Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - Dull Pain is Survivable

Episode Date: October 1, 2024

The guys get nostalgic over childhood filmmaking, including adventures in stop-motion wrestling and VHS tape edits. And since nostalgia can only exist alongside the cruel march of time, Soren & Daniel talk about long-term pain and the particular joy of pulling a hamstring mid-sprint.

I've got a quick quick question for you alright I wanna hear your thoughts on it now what's on your mind I've got a quick quick question for you alright The answer's not important I'm just glad that we can talk tonight So what's your favorite? Who did you date? Who do I be if I were to die today? Who would I be if I were to die today? Oh forget it! I saw a movie, Daniel O'Brien Two best friends and comedy writers If there's an answer, they're gonna find it I think you'll have a great time here

I think you'll a great song and you. So hello again and welcome to another episode of Quick Question with Sorin and Daniel, the podcast where two best friends and collaborators ask each other questions and give each other answers. I am one half of that podcast, senior writer for last week tonight, author of How to Fight Presidents, and man no longer encumbered by pesky microphone technology, Daniel O'Brien joined as always by my co-host Mr. Soren Buie. Soren, say,

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They want to try bits they want to try this up because now they can see themselves their grandparents, they want to try bits. They want to try stuff because now they can see themselves and they're like going to try some things to make make it funny for the camera. A lot of it does not play. A lot of what they do does not play on the camera. A lot of them like trying to come into the frame sideways, but they're like moving too quick a lot of the time for any of this to really work. Or they're like trying to do jokes where they're really quiet for a long time and those also don't play. And what the things that you were just doing, you had a lot of great hand gestures, but they were too close to the camera and everything got blurry and all of a sudden I couldn't see anything. I think I was going for a 3D experience on this podcast, which is what our audience has been clamoring for it's

Unclear to me What how much space I? Thought the microphone was taking up. I was going way too wild. Okay with my new freedom It's not a pull it back. I wasn't handcuffed to the microphone, but as soon as it wasn't there I've done I I started doing things I'd never done before. That's good. That's where you want to start. Up to and including singing wicked. That's where you want to start though. You can always pull back.

It's way harder to go bigger than it is to go as big as you can and then like, and then just pull back. I think it was good. I think it was good. We just, we'll work on like, on like focus, focus, and how we can manipulate that. But yeah, my kids, I frequently tell them, hey, that's not working. That's not working.

The thing you're doing, it's not working. When you jump up and down on the bed while I'm talking to NeNe, all it's doing is rattling the camera. She can't see anything. Do you let them play with just Just the camera filming themselves. No Tolerable that is when you're on a call with somebody who's let their child do that Okay, it's it's I can't I can't do it because what will end up happening is first of all

They will be running around the house with it and you won't see anything Or they will have their faces in it Like this and then they will try and put on like why isn't Why isn't the alien one working? Why isn't the alien one working and like trying to get their faces to become different stuff? But it's not working because their face is in the fucking screen I mean not when you're on a fucking call when they're just like here's my phone You want to play with the camera? Oh, no my my cousin

Carolyn who was like an adult at this point, but tapped into the youth when we have like big Family gatherings for holidays. She has taken the much smaller kids down into the basement and using the camera editing tricks that all people of a certain age now understand and can do. She made like quick little music videos that look sharper than anything you or I could make that star the kids. And it's just like, you know, a seven year old popping up from behind a couch and another

one jumping into frame and someone catching something. And she just cut it together and made a very dynamic Edit of it set to music and the kids fucking Love it and it reminded me certainly of being very young with my two older brothers and taking our parents video camera are the giant VHS camera and under figuring out the very the most basic special effect of filming, filming, filming, pause, remove person from frame, start filming again, playback, it looks like

the person disappeared. Like putting that work in and then seeing playback because you couldn't watch playback in the video camera. I'm a hundred thousand years old. You had to like have the patience of making a whole movie with a couple of special effects in it and then bring the VHS tape to your VCR and play the whole thing to get the payoff of seeing if your magic trick worked or not. It was when it did work, the rare times when it did, totally worth it. Nothing more exciting in the world than seeing

my brother disappear from frame and like what looks like a puff of smoke entering the frame, but it's really one of us throwing a cloud of dirt from off camera. And now the kids can do it instantly with their phones soaring. Not their phones, our phones. Yeah. Yeah, no, I don't do that with my children. I don't know how to do that. That's a step beyond my capabilities. I wish I had some sort of editing software that I understood that was directly on my phone. There's a lot of cute little videos I'd love to make. You gotta get yourself a 22-year-old cousin, bro.

I do remember doing that as a kid with the VHS, not only like trying to do the on the fly practical effects, like you're describing, but also knowing that you had like building out the entire scene that you wanted and then being like, well, we're going to have to edit this because we've got like a lot of takes of this one, taking it to the VHS, having a dual VHS player so that you can put a recording one in one of them and then the VHS that you recorded on in the other. So then you can put a recording one in one of them and then the VHS that you recorded on in the other so then you can just get to the scene you want, press record, get just that scene, press stop and then having to edit your films from one VHS to another. Man, yeah it was tough. It was tough work. I would have

friends over for sleepovers in middle school and we would take all of our wrestling action figures in our giant wrestling ring and make stop motion movies that were like we didn't have the greatest imaginations yet. We weren't making like a gangster film starring the rock. We were doing like a full pay-per-view card we use wrestling figures to make our dream wrestling pay-per-view card including like we respected the fact that every pay-per-view event has a couple of matches that you don't care about we put those in too we would we were like we really want to see the Rock and Stone Cold verse Undertaker and Kane but we

understand you need like an opening match with draws and D'Lo Brown. So we would do all of it. We would put all the work and like this stop motion stuff that we would try to do some commentary when we could. And we would like use Napster and load up the wrestlers entrance music so we could have their like full entrance. We're lifting them up on strings and we would spend an entire night staying up just fucking pounding surge cola staying up and then we would finally the payoff of

watching this tape at four o'clock in the morning for what amounts to I don't know max 60 seconds of video content of wrestlers slamming into each other with my buddy's legs still in frame the entire time. It was a magical time to be a young playing filmmaker. I won't out the person who this is, but during my childhood, when we were making films like this, we at one point were making a film in his house and we were like, you know, you never really have much of a plan going into it. You're always like, I have like the kernel of an idea and that feels like plenty when

you're a kid. And so like it's long meandering. And we happened to discover a sex toy in his father's bedroom. And we were like, Oh man, because I was going to out who this was because of context clues. Because you grew up in a hole in the woods and your nearest neighbor was 30 miles away. So this could only be that neighbor or your brother. Well, now I know who it is. And we found a sex toy and we were like We have to make a movie about this So that now we have a focal point like the whole movie has to be about this thing and we

We did we made a whole movie about it. I don't know if his dad ever saw it but Didn't get a wide release It was a it was a sex toy not for not designed for gentlemen Well, I guess I shouldn't even say that no, it's a sex toy not designed for yeah, not designed for Penile stimulation is more for the ladies or for You know the back to us. Yeah, and so we It became like this thing that one of us would wear at all times in the movie

that we made. It's very, I mean, that resonates with me, not finding a sex toy, but it's an approach to creativity that I wish I could get back now that I'm here at the end of my life. It's in youth coming across like I found a barbecue lighter that is common in in like every household in America. It's a long lighter that like if you squint kind of looks like it could be a very skinny gun and coming across that as a child and seeing that I can Press a trigger like guns have and a little flame pops up. I'm like, this is the film This is the movie I have to make and I was like right out and try to storyboard a movie centered entirely around

someone finding this thing and deciding to Rob banks with it like the only thing stopping this person from being a crook was this piece of technology. And I, I wish I had more of that creative entrepreneurial spirit of just like, I can wrap a whole movie over one thing that I found, but. You were, you were so much more willing to make something shitty as a kid. Oh yeah. It didn't because it wasn't for anyone but you.

So you were just like, I want to make something that's fun. Like I'm going to make something that's the journey is the destination. Like I'm going to make something that's fun to do while I'm making it. And at the end, I'll have this thing. They were always by the end. And so much of it was based around what if a kid found a policeman's badge and then became kid cop? That was all I needed.

Right. And, uh, and so we would make these films like just for the pleasure of making it and I'm like, there's no way I would ever gain that back. There's no possible conceivable world in which I'd be like, oh, you know, it'd be fun as to like make a little movie right now. Right. It has to be good. It has to be good. I wouldn't even let my son make one by himself. I'd be like, no, you're fucking...

There's no... You understand there's no conflict that you introduce, so there's nothing to solve. I'd get mad at him. If I'd come across the adult equivalent of a barbecue lighter, some thing that seemed like an interesting relic that I could write a movie around. I would look at it and be like, I don't think we're gonna get anywhere if I don't get Timothy Shalemei attached to this, so I might as well dump it. No one's making anything anymore. Scrap it. Yeah. I mean, this would be... I could say... I see it. I see it in my brain, but I just know

that it has broad international appeal. So it's like there's no way anyone's going to fund this. I should just do this as a newsletter or not at all. Yeah, that's generally the answer is not at all. It was a strange moment in my life when I suddenly I kept having these ideas, I would write them down, they go nowhere, but I would still write them down. And then after a while I was like, or I could just write them on Twitter. Then I had this write them down. And then after a while, I was like, or I could just write them on Twitter. Then I had this outlet for them.

And then I just lose the idea. And then months or years later, someone would be like, I loved this tweet. And I was like, I wrote that? That is a cool idea. I like that. That was going to be a novel. You had a Blue Sky.

What is a tweet on Blue Sky? Well, OK, they're called posts. But for a long time time people were really trying to get skeets to stick. Oh, I know I You wrote something you skeeted something. Yeah that I thought was a thought was a perfectly good modern like Jack Handy post but now I can't find it anymore so deleted it I must have dreamed it I was it the was it the baby

pit the baby hippo thing or the little yes yeah I deleted it is it because you spelled steel wrong yes great yeah so well listeners watch this space a great tweet is coming back no you're not gonna bring it back no it's gone now it's been done much the writers room in which Jim Handy in in which Mike Handy, our good friend Mike Handy, worked. It's SNL. They just trash it if it doesn't work the first time. This has been some good podcasting. Oh, yeah. There's some things I want to talk to you about, Daniel. Oh, OK. I some good podcasting. Oh, yeah. There's some things I want to talk to you about, Daniel. Oh, OK.

I was going to leave. No, no, we're going to keep going. All right. I got a quick question for you. Shoot. I don't feel like I gave it appropriate, the appropriate gravitas that it deserved last time when you mentioned that your back was hurt and that you couldn't move on the podcast. I just burned right through it mostly because Jason was here. But what are you all right? I'm okay now. Well

there's two things. I say now that I'm I am finally a few weeks out a hundred percent healed. What I mean by that at 38 years old is 100% healed is a dull pain that I've decided I can live with for the rest of my life. I don't think it's ever going to be back to the way it was before. But there's a common for me lower back injury is anytime I do any kind of workout at the gym that involves swinging, like usually it's it's you can do it with dumbbells or kettlebells, but you're you're holding the weight and you're swinging it forward. It's a kind of motion that I am never doing because it's not the way that I I prefer to work out generally. But I vary my exercises by taking group classes about once a week.

And with the group classes, you are moving very quickly from station to station, and sometimes you're in that station that has kettlebells doing a swing. And these classes, A, move so fast. So I'm not really thinking safely, which is a terrible indictment of myself, but mostly these classes. And B, it's a group. So there's like people around me. So I still have enough vanity that like, I am going to use larger weights and probably do something quickly and carelessly for the sake of looking cool in front of strangers.

These things combined is a recipe for very stupid gym injuries. And this is probably the third or fourth time that I have heard this same part of my back doing a very similar swinging exercise with too much weight too quickly and without anyone checking my form or anything. So I was doing these kettlebell cleans and was just in like I lost an entire a full week of running. I just couldn't and and like I'm a master at pushing myself through injuries that I should not be pushing myself through and I couldn't get three feet out the door running so I just was laid out for about a week and then when I was when I did first start running again I immediately put 12 miles on my stupid body

and was talking to my brother about it and he was like, oh, so your back is better now? And I'm like, yeah, better than before. Oh, no. Is it healed? Never. It's never gonna be healed, not with what I've been doing to it. But I can move around now. It was like a very, like, painful and we've talked about this before that like when I can't

run that's very load-bearing. That's like I need to run to clear my head and to write and to be my normal exercise. And so just like having a week where I wasn't able to do my favorite thing to do was not great. Yeah. Yeah, you get to a dark place pretty quick. It's also like, when your mobility is limited, you start to really panic. You start to look around at the world and see other people and you're like, they look fine. They could do whatever they wanted. Why aren't they doing the thing that I want to do right now? Or you look around, you're like, is this it for me? Do I just live with this the rest of my life? Is this how it's going to be?

And it's so scary. If you're like an active person and you are limited in any capacity, you're like, oh, I get it now why everyone complains about the indignity of aging. Like, if I had to live with this, if I had to live with this the rest of my life, I'm going to kill myself. That's the feeling. Yeah. And you're like, you're like window of age changes as you get older, obviously, where there's some people like, you're an old person.

And so of course you can't move anymore. Like you, this is me looking at an old person walking down the street with, you know, like a hunchback or a cane or anything like that. And then it happens to me where I'm in pain and I am not moving well. And like, well, no, no, no, no, no, no, this is supposed to be for old people, which until recently was my age. But now my age is young people. And so we're not ready to start this process yet. Right. Or like how easy. I will update what old people means as we go on.

And I will update what old people means as we go on. Yeah, it's a it's a it's a it's in a state of flux. It changes a lot. It really only changes in one direction, to be fair. Yeah, it's only changing backwards. You read about all these stories of these like the billionaire class doing these longevity experiments, whether it's Peter Thiel or Bezos or that other freak that you've taken his son's blood, who uses his son's blood and only drinks coconut electricity or something insane like that. These people who Brian Johnson forever. Yes.

And you read about them and she's like, and there's part of me that that is saying like listen getting old is not Terrible and like dying is a thing that happens to all of us. This is the deal We make with with life is that eventually you you get old and die and then other people Come up and they get to have the world you get to leave it to them And that makes very intuitive sense to me as a thought process. And then the second catastrophic injury to my hamstring. Yeah, playing baseball, playing softball. I... So unavoidable. Yeah, sprinting to first, and I was like, I could beat this out. Like Like I hit like a dribbler and I was like,

oh, but they don't realize that I'm super fast. And so I'm like sprinting to first and just feel my leg come untethered. And I fall down and I'm like, oh, that was bad. But it's the same thing where I'm around a lot of people and I'm embarrassed and I don't want to be the guy who pulled his hamstring. And so I get up and I'm just sort of like playing it off like it's nothing.

And meanwhile, I'm thinking like, that felt really bad. That was like a really bad pull. And I start feeling down my legs just in the back, trying to like stretch my hamstrings a little. And immediately it's like, don't stretch that. And I feel like this ball of something in the bottom of my knee pit like by behind my knee and I'm like what is that and uh I go through the rest of the game I do hit a few more times I was my my first question on the podcast uh was going to be did you beat out the throw no I mean I fell down I As soon as I did it,

I fell down. So I didn't even make it to the base. And I did hit a few more times, but I had somebody else run for me. I also I played catcher from that point on, which catcher and softball, there's not a lot you're doing. Right. And so then afterwards, I go home, and I'm supposed to go on a date with my wife that night. And I start just kind of researching it. And I'm like, what does it mean when there's like that ball on the back of your knee? And most of what the internet was agreeing on was,

this is a ruptured tendon. You need to be seen immediately. And I was like, okay, I had to cancel this date and I got to go to the ER. First, I tried calling urgent care. I know now to call first to find out if they can do a thing. And I was like, if I rupture my tendon, would you be able to tell it's your urgent care? And they're like, no. And I was like, okay, great. So I had to go to an ER. I got an MRI, the doctor felt it. And he was like, he kind of like played with my knee a little,

like he was like pulling on my heel, I mean like does that hurt? And I was like no, he's like pushing it in and stuff and feeling around in there and he's like okay, I don't think it's a ruptured tendon because you can still use your leg and I think what it might be is your hamstring. So I'm gonna get an MRI, got an MRI, he's like it's a full tear. You've got to go see an orthopedic surgeon. I'm not even going to give you any advice on what to do with this, because I don't know. I don't know enough, whether you're going to need surgery or not. And I was like, oh fuck. And I was like, already like thinking ahead to how this is going to affect the

rest of my life. I'm already like, if I have to have surgery, that's months of rehab. I miss like all the things that I like doing are gone now. All the things that like made me happy are gone. And I did it doing something so stupid. We're also, like, just to give you some context, we're winning the game like 19 to two. This was so dumb. It was so fucking stupid of me to do this.

And I was getting really down on myself and angry. They gave me this big brace that like I couldn't even bend my legs. I can't put shoes on with it. I have to have somebody else put my shoe on for me. They give me crutches, which is any time you get crutches, you're like, well, that's it for me. They give me crutches, which is any one time you get crutches, you're like, well that's it for me. That's a wrap on my, on any, I can't, I don't even know how to go to stairs with these things. I don't understand the how to do this. Right. Not only is it, is it tough to get around when you're on crutches? Cause I remember from breaking my foot last summer, you also, it, it like discourages you from doing absolutely

anything at all. Like even if your friends are just saying like, come to dinner, you can sit at dinner. So like, yeah, but I need to get dressed and then I need to walk to the door, walk to the car, get in and out of the car, walk to the restaurant. I'm probably going to have to go to the bathroom while I'm at the restaurant. It's easier if I just stay in and keep my foot elevated and just like, yeah, watch something that makes me angry.

Also, I don't know what the chair situation is going to be like. Is it going to be a barstool? Because I cannot do that. I can't like be up like that. I got to be down low and I got to be able to place where I can fully extend my leg while not putting weight on it. So anyway, I'm like getting really demoralized. I don't have an appointment. It's the weekend. So obviously, I can't see an orthopedic surgeon until Monday. I'm getting really demoralized. And then I go to take a shower. And you know, at that point where I'm like, not can't see an orthopedic surgeon until Monday. I'm getting really demoralized. And then I go to take a shower. And, you know, at that point where I'm like, I'm not a religious person or anything, but I'm like, please don't let this be something severe. Please just like get like, let this be a trick. Let this be just like, oh, it's actually not that bad somehow.

I don't know anatomy. Maybe this is a not that bad thing. And like, but pleading to some higher authority. I take off my brace and I'm like taking a shower. I'm like taking a shower. I'm like, it actually feels not too bad. Like it doesn't even feel like a pole even. Like I can move. I've got some mobility. I can, if I stretch it too much, I can feel it or activate the hamstring too much.

I feel it, but it's not like painful. But like it doesn't feel that that bad. And surely that's an expert diagnosis and not just temporary relief from the hot shower water. Surely the prayer worked. Yeah. So then I get out of the shower and I happen to look in the mirror. This is like the next day.

Toilet. Yeah. I look in the mirror and the back of my leg, Dan, was so gross. It was so black and blue and swollen. And like blood had drained, you can tell, had drained down into my calf. And now my calf was all like deep and black and blue. And I was like, this is a lot of blood that is in there. It's not where it's supposed to be.

No. I mean, it's still in me, which is like, I would always count as the most important thing. Yeah. But I go to the orthopedic surgeon and she's like, I got to do an MRI on just the knee to see like what kind of damage this is. And so she does it days go by before I hear from her again. I finally go in and talk to her and she's like, okay, here's the deal. I've never seen this before. Immediately. I'm like, Oh no.

She tells me what ordinarily happens is that just like, okay, you have these biceps in your hamstring, your hamstring is two different muscles that connect down to tendons to your knee and on each side of your knee, there's the tendons. Like if you put your hand in your knee pit right now, while your knee is kind of folded, you feel those on the sides, there's like something solid on the sides. Those are your tendons that are connected to the muscle. What ordinarily happens is that somebody will tear a tendon

and it fucks up the knee, it fucks up the tendon, and then they have to anchor the tendon to the knee again. And it's like a big surgery that then takes a lot of time to heal. What I did was where the hamstring and the tendon connect, completely tore the hamstring away. So the hamstring is completely disconnected from one of those tendons, the outside tendon on that.

So she's like, we can't operate on something like this. You can't see because where the tendon connects to the muscles, like fibrous and like feathery almost, like you just, if you tried to sew through that muscle, it would just tear right through again. Sure. And so she's like, usually people tell the tendon tear the tendon, you tore the muscle right against the tendon and it's completely torn off. She goes, I don't think this is going to affect your life too much.

What? She goes, I don't think this is going to affect your life too much. I was like, what? And I was like, how can that be? And she's like, that's only because this injury is unprecedented and I can't say what it's going to do. I think that's also part of it. She's like, I've never seen this before. Maybe it's fine. That's basically the vibe I got from her. She was like, there's a lot

of reinforcement around the hamstring. There's a lot of things keeping it in place. So I don't think you're going to miss that outside tendon too much. And I'm like, that cannot be true. Like, I can feel on my leg where you just felt Daniel, that like bony thing on the outside or that like the tendon, you can feel that tendon. I don't feel it on the other side anymore. Yeah. And I'm like, am I going to recover from this? And she's like, well, what are you trying to get back to? And I was like, running softball, just playing with my kids, sprinting and cutting. If I have to join the NFL at any given moment, she was like, uh, I don't think you're going to, it's going to be a problem.

I think that you'll probably be able to get back to all this. Obviously, if there's a problem, come back to me. But I was like, doctor, this fucking doctor is me in 2002 selling shoes at Sports Authority and someone being like, will this be good for for track for like for like like rubber track or like or just like cross country? It was like, what do you want it for track? Yeah. Yeah like rubber track or like or just like cross country and it was like what do you want it for track yeah yeah it's great for that that's why buy the shoe and get away from me yeah i don't have any answers for you but i'll give them i probably should have known that when i first got there and i had the crutches and the leg brace i was like i'm actually pretty

mobile without the leg brace and she's like well don't use it i was like okay I'm actually pretty mobile without the leg brace. And she's like, well, don't use it. I was like, okay. And she's like, do you want to leave all that stuff here? And I was like, very much. And she just was like, yeah. She was so cavalier about the whole thing that I was like, I think I'm fine. And then she's like, when do you, I was like, well, so how long should I wait before I run again? She's like, you could try it. Like try it now.

And she's like, obviously, don't go crazy. You may want to do like a run walk. Dole pain is fine. Like try it now. And she's like, obviously, don't go crazy. You may want to do like a run walk. Dole pain is fine. Sharp pain is bad. Don't overdo it. And I was like, what about stretching and stuff? She was like, yeah, try to stretch it out. Try to just keep it strong. And I was like, this is the wildest advice I've ever gotten. I have never had a medical professional tell me to do Anything they have always there was an abundance of caution you to do anything. No matter what? No matter what you have in your life coming up that is important to you There's like well if you can avoid it stay in bed forever in the dark. Yeah quietly

They have to be water hooked up to you in the dark, quietly, with an IV of water hooked up to you. They have to operate that way because if you go and do something that you shouldn't have fucking done, you can sue them. And it's like they have to operate under the assumption that you are trying to sue them at all times. Like every patient is trying to find a way to sue them. But this woman was so cool. I don't even know if I'm trying to decide if I should even say her name because she

did give me really good advice, but I'm making it sound like it's not. I'm just gonna leave her name out. But she was wonderful. And she she was like, give it a shot. And she was like, it was the first time I went into a doctor and they were like, looked me over and they were like, I think you could do it. You know, like they gave you that feeling of like You're I think I got a fair assessment of you

I'm I think you can handle this and I was like, ah, this is the best news I've ever had. You're the best doctor I've ever So let me throw something at you I've never played violin but Do you look at these take a look at these digits. Do you think that these could handle the violin? I think they could. I've got these little tiny fingers. I've always wondered. And so I now I'm like, I've been choosing after I asked her about going to the gym and stuff I was like, what about working out legs? She's like

You know feel it out go with very lightweight first and just feel it out and see if it's how it goes And I was like, this is amazing. And so obviously one of my biggest concerns was my best friend's wedding is coming up and I need to dance at that wedding. Like I need to, that's like the whole reason to go to a wedding is like the dancing. And I was very worried that I wasn't going to be able to. And now I'm pretty confident I'm allowed to do that and it's going to be fine. Listen, it sounds like your doctor gave you a pretty clear bill of health there. So you don't have any excuse. I kept checking in with her because I was like, it's just that it looks so bad.

And she was like, I know, there's a lot of your muscles when you tear a whole muscle, when you completely tear it, there's a lot of bleeding. And I was like, okay, next question. If I don't, if they don't need to be connected, why are they connected? Why are the muscles and the tendon connected? She's like, that's where she was like, well, they should be. There's just a lot of good reinforcement for your hamstring and other areas. So you're going to be fine. You really do. It's, it's good of you to, to cross your own T's and dot your own I's there because you really want to be like, listen, I also don't want

me to get surgery or go to rehab or do anything out of the ordinary at all. But like, don't want me to get surgery or go to rehab or do anything out of the ordinary at all, but like, don't just tell me what I need, what I want to hear. You have to be the one. You have to be the ghost in the room. The news was too good that I was like, I kept her there for a while because I was like, well, hold on. Let's just think all the things through here. So I haven't tried, even I wasn't going to go as far as she gave me the permission to do. I have not run yet. The closest I've come to running is that I took my daughter out to ride her bike. She fell a fair distance away from me and I jogged over to her to help her.

I haven't tried going for a legitimate run yet. And I haven't tried doing many things on it. I do feel it every once in a while when I activate the hamstring where it's like, oh, oh, that didn't feel good. So it is a clearly an injury still. Yeah. And I'm concerned about the fact that I have done something completely irreparable in my body and that I'm going to discover it. Oh, there are certain things I just can't do now. Because that's big. I mean, it's big to tear an entire muscle away from a tendon. That tendon is just flapping in there like a windsock from what I, in my imagination,

is happening. Right. And the big fear again is that you might not know the extent of this until you're 60 or something like that. Yeah. And you're one of those, one of those guys we've both seen walking in the street where they're like almost completely at 90 degrees. And it's a doctor who's gonna be like, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's because of this injury 20 years ago that was not addressed.

And now this is just how you maneuver through the world now. And if you have two tendons connecting to your knee and one of them's gone, now you're putting a ton of stress on the other one, I'd assume, with all the Bo Jackson type of activity that I'm doing every single day. Sure. So I don't know, like, if I try to, if I ever try to sprint again, because I, so much of my life has been like, at any moment, I could just take off. Bo Jackson, he does both of the major sports, running and falling. It's got it all covered. You know, he did run out of his own muscle, if I remember correctly.

The way that he finally got injured enough. Is that true? Yeah. The way that he got injured playing football was that he was too strong for his own legs. Like he got this injury that was a surprising injury because he pulled his... I'm going to get this wrong. I think he tore a muscle in his leg like running out of it. Yeah It's tough to try to remember what was said in that Bo Jackson biography

They made all of us read in fifth grade for some fucking reason He was a phenom teachers knew it They knew that there would be never be another human like this you'd read things about him Like it was so inappropriate for kids too because it was stuff like did you know that when he was a little kid he threw a rock at a pig so hard he killed it? You're like what? Is that true? Nobody knows. I know that it's very rare for someone to be dominant in two professional sports but in retrospect I do think we made too big a deal out of it to teach that to children where it was like, it would be more impressive if he did baseball and like, I don't know, not sports.

Also, we remember it so much differently than it actually was. Both he and Deion Sanders were like, they were dominant at these other sports, both sports. Not true. Bo Jackson was an excellent football player and a very mediocre baseball player, but he did some spectacular things out on the baseball field that people were like, that's never been seen before. Like he would like run up, he would catch a ball and then run up the wall of the back of the stadium, basically. Run up the padded wall and get like five steps in. Like he just changed how gravity worked for a moment. And started walking on the wall for a while. Or he was like one of the first guys to take a solid wooden bat and break it over his leg when he struck out. No one's going to remember the fact that he struck out so much only that he broke that bat. I think that the the the

the legend of of Bo Jackson works if you assume that everyone who is great at their sport has only done that sport their entire life and has not ventured Out to try other sports when the reality is the best basketball player in my high school was also Pretty good at football and pretty good at baseball like athletes are athletes They we've got plenty of professional athletes now who are like no I was a quarterback in college That's why I was recruited for college. But I'm also very tall. So now I'm on the Blazers. And that's just what it is, because athletes don't

unless you're truly Steph Curry. And from birth, you're like, I'm going to be a basketball phenom. And that's all I'm going to do. Unless you're that you're mostly just like an athletic kid and athletic person who find something that's that that works for them and can be a career for them. Yeah, 100%. They basically just at a certain point, at a certain point, they're just like, I'm just going to close the door on these other sports so that I can really focus on this one and try and go all the way with it. But yeah, like every single every single basketball player who didn't make it decided they wouldn't make it in the NBA then tried to be a tight end and some of them were very successful at it like some were

like oh okay well I'm good at this too um but yeah I don't anyway I'm saying I don't I don't know what the full effects of this are yet I have not really taken it out on the open road to really test her out. Have you tried dancing? No. No. I do a lot of jumping when I'm dancing. Sure. I, you know what, I'm going to try it. I'm just going to make sure and I'm going to not overdo it.

I'm going to dance to something slow first. Then I'll like slowly, slowly work my way up to House of Pain, which I'm sure will be played at your wedding. Yeah. We will also, we'll let the band know one of our main guys is injured. So if you can just do all the slow songs up front. And then like if he gives you a signal that he's good to go then pick things up. If not keep it slow don't embarrass him. There's a lot of hype about his appearance at this wedding so let's just make sure we're not ruining anyone's vision. Yeah, yeah so I don't know yet and I guess I found myself like I'd watch videos online and I'd see slow motion videos

of somebody doing the triple jump or I watch, I have a very strange algorithm. Or watch a rugby player in slow motion. He's like moving, just like shedding tacklers. And I'm just like fixated on their backs of their knees. And I'm just like, look at those fucking tendons go to work. Like you can see them on every single movement. Like you see how important it is. And I was like, it has to be important.

There's no way that this thing isn't important. And it's not a thing where I'm just like, well, I just gotta, I gotta be patient. I just gotta wait it out and it will eventually fix itself. This is never gonna be fixed. I will never have that on one side. And I'm like, how can that be? How can that be that I'm gonna be fine? Yeah. But we'll see. We'll see. I don't know that she maybe she didn't anticipate how active I

actually am. Or maybe she's right. I'm sure. We'll find out when I fully tear it. Yeah. We'll find out when you collapse and another doctor is like, you were walking around. We gave you crutches and a brace. What do you mean you gave them away? In the same way that I got had to like lie on the floor when I got when I heard about how vasectomy goes. She when she was started talking to me, she's like, usually she's showing me the anatomy of it. And she's like, usually when people tear a hamstring or like they pull a tear fully tear the muscle It's up at the top. It's up here And then the muscle just falls down in their leg and I was like, oh my god

I'm sorry I'm gonna just like scoot down to my chair cuz all the blood just left my head It made me very comfortable to know that information or she she described it as the tendon on the bottom Like if you tear those it goes up like a window shade. Like it can like flap up. And I was like, I don't want, I can't keep having this conversation. I know that you're trying to be very helpful right now, but this is making me sick.

I remember when I was getting, when I was deciding between getting surgery on my wrist when I broke my wrist or just using a cast and letting it heal for as long as it needs to heal. And the doctor was like, you're going to want surgery. You're going to want to put a metal plate in there because it'll heal, you know, probably fine if you don't get surgery, but there's a chance that your bone will just, just, just sort of go. Yeah.

Necrosis. And I was, and I was like, where? Yeah. And he was like, just out. Just like, just exactly like that. Listeners can't tell that I'm I'm dismissively waving my hand but that's exactly what the doctor did you said it'll just go out like it would just wander away but there's no there for I

don't know what what what our listeners are like but there's no out for my bones that's all it's all technically in so I when he's out, the bone just wanders somewhere in my arm, underneath the skin, hanging out. By this point, I know all the doors out. I know where it could come out. I've never seen bone come out of those. No. And if it does, I'm not going to enjoy it. There's a bone on the end of your ankle ankle and I did break that off when I was in

college and it was the same situation where the doctor showed it to me and it was separate. And I was like, so what happens to it now? The doctor said, it'll just dissolve. The body will dissolve it. And I was like, what? Like it will just like float freely there until finally it's just gone. And I was like, that's fucking wild. That's something your body does, like your bone just breaks off and your body's like, oh, guess we didn't need this after all. Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle.

Right. What stops my body from going rogue on my other bones? So did you get the plate in your hand? Yeah. Do you set off metal detectors with it? No, I think they beat that system a long time ago. If it was ever in place to begin with, or that might have just been like a Pete and Pete sitcom myth.

Oh, the mom. Yeah. No, but what about you? You can't go in MRIs though, I don't think. You can't ever get an MRI with your hand in there because it heats up metal. Does it? Yeah. I think I just learned. Also, I mean, did they scare the shit out of me with my two MRIs?

Before they let you go in, they ask you a lot of questions about different things that could be in your body. And if you have any metal in your body, like you are not allowed in there, and if you have any metal on you, like a ring or something like that, like it'll burn you. The other thing you're not allowed to do in an MRI, just cross your hands. If you tried to like cross your fingers like that, you would get electrocuted. Why? Because I'm creating a bond? I guess so. You're creating some sort of loop. Like you're not supposed to fold your arms or put your hands together because you will start to feel shocks. And I was like, I don't I'm realizing in that moment, I'm like, I don't guess I don't know what an MRI is.

Yeah. But yeah, you're not allowed to do any of that stuff. And you're they're like, really careful about making sure that you don't have any metal in your body whatsoever. And to the point where I was like, I have a zipper on my pants. Is that a problem? And they're like, yeah, shouldn't be. And I was like, well, let's just fucking take them off. I'm fine with that. That's one of those situations where I feel like I should be able to say I can, I will not be held accountable. If I get these questions wrong. Doctors, you should have a thing, an objective thing that tests if there's metal on me.

Because I don't, I don't know. I don't know at any time what's in me or on me. I would be able to tell you. Also I'm like, now I have a million questions because I'm like, what if I've got an iron surplus in my bones? Is that, or in my blood? Is that going to be a problem? Like, does that just come shooting out at me like that guy from Magneto did in X-Men

2? In X-Men 2 and X-Men United. What's going to happen? But anyway, it all went fine. The MRIs were fine. And in fact, so fine that a miracle happened in my body and I'm fine. Glad to hear it. Thrilled to hear it.

Thank you. We, of course, always wish you a speedy recovery and everything. And as soon as you told me this over text, Shay asked if you could dance and I asked if you could jump. Uh, because we were funny folks, but of course you understand that our main concern was your health and all that kind of thing. We were certainly bracing ourselves for, Soren might not be able to go to the wedding because you can't fly with surgery or something. I don't know how things work. Oh, I would have broken that rule.

I was never concerned about not being able to go to the wedding, but I had all the exact same concerns that you guys raised, which just makes me feel very seen. Can I jump? Can I dance at the wedding? Like those are the things where I was like, well, these are my immediate future.

These are the things I was looking forward to most. When I hurt my back, it was certainly I have a half marathon coming up. At this point, it's in three days. And I have a wedding and I need my back for both of those things. And it's It's. It's it's it's a cliche to say that you're like you're like pleading to a higher power and you're trying to like. Get your circumstances to change. Mine was very much less pleading and a whole lot more negotiating as one would a business peer where it's like, listen, this doesn't work for me right now. Not having my back for the next 25 days is out of the question. So let's, let's start there. And then let's see. Let's see what we want to do after that. I go on hiatus mid November, perfect time to knock me out completely.

You can have November, December, mid January, that's's yours if you want to lay me out, fine. We will have taken the pictures and I will have danced and I will have run the half marathon. So can we just be adults about this and be reasonable people and work with me? And that strategy seems to have worked out. You tried to big time your injury and it was successful. Yes. Which it teaches us, and I also had a miracle happen after I asked for a miracle, it teaches us really bad lessons honestly for the rest of our lives that we're gonna depend on. Which is... I've learned nothing. No, if anything, the next

time you get severely hurt you're gonna be like, maybe this isn't as bad as it feels. Yeah. Yeah. I'll break my arm and a doctor will tell me that it's broken. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I've been through this before. This is a tough love situation. This is, don't let your bones think you're scared. Don't walk into the room like you're chicken shit.

If you walk in there saying that this is not worth your time, then your bones are gonna start to be like, this guy's really on top of his shit. He's the real deal. I better shit bump. Wow, we're talking to the top brass here. Yeah, well, anyway, I'm glad that yours is moderately recovering. I'm happy to hear that. Yep, dull pain for the rest of my life. Couldn't ask for anything better.

Yeah, dull pain is survivable. We all know dull pain. Did you ever get that date with your wife? No. Rats. I know. I should actually make that. That's a good reminder that I should make that up to her. Because not only does it ruin her night, it also means that she has the kids for the rest of the night too. It's not like, oh, I didn't get to go on a date. It's like you don't get to go on a date and also you're at homework. Here's a pump quiz.

So yeah. All right. Well that's gonna do it for our show. The show is Quick Question with Soren and Daniel but you knew that already. You can find the show on Twitter and TikTok and Instagram and YouTube and all of the other social places and listening places that you go to to engage with a podcast. We have a Patreon and if you subscribe you get bonus episodes, two of them a month. They're shorter, they're looser, they're more fun. Sometimes we ask questions from you, the listener. Sometimes we respond to comments that you, the listener, have made on our YouTube channel. And we do not tell you that we're doing this. So it's possible that we have been responding

to you for months and you are unaware of it until right now. I like this relationship where we say things and don't expect anyone to listen and you say things to us. Well, hold on. How does this work? Neither one of us is ever sure that the other one is listening. And that's the way I like it. It's always it's it's it's got three out of four ingredients for a conversation without

ever actually getting that fourth crucial ingredient, whatever that might be. Not necessary. It's just like my tendon. We don't need it. We don't need it. The theme song is by the fantastic Merex that you can find on Bandcamp. Their music is great. Bandcamp.com slash Merex. We are recorded, edited, engineered, produced by our president of podcast Operations Gabe Harter. This week, his vice president, Jacob Weinstein is taking over duties. Thank you, Jacob. You can email the show at qq with Soren and Daniel at gmail.com. You could find Soren on blue sky where he's doing some real jazz skeets, by which I mean mean his best stuff is the stuff that he is not posting I'm also on there but it doesn't matter nothing does yeah bye I've got a quick quick question for you, alright I wanna hear your thoughts, wanna know what's on your mind I've got a quick quick question for you, alright The answer's not important, I'm just glad that we could talk tonight

So what's your favorite? How did you get? What do I be? Don't you remember? Words without words, word at all, you know You know you know, I forget it Sore and booey Daniel O'Brien Two best friends and comedy writers If there's an answer they're gonna find it I think you'll have a great time here

I think you'll have a great time here