325. - Daniel Riley

All right, this episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Stateside with Kai and Carter, a new podcast from The Guardian. And they are using this podcast to slow down the news and wrestle with the questions that we all have about what's happening in the world. And they do it three times a week, Jason. Does that sound familiar to you? We don't really talk about, you know, a lot of international global news items and climates and cultures and sports and things like that. We do talk about fashion and wellness, but for everything else, Kai and Carter are a great place. All right, so who couldn't use more news? Listen wherever you get your podcast. or watch on YouTube. Yeah, my volume levels are good. How long gone? Back in LA, it's 90 degrees. It's noon. And I couldn't be happier. Jason, how are you? I'm overall pretty good. It was nice to have a sleep where you have the windows open at night. Get some of that fresh air while you're dozing off. But I did have a little bit of a morning. Halfway through my sled workout, I locked my keys inside my car. No, I like this. I have a spare key, so I called Bay and said, hey, I locked my keys in my car. My water's in there. It's 90 degrees. I'm sweating like a whore in church. I can't refuel with my Laird. Thank God it was just your Laird water and a How Long Gone Nalgene and not one of your beloved dogs in that car. Oh, yeah, I would have had a kettlebell through the window. The Nissan doesn't have dog mode like the Tesla. It hits a little bit different. So she was like, I will come bring you your spare key as soon as I'm about to do my online therapy. Shout out to BetterHelp. So I had to wait then, you know, 50, 53 minutes for her to do that. So then I was like, you know what? And I ran out of coffee filters this morning. I used my last coffee filter. You're falling apart. If I don't have my java, it's a problem. Don't talk to me until I've had my mud. So it's 90 degrees. I'm dying of thirst because I have no water. I've just been dragging kettlebells around the park for an hour. I walk down to the coffee shop.

Wait in line. I asked for a cold brew premium splash of hole. Of course, of course. And they have some coffee filters there, so I re-up on the filters, go to pay for it. Actually, the Apple Pay is down right now. So I went over and I threw the coffee filters. They gave you the cold brew. They know you. They did not give me the cold brew. The cold brew was never poured. Are you fucking kidding? Are you fucking kidding? No. That's wild, man. That's wild. Like, if that happens and the coffee shop doesn't give you the coffee, you can't go back. That's disrespect. You're a known entity at that coffee place. And you're saying that one of your Armenian brothers didn't hand over his black MX and pay it forward? I mean, if I was wearing my Yeezys, but I can't work out in those. No, of course. Yeah, that would go against the knees over toes philosophy. Yeah, so if any of my barista shooters were working, of course, on the house. But I was working with the away team, the D-League, and that didn't happen. So then I hoofed it back up the hill, and then Bay came and rescued me, and then I was able to finally go drive back to the coffee shop. Finally get it. I was so close to stealing, but I can't steal from a small business. I can't steal from a small biz. I don't know how small to be. There's five locations. They're doing quite well, but I have no remorse stealing from Bezos Farms. I understand. A small biz in my neighborhood as a local member of the community. That would be bad for him. I have too much at stake. That would be bad for him. Then I got back in my car, and then my car didn't start. for a few turns. But then I was like, you got to be kidding me. But then, you know, I was like, I have to podcast with another writer from Condé Nast. This can't be happening. But then it finally, by the grace of God, she turned over and here we are. Yeah, if I had to do this one alone, I don't know if Anna Wintour would have given us our monthly. check our stipend. So I'm glad that you made it back. But that's a tough morning. And I think it goes to show that sometimes the Jet Set lifestyle can leave you discombobulated. Every time. Every time. And this kind of stuff happens to me as well, where I backed into a pole.

You know, not yesterday, not today, but I just mean in the last six months. I mean, lest we forget the smoothie convertible story. It can happen to even Chris, a person whose mind is bright and alert at all times. Yeah, I'm not even hungover. I have no excuse for my stupid mistakes except that I am stupid myself. But I'm glad you recovered. Maybe go take the Nissan in, make sure the oil gets changed, make sure the fluids are all correct. Look, I just had it serviced maybe a month ago. I don't know what was going on. It could have just been God's hands. Or maybe the heat because it's the first really scorching day. But look, I'm glad you made it here just in time to podcast. I imagine you haven't showered, of course. There's no way there was time for that. No, no shower. Not even close to showering. I have a photo shoot tomorrow, so I'll probably... Oh, that's right. That's right. How is that coming along? How's the pre-pro looking? Pre-pro is good. Just sent out the call sheet this morning. So how many names are on the call sheet? Is it two or three? It's two. Okay. Three, including one of the person's emails that got bounced back. But yeah, it's two recipients on this call sheet. So this is the kind of thing where like a... A call could have been a text. A call sheet could have been an email. You know what I mean? Did you make the full PDF with your logo? No, no, no. It was just an email. It was only an email. For some reason, I like, even though it kind of goes against everything that is me, I guess it's a little bit of a photographic memory. Like when I write all my thoughts out. It works better if I'm writing it by hand, like if I'm sending a message to Keith. Okay, guy. Okay, this guy. All right, Hunter S. Thompson. Relax. Once I write all the ideas out, I'm able to retain the information. I'm sending this email to my team, but it really is for me. I don't know if you can understand that as a producer. Okay, all right, Jason Steinbeck. So you're basically taking out your quill.

You're penning your email on paper, and then are you just – you know what could be cool is if you just took a – you wrote every email by hand, took a digital photo of it, and just sent that over in the body of the email. That way people are getting to see not only your thoughts and your process, but also your beautiful penmanship since you have a graffiti background. That's a great, great idea. And these – you know what these sound like, Chris? That sounds like an NFT project just waiting to happen. Yeah, exactly. Your next sub stack is just a picture of five pieces of legal paper scribbled on. Unintelligible, but that's not the problem. Yeah, I think there's like, isn't there kind of like a slow living movement right now? This sort of works into that a little bit where like electronic mail, what is that doing to our environment? Electricity is bad. Have you heard about this stuff, Chris? I've heard that everything is bad. So everything that we do is either bad for our fellow man or bad for the environment or both. So I'm trying to do as little as possible. Luckily, I don't care about the fellow man. I don't care about fellow man. The environment, I'm going to be dead, hopefully, by the time it's fully ruined. But we'll see. I use a... plastic water jug every single day and i would love to cut back on that but there's been some delays at ben edgar's corporation about getting my custom gallon made so yeah and also next time just a side note whenever you bring that gallon over to my house and you squish it on your head party guy style from the 80s movie the the bigger trash cans are in the backyard and i'm going to want you to dump those there instead of kind of cram in the whole gallon container into my into my simple human pullout you know it It takes up so much space because you pull the drawer out and sometimes your plastic gallon will come back to life because you're not strong enough to really compress it down. It'll come back to life and it gets stuck when you're trying to pull the door and it can be a hassle. It bounces back. I know that you're not used to having the trash cans in the backyard, but...

You know, once you kind of work your way up on the ladder, you won't have to keep them in the front where people can put the poo-poo in there. I actually hate, I actually think trash cans in the house are also disgusting. I prefer to use a whole foods bag and then dispose of it every day. I like that about you because that's kind of Asian mom style is to use the grocery bag and then dump it. Like keeping trash in the house is crazy. I mean, I think it's also a little bit of a New York. When you're living in a smaller space, it really feels crazy? Yeah, but it also depends on what kind of trash. If it's like food, stinky stuff that will smell and rot... That's out of there night of. That's a one-nighter. We're not sleeping over. We're not exchanging information. But if it's just a paper towel or some mail, then yeah, that's fine. No, it all goes out. The mail go. You can't sleep knowing that there's mail in the house. I like that. No, it's just a nice routine to get in, I feel like. It keeps the house clean. It keeps the smells nice. You can sleep in the house knowing that there's a mail in the house, but not like a parcel, as it were. I'm excited to go to another overpriced fussy dinner. with you tonight, which I'm really looking forward to. We're off to Kispaca. I don't even know how to spell that. It's a meat lover's paradise. C-H-I space S-P-A C-C-A. Our guest today will probably know all about it. He's originally from L.A. I think now he's in NYC. I love that it's called an award-winning meat restaurant. Some people out there love meat. I love meat so much. I can't wait. I'll pay for the veal tongue with the salsa verde myself out of my own pocket for you. That's the kind of guy that I am. It looks like I'm going to be eating very light tonight. No, you'll be eating fish. I'm sure there's going to be some broccolini that will also get a little char on there. Oh, not a char. Jason, you're crazy, bro. Okay, we do have a guest today. I'm sorry. I was getting so excited about our meal. You're getting Daniel riled up. Yeah, Dan Riley is our guest today, correspondent from Condé Nast's GQ magazine. He's written multiple books, Fly Like Me from 2017, Barcelona Day.

from 2020. We're going to ask him why America continues to forgive Tiger Woods. What it's like to build with Robert Pattinson. Why people care about Nick Cage. I don't get it. What it's like being a non-fiction and a fiction shouty at the same time. Not a lot of people cross streams like that. He's polyamorous with the pen. Yeah, Dan gets it both ways. He gets it both ways. Alright, let's give Dan a call and we'll find out what's going on with him. Okay, bye. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by a new podcast from The Guardian stateside with Kai and Carter. This is covering a lot of our bases, Jason. It's trying to slow down. the news and wrestle with the questions we all have about what's happening in the world and i know you particularly have quite a lot of questions a lot of questions but how often because we do this podcast three times a week and that's a sweet spot how many times do they do three times a week and i i have a feeling just based on the platform and these talking points that they're maybe going to be covering different stuff than we do that's just a guess the guardian is not some billionaire owned They're not afraid to say what they want to say, brother. Yeah, Rupert ain't sniffing around in what journalists Kai Wright and Carter Sherman are up to over there at Stateside. But yeah, listen wherever you get your podcasts. You can watch it on YouTube. It's three times a week. And who couldn't use more news? You know, especially when it's not, you know, from here, let's say. Give it a listen. Give it a listen. Oh, this is huge for me personally. This episode of How I'm Gone. It was brought to you by TaskRabbit. Oh, baby, let me tell you something. This is not a joke. I use TaskRabbit a lot because I can't do anything. You need some art hung? TaskRabbit. You need a fucking something put together, a cabinet? Got to reach that cheese grater on the top shelf? TaskRabbit. Anything you need, TaskRabbit can take care of it for you. And, I mean, how it works, TaskRabbit connects you with skilled taskers in your area. They can help you move. They can assemble furniture.

repairs, yard work, mounting, and more. You can search for a Tasker based on cost, skill set, availability, and past client reviews so you know exactly who's showing up and can have confidence that they know what they're doing because Taskers have assembled over 3.4 million pieces of furniture, completed 700,000 home repairs, handled 1.5 million moves, and the numbers are just going up, Jason. Yeah, throw a little money at the problem. It's not so expensive, and that job that you really don't want to do is something that another person out in the world, is very good at doing and would gladly do it in exchange for a little bit of money. So when life happens, your to-do list grows. Get ahead of it now and get $15 off your first task at TaskRabbit.com or grab the TaskRabbit app using promo code. how long taskers book up faster, especially for same-day tasks. So book trusted home help today. That is $15 off your first task using promo code howlong with the TaskRabbit app or at TaskRabbit.com. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Squarespace. Obviously, Jason, you and I spend a lot of time on the World Wide Web, sort of our peers, our listeners, our friends, our colleagues, maybe even your parents if they're freaky. And if you're doing anything in the world, writing, taking pictures. I do topless boxing. You need a website. Exactly, a website that works, that does what it's supposed to do, that allows you to be creative but also business-minded. Jason, there's one place to go for that, Squarespace. Yeah, Chris, I'm over here. I'm modifying calculators and putting Claude inside of them so you could cheat at school. And I just want a place where I could have everything all in one place. I can have the SEO tools. So those future graduates can find me and, you know, I'm able to accept, quote unquote, donations for my services that might be gray area. You know what I mean? And then email campaigns. Hey, I got a new, you know, 2.3 version upgrade. Boom, boom, boom. Get the analytics going. Raise some money. You know, show your investor all of your cool analytics of what's going on. They're going to want to get in early and we can use Blueprint AI to make your website look as professional.

as your competition, if not more. So... Head to squarespace.com slash howlong for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, use offer code howlong to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or a domain. Where are you, right? You look like you're in like a WeWork with audio capabilities. I mean, that is literally how I would describe my arrangement right now. I am back in the Condé Nast offices after some... some time away uh helping out with a project here and i came down and found the little uh the little audio lab that they built here so i i think of the condé nass tower as my We work right now. So you're in a room specifically treated for audio recording. It seems to be. I've never been in here before, but I see some control panels over here. I'm not much of a producer myself. Not an audiophile yourself. That's fine. But it's nice that you have that kind of audio quality, though, because most of our guests, especially the ones that are famous musicians, they like to... They like to kind of use an AirPod and walk around, so it's nice that you respect. Grammy award-winning music on a level of professionalism most people can't even dream about. You respect the craft. And you're also not a sex pest. Well done, Daniel. Thank you, guys. Thank you. No problem. And Daniel, also, I want to situate the listener. Daniel's wearing a button-up shirt, and I just want to say it's nice because I'm wearing... My US Open year 2000 t-shirt that's a little too big that Jason likes to point out. Jason's, of course, not wearing a shirt after his issues this morning with his workout. Oh, I thought that was a t-shirt. No, that's just here. This is my flesh-colored shirt, baby. Like Ed Hardy or something. Yeah, he has been known to wear one of those Ed Hardy long sleeves that has the tattoos kind of pre-applied. But today, for you, he thought better of it. Oh, thank God. Well, Dan, why are you in New York? They needed you to come to the... the they sent the bat signal and you hopped on delta one i think he lives there oh you do oh i'm sorry no no i'm from los angeles originally live in new york um back doing an editorial bill in for a bunch of people who had babies at the same time and so that

That was the bat signal. Exactly. You're here to clean up the mess of all these Condé Nast breeders is what it looks like, Daniel. I mean, yeah, it's interesting. I think that the children weren't allowed for many years when I was here. So it's interesting to see how that broke the other way. Children weren't allowed pre-pandemic. It wasn't like an official rule, but it was understood. Yeah. Those are my favorite. Reproduction of the family's bloodline was frowned upon at the very least. Exactly. You either needed zero children or like a 20 year old that was out of the picture that would not be interrupting you from late meetings or. I got to say, it sounds fun over there at the tower. You call it the tower? The kids are usually hot and go to a good college. You know what I mean? If they're in their early 20s, which is always nice. And then they loop right back for that internship. The only people on earth that can afford to take that. Formerly free internship at Condé Nast. Formerly free. Is this unpaid? We call it formerly free. So it's like a nice human centipede of literary minds. Yes, exactly. If the last name sounded familiar, the answer was yes, it is that person's child and or niece or nephew. I feel like we're one comment away from some guy with an earpiece coming in behind you. Daniel, we're just going to go ahead and kind of wrap this up now. No, this is why I'm in the soundproof booth instead of out in the open. You know, it's like nobody's got offices anymore. You're just kind of stuck out in the middle. No, that open floor plan has ruined shit talking, I can imagine. I mean, what fun is an office if you can't talk shit to your coworkers about other coworkers? Or it's just more brazen and you just hear people talking shit about you and you're just like, it's a little more. People got used to the Twitter thing, which, by the way, I was just reading about the New York Times asking its employees to clean their act up and get back to work or something like that. We call that the Taylor Lorenz effect. It looks like her hurt feelings and departure to the competing Washington Post has really shook the core of...

Do you think it's because the New York Times is like you guys are leaving all the good stuff away for free on Twitter or it's just like we need to kind of button up our reputation? If you're a Times writer, you're going to have to kind of keep your side of the street clean while you're on payroll. Is that what it is? Yeah, it seems like there's a few different things going on there. They seem like concerned that everybody is like fighting with each other, you know, like children eating children. Yeah, I mean, maybe it's just, like, an old-fashioned, like, why aren't you working harder, you know? Or, like, how do you have time to spend so much time, you know? The classic, when you work at McDonald's, the time to lean, time to clean. Sure. No, I think it's because they're all arguing with each other about personal brands. That was the big story. You know, I think that has a lot to do with it. But also, yeah, I mean, it's – I feel like – They let it rock for so long with no rules at all, and now they're like, we can't really add rules to this, but we can ask politely if you guys would calm the fuck down and get back to work. We have important stories about burnout to write, so if we could just hurry up, that'd be great for everybody. Take a page out of our own page and tweet. tweeting like a treat exactly well i heard you talking about giving yourself little treats for for good behavior but the problem is if you give yourself that 20 times a day a treat it is not anymore you know i was i was shocked by treat culture and people I just don't think that – I can't believe how bad young people's outlook on life is. Like I don't really – I cannot relate. Is this where I hit the OK Boomer button? Carry on. No, but I mean it's just like if your life is so bad that you have to give yourself a candy bar for running an errand, I think there's bigger fish to fry. That's all I'm saying. It just seems like – is it really that bad if you're 22 and you can still party and you have your looks? Like what's the big deal? Yeah, I am not one to answer that question.

question as somebody who was already on the New York Times plan of tweeting, which is like once every eight or nine weeks, I think, and then takes great pleasure in, I don't know, just very boring things like walking around and reading books and stuff like that. No, you're good. You're one of my favorite kind of Twitter archetypes. The guy who's... Checks in when he's got something to share. You tweet every time a book comes out. Yeah, pure promo. Exactly. It's pure promo. And then there's some lightly sprinkled friend promo. And the friends are relatively high profile, or at least the story is very well written. Unlike me, who's just diarrhea of the fingers. You know what I mean? It's nice to see someone who's got such restraint in their sharing. Diarrhea of the fingers. Note to our meme account. I mean, I had no idea what you guys had been doing these last two years. My wife is a devoted listener, and I resisted as long as I could, but was definitely catching up and kind of getting my arms around. Let's get our arms around you trying to resist it as much as you humanly could for the last two years. I'd like to know maybe three or four reasons why. Yeah, no, it sounded terrible, right? And then... It was just one of those things that seemed to... In terms of subject matter or pure audio quality. Yeah, basically the audio quality, exactly. I'm only in it for the $100,000 a season, highly produced six-episode narratives that seem to be... He didn't see the Gimlet logo on our artwork, and he just kind of kept scrolling. Abbey Rhodes was closed for quarantine reasons. This episode will be out in six or so. seven months daniel you and i share the same thoughts on this matter as somebody who creates three to four hours of edited professionally produced audio per week it is a shame when teams of dozens of people take months if not years to create six episodes you know what i mean what's really interesting is like i i am such a um i think that

In the writing that I do, which is kind of like there's a couple novels. It's mostly monthly magazine work. I've done my whole kind of editor career. Like, I love a thing that takes months, you know, that takes a little time and really cooks and isn't just something that is, you know, fired off as quickly as possible. Of course, there's great, great versions of all that stuff. It does seem like the audio thing. It's like, God, there's got to be some medium between. uh, you know, what you guys are doing, like the second, the second we're done or whatever. And like the, the year long thing, I don't totally understand it. I've done, done some work, um, you know, just helping with being a script editor or whatever on things like that. And the, I wish some of those resources could be spread out a little more or something in order to, to, uh, be have, have that happy medium. I think a lot of these shows though, that do what you're talking about, where it's like a 10 episode season and there's like a sponsor or it's like Amazon studios. I think they have to do it that way for them to get the money they want to get. To justify the money. I would guess that often those shows, it's not about numbers at all. It's just about we sold the idea, and you like the idea, and GE is sponsoring it, and they're going to give us $200,000, so we're going to hire 10 people, 15 people, and that's what we have to do to make it seem. It's like when you go to a photo shoot. And there's 75 people when it probably could have been 10 people. Yeah, exactly. The client wants to see bodies. The client wants to see bodies. God, okay, okay. That makes perfect sense to me. You know, you guys probably know from kind of seeing that stuff up close that a lot of work goes into that like last percent of like, you know, like the super specific production thing that glosses it up to that highest thing. And kind of going back to the Twitter thing, it's like there isn't, there's not enough. that is is thriving right now in between uh tweeting and the the thing that takes forever and that's sort of an interesting thing because i feel like that's always been the best the best stuff i guess you know when you can see somebody who makes a film and it doesn't feel like it took them five years but it also wasn't shot on their iphone that's always feels like a win you know whatever but there's that sort of that sort of interesting in between them damn no you're right i don't i don't think about this that much because i don't really listen

I mean, I feel like anything film or TV related just takes too long. And that's like the name of the game because, again, it's a lot more money at stake. You know what I mean? And we all expect books to take a long time because that's like part of the art form. Even that, there's sort of like a thing where, you know, it takes as long as it takes to write a book. But then for whatever reason, production remains, you know, you have to turn in a book six months ahead of time or a year ahead of time or whatever, unless it's super timely and they're kind of. crashing it through everybody has their reasons but it is it is weird that like most of what we consume is just was not thought through at all and that's probably why i don't tweet at all i was gonna i was gonna say chris that we don't know each other but like the thing that i've i've realized um listening to you is that you um you seem to be embarrassed by like most people you know like that you just find them like that like you can't believe that adults are behaving a certain way and i find i try to be a myself myself included myself included i try to be a like work toward being a more like open generous person understanding how how others are and then but mostly default to just being embarrassed by what everybody's doing well then i like that you're trying That's more than I'm doing. It's good that you have a little angel and a little devil. It's a good balance to have. But I am shocked every day by people's behavior. Every single day, whether it's on the Internet or in real life, I'm shocked by people's behavior, which I think is a crisp problem more than a society problem. but I also don't know what that – I don't know exactly what that says about me, and maybe I should just relax is probably what the main takeaway is. Well, I think it's good to process the embarrassment of other people, the ludicrous actions of humans, but you either let them make you mad or you laugh at them and let them roll off you like water on the feather. Do you think that – I mean, I don't know how much like –

feedback you guys get of of you know why we get quite a lot of feedback why people listen to this at all but i have to imagine that's part of it right it's like somebody somebody articulating that and being like you know what it is embarrassing when adult men uh dance at a at a show or whatever you know those sorts i think there are look i think there are people that subscribe to my kind of thinking for sure and i think that i'm a voice to the voiceless when it comes to when it comes to stuff that doesn't matter um which is an interesting place to occupy. But I also, yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think that there are, like, I think it's nice also because most of the stuff that we talk about in that realm is completely innocuous and, like, doesn't actually matter. The stakes are incredibly low. The stakes are low, but also people have a strong enough opinion about these things to be interested in hearing you, you know, with the clandestine AirPods on being like, I can never publicly admit or agree with these things, but I get a kick out of listening to this guy yell and scream about it. Well, thank God that I've given a voice to the dog haters out there, and that's the number one thing that I feel. That's kind of becoming my life's work. That's the new birds aren't real movement. Right, right. Yeah, it's an underrepresented portion of society that I don't think is kind of accepted on traditional platforms. Chris is swimming upstream. He's doing the hard work that a lot of people don't really have enough gumption to handle. And I think there are other people that don't want dogs when they're dining. And I think that they're afraid to say something, but I'm happy to say that. And if I get attacked by a pit bull and I die, that's how I was meant to go. I've learned when you're being attacked by the pit bull, Chris, give him or her your weaker arm of the two, so we're both left-handed, so we're going to give him that right arm, and then the left arm is where you punch him square in the wet pink nose. Okay, so I'll give they my arm, and then I'll just kind of come over with the left hook, is that what you're saying, to kind of get the dog off me? Look, if you want to beat up non-binary animals, then that's what you would do, Chris.

No, no, no. That's not what I'm saying. Let's clean up these non-binary streets. Is that what you're saying, Chris? No, I have to protect myself against these wild animals that people have domesticated. Jason, is that a palm tree on your shoulder there? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Representing your heritage? I'm a Cali boy. I'm from OC. Which town? Huntington Beach, bitch. Okay, that's like... Yeah, welcome to the HP. Exactly. So you're from L.A. as well, but I'm assuming it's not square on Hollywood and Vine. Are we on the outskirts? No, no. I grew up in the South Bay, so Redondo Beach, Manhattan Beach, which I feel like has... cultural overlap with huntington beach in terms of the racism in terms you're right in terms of uh the the you know closet uh racism and then also the uh you're close to the trump golf course over there in pv right right well i guess kind of halfway between us so same kind of vibe where i'm from yeah and the uh and the But, like, also the, like, lifted, you know, like, Chevy pickup with... Roland Cole, as they say. Volcom stickers and stuff like that. I love Volcom. Thank you guys for that. Thank you guys for Volcom. I love Volcom, too. It was weird because growing up there, I rebelled against that whole culture so much. All of our friends were kind of like, we rebelled against bro, lifted truck culture. Volcom was the enemy. And now that I have a sentimental connection with like Sublime and Volcom and all these like bro brands that used to represent everything I hated because I don't know why. It's your culture. You should have been hating the jocks. But like the lifted truck bro people, there's a lot of chillers in that group as well who just want to hit the six-footer and listen to some. cottonmouth kinks and just have a bomb ass burrito and just kind of have good vibes only you know they definitely don't uh they have a more uncomplicated relationship to their their own happiness i feel like they like they figured it out and never looked beyond yeah they're like i don't feel very good and they're like should we have margaritas and pot and like yeah and then 45 minutes later you're like today is the best day ever i think that the

That Cali laid-back lifestyle, it's interesting how it can be a through line through many different types of people, like you're saying. None of these groups necessarily want to hang out together, but they all have that kind of attitude, whether it's a margarita and chips and guac or it's a martini and some fries. It's kind of like a... It's an approach to life that doesn't exist. Definitely not in Atlanta and definitely not in New York. It's a Mediterranean almost. I thought a lot about this like growing up and my family was from there and kind of just like had no access to anywhere else. And so I thought that that was all there was. And then like slowly, slowly like realized that we were like in a city, like part of a city and kind of discovered things just beyond the South Bay and on and on and on. So at what age did you discover? Or did you kind of climb out of the bubble that you were in? I guess when we could start driving and just kind of like going up to Hollywood to go to see music or go eat somewhere or whatever, just anything outside of that. But you're kind of trained. I don't know if it was like this where you were, but like everybody was made to feel like the place that we were was the only place there was, the best place there was, and that anybody else would die to be there. And so like why? look elsewhere i mean look to be fair bro it's fucking nice look it's it's it is nice it's pretty fucking nice it's it's a it's an amazing it's just an amazing mindset and it still it still exists and i love it and i go back a lot and i i sink right into it and uh can be can be persuaded that people are right but it is a utterly bizarre thing but to your point jason about the people who kind of like never moved beyond that like it's that's part of what it is too there's a real gravity to the whole thing where like if you are like i would like to uh like even my mom i remember she was like she when i was growing up she would talk about the time that she um you know left the south bay and um i thought that this was like for many years or whatever but it was like three weeks she went to morrow bay and i got a house and you know which is like a four-hour drive and and so there's a real like

a real thing to that and um and i i love that that that first that first novel that i wrote is set in a different time um in the early 70s but it it's a lot about that kind of pull that that that those beach towns have and like it was weird when i was in high school the oc was being filmed in manhattan beach and so there was a real thing of like people learning about whatever that weird alchemy of my backyard is on this on the center stage of the world just all all that sort of All that sort of stuff. And then going to college and seeing that people had watched that show and were fascinated by it. And you started to kind of be like, oh, I guess there is something interesting here. You see them whispering about you as you walk down the hall. Exactly. Exactly. That's what that's what you wanted, though. Yeah. But you I mean, Jason, do you miss do you miss that stuff? I mean, like, does any part of you want to go back there or? Well, I mean, I live, you know, 45 minutes away from where I grew up sans traffic. So I'm able to kind of go back and it's always there. People nowadays in our age range talk about we have the beauty of living pre- and post-internet, so we kind of are grounded in reality more so than the current generation who doesn't know life without the internet. And I kind of feel the same way about I know life in and out of the orange curtain or the suburban bubble that exists all over the world. I'm able to appreciate the suction that I get from it, but I know when it's time to jump out before I get sucked in too far deep because so many of my friends and friends' parents and everything were like, the thought of international travel is asinine to them because where they are is perfect. I wonder what the stats are like for people that like... move back or don't have passports yeah you know what i mean that like i i do think the draw or never leave like you're saying dan like that's it's like maybe you go to college and you come back at the most you know what i mean but if you're bred to think this is the best place on earth like like i said there is some truth to that at least weather wise i think i think it's it's kind of like trying to find a justification for being a closed-minded person or like trying to rebrand closed-mindedness of just like why would i ever want to go

to India and see how other people live and open my mind and be empathetic about other people's cultures and struggles or the beauty of other cultures and people. You know, I just don't want to do that. I'm good here with my country music and my skinny girl, Spicy Marks. The thing that's kind of interesting about the South Bay area is that it's become like, you know, I don't know how this actually tracks for people who live there full time, but like it does seem like just a ton of people who could live anywhere are choosing to live there. Like a lot of athletes, you know, a lot of Lakers historically, a lot of Kings, a lot of actors and producers. Like there was no Hollywood kind of thing going on there. And there's like a, I totally get like proximity to LAX and you can get a, get a nice place near the water or whatever. But like, and, and as I understand it, it's, it remains cheaper than like, you know, really. pacific palisades and whatever but it's it's interesting like that there there is a worldliness that's kind of coming in just by the kinds of people that are that are moving in and for better and for worse like i think a lot of people move there because they think it has a sort of 60s 70s surf culture thing that of course they themselves are displacing by moving in and uh and like trying to embody it or whatever but like there's it's kind of fun to watch those different those different cycles of just like why certain people are deciding to go there it's always fascinating to me because this happens in atlanta too like these guys live an hour outside of the city you know like that it's crazy to me the more money i have the more inside of the city i want to be like i would you know what i mean like i want to live in soho i would live in fucking beverly hills like i don't i If you have real bread, you can get what you want. It's not like size is an issue. Yeah, but how many rich and famous people do that? I mean, everyone in L.A. is in Calabasas or up in the hill. No, no. In L.A., in New York, I think they live amongst us, and that's part of the charm. In New York, yeah. Because you can't really, like, you're not going to really do that. Yeah, but you can escape up. Yeah. No, I know. It's so fascinating to me that the more money you get, you want to live.

like so far away and i'm just that just seems like a i don't know i have no interest in making more money and then getting a hundred acres an hour an hour and 15 minutes away from a restaurant that's good it just it's a i mean i guess you have a shit i agree with you it's just more isolating as a celebrity i think it's even more isolating but maybe you don't have a choice depending on your level of fame you know right right it's like a safety thing yeah it's a safety thing it's just an annoyance thing sometimes you want to just go outside and not be hounded well look You don't have to go to Alfred every day for coffee. There are other places to go. Chris is saying they're asking for it, is what you're saying. They want to be... I really do believe that. I think there are probably A-list celebrities, definitely in New York and probably in LA, that do regular stuff every day, and it's fine. Because New York's the one city where the city will kind of leave you alone. Yeah. Because everyone walking around Manhattan thinks they're just as cool as Alec Baldwin and just as important and famous as Alec Baldwin, so... You're not going to go up and ask him for an autograph because you won't be cool. But I just don't. It's a perfect society, honestly. No, I mean, it's more evolved for sure. But I guarantee you if you take out the rats and I'm there. But if you want to go to if you want to go to hot spots all the time, like, what do you think is going to fucking happen? That's like part of the you know, it's like you choose that stuff. You're saying about the South Bay, about like people are a lot of people are flocking there. And why are these Lakers and actors and people going there? And I think that's kind of the beauty of Los Angeles or Southern California is you can. There's a hundred different areas that you can live in with very unique attributes and capabilities. So you could really kind of tailor make, not to use a golf pun, your environment. Please do. A lot of people might want to live in Pasadena because it has a lot of stuff. You can get some good real estate, beautiful places. But it's not by the airport or it's not by the ocean.

So you can kind of get Pasadena by the sea over here in PV. The school district's good there. If you have kids, if you don't care about kids, you can go over here. If you like hiking, go here. Thank you to California Board of Tourism for sponsoring. Visit California.com. Use the promo code. LA is great. It is great. My favorite part about what you're saying, Jason, though, is I only think about these neighborhoods of Los Angeles and New York. like 18 hours a day uh and what they what they say about people and my friends at the choices people make no i do i do love that that uh you know each one of those things uh in los angeles says something about you whether it's whether it's real or not but people just can can chop that up however they want and and uh and it just paralyzes people on where they where they choose to live and what it says about them and and uh even though they're all you know in the in that same area more or less but that that is just like i love it i love watching people especially that have never been there try to try to parse that we talked about on this we talked about this a lot on the podcast about how the valley had this like bad rap because of the media and like hollywood But if you go there, you're like, oh, this is pretty fucking nice. I totally get the appeal of this. It's the New Jersey of Los Angeles. But if you don't know that, if you don't go there, it's like a punchline. Daniel, I was listening to a podcast interview that you did, and you were talking about interviewing Brooks, the golfer guy Brooks. You were talking about the kind of process of when you're interviewing somebody, and you're with them, and then they'll go away for a while. Him and his caddy will drive to the restaurant. on their own so you can kind of pump the brakes and get a little solitude so you're not always like on the record and i guess like you know like living in the valley or living in a place like that allow it's it's good to be like i want to go in and i want to be on the record at horses restaurant or at balthazar and i want to be able to pull back and loosen the tie a little bit and just be like oh it's nice to be off for a minute yeah the the uh you know whether you're doing a story or or whatever like you're saying like

it is fun when you can kind of get close to somebody enough where they're start, they start to kind of let their, not just let their guard down, but kind of forget you're there, you know, and, um, the real rules, road rules, challenge cast forgets that there's 10 cameras in the bathroom. Yeah, I'm the guy just kind of pointing the camera at the bathroom. No, you guys keep having sex. It's totally cool. We can't show it. It's TV. It's fine. It's totally cool. Did you change cameras? Yeah, exactly. Golf does nothing for me, which we're kind of on the record on that. But I also want to know, I'm fascinated by the Tiger Woods. constant redemption and forgiveness by the american public in a way that i don't know if other people get this or afforded the same grace that he is like the master started today yep and people are just frothing that he's playing and i understand there's the he's fucked up so many times he's injured he's back he's injured his back is it just because he's the greatest of all time that people can give him is that not enough i mean honestly in today's society absolutely not enough i was um watching watching very first shots of today's round, Masters Thursday. Sorry for pulling over the Masters to do this. Totally hooked. Don't really understand even my own obsession with all of it, and yet can't look away. But the thing that's kind of cool about the Masters is the old guys who've won get to keep competing. And what you realize is like, oh, this is the one game, the one sport where... you know if he were healthy or whatever like it'd be like jordan coming back and and playing kind of at the highest level and like the fact that what they want though like tiger under normal circumstances would he's so healthy uh in in some ways despite his body kind of breaking down but he was he was kind of the most physical of

all players ever like he was in the gym when nobody else was exactly and he kind of transformed that but people i think were hoping that he would be around you know playing in the masters till he's whatever 70 years old or something and then he almost dies again and people are like oh he's definitely never gonna play again and then not only is he playing again but he's in the most important tournament of the year ready to go and uh it's yeah there's just a some some insane resilience there on top of that he came back completely jacked yeah yeah he's looking good he looks he looks even bigger than ever you know he's got the superman pad yeah his the back the back and chest he did not skip a day jason that's what they're really cheering for though yeah i think there's something to be said about a person like you said at any age you know he's you know years past his prime and he's been in our life playing professional golf forever That anyone could be like, you know what, I'm just going to go and win the biggest tournament. and beat every single living golfer in the world whenever I want, just because I can. To see that power is exciting. Yeah, and there's a weird thing, too, and I don't really know how I feel about this, but anybody who lived through the Tiger sex scandal, it truly is one of the craziest things that ever happened in public life. Coolest things. I couldn't agree more, man. I mean, that guy, you can't take that guy to a Houston's in South Florida. You know what I'm saying? You just can't. So there was just like a drip. a drip drip of revelations for 60 days or whatever and he was like led he was on the cover of the new york post like more days than 9 11 or some crazy thing like that that's a great fact that's a great it was just so humiliating and and yet uh you know like he he kind of sucked it up and came back from that but i also think that like maybe the he was really dragged for that in a way that i i do wonder if that happened like right now if people would be as betrayed or something that's a good question the jordan comparison is is fairly accurate because i think they're both really non-sympathetic characters like they're not really likable at all like tiger woods is deeply unlikable to me right like he he does nothing he has no personality

It's very robot vibes. He's a philandering golf robot who really – somebody should give that guy an Uber account on his phone. And I love – Dan, I love painkillers. You know what I mean? Blondes, painkillers. I get it, bro. I get it. But I understand. But I just don't think that he – he has no sense of humor. It's just it's strictly based on skill, which makes me feel like that's why people can separate it is that, like, we don't know. All we know about him is bad stuff except that he's so good at this game. And we can just focus on that because there's nothing in his life that is interesting besides his golfing. Yeah, I guess similar to Jordan because they don't have any room in their life for anything but drug use and bad shit. Yeah, it's weird. There's a whole other set of other great players that have existed over the last 10, 15 years. And it seems like fans and media get mad at them for not being as... like psychopathic about their their obsession and like because they do have other elements and whatever and tiger is like doing this this week wanting to destroy everyone else yeah he's a no he's a freak that's why he's the best you have to kill people it's not like a fun like like let me go and like that I think that people really respond to that. It's just whether you're a method actor or Francis Ford Coppola. Level-headed guys don't get the headlines. When you watch somebody that's monomaniacal in that way, I think part of people want to feel that they could devote themselves so wholly to something, but really there's just a handful of people who can both do that. kind of make it manifest and the fact that he's been doing it since he was two or whatever it's really it's really wild yeah i love i love abusive parents um i don't know if you've seen king richard king richard's a great movie bro i don't know if you've seen it great movie because i don't follow sports at all don't care but i will devour any sort of sports documentary thing For this exact reason, because I think the singular focus part of it and being so good at something is deeply appealing to me, a person who's really not good at anything. The best sports stories and the things that I try to, when I write about athletes is like, it's important, I guess, that they're great at whatever their sport is. It's what, I guess, makes them a name and interesting in other ways. But I'm so much more interested in what you've done to your brain to get in a place to do that.

I was just thinking back on this story I wrote on Cristiano Ronaldo, which was definitely one of the more insane stories I got to do, not because we had so much time together or whatever, but he was at a whole other level of that because it wasn't just dominating other soccer players, but every element of his life was so preening and about putting him at the center of the greatest movie that's ever been done. the GQ photo shoot. He refused to put clothes on. He was only going to wear underwear. What was the grease budget for that shoot? The grease budget. He's one of the shiniest, glossiest humans alive. Exactly. He brings his own gloss. They gave us an address as they do or whatever and we showed up thinking it was his house but it was in fact a house within his gated community that he kept only for photo shoots activations uh to shoot the watch or whatever and so you're at the media wing of his estate art on the walls nicely appointed furniture whatever that like it was just for these for these special moments fridge with the boss yeah and so you're like definitely in a different realm when you are with somebody that's not calculating about their image making man the soccer Cause we used to, cause I work with Tom Brown and we, we dressed FC Barcelona. So I would go and do these shoots and I've never seen anything like the way those guys get treated. Yeah. Like the, the level of fame and the level of like, they just levitate through the world. No, it's like, it's really different than the way we treat athletes. Like it's, it's so global in this way that I think there's like not a lot of other things that are comparable. And there's, and it's the one sport in most countries, you know, like it really is one and nothing else. And so like, there's. But there's also a way in which that makes them all incredibly solitary and lonely and strange. He also had a young son. At that point, it was by a woman who had signed an NDA to never disclose who she was or claim anything. Damn, Ronaldo on his drizzy shit. I like that. He was this little mini-me with him that was with him the whole day that we were together. And that was just like an incredible...

thing too. He was dressed the exact same way. I believe that Ronaldo married some woman and now she has a reality show on Netflix actually. That could be. This was maybe six or seven years ago and I haven't followed the personal life too closely but I just love being able to get a little glimpse into stuff like that. But what do you think about this? So this golf boom we're experiencing. Like people playing it. Yeah, what's up, man? Because it's hard to be good at it. It's expensive. But I think people really hate their spouse. So they like the five hours. You know what I mean? But there's got to be more to it than that. Well, I think maybe a better way to phrase this question is, Daniel, you write about golf for people who don't play golf. Right, right. Knowing Chris and his devilish ways. his diarrhea fingers and his diarrhea brain, pitch Chris on golf. How do you get him on board? I wish fewer people would be playing. It's kind of crowded up the public courses in L.A. County that I grew up on that you used to be able to. walk out to Brookside in Pasadena or Rancho. Jason, Dan's a saltier guy. He's carrying his own clubs. He's walking the course. You know what I mean? I used to get dropped off as a little 10-year-old and go make my bones out there and throwing down a buck for putting contests and all that sort of stuff. It was so fun as a kid. It was a great way to kind of... kill time and and uh and try to get better at something i mean i do wonder with the like why are people suddenly discovering it thing like i don't know i mean like maybe it's like after so many years online of like optimization or whatever there's like a physical thing you can do like a thing that like you are marking with the score you can see if you're getting better my favorite part of it is that you can basically go anywhere in the country and have kind of a different outdoor experience which is no that's a nice nice thing too and you know so you're gonna it's gonna be different and

in georgia and florida than it is in in california or new york or whatever and you can get i don't know it's just kind of a fun thing to to get hooked on in terms of of all that i don't totally get the like i hated it until 2020 covid summer and then i i saw the light kind of thing because it's like i don't know there are a lot of a lot of activities but they were open that was a big thing the courses were open yeah that happened with tennis a lot and the same thing of like you know pitch somebody on tennis and we're like no we're good you try to go get a You try to go get a game over there, and you've got to wait two hours at the public court. Don't even get me started on these dorks playing paddle tennis. Pickleball. Pickleball. Yeah, pickleball. Pickleball. I don't even want to call it that because it's too disrespected. We'll be playing that at some point in our age. Daniel, how do you feel about the Malcolm Gladwell kind of tax evasion part of golf courses taking up all of our... all of our land displacing stuff and not paying any property taxes or land taxes on any of that. What are your thoughts? Yeah, I generally agree with all of that. I do think that there's like a public golf course, private golf course problem where he's talking specifically about clubs in Los Angeles or other rich communities that are basically grandfathered into their tax rate from earlier days, and so they're paying a fraction of what they should be for their property tax. From the 1400s. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I mean, they should pay more. It's pretty simple. But if they pay the right tax amount for 2020 standards, then they wouldn't be able to stay in business? I think that's the only thing keeping their margins... alive or would you would you disagree with that i mean it's weird in a place like i'm i'm kind of confused by country clubs and private courses in general just because like i'm always shocked at how many there are and that there are that many people with whatever amount of money to spend i also look look dan dan look it's 25 25k initiation but then a month it's cheap it's cheap it's nobody you got to spend a little money at the club i'm sure your daughter loves the chicken strips over there it'll be fine swim lessons yeah the whole yeah yeah swim lessons is a great idea for you for me the bigger thing is like i find it incredibly boring to play a place as many times as you have to to to go do that you know these people are playing the same place 50 times a year and that's how i feel about the country house sure she kind

want to go somewhere one somewhere different you like a little deprivation yeah i mean i i love it and i play like like a dozen times a year you know it's just not it doesn't doesn't fit right now that's it playing once a month that means that once a month game of golf is electric for you It must be so fun. The last time I played was actually with a former guest of yours. Michael Williams invited me out to the... Oh, known golf influencer. Exactly. He influenced me and got me into the Pro-Am at the Los Angeles Open, which is a big tournament at Riviera Country Club out there. You're playing once a month and you're able to hit the Pro-Am? Okay, Daniel. Was not prepared for the fact that there would be fans out there and you're trying to not clank. spank balls off people's heads and stuff like that but trying to get a whiff of bill murray or something exactly exactly fans fans do make things difficult they kind of ruin it but i get it wait but with with the the the monotony thing the boredom thing like i i was thinking the the cadence that you guys are on right you're like two years into this and how do you keep going what is the what is the three-day Three day a week. It's funny you say this. We were talking to our agent about this this morning. Interesting. I think it's just like, to me, it's like that's what we do. That's part of the whole thing. I mean, Jason, I've talked about it. It's basically like that's really made a difference, I think, in the beginning. And to back off of that would just be, it would feel weird, honestly. Daniel, think about a podcast as a car, all right? We got Kias. We got Lamborghinis and everything in between. So we're kind of like a – A lifted pickup truck with a Vulcan sticker. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A little – we are that – for the grocery getter, yeah. But on the weekends, let's say we got the nice Porsche 911. It's got the turbo in there. You know, if you've ever seen Ford versus Ferrari, there's certain cars where the RPMs, it doesn't really work unless – Unless you're really getting some foot on the gas. Right, right. If you're on 2, 3K on the RPMs, it's going to sound like shit. But once you're up in 5, 6, 7, oh, she's purring like a kitten. And that's the way. We're a car that's supposed to be driven fast and hard.

So your agent was begging you to do less, and you guys said, no, no, no, we've got to keep going. Kind of, yeah, kind of. Got to keep redlining this poor thing. Well, we're not redlining. This is a good cadence for us, and for me, it really helps out to where it keeps me able to work very hard and have a lot of output into the world without being overwhelmed. It gets a little tough if we're going to go on vacation or something like that. You've got to plan some shit. But otherwise, You know, compared to somebody who works nine to five Monday through Friday and takes their weekends off, I so much prefer this and I'm still working less hours than that. I got to say, also, it doesn't, I don't know, man. We've never really had, like, there's been very few, like, how are we going to do this moments. Right. And we both now, I mean, in the last year, we've both been like on the road, like we're on the road, like we're doing our thing. We did a tour of the whole thing. It's just like. I don't know. I mean, once you decide to do something, that's what you're doing and you kind of are – I think it's also all relative to what other people are doing. So like most people will put out a podcast every week. So we feel – we seem insane for doing 3X whatever everyone else is doing. But, you know, when you think about it outside of post-production or whatever, uploading the shit and making, you know, promoting it on Twitter, it's three episodes a week is three hours of work a week, right? Yeah, I don't know. I just don't think about it anymore. It's like, yeah, this is just what we do. And it's never been that problematic as far as like, and I mean, you know, a couple weeks ago, like because of the way guests operate and schedule things, we just had to do four in a row. Like we had to do two back-to-back shit. And it was just like, yeah, let's do it. We got to do it, you know? And it's just fine. I don't know. I mean, I just don't – I would rather be doing that than, like, saying no. You know what I'm saying? Like, that's where I'm at with it. But I guess it does seem – I guess because of the way the genre works and, like, the way other people operate, like Jason's saying, it does seem crazier than it actually is when you think about what's nuts and bolts happening. I guess when I'm always – when I'm working on a long-term project or something I've done for –

uh several several months or a couple years or whatever i kind of like that's in the time when i start thinking about like okay there's now there's this other this other thing you know like i've done the the two books and the magazine articles i like the magazine articles because they're kind of done in three months and then you're on to something totally different whatever and so like does it does it make you guys sort of look toward like okay i really like this element of it and not this element and how do we yeah the element i like is when the guest is fucking good and on time That's really it. I want to get paid for it. It's really that simple. I think it's been something that's led us to a lot of great places and will continue to do so, I think. Part of it, I think we attribute to the pace of it all. It gives you time to go to dinner still. Yeah, exactly. I've worked so many jobs in my life doing shit stuff. The thought of being paid and making a living to talk to cool, interesting people all over the world, make a couple off-color jokes, and add a fun song at the end of it. It's not work at all. The only time the tour felt like work. Yeah, that's true. Not the stage part. That's fun. But when I'm lugging a bag of merch around, I'm like, I shouldn't be doing this. I shouldn't be doing this. What's the quote? You don't get paid all the money for doing the work. You make millions of dollars for dealing with all the bullshit in between. How much bullshit are you able to tolerate? How much are you willing to? The fourth round of edits, you're like, God damn it. I don't want to fucking do this. The book is good. Leave me alone. That's when you start breaking down the... Get paid $4 an hour for this book? Yeah, hold on. How did that work out? So you're saying I get the final payment when I turn this in, and you guys keep delaying when I'm turning it in. I don't like this one bit. I see what you're doing. I see what you're doing. You got $50,000 for this. It only took you two years to make. Right, right. Are you doing another book? You got something cooking? There's not another book right now, but I'm always kind of doing a few other things. One of the reasons I left was the editor job was to, as a lot of,

journalists and novelists are doing is kind of uh give a little more into the the screenwriting script writing tv film stuff and so that's all moving along but that's a but did they did they cop some rights from you was it that kind of thing or is it other people's project no it's all it's all been that stuff so the first book was option which allowed me to write a first script and then that led to other stuff and then you know all that stuff as um anyone knows who's had a taste of it is sort of like you have a million things before one thing does or doesn't happen and so um definitely in that in that phase but it's great it's super super fun another good excuse to to get home and do all that i i think that that that stuff is the hollywood thing is a grind because i just feel like i feel like the way to make a living is almost nothing ever gets made you know what i'm saying you're like well no it's a lot of people a lot of it's so strange a lot of people make a lot of money by not making things and they they still make their their salary you know on the production side and and it's it's complicated because it's sort of like you know i that's all way above my head and i'm just trying to to write some things and like see if somebody can do something with it but it is it is interesting to watch because that does not really exist in in books and magazines there's not quite as much or not nearly as much of the waste side of it. Not a lot of holding deals? Yeah, you're not going to commission something unless you plan to run it. We'll give you $3 million so you don't work with Simon & Schuster. Yeah, there's a lot of that going on at the magazine right now. No, but it's interesting just the way that every writer I know is kind of trying to do... find their own you know how to chop up the pie in terms of like okay i'm gonna i'm gonna do some magazine work and i'm gonna do some behind the scenes work over here and do that you know like you kind of have to a little copywriting yeah just whatever some stuff some stuff with your name on it some stuff without you know and kind of trying to trying to balance all that uh and it's interesting that not i don't know any two writers who are kind of doing it uh the exact same way everybody's kind of got their own like oh i'm better at this or like we were talking about some people maybe go the audio direction and try to go do

you know, turn one of their things into a podcast or whatever. And I think that, I think it's great that there, at least there are options, but it is interesting how there's really no, no obvious path. And so it's kind of, in some ways it's fun. It's like, okay, you have to go, go figure out exactly what's going to work for you. I'm still trying to figure out what works for me. Wait, what do you do, Chris? What is your job? Well, I mean, I'm CEO of How Long Gone. Yep. Jason's the CTA. He's the chief technology officer. So that's kind of how we split the duties. Does he make more money, though? Actually, yes, he does. No, no, he does because he does more work. Because, I mean, some people would say that my booking is a gift that has come so naturally to me I shouldn't be paid for it. I feel that way about Jason's audio skills, and he agrees but still kind of wants to get paid for it. So we worked it out. Because while I'm working, he gets to go to art galleries. Yep. And have coffee with friends? Yeah, I get to go have Zoom calls with my clients who pay me more than anchor ads. No, this is what I mean. You got things with your name on it and things without. That's right. Exactly. That's a nice balance. That's what life's all about. Let me ask you another question. I know that you guys were early on the horses thing, and I got my one experience there, but what will be the next? the next uh up and coming horses if you may so predict this is a great jason question but uh Did you go to horses for the star-studded GQ event? Yeah, that was the one. Must be nice. I guess Will Welch lost my email address. I don't know where that – I mean, Dior doesn't fit me that well, but I could have made it work. He specifically said that I was in your seat is how it worked. Oh, he said, look, Rob loves Chris, but you guys just work together. There's kind of a rapport here. Okay. Tonight's business, not pleasure. Yeah, I think – I mean, right now the next hottest restaurant probably is Mother Wolf, which is Evan Funke's pasta pizza place in Hollywood. It's not cool, though, in the same way. Yeah, I think that's the kind of thing right now is the crowd is a little bit more pedestrian and foodie-driven just because it's a more famous chef name attached to it. But I think the food will probably be much better there than horses, but horses, you're really going there.

The food is very good at horses, but you're really going there to be seen. Yeah, it's an interesting question. I mean, I think that I like that all these restaurants are close to me, because I'm not going to fucking Eagle Rock to try some gym lettuces. But I was talking about this this morning with my girlfriend, how with New York, it's like there are 20 different horses. There's 20 different Balthasars in New York that are equally prestigious, hard to get into, good crowds. And in L.A., there's always one or two at a time. And that goes for restaurants. That goes for bars. That goes for nightclubs. It's like everyone is going to this place right now. And we are going to fuck it out in six months and leave it destinated in New York. It's able to spread it all around. But I feel like that's kind of like L.A. nightlife culture bleeding over into every part, like the way a club can last for a year, you know, and then they got. Somebody gets shot outside. You got to close it down. You know what I mean? Rename it. You know, redo the interior. Don't come for Justin like that. You're definitely right, though. I mean, you're definitely right. I think there's one or two at a time, which is kind of nice. I mean, it allows you to keep up a lot better. And then, you know, luckily for us, we have relationships in these places so we can actually fucking go. Without our relationships, we're nothing. A friend of the show, like the other night, we were leaving Dashwood after this Calvin Klein Palazine thing. I didn't know where to go. I wanted to go to Il Bucco because it was next door. I assumed we couldn't get in. I texted my friend Al who owns a restaurant here called Gigi's in LA. Shout out to Al. And he's like, I can get you. We can go to Balthazar right now. I'm like, what do you mean right now? He's like, go right now. And we went right there. And I was like, damn, this is what is required to go eat. six and a half of ten French food on a fucking rainy Monday night. You know what I'm saying? I desperately wanted to go there. I was like, yeah, that's exactly what I wanted to do. Did you try to go there or not even try? I didn't try. I just assumed. I feel like the older standbys remain gettable because there's...

chasing and those other you know those other corners and stuff and those kind of are the we'll go to el buco jason's never been there actually um and i used to go a lot i really like it so i wanted to go there but it was just you know when you're in new york for a couple days it's like we went to frenchette we went to balthazar they're both like fun restaurants and that was the experience right that was what we were going for this was not this you know that's what the trip was about because it was a 48 hour in and out kind of thing you know don't worry i had a lot of bacon egg and cheeses sans cheese of course daniel are you keeping up with cheese free april as well No, but I learned about it from you. Thank you. It implanted in my mind and is kind of consuming me. We're making cheese for your April a thing here. Hopefully someone reaches out to kind of sponsor it and get it on the calendar for 2023. Hopefully, yeah, Big Sour Cream, maybe you can step up and fill their shoes. Yeah, somebody's got to fill in. Dan. Thank you for joining us on How Long Gone. It was a pleasure. Great job. Great job. And people can find you on the World Wide Web. You tweet once a month just like your golf game. Yep. And you're available on Amazon.com, wherever you buy books. Yes. Subscribe to GQ. It's $8 a year. You get a free hat. Nothing. Yes. Yes. The woman who checked me out at my grocery store the other day had one on, and I really felt like the viral marketing was working. That's great. That's great. I love that. I love to hear that. She goes, wait, are you Daniel Riley? Yeah, yeah. She fans out. That's so good. All right, Dan. Thanks for joining us. We'll see you soon. Have a good one. All right. See you. Later.