Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - What To Do with Heirlooms
Episode Date: August 13, 2024Daniel got into a (minor) car crash, so the guys talk about car crashes and onlookers and awkward conversations with the police before pivoting to family heirlooms, sentimentality vs. practicality, an...d the importance of throwing away journals. Thanks to Factor for sponsoring this episode. Head to FACTORMEALS.com/qq50 and use code qq50 to get 50% off your 1st box plus 20% off your next month while your subscription is active! Find Soren & Daniel on Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/sorenbowie.bsky.social https://bsky.app/profile/danielobrien.bsky.social
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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 can talk tonight
So what's your favorite? How did you get it?
How could I be your number? Words without words, word and all that you've got to be known I were to die?
Oh forget it!
Sore and booby, 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 So hello again and welcome to another episode of Quick Question with Soren and Daniel the
podcast where two best friends and comedy writers ask each other questions and give
each other answers.
I'm one half of that podcast.
Senior writer for last week tonight with John Oliver, author of How to Fight Presidents
and car crash survivor Daniel O'Brien joined
as always by my co-host Mr. Soren Buie.
Soren, say hello.
No, fuck me.
What?
You were in a car crash?
Uh, so I debated if crash was the right word or if that was...
Oh no, we're already walking it back.
Okay.
Yeah, did you stop abruptly at a stoplight and hit your head on the dashboard?
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I got my car was hit by another driver. That's a crash. And it was entirely their fault. That's a
crash. Yeah. It was it's very light. There's like neither of us were anywhere near considering
seeking medical attention or anything like that.
It was, we haven't recorded in a while, you and I, so this is weeks ago and it's still not a hundred percent resolved.
But I was in a parking lot and I was driving along the storefront of the parking lot in the lane where I'm supposed to be.
And a car was coming down one of the lanes where the cars are parked and he was going to make a left.
While I was going forward, he was going to make a left into my lane and I see his head completely turned to the right as he's moving the steering wheel to the left.
And like it's truly a because it's slow because we're in a. And b, just because this is where all my attention is going. It feels like slow motion. And my instinct
wasn't even, oh, no, this guy is going to hit me. Because that seems so it seems like such a strange
thing to do. Like, I wouldn't hit another car with my car, because that's only an idiot. And so as I'm seeing this guy turning his car into mine, my instinct is like, I'm really interested to find out
how he doesn't hit me because it seems like he's going to. So this is I can't wait to
find out how he gets out of this one. This guy found a unique new way to drive and I
am getting into it. I could learn a lot from this guy because if I didn't know any better, I'd say he's
going to drive straight into me because that's what his body language and his course seems
to be.
And then sure enough, he finally turns his head as I'm there now and I honk my horn a
little bit and he just collides into my car and his end like I get out with
my my arms up not in a mad way just to know like what are you doing? What do you
mean you hit my car? Why do we have to know each other now? And instantly he's
like I'm real sorry man man. That's my fault.
Let's call the police right now.
I was like, yeah, sure, totally.
And it so happens that there's just so much going on in a situation like this under all
circumstances.
And it so happens that this particular parking lot, there's a liquor store right there with
a lot of like 60 year old degenerates hanging
out in front of the liquor store, just like being there. And instantly they all come out
to look at the damage and to say, to like give their report as if we're going to need
them for witnesses.
Well, to be fair, a lot of those guys are, I saw he was coming down here. A lot of those
guys are ex cops. So that makes sense. Sure. Yeah
We're saying like here's this get you know what a couple of them are being witnesses and saying here's what happened
I saw the whole thing and then a couple of them are being like old heads who know cars
So they come up to look at the damage and they're like touching my car and like yeah, you can fix that right up
I just don't a body shop. That's not gonna that's not gonna be too too big of a deal at all
Yeah, it's just a boo- Yeah. It's just a boo boo.
It's just a boo boo. You got, there's no glass broken.
And like we're getting our insurance out and like on hold with the cops.
And we're just like, I think if we could just have like,
if it could just be just the two of us who talked for a while,
that would make me feel better because it's not like shocking or traumatic or
anything like that. There's just a lot to deal with right now.
Like I was on my way somewhere
and now I have to wait for the cops.
And like, I don't need these six degenerates
coming to be part of this endeavor.
And just timing wise, another guy pulls up
who was just some like adjacent degenerate in a car.
He rolls his window down,
doesn't ever come to a complete stop, but he just rolls his window down definitely doesn't ever come to a complete stop
But just rolls his window down and he says if you call the cops
They're gonna let both your insurance companies know and you're both gonna have to pay higher premiums than your insurance company
So just like get it fixed take care of it. Don't tell the cops and then he drives off
So we wait and wait, and the- Go ahead. Go ahead.
I was gonna ask, was the guy that you crashed with, was he a cool head as well?
Was he like, was he good on your level or was he more on the spectrum towards these
guys?
He was good on my level.
He was like a 26 or 27 year old kid.
Cool.
Isn't it funny how 27 year olds are kids now, Soren?
Isn't that great?
Isn't that a fun thing about how time works?
So this child is like, I know exactly what he's thinking
and what he's going through, which is very clearly,
he is dressed for the gym
and this shopping center also has a gym.
I'm assuming that's where he was going to or coming from.
So he had a plan that has also
changed now. And I could see in his face and his body language that he's just like,
this is 100%. This is a thing I'm going to have to deal with now. And it's stupid. And it was
avoidable. And I'm mad at myself. Like he was, he was pissed at himself and I wasn't going to get in
his face and like make him feel better or make him feel worse. Just like he's calling the cops.
He's saying he's sorry.
And it's like it could have been much worse is really all I say to him.
And then we just wait for the cops.
Cop gets there, asks me for my version of events and there's two things going on.
Well, one, I should be very good at this because as writers,
Soren, we're sort of expected to be observers of the world around us and
Oh, what a yard you can we I know
Like give me your version of this night time. Yeah
Hunched over the steering wheel nowhere Nowhere really to go with the tires still
singing on the wet road.
But all of my instincts fled because, one,
it's like a very fresh thing.
And two, he's asking me for my version of events
while the other driver is two feet away from us.
And it is 100% his fault. And he admitted it to me that it was his fault,
but I still, there's like,
like an anti-snitching instinct in me,
especially when I'm talking to a cop.
And even though I want the truth to come out
because it will benefit me,
the cop's like, give me your version of events.
And there's a party that I just like, two cars crashed.
That's all I wanted to say to him. It was like a mere year version of events. And there's a party that is just like two cars crashed. That's all I wanted to say to him was like, we like, you're the
fucking detective. You tell me. And I'm not saying shit to you. But instead, I was just
like, I was in this lane and I was going this way, traveling forward. He was coming this
way. He made a left into my space and the cars hit. That was like my, I don't want to
give the cop information. I also
don't want to be like, this fucking idiot crashed into me. Because again, he's right over there.
And then the cop turns to the other guy and the kid is just like, yeah, I turned left and I was
looking right. It's my fault I drove into him. You were trying to give this version of events where
the same with when cops are giving the report to newspapers on how they shot somebody. It's like,
when cops are giving the report to newspapers on how they shot somebody. It's like, oh, there was a bullet traveling and this person's flesh happened to be in the way of it.
Right. Suspect fled while firearms were discharged and now we're in the news.
And you can fill in the blanks however you want. But the other guy was like very upfront with the
officer and like, this is my fault I did this. And I was like, great. And then we got the police report and there's
I'm still I'm sure everything's going to be fine. There were just too many little details
where the kid was like, officer, by the way, I don't have my insurance on me. And it's
like, that's one of the things that that you always used to need on you all the
time.
He's only 28.
But yeah, the baby is like, I have it on my phone.
And the officer is like, that works because the officer is also a baby.
And it's just me and the six degenerates, the liquor store, my peers.
So he shows his phone to the, to the officer.
And then we finally leave.
And I talked to my insurance company, we get the police report and it confirms that it's
the other, the kid's fault.
And then I get a call from Progressive.
I'm going to name this insurance company and you'll understand why it's not a knock on
them because they're not involved.
It's a very strange thing where they call me and they're like, is this Daniel?
This is Progressive Auto Insurance. We just want you to know that someone filed a claim for an
incident that you were involved in. And they filed it with us to take care of the damages.
And we just want you to know, we are not the insurer of this driver or you. We don't know why
we were called. We are just letting you know. We're not paying for this. I was like
I'm sorry, but it seems like
It was flow. It was it was flow. It was it was every flow. What not her best. No, I know. Yeah
And it's more like an ensemble call now. So like now that's how Jim Cashman's in the background. Yeah
Stephanie Courtney and Nellie Palamedos and Jim Cashman. Look at this. What a strange
amount of information for the two of us to know.
The week that we have on the Flow commercial.
Good Lord. And then I called my insurance company and I'm like, hey, every step of the
way I just like want to get this done. So I've now called my insurance company and I'm like, hey, every step of the way, I just
like want to get this done.
So I've now called my insurance company a few times to be like, hey, is there anything
I can do?
And they're like, no, we filed it with Progressive and they're going to get back to you.
And I was like, hey, me again, Progressive got back to me.
They said it's not their fault.
And I'm inclined to agree with them.
It seems like we woke them up in the middle of the night
Tell them about an accident somewhere else. Yeah
And it was like very kind of them to let me know
that someone screwed up along the chain and I should get back on the case and
My insurance company was like, oh, yeah, you're totally right. It's not progressive
Is this other insurance company that that that I've certainly of, and they called them, and that insurance company,
we've played phone tag a few times, so I think, knock on wood, everything is going to get resolved.
I need to go and get a quote for the damage on my car to get it fixed and reimbursed.
But yeah, just an anticlimactic end to a pretty not dramatic story.
I would say you're so far from over, man.
I don't want to brag, but I've been in a lot of car accidents, Dan.
And you're a long way from the finish line.
I feel sorry for this kid.
I've been in that situation before, where I was young.
I made a stupid mistake on the road.
And then afterwards I'm like, I'm sorry, that was all me.
I take full blame for this.
And then seeing that it's somebody who's a little bit older, distinguished, right?
The person that you're in an accident with and thinking in my heart, because I'm such
a young dumb kid, I'm like, oh, this person's put together and they've got their life together.
Maybe they'll just let me slide.
Like maybe they won't.
They'll be like, you know what?
You're a good kid.
You're gathering up your umbilical cord, I see.
Get back in your car.
You're fine.
You're all right.
And I just said nothing happened.
Because I'm such a meek person and have no alpha bones in my body, I feel like if the kid had said,
can I just give you some cash to take care of this
and then we don't involve the police,
there's a really strong chance that I would have said yes.
I could have been a real pushover,
especially the thing, I was on my way to see my nephew
and niece in a play and I didn't wanna miss it.
And so if this kid was just like, I have $300 right now.
Do you think that's enough to fix a car?
I would be like, yeah, probably.
I don't know.
$300 sounds good.
And especially if him and like, it's going to take a while for the cops to get here.
We can wait if you want, or we can settle this right now.
All of that, if he had said it to me, would have been like 100%.
Yes, let's go. let's take care of this.
But he, right from Jump Street, was like on the phone with the police and letting them know that we're going to do everything above board.
Which, to his credit, I suppose.
Yeah, that's good.
I've certainly been in his and your shoes. I was in LA and on my way to work and wasn't paying attention and bumped into the car in front
of me and I, and there wasn't like tremendous damage. You could see like the bolts that
secure the license plate had made like bolt shaped scratches on her bumper and she gets
out of the car and she looked like put together and professional. And she just looks at the damage and she was just like,
or before she looked at the damage, she was like,
I just got finished dealing with
the last time someone hit my car.
It's such a process.
It took so long.
I don't think there's any damage or anything like that.
And then she looked and she saw that there was like scratches
and she looked at it and like did the math in her head. I was like, it's fine. Give me your, yeah, let me take your number
down. So if something goes wrong later, I'll call you. But it's, I just don't want to deal with
insurance again. I was like, this is huge news for me because I also don't and it's my fault. So I
extra don't. And she just like called me a few days later like yeah it's it's fine it's it's just don't worry
about it that I mean she called was crazy like I know just ghosts like right
just didn't leave me on the hook forever thinking if anything ever happens to
this woman's car it's my fault now yeah mean, Colleen has been in a situation
where she's on the opposite side of that,
where she has gotten in an accident.
It wasn't her fault.
It was the other person's.
The other person was very much like,
I don't want to involve insurance.
I'm just going to pay you.
Like, give me your number, give me your information.
Here's all my information.
And then Colleen just, throughout the course of years,
could not get in touch with this person.
Wow.
And that was it.
And that sucked.
That sucked a lot. But I'll say it like
I feel like it all balances out
because I was also around the same time
in an accident. This is all making us sound
like we were terrible drivers, but it's just not the case.
It's a numbers game out here in Los Angeles.
And I was moving into a lane
and there was a car in my blind spot. I see it the last second
and I kind of swerve back, but we just glance each other a little bit.
We both pull over. It's a young kid.
Shirley, like 28, slick with amniotic fluid, just fresh out of the womb.
And he was like, yo, you know this is your fault, right?
Taking his first steps out of the car.
He's like, you know, this is your fault, right?
And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally my fault.
He's like, all right.
And then we got each other's information and everything. He's like, you're going to be hearing from me. And I was like, you know, this is your fault, right? And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally my fault. He's like, all right, and then we got each other's information and everything.
He's like, you're gonna be hearing from me. And I was like, I fully expect that. Yeah, I'm sorry.
And he was like, he did. We leave.
Never hear from this kid again.
Never hear about his car, never hear about the damages.
Nothing. Like nothing ever came of it. Like, oh, he was... Just so heated, just drove straight off a cliff.
Just...
counting his insurance winnings.
Now, when you guys got into this little accident,
when you were both, let's be honest, on the way to the liquor store,
did anything happen to you?
Yeah, man, I told you. I'm seeing a child's play.
You gotta bring some pooch to that thing.
Fill up the flask before you head out. Did anything actually happen to either of your cars? He was on the phone before you even saw the damage, right?
Yeah.
Well, okay, we fucked up, but go on.
I have scratches on my car for sure, and there's like a thing that is like popped out a little bit that I could probably manually push back in with my hand or a soft mallet if I wanted to. Some other
little panel popped out. I popped that back in. But the you know, what's at stake here
is I have not had this car for a year yet. It was the only new car I've ever had and I've been keeping
it nice and like diligently washing it and doing all the regular maintenance
stuff that I'm supposed to do and I just don't want scratches on it if I can avoid
that. I don't think there's any like internal damage to it or anything like
that it was such a quick light hit, but it's
still, you know, you want your new car to look like a new car for as long as it possibly
can before it gets as much wrinkles on its face as I have.
Yeah, before it starts to see the damage of the world. Okay. Well, I'm sorry that happened,
Daniel. I'm glad that you're okay
Yeah, if that I'm truly that means nothing to you at this point because it was not a real accident
But no, it's always nice to hear somebody was an accident didn't get hurt
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We used to work with a woman.
Do you remember a woman that demand me to name Jessica?
I'm going to just outer.
She had spilled her name.
I've met 900 Jessica's in my life.
So I don't.
She was a woman that was not in at demand with us.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, I know who you're talking about.
She'd gotten into an accident in the parking structure.
And we're just talking about accidents.
And it came up that she gets into three accidents a month.
And we were all like, that's too many.
How is this happening?
And she's like, it's usually in parking structures.
And it just like, that was the first time
that I'd met somebody who is just genuinely
has a ceiling to their driving ability.
And like, they're just never gonna get above that.
Like she's been driving long enough
that she should have by all intents and purposes
become good or become at least like proficient.
And it wasn't happening, it wasn't taking in her.
And she was just a bad driver and just like
Drive through parking structures just like clipping
Parked car like oh again darn it. I
Had a friend in college
Jenny since since we're outing white women who was driving me somewhere and
Was parking on the side of the road not not parallel parking
But just like parking on the side of the road, not parallel parking, but just like parking on the side of the road.
And she was like, don't judge me, I'm gonna hit the curb.
And I thought like, nah, buddy, you got this.
And then she like very with intention drove into the curb.
And it was very clear, it was like, oh, this is how you park.
This is just how you decided your style is.
Like that's how you know where the curb is. I understand.
You don't think this is a problem to get better.
Yeah, until the curb is an inch and a half higher and then it's not just your tire gently
like, that was a fun bumper car moment. Instead, it's just your bumper just crunching against
it.
Oh my god. Yeah. At some point, point that bumper is just gonna be destroyed if the inch is just like,
I mean the car is just like an inch and a half higher. All right, Daniel, I have a,
I have a quick question for you. Hit me.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna give you a little preamble first. I went back home to Colorado.
That sucks.
Find your phone. And half listen.
My mom is like thinking of moving out of her house.
And she's trying to decide on what to take.
And she's, you know, she's lived there for, since I was born, so 40 some odd years.
And she's like trying to figure out what she's going to do with all of this stuff.
And so she's like, she's made some piles for my brother and I,
who he was also there.
She's like, we could just like look through this stuff
and see if there's anything that you're gonna want eventually.
And I'll just, I'll keep it if you want it,
but you don't have to take it now.
It's like we're walking through this house
and we're like, we're looking at stuff
and some of it's furniture and some of it's silverware
and like a china and stuff like that.
And my question for you, Daniel, is,
first of all, do you have fine China?
No.
Do you have nice silverware that you save?
No.
Would you ever?
I put a little sauce on that no,
a little intriguing sauce,
because just the luck of the draw of
timing of when we record this, we were just over the weekend looking at silverware and
like, like crazy people have four different sets of to the untrained eye, including my
own identical silverware, but they have different names.
And so we're just like picking up different forks and seeing the weight of them to see
which of these we like better, which is the same way that like when you're planning a
wedding, you're forced to have very quick, really strong opinions on things you've never
thought about before.
As we're also thinking about what would go on a registry and what kind of stuff we'd
want in a future house down the line.
Forming strong opinions on silverware and plates and stuff too is something that I'm
learning is going to be part of my future.
A fork weight is something that I've never thought about in my life.
But now that we might come to a position soon
where we need to say the kind of forks
that we want for our future, like our investment forks.
And I was like, well, I guess I'd better
start having opinions about this thing.
You have to carve out real estate in your brain
for that now.
That sucks.
That sucks hard.
Because you're not allowed to say, you don't wanna sucks. Because you're not allowed to say, you don't want to say, and you're not allowed to say,
I don't care to all of these things. I feel like that was like a certainly more acceptable
position for men to have a couple of decades ago, just be like, yeah, fuck the plates,
fuck the forks, whatever. But we're in a more enlightened society now and I like being a part of these things. But I can't, there's almost nothing
where I'd be like, I don't, I'm never going to care about what kind of wine glasses we
have. So that could be a fun thing for you to sort out. No, got to have opinions on all
the things, including fork weight.
Yeah, I mean, well, depending on who your spouse is,
it's also possible that they also do not wanna have
opinions about these things.
And when you say, I don't have, you bow out of it,
they're like, well, you've just put all the onus
on me to care.
Like, now I have to fucking care.
And instead of you sharing the load,
there are definitely other people who do care
and they care about like, okay, this fork is going to bother me every single time I eat with it because the
back isn't balanced with the front. I get that. These would be forks and silverware that you would
end up using in your everyday life though, I'm assuming. You would just have some uniform silverware.
Now, this has got to be like a generational thing, because I look at movies
from like World War Two and how they're like going into houses and stealing the silverware
and stuff. And I'm like, was there like, was silverware up at some point? Like that was
a really, that was a form of currency that you could just use. Cause everyone was like,
people get very serious about, and silverware is just like the tip of the iceberg, people get very serious about their china and about silverware.
And like some silverware that you're just never going to use except when,
I have no idea, the vice president comes to your house for dinner,
I have no idea like why you're saving this shit.
And generationally, that has just not ever been a concern of mine or anyone that I know
that like we're going to use different silverware in China when we have guests over.
It's like, you get the same fucking fiesta-ware that we use, god damn it.
Like, these are nice plates. We use nice plates.
You're gonna use our nice plates too. Like, that's it.
Um, and so-
You're gonna get a mix of plates because I had plates and Shay had plates.
We moved in together. And instead of having a fight, we have an eclectic mix of plates because I had plates and Shay had plates we moved in together and instead of having a fight
we have an eclectic mix of plates. My plates are just higher on a shelf because I'm taller you see.
I it's one of those it is one of those things that um I'm thinking about now uh in this
conversation in real time that I haven't actually spent
too much time dwelling on it.
But I think I assumed one day I would have find China purely because of how we were raised.
My mom got China, worked up to it, and then got like her nice set of china that goes in the
china cabinet that is a piece of furniture that used to exist and now I'm not sure it
does anymore.
But it just to me like I remember it being like we all chipped in and got different parts
of china for my mother for Christmas one year and I remember it being a huge deal to her
to have nice china that
we were not allowed to eat on.
Yeah, did you ever even see that stuff except locked away in glass?
Not when we were growing up.
I think it probably came out when we were having Christmas Eve dinner and having the
family over, but even then it was like the adult family would use the china in the dining
room and then us kids would eat off
the fucking Ninja Turtles place that we had with our macaroni and cheese on the kids table
in the kitchen. But even though I don't think about china often, I think in the same way
that like, I think, well, maybe when I'm older, I'll have a mustache and like cigars more
because that seems like a thing
dads do and I'd like to be a dad one day. And so I just like in the back of my mind was like,
well, surely we'll have China because that's what parents do and we'll need something to
stare at when we have our brandy in the study. China will be perfect for that. It's all this like,
when I cosplay in adult life in my future, I assume I'm going to have
all these things that I don't want.
Yeah, I, the idea of it, even like a China cabinet is so funny to me because clearly
somebody, it's designed to be seen in there, right?
Like you've got a cupboard, but you just got this, you unlock this new achievement, you
got your China finally.
And then you're like, well, I mean,
we're never gonna use it,
but I would like to someone to see it.
And so you have what is essentially like a transparent case
so that everyone knows you have the China,
even if you're not using it.
That's not for you.
That's not for you to walk up and be like,
I better decide what I'm gonna use before I open this
so I don't let out all the air from in there. Like, that's not for anybody to walk up and be like, I better decide what I'm gonna use before I open this so I don't let out all the air from in there.
Like, that's not for anybody other than guests coming.
They're like, okay, I'm gonna put that down.
They've got China, that's nice.
And like, there's other stuff in ours too.
There's like an old, these old silver goblets.
I was like, what are you using these for?
And like, I don't know,
sometimes at our Christmas party, people would want wine.
And I was like, but we're not vampires. Like, why are you drinking out of this? Just put
in a wine glass. I know where those are. Those are accessible. And there's like, and they
had fancy sniffters and stuff like that. And they had that. Yeah. This thing I did want
the, they had a two, I don't even know what you call these. They're like these glass,
thick glass containers
that have like diamond glass on the outside.
There's a little, looks like a crystal golf ball on top
that you pop it out and one is for brandy.
I mean, one is for bourbon and one is for scotch.
And you would see them in old noir films
and stuff like that.
My parents had two of those
and they had like a little brass chain on them
that said which one, whether it was bourbon
or whether it was scotch and that you seem like mad men and stuff like that. And I was like,
I think I want this. I don't know where it even goes, but it would be, I just want to put this,
I want to put liquor in there and look at it. I like the idea of being in a 1950s Maltese Falcon type movie.
Right. It's so thinking about registry stuff and this kind of thing and looking at like
sherry glasses, those really tiny, like, like miniature wine glasses that are specifically
for sherry. And I look at those and it's like, man, that's right. We don't have sherry glasses
in the house. That's so crazy.
What if everything about my life changed
and I had some people over for sherry?
I'd feel like an idiot.
Wouldn't it be sad if I suddenly got into drinking raisins
and I didn't have a way to do that?
What if Niles is coming over?
What am I gonna do?
Give him sherry in a mug?
He'll walk right out. He'll storm right out.
And then Maris will never hear the end of it.
So I'm having this conversation with my mom where I'm like, I don't want any of this stuff.
And she's like, it's like really nice.
And I'm like, yeah, but like, there's no conceivable place in my house where
I'm just going to like put all this stuff and it doesn't fit together well, like in terms of,
I mean, logistically, like stacking aesthetically, it all works. But like, like you can't even like,
you can't fold plates up, you can't like store those somewhere nice and neat.
And then it became like a bigger conversation about the furniture and everything and how
traditionally, historically,
furniture gets passed down through generations.
Those become family heirlooms.
Giant 90-pound couches and chaise lounges and stuff become family heirlooms.
And I was like, am I doing my kids a disservice by buying everything and thinking in 10 years
this thing will be destroyed and And like no one will, nobody else wants this.
Am I doing them to disservice or am I alleviating them of this burden where they have to now
pass down a piece of wood through generations and generations that nobody actually wants?
Is there nothing from your childhood home that you've had your eye on for a long time
that you're just like like especially now that you are a furniture craftsman
yourself and and a homeowner and everything like that something where
you're older now and can can appreciate how good a piece of furniture or I don't
think glassware dinnerwares is up your alley but like something that you just thought like
When the time comes I want that
Coffee table or whatever. I will call
I'll walk this back a little bit and say that there is one piece of furniture in the house that has like real historical
Relevance and is very cool
there's a in our
front hall there is a
dresser that my
Let's see,
great, great, great grandfather built. He was a craftsman and he built this beautiful,
gorgeous dresser that has, you pull out the top of it
and then it has individual tinier drawers inside of it
and stuff and it's gorgeous. And you can actually, we know that he built it because you can take it out and you can see his markings inside of it and stuff. And it's gorgeous. And you can actually, we know that he built it
because you can take it out
and you can see his markings inside of it.
And from like, I don't know, from like 1830 something.
And it's really cool.
It's a very cool, it's in very good shape.
And I'm like, this, it's huge though.
Like there's, I'm just like, my wife and I were like,
well, even if we got it, like, where would we, where would we put it in the house? And it's like, you, it's huge though. Like there's, I'm just like, my wife and I were like, well, even if we got it, like, where would we,
where would we put it in the house?
And it's like, you, that's the kind of thing
where you make space for it.
I'm like, okay, I could figure out how to do this.
Other than that, it's stuff on the walls.
It's like, maybe there's some art from my childhood
that was on walls where I'm like, oh, that is very cool.
I think I would like to have that.
But that's very easy.
Like that's different.
That's something that is essentially 2D
and takes
up no room in your house at all. The real issue is family heirlooms that are massive and there's
just, it's something like, I'll say that we have a, I'm trying to decide if I should say this, we have
we have a sewing table that is ancient and it has gone through generations of my wife's family.
It's very cool looking.
I used to do all of my office work from it during COVID
where I didn't have this garage set up yet.
This, the beautiful setup you see behind you
didn't exist yet.
The studio.
And I was doing it in another room
and I would work off of this sewing table.
And as a functional, like just table like that, it was fine.
It is a giant piece of iron and wood that, like, we have to move with constantly and
we will have.
It's just something we will carry with us until we're allowed to give it to our children.
And we're not going to be sewing on it it. Like it's not using its original purpose.
It's not doing much.
It's taken up a lot of room and we are guaranteed to have,
it's not something we can ever just get rid of.
And so it's just something you now carry.
We had an incredibly old sewing table
in my house growing up that was like,
unusable but like a beautiful piece of history that I'm sure my mom got from her mom or, or grandmother just had
been around for a while. And it was like such a staple of a thing in my house. And then,
uh, when I was renting a beach house, uh, for a couple of years, not too long ago, they
had like a very very maybe the exact same
model of this like antique sewing machine. And I was like, Oh, yeah, we used to have
one of these sucks are stuck with that, huh? You can't use it. And you have to like build
a house around it. What a bummer.
It's just like some furniture that like this better be your aesthetic because it's going
somewhere prominent. And you're gonna have, you're gonna build around it.
And I think I accrue enough stuff in my life alone.
Like I accrue stuff that I don't like anymore,
but I can't get rid of.
Baseballs that I caught at a game,
like a foul ball that I caught
at a professional baseball game.
And I'm like, well, I can't,
like no one understands the value of this other than me.
I have to keep this,
even like I don't think about it or look at it ever.
Or there's just things in my life.
And even being at my mom's house,
I was finding a lot of it where I was like,
well, I don't really wanna get rid of this
because it meant so much to me at some point.
I still feel an emotional attachment to it.
And that's just one person.
And now I don't wanna then carry that for generations of people. And I don't want to ask my children to do it either. So
I'm like, somewhere this line has to stop. There has to be a finish line here. My brother
and I, we don't want the China. I don't want to have any of these other pieces, a letter
box, like these pieces of furniture where I'm like, I know that this has a history to it.
I know that there's value in it.
And I feel terrible about being the one to get rid of it.
But I feel like also somebody has to do it.
Yeah.
I don't want to keep anything.
Someone who's listened to the entire podcast might be able to pull up an older episode where I might have had a different opinion.
I don't remember that.
Things change and people change.
I'm now at a point where I have very little fondness for almost everything. I just because I would like a more, I appreciate a more Spartan lifestyle where the things
that I do have are easy to get to and easy to put away.
And we just have the things that we need. It's a very, very wasteful approach to life because to have my druthers,
to put me in charge, so much stuff would just be garbage, just more pollution for the world
that I would get rid of. But when I'm trying to close the cabinet with the coffee mugs
and it doesn't quite close flush all the way, it's like, well, I'll just throw out fucking nine mugs.
I only need one for coffee in the morning.
So let's just get rid of all these things.
I know I collected them over time and I used to make it a point to like get a mug every
time I traveled somewhere.
But now my cabinets are smaller.
So fuck it.
Fuck all that.
Yeah.
I, we were at home and my mom was like, go through your old stuff.
And so I'm doing that and I like find my bass guitar.
And I'm like, I'm generally an unsentimental person, but I don't play bass anymore.
I don't it's a huge thing because a bass amp is big and the bass itself is just a fucking
big guitar.
And so it takes up a lot of room and inconvenient room.
It's not a good shape or anything.
And I'm like, well, I don't want to get rid of it.
It's a beautiful old PV.
Like I don't want to get rid of it.
So I'm like bringing my kids down to the basement
and I'm like really quick
trying to get them hooked on the base.
I feel like maybe my kids want it.
Maybe like, and I think that's all
my mom is also trying to do.
It's like, she knows that.
And oh, it's real hard with because my dad is dead,
my dad has died, he died last May, not this past May but the previous and there's stuff that was
very important to him, like stuff that he cared a lot about that he collected and she has no
emotional attachment to it but she knows that he did and so you're doing him a disservice by being
like well now we just get rid of these coins or like whatever the things were that he was interested in. You're like, no, I don't think you can think now we carry his interests and we try to make
them our own.
I don't know.
We're gonna have to figure it out.
It's very tough and fortuitous the timing of this recording.
Do you listen to or have you listened to Jimmy Loftus's current podcast Endeavor 16 minutes
of fame? No. Or it might just call this 16th minute. I'm not sure. to Jimmy Loftus's current podcast, Endeavor, 16 Minutes of Fame.
No.
Or it might just be called the 16th minute.
I'm not sure, forgive me.
Okay.
It's on Cool Zone Media, you can check it out.
The episode that she just most recently came out with
does not fit the theme of the show.
It's a standalone episode because her father,
Mike Loftus, just passed away recently.
And so this is just an episode that she released about like her grief and the process and
you really get to fall in love with with her father through listening to this episode. And one of the things that is very
crucial to that is he like kept
everything. He was a journalist, a reporter, and so he's like always
taking notes and he's got like there's audio recordings that he's made when he's like on a
road trip with six-year-old Jamie just like narrating what's going on and talking to her and like
cards that he has saved just like the box of like his Jamie box, his box about his daughter and his box about his son,
all this stuff.
And like Jamie admits in the podcast that a whole lot of it is unusable because he just
collected everything.
But as I'm listening to this podcast and thinking about my own parents and thinking about hopefully
having kids one day, it's very easy to get choked up and just be like, I should
be saving everything.
I should have, I should do as much as I can to be immortal, I guess, or to immortalize
other people or other experiences and just like have this stuff because it's such a,
it seems like such a gift to have these relics.
But then the other part of my brain kicks in and is like,
where are we going to put these boxes? Where do the boxes live?
We're running out of space as it is. Where are we going to put all this stuff?
Yeah, it's also a huge responsibility, especially when they keep everything,
because you know that what you buried within there are those valuable things.
But the only way to find it is to go through each piece of hay
until you find that fucking needle.
Like there's, you're gonna, it's gonna be an awful process
of just like sifting through Valentine's cards
and being like, no, no, no.
And then you like land on one that has a special message
and you're like, well, now I have to look through everything
because this stuff is here.
It's also the idea of my kids one day coming across an audio cassette tape from a radio
play I did with my brothers when I was nine.
They would have a cassette and be like, I have to...
Boomboxes are like $10,000 now because it's the future and they don't exist anymore.
How am I supposed to find out? Yeah.
I need to hear what I don't realize now is going to be my father ripping off a 1998 episode of Saturday Night Live.
How can I play this?
What if it says something prescient?
You know, one of the things my mom asked me about was a box of VHSs.
And it's basically our shared family history on VHS.
And I was like, that sounds great.
Where the fuck am I gonna play that?
It's gotta go.
Like, I now, if I take that from you,
I now have to come up with a way
to actually watch all of those.
And I'm not gonna do that.
So I'll just carry this box everywhere.
Years ago when my parents moved into their North Carolina house as a housewarming gift,
my brothers and I got every VHS tape that our family had made, like hundreds of hours
of footage.
We just documented everything and we gave it to a friend of ours to upload them and make them into
DVDs so now we had a giant wallet of DVDs also completely useless now I don't
have a DVD player I don't know what I would do it's just as bad
a lot of the things that my dad also kept were relics that I think,
he's in the same boat where like his dad died.
He founded some journals of his dad's and he was like,
it would be crazy to throw these out.
And so he kept them and I happen to find them now when I was at home
because my mom's like, go through these bookshelves
and see if there's anything you want.
So I'm like looking and I find these journals
and they're like journals from when he was stationed in Alaska during World War II. And I was like, this feels like important
stuff. And I'm looking through it. And it's just like, sleet again today. I didn't even like the
breakfast. It's stuff that we're not getting like him coming to terms with the fact that he strangled
somebody or anything like that in there
There's nothing that's like there's no meat to it
It's just a historical document of the time
And so even within that you'd have to really like dig to figure out if there's anything
That you're gonna glean about your grandfather from it. And so I I'm like well, we have to keep it. We don't have a choice
There's no I can't even see myself taking this thing, this relic
of the past, and throwing it in a trash can. That's just not going to happen. So now I
own these journals.
Yeah. I think we've talked about this before, that I meticulously keep every Notebook I've ever written in and they they move with me from the place to place but if
If I if I don't get
Will and testament, but if this podcast somehow survives, does it get wiped by some company buying up? I
Don't know
Some somebody coming up with a patent on podcasts and then like buying up and scrapping it for parts and destroying it like all my other work but if the
podcast somehow survives I hope my future kids and future generations will
hear this you can throw those out you don't need them you're not gonna learn
anything there's not good yeah I don't know why I'm keeping them you're gonna
have like some like rough drafts of cracked articles
and last week tonight episodes that aren't going to be very instructive as far as writing.
Yeah. And there's going to be some, some drawings that are just like, I have a habit of, of
drawing me what I would look like if I had different hairstyles. So you're going to see,
you're going to see that. You don't need it.
I'm not a good artist and I learned nothing from that.
It's not like I drew a picture of myself with a faux hawk and a soul patch and was like,
oh, this is good.
And then I showed it to a barber.
It has no impact on anything.
You could just throw it out.
I could throw them out.
I'm not going to.
But please let that be my gift to you.
I have also kindled my troubles.
You don't have to keep any of it. That is my gift to my future children is like, none of it matters. Throw it out.
Yeah, I was looking through, first of all, when I would write all that stuff at the time, I was really, it wasn't like a Dear Diary type of thing. Today I did this. It was, I would only write it
when I was really trying to like figure something out
where I had so many balls that I was juggling
and what the thought that I was trying to have
that it felt very much easier to put it out on paper
and lay it all out in front of me.
So there's like a lot of me trying to figure out
who I am and stuff like that in those
and or like my writing style.
But at the time I also was thinking,
because I was keenly aware of Kurt Cobain's journal that got published. And I was like,
perhaps someday when I am the voice of a generation, people will want to look through this and
see my path. And like, they'll want to pick the supporters. It's just such like a dumb
grandiose dream. And now that I'm older, and I like, if I would go back and like they'll want to pick the supporters. It's just such like a dumb grandiose dream.
And now that I'm older and I like if I would go back and like creak that open and look at it, it's humiliating stuff. Like it's not stuff that I want anyone else to read. It's like
me trying to figure it out but in a very performative way. And I'm like,
this is not valuable to anybody. This sucks, dude.
to anybody. This sucks, dude. Yeah. I also have, because of the chaotic way that my brain works sometimes, is that you couldn't even like... the notebooks that I've accumulated, I usually have
multiple different kinds of notebooks in like different rooms and different areas to me, so like
So like one novella can be found across three different notebooks and like the menu, like the order writing pad for from a restaurant because I would write a lot when I was bartending
and just like had that like memo pad that I was writing in and I'll just pick up whatever
I have any kind of idea. I'll pick up whatever notebook is nearest to me and jot stuff down in it.
So there's you can't even like not that you would ever want to do this because it wouldn't be a worthwhile endeavor.
You couldn't even chronologically trace my development as a person or writer because it's not clear what year anything
is happening because they're all happening in every year somehow.
Every notebook is brand new and 20 years old and they're all connected to each other in
some truly call for help-ish kind of way.
That speaks to the way that I write as well.
I know that I can open up a notebook and see long, scattered writing that goes all the
way up the margins and stuff, and teardrops in the ink and stuff, and then next to it
would just be one blank page except it says, Fartress of Solitude.
And then that's it.
You're like, okay, these things probably happen 12 years apart.
And then every once in a while you'll go through one of these notebooks and it'll be like,
oh, this is this is like song lyrics. Oh, this is a cracked article. I can I can spot
that and like, oh, this appears to be astronomy notes. I think he just took this to school. Yeah, I forgot his book that day at school.
It took notes here.
Yeah.
Yep.
Yeah, there's a lot.
There's also like, not that it matters.
I don't think he understood astronomy that well.
These notes are not helpful.
When they found, they'd find like these old Assyrian tablets, right?
Like these old writings that were on tablets.
And it took them a long time to figure out, what's that Assyrian, right?
Sanskrit.
To figure out how to translate Sanskrit.
And so they just had all these tablets and they were like, archaeologists, I mean.
And they were like, if only we knew what secrets we could unlock from these.
And then they figured it out.
And I don't remember how,
maybe Rosetta Stone or something like that,
but they figured out how to translate Sanskrit.
And they were like, okay, here we go.
And they started looking through it
and it would be things like two goats, four chickens,
and then a price.
And it was like, yeah.
And it was like grocery lists or receipts.
And they were like, fuck.
And then they'd come across, and so some of these jobs, you just go through all these
old receipts basically, or yeah, go through all these old grocery lists and be like, okay,
here's another one, here's another one.
And then they'd come across something and be like, we must treasure the dream whatever
the terror for the dream shows us that misery comes at last to the healthy man and the end
of life is sadness. And they'd be like, yeah, that feels like something I would have done in my book.
That was good. Yeah. Just an archaeologist going through a thing and like learning a dead language
to find some tablet in Aramaic that's just like, hey, hi, so sorry, it looks like you parked your
horse in my spot. No big deal. I don't want to have to call the Romans.
So just like, as long as you move it,
because the spots are assigned and this one is mine.
Thank you.
No worries.
No worries, but next time don't.
Yeah.
So, yeah, again, Daniel has made his will clear here.
Mine as well.
To my children, first of all, don't ever listen
to the podcast, because they talk about you a lot
and I think it might be a little humiliating for you
and I'm sort of grappling with that.
But also, don't keep any of my journals.
You just burn those, that's fine.
Yeah, and I'd like to extend mine as well.
When I die, destroy all of Soren's notebooks.
Yes, thank you.
Doesn't matter if he's alive or not, just do it.
That's, I think, will be fun.
Find a way in.
That's how I want him to find out.
I want him to open his closet, unlock the safe,
move his, at this point, several guns out of the way
to be like, oh, my notebooks.
It's like, oh, this is how I find out, rats.
Yeah, my mom has been, to her credit,
very unsentimental about all this stuff.
And she did go through,
when she found a lot of my dad's old stuff, his journals.
And like his journals is his chrono,
it was chronicling his battle with MS too,
because I think he'd been asked to do that
by maybe a doctor or something.
And also just journals about like his first,
when he was first in Aspen and stuff like that. And my mom was like, I'm burning all of these. And I'm also in doing
so I found a lot of my old journals, I'm going to burn all that stuff unless you want them.
And I was like, are you sure you don't want them? She's like, no, I don't want them. I'm
going to burn them. And I was like, yeah, okay. All right. That's fine. I don't, there's like,
there's probably very personal stuff in there. I don't need to like there's per very probably very personal stuff in there I don't need to like I did enough prying and snooping when I was a child. I know my parents lives
I don't need like yeah journals that they also were keeping even more private
So yeah, go ahead burn them and so that was great. That was great that she didn't give those to me
Yeah, and make that your problem forever and then eventually Ronan's problem, right?
Well good episode.
Oh, there's something I've been meaning to tell you.
That, you know that you have...
How old are you?
Forty-two.
Yeah, you are...
I... It might be by a couple of months, outliving...
the only other famous Soren, Soren Kierkegaard died at 42.
So you are now, you're becoming the dominant Soren, I think, in history.
That's pretty cool.
And if I just outlive Bowie as well, then I can take on both of their powers and I become
the top Google search.
All right, everyone, thank you.
That is how it works.
It has nothing to do with impact.
It's just length of time alive.
Yeah, that's how you work.
Where everyone has to just start respecting you a little bit more as a philosopher now.
The last one left.
I will say there's a huge boon of Sorens coming up behind me, though.
I know there are lots of Soren's now like in my rear view mirror.
And I don't feel great about that.
I want to be the one.
It was really nice my whole life being the only one.
Anyway, you've been listening to the quick question with Soren.
Soren and Daniel.
To the quick question.
You know that already.
If you want to find us, us doing our own individual fun little jokes, we do that on Blue Sky.
Also, I use that sort of as a diary occasionally.
If I just think of something, I'm going to turn it into a joke and put it on there.
Burn that, by the way, when I'm dead as well.
And then if you want to find the show, we are still on X the show.
You can go find Quick Question on X.
I don't know the exact address.
We're also on Instagram.
You can see little clips of this show.
It's kind of fun.
We're on TikTok.
You can find clips of this show.
And if you really want to watch the whole episode, as opposed to just listen to it,
you can find it on Apple Podcasts or you can find it on YouTube as well.
If you liked our theme song, that's by Merex.
You can find their music anywhere you stream music.
They're kind of a big deal.
You can also find full albums from them at merex.bandcamp.com.
And I also would be remiss not to give a shout out to our...
I mean, it just doesn't even feel enough to give him a single title for our show.
But our editor, our producer, our sound engineer, the glue to the whole show, Gabe Harder,
Gabe Harder, who you will never find in your entire life
because he very well might just be a figment
of Daniels and Maya's imagination.
That's it, bye.
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 can talk tonight
So what's your favourite?
How did you get?
What would I be?
What's your number?
What's your number?
What did I do?
What do we know?
I 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 have a great time here