Fat Chance Podcast - Ep.30 - Erika Miller

Episode Date: September 23, 2021

First time we met, we already knew each other. By the second time, I had roasted her on a podcast. 

Well, at least it's like starting to pay off a little. A lot of it here. We'll be a bit closer. Your body facing your camera. This way. And then you face the microphone. Just speak up. Like this? Whatever you want. All I ask is you speak up.

Okay. That's it. I'm good. I always ask as you speak up. Okay. That's it. I'm good. Yeah, it has kind of done well recently.

Yeah, since you got on TikTok. I know. I fucking hate it. Were you like, who pushed you to do that? Cody? Cody, yeah. So much so that, well, we made jackets for the athletes that I'm jokingly sponsoring and need legitimate contracts for now um but we put cody's tattoo on the back of the jacket that's super cool yeah i love that you got the tattoo i do too i think it's a little insane but um yeah so

you're a teacher so i have to say this because i'm not going to go through this again um fair warning i will not edit anything everything you say can and will be used against you okay so i won't put any names or details of my school yeah i wouldn't do anything with your school um just just letting you know this is going everywhere i am not going to edit this and then so you should have a contract for me to sign no this is your contract right here just shake your hand and be like okay i agree yeah no that's that's it because i do not want to do two days of editing this and then get a this is kind of a shot at someone else and they'll know if they listen to this but i do not want to edit this and then get a text saying please don't

release it really did you film someone's a teacher and they were like wait yeah definitely and i get why but i just covering my ass now and my time um this is not talking about my school district or my kids or parents i mean you could talk them. It's just at your own risk. That's basically all I had to cover. Now that you agreed to it, what do you want to talk about? What do I want to talk about? Should we talk about how we met? We can.

I don't know how we met, though. I do. Really? Yeah. Do you remember? No. Here, move that closer to you. That's closer.

Or you. Yeah. Just that or speak up a bit. You're a little quiet. But yeah. I have a voice that carries. Okay. So we met because of our friend Cody.

Yeah. And but I didn't like know you know you. I like knew who you were. Okay. Okay. Okay. So I always knew you as like know you know you. I like knew who you were. Okay. Okay. So I always knew you as like Cody's best friend. And then we were at Lizzie's house one night. Do you remember that night?

So this is recently? It was like probably eight, nine months ago. Oh, really? Like last winter. Oh, wow. Yeah. I thought it was like a long time ago. No.

That was like when I first really remember like meeting you, meeting you. Okay. We always followed each other on social media. Yeah. I thought it was, like, a long time ago. No. That was, like, when I first really remember, like, meeting you, meeting you. Okay. We always followed each other on social media. Yeah. Because, like, I knew you as, like, Cody's friend. And then I called. Yeah. Okay.

I know exactly where this is going. And then, so I met you at Lizzie's house. And I was like, hey, I'm Erica. It's nice to meet you. And you're like, I'm Michael. I know who you are. We know each other. Like are we know each other like we follow each other on social media yeah basically and like i'm cody's friend and i was like oh my

god i know exactly who you are you're cody's friend but i never put two and two together and knew who you were like to be honest you didn't have the biggest social media presence until recently still though my personal account, my personal account's dead. So, like, I never was really in Madison. You weren't really in Whitewater that much. Fuck no. So, I didn't, like, put two and two together. And then when I saw you, I was like, oh, my God, I know who this guy is.

And then the next week, my friend, should I say my name? Yeah, you can say your name. I know her. This is how I think. This is what I remember. My friend Lauren was like, hey, I think Kuski was talking shit about someone on his podcast. And I was like, really? Who do you think?

And she said the person's name. And so then we asked you about it because we were out together. I was like no it was you you were talking shit about me on your podcast yeah that was that wasn't this show that was uh i think that was way back when we were doing tending a list just me and braxton yeah it was the whole um and it wasn't because i we first met I remember this now I didn't say like oh we know each other

I just went like alright fuck it we're going to play this game and I hated that I was like I knew who you were though I wasn't like trying to act like I didn't know you

that's how my head interpreted it so I was like I hate and it wasn't that I was talking shit about you it's the

like the game everyone plays. Because let's be honest, there are people, I have, what, I probably follow 500-some people on social media. I bet you there's at least 100 of them I barely know or have talked to. That you would feel like you need to introduce yourself to. Exactly. No, I get it. But at the same time, it bothers me.

It's like like i know more about you than i probably should like i know what you did for winter break for spring break i know you're not you specifically but like people it's like i know who you're dating i know you broke up with this person i know you like skydiving all of a sudden i know you think you're ripped because you're i'm like i know way too much because of social media so that's what bothered me um yeah but then you were like yeah i was talking about you yeah it was you were the example that came up because it's bothered me for a long time um and we all do it i'm guilty of it too but um yeah and then i was like that is so funny because i literally texted cody right after I met you saying,

Oh my God, I just met Michael. He's so cool. And then you go on to your podcast later. That doesn't mean I'm not cool. I think at least you didn't say he's so nice because he's not. I'm not. Yeah. I mean, maybe.

I don't know um but yeah i don't even think cody i thought that was funny that's i actually i think what bothered me the most is doubling down or the first person you brought up we're like you know cody and i'm like you know damn well this is the reason we know each other is fucking cody um well i wanted to say it i know i don't want to assume you know when you like have to like segue into something i know i think i think for a future reference let's start with someone i probably don't know that went to frank i go not really then you go oh how about cody like oh yeah best friend okay play it off a little better next time okay speaking of cody uh hasn't replied to me in a while getting really annoying i don't know i've not actually i texted her two hours ago when you said you were

coming on and i say it's like i called her no response i'm like i know you're at work but like a quick hello or like when i text you you're like help me figure out what i need to talk well i literally said well i wanted them like give me something that can bring up that she would have no idea i know about and just like nothing okay so i didn't even know you started this thing you never gave me like a warning that you started the show by the way i was like okay i guess we're jumping right into this oh yeah well i told you once i turned cameras on, we were basically rocking and rolling. Do you always do that? Oh, hell yeah.

I hope all the cameras are on. I always do this, too, is are they all on? And we're all gone. Cool. Yeah, no, we joke around like that should be a t-shirt that said, oh, we're going. Yeah, I do it to everyone. Because most people are uncomfortable when they come here. I mean, it's kind of uncomfortable.

I totally get it. I feel like it's almost a forced conversation. Yeah, it can be. If you don't have talking points, you're like, what are we talking about? When I say, if I'm like, all right, record, go. Even I think it's forced then but if i can just like i can kind of start something you're like oh we're just talking now and then 15 the longest someone has gone is about 20 minutes and like have we started gotta go we've been going for we're almost halfway through this episode how long do you normally film for an hour

really yeah it's pretty long depending on the conversation yeah we can end it whenever you want like if i get sick of you i'm like you're like all right it's good let's wrap this up yeah if it's good i would want to go longer i only have one question um and that's at the very end um i really wish cody would have replied because i want to hear like some fun story but i also know your teacher so you have to dumb it down a bit yeah well okay I could talk I have I got a dog recently oh yeah we actually should talk about the reasoning behind this dog too um okay so I got a dog recently I got a little border collie puppy named Atlas he's a trimeral and when I was thinking about getting a dog, I was like, my life has been going too fast lately. I really need to just grow up. The first thing that popped into my mind was

like, I think I need to get a dog. That'll really make me grow up and have some responsibilities. And so then I was researching like dog breeds and I really wanted a dog with like high energy So then I was researching like dog breeds and I really wanted a dog with like high energy so that, so that I could like be super active with it and really smart dog so that I could train it really well. So also could be family-y because, so I was like Border Collie, perfect dog. So I did my research. I got on the Border Collie facebook pages started finding breeders you know there's a lot of backyard breeders and puppy mills on like those facebook pages

but i talked to this lady she checked out she seemed good i got my puppy i mean it was in someone's backyard but that's like what breeders are in like backyards but like a backyard breeder i would say is someone who like has like 10 dogs there and like runs through them like still have like three litters at a time Jesus and like a puppy mill is more like a business type of thing they'll have like 50 dogs there you know what I mean um so I got my puppy and he's a lot more than I thought it would be it's like instead of like slowing down my life, it's completely stopped my life. Like I have zero social life right now.

I don't go out. Um, I went out for the first time like last weekend during the day and I had to bring him with me. Otherwise I wouldn't have been able to go out. yeah. And he's, he's like a lot of work in the

sense of since he's a working dog and a border collie he never stops like he doesn't know how to settle i've actually had to like teach him how well he's a puppy he's also a puppy too but like there's some puppies like a golden retriever puppy i'll just be like happy laying on you and rolling over and falling asleep this dog not happy with that at all he's not you asked for this you're like i want the active i want the smart dog he's not cuddly and like the fact is he learns just as much bad things as he does good things every single day like right now he's on chasing his tail and barking at it all day long in circles if i'm not playing with him for a second that's what he's doing so he's real smart so he's a bit neurotic a bit compulsive i'm like is this

gonna be like your thing and then as we go on walks lately he started to chase cars and that's like a no-no i don't want him to be off leash and then all of a sudden chase cars too but yeah it's been a lot just getting used to it so if anyone out there is in the market for border collie let me know kidding i was like holy shit yeah the fact when you told me like you know i wanted my life to slow down um i took it as like yeah i just like i need to relax just not do as much i'm like i think a dog's the exact fucking opposite of not do much. Like you might not be like traveling all the time, but you now have like a four-legged child, but not really. I know, but puppies are literally worse than babies.

Because you can't like set them down and walk away from them. No, you quite literally can. Like if a puppy falls over, you're not worried he hit its head yeah but also like he they just don't sit down like they won't you cannot become the whole i'm a mom i have a dog person please don't i mean but like don't don't say it but like the the at least the babies you can like put them on a couch and walk away and do other things right in a kennel i mean put him in a kennel but then he cries and whines and he's in his kennel all day when i'm at work

so there's a baby um but yeah i guess i don't know i have to be like more okay with it but it's just a lot what are you gonna do when you have a child of your own. Not having kids. You don't want kids? No. Not at all? Not even a little bit? No. Interesting. I'm a teacher. I have my own. I have enough problems with kids as it is. I don't need my own kids. And also I'm terrified of having an unhealthy baby. I mean

you're the first person I've met really that doesn't want kids. Besides maybe Cody but like Cody doesn't want them anytime soon, I think. I just like couldn't imagine having that responsibility, spending all that money on your kid. I just want to spend my money on myself. Dogs were worse than children. So please, let's balance this out. But dogs, you can train it to be a really good

dog and take care of it that's quite literally the definition of raising a child and they only you only have them for like 10 years a kid like you're committed to for like life it sounds like you're waiting for this dog to die already no i'm not but i'm saying it's a shorter commitment and they can be like cute and cuddly and it's i don't know i just like see it as a different thing i don't want kids clearly i don't want kids at all that's i mean that's totally fine there's nothing wrong with that i want kids but again not anytime soon yeah those kids would die if i had one right now. Oh, God, yeah.

I can't imagine I have a kid right now. And I know I'm going to have four daughters. It's just going to happen. I'm going to shoot for two or three, and it's going to be like girl, girl, try for a son, twin daughters, and then. Are you going to be someone who needs to have a kid with their wife? who like needs to have a kid with their wife i would like to have a kid with my wife yes like i don't know do you see what else am i having a kid with right do i see myself getting married that's what they say i would like to be married

do i see it happening right now no no no i had i've told my mom, I said, mom, right now your best bet of being a grandmother or having grandchildren is a fucking accident, which is not good. Because none of your brothers? No, we are romantically useless. I mean, it is, it's brutal. I mean, you'd have a hard time picking which of the three of us. You're like, they all suck right now. It's just we're not in that stage of. No one's looking?

No. No one. Oh, Steven might be. Steven's so quiet that we have no fucking clue what he's doing. He might have three girlfriends right now for all we know. He is definitely the hopeless romantic. Okay. For sure.

Andrew's going to get lucky. And I think I've told on him before. My mom has said straight up, Steven's hopeless romantic. Andrew's lucky. get lucky. And I think I've told on you before. My mom has said straight up, Stephen's hopeless romantic, Andrew's lucky. And then she just stopped talking. I'm like, you have a third child, mom. So what about you? I think the silence meant I'm screwed. Okay.

I told my mom, I was like, I don't think I'm going to get married. I don't think I'm going to have kids. She got super upset. I don't think I'm gonna have kids sure that she would got super upset she's like what about all the grandbaby books downstairs in the basement and all the toys I've kept and I was like I'm definitely not getting married and I'm not having kids you can give them to your if you're married to the job give them to you are you gonna teach like kindergarten the rest of your life then no that's gonna be your fourth grade kindergarten same thing i mean not really the kindergartners are like this big barely know

how to read fourth graders are like distributive property writing literary essays what the hell is distributive property like also what did tri lumo mean for your dog or emma tri maril close enough you just thought of that now yeah i actually thought about a while ago but my head goes a million different directions um it's like his it's just like the kind of border collie i guess it's like his coloring i don't know for the people he is fucking cute yeah it's like real cute like it's like very australian shepherd coloring like looks like an off dog breed illiterate but so he's like a blue merrill with some brown in there this is that wouldn't that be by merrill then not try

merrill i don't know the breeder that's what the breeder wrote on the papers try merrill well it was also out of someone's backyard you know what all those people do in backyards is make meth so i mean i don't think it was a backyard breeder. Is Try Merrill even a thing, or are they just writing things down to make it sound like a fancy dog? It's real. Five grand. Try Merrill. He was not five grand. Try Glissoride.

Puppy. He was not five grand. He was like $1,200. Damn. Yeah, but that was because he got delivered to my doorstep from Ohio. I had to pay a delivery fee. What was he shipped in, like a box? No, a puppy nanny drove him.

She took a bunch of puppies across the country to different people who bought them from breeders. And then she picks up other puppies from other breeders and drives them around. That's an interesting job. Yeah. She had a car full of puppies just on the road for like a week straight. We do. I'm road tripping with a bunch of dogs. Yeah. That are pissing and shitting all over the car and i'm like where do you stay in a hotel

with all she's got a kennel of her own yeah like do you think they just sleep in the car or what goes on that would have to be miserable that car has to reek yeah well they had like three kennels two puppies in each kennel and then picking up the stuff from there. How do you, what's the logistics of taking, let's say you got 10 puppies and you're going across the country. At some point, they need to pee. They either pee in the car or you let them all out. But then what, are you puppies, you got like 19 puppies on a leash on the side of the highway? Let's say you have your dog who's trying to chase cars.

So you got one going this way, one's looking at the other one because you know they're so smart yeah so my dogs like they don't pee in their kennel they don't pee where they sleep they don't want to poop where they sleep they like they'll do it where they're not so that's why they're in the kennels in the car and if they do pee and poop in the car that means they really really had to go or they're like a really really young puppy but after one time of them doing that the puppy will never do it again my dog had one accident in his kennel and ever since then he's been completely fine it smells like shit in here sleeps like 10 hours through the night and will go immediately in the morning and have it all saved up but like won't in his kennel when he's out of his kennel it's every hour so i didn't know that that's yeah that's good at least yeah they're not cleaning the kennel every morning but they'll

i don't know if she had to like take him out here and there to try to go on the side of the road but have you brought the dog into your classroom yet because i feel like that'd be a hit with your kids i feel like my principal probably wouldn't let me. Bring a dog in? Yeah. I mean, I don't know what the kids' allergies are. Yeah, but no one is, like, deadly allergic to cats or dogs. It's not like you're bringing in a bag of pistachios and be like, here, Jimmy, let me rub this in your face.

And I know that sometimes, like, maybe custodians wouldn't want like to clean up messes. I don't, cause I don't know what my puppy is going to do in the classroom. Put them in the kennel. He definitely won't do anything. Put him in the kennel. He'll watch us all day from his kennel, whine all day,

watching people walk past him. I mean, I think it would be fun. Don't get me wrong. I think it'd be very fun. I always share pictures with my kids, but I don't know if i could ever do you find your kids to be like your best friends yeah they were like besties i'm not gonna

fourth graders they're nine turning ten and you're besties what's what's a typical you okay so fourth grade are you how does it what's cooler. You're not, now I'm trying to get you fired. So I went to a private school and we had two fourth grade classes, two fifth, two sixth, two seventh, two eighth. And the two teachers taught every subject. So like one taught, I don't know, what do you teach? Eight subjects. One teaches four, the other teach four don't know what you teach eight subjects one teaches four

the other teach four is that what you're doing are you teaching like four and then the miss johnson is teaching so i teach all the core subjects i teach science math social studies english writing sel which is social emotional learning i teach spelling we're gonna come back to that so all the core subjects the only subjects they go away for is library which they it's not really like a subject they're just checking out their library books and like learning how to check out library books like read the systems with the Dewey decimal and all that stuff they have music gym and art that's what they go away for everything else is with me. You'd think the library thing would be outdated.

I don't remember the last time I was in a library. Yeah, me neither. I mean, this week, but just to watch my kids check things out. Like, do you really know how to check out a library book? No, the librarians do it for me. Like, hey, I need to get these books. And they'll just go grab it for me and yeah put in a bin to be honest i mean i think you could you could get rid of the library class and just go to like amazon class and be like

this is how you look up what book you want jeff bezos will send it to you in one to two days depending on if you're cheap or not and don't have prime and then that's it no one goes to a library for books did you go to a library in college to study i didn't even do that not to like actually get books but i think like the last time i went to the library to get books was probably like a summer camp in elementary school you know when you like had those summer reading goals no my my parents were always big into that i would go to the library we'd sign up for the summer reading program like win things it's not like your summers were real fun

i mean they were busy and my parents liked me to keep up on my school stuff we were doing like backyard sports we weren't doing backyard reading well you didn't do your parents didn't have you do like math and reading at all no you didn't read like 20 minutes a day? No, absolutely not. We did not read 20 minutes a day. I think when we were super young, I guess I'm thinking middle school or even fourth grade when I think I could read still.

I don't know. When did you learn to read? So first grade I feel like is really the big year where you start to like hit it hard with reading kindergarten is a lot of like sounds and putting together am i too far away no you're fine it's just i don't like when it it taps or it goes to sleep and then i can't see everything okay um but yeah kindergarten is like more so like learning sounds and like how to write their names and phonological awareness i don't think you know i'm not sure if you know like learning sounds and like how to write their names and phonological awareness

i don't think you know i'm not sure if you know what that is and like phonics and stuff hooked on phonics i did that and then they start learning like putting it together in books and thinking about what happens in the stories in first grade what do you mean by learning sounds like the cow goes moo and like vowels can have like two different sounds like the long a moo and the pig goes oink oink oink? Like vowels can have like two different sounds, like the long A, the A, or the ah sound. Ah, ah. Yeah. Oh, ah, ah, ah.

Are they learning Spanish yet? I got a lot of questions about what you guys are teaching the youth. No, they don't learn Spanish, at least in my school, in my district until middle school. So they're in all white schools, is that why? I mean. That's a yes.'s uh it's mostly white caucasian it's mostly white there is it's definitely getting to be more diverse

but i would definitely say it's has its majority population you have your like token black kid at the school is that what you're saying no no i would say that there's like a a few more than just one or two a few tokens yeah but it's it's getting to be more mixed and i think it's also also where i like my school just happens to be too yeah i think like a certain like minority groups like to live near each other situation yeah so for reasons sometimes not of their own control i know so like my school um like has larger populations of certain minority groups and i don't know if i'm not sure if that's like there's a reason for that i'm sure there is but that's like what i've noticed yeah um we'll move away from the racial topics um because i mean that could be worse than you

just saying the name of your school um let's get to this one that intrigued social emotional learning is that what it was called what the fuck is that so social emotional learning is the idea that kids need to handle what happens inside of them like their stresses their worries before they can learn like other things like gain other knowledge and like math or science or writing or whatever that needs to be dealt with first like they need to be okay with socially and emotionally before they can succeed as like academically so we learn all about like empathy and compassion and we check in with each other we learn like mindfulness

strategies and like i don't know we have like daily community circles where we promote our classroom community i literally was picturing you guys just crisscross i was uh kumbaya in a circle just yeah you have the feeling stick kevin but it's not like always about feelings like a lot of it's just like getting to know each other like fun stuff we want to talk about and then there's sometimes like the kids will come in and say miss miller we need to have a community circle, and we need to talk about what happened at recess. And it's like, okay, let's work out our problems kind of thing.

What usually happens at recess that they're like, we need to talk about it? Jimmy threw a snowball at me and I didn't like it? So it's, like, all the problems I feel like in the school day mostly stem from recess issues. Oh, yeah. And it's just not fair yeah it's like it's games that kids play like a kickball game or a four square game he was so out at first base yeah they're not agreeing on who's out and they're thinking someone's cheating and it's really

starting to bother people and they're not listening so we like work through strategies for that and we sometimes they'll i'll say do you want to talk to this person directly and they're not listening so we like work through strategies for that and we sometimes they'll i'll say do you want to talk to this person directly and they'll say yes and they'll like turn and say jimmy i think at recess what you did was super like they use their eye messages we work really hard on like eye messages like how do you say like how i'm feeling? Like you made me feel this way. In the future, I would hope that you do this. And then the other person like acknowledges them through their iMessages. I don't know. It's like a strategy we teach.

And it's actually like promotes like a really tolerant and very communicable people. I think that's good. I guess people are communicating. It's in a way that would make me want to rip my fucking ears off but i couldn't i couldn't teach i don't know how especially that because i guess i'm terrible at that and if they're like uh mr kuski you need to teach to deal with your internal emotions to children i'd be like just tell someone to fuck off and move on it's just i i'd be mean sometimes that'd be easier so much my my personality personally

i feel like i would rather do something like that yeah but i also want to teach kids give them the tools there are other options yeah other options i just i think a lot of when i think social emotional that's not even a thing we're just putting words together now um it's like most of that is experience learning in my opinion like you're not gonna can't be like this is how you're supposed to react or just you know go through it figure out you didn't like that and then don't do it next time rather than i'm just in my head i'm like all right you're in a textbook if johnny's mad you don't make him mad anymore if you're sad don't be sad anymore it's it's a weird thing to try and teach rather than just learn through experience when you think about it actually you probably don't remember

a lot of elementary school i remember every day really no but like everything that we do without thinking about at one point was probably taught to us oh yeah you know like you're thinking about like they learn it through experience like it was probably you was also probably taught to you at one point and that was like you thought to yourself that's how you should react in this experience but like i'm trying to think i never had a class like what i remember is like you have like guidance the amount of times i've gone to a guidance counselor in my life i can count on one hand and that's because i was required to go for like uh well like didn't they come to your class like guidance counselors would come and do lessons no school psychologist no

do you know i know who my guidance counselor was at middle school who jesus oh yeah you went to a private school i feel like god is my guidance counselor i feel like it's different yeah because i know when i grew up we always had like a guidance counselor come in once a week and they teach like a we had religion once a day and then mass once a week yeah father son holy forgiven and you're good to go yeah we would that's definitely different i don't know then i guess maybe you didn't you just learned that god should help you through your problems basically no no i mean catholic school is it's a lot different i mean i guess our teachings literally through the bible in terms of like how to treat people or oh yeah here's the thing though when you're teaching kids life lessons through the bible it's hard enough if i just straight up told a child you're not supposed

to make johnny sad but when you do it through a parable about a giant fish who eats someone then swallows them out and you're like what does that mean you're like i don't fucking know you're a child you're like i think are they actually eating the people there is i know there is one where someone was swallowed by a fish and I think spit out. Yeah. Or departing of the Red Sea. And they were trying to relate that. Ask a five-year-old, what the hell does that mean?

It's like there are kids in college who can't interpret to kill a mockingbird. You're asking a four-year-old, what does Noah's Ark mean? Like, no fucking clue. I don't know. I would probably never teach in a private school. I would love to know what's the difference between private school and public school because you went to both. Hell. Hell.

Oh, yeah. It's hell. It's hell. I truly believe some of the worst people I've ever met or some of the most, like, misbehaving kids I've ever met have come out of private schools. So, you know Sarah Kavis, right? Yeah, there you go. She went to private school. Sorry, Sarah.

And it was like a, it was like a, I remember her always saying, as soon as she left private school, it was like, she went through this phase in, like, early high school of, and I feel like that's a pattern. It is. Right? Well, think of it like this. It's your, people say say people with the most strict parents usually like break the most rules because you're repressed like you're like no no no no no and then when you finally go to college or something like that and you have this freedom it's off the deep end because they haven't been able to experience things yeah they've just been told what to do

yeah and not experience like oh don't do drugs don't do alcohol and they're like oh this kind of feels good and they're like more more more and then it's off the rails versus if you experiment a little in high school i'm not advocating high schoolers drink right now jesus christ um jesus christ um see i guess i did learn something um but when you experience it a little bit like in doses when you're afraid instead of just constantly getting reprimanded you kind of learn limits and stuff like that yeah i think experience in my opinion obviously i think it's the best teacher of all for everything but um yeah it that's what the catholic school is it's strict parents i mean i had the same 30 kids give or take five your parents were strict

not really i think they're restricted to catholic school my dad was raised in a very catholic family my mom's lutheran so my mom just lost the battle my mom was like i'm not fucking arguing with your father or his side of the family so see the strict parents religious parents or i mean those are the two i mean i'm comparing like comparing catholic school or religious schools in general mainly catholics to i think hyper strict parents and like going from private school to public school like same 30 kids give or take five or six from kindergarten through eighth grade yeah um you guys kind of had more when you guys got to middle school you guys had it was like 300 of us exactly i had still i had kevin and jimmy next to me kindergarten through eighth grade yeah occasionally hannah sat next to me and all

with like kind of the same upbringing right yeah and then you're exposed to all these other kids who have way different experiences in high school exactly then you go to public school and you're like holy fuck there's more people in the hallway than there were in my school yeah i can choose what classes i want to take i don't need to go to mass i'm not wearing a uniform oh you are a uniform yeah what's your uniform um well until you get to i think it's fifth grade, you were given a slip at the end. And you're like, you can now wear a red polo shirt. But it had to have the school's logo on it. But when I first went there, it was a navy or plain white polo.

And then navy pants or khaki pants. So, did you have to go to the uniform store? You could mix and match. I think we always got ours at like Kohl's or target okay and then they finally they uh they expanded they went to uh forest green we could do that too and then red if you were in middle school you could throw one of those on but they had to have the school logo on it for those colors really yeah that's crazy because well the i have so much to say about uniforms. I feel like it's just so limiting. Freedom of expression. There's like a 10%.

I don't know what. Wording this wrong. Part of me didn't mind it because when you get into high school, and I didn't really care in high school either what I wore, but it's one less thing you have to worry about. You're like, I'm on school. Because there are times where you're probably like what the fuck am i gonna wear to school day it's friday i gotta look my best and you're sitting there

wasting 30 minutes to get dressed yeah well you always knew what you were gonna wear yeah it was like i was like which polo was clean and that's it and all the colors matched with each other yeah so you could literally wear whatever yeah and that would be super nice from that sense but also like you couldn't express yourself through clothes oh you would have hated girls tried to the sum of the rules were dumb they like what um ugg boots are they still a thing by the way not really okay you couldn't tuck them in you couldn't you couldn't tuck your pants into your ugg boots they had to be under no they had to be over your ugg boots like your pants had to be over your Ugg boots. Like, your pants had to be over. Obviously, Ugg boots.

Like how my boots are kind of right now. Yeah. So, like, if you had, like, skinny jeans, you had to have those, like, really wide boots. Like, what are they? Flare pants. Sure. And to go over. Or, if you came with them tucked in, you had to, like, do that, like, thing where you do

with your pants where you go over like this. Yeah. But with your boot. And then put your pants over it. Girls looked like fucking idiots. But they were trying to keep up with the trends. Trying to keep up with the trends. And they're like, no, put them over. It looked like they had fucking clackers for feet.

Yeah. I mean, it was hysterical. Yeah, that was the big one that pissed all of them off. um yeah that was the big one that pissed all of them off we had i once was told i was disrespectful respectful to the church and god for the shirt i chose to wear to mass what was it it was just a plain shirt that said hollister on it they're like that's not dressy enough do you think that's respectful to god and the priest i go i thought this was an all forgiving all loving god i can't wear a shirt that says hollister on it it's not like i'm saying i have a shirt that says 666 or kkk or fuck jesus on it yeah it says hollister it was like a nice shirt too it's probably pretty nice it was just it was

like a plain it was a plain blue shirt and then like those like big letters oh they're like they came across a little bit of rips on them yeah i'll like the phrase yeah i'll never forget that i'm like that makes no sense this is supposed to be a loving place to be wearing jeans no you were wearing khakis yeah see then i would have been like it makes no and i wasn't even the one handing out the little like prayer books before mass it was so on mass days you had to dress like really nice or was it like actually you were allowed to wear just like dressier clothes you could put on a button down like a long sleeve or so oh you could wear like collared long sleeve but had to be like the same material it was basically like it was so dumb i'm like not religious at all oh we aren't either anymore i like have faith in something else i

feel like but lizard people there's like gotta be something you can't just be us out here oh yeah but i don't think i like necessarily i'm like i'm religious and i believe this one thing i don't either i think it's i think there's a reason behind the bible like it stems from something yeah but i'm not like and how all religions like kind of have some similar teachings i mean it's it's a good teaching tool and it does help a lot of people for like just guidance and getting right on on track for like if you had like a poor life before and like i found god it's like that can mean so many different things you're like oh i'd follow these rules now and i'd live

a better life that's fine i always say is i was raised catholic i don't know if i am catholic i was raised catholic too but i'm not my brothers and i haven't been to my dad hates us too because he's still really goes to church yeah um we don't i haven't been to church we used to be christers for a while and my dad hated that and then uh now we just don't except your dad does i mean that's sometimes i think like three years ago we went to christmas mass with him okay but we sit in the he sits in the back it's not like we're involved we're just like we're on like the window so like we're getting out of here right away well sometimes it's just like going with your parents and doing the things that they want to do i'm sure he really liked i know but he liked shooting guns can we go shoot guns and then do the sign of the cross afterwards like let's pick some other bonding things yeah we don't need to do church yeah church is uh oh andrew's wearing

his jacket out nice nice jacket andrew um yeah i got all my brothers one of them i messed up on the front though i'm pissed for what the jackets oh you don't want to show me no i can't i will but like it's uh i'll just pull it up oh did you actually like did you have to iron it on yourself no no no i had someone else do it for me uh and this is the only the one and only no i there's so i have i might give one away but i have one for me and my brother so this is so big oh you wanted it to be a little smaller well the problem is no i wanted it this big but i didn't think like when you wear it it goes goes over. So it says Fat Chan. Oh.

So unless I give it to an Asian kid, it's not really going to make sense. But. Okay. No, it still looks great. It's just like when you wear it. Unless you walk around like this. You can put it out there for the podcast and see if people would buy it. I know.

this you're gonna put it out there for the podcast and see if people would buy it i know well i have yeah i gotta get some decent traction out of before i go buy like 50 of them yeah i would rather do t-shirts because they're way cheaper to buy 50 t-shirts than it is to buy 10 of those okay so since you have like such and such amount of followers now yeah are you able to go live on tiktok yeah you always have been able to i think can't you i think it's like you have to be past a thousand followers oh yeah i can't i have gone yeah after after the first i don't know what's considered a viral video and i don't think it was a viral video but um video that did very well um we were able to go live but i that's i don't like doing that and so we went to nashville after that why because you're just like oh you don't want to be like the guy going live um part

of it yes part of it is like my mentality is like when you go on tiktok and you see the random person that's live i look and i'm, why the fuck are you live? Who cares what you're doing? Well, some people might care about what you're doing. Well, here's the thing. We went after the first video that did well. And I guess we've more than doubled the audience since. But I didn't go live.

It was Scott and Brad and Bobby. They all went. And then it ended up just turning into go yet playing music i'm like hey if we got like 15 people to watch brian brian play music i'm fine with it but i can't was it like super were you super anxious though when they were alive i wasn't anxious no i was just like i'm not gonna be in it i don't wanna i like why can't my head i'm like you had one video do well on TikTok. Yeah. I can't start acting like the world wants to watch me. But also some people, like, you have to, like, work it.

I know. Like, the hustle in and do the live so that more people who start watching you regularly, like, get to know who you are and your personality. Well, I think I'm going to start doing, so, I don't know if you've seen, but I've done two solo episodes now. How's it been? Which is uncomfortable as fuck the first time i sat right there you just had to like talk to yourself like it's a lot of people are intimidated when they come in like holy shit you have three cameras on us and like you weren't like holy shit kind of i'd say kind of a lot honestly what i'm worried about is that like this chair doesn't have a backrest and i know my posture is probably gonna

be oh mine's terrible i'm working on finding new chairs. I thought about bringing the other chairs down. I was like, screw it. I just, I was not. I know, because, like, that camera especially, I'm like, ooh. We barely cut to that one, so don't even worry about it. But where was I going with this? I don't remember.

Oh, oh, yeah. So my solo episode. I just was there. The camera was there, pointing at me here, and I had, like, a rund So my solo album. I just was there. The camera was there pointing at me here. And I had like a rundown on a notebook. And I was like, just talk. And I'm like, I don't know if I can. I started talking.

I'm like, it's only been three minutes. And usually when I do this, I'm like, holy fuck, we're almost at an hour. Yeah. And that one, I'm like, it's taking forever. So did you cut it like 30? I did 40 minutes the first time I did it. And then I had to do another one because I haven't wanted to talk to a lot of people lately. Yeah, I feel that.

So I've just been like, well, I want to talk to people. Just a lot of people at my disposal I've either had on the show before or I'm like, I really just don't want to hang out with you right now, which is no offense to a lot of people. want to hang out with you right now which is no offense to a lot of people but it's like this isn't like i want this to be fun and entertaining or like talk about something i haven't talked about before um and then it's like sometimes like i know you're not gonna bring anything to this so i'm just like fuck it i'll talk myself and i have and i everything i want to talk about i can get out and the last one i did for almost an hour because you just talked

about everything i mean i did half of like get to know not get to know me i think that's where i started talking about this you're like loyal followers probably love that well it wasn't even like get to know me i got like suggestions from a friend and i was like all right here's some irrational fears or something like that and i gave him my like actual irrational fear because i think when you ever like watch clips of like celebrities clips of celebrities doing the Ellen show or something like that, what's an irrational fear? And they're like, heights. I'm like, that's not an irrational fear.

That's like everyone is afraid of heights. Everyone's afraid of heights in the dark. Do you have an irrational fear? Yeah. What is it? Garbage disposals. That you're worried your hand's going to get sucked down? Imagine my hand in there? No, but I had i had a keep it short i had a shot glass in college got lodged in there and i didn't know when i turned the garbage disposal on it broke it shot up and

cut me in the neck do you have a scar there now no but it was super scary because it scared the fuck out of me yeah i mean that's there's a what is this called right here your something your jugular jugular I think it's here and so I was like I didn't think it was actually gonna like

slice me open I was gonna bleed out in the kitchen but I'm like holy fuck like what if I was leaning over and that went into my eye

and so now when I turn it on or something like that I'm like I do this or if I see my mom over there and it's on and she's doing dishes and I'm like i do this yeah or if i see my mom over there and she it's on and she's doing dishes and the thing i'm like get your hands out of there yeah i hate it

um mine is um i don't know if you've ever seen the final destination movies i feel like a lot of my irrational fears have come from final destination but mine is tanning beds okay okay so there's this one lady on final destination so she it's not from like claustrophobia though is it no she gets like trapped in the tanning bed and it like heats up too much and like for some reason like something falls on the tanning bed and like the heat of the tanning bed goes up really really high and she's just stuck in there and she like burns to death that would see now that i'm never going to use a tanning bed and i don't ever plan on it but that would freak me out that yeah

the claustrophobia would bother me which i think is a very rational fear but the burning up i would always have if i could make sure i can open it no i literally like stick my finger out yeah just to like make sure and i think about it every time i get in i'm still like love tanning but i'm like okay i'm just gonna stick my finger out i know this probably would never happen there's nothing that's gonna fall on this i think they just like set it to an automatic temperature i've had those thoughts in like saunas or steam rooms and like what if someone just locked the door yeah like i know you can't lock it on the outside but like what if i just steamed to death you boiled boiled me like fucking broccoli or something. Okay, intrusive thoughts.

Have you ever thought like when you are coming up on like a train? Wait, what thoughts? Like intrusive thoughts. Okay. So like an intrusive thought is something that's like really dark for no reason and you're just thinking it. Like jumping in front of a train. Yeah. Like every time when I was living in Madrid, every single time I'd pull up to the metro stop, pull single time I pull up to the metro stop pull up

I'd walk to the metro stop and the train would pull up I'd think like how crazy would it be if I just like jumped on the train or like if someone next to me just jumped in front of the train like so I have those thoughts all the time um and I think it's it's like an impulse so I have I have a lot of impulses and ticks and stuff stuff like that. And it's not. It's really weird. But it's the plane for me. So it's like if I sit next to the emergency exit, are you prepared to open the door in case of emergency, blah, blah, blah.

And I'm like, what if I just opened it now? What if someone did? Yeah, what if I'm sitting next to it? I can go like this and we are all fucking screwed. What if I did yeah what if i'm sitting next to it i can go like this yeah and we are all fucking screwed like what if i did that like out of a movie we're just sucked out like a vacuum yeah that's an intrusive thought i think literally that's like a normal and then i think about for a while because i'm like just it's one of those things you want to do it's like popping a pimple you know you shouldn't do it but you're like yeah i'll fucking do it anyways i've never opened a

plane um yeah but yeah no that's and there's the other ones like when you're waiting for a car to pass you're like what if i just walk in front of the car that's like i'm gonna drive on the other side of the road going uphill once see what happens yeah fun fact i had a friend actually asked me to do that once drive on the opposite side of the road uphill uphill and we did it for a little bit how was it um scary as shit because i was like fuck this i'm not like it was a big hill and i got halfway up and i'm like fuck this i'm not doing it i can't see at all like there isn't even like cheating on this i get over we get to the top of hill semi really okay i have really no like that

no lie straight up me out so much i have i've thought about it every time like a semi has gone over i'm like i almost that could have been me went head-on with a fucking semi driving is so scary to me i feel like well one of my friends passed away in a car accident and so ever since then like i've had such bad driving anxiety so yeah and it's just like just sitting I think it's literally just sitting in the front seat though because like when I'm sitting in the driver's side like I know I have control of the car but I'm in the back like I can't see anything so I'm like good but if I'm in the front seat I feel like so much less like so much more helpless oh yeah you're like stop stop yeah i'm like dang i'm

a backseat driver but like that kind of stuff i'm always thinking like this semi could hit me would never do that have you ever had a friend or even you go through a red light even in a semi busy intersection and just you're like just go through the like yeah zoned out and because i've done it driving not i've never gone through just straight through a red light yeah but where you black out driving everyone has this and kind of and you're like fuck i've been driving for five minutes i don't remember the last five minutes there were turns they're like turns and like my muscle memory is pretty good swerving on the freeway going 70 but i'm just thinking about i don't know cottage cheese or something you like wake up and you're at home you're like

what the fuck am i here already but you have a friend that goes through a red light like dude the fact that you did that so like last minute red light thank god because what if a car was coming at like 40 through you didn't notice it and boom t-bone that would be my my dad got hit on his motorcycle because someone ran a red light they weren't paying attention he almost died but he's good now got rid of the motorcycle that's good um i think the other car got rid of the motorcycle i had a friend in high school whose thing was like going through red lights like i just it was like a running joke with him and his other friend he drove this really big nice car so he was like no one could touch me and i just remember i don't know necessarily it was like a thing but it was like when i was in

the car i feel like it happened quite a bit where the the light would turn yellow right and he's like a good distance away where you definitely need to slow down and his friend in the front seat would be like bet you won't like just always i remember being like i hate this oh there's there are two people when it comes to driving it's either yellow means slow down or yellow means speed up yeah and they're definitely speed up but it was always like so far away where it was like the speed up would not you're like if i just took my foot off the gas it probably turned green again before i got there yeah yeah they're like i was i remember you like i like doing that it's trying to time it you're like all right i'm far enough away take the foot off the gas where you kind of just like you're rolling in and then

right when you get there you're like boom gone and then you pass everyone on the left lane i like that um where what do you think we're at an hour 52 it's quicker than you think did this feel forced i feel like at times i'm like oh i need to i should have thought more about what to talk about but I think you did just fine we'll end with this close I guess yeah we'll end with this I asked everyone this for the season 2

who's trying to kill us outside but Andrew is that you? no okay so when's your birthday september 12th so it just passed right yeah all right so you have a full year we're good what is something you have to do before you turn 26 something i have to do before i turn 26 how mad is Cody by the way that she's 26 and you just turned 25 Cody is going through like a midlife crisis that she's like closer to 30 than she is

to 20 I like reminding her yeah I think I said that to her I said that to her one time like Cody how crazy is it that you're gonna be closer to 30 than 20 uh Pat was in the room she was like like why the fuck would you say that I told her like hey if you round if you round up it's basically 30 so yeah no and it's just i i don't know i would think about that all the time i guess it's like i freaked out when i turned 23 yeah like not to be rinded of it but like before i turned 26 i better be moved out of milwaukee out of the state somewhere new because it's not for me. That's fair. I mean, I'm right there with you.

Where would you want to move? I feel like it changes, but right now I'm on like an Austin, Texas kick. I stayed there for like a month this summer and I really, really liked it. I actually applied for some jobs there. Really? Got two job offers. Oh, really? What are you going to tell your kids? couldn't take them best friends couldn't take the job offers because i applied without

a texas teaching license so i have to get my texas teaching license first and then maybe i just could see myself in austin i really like it how do you plan on breaking into your favorite people in the world your best friends your class of 30 yeah they'll move on so quick but right now if i left them during the middle of school year that would be bad well it's the beginning how long has school been going for you this is my teacher appreciation week this is uh week four week four yeah we just started week four what are they learning right now we are learning how to round to the nearest ten thousand and thousand we are learning all about basically like place values well you should start with 26 and teach them to round up to 30 yeah well they know how to do that

but they're rounding like like multi-digit numbers okay we're learning how to form big ideas about characters we're learning how to which kind of about characters. We're learning how to. Which kind of characters? Like Scooby-Doo and Bugs Bunny? Like fictional characters. Or like their character? No, like fictional characters in books. Okay.

Like the deeper characters. Like the character that we're studying right now, his mom died and he's super depressed because his dad doesn't let him talk about his feelings type of stuff. So we form like big ideas about characters and what's the big idea with that like he needs to like i don't know there's symbolism in books for like what the author is trying to teach us and i don't know so then in writing they're learning how to write narrative stories like small moment stories fictional stories social studies they are we do a wisconsin studies in fourth grade so they're learning all about the state of wisconsin that's good

we went to the capital yeah i think and then in science we do project lead the way so they're building bikes out of like a vex kit right now which is fun and then that's really what we're doing right now you want to come to fourth grade i don't and learn some new stuff i to be honest i probably would learn something okay you know what would be super fun my like a guest speaker you would come in and tell my your kids my kids all about like having your own podcast because they're super into that stuff they talk about like youtubers all the time you could be like kids stay in school i would otherwise you're gonna be talking to you guys in yeah 10 years oh my god what would i tell nine-year-olds as like a guest speaker about like what you do it's a lot of like career stuff should i do a podcast with a fourth grade class that would be so fun they would just

ask you so many questions they would they're like the most curious people ever it's like if you don't have a definite answer for them it's always but why i'm like like there we i was trying to explain how wind energy is like converted and my one of my kids just could not understand how windmill was made and i was like listen i don't know how it's made. I just know how the energy converts. This is what they tell us. And we're like, we're going to go with it. He's like, but Ms. Miller, it doesn't make any sense.

Like, how do they build all this stuff and then it moves the wind around? Like, it was funny. They were funny kids. I mean, are I explaining the internet to someone? Yeah. I don't. Like, someone did a joke and I was like, the internet is literally metal in the sky and I can talk to someone in China.

That's it. That's something I think about. At one point, this earth was just like rocks. It still is. Everything's still. How does all this stuff come from? The garage that automatically opens and these cameras mirroring our images. This is one like the most

high conversation i've ever had was in nashville and we're all just like you realize earth is just like stuff that was in the earth and now it's above the earth and we can do all these cool things now but it's all just earth yeah like man-made i mean it's just man form not man-made yeah like someone had to make the machines that make these cool things at one point it was all out of earth stuff so everything's natural everything's fucking organic it's crazy to think about that's like the soft thing that like you spiral and you think about everything everything just goes in a fucking circle yeah oh last thing i was gonna ask because this always bothered me in school was um as a teacher, when you're teaching kids how to decipher books, and this is the meaning behind it, do you ever even go like, listen, this is just what they fucking wrote.

It means nothing. We're looking too far into this. No. Like, he skipped to the pond. It's just him skipping to the pond. He's not overjoyed because he got an A on his math test. He's just skipping to the pond it's just him skipping to the pond he's not overjoyed because he got an a on his math test he's just skipping to the pond that's his preferred method of transportation we don't say that because it's all it actually like at least the books that we use in our curriculum there is like always a deeper meaning behind it and like the author's choice

is supposed to like fair show something when you were a student did you ever feel the same way we're like we are over analyzing this book right now like listen i get there are some meetings in these chapters but these last two pages i don't need to overlook like he just walked to the courthouse yeah not like it's dark outside which means there's a looming like shut the fuck up it just happened to be raining that day yeah just happened to be the author didn't choose to do that well yeah but like they're like oh i want it to be raining today while he's walking that's also like something the kids they'll write something like that like i wanted it to be raining then it's your job as a teacher to think about like why do you have it to be raining what mood

are you trying to create in your story i just want it to be raining i think it'd be funny if he was wet when he walked into the courtroom i know oh well well we didn't mention your school so i don't think you're gonna be fired which is good but you're leaving anyways you want to quit so i'm i would never say i'm for sure leaving but i'm definitely like 95 wanting to well think about some other opportunities that's a hundred percent in a different place but also like i was trying to go to boston last year but it was really hard to get your teaching license in i remember you talking about that i take three tests I was all ready to go put in my application. They told me I had to take another test. How long were those tests?

I had to sit for four hours. Each test was four hours? No. I hated taking the ACT twice. Yeah. And then, like, all the paperwork that you have to transfer to. Like, it's a lot. And then when they told me it was one more test, and it was, like, on something I don't really even know,

English language learning. I like was just like, dude, I'm just going to call this a wash at this point. It was a lot. Last question. We're going to end this real quick. Okay. Yes or no answer. You've been trying to end this for like 20 minutes. No, it's fine.

No, it's fine. I'm the one asking questions. We're totally fine. You were the second teacher I've had on. Okay. Are you going to be the second one that believes the earth is flat no all right we're good the earth is not flat what