San Marino. He grew up in La Cinata, California. And we knew each other. So we went to different high schools, but we were around, he was a couple years younger than me. He was a really, really good football player. And I was a serviceable football, baseball player. I was a good jock, I was a jock dude, but we knew each other and he was jacked, and we lifted weights together at Gold's gym in Pasadena. We got into powerlifting and I and Orlando and I just as people we got along really well.

SPEAKER_03 27:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:40

Rest in peace. Yeah, rest in peace, man. And he and I became very close, and then he was crushing people in powerlifting and bodybuilding, and Alberto Crane opened up Gracie Baja Pasadena, like right across the street from Gold's Gym in Pasadena. And he roped Orlando into coming in and doing a couple classes. And at the time, Orlando was flirting with doing Mui Thai at Sityon Tong in Pasadena as well. Walter the sleeper, Michelowski was there, real legends. And Orlando was a devastating fighter in jet in any out because he was just so athletic and so fucking dense. But he started doing jujitsu and he just took it to it like that. He was a white belt crushing, crushing people, you know. Orlando's so intense. You gotta come fucking train with me, bro. We'll be lifting. We'd say, come on, we're gonna, and I was like, all right, yeah, yeah, you know. This is like pre uh the ultimate fighter, like pre-explored. This is 2004, you know, like 2000, someone that he was telling you to come train with him.

SPEAKER_04 28:49

They're like, that shit doesn't work.

SPEAKER_00 28:50

No, it wasn't that shit doesn't work. I found it very interesting, and I was already training Muay Thai as well. And I was, but I just also I was like just starting to see a career grow. I was a single guy trying to make a life for myself, and I was like, that's all and I was also spending a lot of time committed to kind of just lifting weights, health, and fitness. I was like, do I have enough kind of energy and space in my life to do this? So I did, even though I like I said, I found it interesting, but I I knew I don't know if I have what it takes to kind of commit to it. And I wasn't that taken by it for a couple reasons. Not because jujitsu isn't beautiful and amazing, but because a lot of people, as white belts, or or the first couple times they experience the maths, they go in with other white belts or they go in with other people who are just getting started, and then the professor will give them some ideas, and then you can kind of fool around and work on techniques. My introduction to jujitsu was Alberto, Orlando, and Hamilo passing me around like a fucking crack whore and beating the beating the shit out of me. Like they and occasionally they'd be like, Oh, you know, make sure you keep your elbows in like that. And then he's like, Yeah, now frame like this, and I go, Oh, okay, it's starting to get it. And the next thing you know, my arm's behind my head, you know. So I was like, Well, jujitsu isn't like the cracies make it look. Yeah, I'm getting this isn't fun, yeah. And even look, even in Muay Thai, which is which is uh clearly a much more kind of initially, it's like a much more brutal endeavor than jujitsu, the gentle art, right? In Muay Thai, yeah, um a lot of times I was hitting pads, kicking the bag, I was working on techniques, and occasionally we would spar, but even when you're sparring, guys are and touch in it. So I would walk away from it like I get a little brute, but I feel fine. Oh immediately from jujitsu, which was the gentle art. I was leaving, like my whole body was in pain. I have black eyes and from guys' fucking foreheads grinding into me, passing my guard and everything. I was like, I don't know about this jujitsu thing. And then slowly but surely I just kind of kept coming up. And the next thing I knew, I was a serviceable blue belt, and then I started to like have a game, and that that was 2007 to the and then I started hosting Love Line. So I was doing the Kevin and Bean show in the morning, 5 to 10 a.m. live on the air, and then 10 to midnight live on the air. So it I just had I was pulled in between and did you sleep? Uh sometimes I would nap during the day. Yeah, try sometimes. I would sleep. I like I slept at K-Rock a lot. I would sleep at K, I'd just wake up and come do the Kevin and Bean show. But then and then I started doing e News in the middle of that, in between that. Oh god. So it was cool. I started to be like, I couldn't believe it. I had a career. I could for the first time I wasn't balling by any stretch of the imagination, but for the first time as like a a grown adult, I didn't have to worry about like how I was gonna make rent or yeah, fill up my gas tank. And so I felt like I was good. And so I my training had these ebbs and flows. And when I was working so much, I moved out to the west. Then I moved to the west, I moved to Venice and stopped training for a little bit, and then I started training at Crohn Gracie's in in Culver City out there because Crohn's academy was out there. So then I'm you know, then my training went, I was training a lot more frequently, and my game came out, then COVID happened. I mean, I could see myself getting better, you know. COVID happened, I stopped training completely, moved to Texas, and I started training at Tim's Academy, the Gracie Omita.

SPEAKER_03 32:20

So that's awesome. My favorite Orlando Sanchez quote is like the higher the socks, the downer the dude. Yeah, the down one food down.

SPEAKER_00 32:27

Orlando, you know, I I I loved him, and it's a very complicated experience for me to make heads or tails of Orlando and then also talk about it because we were close. I genuinely cared for him, I experienced him as an athlete so greatly. And then also I'm a drug addict in recovery. So to see all of those factors play out in him and lead to his inevitable death, it was it's very sad because what made Orlando one of those guys who he was he, I I I know there's all these like legend weird stories about people who when they pass, but Orlando was a blue belt barely, and he would go to tournaments, he wouldn't give he'd be like, whatever belt rank, I don't give a fuck. Whatever I can make with this weight, I'll do and he would grow and he would go and he would smash everyone that came in front of him until he got to you know like like the um moondial slash 80cc level. That's where he started, you'd start to see him have to work harder, but up until that point, he would just go to random term and just kill everybody. It was crazy. And he would walk in smoking cigarettes and he'd be hungover, he didn't sleep the night before, and he'd just be like, fuck it, bro. That's sweating, you know, and he just crushed people. So he was this shit came that easily to him, and he was super, he would train all day, but he would party all day, and it was there was no off switch for Orlando, he was always go, go, go, and that's what inevitably led to that, you know.

SPEAKER_03 33:58

That was kind of one of my general questions I was thinking about with you is like being a person in recovery, and I have more questions about that too. But when you're around friends like that, how hard is it for you when you're seeing people go through whatever you went through that led to your sobriety and like still being their friend? Yeah, I imagine that that's gotta be challenging. And I imagine you've seen plenty of people like related to it.

SPEAKER_00 34:18

Yeah, oh, absolutely. And you know, cause okay, both from just like my personal life growing up with guys like that, but then also then getting into like the rock music industry and the entertainment industry. It was like you're just surrounded by people where I where they're saying one thing to me, and as they're saying it, I'm like, Nope, that's not true. Like, you're gonna be dead in two months, you know? Yeah, and you could there's only so much I I'm I never would try to lie to people like you're doing great, or when they're slurring their words and telling me, like, I've been clean for six months, and you're like, Oh yeah, I'm sure I would never be the you're doing great, awesome, yeah. But you there's always that pull them aside situation where you go, like, it's not this is your uh experience, it's not mine. I'm just speaking as someone who's kind of been where you are, and I'm concerned because I don't want you to be dead because this is a fatal disease. That's all that's all you gotta break it down to is that you erase the feeling, like really erase the subjective side of it, your feelings and your your your emotional attachment to it. It's like how does this end? Like you're going to be in jail in a mental institution, or you're gonna die. That's let's just get that out of the way. And that goes for people who were really trying hard, and that goes for people who were lying through their teeth, you know. And uh I never like to uh there's a reason why anonymous is attached to all the 12-step programs at the end, because you're you usually but when people have passed, I I do like to point these out for a couple reasons. One we all know it's not like there's any anonymity for Robin Williams or or Chester Bennington from Lincoln Park. But also for all the people that are listening for you two, and then also anyone who may come across this, like that those conversations were had, and lo and behold, they're dead. My idol in recovery, my the guy I looked up to and I said, I want to be like that was DJ AM. And he's fucking dead. That's the guy, the guy who was doing it so well that I said, I want to be like you. You're so given, you're so personable, you're so you're so conscientious of everyone else. You don't show boat. He was already a celebrity by the time you know I would see him in the rooms. He never, and I and by the way, there were celebrities that came in and made everything about them, and it made me furious. I wanted to fucking punch their fight. I really wanted to work on some of those chokes that I'd been working on. I mean, it really made me because there'd be some guy there, he's just trying to piece his life back together, and some celebrity would come in and then do like a like a 45-minute soliloquy about their experience, and you're like, motherfucker. Um, but DJ AM was he would give people rides, he would people you didn't know, he'd be like, Oh, you're having a hard time making it? Where do you live? I live in Pacoima. He's like, Oh, I could pick you up, dude. What days did you come to the P? And I was like, by this guy, and he's fucking dead. He's fucking dead from drugs. So I I don't say that as like a way of promoting me or my status or anything. I say that because there's far too much kind of after school special, very neutered, very, very sanitized discussion about addiction. And that's the reality. Like the guys who are committed to staying clean, a lot of them are dead. How do you think it's gonna work out for you who's bullshitting everybody and taking pills on your way to go pick up your kids from school, washing it down with a glass of wine? You think you feel yo, you got it under control. How do you think this ends?

SPEAKER_03 38:06

You know? So, what was like rock bottom for you? What started this journey for you?

SPEAKER_00 38:11

It's funny. Um, well, I don't know if it's funny at all. It's it's interesting to me because I had, and I and the more I've talked about it with other people uh who have this experience, uh this seems to be a lot of times the case. But I had crashed cars, I'd gone to jail, I had had my parents really just staring at me, crying, wondering what they could do to help me, and personal relationships, really meaningful ones. People cut me off. Um I'd had the shit kicked out of me numerous times. I woke up places uh not knowing how I got there, the whole the whole thing. I got OD'd a bunch, I got rushed to the hospital a couple times, and none of that seemed to kick it into gear. And the time when, you know, by the grace of God, it is the the last time I drank and used, I was in a motel by myself in Inglewood, California, packing rocks in a in a homemade tinfoil beer can pipe. I was watching Jenny Jones, and I can't remember this experience through my own vision in the first person. I can I only for some reason, I know this sounds a little bit pokey, but I can only think back on it as like I'm looking down on myself in a closed circuit camera or something. Yeah, I I can't, I don't remember this in my own kind of experience. It was as if I was an observer. I I I can't tell you why. There was nothing kind of pressing from that standpoint, like all the aforementioned things, the arrests, the the the physical abuse, the emotional abuse, the the way that I'd cut myself off from everyone. None of that was happening. I was just sitting in a room drinking and smoking. And I got up and walked to the side of the bed in this motel and looked if there was a yellow pages. This is before smartphones, and I pulled out the yellow pages and I looked for recovery places, and I called a couple, and this place in Pasadena, ironically, where where I grew up, had bed this place lost in Cenis. They had a couple beds they said I could check in that night. And I hung up the phone. I called my parents and I told them the whole truth and that this is what I wanted to do. They were very happy. Yeah, and they came and picked me up, and that was the last time I drank or use. And I have no I can't, I wish I could tell you there was more concrete reasons why I the uh someone I owed money to this guy and he was gonna beat my. I was just one of those wasted days of drinking and using, and I I don't know if subconsciously I got the sense that like there was more to life, like I could do something, but I had tried to get clean before and failed, you know, I'd fallen off the wagon. But at that time I just I just did, and I and I didn't feel there was an emotional, sorry, there was a physical connection to drugs and alcohol. I had withdrawals, seriously, and I certainly had a lot of holes in my time spent during the time I was in recovery, in in a recovery facility, and then when I tried to introduce myself back into regular life, there was a lot of like immediate initially there was boredom because I was like, this is how I spent my whole day drinking and using, figuring out how I was gonna get more drugs, blah, blah, blah. So I had to figure out things to do, but there wasn't like this big emotional psychological pull. It's as if even before I consciously knew, I was like, I was done, I can't do this anymore. And I knew I was, I was like, I'm young, I just turned 22. It's like I could do I could do something. If I do it now, I could do, I could change this all. And that was it.

SPEAKER_03 41:56

What do you think about the program worked? Like what was the program and what did they put you through from the withdrawal phase to getting back to normal life?

SPEAKER_00 42:04

Well, what worked for sure, and there's nothing kind of spiritual or even controversial about this, is that when I went into a professional facility, they gave me drugs so I wouldn't die. That helps because a lot of people have this crazy misunderstanding that alcohol because it's legal, I mean we could go get booze right now, no problem. That it's not somehow one of the more damaging or dangerous drugs to come off of. No, it's what it's one of the only drugs, maybe the only drug that is commonly fatal to cece use of. If you're a heavy drinker and you just stop, it's very common to die from that. So I had Librium and other drugs that they were providing me so I wouldn't die. That helped a lot. I know it sounds corny to kind of be, but no, seriously, because if you're trying to get off opiates, heroin, vicodin, percocet, any of the you're trying to get off that, the withdrawal is so unbelievably hell-like horrific that you almost, even if you're really sincere about getting clean, you'll go back to using because it's just so awful to be in withdrawal. So to be in a medically supervised place where they can maybe do some things to to bring that down is huge because you're a lot more likely to follow through. And then also, if you're a drinker, to not die is pretty big. Because you'll start sweating and you'll you'll be like, I'm gonna have a heart attack, I'm gonna die, and then you'll be like, fuck it, and you'll go get a 40. Or you'll get a bottle of jack and just swig it because you're like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna fucking die. And the next thing you know, that cycle starts over again. So to have that kind of fail safe and having doctors literally like looking over and making sure that things are gonna be okay. Because I had seizures, even the time I got clean, I had a seizure, and I was like, it would have been really bad if I was not in a medical facility, you know? Yeah. Um was there was

SPEAKER_04 44:00

Was there anything different they did the last time that like really worked and and stuck? Whereas the other times you said you mentioned you tried to get clean, yeah, but it didn't work. You know, is there something uh different or something that you could point to as like, oh, this is what changed?

SPEAKER_00 44:14

Very good question. And I think yes, I'm not sure if it was just for me or if this is would be universal. But I went to this place when I was um living on the east coast for a short time, I was 19 years old, and I had also come kind of come to the conclusion. It was there, it was either put up or shut up. I was I had uh a DUI where I had crashed the car while getting and didn't remember it. I woke up in a hospital arrested, and I really I had a shattered leg and and I was in uh under arrest. And I was like, what? And they're like, This is you crashed on the Jersey Turnpike right here, blah blah blah. And I was like, What? I rented a car and crack the influx. I have no con okay, so it wasn't as if there was obviously there was judicial kind of pressure to get clean. It was either that or go to jail, but and because I was under 21, I was really, I was really fucked. So it was kind of presented to me that I could be on probation and then go get clean to a recovery center and get clean, and that that would prevent me from maybe having like a felony DUI where I'd be in jail jail for a long time. So that I did that, and they sent me to this place called Hazledon, which is in Minnesota, legendary, world globally recognized as one of the high most advanced recovery facilities in the world. Um, and it is amazing. It was the people there that work there are amazing, the facility is amazing, the the structure of the program is amazing, but it was so big time, it was so huge that I almost thought I was at this like like a resort, yeah, yeah. And it's not like I was getting massages or anything, but I'm going to hear some Swiss world-renowned psychiatrist discuss the chemical breakdown of addiction and the components of dopamine and really and then from there I'm going to um uh this group-led discussion about said thing. And I'm sitting there with uh an attorney and a cop, and it's 40, 50 dudes in this in this really beautiful kind of environment in this uh amazing, you know, wintertime in in that part of um Minnesota. It's like ice, beautiful ice outside, beautiful snow, like a Norman Rockwell painting, and it's uh there's a fire lit and everything, and guys are strumming guitars and stuff. And I almost got high on my own experience, more so than and when I got clean for good, I was at this place that I was with, I was with gangsters, I was with junkies, I was at washouts, and we went to meetings in the morning, but it was a fucking AA meeting, and there was bad coffee, and I was getting, you know, like jail cafeteria food three.

SPEAKER_05 47:03

I was about to say, hey, don't point that coffee's don't don't point.

SPEAKER_00 47:08

I'm not I I love I'm a coffee drinker, but I'm not a coffee snob. I'll I I I will go to you know, shithead hipster place in Austin where the guy just dressed like a train engineer from 1890. It's like it's like you know, pour over amazing organic. I'll go to Dunkin' Donuts right now and be like bomb. But but this was this was you know those coffee machines where they put it immediately. And um you know you're drinking shitty coffee and eating like powdered eggs and and Wheaties a couple times a day, and uh you get to one for one hour at the end, we get watch like uh the selection of like seven VHSs that that they had for selection from like 1988, and the rest of the time I'm just reading the blue book, the big book, and and walking, you know, and hanging out and kind of confronting what's going on in my life, and I do think that the restriction of resources almost forced me, just like I was saying, with a lot of times fighters tend to be the coolest people because they're just so fucking tired, they're relegated to their primal state. I was I was relegated to like the animal me, and I was kind of forced a little bit more to confront that. I think that did help a lot. That's speculation. I don't know. I'm it's all of this is way outside my pay grade. I only know my experience, and I can tell you that that that seemed to make it more real to me. I there was one in one experience in particular, because like I said, when I was at Hazledin, I was uh whether you look at it as fortunate or unfortunate, I was uh was staying with other guys, other actors, they all had their shit together. They were all like dads, and like I said, I remember there's a couple cops, there was an attorney, a really good one, there was a pharmacist who was getting high on his own drugs, and he was very honest, but they were all dudes with cars and families and houses, you know. And I was in at Los Cenas a couple times one time I was a lot uh the time I was at Los Encinas, I was with a pretty famous retired athlete, um, and some house, like really like single moms, like end of their rope, like they're gonna lose their kids if they don't get clean, and and a couple gangsters, fucking gangsters, cats on their neck, shaved head, socks pulled up, like like hardened cholos. And that experience I think helped a lot because I remember this one time, this guy, and he was an older guy, he was like this is 2003, 2002, 2003. He had to be 60 at that time. Gray Fu Manchu, mustache, shaved head, big guy, for a Mexican especially. He was a he was a little bigger than me. Um white beater, dicky shorts, the whole thing, like a real vet, you know, like training day style, like classic Southern California cholo.

SPEAKER_02 50:22

And uh he was talking one time and he said, uh all these all these young fools that come in and they talk about I'm so I'm so hard. I'm so hard, I could take, I could kick this guy's ass. I beat this fucking fool up. I went down, I showed up, I showed up with my gun, I did this, he's like, You want to be hard? He's like, get clean. That's what I had to tell myself in the mirror. I was like, I could do all this shit. I've been in jail, I've probably been in fights, I've been in gun fight, gunfights. And I looked at myself, I was like, Oh, are you really are you tough? Are you hard? Fucking get clean.

SPEAKER_00 50:54

And I was like sitting there as like a 22-year-old suburbanite lilywhite shithead, you know, it's like so he's right. Like if you're if you're any man at all, like take control of this, like really do what it takes. And I and it was very it was very removed from all the pomp and circumstance of like this really nice place that I had been at in the past. Um there was nothing medical about it, there was nothing uh formal or advanced. It was this guy who was who had had a conversation with himself in the mirror, who had been to jail, who had looked stared to death in the eye, who had stared these incredible circumstances in the eye, and he was being so raw and everything. And I was like, dude, you're right. And so it was little experiences like that, I think, really helped me.

SPEAKER_03 51:38

Now, did you have your kind of radio career before this, or was that all no I had a nothing career?

SPEAKER_00 51:44

Okay, I was at the time I was a janitor at a orthopedics lab and prosthetics lab, which was actually kind of cool because I'd be like cleaning up and there'd be like a football. There'd be like parts, yeah. There'd be like hands and feet, body parts everywhere. I'd love to see, I'd love to be like, there's dicks and legs. There were you'd see some limbs, but there was a lot of feet and hands. Like a lot, and I was like, damn, god damn. Especially I I wasn't fucking with it. I was and then I put them on, but I wouldn't like practicing rest lock. Someone who could barely I I I couldn't get uh anything but a D or an F in basic high school science classes. But so for me to look at and like some of the more advanced like um robotic kind of basis of the I was just fascinated. But that that's what I was doing at the time.

SPEAKER_03 52:32

And uh then how did you get into the radio and all that?

SPEAKER_00 52:35

I was in recovery in in an inpatient facility for 60 days, then I was in a like a halfway house for six more months, and I had you part of the part of the um criteria of living in this halfway house was that you had to be employed. And there was like a like a collection. It's really beautiful. Uh this is real community service that I think is is powerful because they they they had this this halfway house had connections with other construction sites and kitchens and coffee shops where they could help if you if part of the you stay here, you you pay the rent, which was very affordable, but you also you have to get a job, and they had these options for you, they would help you. And I I worked uh so I was there and I worked at a construction site, and I also got a job at this place called uh I don't know if you guys grow up in Southern California or you nomy Tommy Burger in in Southern California, which is like it's like a a more kind of hipster in and out where they have like artisan burgers, but it's a drive-thru. Uh so I were to Tommy's and uh for a little bit for a short amount of time. Then I got out of there and I started getting jobs. I was like, I'm gonna get jobs because my parents said you could live with us. Obviously, we're very proud that you're standing on your own ground doing this. You could if you're not using or drinking, you could live with us. Because I grew up in Pasadena area. So I moved back in with them, but I was like, I'm now where most of my friends and peers like they're graduating colleges and living their life and doing stuff. I'm like living with my parents, and I have nothing. So I just started getting, I just would take the recycler, the old newspaper, the recycler. There's like I said, there was internet, but like you you had to be really into it to use it. I didn't use the internet at that point. It's 2003. I was reading this and I found I started working at a rehearsal studio in North Hollywood where I was the overnight watchman. Uh, I got a job again at the prosthetics lab, but at a different place that this company owned, but as a janitor, that was what I'd do during the day. Um and I got a job at a as a rehearsal studio right out of the gate, and then I would be the night watchman. And that's I just started doing stuff. Okay. So I but I would continually, because I was making you know$8 an hour at one job and$11 an hour at the other, you know. And even though I was not paying any rent because I was living with my parents, I wanted to do something. I wanted to get an apartment, I wanted to build my life. But I also was very handicapped by the fact like I didn't know what the fuck I wanted to do. I wasn't one of these kids that grew up like, well, I really want to be an engineer, I really want to be an actor. I'm gonna trend conductor. I was like, I want to I want to be uh I want to be a trend doctor, I want to be I want to be not a loser. That was all I thought, and now all I really was was a loser. I was a jock growing up. I wasn't like ever like good enough. I wasn't like, oh, I'm gonna be a pro football player, I'm gonna be a pro baseball player, but I was good, you know, could have gotten junior college or something, but I wasn't that kind of jock. Uh I was a terrible student. I wanted to be a rock star, but as a music, but I also wasn't really doing anything about it. I taught I I'm a very outgoing, very extroverted, really shy guy in that I really wanted, I really did want to be a musician, but I didn't want to go out and join bands because I was too scared. But I taught myself how to read music, taught myself how to play guitar, taught myself how to do like I would, I would, I was really into it, but I I couldn't do it with people, I couldn't introduce myself in the world. I was too scared. And so I was like, I don't know what to do, but I'm just gonna do a lot and hopefully some shit'll so I started working in this rehearsal studio, and I have some fun stories unrelated to motivational recovery and anything, but I have some fun stories about that because it was Southern California in like right near Hollywood, it was in North Hollywood at that like kind of the explosion of those like new metal bands. So I have some stories about being in that rehearsal studio, and I started looking for like bands I could maybe join or like music projects and everything, and then I saw in this time, maybe four or five months ago by I saw K-Rock, KRLQ 106.7 FM, the literal tagline of K-Rock, the world famous K-Rock, because it is a LA local rock station, but since 1979, it has been listened to in Jamaica and London and everything, because they were the first radio station, the first radio station in the whole wide world that would play Joy Division and Talking Heads, and like they were ahead of when when rock stations were playing Boston and and Journey and the Eagles, they were playing, like I said, you know, Joy Division and television and all these like really avant-garde kind of punk and new wave bands. Then in the 80s, and then they they were the first to play like Depeche Mode in mid-80s. They were the first to play those, then in the 90s, they were the first to play Nirvana, they were the first to play Soundgarden. So it was this really cool, very credible, but also very successful rock radio station. And they were hiring for entry level, organize boxes and clean up the studio type shit. So I applied. I was like, well, I'm fucking doing manual labor all these places. I might as well do manual labor there. I might run into Dave Droll or some shit, you know? Yeah, I I applied, I got hired. So I'm working there, like literally, like, give me a uniform. I'm working there, like I'm wearing coveralls, carrying boxes, and um help cleaning the station vehicles that say K-Rock on the side. I'm cleaning them and but I would prank call the morning show and I would fuck with people and I was while I was there. I would, I would, I would fuck with people. Oh, yeah. Blink182 was there. They were doing an interview on the morning show, and I happened to be there, and I came out, and I was fucking with I was fucking with Tom DeLong and Mark. I was pretending to be Tom DeLong. I was playing a guitar in the parking lot. I had my uh uh electric guitar in the back of my truck, I took it out. I don't think I was like, oh I don't feel I don't feel and they laughed and they just walked in. So people were taking on, you know. And this guy went to K Rock in New York. He got he was a producer for the morning show. His name is Jimmy Jimmy. I still know the guy. Um, he got hired in New York at WXRK, Howard Stern Station. The sister station in New York. He moved to New York, so they needed a producer for the morning show. So I had befriended enough people in the station, they're like, dude, at least apply. I was like, okay, I will. That'd be cool. You know, they'd be add me to the I could be on the morning show, I'll be funny, blah, blah, blah. So I go and I interview with Kevin and Bean, who are at the time like number one rated morning show and legends. I grew up listening to these guys. And I sit down and I'm nervous as fuck. I wore a suit. I literally wore a suit because I remember my grandpa told me, he's like, if you're gonna ask someone to give you money to do something, you wear a suit and show them a UK. But it's a morning radio show at a rock radio. These guys are in flip-flops and like billabong shorts, you know, grown men. They're like, what the fuck's with the and so now I'm all nervous. I interview them, they fucking hate me. They hate me because I'm being very serious. Yes, sir, no, sir. They go, Do you understand? Did you know anything about digital editing? Do you have experience? I go, Oh, yeah, so much. I know Pro Tools like the back of my hand, lying out of my lying out of my ass. They don't hire me. They hire this other guy. I never got introduced to, I never knew his name. But Kevin and Bean, because we got became so close later on, they finally told me this story. Like, we fucking hated you. There was no chance we would hire you. Um, and they hired this other guy who had experience in radio. He was at another radio station, KLOS, in Los Angeles, which was like a classic rock station, and he was a radio producer, he had experience and everything. And the first day of his work, he calls in sick because he was drunk. He was all hammered. And he calls, he's I'm not gonna make it.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:48

I'll be in there, maybe I'll be in there around 8 in the morning, but I had a long night and everything.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:52

And Kevin of Kevin and Bean, he fucking slams. This is I I heard this story. They he people other people told me, the producer told me because I obviously wasn't there. He slams the phone like uh De Niro and Goodfellas when he finds out they killed uh Pesci, he fucking slams it down and he goes, Fuck it, hire that other kid, and he walks back in the studio to go on the air. And that's how I got my job in radio. That's how I got my shot. It was it's so strange, it's so kind of elegant and magical because I was getting clean, and the guy who gave me a shot was still fucking. Yeah, but yeah, and that's how I got my so I know and I wasn't like one of these kids like like Stern or Seacrest. I was like, I'm gonna be on the radio when I grow up. I fell into it and it was kind of beautiful, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:38

I feel like we've kind of come back to it a little bit, right? Like there's that was radio was big. I listened to radio all the way up until 2020, and then it kind of gone away. But I feel like podcasting is like very similar to the radio shows I grew up on.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:52

It is, it is. It's similar, it's very similar in a lot of ways. It's like no ghi and ghe. It's super similar, but there's big differences too. There's big differences to doing corporate rate real radio and and podcasting.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:05

Yeah, well, and being live too is a little bit different.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:08

You have the ability to go take a break and that's dude, that's what got me jobs in TV, a lot of jobs in TV, because they're be smooth operators. That's why Secrest is Secrest. People all make fun, people can say, Oh, you're Carson Daly, Secrest, these guys that do it, all radio guys. Because most people who make a good living in doing broadcast journalism go to broad, you know, communications degree from fill in the blank, they'll get on a TV show that's live and they will shit the bed. Guaranteed. I'm not talking shit, that's just the reality. Because you can learn as much as you want about Marconi and the development of Bob Hope's radio show, all you and the and all the technical aspects of it. Being on live radio day in and day, five hours a day, going and then hosting American Idols, like there people, it's it's I remember okay. So the the how I got myself into TV, even how I even got the chance, because I was making a good link, and I my career went like this because of like crazy voice bits and comedy bits that I would do. Wild shit that would never translate over to corporate television, network TV. But they had this thing when Regis used to host Regis, uh, when Regis used to be the host of Live with Regis and Kelly, he was in his 80s. So they would give him a week off here and there, and they would do kind of stunt casting. It was really very cool, very interesting. They would do the men of Major League Baseball, they would do the men of FDNY, they would have like a fire, different fireman every day uh come in and co-host with with Kelly. They would have Derek Jeter, and then the next night they'd have, you know, uh Paul O'Neill or they the men of Major League Baseball, you know, like come in and they come in, they'd come host with Kelly, and then they'd have, but they do all these stunt casting, and then they would do the men of radio, and they had this thing where I didn't know this was going on, but the listeners couldn't nominate their favorite radio guys to be on to co-host with. And I won. I got this call from the producers at Live with Regis and Kelly. And then we sign up for this, and I go, What? What the fuck? And then they said, Yeah, look at our website. They we people have nominated you, and then they have votes, and then we all kind of collectively, the production team, and we decide, would you be interested? And I was like, Okay, and they're like, Okay, next week we're flying you to New York, and you're gonna co-host Live with Kelly. So get my suit tailored up again, fly out to New York City, and I meet Gelman and Radio City Music Hall, and I introduce myself to Kelly Ripa. And then the producers bring me this stack of shit where all different questions, potential questions you could ask someone and all the guests and dossiers on the two different guests, and then the different bits that we're gonna do and talk about, and they provide it and they take care of everything, and there's a teleprompter and they go out, okay, are you gonna be okay on live TV? I go, Are you kidding me? You guys did all the work for me. Yeah, all I gotta do is stand out there and fucking chit-chat. This is shooting fish in a fucking barrel. And they couldn't believe that because they they're so cussed. The the baseball players, even though Derek G just played in World Series games at Yankee Stadium, being on live TV was like a new thing. And he's like, Are you gonna? I was like, come on, brother. And sure enough, I went out there and then I got out of there. My phone had died while I was on TV, and Kelly Rip was super cool. And I was saying, All right, bye, everybody, thanks a lot. And I got to JFK. They took that had a car for me to take me to JFK. And when I got to JFK, I plugged in my phone and I plugged it in and went brrrrr and like a thousand calls. Two or three of them were William Morris, UTA, all the different agencies, a couple different people. They're like, We would love to be your agent and everything. I was like, Whoa, this killer! This is a fucking. And that's how I got trusted to do TV. And then, like I said, I got to know Secret S. I got to Carson Daly did radio in the same building as me for a different, for a different uh radio station. But he was in the same, and we got to know each other. And it's like all you go down the line, these people that can host live television, and it's like nothing, you do radio, everything becomes kind of second nature because it's there's nothing structured, like a podcast. But imagine if there's nothing structured and you knew you had to be out of this bit while you're talking to Trent Reznor, you had to be out in two minutes because you got to play commercials, and then when you come back, you have to promote the upcoming giveaway from Link 182 tickets and everything. And it's all live though, but you're staring at, and then make sure you promote the fact that you're playing Pennywise after that, the new killer new killer song that we're debuting, and it's all going on right there, and you're trying to have this conversation with Josh Hami or something. Everything else becomes kind of like everything else gets the volume turned down, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:53

Yeah. I think of it like you're really good at staying in the pocket from something like radio.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:58

Yeah, you you get you get and then you also learn that it's not that big a deal to fuck up. Most people have a real, real kind of like wake up with cold sweats, fear of like you're gonna put your foot in your mouth on live in a live setting. After you do it four or five times, you realize it knowing, oh, you're like, ah, my bad. I I know I said the uh concert was July 3rd at uh the forum. I screwed that up. It's actually July 14th at the Staple Center. Uh, my bad. Or, you know, say even like really embarrassing ones, like you say, uh, how long have you been married to Rockstar? And they're like, uh, my my fiance just left me last week. And you're like, well, that's uncomfortable. You just you go like that's human nature. And and I think like certainly I did too. I'm not trying to say like I'm a Jedi. In the beginning, you fuck up and you're like, oh my god, everyone's laughing at me. And you go, like, no, it's like when you you step on yourself or you stumble, it's like, oh, that's very natural. It's very natural.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:05

How long uh do you think it took for you to to get comfortable with that and realize that, you know?

SPEAKER_00 1:08:14

Another good question. Um it's hard to say exactly, but it certainly it took me a year or so, but not a year of time. It took me a year of like being on the air every day. Like airtime, yeah. A year of like every day knowing when I get to work, I'm gonna be on the air. Because there was a period of time where it was like I would have I would make funny pre-recorded bits, or I'd come in to be a correspondent about something going on, like a live event or something. But then there was a transition where it's like when when 5 30 a.m. hits, where I'm I'm sitting in the studio on the air, having a conversation. Having a professional conversation is a completely different thing than most people think it is. Um whereas it's the same thing as every one of us, and especially in grappling and modern days, every one of us knows the guy who thinks he's a stand-up comedian or could be a stand-up comedian, right? Because he or she, he or she is funny. Yeah, but being funny and being a stand-up comedian is a whole different ballgame. Being super charismatic, being the life of the party, and being a broadcaster, it's a whole different fucking thing. A professional conversation is a whole different ballgame. Now, you can become a legend when what you are as a regular person and what your professional conversations really kind of merge, and when they become when there's symbiosis between who you really are as a person and what you're doing. But there is a there is a differential. You out of common etiquette and courtesy are not going to step on people or being like, I'm sorry, we can't. Can you get to the point? But it's kind of vital in a professional conversation setting. For instance, I have talked 90% of the time I've been here. If I was having you guys, it would be complete, I would never allow myself to bloviate the way that I have been. But this is not the setting that I'm in. Yeah, you guys invited me here and provided the cameras and the microphones and these topics and asked these questions. I feel like I would not be doing my part from a professional standpoint if I were to give you three-word answers.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:19

Oh, yeah. And we've we're new to this, yeah. And I started making some YouTube videos a couple years back, so I went through like the first phases of not even having an audience, just my own phone recording me and dealing with the nerves of that and setting up lights and things like that. And then we've referenced several times our first video where I like did an intro and then I was like, all right, just for I watched that by the way. Oh, thanks, dude. Just for the sake of it, we're gonna put even in that thinking about it. Oh god, and it's just so funny watching, especially for him, the transition of getting comfortable with it. Yeah, just dealing with like but you know, I think you I think you did the exact right thing.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:54

Because if you're uncomfortable in that situation and then try to pretend like you're not, that's the worst thing you can do. Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. If you're uncomfortable in that situation and then spurg out because you're uncomfortable in the situation, bad. Not as bad as pretending like you're not. Yeah, the best thing you can do is going, I'm gonna make the best of this, but guys, I gotta be honest, I'm very uncomfortable right now. This is very unnatural.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:17

Um I'm I'm sweating. Yeah, I'm sweating.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:21

Something I'm thinking about with all of this, totally different with podcasting, we don't have any constraints really. I mean, I'm there's like the platforms we put things on, and I'm sure they have some constraints, but I don't think we've talked about anything on any of our episodes that are against their guidelines kind of thing. But I imagine on radio, what is like the the government organization that's monitoring you? And like what are the rules? The FCC. FCC and no-nos.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:46

They're more limited than people think. Um, I think there's a it's like draconian idea, like you you like the the government's telling you what you can't again say. No, but you can't perpetuate ideas that haven't been concludely proven, which is you know, you saw uh I believe ABC News, George Stepanopoulos, Stephanopoulos. Uh Trump, the Trump administration sued him for very good reason. He made claims that were not, he didn't say allegedly, he didn't say there's reports that he said President Trump is on trial for charges, and that's not true. And ABC had to pay millions and millions of dollars. And I'm by no means in a position where the government, uh the president Trump is listening to what I say. But there's been that's something that I talk about greatly, is I think a lot of these, especially even the good ones, like political-based um bloggers and things, it's just the Wild West. And there's so much problem, is that a lot of the news that we're in taking is just like, what wait, what? That's not if you see, but you see, mainstream media deceitfully uh pull ruses on us, and this is not a partisan thing, that happens in both, but you see them doing it within the rules. It's very interesting. So they won't make claims that uh here's a here's a good one. Um, that that young man again, this is not part of uh political. I'm just pointing out an instance. The um the poor guy who got shot in Minnesota recently, um, and shot and died, killed by the ICE agents, right? I they I think they were actually immigration agents, either way. You know which one I'm referring to, right? MSNBC put up a picture of him and they like doctored him because they knew that it would make the audience engender more sympathy towards him if he was handsome. So they didn't break any rules by the FCC, but it was deceitful. Yeah, so they're playing within the rules that they've been given. They didn't claim he was handsomer, they didn't claim he was a CrossFit champion, they just tanned him up and they made his jaw a little more square. Joe Rogan was under some suspicion of giving out bad advice during COVID about vaccines and whatnot. So CNN put him up. They didn't say ivermectin is in a fact, they didn't say they just put up a picture of Joe Rogan who claims he uses ivermectin and uh uh antibodies and things like instead of the vaccine, and he's gotten better. But then they put up a picture of him and they made him green and made him like sickly looking. So they're not making claims outside of the rules, they're just playing playing loose and fast within the rules. It's very interesting. But even things like cussing and stuff, right? Could you do that on the radio? You can't. There's words you can and can't say, yeah. And the very interesting part about that is there's only a couple words you can't literally can't say legally on broadcast in in America. The rest is decided by the company you work for. Okay. See, I did at K Rock, I'd say bitch and asshole, and you know, sh stuff like that. You you wouldn't say fuck, you wouldn't say shit fuck. The C C word for sure. But you can't you can't say though. Like I think the FCC would have a problem with it. And they like fine. You get a fine.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:59

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:59

Now you're not guaranteed that, but you don't want to take the chance because your company gets fined, you're fucked. People do not like to pay money for you. Um, but K Rock, I'd say, I'd say asshole. I'd say bitch, I'd say um fag. I'd say faggy. I wouldn't say call someone a fag because I frankly jump about a person, I would be like that's uh maybe offensive, but I would say faggy, like look at your faggy ass got me.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:22

But then I at the concurrently I was working at a KV-ass train conductor, yeah. Um I just felt so mean. Oh, I know, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:37

So mean. Faggy and cunty are the two words, because I don't like to say the word the C word. I feel like that this is I'm not like some feminist, male feminist, but I would never, I mean, that's that's hard. Like you're like, oh dude. Uh uh, but I'll be like, what do you mean? Being all cunty.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:52

I don't even feel any even when you add a why.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:57

I would not.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:00

There's a why.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:02

I mean, I literally pardon the pun, I don't know why. Seemed offensive. Like, I've I I I never genuinely would ever want to intentionally be hurtful to gay people. And I, for that reason, personally, even though I I don't think it means much, I don't say the F slur, right? But I say faggy all the time. I don't I don't connect the two. Anyway, so I I worked in a news station, a political uh a right wing kind of political news station during the same time I was still working at K Rock when I was hosting Love Line at night. And now, okay, here's another loophole. Love Line was on 10 p.m. after, so you could say a way more shit because it was after 10 p.m.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:45

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:46

And that's FCC, that's not the local radio. That the FCC says that. Um, what they called safe harbor. Um, but I was working at a uh AM political conservative talk radio station in the afternoon while I was hosting Love Line. At the political talk radio station, the FCC had all the rules that I could live under, but I would always get dumped where they they'd press the dump button on me because I'd say like goddamn or I would say uh that dumb bitch over there, and they would they would edit me.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:19

What's yeah, what's that dump button?

SPEAKER_00 1:17:22

The dump button is literally like you'll be listening to the radio because it's live, but you're in actually what you guys hear is like four to five four to eight seconds delay for the reason that if you have a guest or if you have someone who says some shit that's dangerous, you can hit that and it connects the the live, so you you actually hear like a block, you hear like nothing. Oh cool. And uh I would I would see there's a light that goes off. They the producer would dump me. I'd be like, what the what do you and and he'd in my ear he'd be like, you can't say damn, you can't say yeah. I mean, what do you mean I can't? He's like, Well, no, the boss says you can't say, and I was like, Well, you he writes my checks. I don't, yeah, that's the rules, but it was a that that's decided by the company that pays your your bills, not by the FCC. Um the more interesting part and the part where I feel like there is a sense of superiority, is even my dumbass, who is like I said, I like to make fart jokes and be silly and talk about hot chicks. Even my dumbass would I'd be on Love Line or I'd be on the the daytime show. Someone would get called in with they would call in and they'd be like, Yeah, man, I live out in here in Altadina. The cops just came in, they shot my son, and he didn't do anything. And I don't know what it would be. I think it's because he was black or he was Hispanic. And I go, Oh, well, that that sounds awful. And if that's true, um then I I feel for you. And they go, like, yeah, you need to, you need to get it was officers, and I go, oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, no, stop. Then I or I dump them. I go like, I listen, this radio show, these airwaves are not your place to just wildly make claims that I have no way of um substantiating. Yeah, yeah, and that's me. I'm I'm like uh I I love to fuck around, and I'm I'm not exactly like this formal journalist, but you learn that like live radio is is a real thing and you have a responsibility. You can't just go off on unsubstantiated claims and stuff, and I think that does put you, it does elevate your ability to do things compared to like if you're on the internet, you just you I know I do. Do you guys? I feel pretty comfortable saying whatever the fuck I want. Yeah, feel free.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:35

Oh, you're gonna follow me?

SPEAKER_03 1:19:36

Okay, you know what's like the status of radio in 2026?

SPEAKER_00 1:19:43

I don't think as many, I don't think there's ever been a time in American history where less people listen to the radio.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:50

Yeah, so that's about all expectations. I mean, even for me, I was listening to the radio in my previous car during the pandemic. Some of the guys that I grew up on the local rock station and they moved to the afternoons, they kind of got booted, but it was because no one was commuting because it was the kind of lockdown pandemic time, so that I think they got a few more listeners in the afternoons, and it was like such a great show because I'd been listening to these guys for like 15 years or something like that. But I got a new car, he got me some Bluetooth connection for it, so now I'm like I'm on Spotify. I don't ever turn the radio on in my car in pretty much any circumstance anymore. Right. And I think that like the commute is probably a big one. Oh, yeah. That's why in you know, television they say like eight, nine p.m.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:34

That's prime time, right? Primetime TV. That's where you get the big bucks. That's where everyone wants. If you have the good show, you go on at eight. The best sitcoms, the best dramas are on at eight and nine p.m. In radio, the bay hitters are on at seven in the morning. Seven to ten. It's a good drive to work. That's the always the big the morning show is the linchpin of a radio station.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:55

Well, and I have seen like some people because I went to college in Houston and I can't remember the name of the show, but is it The Breakfast Club or something? But I feel like they've kind of transitioned into more like the podcast type space rather than just being a good idea.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:06

Well, that's people who are successful in radio do that. It's a very good observation. Charlemagne in hip-hop and the Breakfast Club, Charlemagne the God, who's all very good at his job, and Bobby Bones in Country. Yeah, he's from I remember listening to him as kids. Shapiro, uh Ben Shapiro in political talk, uh Stephen A. Smith, and then the other the other dude jacked, big former NFL player on ESPN. White guy, god damn it. I don't know. All the football fans know exactly what I'm talking about. But he's the biggest deal on ESPN right now. And it's because he does ESPN radio, but he also does his YouTube channel slash podcast, and they kind of collaborate. That's the way you that's the way you game the system right now and and make it. And uh I just had a meeting back in LA because I said, well, you got Charlamagne, you got you know Ben Shapiro and the and these guys at ESPN, and you know, what you're seeing with Shannon Sharp and uh at his with his uh podcast and um Bobby Bones is huge in radio, and because he transitions into kind of like more untraditional media, he's in the country world. I was like, you don't have any rock dudes, I'll do that. You should have me do that. And they're like, oh, it's very interesting. And it's meeting with like iHeart and everything. Uh that's kind of a non sequitur because it didn't go anywhere. It's like but uh I was out there doing a different show, a uh podcast video kind of thing. I was out there filming and producing that, and then I was like kind of calling in favors with radio people. I was like, you that's how you make money now. Why don't we explore that? And we're like, oh, it's interesting and stuff. But so that's where radio's at, is you kind of have the ability to play in both fields, is if you want to, you know, you really still want to make big bucks. Because you're you you see it with Stern, like Howard Stern's Howard Stern. Whether you like his political takes or what he's become later in life, he's still he's the goat. Yeah, without no open no debate. And um there's other guys that are amazing that I look up to that I like look at or they're on my personal Mount Rushmore. But Stern's the goat. And because he doubled down on Sirius, he doesn't have any kind of digital attachment, and like no one listens to Stern anymore. Like no one. Yeah, and it's not because he's not amazing, it's because the relevance to modern media is just not there.

SPEAKER_04 1:23:44

Does he have like exclusivity with them that prevents him from doing his own like platform, building out his own platform or something like that? It's a good question.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:52

It's a good question. I I just think Sirius, even more so than regular terrestrial radio, is so fucked, like they're failing so miserably that I don't even think they have the infrastructure to create more for him and they pay him so much, like they don't even have the the ability to pay other people to do it, you know. So I just don't even think like there's enough juice left in that fruit to to even make. Plus, I think Howard was so revolutionary and so fucking unbelievably successful in radio. I don't even know if at this point when all the writings, I don't even know if he looks at it as something he wants to do. Yeah, like why would he want to broaden his horizons? He's fucking Howard Stern, you know?

SPEAKER_03 1:24:34

Yeah, and he's been paid well for a very long time doing that.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:38

Imagine if like next year they were like, you know, if you really the big way to make money in the NBA is if you also do the three on three that like uh three on three in the offseason, you play in that thing. Like Steph Curry's not gonna be like, okay, I'm gonna do that so I can make more money. And then he'd be like, I'm already yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, like LeBron and Steph are gonna be like, okay, you guys have fun. That's what you now guys are, you know. That's probably I guarantee that's a lot because he has his Hamptons house and he has his place in Florida, and he's still if any A-list star, even though there's way less people listening to his show than any other podcast, like big podcast, any A-list star will immediately hop on a plane and fly to be on Howard Stern's show if he asks him to. I gotta look at from his perspective. He's like, oh well, okay, maybe that's maybe things have passed me by, but I'm still me.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:30

Yeah, that makes sense. Same kind of going to the next medium. When did you start writing? And how many books have you published at this point?

SPEAKER_00 1:25:38

Just uh I I I started in like 2006, seven, and I was writing more like autobiographical stuff, and I had editors and stuff, and it got people helping me, and then I gave up on it because I it became I got weirded out by it because people would listen to me say shit like I've been saying to YouTube for the last 40 minutes, you know, just talk about life experiences and weird stuff and sobriety and recovery and strange and scary experiences or kind of eye-catching experiences, and then they would be like, okay, but this is how we would make it marketable. Is there any way we could change this person's uh name or this person's relationship to you? And then I was like, I got really weirded out by it, you know, not to sound too precious about, but I I I I realized like, oh well, if this is a commodity, why don't I just make shit up? Why don't I make a fictional book? I'd rather just like where do you where do you draw the line? Yeah, kind of, you know, and uh like Louis C. K did with Louis. That I that's when I opened my eyes, like well then fine, let's do something that's based around my autobiography or around my real life, but let's make it fictional, like and just kind of have tenets, and these tentacles of weird stories of creativity can come out from it. And then I got really busy doing other stuff, and then I just stopped doing it. Then recently I got bored because I'd get bored that you know, I don't have I used to have like 11 jobs and radio and TV, and now I have just whatever I want to do, and it's far less lucrative, but it's also far more boring. And I when I'm done with my farm work, a lot of times I'm just like doing nothing, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:27

It's so funny that you're a farmer.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:29

I know, and uh so I I wrote a couple ebooks because I get really mad at like health and fitness information. There's like there's really successful and marketable stuff, and it's really extreme, and then there's really meaningful information, and it doesn't seem to be getting to people. So I get really mad because I I I get really mad when I see people because i I don't want to say the internet, but social media in particular, like just like some. marginally attractive soccer mamas telling you how like the best diet to use and I'm like what the fuck everything you just said is wrong like I can't I get every day I'd see someone some dumb cunt in a I just said it some twat in like in like blue light removal glasses in the middle of the day telling you that rice is toxic and I'm like shut up you dumb bitch have you ever heard of Korea or Japan where there's like 3% adult obesity that they eat a metric ton of rice every day shut up like no we we had Tyson on and they were talking about their fight camp and it was like like no grain no something something and I'm like I can't from a reductionist standpoint if you're 230 pounds you want to fight at 190 fine don't eat any because it's very hard not to overeat rice and and and breads and stuff like that. But don't that's fine and I get you and if you're if I was preparing someone to make weight for a fight camp and especially if it was we're talking 20 30 pounds instead of having them cut water I'd be six months ahead be like yeah cut out the bread let's just keep it to meat and like but maybe sweet potatoes things like fruits and stuff like that. That doesn't change the fact like it doesn't mean that rice and shit is unhealthy. It's the most universally eaten carb in the world is is is rice with almost zero allergen activity. It's pure it's purely digested it's fantastic. It's very hard to undereat I will give it that it's very hard not to overeat rice. But like I said there's about six countries that seem to do a pretty fucking good job at it. How about you just don't put Yoshinoya teriyaki sauce on top I bet you it'd be a lot easier not to overeat that shit calm down with the yum yum bro like no I eat rice every day. Even when I was getting shredded I ate rice I I used to have a uh a sponsor that they've now changed company but it's a tropin in nutrition used to be first detachment is one very successful very smart bodybuilding coach and strength conditioning coach uh Justin Harris and he had these shirts that would say steak rice repeat or chicken rice repeat and then with a little bit of guidance for me he made one that was the Miami Vice um logo and it said meat and rice. And that's how people got shredded and jacked for all of eternity. Get some good solid really nourishing protein sources get some rice vegetables that you like and press repeat over and over and over again and don't eat too much.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:41

I always tell folks it's like a it's a blessing andor a curse depending on how you look at it but I have zero problem eating the same shit over and over and over again. It's absolutely a blessing. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00 1:30:56

I'm a committed super strict uh fitness guy that is very concerned with my abs and the size of my bicep and my deadlift and the whole thing. Okay. But I also am a foodie I grew up my dad's overweight but also he's the president of Southern California chapter of the International Wine and Food Society and he grows wine grapes and stuff and I I grew up in a world where I was very appreciative of and I also grew up in probably the most diverse environment in the world. I mean I'll take the Pepsi challenge. I grew up in a place where a European based white guy is by far the minority so I had a very very high appreciation for for not only cuisine but global like very international cuisine and I love food. But it doesn't change the fact that if you can get comfortable eating the same relatively same thing over and over again you can just make little switches to the same shit. Like I had uh an oatmeal and egg whites for breakfast but I'll have I have it in my car I'll have ground beef and rice. Okay. This time I'll have it with like some salsa and you know I'll make it more of like a what I grew up with you know like a Hispanic kind of thing. Couple hours I'll do it again. But this time I'll put maybe some coconut aminos and soy sauce you know and or maybe I'll choose shrimp instead and maybe I'll do like a sriracha you know but it's the same shit. Okay. Then before I go to bed maybe you do like a marinara style like a like a nice tomato based or you could do like a French bouilla based it's the same thing. But you could put a little twist on it and get comfortable eating that but people have to be here's what people need to understand. And I don't know about in life I'm not gonna be one of these guys that like understands pumping iron and eating and then means that I now understand self-help and how to fucking solve the problem of the world. I don't but when it comes to getting a body or performance that you want you have to do a lot of stuff you don't necessarily want to do. And what I do mean by that is not I don't mean do stuff that's torturous but everyone that I work with that isn't like a like a competitive athlete or shredded already they always fall back into like but I don't want to take eggs to hard boiled eggs to work. I want to go I go oh well you don't want to be fat do you okay I which one do you not want to do more? Like there's a lot of I don't want I don't want to fuck only one chick I don't want to I want to fuck all the people that I find attractive but I'm married and I I do what I don't want to do. It ends up being better for me it is a net positive I don't want to you know like there's a oh it's it's just what what do you want to do more right or what do you want more but it I how about don't look at things through ever look at things of what you don't want or what you want and don't want do what's right. Yeah I had a chicken the other day I loved this chicken but its eyes were all foggy and I kept trying to feed it different like tinctures and medications and everything and then it started and I'm like fuck and I knew it had some type of like airborne avian kind of thing. And I didn't want to I did not want to I loved its bird and it was sweet and it wasn't it was still walking in it and I I I there was it's going to get all the other birds sick because I live in can contr contained environments and it might be it's jet there's a real good chance it's suffering greatly even though it's not showing signs. And I walked over to the fucking garage and I had tears in my eyes and I fucking broke its neck. I didn't want to do that. There's nothing about I'm not I first off I'm not a violent person. I didn't like the feeling of it I didn't I didn't want to do any of it. It was the right thing to do. I want to go home from here I want to get P cherries and then I want to go and sit on my ass and maybe explore some of these video games that I see all these young kids play and go get done in the mats and I hear these I like fucking move modern war for gears Pacific theater fucking blah blah blah that shit sounds dope. That shit sounds like look at the budget sounds pretty dope. I want to do that I'm not going to do either of those things I'm going to eat the fucking rice that I made and the ground beef and I'm gonna go to the gym. That's that's what I'm gonna do. It is neither of those things are what I want to do. While I'm doing it I will end up being happy and feel is positive even though initially it's not what I want. Like this hedonistic addiction people have is fucking crazy. Yeah what's what's like your biggest beef with like Hosimpic for example I you it's it's funny you asked that I don't have one most okay my biggest beef with it is not the drug itself and it's not the it's the here I go again I'm gonna do this just for you guys the cunts all my all my British and Austrian Australian friends are like cunt mic uh all the all the vapid idiot whores four or five years ago every one of them every one of them that are famous you know they have a they have a they have a platform to speak to a lot of women and it was four or five all these women it doesn't matter how big you are you're beautiful at any size yeah I'm I'm thick but oh well I get the guys and I they all want and I'm juicy and I'm thick and I'm and don't worry don't let him paint you into a pigeonhole that you have to be thinner and they're all 75 pounds lighter and none of them work out and I go like oh wait good for you if you want to be lose weight that's awesome and you took Ozempic and that helped you control your eating but fuck you though for giving me this bullshit that you were so comfortable big and beautiful edition of this magazine and you're on the cover with your fucking FUPA flopping out fine. If that I actually go like what a what amazing mental health that you have that awesome but don't feed me that shit when as soon as you could find a way to lose a bunch of weight without doing the work you did it. That's the only problem I have because I I find it hard I find it uh infuriating in one way that most of my colleagues or my friends that are in the health and fitness industry that really understand what they're talking about. A lot of them say like you're just not willing to do the work so you're taking Ozempic okay you're taking any type of uh agonist the GLP1 agonist because you are not willing to just diet and exercise I go like uh not a crazy point but aren't you on TRT? Don't you take ephedrin? So shut the fuck up and didn't you take uh a bunch of fucking pills for hair loss because you're taking trend and didn't you you know what I'm saying like and aren't you taking an SSRI? Like yeah am I gonna come at you and be like you're not willing to just dig down and no you're 50 and you do work hard and you do have but you also have a life and it's not you the ability to live like a natural bodybuilder and weigh all your food and everything is probably getting in so what do you do you get 100 milligrams a week of testosterone okay maybe an anabolic here and there some peptides fine okay but shut your fucking mouth with the other person it's like they're trying to keep their life going together the world is an incredibly demanding place. Society is not exactly forgiving right now and they're 65 pounds overweight and they finally found something that can kind of quiet the hunger noise now understand that when you get off of those drugs you're gonna have to dig real deep and get in touch with why you were so disproportionately hungry I think that's a perfectly reasonable conversation to have but if there's something that can lead people who have tried everything that here okay here's the way I look at it. It's like drugs and alcohol because it's not like you take these drugs and they make you thinner you take these drugs and they make you obsess less about eating and unlike I didn't take a drug that made me obsess less about drugs and alcohol you know why? Because I live in a world where everyone knows that that's negative and taboo and no one under any circumstances including narcotic well there is no narcotics including alcohol companies is going to create this idea that I should or am better off if I have this product. Sure they'll Corona will be like look at the hot chicks in them and then like this is good beer but no one's saying you need to take this this beer is better than no beer at all that everyone to a T will agree that if you have a problem with drugs, if you have a problem with alcohol the best thing you can do is fill your life with other things and not do that. That is not the case with food. Yeah so if there is now a drug that can help people make sense from an emotional standpoint with the insane disproportionate need people have for overeating and convenience that is something that I support. Yeah now that being said just understand while you're taking it that this drug is making you obsess less about food and at some point you're gonna have to get to deal with that on the back end. That's all but the pro the the the only the only negative I have with the GLP 1 agonist is like I said the people who five six and mostly female who are five six years ago like you don't need to be obsessed with your weight you're beautiful at any size. I was like all of you are 70 pounds thinner like all of you everyone like Lizzo's like Liz now she's not even a full Liz she's like a Lizzo's leg. Amy Schuber looks like an Auschwitz survivor fucking what's the what's the really shitty one what's the Indian broad the really shitty one uh god damn it I don't she she's be on the office uh oh I know okay the office chick but I don't I can't remember her name right now she was king of like women like traditional beauty standards or but and now she's like she's like I was like oh really oh really yeah traditional beauty standards sucked my dick like I don't know I it it's just all all of them have taken like Ozempic or one of these oh yeah things yeah yeah you know because you know how you know because I haven't seen one goddamn all of them are addicted to social media and I haven't seen one post of them fucking grinding with kettlebell swings and eating their fucking uh chicken breast and uh brown rye I've seen zero of that yeah you they show up one day and Amy Schumer's like hey sexy like 29 inch weights you're like what the fuck happened to you what Miss Big and Beautiful well and even like the marketing strategies have changed considerably I think there's still gonna have to be like a lot of companies making stuff for like plus sizes and that kind of thing. But the Big is beautiful movement seems to have completely died out from my my side of here's another thing though I don't disagree that Big is beautiful because we are not talking like I I get really mad at this like typically more right wing and it's a lot of it is is is in the grappling community like this typically right wing manga kind of manosphere thing where they're like people are just looking for excuses you just need to sack up you need to deal with that I go like in many ways that's a lot it's truth in a lot a lot of parts of the world but it's at this at one center of it is that obesity is not a character flaw it is not an it's not a moral issue. You know that's what people seem to misunderstand is like when people say big is beautiful I go like I agree because you're not an inferior human yeah but let's not kid like when when a woman wants to put on extra makeup or or get boob implants or something because it makes her feel better about herself it's like that's neither here nor that's her personal decision. Obesity comes with it serious serious health issues okay that is not that is not a moral thing. I'm not saying you are I I'm better than anyone who is overweight because I work out a lot and I watch what I eat and I'm not overweight. But I will say my blood sugar my propensity for diabetes is much lower and that's a very serious thing. I have children and my blood pressure and my blood sugar and my internal function of my organs and the that's all I'm saying. It has nothing to do with my morality my character whether or not I am better or worse in any way I am just saying that from a health standpoint it is a good thing to do. That's all there is to it. So when people say big is beautiful I go yes but big is probably not a good idea.

SPEAKER_03 1:44:12

That was my problem with it was that like there was so much push that it's not unhealthy and it's like look I don't care about the look part I'm just saying that it is unhealthy. There's health problems that are going to come with any increase in you know body fat after a certain percentage.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:26

There is a there's a um there was a fan and I'm not gonna clown her that's why I'm gonna abuse her by I believe her name is Tess something. She was a plus size model. She was kind of famous like a decade ago she has tattoos and she she's really pretty but she's a plus size she's a big girl right and I I saw an interview with her um a while back where she was saying you know people say they look at my size but if you you took my vitals you'd realize I'm actually in perfect shape. And I go okay my father very overweight just survived cancer. He's 83 years old he's still 200 pounds overweight my dad's been fat my whole life they always go like how the fuck because he doesn't have high blood pressure and he doesn't have like super high blood and he doesn't have diabetes it doesn't make sense right but my dad was my age when he could play catch with me for like 40 seconds and then had to take a seat. My dad would probably be fucked if uh you know a car like malfunctioned and it got left in gear it was rolling down the car and there was kids in the car he's not running after it was like if there was some shit that popped off and my dad needed to lift something up and carry it to the like okay you could say well as of right now I just went to the doctor they say I'm fine I go yeah but what if I pushed you over right now you break your fucking hip you're 30 years old you'd break your hip you're not fine you know what I'm saying like that when it comes when life hits you in the face you're not fine your shit isn't gonna be able to you're not gonna be able to behave when your back is pressed against the wall because we don't we don't it's not we're not living in Pompeii you're not Caligula where you can just live your life in a fucking feathered bed for the rest of your have people fan you and bring you your food there's gonna some shit's gonna happen where you're not gonna be fine you're not fine if you're certain amount overweight you know that's all yeah well dude I think we can call it there thanks so much for coming on do you want to plug um your books or your butter where you're asshole that's this whole time I've been thinking about that he's like finally am I in my chance I wonder if it's got the same beard spread it apart nicely and me and him are gonna high five I'm gonna go bring me some fucking rice baby I'm getting hungry for some rice bro you Korean I'm Filipino you're Filipino yeah wow you don't look Filipino but you're that's nice bro I meant to send you this reel and it was like another Filipino guy that the Filipino uh like uniform is just jerseys because today it's an exception he's almost always wearing a jersey every day you know why and I didn't know that that was a whole thing I I kind of didn't either well I I think I don't know if it's you know what I'm saying like that's funny because you probably see it but Filipino men probably have a look because they're usually stock they're jack you know like that it's like Mexican guys like all cultures have a thing. Yeah you don't see Norwegian guys you know like oh we wear a lot of like baggier sweats like no because they're seven foot fucking tall and they're you know like Filipinos are almost always like stockier dudes they have bigger necks you know bigger shoulders so unchokeable fucking necks dude unchokeable that's the grappling and squatting you're always like when you see like an Asian guy gets introduced into it and you're like oh fucking cheater it's like a big dick contest in the blackout and you're like oh fuck bear like friends are thinking like being squatting when I was in powerlifting and you see that like the you know the the fill especially like Filipinos and like that whole like like the Mekong area they walk in you're like oh fuck what are we doing here calves like like Blanca you know like you don't even train your calves on your fucking calves like that dude fucking fuck you know and there's always like like you hear like you're you're if you have a girl you're in love with and you're like oh yeah my ex-boyfriend's a black guy you're like oh it's not even like I know what there's certain groups are like yeah racist right no I'm like no it's just you know like you look you know oh no yeah Asians are cheaters at squatting and choking and black guys are cheaters at dicks that's all that's all yeah go to my Shopify and everything meathead salvation uh a meathead's guide to salvation is the best diet book there is it's the most useful diet book you guys can buy so go look at it flex in the city is the best female specific training program there is I'm telling you and I I will I will go I'll take that Pepsi challenge with all of the exercise physiologists out there all of that is available follow me at Mike Catherwood on Instagram and everything's there's my Shopify store there's my Patreon there's my podcast all that stuff so I that's all I want to say I don't want to take up too much of your time being shameless promoter but that's the truth.

SPEAKER_03 1:49:31

Bro thanks so much for coming on really appreciate thank you guys for having me yeah thanks so much and thanks so much for watching another episode of Game Plan the podcast juice I don't got anything else I got nothing we're good man drop a cunt comment if you can yeah exactly we'll be back with another episode soon it's it's a contagion once it takes over it's a contagion