Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - QQ ep 11 - Quick Question with Soren and Daniel

Episode Date: August 13, 2019

Hello again and welcome to another episode of Quick Question with Soren and Daniel. This is the podcast where two best friends get together once a week to help each other make sense of the world by asking and attempting to answer its most trivial and lowest stakes questions. I am writer, comedian, and reluctant podcast host Daniel O'Brien, and as always, I am joined by my co-host, writer, comedian, and American father, Mr. Soren Bui. Yeah, I would say enthusiastic podcast host. If anybody's forcing us to do this, it's me. Okay, so when you say you would say enthusiastic podcast host, you mean that of yourself, or are you correcting me about what I should say? Yeah.

No, no, no, no. I'm certainly not correcting you. You have dragged your feet at every opportunity. I will continue to do so. You'd never guess that I'm seated this entire time for the amount of feet dragging that I'm doing. The audible feet dragging that I've done on this podcast. But you'll hear from me, you'll hear from Soren, you'll also hear from our CFO, Mr. Bacon. Bacon, do you want to say hello?

Hey, Daniel. I prefer Daniel. What the fuck am I, chopped liver? So right out the gate. You say hello to one host? Bacon has done everything wrong. We already did our nice cities. Anyway, once again, the show is Quick Question,

and we'd like to start off by thanking our listeners, a.k.a. Quick Jagger and Charlie what? Okay. So here's why I did that. So Mick Jagger from the Rolling Stones, I made it Quick Jagger. And the drummer of the Rolling Stones is Charlie Watt. And I made it Charlie what?

Because it's a show about questions. Yeah, no, I like this new avenue that you've taken where we're now looking up the yeah so for the word question just to see what else but anyway we'd like to call out one review selected completely at random from one of our listeners and wouldn't you know it this randomly selected one gave us five stars it's from dj problem solver and this person writes so it has become a staple for me to listen, laugh, nod in agreement or disbelief in their answers to the quality quick questions. I wanted to make sure I rated this the five it deserves, but at the same time acknowledge that I lack the Daniel

to my Soren or vice versa as the day decides. I find envy in their broship they have. It's infectious to listen to. Bacon, you You demand a couple of things about that. One. Thank you. Thank you very much. I really appreciate that. We appreciate every review. And that was a kind thing for you to say.

Uh, I was really, Oh, I also, I, I love a bacon shout out. We know that I'm a huge bacon fan, even though he routinely biffs opportunities on this podcast.

Every opportunity he's had so far stumbles out of the gate, base plans. No, people have attached themselves to Quispy Quesadillas to a level that no other name has gotten so far. Today on Twitter, you wrote the Quannled Quacks, which I stared at for a long time and I shouldn't have because I was driving. And I was like, what does he mean? And I was like, does he mean Donald Duck?

But that wasn't even my first thought. It was, does he mean Donald Quack? Who is Donald Quack? Another colossal failure. But another thing that I liked about this this review is uh this person saying i lack the daniel to my soren or vice versa as the day decides which first i love the poetry of as the day decides uh and second of all i hadn't considered the fact that there would be uh listeners out there quizners out there who some questioners out there, who some days they're a me and some days they're a you.

I feel like this was chained to my neck at birth that I'm a me. You can't escape it. I don't some days be Soren. Yeah. I guess that's kind of nice, though. It's nice that you could wake up any day you could be anybody you want that you might you might have like your very best day i don't know which is which and i don't want to speculate no but i want you to speculate that i i want us to talk about

this on the show like i think if i had a gun to my head it would be soren is when i wake up and i'm sore and i'm confident and i i rule the day when i wake up and i'm dora dan i can't even fucking get my name right dora if that doesn't tell you everything about this dichotomy well go on when you wake up and you're a Dan, what happens? Less confident and I'm nervous. I stand in the middle of my apartment and I'm holding a sock in my hand and I'm like, I know I'm supposed to do something with this, but I just can't think of it right now. That's a standard Daniel morning. Here's how I would break it down.

When you wake up in the morning and everything is just sort of falling into place for you and going right, that's a Soren day. When you wake up and you're on and you're killing it and the work that you did is paying off, that's a Daniel day. Okay. So it's natural charisma versus preparation? Yeah, I think it's like God-given talent versus basketball IQ out there on the court. LeBron James versus Chris Paul. No, it's like J.R. Smith. I'm the J.R. Smith of this situation.

Like, J.R. Smith can give you some of the most profound dunks you've ever seen in your life, but that motherfucker doesn't train. He doesn't have any... He has zero ball IQ. Like, that's why he plays off the bench. But I thought, in addition to using this question as a way to alienate all of our fans

who don't care anything about sports i thought it would be have we ever talked about on this show like how we became friends do you know do you remember no no i mean it's not like the nuts and bolts of it is not the most exciting thing in the world we worked in the same building and my boss at the time knew that you were a comedy person and a writer person. You just happened to work for an adjacent content site at Demand Media where we both worked. And you were on the side creating sketches and articles for Cracked. And he was like, you two should meet because you're both roughly this, you're in the same age group and you're

both doing comedy. So you should meet. So we set up a lunch where we all went out to lunch together uh which is not a good story but the the part of the story that always resonates with me that i i think about is like a testament to what a good person you are that i was in los angeles for i think a month at this point so i moved in july and then in august you uh came up to me we'd only had the one lunch at that point. And you very diplomatically, very matter-of-factly were like, Daniel, do you have any friends? And I was like, no. Do you have any friends in Los Angeles?

It wasn't just like you weren't prepping me to bully me. You weren't doing recon to ruin my life you're like do you have any friends in los angeles yet and i was like no not a single one i don't do anything and you you very kindly invited me to a party you were just like i couldn't go to that party at the time but it was enough that you would set it up like there's going to be a party at my apartment. There's really nice people there. There's going to be great folks there. It's a, it's, it's a rooftop. There's going to be, I can't remember if it was a pool or a jacuzzi, but you, you described a very nice party and you were like, you will meet a lot of people there. And I couldn't go to that party, but I already decided I don't need to meet a lot of people.

I've decided Soren is my friend now. And then just howled around with you like one of those yappy dogs in a Looney Tunes commercial that just like bounces around the more powerful dog. We have very different memories of this event then. Because, I mean, I do remember, I know how hard it is being in a new place in a new city where you don't know anybody and you're, and like everyone's already established their friend groups and people don't need more friends. Like you, when people have lived in one area for a long time, they'll meet people and be like, oh, that person was really nice. All right, well back to my life.

And they don't make it the effort to then be like, well, let's hang out with them more often, especially guys like guys don't do that. And I've been in that situation before. And I was seeing I saw you get to this get to L.A. You still looked a little like wonderstruck, like this all happened at once. You had to move out here for your job and you knew no one. And I was like, I've listened. I've been there before. I'll introduce you to some people that I think are really great.

They're my friends. And that will be fun. But I also, when we went on that first lunch, the setup for that lunch was that Cracked was going out to celebrate that you were there. And Orange just happened to invite me because he was like, you do a little bit with Cracked. Why don't you come too? And during that lunch, I was like, oh, this guy's great. Like, he's really funny and he's smart. And, uh, I was like, oh, I'd like to hang out with him more often.

Like the one thing that you never do, uh, in, when you already have your established friend group, unless somebody is like really great. Unless you meet somebody who you're like, God, I, that person was so funny. Or like that person could knew ever all the same stuff I knew. And then you want to spend time with them. And so I was then i would i would ask you do you want to come play poker do you want to come to this yeah do you want to come to this event with us or when you i found out that you were volunteering i was like oh fuck yeah i'll come volunteer with you so i don't i don't think either one of us was necessarily like uh the it was not like the big boss, little boss from the old cartoons where one's a dummy and one's just abusive.

Like we both of us were like, oh, I like you. I do think I learned a lot from you about male friendship and reaching out because that was not a thing that I thought to do. And even separate from male and female. Yeah. Like you have a friend group. Like I could see someone in my, my twenties that seems interesting or seems nice. And she'd be like, well, shame. I've already got the correct amount of friends. Don't need to upset that balance by adding another one. Even though I like this person, like that was an unheard of concept

until I met you. And you were just like, Hey, let's, let's hang out. And I remember early times where you would like, we didn't know each other that well, but you would like on Yahoo instant messenger, send me a link to an article from a different website that wasn't either of our websites. And we're like, what is, what is this? What do you want me to do with this? And you were just like, I read it and it resonated with me and I thought it might resonate with you. And I was like, ah. I want to share it. Okay. Shared experience, eh? All right.

I'm onto your tricks. Yeah. So, I mean, I know what I look like. I look like a Joffrey. Like, that's just how I go through life. And when people first meet me, they don't want to like me. That's like, I give off a vibe that's very, I would say punchable. Like there, and so to, to, to counterbalance that I've spent a lot of my life being as

kind and as nice as possible to not give them a reason for that and to try and change that. But that's only like on first blush. Then after that, you were somebody who, you made a lot of great jokes during it. Or like when we would IM at first, I was like, he's really funny. And you seem like a good guy. And I was like, I'd like to hang out with him more often. And so I really made an effort uh which i occasionally do i did that for uh alex schmidt too when he first moved to la um because he moved here he was a really nice he's like this is gonna sound really sappy but like people like

you and alex they're you can just sort of tell with somebody like when the first few times you you hang out with them like if they're a good heart. And you don't hurt good hearts. You encourage that because everything else in the world is going to try and hurt a good heart. And so you need somebody there who's going to foster that and be like, no, don't change. You're perfect. Don't change. You're doing everything right. This is too sweet. I don't even know how to get out of this. Bacon, you want to blow this moment? Can you please jump in with literally anything? Yeah. Uh, Dan, when I, when I first met you, uh, I, you, you were doing that thing where you were taking over a conference

room and booking it and calling it your office. And, uh, I didn't, I didn't know your sense of humor yet. And so I was like, who the fuck is this guy? Like, I need to book this conference room for a meeting. And you'd be like, do you want me to get out of my office? And I'd be like, I just started here a week ago. He wasn't even writing in there. He was in there playing One Tap Quest.

Yeah, I remember that too. Glad we got that. So now that that's all out of the way, let's get into the show. Hey, Soren, quick question. now that that's all out of the way, let's get into the show. Hey, Soren, quick question. How did it feel seeing your name as a written by credit on television? Because that has happened since we last spoke. I was watching TV. I DVR'd it to watch it. It was an episode of American Dad. It was very funny. And on the screen, it said written by Soren Bui. It was just your name, written by soren buoy it was just your name

written by soren buoy i took a picture of it i sent it to you how's it feel yeah uh pretty surreal i it also because you know with your with the first episode on a show it's so little of it is actually yours i mean the people who actually know what they're doing are rewriting a bunch of it so there's that episode from my original draft went through another four rewrites after that. And what little there is like my fingerprints are faded on that, on the original, on the final product.

So it's like a nice gesture basically. Um, but it doesn't really feel like it's fully mine. Does that make sense? So it was cool to see my name on television. I thought that was really neat. But it wasn't like, oh, yeah, this is mine. This is my baby.

I hope everyone really likes it. I have many follow-up quick questions. One of them is just like an industry inside baseball question, I guess. Just so people know, this is an animated show. This came out last week. What was it, July 29th? Was that the date? July 29th?

Yeah. When did you hand in your draft of the script? Do you remember the date? Yeah, I do. I'd turn mine in February 26th, I think. And that's a standard turnover time? Sorry, that's of 2018. Yeah.

So I turned it in in February 2018 and it didn't air until July of 2019. There were two women on the show who their episodes, they had already been on the show for a year before I started. Their episodes didn't air until about two months before mine. another quick question on this same subject did you

uh watch like did you have to make an event out of watching it with people when it when it happened live yeah i did i i watched it so i don get TBS, but I happen to be in Colorado, which is where my parents live. Well, my hands are tied. There's no way I can get it. TBS is just, I don't know, cost prohibitive maybe? So good. That's the most soaring thing I've ever heard in my life. You're like, well, I can't reduce my earth world costs

I can't put together that TBS package for the show I write on. I crunch the numbers I can't do it a lot of that is going to go towards my climbing slippers yeah I went to Colorado and it happened to be on during that time and so I watched it at my parents house and then some good family friends

who are also over 70 came over and watched it. Now they watched it without any context. My mom has very little context. I think my dad's the only one who's seen more than three episodes of the show. So it has like a vague idea of who everybody is. And they came into a blind and they were, they were not fans. Yeah. And my wife, Colleen, uh, she was also there and my son and my son was like laughing at stuff, which is really great. I obviously not the right parts, but like people would make a face in it and he'd be really into that. Uh, and then my wife is not, she, I mean, she, I don't know that she knows all the etiquette of being an audience member. She knows better than certainly my parents or the Marshes did.

She's turning me every once in a while and going, it's good. I'm like, oh, don't do that. Then I can tell that it's going downhill fast with the other family that's there. My parents are tolerating it. And then at one point my mom chimes in cause she came to the table read the first table read that I had. I invited her because I thought that was so cool. And she was like,

Oh, a lot has, they changed a lot of your stuff. They changed a lot of it. And I was like, yeah, yeah, they did.

Um, I mean, I'd still, it's good. Like I still lot of it. And I was like, yeah. Yeah, they did. I mean, it's good. I still like what they did. I'm not... She's trying to drive a wedge between me and the rest of them to protect me from our family, for our family and friends. No, no, no. He didn't write this. Somebody else ruined it. He wrote something else. It was perfect from his hands.

And so she was trying to do that and she was, there's like a, there's a suicide in it. And she, that's where she really started being like, no, no, no, he, this isn't the one that he wrote. And I was like, no, I mean, that was in it from the beginning, like pulling her down with me, just drowning us both. When, when you, uh, when you you guys i have a question for you guys when you uh write something and it's either not received as well as you thought or you're watching

it with other people is that the same feeling as as being on stage and having like a bombing experience or uh no no i think it's worse to bomb on stage you're looking at the audience that way uh but when you and at least i have something to focus on that's not one of us not them or not me like we can just all stare at the television we don't have to look at each other's faces it's like why it's easier to have a really deep hard conversation in a car than it is sitting on the couch together i guess i watch things differently because when i would watch when i was first out here uh writing for last week tonight i would watch with my brother and sister-in-law because i was staying with them at the time and uh there's no like no episode is written by one person we all

work on every episode in some capacity and uh a lot of times I just know like, I know which specific jokes that made it onto television are my jokes. So now I am sitting there watching my brother and sister-in-law watch the show to see, because I don't tell them in advance which jokes are mine.

I don't tell them afterwards either because that's gauche. So I just wait to see if they laugh at a joke that I wrote. And I have so much invested in that. And like when I'm doing standup, like I'm on stage and I just think like, I could turn this around or if I'm bombing, I'm bombing or,

or whatever. But now I'm just sitting here and it's like, it's what's, what's done is done. I know my joke is coming up and I'm going to see their reaction and hope they do it right. Yeah, they do. Do they laugh generally?

They're generous people and they're very kind. So I think they laugh harder at most things when they know they're watching it with me. Okay. Yeah. Just in case, like they're covering their bases. Like any joke that feels like it could be Daniel's, they're like, oh yeah, that felt like, that was italics in the script. That's gotta be Dan's.

But I had one final quick question, which is actually a longer quick question about this. It's gonna be kind of like a roundabout way of getting at it. Yeah, go ahead. And it's, do you ever intentionally lower your expectations out of self-preservation? And the reason that I'm saying this is relevant to what we're talking about right now is

I remember watching the first episode I did for Last Week Tonight with my brother and sister-in-law, and I had already seen the taping happen, so I know that the audience reacted to jokes. I know that the episode went well. But the only thing that I was thinking of was they're going to show the credits at the end where they have all the writers' names, and I had mentally prepared myself. A, they're going to... I'm new.

It's my first week here. They're going to forget to put my name in the credits, and that's fine. Just assume they're not going to put your name in the credits, and they'll apologize at work the next day, and they'll, in future airings of the episode, they'll put your name in there. But just get ready ready that's going to happen if that doesn't happen they're going to spell your name wrong they're going to do o'brien with an a don't worry it's going to happen just deal with it it'll be embarrassing but like now that you know it's going to happen it's going to be fine c they're going to do dan instead of daniel one of these three things we're going to was going to do Dan instead of Daniel. One of these three things was going to happen.

They're definitely not going to say Daniel O'Brien in the credits of this show. So put that out of your mind. Accept it's going to be one of these three fates. And then I'm either I get exactly what I expected or if they do the thing that that I'd wanted, I'd privately hoped for, Daniel O'Brien, then I'm just surprised. And luckily I was surprised. And like, it shouldn't have been luckily because HBO is a company full of adults and they do this thing, these things all the time. And I'm part of a union that takes this kind of thing very seriously. So I should have just walked into the situation knowing that they would have gotten my name

right in the credits, but I still couldn't allow myself to do that. I need to lower expectations so I can only be surprised. And I wondered if you ever do that for anything. I mean, I do, but man, those are the, all all the iterations that you had planned out in your mind of what would go wrong like that doesn't come from nowhere you've been clearly burned in in high school you went to a smaller high school so i don't know if this is a situation that's going to translate but when you we were in a slightly larger high school, and when you turn like driver's license age on your birthday, everyone goes to take the driver's test on their birthday. That's the thing you do. As soon as you're allowed to take the driver's

test, you do it. You take off school that day, you take the driver's test. I, and there's like so much pressure built up to that because you know, oh, it's this person's birthday. He's not in school. He's taking the driver's test. Let's see if he comes back with his license. And I was so nervous that I was going to fail my driver's test, not because I was a bad, but I just thought I don't, I can't handle the pressure that people are going to be wondering if I passed my driver's test or not. So I just told everyone in advance, Hey, I'm not going to be in school on my birthday, but I'm not taking my driver's test that day. I'm, I'm just taking off for a different reason. I have to wait a certain amount of months to take my driver's license test because I, I filed my paperwork late. So it was this whole thing because I, I assumed I would,

yeah, I assumed I was going to fail and I didn't want to tell anyone that, but I was like, for sure you're going to fail and that's going to be bad, but it would be worse if people knew that you failed. So just like, don't let them know. And then I had to like sheepishly come to school the next day and be like,

Hey, by the way, guys, all all my best friends i got my driver's license yesterday i lied to you about not taking it yeah just in me to assume like just in you to for sake of self-preservation. I mean, I feel that a little bit. I had that with really big events in my life. Like when I got this job, I was nervous to tell people because it was just like, it doesn't feel real yet. It doesn't feel real until I sign something. And I know it can be pulled back at any second because I don't know if I've told you a bunch of this,

but when I got out of college, I was trying to be an actor in Los Angeles. And what a lot of that is, is like you go in for an audition, then you come back for a callback if they like you. Then after that, you come back for maybe another one. Then you go to a screen test. And then they're like, all right,

well, they've got you on a veil. And what that means is that they've booked you out for a certain amount of time where you're not allowed, like, they're like, don't try and don't get another job during this time because we want you for this role. And then at the last second, it can all fall apart. And it's not just like they chose somebody else. It's like the whole project gets shelved. There's like a hundred thousand reasons that this thing could go wrong. they chose somebody else it's like the whole project gets shelved there's like a hundred thousand reasons that this thing could go wrong and then when people you're at a party or something and somebody's like oh you're being that you're an actor okay or have you been in anything like what are you doing now you can't tell them that whole story you just have to be like no i'm not working i'm i have another job where i test dvds and like and so that you that kind of good news like it didn't feel like i was gonna jinxx it, but it felt like, man, this stuff goes wrong all the time. And I don't want to be in that situation where I then have to backtrack, where I tell somebody this thing and then they ask about it. And then I have to be like, oh, no, it didn't.

It didn't actually happen. But I think everybody kind of feels that. that the only time I can really say that I felt what you're feeling was with my son when he was born or like about to be born where I was just like in my, in the back of my mind, prepping for something to go wrong. Like that something would be bad here because I didn't want to be in a situation where I wasn't prepared for that. And so my brain was just going through basically everything that could go wrong and like planning out for those scenarios. And then and then I somehow I'd be more prepared for emotionally prepared for it. So like when Colleen had like a tough, a tough labor, when we finally had him, it was sort of a shock to me that like everything was good and fine.

I was like looking him over and like, right. He didn't come out as like a bag full of spiders or whatever uh right yeah he wasn't he wasn't a litter of puppies he wasn't any of those things and uh then the pediatrician comes through and like they may handle your child for a little bit and they do the same thing and she's like he's got this like weird uh uh swelling next to his ear on the back of his head and i was like yeah that's the thing there it is oh that's no problem okay i can live with that he does that on the back of his head. And I was like, yeah, that's the thing. There it is. Oh, that's no problem.

Okay, I can live with that. He does that for the rest of his life. And then, you know, that went away. And I was like, what? And then it really affected me throughout like the first three months of his life where I was just expecting this other shoe to drop in a very dark way where I was like, this, it's too good. Everything is too good.

This can't be, I don't deserve this. Uh, something bad is going to happen. And I had this very ominous feeling for a very long time that I couldn't shake. Uh, and it, it like, is it gone now? Okay, good. Yeah. Cause your son's perfect. Did you, uh, hear about that?

Did you read that story about the seven-year-old in India? They found he had jaw pain and his mother was worried it was a tumor. So they brought him to the doctor and it was that they found 576 teeth. Oh shit, no, I did hear this. In his head that they had to pull out. Yeah. Yeah. My son has been to the dentist a few times and I've been like

I want him to take x-rays because I'm so curious about the inside of a child's head because those adult teeth are already in there. And so if you see the inside of their skull, it's just like there's teeth on the bottom and then there's these big fuck off teeth over the top of them that are just waiting.

like there's teeth on the bottom and then there's this big fuck off teeth over the top of them that are just way yeah um no i didn't i i hadn't read the story but i just saw the headline for it yeah i don't think i need to look at that there there's there's apparently a kind of tumor that grows teeth and hair and this this kid had one yeah yeah and teratoma tumors and they can they can have nervous systems like when you touch them they shrink back carefully even when they're disconnected from the body they can grow them in like non-teeth and hair places too like you can get like oh ovaries and stuff yeah yeah like you'll just get like a batch of teeth and hair somewhere weird oh god um go for it dan i have a quick question for you speaking of friendships we're both in our 30s now and i've realized in my later life that there are like tacit rules of friendship friendship that i have that i'm i'm quietly angry at my friends for when they

break them even though we've never explicitly said what the rules are. But there are certain things now as an adult that I just don't, I don't think friends should ask of each other. And I was going to ask you, do you have a set of rules in your mind that things you just won't do for a friend now that you're 30 and that you think is almost insulting if they ask you to do? There might be a major difference. There's a list of things. This is a very Irish Catholic thing to do. There's a list of things that I think it's wrong for a friend in their 30s to ask me to do, but I will still do them. I don't think someone should ask me to help them move at this age, no matter what. And that's actually probably for the last like seven years of my life. I don't think you should ask me to help you move.

I'm. Yes. I'm sooner to like, like if someone asked me to help them move right now, I would be like, how much do movers cost in your town? I'll just pay for that. That's the friendship thing that I'm going to do. And I'm going to do it passive aggressively as a way of letting you know that you should have been doing this already because it's absurd to ask friends after a certain age to help you move. I completely agree. If a friend today asked me to help them move, I'd be like,

what's going on in your life? I mean, obviously you don't want me to actually help you move do you just need to talk about something what i'm trying to think what what other things um that one oh um staying if you're gonna like i like to take trips with with with friends a lot like get cabin together go we're gonna do this for fourth of july we're gonna do this for 4th of July. We're going to do that for some kind of winter celebration thing. I'm past the point in my life where I'm going to not sleep in a bed somewhere. Unless I'm camping, obviously. But if it's like, yeah, we're going to get this house and like, you know, you're going to double up on beds. And some of us are going to sleep on couches.

Like, no, thank you. If that's the situation, like I'll get a hotel near there and join you for festivities but i'm i'm not gonna sleep on the floor because of my back and neck i think i think i was witness to the moment that that happened for you because we've been on some trips with cracked where we slept in uncomfortable situations we slept on couches and stuff but i think i was there we had done a trip to idle wild to go film our star wars series and we were all in these like camp bunk beds and the for the first night and then after that you went no i'm not doing it and you said i'm i'm gonna go rent my own place and and they the camp does that the camp like rented out the nurses i mean to both of

us you were there too yeah well once i found out that you could do it i want my own room and i don't want to be in a loft that is designed for like nine 12 year olds that are now full of a bunch of sweaty 25 year old crew members farting with complete abandon. It's like, no, this is, I've, I make too much money for this. I've outgrown this. Yeah. Another one that I, that I do, and I'm really genuinely pissed off when people ask me to do it, I'll still do it. But when a friend's asked me to, to take them to the airport.

Yeah, that's, when did you, when did you stop doing that? when people ask me to do it. I'll still do it. But when a friend's asked me to take them to the airport. Yeah. That's, when did you, when did you stop doing that? When did that stop being an acceptable practice for you? I guess it probably was around the same, around the time

maybe that Uber and Lyft started. Okay, so that's pretty recent. Or, yeah. I would still take people occasionally. LA is a different story as well because it's so big. And the idea of going to the airport is a half day event. And that's a really big ask of somebody.

And you can't say no. And that's why I get so angry. I'm like, you know I can't say no to this, you motherfucker. And so when somebody asked me to take them to the airport, that is putting an unnecessary onus on me. It's like, I know you have other ways to get there. You have, there's the flyaway, like there's a bus that costs $5. That's very easy to get to just because you don't, you're too lazy to go do that. You're like, no, I'll get a friend to take me. Oh, maybe Soren will take me. When we worked at crack, well, actually before I worked at crack, when we worked atand Media, there was a woman who came up to me

and I didn't know who was my superior and who wasn't there because it was a big company. This woman, Lori, and she was like, I was wondering if you could take me to the airport this afternoon. And I was like, hell yeah.

Opportunity to prove myself. And as we're going, I'm realizing this is our CEO's assistant. But she had no jurisdiction. Like that was not a shame, a sanctioned event. She was like off to, to see friends. And, and she asked me to drive her to the airport during rush hour. And everyone around me was like, don't do it. And I was like, no, you don't understand. I already committed. I thought she was my boss. And, uh, and I was so upset about that. And then I think after that, I was like, no, you don't ever put that on somebody else.

You can find a way to the airport. I have a bunch to say about this. It's tough because I, growing up in Jersey, which is very different from Los Angeles, we have like the two airports. We have Newark and Atlantic City. And also pre-Lyft, pre-Uber. I mean, there were taxes, obviously, but none of them, you know, you're not gonna get a taxi from Hazlitt, New Jersey to Newark airport. And for many years, for decades of your life, airport trips are a thing that a close friend

or family member does. That's, that's like a very normal thing. And, uh, so I understand the impulse of people to be like, who, who is someone in my, in my new life who will take me to the airport and reach out to like a Soren type, for example. Um, but I also know like, like thinking back now, I had you drive me to the airport once in Los Angeles. And when I was living in the Valley, were you in Beverly Hills? This is one of the, this is, in retrospect, this is a terrible thing to do. To have you drive from Beverly Hills to the Valley in the morning to pick me up out of Sherman Oaks and then take me to LAX. You should have fucking killed me. You did that. I can't believe I did that. Honestly, like looking back on You, you should have fucking killed me. You did that.

I can't believe I did that. Honestly, like looking back on it, that doesn't sound like me. It was very kind of you, but I was still like early twenties. So in the mindset of like airport rides are reserved for people who are close to you. That's Soren. He will do that. Right. And I made you do this horrible trip.

That's like, that's,'s that's that's your whole day at that point yeah all the way to the valley and back that would be especially if it was a weekday but i can't i i don't know i don't i don't hold any animus against you i feel like that's animosity against you that was uh that's fine if. If I'd asked you when we were both in our 30s to drive me to the airport, would you say, is there ever a circumstance where you would say no? Where you'd just be like, nope. Yeah, well, first I would say, with you, I would say, why? And then I would give you all the other options that you had available to you. Because I would assume, no, Dan's a logical person.

If I just tell him these other things exist, he'll do that instead. But yeah, I mean, eventually anybody I would drive to the airport to this day, but I would I would be resentful. Oh, you know, it's different with family, though. I still my parents. Of course, my parents pick me up and take me to the airport. My brother will pick me up and take me to the airport. And that's the kind of thing, like I don't feel bad putting them out at all. In fact, with our family, it would be more insulting if I said,

no, stay home, I'm going to get to you my own way, don't worry about that. Like that's worse at that point in terms of repressed Irish Catholic madness if I had gone to the airport and then taken a cab without taking someone up on their offer of kindness. Yeah, and I'm realizing a lot of my own personal little rules are actually monetary based. They're like, once you're in your thirties, you should be able to handle this on your own with your own money, which maybe isn't entirely fair. Like splitting the bill at a restaurant.

I get sort of heated about it. I'm just like, just let me fucking pay it. I don't care. In your notes before we did this episode, what do you mean by that? The splitting the bill at a restaurant? What are you talking about? I mean, if I go to a,

if we, if I go to a restaurant with friends, like we actually make the plans, like we're going to go out and maybe it's just one other person. I don't want to then at the end of the meal, have them like look over the check and be like, okay, let's see.

Well, I had this drink. I had, well, we split the dessert. So I'm just going to split that in half. And like, they're trying to,

they're trying to actually split the bill. I will just, I would way prefer to just give it to me. I'll pay it. And next time you can do it. Or like we'll work something else out. Because I hate the idea of pinching it down to like each penny. And being like how much each person owes.

I feel the same way. It drives me crazy. I want to be past the point of like we're going to turn the receipt over and we're each going to write down what we want to pay next to like the last four digits of our credit card and at that point i'm just like just we're gonna have food together again at some point and this will all balance out in the wash and like if it it sounds very privileged when i say it like that, it sounds like money is, is no object or whatever.

Um, but it's still like, even if you are pinching pennies at the time and you, and you really want to spend exactly what you want to spend and that's fine too. Like I'll just, I'll, I'll cover it.

Your, your friends will cover it. It's going to be fine. Right. Don't worry about it. I don't know. This conversation is running away from me. You guys two are, I bet you're okay with splitting the bill in half, right? Yeah, that's fine. I think that's the difference.

That's fine. It's when people want to go through each, and then they're like, well, I'm going to wait to put tip in until I see what everybody else puts in. That kind of shit, it drives me nuts. But I don't think it's just monetary because there are other rules. Like I don't want to go to your, I don't want to be asked to go to your show anymore. I don't want people to be like, I'll look,

I'm graduating from groundlings one-on-one. Like, uh, it would be really nice to get a lot of heads there. Like you're going to serve a purpose as opposed to, I think you would really like this. Uh, I,

I get very upset about that now, quietly, of course. And it's because I think I value my own time more now that I'm older. Like you actually can put a value on your time in a way that you didn't when you were straight out of college. In my early 20s, it felt like I had this inexhaustible bounty of time. And I was so philanthropic with it. I would just give it away. And now that I'm older, I'm like, no, this is mine. You're older and you also have a son.

Left to your own devices, that's where your time goes. My day's already pretty full. Ideally. Right. I think you're more interested in kind of like the idea of the adventure when you're young too. It's like, oh, well, this will be interesting. Maybe this will turn into something. Maybe this will turn into a story in my life if I do this thing for this person. But those the rewards never meet the expectation in those types of situations. And I'm just like, this is my my time. And you should value it. I think people everyone should value their time more. And we just don't. We treat it like it's free, especially on the internet too. It's like, not to get off track here, but you get into a fight with somebody on the internet. You're like, man, don't give that person your time.

That's like the last person who deserves your time. That's yours. Yeah. So anyway, yeah, I should really put together a list in my head and then just disseminate it be like listen everybody these are the rules i'm gonna operate by them i would appreciate if you did too certainly don't want to sleep on the floor or double up on a bed or sleep on a couch um i don't know i feel like big parties i don't want to go to. You guys missed a great one too that I think someone mentioned about you don't ask anyone if you're going to stay somewhere,

you don't ask to stay more than two days max. That one drives me cuckoo when people are visiting for six nights. Yeah. Again, family does not count. I'll have my family stay with me as long as they want. But when a friend asks to come into town, they does not count. I'll have my family stay with me as long as they want. But when a friend asked to come into town, they're like, Hey, I'm going to stay for a week.

You're like, are you fucking kidding me? A week is a week. A week is too much. You're going to crash. Um, yeah, I'm with you at three.

And yeah, I would say two nights, three days. Like that's a good amount. And if you are going to stay more than that, you have a lot of work to do as a guest. You're going to be cooking a meal maybe two of those nights. You should go to the grocery store for them, even if you don't eat any of their food.

And you're making your bed each day. It's not an easy job to be a house guest when you're in your 30s because you know how important it is to be a good house guest. I just had a house guest for a week and so I can't say anything because I know I know she'll listen to this podcast. So even if I'm not speaking directly about her, she'll assume I'm speaking directly about her. But I can just say that I broadly agree with Sora. I just had one too. I don't know if they'll listen to this but it was somebody who was like hey i'm coming to come into la for a week and i want to stay with you and i

know this person has other friends in la and they're not even going to make the effort to like bounce around and so i i go okay here's my plan i'm gonna say give me the dates and then i'm gonna say no i'm away for the first three days smart But you can come for the next two or three. And did that. And this person said, oh, no, that's cool. I'll just change the dates of my trip. And changed it so that they could still come for a full seven days. I mean, that's a bad.

I hate that person. And then didn't rent a car. In your case, I blame that person. In my case, I will always blame me because I have this strange mental hang-up where I can't not let someone know that they can stay with me whenever they're in town. It's like I don't know how to say goodbye at the end of a conversation.

If I meet someone who is not from, in the past, LA, and now in New York, and I meet them and we're having a conversation and I don't know how to get out of it, I'm just like, well, if you're ever in town, let me know. You can crash with me for as long as you want. Bye. I love you. I don't know. It's a real problem of mine that I let everyone intimate and casual and like new acquaintance, no matter what our level of friendship is, I will always tell people that they can stay with me and that it's no problem. But I want America to know it is always a problem.

I'm just trying to be polite because I want people to like me, but it kills me inside when we do this. Yeah, I don't expect anyone to take me up on that with that that's happened to me once where there was in college and even in college college is the time when i think you can get away with that kind of shit and it's fine we're all kids we don't know what we're doing yet but there were these two people who were saying oh we're gonna be we're gonna try and road trip from L.A. back to Connecticut where we're from. And I was like, oh, cool.

Well, if you're through Colorado, look me up. Monsters. And they did. And then they came and stayed with me and my parents. And I didn't know these people very well. I thought maybe like, oh, you're coming through Colorado. I'll buy you some pizza that has honey on the crust. No, they wanted to come stay at my house.

My house where I live. We met when we were children we were 11 years old we did a play together we did a local theater knockoff version of snow white and the seven dwarves that was called something like the enchantment of white princess because we couldn't get the rights to the real one and we met in this play 11 years old and uh we had a showmance which is a portmanteau of show and romance, which happens in every play that has ever happened in the history of plays. And we were like, we are cute and we like each other. And we used to write letters to each other for about two or three years, starting in sixth grade and then lost touch, as people do. And then got in touch again many years later she is now like a

like a Broadway actress and I do whatever it is that I do and I was talking to her over the internet in Los Angeles like you remember when we met it's crazy you're doing so well and she was like yeah I'm really happy I get to do theater and tour around a lot I was like oh well if you're ever in Los Angeles let me know you can crash here I was like, oh, well, if you're ever in Los Angeles, let me know. You can crash here. She was like, okay, I will. And then she just did. Showed up in Los Angeles when I was like 26 years old.

We met when we were 11. And she was like, I'm here. I'm in LA for two weeks. Yeah, and she did. She like stayed in my apartment. And I was like, yeah, I guess you could stay here. And it happened to coincide with the second week of the two weeks that she was there. I was going to Hawaii with my family and I was like, I'm not going to be here for the second week. I guess if you want, you can, I could just give you the keys and you can stay here. And she was like, okay, yeah, great. And she just did. Oh my God. No. Yeah.

She stayed in your apartment without you. Let me also, I, knowing how chivalric you are, let me guess that you gave her your bed and then you slept on the couch while she stayed there. Yeah, I figured. Okay.

That's brutal, man. That is rough. It was very, she, she was one of the better house guests I've ever had. Honestly. Kept to herself. That's brutal, man. That is rough. She was one of the better house guests I've ever had. Honestly. Kept to herself.

That's good. Kept the apartment clean. Yeah. I mean, I'll say family is totally different. Like even like my sister-in-law wanted to come stay with me. That would be fine, too. I'd be totally for that. Like extended family. That's all a totally different story but when it when a friend a friend should

know better and like we're barely friends this woman she's she's great we both live in new york now so we see each other more but it's still it'll always be really strange to me that she was like yeah okay i'll stay in your house that's fine I'll stay in your house. That's fine. I'll stay in your apartment. And even at the time, I was thinking like, what are you? What goes through that person's head? What are you telling your parents? Where do they think you are?

You're like, oh, do you remember Dan from the secret enchantment of White Princess or whatever the fuck that was? Yeah. I'm going to stay with him. What's he been up to the last few the last years no idea could be in prison for all i know yeah i may have just gotten out on an early release no idea um all right well we're out of time dan i'm gonna look up all of our social accounts but before i do um you had told me uh that you didn't think the wage gap was real and you just wanted to take some time to talk about that. Yeah. So what I'm hearing is that for every dollar that a man makes, a woman makes 70 cents, which is insane.

So like I go to work, I'm working all day. I make, let's say, $50. work, I'm working all day, I make, let's say, $50. And then a woman who is not working makes 70 cents for every one of the dollars that I make of that 50? That's absurd. I mean, you've misquoted me. I believe there's a gap. I just think that it unfairly punishes the man, is I suppose the logical extension of this argument that I started making. It's, I find that when I do these as well, like my, my idea is to be like,

I'll lean into this. Oh God, I'm leaning in really far. And then the ground just starts collapsing and I start getting sucked down into this horrible vortex of saying really terrible things. That was wonderful, Dan. Thank you. You can follow Dan O'Brien on Twitter at DOB underscore INC. That's DOB Inc. You can follow Soren. That's me at S-O-R-E-N underscore L-T-D.

Soren Limited. And you can follow Bacon, our CFO at Make Me Bacon Please, P-L-S as please. And that's no spaces in between. You can email us at QQ with Soren and Daniel at Gmail, and you can find us on Twitter though, well, you can find Quick Question on Twitter. I don't know how active the account is at QQ

underscore Soren and Dan, and here's the real doozy, Instagram. Not a single post so far, as far as I know. QQ underscore with underscore Soren underscore and underscore Daniel. Get on that now because I think it fills up. I think that at a certain point there's two people following it on Instagram. Yeah. You can also find Vincent.

He's our sound engineer and our editor. You can find him at SiliconBeachPodcast.com, especially if you want to hire him. And that's... Oh, we also have a Patreon. We're losing patrons. Are we really? Oh, we lost a few.

Oh, boy. I wonder what the turning point was. Can we send out like a survey monkey and find out what made them stop? Backslash quick question jesus christ that's a bad job i'm sorry all right bye