Club Random with Bill Maher - Tony Hawk | Club Random with Bill Maher
Episode Date: June 23, 2024Bill Maher and Tony Hawk on Steve O and sobriety, Tony’s death-defying stunts, how being a pro skateboarder in the '80s was like being an astronaut, how Tony’s kids think the '90s were ancient his...tory, bridging the gap between grunge and TikTok, Tony’s journey to finding the perfect wife, Bill compares childbirth to skateboarding injuries, Tony’s sage advice to young skaters, the lack of PED’s in skateboarding, and their mutual love of Jackass. Sponsor Club Random: https://public.liveread.io/media-kit/clubrandom Check out Bill's tour dates here: https://www.billmaher.com/schedule/ We have Merch! Get it here: https://clubrandom.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Transcript
Discussion (0)
If you say that you're a pro skateboarder now,
that has much more merit than when I said I was a pro skateboarder in 1984.
I ended up with a broken pelvis, fractured skull, and a lot of pain.
Did you ever think you were going to die doing that?
That's fair.
Hey, hey. Welcome.
Hiding behind the post?
How are you?
Wow, you look different in person.
Oh yeah? Is that good or bad?
You look younger.
Oh, that's good then, thank you. So do you.
How old are you now?
55.
Come on, really?
I am, yes.
You know it's depressing that, like, I can take, I was born in the 50s, kid in the 60s, I can take the 60s, 70s being like ancient history,
but the 90s, kids.
Oh, to kids, especially.
Who are born after or in.
Younger kids, they're like, that was,
you mean in the 1900s?
Yeah.
How old are your kids?
They range from 31 to 15,
and then a bunch of 20-somethings in between.
How many in this whole litter of you?
Six, yeah.
Five boys.
You have six kids.
Five boys, yeah, between my wife and I, yeah.
From one woman?
No.
That would be a lot to ask of one woman.
Yes.
You know, birth's gotta be a bitch, right?
Uh, it looks very traumatizing.
Yes.
They say a man, you know that old cliché,
a man could never undergo the pain of a woman giving birth.
That's all I have to say to women.
It looks like they have an out of body experience.
Giving birth?
Yeah, I think so. Well at least giving, see, like if you're being tortured.
I mean like, what?
Like you know, men get, women do too,
but I mean like, probably more men,
because they're serving more in the military,
not that women don't, but certainly in the time
when they were getting captured.
So, if you're giving birth, it's painful,
but it's a positive experience, you're giving life.
Sure.
I don't see a lot of people comparing those two
specifically, though.
Childbirth and torture, so.
Well, it begs it because if you're gonna defend the idea
that there's nothing more painful than childbirth, then I'm gonna throw in torture.
I see, okay, we're just going all the way to the extreme.
I understand.
Well, I mean, if you're saying it's the most,
then I gotta go to, how else do I argue that?
Am I wrong?
Well, I don't know if you're wrong,
but I just think that's an extreme scenario.
But I'm not apples to oranges.
I mean, pain is pain.
Pain is pain, and I'm sure you've had a lot of it.
I've had enough.
I actually was telling someone just now.
I've had just enough to keep me in check
but not make me quit what I do.
Well, but you're not still doing what you did when you were 25. Not on that level, but I'm still doing it to a certain degree, yes. To a degree that could... Yeah, most people would consider it reckless, yeah.
So you're like the Mike Tyson of...
Oh, maybe.
Your sport.
How old is he now?
60 and he's fighting again.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, at least I got a few more good years.
Yeah, I mean, I'm still doing it.
I'm still doing it.
I'm still doing it.
I'm still doing it.
I'm still doing it.
I'm still doing it.
I'm still doing it.
I'm still doing it. I'm still doing it. I'm still doing it. I'm still doing it. I'm still doing it. But oh, maybe. Your sport. How old is he now? 60 and he's fighting again.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, well, at least I got a few more good years.
But are you in competition at 50?
No, I mean, sometimes they have,
they have a legends category of competition.
Right.
And I get into those once in a while,
but honestly, there's so many outlets now
in terms of
if you are a pro skater, you are a pro skater,
you have social media, you have all these other ways to
be out there that you don't have to compete anymore.
In my day, you had to compete to get recognized
or get any sort of success.
Also, competition is your drug.
I would say it was.
Or the lead athlete.
It was my incentive for sure,
but my big directive all through the years
was just learning new tricks.
And so the competition was incidental to that.
In fact, sometimes that got in the way
of progression to me because I had to skate
in this sort of conservative way to compete.
Couldn't take many chances.
Interesting.
And then when the competition was over,
I was on the ramp the next day trying to learn tricks.
So when did that change when they recognized
instead of squelched what you were good at?
That's a good question. they recognized instead of squelched what you were good at?
That's a good question. I mean, I got a lot of flack through the years
just because my style was weird.
I was mostly focused on tricks
and so I didn't look like I was flowing.
I didn't have a lot of height because I was small.
I think it was probably, honestly,
not until maybe my second decade of skating
that I got more respect for my skills, yeah.
But I mean, as someone who's not a great follower of it,
like, you're the name I know.
You're the, from my view from,
as not one of those on the inside,
it was like, it wouldn't take me two seconds
if it was a word association.
Okay.
And they said your name or skateboarding.
Oh, thank you.
Well, I don't think that's the majority of the country.
I think that stems also from our video game success.
A lot of that, especially in terms of non-skaters.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I thought it was more
that you were this innovator of a way of doing it
that leveled it up, that took it to a different level.
I'm honored if that's the narrative.
Am I wrong?
I definitely created a different way of doing it,
mostly out of desperation, because I was so small
that I couldn't figure out how to do the aerial maneuvers
that I saw these bigger kids doing, like these men doing.
And I created a technique of doing it
that required less strength, if that makes sense.
Yeah.
And then that allowed me to finally get airborne
like I wanted to, and that became the sort of
standardized way to do it going forward.
I'm just saying that sometimes somebody,
it's rare, but somebody in a sport will do something,
and it makes the sport a different,
it takes you to a different kind of place.
I mean, Babe Ruth is the great example,
because I mean, before that,
nobody hit a lot of home runs.
It was a rare thing, is that how you scored?
I think one year Ty Cobb led the league with nine.
It was more like a triple.
And then he bombed 59 and 60.
That was, and just changed.
You figured out a way to do it without running the bases.
Yeah, when I see the footage of him,
he's not as fat as they make it in, but...
No, no, I wasn't saying, I'm just saying like...
No, but he was fat.
But in his eyes, it was like,
well, this is the way I get a score.
But it just shows you, it's not always about the body.
Right. And that was a bad body.
I was like a dad bod plus.
Yeah, a dad bod.
And he was drunk.
I mean, this guy could eat a home run drunk
eating a pork chop.
He probably did several times.
Sometimes with one hand.
I mean, he was a badass.
He was fascinating.
I thought that movie was good too. Which movie? John Goodman.
John Goodman, that's right I remember that. He was perfect to play him. He was. Yeah.
Well cheers, thanks for having me. Pleasure. Although there are people, and I may be one of
them, who think Blade Runner was well would be at least half black.
If you look at him, his features, it's just not out of the question
that the greatest player in the sport
that worked desperately hard
to keep the black people out of the sport was himself.
It could be, I don't know,
but his background is a little murky.
Yeah, for sure.
Orphanage.
Right.
But that would make him even more of a towering figure.
Like it would be like if they knew that Jack Johnson,
who was also like an amazing badass, Jackie Robinson.
Of course.
I mean, your sport is not like diversity crazy, is it?
It is, yeah, it is.
Really, yeah.
So who are the best people now?
Who are the?
Oh, so many, wow.
Some of the best skaters from Japan.
You keep up with the kids?
You have the kids, you talk to them, you mentor them,
you're like, they must see you as they.
If they want my help, I don't actively seek it.
I don't wanna impose anything on them, but if they ask me any advice, I'm happy to give
it.
My style of skating is more the half-pipe, the ramp kind of skating, whereas the more
popular discipline of skating is street, which is just out in the wild, skating the
rails and the ledges.
And I did a little bit of that
but at some point I realized I'm not moving
the needle doing this and my ankles hurt
from doing it so much.
And I like flying so I just went back to skating the ramps.
So do you have injuries now that you still
are dealing with from?
Yeah, I would say the biggest one,
the most chronic one is my neck
because I just had so many whiplashes through my life.
But actually, I got stem cells a couple months ago
for my neck, and I am just now feeling
the positive effects of it.
Oh, good.
Yeah.
But even after the first time that happened,
you didn't make, deter you from.
No, I mean, the first time I got hurt, I was 11.
I got concussion, knocked on my front teeth, and I literally woke up in the ambulance.
And my first thought was not, oh my God, what have I done?
My first thought was, why did I fall on that trick and how can I do it better?
And I think that was probably a defining moment
in my career.
What do you attribute this inordinate amount of drive
and ambition and-
Stubbornness.
Really?
More obsessive, yeah.
I mean, it definitely, my mom used to always say
I was determined.
That was her way of speaking nicely
when her friends were like, your son's a terror.
When your kids take after you?
In various ways, yeah.
They had the same kind of drive?
Yeah.
Really?
Yeah, in different ways for sure.
I would say a couple of them, maybe more than me
and against their own health, a couple of them maybe more than me
and against their own health,
you know, against their own well-being.
And then others are very talented
but not as eager to push the limits.
And then some kind of, you know,
my oldest son is a pro skater.
Oh. Yeah.
Well, there you go.
Most people who talk to me about their kids
are always complaining that they're too woke
and they drive them crazy with their,
is that, you find that problem with your kids,
you find them to be always correcting you?
No, I mean, I've definitely seen the shift of,
of attitudes and the generation, you know, because we do
have varying ages and I see how even my oldest is more steeped in this attitude or whatever
from his early days in the, like in the 90s and the 2000s, and then the younger ones are definitely more aware
of everything else and pronouns and things like that.
So I feel like we see the full spectrum of it.
And I, my wife and I are pretty loose.
We're, you know, we just roll with it.
We're not trying to impose any sort of values
in that way on them.
No, it's them trying to impose it on you.
They don't for us, no.
They don't try to shame you like, dad.
No, but like I said, we're very,
I would say we're more understanding in that way.
We're not, because my wife and I both had,
we had parents,
my dad was in World War II.
Mine too.
Yeah, and so he was much older when I was born,
but he and my mom, children of depression,
they were just, this is how it is.
That's right.
Yeah.
So I tried to be a little more reminded than that.
There's gotta be a middle ground. I believe so, yes.
I mean, what they call, today they call it gentle parenting?
Yeah, we're not that.
I will tell you we're not that.
We're children of the 70s.
We're not gentle parenting, yeah.
Right.
At some point, you gotta hear hard nos.
Right.
But no corporal punishment.
No, no.
Never hit a kid? No, no.
Never hit a kid?
No, no.
Were you hit as a kid?
I was not.
Never was spanked?
No.
Really?
I think my dad had a pretty abusive background
and he was very adamant to not keep that going, that cycle.
Maybe that's why you want so much pain now.
You missed it in childhood.
Well I got-
I had plenty in my childhood.
I mean I started skating at age 10.
I got spanked.
Yeah.
Not often.
Right.
But it was like the nuclear option.
Right.
That to me is the correct policy for corporal punishment.
Of course you put it in the hands of sadists
and stupid people and drunks and drug addicts,
but that's true of anything, everything with a child.
If a child is living with a psycho of some kind,
it's gonna be horrible, and that's probably,
it's probably gonna manifest in some sort
of physical violence as well, and that's horrible.
But that doesn't mean you need to prescribe this
for the majority of people who,
you know, kids are little fucking monsters.
They're feral.
You have to educate them to be decent humans.
It's not innate.
No, you definitely, yeah,
but you can teach them to make good choices,
I think, without physically abusing them.
I think that what you're saying,
but I understand what you're saying.
Spanking is not an abuse of it.
Abuse it.
But I think your experience or whatever
is more of an exception to the rule
when you think about people who are regularly spanking
or hitting their kids.
Not in my generation.
No.
In my generation, everybody got spanked.
In fact, I mean, it's hysterical.
I did actually, I got hit in school once.
Oh, and then there were the nuns.
They would...
Yeah, well, I wasn't going to Catholic school, but...
Yeah, no, I got hit with a ruler by nuns.
Like, I wouldn't go to...
I got hit with the equivalent of a phone book.
Catechism.
And they had a ruler.
I guess it was just why you would carry a ruler, I guess it was just
why you would carry a ruler, I think only for that purpose.
We weren't measuring things.
Right.
We weren't measuring.
Oh yeah, it was definitely the whipping stick.
The whipping stick.
Yeah.
And it was on the knuckles.
Yep.
And it smarted, and I don't think that's the worst thing
to do to a kid.
And look, I mean. It smarted, that was don't think that's the worst thing to do to a kid. And look, I mean.
It's smarted, that was the perfect generational term
for that.
It absolutely did.
Oh, that's smart.
And that's why the kids today have no smarts.
Good night, everyone.
But it is, I do think it's connected.
I think you have, I mean, kids need boundaries.
They need discipline, they're not getting it, that's why they've gone insane.
But having a lot of kids and you have none,
I think it's easier for you to generalize that.
Well, I mean, we can look at it two ways.
You're too close to it and I'm too far away.
You see your kids and when people look at their own kids,
it's very hard for them to see flaws.
Their kids are all.
Oh, I'm not saying they're not flawed.
I have no way that I'd say that.
And I never would, nor would they.
Right, of course.
But I mean, parents, it's hard to be objective
about your own kids.
Maybe you're, I'm sure you're right,
you're not in this category, but lots of parents.
And this is one of the big problems
with parenting and all the problems it causes
down the road for all of us in society
is that parents don't give their kids boundaries.
They don't.
They don't say no.
They don't say no.
They don't say no.
Exactly.
Yeah, I agree with you there.
They take the path of least resistance.
And also just the idea that you have
to compliment everything.
Right.
For jobs that are expected.
Oh.
That is the, that's the rub for me.
And then, you know what the result of that is, is like, you grow up like that,
and I see it in society, like every people now, the younger two generations,
expect to be complemented
for just ordinary things.
I got this exercise machine, I wouldn't say the company,
but you know, and it comes with an app on your phone
and you connect that to the TV and then you basically,
there's a trainer on there, many, many programs,
and I couldn't, I did this for a few months,
I just couldn't take it anymore,
because the trainers, it's not what they're telling me to do,
it's that every five seconds they have to tell me.
I'm the great.
You're doing great.
Killing it.
You're a warrior.
Yeah, yeah.
And just shut the fuck up and tell me what to pick up next.
I mean, I wanna say, that was part of,
my dad was very rare with compliments.
And so when I was doing skating and stuff,
it wasn't that I was doing it to impress him,
but definitely there was a part of me that was like.
Absolutely.
I remember my father once looking at my report card
and it was like all A's except like one B.
And he, which was in like science or something,
and he just went, hmm, had some tough tests
in science this term.
Yeah, yeah.
Just like a little dig.
And it's like just enough to make me want to get
his approval even more next time,
which I don't think is the worst thing in the world,
because I probably did do better next time.
I mean, we could have used a little encouragement.
Absolutely.
I mean, that generation,
which apparently is both our parents' generation,
the World War II generation, the Depression and the war,
I mean, these motherfuckers were hard, hard.
These kids, they think they don't even know the meaning of it.
Hard. They were hardened by poverty.
Trying to raise four kids. She's working.
Oh.
You know, my dad is in the Navy.
It was definitely not easy.
I've recently found something she wrote.
She passed away, but where she was talking about her life,
she's like, my life is generally good.
We could have used a little more money in the coffer.
Ha ha ha ha.
You know what's one thing that nobody in the first half
of the 1940s ever said to each other?
What are you doing these days?
Yeah, working.
The war.
Yeah.
We're all doing the war, okay?
We're all involved with the war.
We're fighting.
We're fighting.
Either on the home front or just all in this.
Or fighting the enemy.
We're all in this.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah.
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Are you gonna go into politics?
I am not, not at all.
Because you are very political.
It seems like it.
You slip and slide on every question.
I wouldn't say slip and slide.
I do find.
Look at that, I wouldn't say slip and slide.
What I would say is.
I'm definitely hardened in my vagueness.
That's a great phrase. That's a book title. definitely hardened in my vagueness. No. That's a great phrase. That's a book title.
Hardened in my vagueness.
I'm gonna steal that.
That's genius.
I think I just experienced so many walks of life
and I've experienced so...
What do you mean, walks of life?
Just in terms of skateboarding,
like so many people that chose to skateboard
were outcasts and misfits
and had really difficult backgrounds
and so I just grew up around all that.
So I came to be much more understanding.
I remember doing this joke about,
oh, it's probably in my book which.
Oh wow, did someone drop that there?
Yeah, somebody just dropped this here.
Oh, what this gradient said will shock you.
Anyway, pre-order it now.
But there's one in there about, we're talking about cultural appropriation and they were
doing it with sports.
And they got mad last Olympics with surfing because it was cultural appropriation from
Hawaii.
Oh, yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Is your sport in the Olympics? Yes.
See?
As of last in Tokyo.
Right, congratulations.
Yeah, it is a big deal.
Well, you probably. In Paris this year.
You did that probably more than anyone.
Oh, I appreciate it.
Yeah, anyway, so,
we were talking about how, it's so ridiculous.
First of all, surfing, like, how do we know where it started?
The idea of standing on a board in the water.
I mean, it's pretty well documented that it was Hawaii,
but I do feel like they honor Hawaii in that.
Oh, come on, there was billions of islands around there.
Like, that never thought, nobody else thought of that,
even if they did, so the fuck what?
Why is it wrong?
Oh no, I didn't say it was wrong.
This is what they were saying, it's cultural appropriate.
I don't agree with that.
There's a hardened opinion, I don't agree with that.
How's that?
That it's not appropriation.
Okay, so we do agree though, right?
Yeah, I mean it's.
Right, I mean, it's standing on the board in the water.
I mean, it's just fun in the ocean.
Okay, so, but then like badminton came from France, I think.
Or maybe tennis.
Sure.
You don't know that?
I don't know.
I think tennis came from France.
And maybe bad skiing came from Norway.
Judo came from Korea.
Or taekwondo came from Korea, or Taekwondo came from Korea,
Judo came from the Far East,
and skateboarding came from the Far Out.
That was the joke.
Which I always thought was pretty cute.
But to your point, it always seemed like a place
for misfits.
Yes, absolutely.
It was where we belonged, yep.
Yeah, I mean like as opposed to like picking up a guitar.
You did that.
Yeah, but I think there was a sense of community
in skateboarding where, here's how I felt.
I played basketball and baseball, and I was okay.
I never felt like I was making measured progress
in any of those.
And then every time I skated, I got better at it.
So at some point I thought, this is what I love doing,
because I love the freedom of it,
and I love that I always improve when I'm doing.
And then I found this community of people
that were supportive, but also were understanding
and it was an individual pursuit and it was more like,
this is more like an art form as much as a sport.
Almost like ballet.
Sure, but with, but with,
Or not, you don't have to humor me on that.
I mean, the closest thing, yeah.
Because ballet is athletic.
Yeah.
As well as an art form. It's a little like, you know. But the idea that skateboarding was highly I mean, the closest thing, yeah. Because ballet is athletic. Yeah.
As well as an art form.
It's a little like, you know.
But the idea that skateboarding was highly competitive.
I mean, I guess ballet is highly competitive
in terms of your trying out for roles and stuff.
And I'm talking about like,
well, there were these competitions
where you were getting judged and you wanted to do well
so you could get recognized to move forward.
But what I found was just this group of people
that were so creative and supportive,
yet motivated.
And they listened to weird music, they dressed weird,
they had crazy haircuts, and I loved it.
And I felt like these are my people.
And so when I had any modicum of success,
the first thing I wanted to do was provide those facilities
for kids who are disenfranchised
and kids who choose skateboarding
but don't have anywhere to go to do it.
So you were rebelling against your stern father.
Ha, he was actually very supportive of skateboarding.
He was. He was, yeah supportive of skateboarding. He was.
He was, yeah.
From the beginning?
From the beginning, yeah,
because he saw what it provided me,
and also, I mean, let's put it this way.
The year I chose to go all in on skateboarding
was the same year they appointed him Little League president
in our area, and he was okay with me quitting Little League
in that year,
which was an awkward conversation. What, because he was so invested in you
being a baseball player?
Well, the only reason he's in the little part
of Little League is I'm on a team.
Right.
And I quit.
So he had to finish out the year without any of his kids
in Little League.
Right, yeah, that is embarrassing.
And I would be at the skate park.
So.
Right, I mean.
But he was, like I said, he was totally supportive
and he actually helped to form one of the only
sanctioning bodies at the time for competition
because he saw that there was just no,
there was no organization in skating.
It was just such a wild west.
So, you were famous by what age?
I guess that depends on how you define fame.
Right, it's always shifting, that's true.
I was known in the skateboard community for sure
by the time I was 15 or 16.
And in the wider community, like when would I?
So in the 80s, skating was kind of big.
I feel like I knew you were in the 80s.
Yeah, and I was doing really well in competitions.
So if anyone was looking at skateboarding,
they might have seen my name,
because I was winning a lot of events.
But so, you know, like...
Did it make you popular?
Mid to late 80s.
Like with girls?
Yeah. Yeah.
I mean, it was a weird time,
because there weren't a lot of girls...
Yeah, there must be skateboarding groupies.
More so now.
More so now?
Yeah, cause skating is really considered cool now.
You feel cheated by that?
What's that?
Do you feel cheated by that?
No.
Are you bitter?
No.
Come on.
I'm okay, I'm okay.
I mean I've lived many lifetimes.
How is a skateboarding groupie like different
than say the motley crew groupie?
I don't, I haven't met both, so I don't really know.
I don't really know.
Well, I'll get Tommy Lee over here.
Well now, skateboarding is much more diverse.
I mean, there are equal events,
and there's parity and prize money,
men and women, so crewby is a tough term, but I would say that
if you say that you're a pro skateboarder now,
that has much more merit than when I said
I was a pro skateboarder in 1984.
Really?
Because if you said you're a pro skateboarder in 1984,
they're like, you still skateboard at your age,
and I was 16.
Right, it was a kid's thing.
It was a kid's thing.
Right.
So it was more like, it wasn't the best in to meet girls.
Wow.
Huh.
And then when there was sort of a little bit of more hype
in like 1988-ish, then it was more like,
oh, hey, that's cool, you're a professional.
Wow, you travel the world.
Well, you got married young, right?
I did, yeah.
How old?
I was 24.
Okay.
So, when you get married at 24, what are you thinking?
Because...
Well, I was starting a family.
I mean, it was all kinda happening,
it didn't last that way, but it was more just,
I was kind of a disaster.
So, you know, I thought I was getting grounded
in my chaotic lifestyle of skating
because skating was taking me all over the world
and it was kind of frantic.
You know, it was like, it was a strange,
it was a strange space to be in
because no one had really done it yet, made a career like that. You know, it was like, it was a strange, it was a strange space to be in
because no one had really done it yet,
made a career like that,
and we were sort of forging the way,
so we didn't really even know what we were doing.
But it was exciting, isn't it?
It was exciting, yeah.
It's so, I mean, to me.
It was crazy, I mean, I never expected to leave San Diego
and all of a sudden I was in Japan for two weeks.
I was in Australia for a month,
I was in Europe for two months.
It was like, I didn't, it wasn't like,
when people pick up the guitar and be like,
I'm gonna travel the world and I'm gonna play,
it was like, I picked up a skateboard
because I loved doing it, I had no idea
that it was gonna take me around the world
or make any money ever.
It was kinda wild.
And what about drugs?
Is it like Lance Armstrong and the doping scandal?
That there's a,
they're not doping to?
I've never seen anyone that was doing that that was,
I don't know, I feel like that just doesn't
give you an advantage.
You never were. Really? No, yeah, I mean, know, I feel like that just doesn't give you an advantage. You never were.
Really?
No, yeah, I mean, at some point you gotta be.
Hand-eye coordination and quickness.
You gotta be flexible too though.
Why would that make you inflexible?
I don't know, it just feels like if you're on steroids
it's more for the actual power in the muscles.
Okay, but like, when baseball was going through
its steroid period, you remember that? Sure.
Mark McGuire, Sammy Sosa, Barry Bonds,
they were all hitting 70s.
Right, but that's what I mean,
like skateboarding isn't about the...
Why did they hit, why did, what was the connection
between why those balls were flying out and the steroids?
I think it's hand-eye coordination.
Not the strength or the power behind it?
Yes, that too.
But I think what really makes the ball fly out of the yard
is how fast you hit it.
Yeah, I just, I don't know.
I mean, there might be an example of someone
that was juicing and skateboarding and that was doing well,
but I don't know anything about that.
Like, I've never seen anyone do it.
I've never thought they should have even been prosecuted
because everything changes in sports over time.
I mean, Babe Ruth didn't have to face black players.
Really, you know, in his era,
he didn't have to play night games.
He had a high batting average
because they wore little mitts, you know.
So the fact that they were juicing at a certain point,
I mean, but so were the pitchers.
Roger Clemens was doing it too.
Yeah, well, I mean, that's the whole thing
with Lance Armstrong, it wasn't that he was doing it,
it was that he, everyone was doing it,
so he figured out how to do it the most stealthy
or the better way, I don't know, like, yeah, that's wild.
But I-
He sat here and he told me how he did it.
He said, every drug test I took,
it was a real drug test, it wasn't somebody else's pee,
it's just that I knew how to get stuff
that left your body in four hours.
Yeah, I mean that was it. It was like don't hate the player, hate the game.
That's why I think the Lance Armstrong story is a great story.
Yeah, it's fascinating.
Because it's a great American story because America wanted him to be the champion.
And he did what we wanted, he got to be the champion
by doing something that everybody else was doing.
And then he was the history's greatest monster
when he lied about it.
And he was, by his own admission,
kind of an asshole about it.
And was like very driven.
You seem like the nice version.
Not that he's a bad guy.
But also when you talk about skating,
I just don't think anything is gonna be an advantage.
I know plenty of skaters that smoked a lot of weed.
Really, weed?
That's ridiculous.
Yeah, and they skated well.
What's that?
Doesn't do anything for you.
But yeah, that I associate with skating.
Like almost to the point where you could do a joke,
and I think I probably have,
and I think I may have just done one,
intimating the connection between weed and spirit.
Oh yeah, well, I agree with you
that there's definitely the stereotype,
and to some extent, especially in the 80s,
that was on point, but I feel like now
skating is so much more diverse, and there's so many people, and now it especially in the 80s, that was on point, but I feel like now, skating is so much more diverse,
and there's so many people, and now it's in the Olympics,
so people are very serious, but they're working out,
like they're sponsored by Nike,
they have those resources.
You never were baked when you skated?
No, no, I smoked weed a little bit when I was younger,
and it really affected my skating negatively,
and I was so hyperfixated on skating,
that it was like, I can't do that
because this is what I have, this is what I do.
No, I can see that.
I mean, I can see how it would be bad.
I've played basketball stoned.
And I can be pretty good stoned.
Sometimes I think even better, but not drunk.
I tried that a couple, that really threw my game off.
I learned my lesson the hardest way, drinking and skating.
I was skating at a party.
Basically, I didn't realize it was like
before raves were raves,
and it was just this random warehouse party
way outside of a city in New Zealand.
You were hired to do this or you were just having fun?
No, we were there on tour and they said,
hey, there's this big warehouse party, you guys should go.
And they have a meeting around, I'm like,
yeah, sweet, let's go. And so we went and somewhere around one or two a.m.
They said, last call, last call, let's go drink.
And so we went and pounded a few beers,
went back to the mini ramp.
I dropped in and hit the other wall.
Like, as if it was just a wall, not a ramp or a slope.
And that was uncharacteristic.
Very much so, that was my lesson. I was like, oh, I don't, I can't drink and skate. And that was uncharacteristic. Very much so. That was my lesson.
I was like, oh, I don't, I can't drink and skate.
Is that on film?
No, thankfully.
Are you sure?
We're talking about like 1990, 91.
What about doing a reenactment?
Ah, I do that enough on accidents.
Did you ever think you were gonna die doing that?
No.
No?
You ever thought, oh, I just fuckin',
like while you were mid-air?
I had some bad concussions, bad accidents,
and for sure, in hindsight,
oh, that was extremely dangerous and life-threatening.
What's that?
You've had concussions?
Yeah, several, yeah.
What's that like?
It sucks, cause you wake up and you wake up elsewhere
and you at first don't remember what happened.
You were completely knocked out.
Oh yeah.
So when you come to.
Yeah, well there's sort of a gray period
where you have come to,
but you keep repeating the questions,
you keep asking what happened,
and you don't have, you're not cognizant really.
Because I've seen other people go through it,
so I know what it's like.
Scary.
What's scary is when you've had enough concussions
that you recognize your concussed.
And so you're like, oh, I know this feeling.
Right.
I must have hit my head.
But also it calms you down,
because you think, oh, it's gonna come back to me.
Right.
I'm gonna get there.
But I've had residual effects, I mean, a couple times
where there was one where there were a couple weeks
where I couldn't really concentrate.
I was trying to edit videos.
I just couldn't make sense of it.
So I'm very cognizant of that.
I'm very, you know, I'm aware of the risks
and I've definitely been proactive in studying it.
Are there lingering effects?
I mean, like, no?
So like a day later you're not like?
Not now.
Hanging in the hamper and throwing your clothes
in the toilet.
No, no, no, not now, no.
I mean, I definitely had, like I told you that one,
I had another one where I had recurring migraines
for a couple weeks.
So.
But that's what they worry about in football, CTE.
Of course, yeah.
And like I said, I've been proactive in sort of getting tested and making sure that I have
all my facilities.
And so this is as smart as you get.
This is it.
You get me on my best.
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Hey, I'll be at the Orpheum Theater in Minneapolis
on July 13th and the Rivers Theater in Minneapolis on July 13th, and the Riverside in Milwaukee
on July 14th, and on the July 26th, I'll be at the MGM Music Hall at Fenway in Boston,
Massachusetts, and July 27th, the Toyota Oakdale Theater in Wallington, Fort Worth, Connecticut.
Come out and laugh your ass off.
So what do you do for fun when you're not risking your life?
I just stay home. I just try to stay for fun when you're not risking your life?
I just stay home.
I just try to stay home.
What's at home?
Your wife?
My wife, we have one still at home.
My daughter's 15.
So this is wife number three?
Yeah, four.
Four?
Oh, come on, man.
But I mean, we're on 10 years.
I finally figured it out.
What is different about the four
that you didn't know?
Well, one is that we are absolutely perfect
for each other, no question.
That helps.
Two is that I finally did a lot of work on myself
and sort of figured out how to be happy, centered, content.
And honestly, to like what I was doing, to like myself,
because I just, I was skating, but I just didn't really,
at some point I was so.
You grew up and matured.
I mean, aging sucks, we all know that,
but it's also fucking great,
because you're just different in your 50s and 60s,
you're comfortable in your skin.
You know exactly who you are.
This is the best version I've been, for sure.
Me too.
I mean, so it's a cruel joke
that the God I don't believe in.
No, but I do.
I feel like, especially with my wife,
like, you know, we are older.
We're both, you know, she's only a year younger than me,
but I feel like we are in our best years.
Like it's amazing.
I always think of that when somebody grade croaks,
like wow, like so much that you put into a life
to gather all this wisdom and knowledge and sensitivity
and all these good things, and then that's the time
you would wanna preserve it.
Right, and that's when your body's starting to fail you.
Right, and that's when it goes.
Yeah, I mean, I'm definitely hanging on,
hanging on to that, to what youth I have,
especially with skating, but I feel you, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, it's only about tomorrow, person.
Like memories, sad memories, memories of things
that were bad and sad, they don't make me sad.
They make me happy because they're over.
They're oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
But good memories make me sad.
Because good memories are things that are also over.
And fleeting.
And fleeting.
Yep. And in many ways, irrecuperable.
Oh, absolutely, yeah.
But the future is still the future.
No matter how old you are, tomorrow is still.
Oh no, and I feel like we're creating
incredible memories now.
Because we have that much appreciation,
and we have all of that experience
to understand why we should appreciate it that much more.
No, I mean, I love life now.
It's way more fun than it's ever been.
So the fourth wife is the lucky one.
Oh, I think we're...
She's the one that got the good version.
Well, but also she was the catalyst for that.
Ah.
Yeah. Well, but also she was the catalyst for that.
Do you ever feel bad about past wives, past relationships?
Wait, let me finish the question.
Feel bad because you learned something on a later person
that you didn't know
when you were with the earlier person,
and you're like, yeah, I would have gone better
for her and me and you if I had known that then,
but I didn't learn it until Suzy,
but I feel bad because I should have known it
when I was with Sally, but I didn't, and so she suffered.
I don't think I get that introspective on it.
No, I feel that all the time.
I feel like, oh yeah, if I hadn't been such a dipshit.
I mean, I feel like I could say that
through so many points in my life,
not just with relationships, but.
So you think it's as ridiculous as I do
when people say, I have no regrets?
Oh yeah.
Well, that just seems like you're not accountable
for anything.
It seems to me like you're not sentient.
I mean, how can you not have regrets?
Every day I have a regret,
even if it's just the most minor ones.
Sure.
It's like, I never had a perfect day.
I dropped a perfect call.
My day was perfect.
I was in court. I didn't say a word.
I always wondered what a perfect call sounded like.
I wonder if you hang out and you go,
that was a perfect call.
It's such a testament to his insanity
to even come up with that concept.
I mean, it's just not a phrase
that you've ever heard anyone else say.
A perfect call. Perfect. a phone call, perfect.
Like, no one else in the universe ever put those
two things together, a perfect and a phone call.
It just doesn't happen except in the mind
of an insane person.
That's what people miss about him.
He's stupid, of course, but also insane.
That is insane.
That is a level of insanity of our next,
of our past and future president.
But I don't wanna drag you into politics and...
I did, you know, I did politically incorrect.
Oh, I remember.
You remember the sign?
Sure, yeah, yeah, I saw it.
Isn't that awesome that I fucking saved that
all these years? It's pretty cool.
Doesn't it look like a cool thing in front of a stripper pole?
That's where it belongs.
Yeah, that's perfect.
I mean, come on, man.
Yeah, I remember, again, 90s.
But that's why I'm saying, we obviously, I was obviously aware of you then, and you obviously
had risen to the level where you were on talk shows.
Yeah. And you obviously had risen to the level where you were on talk shows. Yeah, I don't know if I was quite prepared
or qualified to be on Politically Incorrect,
but I was stoked.
There were no qualifications.
That was the point of the show.
The point was to put together four people who, you know, were...
But I always thought that was a great name
because of the Chyiron, of course,
that were Senator, actress, skateboarders.
Perfect, this is what I'm trying to do,
create this train wreck of mismatched people.
And do you remember who you were on with?
No, I don't.
I remember I tried to get a few words edgewise
and I just, it didn't land.
Somebody was drowning you out?
Yeah.
Could have been Paulie Shore.
It was not Paulie Shore.
I would have remembered that for sure.
I feel like I would have been,
like I had a little chum with him.
So I mean, when you do see stuff, you know,
from the 90s, occasionally,
they'll rerun something somewhere or something.
I mean, it does look like the land that time forgot.
Oh yeah.
The hair, there's a certain kind of,
I think it was Armani influenced suit
that men were wearing.
The thin leather jackets.
That too.
I mean, it wasn't as horrific as the 80s
with the hot pink and the hot ice blue.
But there is a kind of a look and the ties,
or if you see a movie from the 90s,
and it's like, wow, that should be recent.
And it's, I mean, that show went on 31 years ago.
I mean, 31 years is, you know.
on 31 years ago. Right.
I mean, 31 years is, you know.
That's a lot of taped conversations.
That's a chunk of time.
I know.
I don't know where it goes or of course you can't get it back, but what would you tell
your like, if you have one thing to tell your young self from your old self, what would
you tell them?
What would save you the most pain
that you could say to a person?
If you find yourself shooting a TV show for MTV,
two of the Jackass cast,
and you're dressed in a monkey suit,
don't try to do a full loop.
That's what I would tell my younger self.
Much more specific than I thought.
Yeah, it's very specific, yeah,
because I ended up with a broken pelvis,
fractured skull, broken thumb, and a lot of pain.
So what show was this for?
Wild Boys.
Wild Boys.
Yeah.
That was on MTV?
Yeah, that was one of the offshoots of Jackass.
So it was when Steve-O and Cresponius did their own thing
with mostly like animals, wild animals.
Okay, you know, I mean,
the Steve-O guy was taking shots at me in the press recently.
Oh yeah, that was unfortunate.
It was not unfortunate.
Unfortunate is Darfur.
This was just, I mean, look, I don't want to start a feud and I'm sorry that he felt
slighted or something, but it is ridiculous that somebody thinks that I should give up
pot smoking because they have a problem, then I'm sorry you can't be here.
And, you know...
Well, it's your show.
It's my show, my house, my rules.
And it's sort of almost the point of the show,
is that this... I already have another show.
It's called Real Time. It's on HBO.
And it's very much not on pot.
It's on point.
This is different.
This is just shooting the shit,
and this is how I shoot the shit.
This is an attempt to get conversation
as real as it ever is, just like if we were doing this,
and I don't see anything that we've said
that I wouldn't have just said to you
if there were no cameras here,
and you don't even know where the cameras are.
Okay, so let's remember that.
But, you know, that's what it is.
And, oh, I mean, I have no feud with any of these jackass.
I've watched all the movies, they are funny.
I mean, I'm not gonna lie.
I do like that kind of, even though I know it's coming,
like a physical gag like that, it's funny.
So much of it is, I was actually talking about this,
I just did, we have a podcast, Hawk vs. Wolf,
and we just interviewed Jeff Tremaine today,
the director of Jackass, and we were talking about
how a lot of the skits that became Jackass
iconic moments were just things that were filler for skate videos.
I mean, all that stuff was like,
there would be skate videos,
you'd have just sort of weird segues
in between the skating segments,
which were just kind of jackass type stunts.
And that's how they started.
It really is how they started was,
they had Big Brother Magazine
was a sort of irreverent skate magazine,
that was uncensored, that was just raw and funny.
That's where Knoxville did his review
of self-defense devices.
And where he shot himself, I don't know if you ever saw that,
but that was for a skate magazine.
And so they made a video of it,
and then they were talking about how
this just was skating sensibilities
turned into a whole show.
But what you were doing,
you were not trying to hurt yourself.
Not at all, but- I mean,
there's a very big difference.
But we knew the humor in it.
I see the Venn diagram overlap
between what you do and Jackass.
I think there's a huge difference.
I just said skate sensibilities.
I'm just talking about the idea that you're willing to risk yourself for it. between what you do and Jackass. I think there's a huge difference. I just said skate sensibilities.
I'm just talking about the idea
that you're willing to risk yourself for.
Yes, but you're doing it again to perform this ballet.
They're not doing it for that reason.
Just take the compliment.
Because it is in your favor.
Oh, I'm a fan.
I love it.
Look, I can say I love laughing.
And that's a great just to laugh-a-thon.
Most of it, some of it, if it's gross or something,
I mean, I can also hate it, but it's,
look, they gave me laughs.
I like anyone who gives me laughs.
But it also does remind me that, you know,
show business, you gotta love it.
And one thing about it is,
if you really insist on being in show business,
you can be.
You can find a way, it won't be dignified.
You know, it's the old joke about the guy
who shovels the shit behind the elephant at the circus.
Yeah, leave your dignity at the door.
You know, what, and leave show business?
Yeah.
And some people just insist on being in show business.
And God bless them.
Yeah.
That's, you know, you made it work for you.
At a price I don't think is worth it,
but if that's the only way you were gonna get
into the business, I mean, you work with what you got.
You work with the hand you dealt.
But I do think that they had a,
they were creative in this Buster Keaton sort of way.
And yeah, they were willing to destroy themselves
for the sake of comedy.
That's the little.
But there was, it was so funny.
I mean, we were just talking about,
I don't know if you see the bungee thing with Preston
and Wee Man where Preston is the bigger guy,
Wee Man is the little guy,
and Preston stood on a bridge
and he was bungee'd to Wee Man who jumped off the bridge.
And just that in itself was one of the funniest things
I've ever seen.
No, it is funny.
It is, I mean, it damn well better be
when you give up your kidney.
True.
You know, you better get-
Or your urethra, as Johnny Knoxville knows.
I mean, I've given up dignity for sure on stage.
I mean, when you're standing there opening for,
you know, a rock band, which I've done,
and they're literally throwing shit at you
to get off the stage, and you're dodging stuff while you're telling jokes,
you do not have a shred of dignity.
I'll admit that, I mean I've been there.
And paying your dues.
Yes, and just, or by my own stupid fault,
like turning off a crowd, I mean this is 40 years ago,
but still, and so like, no matter what I said,
just they were like, looked like when your girlfriend's
pissed at you, you know, just a look on their face,
like, you think I'm gonna laugh at you now?
After what you just said?
So, I mean, but that's a lot different than your body.
True.
You know, you only get one, and as we know,
it's a reclamation project to keep it in top shape.
Oh, don't I know it.
As time goes by.
But you generally feel healthy?
I do, I'm actually, I kinda turned a corner recently.
I broke my leg two and a half years ago.
Like broke my femur in half.
Doing what you love.
Doing what I love, yeah.
And being careless with it.
And I paid the price, I fucked around and found out.
And that recovery was really rough
because I got back on my skateboard too soon,
my bone shifted out of alignment,
so I had to have a second surgery to put it back in place.
And now I've taken upon myself where I'm,
you know, I'm not taking those unnecessary risks anymore.
I embrace how old I am and that I get to do this at all
on any level, so I've actually kind of reached
a more baseline of scaling.
You know, you've always got to throttle back.
Sure, but I wasn't.
I mean, I wasn't until I was 53.
Yeah, it's not gonna be exactly the same,
and that's okay. That's the... Yeah, I think, well, I mean, I think I wasn't until I was 53. Yeah, it's not gonna be exactly the same,
and that's okay.
That's the...
Yeah, I think, well I mean I think
that's the hard lesson I learned.
You make up for it with other, you know,
it's always a balancing act and a trade off of,
yeah, but I'm also getting better at this.
True.
You know, I mean I'm lucky because what I do is,
up here.
So I can be getting better at 68.
Whereas an athlete, you guys, you know,
that candle burns when you're young.
Yeah, yeah.
And that's something I'll never,
one of the great advantages,
I'll never understand the beauty, the joy.
Kind of the same with music,
usually flowers only when you're young,
of certain highs that I think athletes and musicians reach.
But I'm also like doing better at my age
than most of them, certainly athletes.
Yeah, but when you say it's funny,
because skateboarding, like I said,
is such an art form as much as a sport,
that there are techniques that I now have learned
and that I am working on that are better
than what I used to do.
They're just not as high impact or as risky,
and it's like I never wanted to zero in on those
because they didn't seem as interesting.
And now they are the interesting thing
because it's more like, oh, I can explore this
because I still have the skill set
and these things aren't gonna kill me.
That itself is interesting.
It's really fun.
So I mean, like, this year I learned a new trick
that no one had done before.
But in 10 years?
No, not in 10, I mean, I don't know.
If you asked me 10 years ago,
will you be doing this in 10 years?
I would've probably said, I don't know.
So.
Mick Jagger is going on tour at 80.
I mean.
Yeah, I think 80's gonna be a, that'll, that's it.
No more McTwist at 80.
But then what will you replace it with?
That's all.
No, I mean, I think that I'll replace it with
enjoying my children and my children's children
and more just sort of reveling in that.
But you've already been doing that for decades.
Sure, well, I'm saying grandkids.
Grandkids would be great because then you can
rile them up and give them back.
Yeah, I never had the chip to like kids
or want to have kids or, you know.
Oh yeah, you've been very transparent about that.
That sounds like you're rolling down a glove there.
No, no, no, I'm just saying, I know that about you.
I watched, I'm a fan.
Oh thank you, I appreciate that.
Of course.
Yeah, I mean.
So I'm just saying, I've heard you say it many times.
You're not interested in having kids,
you don't like kids. No, I'm not. Well, I've heard you say it many times, you're not used to having kids, you don't like kids.
No, I'm not.
Well, I feel like I have to speak that because
nobody else will, and I speak for so many people
in the country, you'll feel that way.
Oh, for sure.
And I just, all I'm ever saying about that is that
there should be no moral dimension to it.
When I started in television,
probably when you were first on that show,
it was considered kind of like, you're a weirdo if you don't aspire to have children.
Oh, I agree completely, and I know plenty of people
that are not interested, and that's their choice.
I respect it, like, of course, you don't have to.
It's not a requirement of being a human.
Exactly, and it doesn't make you a better or worse person.
What makes you a better or worse person,
I think, is how you are as a parent.
If you're a bad parent, you're a worse person than me.
Because I didn't fuck anybody up.
I didn't have anybody.
Yeah, you're creating more problems.
But I didn't fuck anybody up either.
I didn't have somebody and then shirk my responsibility.
No, I agree with you completely.
I didn't have somebody and then shirk my responsibility.
No, I agree with you completely.
Um, I, you know, I know, if I had had a kid,
I don't think I would have, you know,
been there to the degree that a kid needs.
I mean, to a certain degree,
you absolutely do have to train your life for your children's.
I mean, that is the priority life now.
You go through your life before you have children, and there's no doubt., that is the priority life now. You go through your life before you have children and there's no doubt, whose life is a priority?
Mine.
Now, you fall in love, maybe you'd save your lover
before you, certainly Jack did it in Titanic,
although as many people have pointed out,
although I was one of the first.
Didn't have to.
Right, you gotta get on the thing.
That's good good job.
She was a little selfish there with the,
yeah, you know what, I've had a rough day.
I really need to stretch out.
But, you know, I just never wanted kids.
I didn't want them when I was young.
And they were cruel, kids are cruel. I didn't want them when I was young, and they were cruel, kids are cruel.
I didn't need that.
And they ostracize you, they bully you.
Like I said, they have to be taught
to be decent human beings.
It is not something that comes naturally.
Yeah, and on the flip side of that,
like I said, my wife and I, we have many children between us,
and the most rewarding thing is when you, we have many children between us,
and the most rewarding thing is when you...
When you say many between us, but you mean...
She has two, I have four.
Oh, I see, that's the six?
Yeah.
So it's a blended family.
So you had four biological ones, and then, oh, I see.
So this is like yours, mine, and ours.
Absolutely, yeah.
I see.
Yeah, and it's just the most rewarding thing as a parent,
and I'm not, in no way am I trying to pitch it to you.
I'm just saying the most rewarding thing as a parent
is when you see your kids and they end up becoming
young adults or full-blown adults,
when you see them make good choices
and you know that you had some influence on that.
Yeah, I'm sure that's great.
And at some point, you know that you had some influence on that. Yeah, I'm sure that's right.
And at some point, you know, we've come a long way with our relationship and there's
been plenty of ups and downs through all of our years, but when we see them all together
and we see them talking, conversing, joking, you know, that's what it's about.
And we look at each other and we go, we did it, look at this.
They're functioning adults, yeah.
I obviously can't relate in a direct way,
but I get that, I really do.
And I get it for you where it's like,
I'm not interested, that's not my...
There's no danger of you tempting me,
talking me into this.
Oh no, no.
There'd be more...
In no way would I...
It'd be more likely that I go out there and do a half pipe
or I could do a full pipe or I can do a full pipe,
I can do a hash pipe before this would happen.
But no, it is just personal taste
and it's probably again, everything goes back
to our first few years of life.
And what environment plus innateness
and what we inherited, our genetics, our DNA, made us this person we are.
And it is amazing to me how that has been so steady
throughout my life, the kid thing.
Didn't like him when I was one, didn't change in my...
When I was one.
When I was one. Feel that, yeah.
Didn't change in my childbearing age
and didn't change in my post childbearing age.
Did you ever date anyone with a kid?
Oh, single mothers?
Yeah.
Yes, of course.
There was a, it's funny you say that.
I did have a single mother period where I just,
I don't know what it was, the universe,
although I don't believe in that,
but I just was with a lot of single mothers.
I mean, they were like 22.
Okay.
You know, I was probably 40.
But young kids then?
Very young kids who I never met.
Oh, okay, I get it.
And never wanted to meet, and they were fine with that.
They were like young mothers who were like,
I mean, they of course loved their kid,
but they were young, they wanted to have fun.
When I came around, it was not about the kid
and we both loved it that way.
I once had an idea and I pitched it and could have sold it
except there was a technical problem,
a business problem, I was on a network
and I couldn't do a show for another network,
but they wanted to do it,
the single mother's beauty pageant.
I wanted to do a beauty pageant.
I pitched this really with,
and they put the little four-year-old boy in a tuxedo,
walking his mother down.
There would not have been a dry eye in the house.
I would still do it if anybody's hearing this
who wants to do my single mother's beauty pageant.
That sounds like the reboot of Politically Incorrect.
This would be even better.
You have to get HBO's permission
and that's gonna be tough again.
But I think I could knock this out of the park.
I think it's very funny and I think it tugs
at the hearts of Americans because there was a time
when single mothers was not a thing.
I mean, you ever watch Mad Men?
Sure.
Great show about, you're a little younger than me,
but my youth in the 60s, there were no single mothers.
That was not a thing.
We didn't hear about it at school. It wasn't in the 60s, there were no single mothers. That was not a thing. We didn't hear about it at school.
It wasn't in the neighborhood, you know?
Then it became a big thing.
And so there was some judgment, much less now,
but there's so many single mothers.
Now it's almost...
Oh, I mean, I grew up in the 70s,
so most of my friends, they live with their mom.
That was it.
Is that right? Yeah.
Yeah, it's amazing the way the family did really break down
from when I was a kid.
I mean, honestly, there was,
growing up in 60s New Jersey,
there was quite a few suicides.
Wow.
But no divorce, which tells you something about marriage.
No, really.
I walked into that one.
No, it's true. There was. You walked into that one. No it's true.
There was like guys in the swimming pool.
Wow.
But not a divorce.
Yeah that was like much more common I feel.
I remember three of those and no divorce.
And on Mad Men there was one character who was the divorce lady.
And she was like shunned.
Like we were the Amish or something
and she was using a radio.
I mean, she was like lived at the end of the block
and her kid was all fucked up.
And the T-word.
The T-word.
It's amazing how far this country has come.
But anyway, I'm gonna go back to my day job.
But this was-
I'll watch you there.
So thank you. Yeah, I appreciate that.
My wife, she has sleepless nights sometimes
and if I hear your voice, I know that she's not sleeping.
Your wife watches me?
Oh yeah.
Well, I mean, we both watch it,
but a lot of times she'll catch up while I'm asleep
because she's awake. I love that.
Yeah. Oh. Yeah, so thank you. Hello, I appreciate, we both watch it, but a lot of times, she'll catch up while I'm asleep, because she's awake. I love that.
Oh.
Yeah, so thank you.
Hello, I appreciate that.
Absolutely.
Thanks for...
Great to meet you.
Thanks for lulling me back to sleep every once in a while.
I'll take it.
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Oh, and I signed this for you.
Oh, wow.
Thank you.
I signed it with great respect to an ultimate champion.
Oh, I appreciate it, bro. Thank you very much.
Yeah.
I'm honored.
You're the babe.
You're the babe.
You're the babe.