This Past Weekend - E416 Mike Rowe

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Starting point is 00:01:12 Those are good colors. Get that hitter and more at TheoVonStore.com. Today's guest has been a figure in most of our lives. He hosted a show called Dirty Jobs where he just got involved in it all, man. He's not afraid to go to the beach and sit in the quicksand, you know? He has been a narrator. You've heard his voice on shows like Deadliest Catch and Shark Week. He's an activist for the trades and for regular working people.

Starting point is 00:01:47 I'm grateful to have him here today, Mr. Mike Rowe. How's cleaning? Story of my life, man. Has it been? Yeah, and no. Did you do chores growing up? Did you have any chores? I had all the classic chores, right?

Starting point is 00:02:33 We had some land that really wasn't ours, but we had access to. And my mother was crazy for horses. So we built a barn and we had three or four or five horses at any given time that we boarded. And the average horse will crap eight times a day. Oh, wow. So if you have five horses each one, crapping eight times a day, that's basically 40 loads, right? So I'd come home from school. The first job was to pick up the horseshit, put in the compost pile, and then split wood.

Starting point is 00:03:05 Our house was heated mostly with the wood stove. So my main chores from, I guess, 13 to 18 were picking up horse crap and splitting wood. Did you get to see them do the craps or you just, there was already done when you got there? I played a game called Bonus Points, right? So I mean, normally when you come home, the field's just full of little loads of turds and you scoop them up with your wheelbarrow. But if you catch one in the midst and if you can get over and get the shovel, under its ass, the sound that the turd makes when it lands on the shovel,

Starting point is 00:03:43 it's weirdly satisfying, you know? And you start, you're looking over your shoulder when you're out there waiting for the next one. And really, it's strange, you know? I'm older now than I've ever been, but I do the same thing with my dog. When I'm walking the dog and I see him spin, it's ridiculous. You're like a grown man with a plastic bag in his hand, but there I am holding it under its ass, catching it in midair. Like Kirby Pocket or whatever.

Starting point is 00:04:05 But no, I could see that there's some, for me, I could totally see that there would be value. If I could, like, in my head, it's like, oh, if I can get a little more efficient here and cut off the time between. Isn't it crazy the games we play and the little things we do, at least I do, over the course of a day, right? It could be making the light at the intersection. It could be, you know, the perfect text, the right tweet, whatever you assign value to. But yeah, it's funny.

Starting point is 00:04:32 I hadn't thought about it that way. But at that point in my life, one of the most satisfying things to do was to catch a turd in midair. Yeah, God. Simple things. Oh, I think in some countries it's still probably, it's a damn, it's probably a dang Olympic sport, I think, if you get out there in the sun places, you know, oh yeah, I think, I mean, who knows where things will go. I think that entertainment's getting pretty out there.

Starting point is 00:04:56 You think? I mean, geez, you know what I did the other night, man? I'm flicking around, not knowing what I'm looking for. Yeah. And I stumble across the national cornhole championship. Yeah. Grown men. Them bag boys, yeah.

Starting point is 00:05:11 I mean, I think seven or eight straight in the hole, no sliding, no nothing, just nailed it. Well, I feel like when I watch that, I can feel their wives in the distance being like, get a king job right now, Darren. So proud of you, Darren. So proud of you with your little bean bag and your little hole. We're proud of you, but Tiffany needs her daddy at home. You know what I'm saying? You could, because you know, I don't think the money's there yet.

Starting point is 00:05:40 We're like. But it's the same, it's like, as a kid, I remember flicking around and watching bowling. Yeah. Like Earl Anthony Jr. bowling. And it was the most, I mean, the intensity and the focus. And it wasn't a big crowd, but it was an engaged crowd. And you know, and the way the announcer would step in there and oh my God, the pressure is high and here he is and the focus and the concentration.

Starting point is 00:06:05 It's the same thing with darts. Yeah, darts. I love darts. And it's like, so there are so many of these little hobby type things get treated like it's the Decathlon. Yeah. And if you're just a guy flicking around in the middle of the night and you stumble across, there he is, man.

Starting point is 00:06:24 Bush is tossing the, look at that, right in there, like it had eyes. Amazing. That bean baby right there. Yeah. And what kind of beans are in the bag? I wonder maybe that's how Bush does it. You know what? That would be amazing.

Starting point is 00:06:36 Somebody should open up a bag and see if Bush beans are in there. I cut open a golf ball once when I was a kid, went to my grandfather's shop and put a golf ball in a vice and I took a hacksaw and I opened it up. And it was like Newton. I'd really, it didn't occur to me that at the time I was just like Isaac Newton, but you're right. There I was looking inside the golf ball. Like it was some microcosm of the solar system and peeling these rubber bands away.

Starting point is 00:07:06 And you know. Oh, there's rubber bands in there. Well, there's something rubber. They look like rubber bands, but they're really dense and they're really thin and they're wrapped really, really tight around this nucleus in the center of it. It's a marble type little thing. But you know, some guys at home trying to find a better way to make a better golf ball. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:07:26 Knowing full well that some knucklehead who's been amusing himself by catching shit in midair is going to take one, put it in a vice and cut it open and see what makes the world work. What, uh, what's keeping you busy these days? Sitting here with Mike Rowe. Thanks so much for coming in, man. Sure. And congratulations for being in Nashville and for carving out a, carving out a piece of something real.

Starting point is 00:07:50 I mean, this is so, you know, I do a podcast too. It keeps me pretty busy, but I'm on the road all the time. So I'm doing it on like Riverside or Zoom or, you know, and it's not the same as, you know, sitting in an upholstered chair with the guy in his house with the, you know, it's, it's like cable access meets real, I mean, honestly, like we're this far from Wayne's world. And people are watching like lots of people are watching. So congrats on that. Oh, thank you, man.

Starting point is 00:08:20 Yeah. I think we've been looking for different studios recently, but there's a level of not, I don't want to, there's a level of rogueness that has to accompany a podcast space. Yeah. It's like in LA, cause we have a studio in LA and we've been looking there and it's like, man, this is, there's a chase bank in the lobby. That's not it.

Starting point is 00:08:40 That ain't it. We need like a missing person poster within 60 feet. It doesn't need to be on the building, but you know what I'm saying? There needs to, cause there's a level still of grunge to it. Right, right, right, right. That I think always needs to be there. If I walk into a corporate place, I in my head feel more corporate. And so it puts me in a different headspace.

Starting point is 00:09:01 So I'd imagine it does that for other folks. But you can't fake it, right? I mean, if you're going to be in a corporate space, there's a way to behave that's consistent with your surroundings. And when people look at that, they might not like it, but they're not going to judge you for being a sellout or a fake or a poser. Like, You don't think so, huh?

Starting point is 00:09:21 Well, I mean, I'm not, I'm not saying that came off a little, uh... What they might. Yeah. You don't think so, huh? Came off a little bit outsiders. Well, I mean, it's like, if, when I see somebody working hard to be grungy, I don't see it as much different than somebody who's working hard to be corporate.

Starting point is 00:09:40 If you're working hard to create an appearance, then you become part of the production. And if you're part of the production, then you're part of the enemy to authenticity. And I, and what I take from what you're saying is that the thing that's for sale in the podcast space that is also for sale, you know, in any good comedians act in any TV show that feels real and any song that feels real is authenticity. Yeah. Right.

Starting point is 00:10:12 And so there's this weird trap if you, if you work really hard to create it, well, then you're manufacturing it and that makes you fake. But if somehow or another you can function in your space, ask the questions you want to ask, give the answers you want to give in a timeframe that you want to create, you know, then, then I think people will at least give you a listen. Right. That's a good point.

Starting point is 00:10:36 So maybe I'm over, maybe I'm giving that too much credit, maybe, you know, maybe like, I know on dirty jobs that, I mean, I think the reason the show lasted as long as it lasted was because we never did a second take. It was, I just said, look, if I'm going to do a reality show, this is back before reality meant something unreal. Yeah. So it's gotten like if we're, if we're literally, I mean, you came up in that world too. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:11:04 I'm like, look, we're not going to do any pre-production. We're not going to do any writing. We're not going to do any real casting. All we're going to do is follow a guy around doing his job and I'm going to have a normal crew and they're going to shoot the show and they're going to cut the show, you know, however we agree to do it. But I'm also going to have a camera that never stops rolling. And I called it the truth cam and, you know, like right now when I'm looking at this,

Starting point is 00:11:32 that's camera A shooting me, walking and talking in this dump, actually, down in San Francisco. But over my left shoulder, there's another camera that's rolling. So if that camera there suddenly craps the bed, or if I have an audio problem, or a plane flies over, or I screw up my line or something. Or dog attack. Anything happens, I can turn to the truth cam and I can tell you, I can tell the viewer, here's what's happening right now. I love that.

Starting point is 00:12:03 Right. Here's what's happening right now. And it wasn't planned. And I just want you to feel like you're there with me. So that's the thing. That's reality. Yes, and you don't need to do it every second. You just have to remind the viewer from time to like that.

Starting point is 00:12:21 There I am smeared. That's actual shit. I'm smearing on the lens of the camera. Oh, wow. That's Japanese as heck, you know. Japanese and German. Yeah, dirty jobs was always one click away from a German porno, right? And I mean, look at me.

Starting point is 00:12:39 That's me 20 years ago. Wow. Right. That crazy show is still there. There again, you see it. That's actual mud exploding from an oil well onto the lens of the camera. That's chicken shit squirted onto the lens of the camera. Like when you put stuff like that into the viewer's face,

Starting point is 00:12:59 and there's the truth can. Oh, yeah. That's me showing you what I'm seeing as it's happening. So that's all just a long way of saying that you're doing a version of that with this podcast, you know, you're. Right. We want to keep it as authentic as possible. Yes.

Starting point is 00:13:16 Because it really is what the truth is. I think so. Yeah. You know, I think it has changed over the years. A lot of those shows now are so different. It's so, it's just all so manufactured. And the algorithm has gotten so strong of is to like what people want. What do they need?

Starting point is 00:13:32 It's like there's all these testing points and stuff. It just, the reality has gone out of a lot of stuff. And it's been replaced by feedback. Everybody, it's normal to want to know how you're doing. Yeah. And, you know, back when I used to do that show, there I am with my arm literally past my elbow inside a cow. And, you know, it didn't.

Starting point is 00:13:54 Oh, that's deep, huh? It didn't occur to me. What are you trying to, what is this? Part of, is this, this isn't one of those like, it's not like a crystal ball thing, is it? I don't think so, man. I think that episode, we were showing the realities of artificial insemination. Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 00:14:17 And I was trying to make the point that, you know, there is no McDonald's. There is no Carl's Jr. There are no millions and millions of hamburgers served every day without people coaxing the sperm out of a bowl and getting it into a cow. Yeah. I mean, it's so prevalent and so common in the places where it happens, but so mysterious to most people. How you get the sperm from one of the other.

Starting point is 00:14:52 Yeah, yeah, getting the, you know, I mean, you're talking about artificial vaginas. You're talking about styrofoam cups. You're talking about, you know, guiding the penis of a bull called Hunsucker Commando into the right spot. How big is it? Can you put it around like a, could you get one hand all the way around it or not? Yeah, the bulls are interesting. It's like a carrot.

Starting point is 00:15:15 And that's my garage door we just heard. Just in case you guys heard that, that's authenticity. Keeping it real. You know what? I did a, I did a podcast a couple of months ago and the title of it was The Leaf Blower Stays In because there was a goddamn leaf blower outside my window. And I really, I really thought about, I take a golf club and I could go out

Starting point is 00:15:35 and I just kill the guy and I solve the problem because he's not going to go away. Right. And, and eventually we just made him a part of the show. So, yeah, whether it's a leaf blower or the penis on a bull, you know, sometimes you just got to play the cards you get. Yeah, that's true, that's true, I think. I'd rather play the leaf blower, I think. The leaf blower stays in.

Starting point is 00:15:57 No, the, how big, yeah, could you get your hand all the way around that wiener? That's a good one right there. Bovine reproduction. So it's like that. It's not a, it's not a big thick vascular. Which one that, that looks like a dang snowman nose, huh? Well, the weather outside is frightful. It's getting frightful now, dude.

Starting point is 00:16:17 I'll tell you that. This is a surprise, dude. If that thing got loose in a schoolyard, my God. See, that's the kind of stuff we got to stop, man. All right, so here's, here's what you're not seeing. And, and, and here's what we showed you on, I guess it was season three. I don't remember which one, but we, you know, before you grab the penis like that and, and direct it into a repository, you take a, you take a probe, right?

Starting point is 00:16:48 It's about two feet long. Looks like a shotgun mic. Okay. Right. And, and on the back of the probe is a battery about size of a deck of cards and hanging from the battery are these wires, right? Okay. And the wires go into this tackle box.

Starting point is 00:17:06 I called it the tackle box from Amsterdam because it was full of lube and it was just full of dials and buttons. It was a real curiosity, you know. This farmer opens up the tackle box and you look inside and you take out the probe and you slather it up with lube and then you walk to the, the rear of the, of the animal, the male and you insert the probe into its rectum all the way up to the, the battery at the end. Wow. And so you get it in there about a foot and a half.

Starting point is 00:17:40 Free coffee, huh? There's nothing free brother in this life. Oh man, that is hot. So you get it. So you get it all the way in there and then you go back to the tackle box from Amsterdam and you turn on the current. Oh my God, bro. I didn't see that coming.

Starting point is 00:17:56 There it is right there. The ultrasound scanner with tow probes for rectal probe for veterinary animal. So. Is this part of saw, isn't this saw season two? I feel like this is heavy, bro. So. I mean, you guys were doing all this. So you run a light amount of current through the leads into the probe

Starting point is 00:18:14 and it stimulates the prostate of the animal. Yeah. Now, when this happens, all right, so the cowboy is turning the knob. I have taken a position underneath Hunsucker commando. Right. And he hands me this, this styrofoam cup. He basically says, you want to be on the knob or you want to hold the cup. And I'm thinking, well, it's TV.

Starting point is 00:18:37 I'm going to be more exciting if I hold the cup. Yeah, you got to be right there. You got to be that light. Yeah. So, so the first, the first knob sends the first blast of current into the prostate and the bull, whose name incredibly was Hunsucker commando, immediately presents himself. So that, that, that carrot shaped thing becomes a turgid.

Starting point is 00:18:59 Really? Rigid. Right. And then you grab it and you point it towards, toward the cup and then he turns the second knob. No. And the current really flows in there. God. And this thing explodes.

Starting point is 00:19:11 And is it with triple A? Who is this guy again? Duracell. No, it's, I don't know. I mean, at that point, you're not asking a lot of questions, right? You're, you're squatting underneath an enormous bull. You're holding its carrot shaped penis. And you've got a styrofoam cup toward the tip.

Starting point is 00:19:29 And the guy turns the second knob and that current hits the prostate. And then he starts yelling at me, what do you say? Don't, don't spill a drop, Mike. That's white gold. Every drop is precious. So you fill up the styrofoam cup. Wow. And do they put it on a scale after?

Starting point is 00:19:46 Is it like? See, you turned it into an Olympic event again. It's like fro. The size of that load. I put sprinkles on mine. I think this unbelievable. I pedazzle mine. I want it to really pop in the afternoon sun.

Starting point is 00:20:02 So now you take the sperm from the cup and you put it in this device and then you take these things that are like pipettes. It looks like a stir that you get for your coffee at Starbucks, right? And the sperm goes into these pipettes. And then you bring in the girls or actually you go to them. There'll be maybe 30 cows, you know, all facing north and you're behind them. Wow. And you take this injector and you put the pipette in there and you reach all the way in,

Starting point is 00:20:32 right? Past the vulva, past the vagina, past the cervix. Till you get to the horns of the uterus. The horns of the uterus, Mac. We're there. And you find that and you situate the pipette and then you pull the trigger. And then you have artificially inseminated a cow. And does she smile or anything?

Starting point is 00:20:49 Is there any? Well, what I like to do, I'd like a candle first, a little aroma therapy. Oh, yeah. And of course, you know, a tasteful floral bouquet, something to set the mood. UFC 281 is live. It's live from New York this Saturday. Get closer to the octagon with DraftKings Sportsbook, the official sports betting partner of UFC. Right now, new customers can bet $5 on UFC 281 and get $200 in free bets.

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Starting point is 00:21:59 Minimum age and eligibility restrictions apply. See show notes for details. So the other day, I realized I have a lot of subscriptions going on that I haven't even canceled yet or that have been running in the background. I got in a damn haircut club or something. Somebody put me into and I don't even know where it's located. And I'm paying $9 a month for trims, but it's not just me. 80% of people have subscriptions that they've forgotten about or can't get out of.

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Starting point is 00:23:04 That's why I love using them. They're formerly known as Truebill. Yup. And right now you can get rid of useless subscriptions with Rocket Money. Go to rocketmoney.com slash thEO. Seriously, it could save you hundreds of dollars per year. That's Rocket R-O-C-K-E-T Money.com slash thEO. Now, look, man, it's different everywhere. I was a place called Babcock Ranch in Texas where we did the same thing with quarter horses and thoroughbreds.

Starting point is 00:23:39 And what's that, ponies? No, quarter horse is a big animal that runs the quarter mile as opposed to a thoroughbred who would run, you know, Belmont Stakes, Preakness, things like that. Yeah, I was just sitting kneeling, kneeling. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They keep changing the name of it, but I was there. Fast horses, man. Fast horses. But the quarter horses are bigger.

Starting point is 00:23:59 No, they're about the same size. Okay. They're just, their cardiovascular systems are a little different. Their musculature is a little different. They're just bred to run faster for shorter periods. Yeah, they're urban. But they brought in this horse called Paid by Chick. I still don't know why they call it that.

Starting point is 00:24:16 But this was season one of Dirty Jobs. You can find this too. I'm wearing a yellow bicycle helmet because the day before a groom got kicked unconscious. Oh, why? Because he got underneath the horse the wrong way. Look, it gets violent. So the horse is let in and then it jumps on something called a pommel horse. Like, that's literally where they go.

Starting point is 00:24:42 Oh, yeah, I've seen those things in the Olympics. Get on top of this thing. Now, meanwhile, they bring in a mare in heat. So it's like, you know, and a handsome animal. So like, it's like porn. It's like black beauty is let in. She's in heat. You bring in the stallion. Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 00:24:58 He jumps up on the quarter horse and he just starts thrusting in midair. I mean, he's fully ready to go. Yeah. And that's when you step in, you, meaning me, with a yellow bicycle helmet holding an artificial vagina. Oh, like some kind of damn spunk minion. It looks. All right. Somebody make a note. Spunk minion.

Starting point is 00:25:22 If that doesn't wind up on a hat, if you're not selling spunk minion hats by this time next month, I got to talk to your ad guys because you've missed a real opportunity next on spunk minions. And so, so you're hunched under this animal and this is not like a bull's little carrot penis. This is a full on baby's arm holding an apple. You have to rest on your shoulder or anything like how heavy is it? Yeah. Well, you get your shoulder underneath the animal. Then you grab the penis and you slip it into the artificial vagina, which looks like a hot water bottle.

Starting point is 00:25:59 Oh, yeah. And now here's the craziest part about that. On the other side of the artificial vagina, you've got a baby bottle, like a formula baby bottle that screws in and inside that baby's bottle is a plastic bag. So all the sperm from the artificial vagina drains into the baby bottle and into the bag inside. It's like $35,000 worth of spooja loading, right? Like in your hand, like stat. And yeah, the strangest thing and my favorite artifact from Dirty Jobs

Starting point is 00:26:39 that I actually auctioned off a few years ago from my foundation was that baby bottle, 14 years old, filled with the sperm from this horse called Paid by Chick. And I used to keep it on my mantle in San Francisco where I lived in my apartment. And the afternoon sun, Theo, it would come through the window and it would pick up that crystallized semen and that baby bottle and throw the most beautiful little rainbows across the living room. Unreal. Little sperm prisms. It was amazing.

Starting point is 00:27:14 Anyhow, I don't know how we got on this, but yeah, that's it. There are lots of penises out there attached to all creatures great and small. And on Dirty Jobs, we violated pretty much every barnyard animal. You checked them all out. Was there a wiener you didn't get to see? Was there one a goat? Was there something off a Noah's Ark you didn't get to see that hammer? I'll tell you what I saw that haunted my dreams for a while was the joint on an ostrich. Looked like a loaf of bread. Really?

Starting point is 00:27:41 Yeah. No real tip to it. Just a blunt instrument. Which to me explained why, you know, they all walk so funny. It was just brutal. Maybe they stick their head in the sand out of embarrassment. They're like, oh, God. Wait till they see what my penis looks like. There are so many things about an ostrich. We could talk for hours about the ostrich, but I saw an ostrich charge an F-150. The guy had left the door open and tore the door off the hinge, just ripped it off.

Starting point is 00:28:14 These things can go from zero to 40 miles an hour in about four steps. Their breastplate is about two inches thick. You can shoot it with a 38 caliber, six feet away, slug will bounce off. Oh my God. They're cassowaries, right? So they've got their claws. They've got three claws. The guy I worked with had one of those big cowboy belt buckles that had been cleaved in half, right down the middle, by an ostrich.

Starting point is 00:28:49 Had that belt buckle not been there the thing would have killed him. They're dinosaurs, right? And putting the socks over their heads and leading them off to slaughter was one of the more exciting things we ever did. That reminds me of a time I actually went to Guantanamo Bay, actually. Why? To do stand-up comedy. Holy crap, tell me about that, dude. So that kind of blew my mind.

Starting point is 00:29:10 Some guy hit me up. This guy knows blind. He's not blind, but he's like, actually, he is blind. And he hit me up and he's like, hey, do you want to go do stand-up comedy? He did some military tours and he's like, we should go. I had the opportunity to go down to Guantanamo Bay. And I was like, jeepers, man, I have to go do this. So one night we all get into Florida and Fort Lauderdale.

Starting point is 00:29:33 We all get on a little Cessna plane. And it was like military pilots or whatever. And then they fly in at this crazy pattern where it's like, because they can't, like, they just, it's just the history of how they fly. So it's less likely to get shot down or whatever. And we're just flying at this crazy pattern. And at first, you don't even see the base. And then it's like the brightest, it's like a diamond in the middle of nowhere. It's like the brightest lights outline it.

Starting point is 00:30:02 It looked like a huge constellation, but on the ground kind of. And so almost beautiful from a distance. Oh, yeah. Unbelievable. Look like a damn wedding ring or something. It looked like the earth had a wedding ring on. And so we start to land in there and then next thing you know, we're on this base and there's golf courses there. There's a couple thousand troops there.

Starting point is 00:30:22 They have all these like unique, bring up the Guantanamo Bay vehicles, like unique vehicle, Guantanamo, Gitmo, unique vehicle. You're going to have to get out of the German porno category there. Yeah. We're deep in here. I mean, we're getting ads popping up. I mean, we just got a new Kanye West ad pop up. Not Adidas. Yeah, it wasn't for Adidas, dude.

Starting point is 00:30:49 But they have a lot of people, oh, they hit that green room right there, that van. Yeah. There's like a Scooby-Doo van. There's a lot of unique vehicles down there. It's like one of the weird things people do on the island is build these crazy vehicles and drive them around. Yeah. But yeah, we stayed there and did shows for three nights. We by yourself?

Starting point is 00:31:08 No, there was three other comedians. There's one Yiddish dude who was a wrestler, Mike Burton, and there was the blind guy and somebody else too, I think. How was it received? Were they appreciative? Oh, yeah. They were excited, man. The crazy thing was they said the first day we got there, they said, yeah, I'll take that. Thanks very much.

Starting point is 00:31:30 Thanks, brother. Appreciate it. The first day we got there, they said, oh, there's something called Gitmo Pretty where the ladies at first, you can be like, oh, these ladies aren't cute, right? But by the third day, you can be like, oh, that lady is a damn, she's damn Betsy Ross, dude. I'll let her knit my wiener into a damn stack, you know? Anyway, so that was it. That was really my, but we had a great time and we did the shows there and people really enjoyed it. And we got to go, they have like beautiful beaches on the, like, I didn't realize that we went to this place, I think, called Shell Beach where we swam and it was really cool, man.

Starting point is 00:32:10 So was that maybe the most exotic, strangest place you ever did your act, your thing? That might be, man. Some of those military base, we did like the Azores one time, which is in the middle of nowhere. We did, I did Spain, we did China, but that's one of the, that's probably one of the most unique places I've ever done it. I was thinking the other day, too, somebody asked me, you know, where, where on dirty jobs are really anywhere for that matter. You know, what's, what's the place that, that sticks with you? And for me, it was a place called Cooper Peaty in the Australian Outback, where they, they mined for Opels. Opels, what is it?

Starting point is 00:32:56 So Opel is a, it's a gemstone. Oh, it's a rock. Yeah. It's a, it's basically the gemstone for, or the birthstone for October, I think, but it's, they're very valuable and most of the Opels in the world come from Australia. And most of the Australian Opels come from this little town called Cooper Peaty. It was 122 degrees the day we were there. The city where it's not a city, but the town is underground. People live underground.

Starting point is 00:33:26 Because it's so hot. It's just so hot. And the flies, man, the flies, they're, they call them stickies because they'll get on your face and they, and they just don't fly off. They just crawl really quick all over you. So you have to wear these, these masks. Anyway, mining for Opels is, they call it prospect mining. So you dig a hole with something called a, a cold well bit, which is about the circumference of a manhole cover. Okay.

Starting point is 00:33:59 And they run a shaft about 60, 70 feet deep and then they set up a, a pulley and hook up a boson seat to it. It was just a two by four and you, and you sit on it. And then they, there you go. That's, that's the road to Cooper Peaty right there. The most dangerous road with the most exotic roadkill in the world. Oh yeah, dude. It is bananas everywhere you go, you'll find a new dead thing by the side of the road. There's a kangaroo.

Starting point is 00:34:31 They're everywhere. It's like the, it's like, it's almost like an Australian. It's like, hey, if you're going to die, at least die out by the road so people see you. There's so, there, there's so many dead animals and the billboards that they show you to beg you to slow down. Right? They're like shots of guys, their faces, like their mouths open, they're screaming and their literal toothpicks holding their eyes open. Because the people who fall asleep on the road to Cooper Peaty. And, and the trucks, like we've seen an eight, you know, you see 18 wheelers here all the time. They have these things called truck trains.

Starting point is 00:35:09 So it's like five 18 wheelers attached to each other and they'll go 80 miles an hour down this road. Hey, dude, who, why is there that guy was like, man, I'm, I was, I met a driver one time. He's like, man, I can drive for 40 straight hours. I'm like, but we don't want you to do it. Just, just because you can do a thing, brother, doesn't mean you should. Drive for six hours. Take a break. Yeah, we'll make you a sandwich.

Starting point is 00:35:32 Yeah, get you a coffee. Live alone. But he's like, God, I'll drive for 200 hours, dude. My dad died out here. And I'm like, well, you're going to die out here. We're all going to die, man. Yeah, man, your dad don't want you driving for 200 hours. So people love to drive law.

Starting point is 00:35:49 There's something about that. I can drive forever. What is it? I don't know. It's like some, like one guy came to me one night, he came to the comedy show. He's like, man, we drove 24 hours to get here. And I was thinking about where he couldn't have come from anywhere. I'm like, then you got law.

Starting point is 00:36:05 Like, wait a minute, would you drive a tractor, a rickshaw? Were you on a vehicle with a combustion engine? Because I'm not sure I understand why it took you 24 hours. Were y'all running on brick hats, bro? What's going on here? I think I can explain it. I can bring it back to where we started. Yeah, go on.

Starting point is 00:36:26 Cornhole, darts, catching crap in midair with a shovel. You know, if you're not engaged in some great purpose, if you don't have some, some sort of overarching mission in your life, then you're going to find meaning where, where you can find it. Yeah. And if the only place you can find it is I drove 24 hours straight to see you. God damn it. It's like, okay, I don't want to, I don't want to take that away from that dude.

Starting point is 00:36:55 That's, that's what he's got. That's what he's selling. So hey man, thank you. But then he gets ready to sleep for two days. Then he has to leave. He never even got to spend any time. But that's part of the story too. I got there.

Starting point is 00:37:07 I was so tired. I never, I never heard a single joke Theo told me. But I drove 24 hours for that thing. I can't remember. My God. We loved him. My God. Um, so what is a, what's one of the purpose?

Starting point is 00:37:19 I know you talked earlier about, I want to, I want to get into like, um, just some of the stuff that you're doing. We don't have to get into it. What were we talking about? You mean before we actually started rolling? Well, we're talking about, you have a whiskey. Yeah. I own a whiskey now called Noble.

Starting point is 00:37:36 K-N-O-B-E-L. That was based on your grandfather. I thought that was interesting. So dirty jobs was a tribute to a guy named Carl Noble. Carl Noble was my neighbor and my grandfather. Um, both of those things. Both of those things. And he was a magician.

Starting point is 00:37:52 Um, a real magician? No. As good as they can be? No, the kind of magician who, you know, the guy woke up clean every day and came home dirty every night. And somehow, during the course of the day, something magical happened. Something was fixed. Something was repaired.

Starting point is 00:38:10 Something was built. The guy could build a house without a blueprint. Take your watch apart, put it back together, blindfolded. A combustion engine, a plumbing line, whatever it is, right? He was born. He was drug-free. He was drug-free? Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 00:38:28 I mean, as far as I know, I never saw him drink to tell you the truth. Wow. But he, um, he only went to the seventh grade, but by the time he was 30, he was the chief electrical inspector for the state of Maryland. He licensed electrician, plumber, steam fitter, pipe fitter, welder, architect. He could do all that stuff, right? So I thought I'd follow in his footsteps. I worked as his apprentice for a couple of summers.

Starting point is 00:38:55 The handy gene is recessive, right? So all the stuff he could do, all the stuff he could do naturally, it didn't come easily to me, right? One day, I was working with him on a concrete pour on some construction site, and I just bitched up the mix, completely ruined it, you know? And I was probably 16th time, and he said, Mike, you know, just because you, you can be a tradesman, right? I just got a different toolbox.

Starting point is 00:39:30 Yeah. And I mean, that, that advice changed my life. And anyhow, long story short, I got in the entertainment business. I started pursuing things that I didn't, I didn't know I would like, and I didn't know I cared about, like singing and acting and writing and hosting and, and narrating. You know, I, I got into all of this at a community college as I tried to put a different toolbox together. And, you know, way leads on the way.

Starting point is 00:40:01 And I, I freelanced for, for 20 some years in, in the TV business, had a lot of jobs. And then my mother called, I was working for CBS in San Francisco on a show called Evening Magazine, terrible little show, one of those half hour things that comes on after the news, right? Yeah, sounds bad. It's awful. But I was good at it, you know, I was, I was good at creating the illusion of, of competence in, in short bursts.

Starting point is 00:40:28 Oh yeah. Like Russell Wilson. Sure. Yeah. Sure. You said it, not me. And so I'm sitting in my cubicle one day, preparing for the show that night and my mom calls me and she says, Michael, you know, your, your grandfather turned 90 today and he's not

Starting point is 00:40:46 going to be around forever. And I was thinking, would it be great if before he died, he could turn on the TV and see you doing something that looked like work. My mother, no, no, my, my, my mother hits me with this, right? So I take a, I take one of my cameramen. Actually, I go to the boss and I say, Hey, why does Evening Magazine always have to be hosted from like a winery or a, or an art museum? Why can't it be hosted from a factory floor or a construction site or a sewer?

Starting point is 00:41:23 And he's like, you want to host Evening from a sewer? And I said, why not? He goes, Mike, I don't give a shit. No one's watching the show. Do whatever you want. So I, I took my cameraman into the sewers of San Francisco and what happened down there is actually a book I wrote a couple of years ago. It changed my life.

Starting point is 00:41:43 The, the whole experience in the sewer, the rats, the roaches, the, the, just the endless chocolate tide that washed over us and, and, and kept me from doing the job I was trying to do. All of that forced me to do the only thing I could do, which was work with the sewer inspector who was down there replacing these rotten bricks. You know, that was his job. I was just there to, to shoot wraps, to host the thing. Anyhow, that footage, uh, wound up on the air, um, and it turned into dirty jobs.

Starting point is 00:42:19 I crushed. My granddad saw the first episode died. Oh, killed him, huh? Killed him. Killed my own pop. No, he had, he had an amazing life and he, he, he lived long enough to see me doing something that, as my mother said, looked like work. Right.

Starting point is 00:42:37 And so, uh, and then dirty jobs blew up. Yeah. Yeah. And so this, this is, you know, I'm, I know you've seen this kind of thing in show business. I hadn't at that point, I'd had a lot of jobs, but I had, I had never gotten mail from people saying, you think that's dirty. You should see what my father does. My brother, my cousin, my uncle, my sister, where do you see this?

Starting point is 00:43:03 And that's when I was like, Oh, Oh, this is not a show. This is something else. This is, um, I love letter to work. It's a romp. It's, I mean, a truly unscripted, back before reality was reality. It was like, it was a very unusual thing for discovery to put on the air. Oh yeah. When you're in an animal's, when you're in an animal's butt.

Starting point is 00:43:28 You just, no one had ever seen it. And I mean, few had and they weren't supported by, by the, you know, by society. Hey man, that, that cow still calls me. Hey, Mr. Fancy Man with the opposable thumb. When are you coming back to town? Yeah. That thing's a wiener mitten. That's a wiener mitten.

Starting point is 00:43:47 So for, so for 20 years, man, I mean, the show is still in production. I'm still shooting dirty jobs right now. Wow. And, um, my granddad is long gone, but I wanted to, you know, he, he had girls. So when he died, his very strange last name. Female offspring, you mean? Yeah. Okay.

Starting point is 00:44:08 Yeah. My mom and, and her sister. And I don't know of any other nobles, K and O, B, E, L. So this year with dirty jobs coming back, I thought, you know, let's, let's do something to get his name out there. And so, uh, I've got this whiskey and, and we, we raise money for the foundation that was also, uh, in his honor. I do this thing called micro works and we award, um, work ethics scholarships to

Starting point is 00:44:33 people who don't want to go for a four year degree, but want to weld or be plumbers or steam fitters or pipe fitters or mechanics or electricians or all the jobs might that my, my granddad had. Yeah. My god cousin Ricky is a welder. Dude, I can't tell you how many people I've talked to who didn't know what they wanted to do, but got a welding certificate, went to work and who are now just crushing it.

Starting point is 00:45:00 150 grand a year. Many of them, you know, have picked up their plumbing certification as well. Some of them. He's telling me those dudes are out there. They're killing it. Yeah. I know an underwater welder, 350 grand last year. Wow.

Starting point is 00:45:14 Now he's underwater and he's welding. He earns every penny, man. I mean, it's, if you've ever. I mean, he has oysters for lunch. I mean, if you've seen Google underwater welder and look at what comes up, these guys have big, big, big stones. And there's some of them right there, dude. Now those, those are the opals.

Starting point is 00:45:34 That's opals, huh? Those are opals. Yeah. That's a fortune. God, I want some of that. That looks nice. Underwater weld. And that's gangster.

Starting point is 00:45:43 And being from Louisiana, you hear about that all the time. Sure. Offshore rig and welding. People leaving their families. You hear all of it. Yeah. Louisiana was very good to dirty jobs over the years. You know.

Starting point is 00:45:56 Before we go there, I want to, I want to know a little bit more about that. The, the, the grants you guys give. Just sure. Just so, just so our audience can hear about it. Yeah. Thanks. You told me a story about the, about the, I just think it's a neat story. All right.

Starting point is 00:46:12 So here's what happened. In 2008, dirty jobs was the number one show on cable. Yeah. It was all over the world and I was working my ass off, living in Motel 6s and Super 8s. You know, the, I mean, on the road, full time. They're good, but they're bad. Dude, there's, look, anytime you see a hotel with a number in its name. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:46:36 Right. I mean, in actual, like the number six or the number eight. Yeah. It's no good. Now, now if like four seasons is different, but they spell it out, right? F-O-U-R. Yeah. But if it's just the number four, don't go in there.

Starting point is 00:46:50 So I'm, I'm living with hotels with numbers in their names. It's 2008. The show's killing it, but the country is starting to slide into a, a recession. Every morning I wake up and I walk out of my Motel 6 and I look, you know, there's a USA today, new headline, right? Six and a half percent unemployment, seven, seven and a half, eight, eight and a half, nine. I mean, for weeks it goes on and all anybody is talking about are the millions of people

Starting point is 00:47:18 who can't find work. And the crazy thing is on dirty jobs, back then anyway, everywhere I went, I saw help wanted signs. So something weird was happening in the country. On the one hand, nobody could find a job. And on the other hand, everywhere I went, no one could hire, right? They couldn't find people with the skills that were necessary. The welders, the plumbers, these, these, these shortages were real.

Starting point is 00:47:46 So I thought maybe I could use the dirty jobs platform to make a more persuasive case for a lot of these jobs that were out there that nobody, nobody really cared about. And so micro works started as a PR campaign for those trade jobs, for skilled labor jobs that didn't require a four year degree. And then it turned into a scholarship fund. Okay. So that's what you're talking about. A few years after that, starting in 2012, I guess it was, we started raising money and

Starting point is 00:48:21 to this day we give away like a million or two million bucks a year. That's awesome. In work ethic scholarships, specifically for people who want to learn one of these skills. So we've helped 17, maybe 1800 people over the last eight years, mostly the construction trades. But this year I've opened it up to any skill that doesn't require a four year degree. So I don't care. Cosmetology, cutting hair, fine.

Starting point is 00:48:52 You know, braiding hair, fine. Oh yeah, because some of that hair is damn 200 pound test, man, you know. Well, it's heavy. It is heavy. And you know, I don't know what goes on here in Nashville, but down in Georgia, this is terrible. You know, there are a lot of black women down there who make their living braiding hair. But the government had set up this accreditation thing where you need to literally pay like

Starting point is 00:49:19 $20,000 in order to get a license to braid hair. No. Yeah. So it's like, I get it if it's brain surgery, I get it if you're going to take my appendix out. You know, I'd like to see some diplomas on the wall. I'd like to see some, you know, but to charge a woman who's trying to feed her kids $20,000 for the privilege of braiding hair, that's freaking criminal.

Starting point is 00:49:45 That's cheap. So I got angry. I mean, it's criminal. I mean, it's cheaper the city to do that. Yeah, yeah. It's just dumb. You know, of all the ways to raise money, why in the world do you want to tax the people before they've even made a dollar?

Starting point is 00:49:59 Now, I think you should make those people get tested once a year to make sure they're decently braiding hair. Now, that's something I do think because I've been at the beach before my little nephew comes back. You know what I'm saying? It's a mess. I mean, just looking like he's a, you know, he comes back and he's also stolen a car. And I'm like, I think they braided this, this is a little too tight over here, you know?

Starting point is 00:50:18 Got to loosen it up. Yeah, loosen it up a little bit. This guy's forgetting his morals, you know? But, you know, bad, bad braids are their own bad advertising. That's a good point. Like nobody goes back. That's true. You know?

Starting point is 00:50:29 So it's like, you know, again, it's, it's, it's hair for crisis. So, you know, Yeah, that's a bummer. Yeah. So anyhow, So you guys opened it up. Yeah. We opened all that up.

Starting point is 00:50:38 And so today, when I'm not working on whatever show is happening, I, I circle back to the people we've given money to, and I asked real probing questions like, how's it going? What's new? And dude, the answers will fucking make you weep. Like I, I talked to a guy about eight months ago who, I gave him $7,000. He got his welding certificate. I said, how's it going? He said, let me show you some pictures.

Starting point is 00:51:09 So he's hired three of his best friends. Yeah. They've hired additional people. They got three vans. Yeah. I love vans. They're doing, they're doing welding. They're doing air conditioning and heating.

Starting point is 00:51:22 They're doing electric and they're doing plumbing. Like nine dudes generating about $3 million a year. So, you know, I can walk all that back from a $7,000, $8,000 welding certificate. So I'm convinced that that's something we ought to be doing more of. And to the extent I can, that, that's what I've decided to do. So yeah, the money I raise selling noble Tennessee whiskey named after my pop goes into that scholarship fund. And that makes me feel like less of, you know, an asshole. Cause sometimes you're a guy, you know, holding the penis of a giant bull trying to catch the white gold.

Starting point is 00:52:01 And you, and you wonder if your life has any meaning or purpose. And then you can maybe, you know, maybe help some people who are, who are trying to find their way. Yeah. Blue chew, have you been on them? Have you tapped into them little blue chewables, baby? Dang baby, put that low spine in your pants, bud. Spine up that meat. I'm talking about blue chew. It's a unique online service that delivers the same active ingredients as Viagra and Cialis.

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Starting point is 00:54:42 Yeah, no, that's amazing, man. That's really, it's just a neat story, especially when you get that moment where you get to hear that whatever you did was helpful and you get to see that. You're like, man, that's because that's a real thing in somebody's life. Like, especially if somebody's struggling, the one I'm from, the only way to get out if you were really struggling, pressure washing was the number one thing. If you're poor, and I'll say this, I've said this for years and you don't have any money, pressure wash, bro. You got a shot. That'll get you to that next level. You know, it'll get you one stair, two stairs up, you know, because it's a $600 machine you get and you can start your own business.

Starting point is 00:55:18 And I'll tell you, the beauty of pressure washing is, like so many dirty jobs, you know how you're doing every step of the way. You're like, it's the walls a mess and now it's clean. Yeah. It's like so addictive and weirdly satisfying. You know what I did in Louisiana once outside of Baton Rouge? I went into a frack tank, right, and the guys who clean the insides of frack tanks, they not only pressure wash, they, what do you call it when it's not water that's coming out, but these very, very fine pellets, like sand washing. Oh, yeah, yeah. Right.

Starting point is 00:55:58 So when you blast sand out of a pressure washing unit, it's like a high powered shotgun. Yeah. And you can take the finish off of anything. Take the finish off your cousin if you want to probably, huh? These guys go inside of these frack tanks and you're in a, you're in full turnout gear, right? You're like in a rubber suit and you've got the pressure washer. Okay. And then you've got it hooked up to this, you know, so you're blasting out these other little pellets.

Starting point is 00:56:28 And that is, it's a, it's basically a sand blaster. That's what it's called. And there it is. That's one of them right there, you know, but that thing hooks up to whatever you want to hook it up to. And man, you feel like the terminator. Yeah. And so those guys are in there using those things. Oh, I see.

Starting point is 00:56:46 Wow. But see, that's miniature. The thing I had really was as big as a shotgun. And you've got all this compressed air on your back and you can just take the finish off anything. That AK-40 sand, huh? That's exactly right. Dang. Now, cause I used to, what's a job that I had?

Starting point is 00:57:07 I used to get in, so I used to work on a corn, soybean, corn and cotton farm, right? For two years. So I would get in. I'd have to, over the winter they would, the snakes would get in, rats would get inside of the things that kept the, whatever they called. Siloes. Yes. Rats would get in there and we'd have to get in there and then snakes would get in. Yep.

Starting point is 00:57:30 So they'd send me in there to get like the whatever was dead, right? That's a good one. Yeah. The thing is 90% of the stuff ain't dead. It's still in there hunting. You know what I'm saying? We're still in the last trilogy of Lord of the Rings for these things. Right, right.

Starting point is 00:57:43 And you're in Mordor. And I'm just rolling up the mountain with a shovel at $4 an hour, you know? Like it was just poor choices, but dude, it was the scariest. They would leave me in there. They'd be like, all right, we'll be back in a couple hours, man. Get what you can get. Get what you can get. All right, that should be on a hat too, man, because that's it.

Starting point is 00:58:02 It was so scary because you'd hear one little thing. You didn't know if it was a mouse or a snake, but either way, it was fucking horrible. Yeah, man. Yeah, it's the stuff. Sometimes I think it's the stuff that you can't see. Like Dirty Job spent a lot of time in the animal kingdom as well. And you know, I hosted Shark Week for a couple of years. Oh, wow.

Starting point is 00:58:22 That's crazy. And yeah, when you're bit by a shark, I mean, that's a whole different. I mean, that's so horrifying. I tested the one of the first stainless steel shark suits with the guy who made it. Wow, and they in the shark bit you. Oh, yeah. No, we got bit and turned upside down and shook like a tug toy, man. It was, I honestly, that was the first time I really saw my life flash before my eyes

Starting point is 00:58:49 because, you know, like you, I'm sure I saw Jaws when I was a kid. And you know, that primal fear of sharks is in everybody's brain. Anything. Like it's the same thing with a tiger, like a big full on tiger. Anything that can eat you alive is will get you thinking in a different way. Oh, we had kid Ernesto that would bite us on the fucking school bus every day. I was so scared of that. That kid alone crossing from row like seven to row 11.

Starting point is 00:59:17 Dude, it was, it was our Euphrates, man. It was unbelievable. It was impossible to get past that guy. You had a kid named Ernesto on the bus. Oh, he would latch on to you, bro. He would come out. I mean, it was like, yeah. What?

Starting point is 00:59:31 He bite the head. He bite you. Whatever happened to him? Oh, I'm sure he's probably working for the city. You know, but at the time he would bite the, he just had some itch or some oral fixation or something or whatever. Yeah. I mean, look, I guess maybe I could talk to the network and say, look, you know, the

Starting point is 00:59:48 shark week thing, you had a good run. You had a good 25, 30 years, but I know a dude, Ernesto, I think we do Ernesto week. And we just see where he is, file his teeth down to really take the stakes up a little bit, make him good and pointy. And then just have Ernesto hide behind a bush and just jump out and bite people. I mean, that's a, that's a ratings grabber. I think we start off like rabies Wednesday, we call it. I think that's where we start.

Starting point is 01:00:17 I don't think we go for a whole shark week. I interrupted your story though. I don't know where I was going with it, except to say that I've been in silos. Oh, you were in that suit. You were in that shark suit. I was in a shark suit. Yeah. So that's powerful.

Starting point is 01:00:30 When it grabs you, you can, it's really insane. It's like a giant with giant hands, but, but the hands have gloves on like boxing gloves, right? And so the, you, you feel all the pressure of that, of those jaws, but the, the suit works and that stainless steel keeps the teeth from, from going through. Usually, you know, one got through. I got a cold in my shin. Just one, one little tooth gets through.

Starting point is 01:01:04 But, but yeah, when they get on your shoulder and when they got on your elbow, they'll twist you and you will flip upside down and then they will just shake you like a rag doll. And that, that was in 2006. All that happened and all that aired. And I remember watching it at home and feeling just as terrified as I did when, when it was actually happening. And that's weird. Cause I, I, I know I lived, right?

Starting point is 01:01:33 I mean, I know how the story ends, but it's, it's just the, the fear of being eaten alive is so, is so primal. And the guy I was down there with, we were in the Bahamas and we were kneeling on the ocean floor about 60 feet down. Oh wow. And you're there with these two big, well, first you're on the boat up top and you take the chum and you throw it. Yes.

Starting point is 01:01:59 You just cover it and the sharks come. Dozens of gray sharks, about 10, 12 feet long and they're everywhere. And you're in a full scuba gear and you're dressed up in this stainless steel suit. Yeah. And then when the sharks are right in the middle of the feeding frenzy, you jump in. You just jump. Oh my God. You jump right into the center of this swirling mass of gray.

Starting point is 01:02:24 Jeremiah, the guy who, who, who, who took me on this fricking misadventure called them the, the men in the gray suits. And, and so you sink to the bottom of the ocean and the sharks follow you down and you kneel on the ocean floor and then you open these other containers with more blood and guts in them because the sharks really don't want to bite you. And whose boat is this M night Shyamalan? I feel like this has a fricking titanic. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:02:52 This sounds, it sounds biblical and absolutely ridiculous at the same time. You can find it. His name is actually Stuart. It's Stuart's Cove and it's down in the, in the Bahamas somewhere. So you're kneeling on the bottom. So you're kneeling on the ocean floor. And then boys come up and start nibbling. And they come up, they, they want the fish and the blood that you're holding, but all

Starting point is 01:03:14 you just do is let it go and sit in the middle of it. And then they'll take you. They'll, they'll start biting at you. And then once they start, they, they really go for it. And I remember looking over, I had a shark on my, I had one of my elbow, my right elbow and my left knee. And I thought they were just going to pull me in half like a, like a wishbone. And I looked over at Jeremiah and he was upside down, sharks all over him.

Starting point is 01:03:42 And a big one swam past me right in front of him. And the tail knocked his regulator out. So now this dude is upside down. There's blood in the water. I don't know if it's his mind or the chum. There's urine in my suit because all that, you know, all that's, all that happened. And, you know, he's just very calmly got the thing back in his mouth and live to fight another day.

Starting point is 01:04:08 It was one of the craziest days really on, on dirty jobs ever. But isn't there something interesting when you're shooting a show, sometimes it feels like if you died on the show, you'd come back to life in your regular life. Did you ever have a feeling like that? The feeling I used to get and, and, and it didn't happen on this day. This is one of the rare days where it became so hyper real that I didn't experience the, the bulletproof quality that I'm talking about. Like the things I did on camera, the things I was willing to do on camera, I would

Starting point is 01:04:43 never do in real life. Interesting. I'm not a stunt junkie. I'm not like let's go push the envelope. Right. I'm just a guy who tried to do a show that looked like work to shut my mother up to honor my granddad. Now I'm upside down with sharks biting me.

Starting point is 01:04:58 It's like that's weird, right? So it's, so, so when you're out there in the world, you know, whether you're going into an opal mine, which is horrifying or getting bit by a shark or trying to coax the sperm out of a bull called Hunsucker Commando, you don't, you, you don't think you're in real danger because you're on camera, because you're making a show. You're not actually doing the thing. Right. That's the thing.

Starting point is 01:05:24 Even pulling my own parachute with the golden knights, you know, when I can still hear the sound of my sphincter slamming shut at 15,000 feet, but you do it because you're just like, there's no way I'm going to die on camera. Right. And the cameras are everywhere. And so you do it. Now that of course is stupid. That's very foolish, but that is a very powerful feeling to answer your question that I had

Starting point is 01:05:51 all the time. Yeah. There's something about, oh, this isn't, I remember one time walking between two hot air balloons on a plank, right? Yeah. Yeah. And I was like, oh, well, if I die, I'll just wake up back off camera. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:06:07 It's not real. Yes. It doesn't not real. Yeah. It doesn't feel real. It feels like this other adventure. Why were you doing that? Why were you on a plank between two hot air balloons?

Starting point is 01:06:16 I was doing an MTV show and we just had, um, that was one of the things we had to do, you know? We did some weird shit, man. One time, this is a crazy thing we did one time. They had a wood chipper, right? We did the opposite, I think, of what you did. Like we didn't help society or learn anything. This wasn't a job.

Starting point is 01:06:35 This was just jackass meets fear factor, you know, with stakes. Yeah. This was like, this was, and they paid us minimum wage to do this. We made so much money for this, for this production company, everything, but, um, they put animal carcasses in this wood chipper and then they, um, shot, it was like an industrial, like the best one you could get. I mean, like something God would have, you know? And it would shoot the stuff like 60 yards.

Starting point is 01:07:03 And we had these buckets on our head, remember like a double dare? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure. And we had these buckets on our head and we're trying to catch. The most guts. Yes. The most you could, literally 60 yards, man. So we're talking like Justin A. Bear throws it or Herbert throws it.

Starting point is 01:07:18 You know, I don't know how to say it, but, um, yeah, I remember when this one chick called a Cossacks right in the face, man, some kind of damn animal Cossacks or something. And, uh, you mean the tailbone? She was never the same, man. Once you get it with a Cossack, you can't go back from that. I mean, look, a lot of women want a little bit of Cossacks to the face now and then. Now and then. But I mean, I mean, at least she has a story.

Starting point is 01:07:42 I mean, she's got a scar story. What happened to your face? Well, I'll tell you what happened. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:07:52 Hit me about 40 miles an hour. A dismembered, disembodied Cossacks caught me on the left side of the face. Different times. That's amazing. You know, for me, the, uh, those, it's that feeling that you're sort of invincible in making a show, but every now and then a thing will happen, right? So it happened with the sharks, but the one, the one I remember best was, um, have you ever been on the mighty Mac?

Starting point is 01:08:19 It's a bridge between the upper and lower peninsula in Michigan, the Mackinac Bridge. It's five miles long. It's green. I believe in it. I've just never been there. It has to be painted constantly. I mean, you did. They, you never stopped painting the minute you finish, you just start over again.

Starting point is 01:08:36 Why? What's going on? People are still in the paint. No, it just by the time you get to the end of it, it's two years later and it needs to be painted again. Wow. So, so I wanted that Mackinac Bridge, I wanted to paint the Mackinac Bridge on dirty jobs. And so they, they, they brought me out there and they let me paint it and it was amazing.

Starting point is 01:08:55 And then they let me go into the towers and down below the water and clean the inside of these like honeycombs, which is fricking terrifying. And then at the end of the day, I did something. I asked the question and I knew the answer would be no, but I wanted to ask the question on camera because I wanted everybody to know what a badass I was, right? So, so I say to the guy who was in charge of the whole thing, I said, Hey, before we leave, what do you say I walk across that girder and step over that stanchion and walk up that cable?

Starting point is 01:09:29 See those green cables there? And I said, you know, some, somebody must have to change those light bulbs. That would be a cool shot because we have a helicopter with us, with a West Cam unit on it. Yeah. And how wide are those cables? Those cables are probably three feet in diameter, right? So I asked the question, knowing that the guy would say, well, no, of course not.

Starting point is 01:09:53 Of course we're not going to let you do that. But he looks at me and he says, Okay, so I walk across this girder and I start walking up this cable. And so the way you do it is you tie off on both sides. So you're walking up a hill, you got a clip in your right hand, you got a clip in your left hand. There it is. Right.

Starting point is 01:10:18 Just like this, right? Okay. So I got a camera screwed to my head shooting backwards. I got that guy encouraging me to go forward. And I got a bag on my back full of light bulbs that have to be replaced. So that little wire that comes up, you can see them, those guide wires, every 30 feet or so, you have to undo and go around. And the reason you have two is so that you never are completely not tied off, right?

Starting point is 01:10:48 And so... Somebody learned that the hard way. You bet they did. So right here, you know, I'm like, all right, I'm being super careful. I don't want to fall to my death. I'm 300 feet above the road and 600 feet above the water. Amazing. Right?

Starting point is 01:11:02 And that's a pretty great shot. Wanted to Emmy for that shot, actually. That's amazing. It's like a helicopter. So we're walking up there and I'm doing my job. And how many gay men love this shot, huh? I don't... We'll take a poll.

Starting point is 01:11:16 I mean, I bet, dude, I got a game. I'm going to send him this later, bro. It was, I mean, it was a big day. So what you're seeing now is me getting increasingly confident as I do the job, all right? And so you tie off, you tie back on. You tie off. There it is. That's me doing it properly.

Starting point is 01:11:35 And so at some point, I get about three quarters of the way up here and I'm communicating with the pilot of the helicopter and the cameraman and the helicopter. And we're trying to get the shot, right? So the helicopter comes up and this is not for the, for the episode. This is for a promo. This is just, I know it's going to be a great way to promote the episode. So I want to get this shot just right. So I'm sitting straddling a, one of those stanchions.

Starting point is 01:12:06 I just replaced the bulb and somehow or another, in the midst of all the conversation, you know, the guy behind me is not in this shot. I get him out of the shot because I'm, I'm, I'm shooting a promo, right? So I want to clean. Long story short, I am holding on to the stanchion here. The helicopter's coming up like this in front of me. I got a light bulb in this hand and I'm, I'm leaning over, right? So like between my toes is 600 feet straight down and I'm looking at these tankers that

Starting point is 01:12:39 look like toys going underneath the bridge and I'm sitting there and up comes the camera and I realized somehow or another, I'm not tied off to anything. I had unclipped myself and I didn't clip back in point of the story is nothing changes. I'm as high as I was a second earlier. Um, I'm, I'm, I'm not doing anything different. I'm simply aware that suddenly the, the safety net is gone. Right. There's nothing there.

Starting point is 01:13:15 So the stakes are higher. That's all. And that's the moment Theo, when the sound of your sphincter echoes in your mind. Right. Nothing changes, but holy crap. You took your eye off the ball and the cameras can't save you. The helicopter can't save you. You're just an idiot.

Starting point is 01:13:33 Yeah. Dangling 600 feet in the air, right? And so yeah, it, it was moments like that during the show that, um, reminded me, you know, don't, don't be an idiot. The cameras actually can't save you and people, people get hurt bad. People die every day doing this kind of work. People die every day. I think that's why God made so many people because you, we need repeated examples that

Starting point is 01:14:02 people aren't going to make it. It's the Darwin Awards, man. Um, the herd gets thin. I know, huh? It's scary. Yeah. Um, what's been something like, uh, what's going on with like, do you fear, because obviously people tie you in a lot with like work in class, right?

Starting point is 01:14:20 You get tied in. Yeah. Right. You know the guy that was in La Bamba? Yeah. Um, I can't remember his name right now. Richie Valens is the character he played, but I don't remember his name, right? But he always gets invited to all these Mexican things and he's Native American, right?

Starting point is 01:14:35 Right. So people just get tied in sometimes to things, right? But he goes to these awards things every year. It's awesome, right? Sometimes it's like, uh, the screen will make you a part of things, even if, you know, like in your story, you're almost living your grandfather's, you know, some of his dream, right? Some of his, um, but what I'm, what I'm saying is like, do you, what do you think about like

Starting point is 01:14:57 the future of like jobs and stuff? Do you feel like we're in a scary spot? Do you feel like that's just hype that we're in a scary spot? No, we're in a scary spot. We're in a scary spot. Two things. First of all, yeah, the visuals will define you. It doesn't matter what you say.

Starting point is 01:15:16 It doesn't matter how hard you work. Like on Dirty Jobs, not a single episode went by where I didn't say something along the lines of, look, I'm not an expert. This is not what I do in real life. I'm here as an apprentice. I'm not here as a host. I'm here as a guest, like an avatar. My job is just to try and keep up.

Starting point is 01:15:37 Those guys are the experts. They're the real workers. I'm an actor. At least I used to be once upon a time. And before that, I was a singer. I sang in the Baltimore Opera for eight years, right? Like I never tried to hide who I was or what I'd done. None of that matters to you because when you're flicking around and you see a guy dressed

Starting point is 01:15:57 up like a worker wearing a hard hat, doing a job, you make all kinds of assumptions about that guy. And then later, when people discover, like it was some secret, that I did some off-Broadway shows. And I sang. I love newsies, okay? But not glee, right? But I mean, people today have a hard time with the cognitive dissonance that comes from

Starting point is 01:16:29 the fact that two things can be true at the same time. It's true that I sang in the opera for years and I had a great time. I loved it. It's true that I went to a four-year school. It's also true that I became one of the loudest proponents for vocational education in the country. It's true that I work on blue collar shows. Like all these things are true.

Starting point is 01:16:59 And so some people have a difficult time processing it. Right. It's hard to see people as more than one thing sometimes too. It's like our brain just wants to make it easy on ourselves as well. That's right. But what can I assume from a guy with a haircut like yours, a ball cap, a vest, a t-shirt? The honest answer is freaking nothing. There's nothing to assume at all.

Starting point is 01:17:25 But I'm trained to make all kinds of assumptions. And so that thing is alive in our culture and it's alive in our workforce. And it's just bitching everything up because people simply can't. They just can't process the cognitive dissonance of it. The other thing is, yeah, we're in real trouble. I had a guy on my podcast just a couple of weeks ago, an economist named Nicholas Eberhardt. This guy is brilliant. Harvard, all the abbreviations after his name that you want, American Enterprise Institute,

Starting point is 01:18:05 wrote a bestselling book in 2016 called Men Without Work. It's republished it because the contention in the book is now on steroids. And basically what he's saying is never mind the unemployment numbers. They don't matter. That's a depression era metric and it doesn't tell us anything we really, really need to know. Here's what we need to know, 7 million able-bodied men between the ages of 25 and 54 are not only not working, they are not looking.

Starting point is 01:18:42 They're affirmatively not looking for work. Never in the, in peacetime, never has that metric existed before. We have 4 million more open jobs today than we did pre-pandemic and we have 4 million fewer people in the workforce. That's really bad and you can't find an employer in anywhere today who is not desperate to hire. So, like, that's actually happening. So some of the things that I hear when I'm out and about, you know, you hear from some

Starting point is 01:19:20 people that they're not paying enough, right? Oh, sure. And then you hear from other people that if they raise the minimum wage in some job, in some businesses, then it'll kill the business. Sure. I think greed is also probably a big problem that's happened in this country. It's like we don't, you don't want the man who's working with you to also have success at some point.

Starting point is 01:19:45 It's like, it's exactly what we just said about two things being true at the same time and people struggling with it. It is true that lots and lots of people are out of work. It is true that even more people aren't looking for work. If I tell you that there are 11 million open jobs in the country right now, that's not political. That's just a fact. And no one can dispute it. No one does dispute it.

Starting point is 01:20:16 But what immediately happens is my buddy's on the left, to your point, when I say why do you think there's so much opportunity here that can't be filled? They'll say because, because business owners are pricks, they're greedy and they're rapacious and if they paid more money, those jobs would fill. My buddy's on the right, when I ask him the same question, will say, because people are lazy. People are just lazy. They don't want to work.

Starting point is 01:20:44 They won't show up early. They won't stay late. They won't take a bite of the shit sandwich when it's their turn. They won't do the thing that needs to be done. So that's how it becomes politicized. It doesn't change the fact that there's still 11 million open jobs. But if we want to argue that the jobs are open because the opportunities are shitty versus the jobs are open because people don't want to work, then we're going to paint with

Starting point is 01:21:07 a really broad brush and we're not going to solve the problem. The truth is, exactly as you said it, sure greed factors into it, but so does work ethic. My foundation offers work ethic scholarships because I think work ethic actually is under siege and I don't think it has as much, it has something to do with benefits. It has something to do with pay, but it's not just that. It's a real clear and present aversion to getting in there. I mean, I don't care if it's blue collar or white collar. My work ethic, whatever that means, I learned it as a kid.

Starting point is 01:21:56 I learned it from my pop and it's got nothing to do with the trades. Your work ethic, how many shows do you do a year? How many podcasts do you do a week? For years I did, I put in my work and I still do. You still do. Yeah. And I still want to make it better. And you are.

Starting point is 01:22:13 And to me, I don't know a ton about your career, but the thing I like a lot about everything you've done is that you're actually a fairly serious person and you have a platform and you have listeners and you have the ability to do things and say things that might actually help somebody and you're doing it. And you're not doing it for a medal, you're not doing it for a prize, you don't have to do it though. You don't have to do any of this. So I admire that and the people that my foundation tries to help have that quality.

Starting point is 01:22:55 And I'm sorry, but I put my thumb on the scale too and I say if you're not willing to take a bite of the shit sandwich from time to time, then why should I give you money that people trust me to dispense judiciously and fairly? So I am in a weird spot. People get angry at me a lot now because they're like, well, who are you? I got this thing called a sweat pledge. Some people love it. Some people hate it.

Starting point is 01:23:23 And what is that from? Like a Sigma Nu or something? So I had a couple drinks one night like eight years ago and I was trying to figure out what can I do to get people to talk about work ethic? How can I challenge them? I can't look into their soul, but what are 12 things that I believe are true and really impact people's success? So I wrote these 12 things down, sweat, it stood for something, skill and work ethic

Starting point is 01:23:53 aren't taboo, right? It was just a thing to get high school kids thinking and talking about the value of an honest day's work and the sweat pledge says things like, I think the first one is, I believe I've hit the greatest lottery of all time, I'm alive, I live in America, above all things I'm grateful, all right? So I feel that way and I understand that life's not fair and I understand that other people feel different ways, but if you don't fundamentally feel jazzed and psyched and excited by this brief little time you've been given to fog a mirror and walk around on this planet, man,

Starting point is 01:24:35 if you're not stoked by that, I can't help you, I don't want to help you, I don't because there are other people out there who are showing up early and staying late, there are people out there who understand delayed gratification, they understand the most important rungs on the ladder, you mentioned the minimum wage, I get shit for this all the time, but it's like those minimum wage jobs, they're not meant to be careers, they're meant to be a thing you do for a time so you can learn about that thing and get paid something for your trouble, those lower rungs on the ladder, they're important because they get you to the middle. But you shouldn't monkey around there forever if you can help it.

Starting point is 01:25:25 And you should try to help it, look, again, cookie cutter advice is dangerous, everybody's different. And there's outlier circumstances, people have children, they don't have any other choice, that's not who you're suggesting to, it's like, but if someone's going to just sit at that position and then complain about it, then it kind of creates a different set of circumstances. Here's the scary thing about Nick Ebersat's conversation with me, the thing that really stuck, it wasn't that 7 million able-bodied men are affirmatively not looking for work,

Starting point is 01:25:58 it's what they're doing instead. And there's a lot of research on this, worse, what they're doing instead, and this data, by the way, comes from self-reporting surveys. So this is what the 7 million men have explained is taking up all their time, 90% of them are spending over 2,000 hours a year on screens. Now 2,080 hours, that's 40 hours a week, that's a full-time job. These guys are spending a full-time job's amount of time on screens. Well, here would be my thought then, at some point was our government, and I know this

Starting point is 01:26:49 is like, people are going to say, well, you can't respect your government to take care of you and this and that, and I don't either, I don't expect, I don't expect my government to take care of me, I have to take care of myself, but at some point was there supposed to be some protection against the addiction to screens. It's obviously dangerous for us, people die because they're texting, people are losing their human instincts because they're human connect, it's so obvious, it's like... It's not that obvious, it's obvious now, but you got to think of it like prohibition. People looked at booze and got to the point where it became undeniable that it was destroying

Starting point is 01:27:36 lives, and so in the 1920s, we just decided that's it, no more booze, we're going to prohibit it. Well, that ain't going to work because not everybody wrestles with the same problem the same way, and you can cross out booze and write in porn. Cross out porn and write in vaping, cross that out and write in, but then all of a sudden you get to fentanyl, and now, no, your experience is not going to vary, you're going to die. And then put in screens, now there's something different about screens, it's the addiction and it's the fun of it, I mean look, I literally sat on the bowl the other day, and I don't

Starting point is 01:28:22 like to linger on the bowl longer than necessary, give you hemorrhoids, you cramp up, my circulation I can't walk away from it. You stand up and you fall down, like a cheap card table, because I'm sitting there on TikTok or Reels, just like, God, and suddenly I got 20 minutes, I stopped crapping 20 minutes ago, and there I sit, right, and look... It's addicted, and they created the algorithm beyond what we can, we can't even handle it anymore, you turn that on, you go into it. Dude, I'm 60 years old, okay, I have had a certain amount of success in my life, I've

Starting point is 01:28:59 seen a lot of things, I'm not a foolish person, I sat on the bowl for 20 minutes until I lost my circulation looking at this thing, alright, and I'm busy, I got five shows going on, I do a podcast, I'm running a foundation, I'm trying to launch a line of whiskey, I'm busy, but I sat there for 20 minutes as all the blood left my legs, you know, waiting to see the next little magic trick, where the next guy take a pie in the face, what the fuck, what is that, right, and so there is something about the screen that is different than booze, and different than porn, and different than all these other things that came along that would keep an otherwise busy sensible man sitting on the bowl wasting time, so why are

Starting point is 01:29:45 seven million people sitting home doing this, because they like it, because it's fun, because they can, you know, so, you know, oh, and the other thing you said before I think is so true, it's the, it, we all want feedback, remember early on we were talking about the feedback from a podcast, the feedback from a TV show, the amount of time you have to wait to see, did it rate, we're going to wait for Nielsen, we're going to wait for pod track, we're going to wait for somebody somewhere to let us know if what we did worked, you can post this conversation with you and me right now on YouTube or wherever it goes, and know in real time how we're doing, you can just watch it happen, and man, that's

Starting point is 01:30:30 addictive too, for me, that's interesting, because we all want feedback, we all want to know how we're doing, and there's, the screen offers something like that, how pissed do you get, how impatient do you get when you text somebody, and then I'll text you right back. Oh, it's unreal. It's like, what happened? Don't give me the three dots, I see, I know you read it, son of a bitch, I know you read it, I know you read it, but what you doing, you know what they're doing, they're sitting

Starting point is 01:30:54 on a toilet, watching some hassle with respect, walk a plank between two hot air balloons. Yeah, yeah, no, you're right, or watching autism construction, that's what I watch all the time, it's like, would, you know, bird houses and a lot of, you know, I get caught into that world, but one thing that's also interesting, it's interesting, Mike, we used to go to our grandparents for a skill, you know, we used to go to, like, if you needed a skill, you had to be an apprentice, if you needed a skill, you had to go to a master of the skill and get it, you know, and then now with like YouTube and how-to videos, that's become everybody's grandfather, that's become everybody's father in a lot of ways, we've

Starting point is 01:31:41 killed, not killed, but we've hampered the skill sets and the connective pieces that even connected fathers and sons and mothers and daughters. Dude, that is, you know, I call it the death of grout, the grout is the stuff that connects the tiles, it's the connective tissue, you know, and we haven't, to your point, eliminated it, but we've replaced it. So Zoom learning is not the same as classroom learning, and YouTube instruction is not the same as hands-on apprenticeships, and there's nothing inherently wrong with Zoom or YouTube, but they're selling it to us like it's the same thing, and that's a lie.

Starting point is 01:32:29 It's like that movie, you ever see Pet Cemetery? Oh, yeah. So the cat, what was his name? Church. Right, the cat that comes back to life, that's a bad cat, dude, right? I mean, the cat dies, they bury it, and it comes back, and of course the same thing happens with their kid, and that's what these things are, they're versions of the original, like multiplicity, like Michael Keaton, like he keeps cloning versions of himself, and each

Starting point is 01:32:59 one gets dumber, and less competent, and more entitled, and more tragic. And so, yeah, you can replace these things with these other things, but there's going to be hell to pay, there's always going to be an unintended consequence. I don't care if you're talking about rent control, or the minimum wage, or Zoom learning for school learning, it's a poor substitute. It's a substitute, rent control is a poor substitute for self-sufficiency, a minimum wage is a poor substitute for people who refuse or can't leave the rung where they're standing. You just wind up enabling the very kinds of behavior that we all know we'd like to improve.

Starting point is 01:33:51 And so, that's what I think about today, you know, when I'm not trying to get the sperm out of a bull called Hunsucker Commando. Yeah, look, I masturbated 11 hours ago, so it went like it goes, you know, that's the problem with it, it's like, right when you're done, you're like, ah, I knew it was going to be just like that. Yeah, but I mean, do you feel like, well, you know what, actually, I'm going to quit saying that, you know what, dude, you nailed it, you crushed it. I mean, I didn't take it super easy, I freaking, you know, I kind of made it cool, you know,

Starting point is 01:34:25 I made it a little bit more exciting than usual, nothing insane, you know, because I was trying to get to sleep. Well, I mean, but who are you trying to impress, really, I mean, that's the thing, if you get too wrapped up in the performance of self-abuse, then you lose the authenticity. I think you do, way to land the plane and bring it back to where we started, and talk about immediate feedback, you know how you're doing, you know. Yeah, you do. You always know how you're doing when you're rubbing one out, you know, it's just like,

Starting point is 01:34:53 ah, you know what, this is not going well, you know, maybe you got the wheel of options that's spinning, right, and you're like, ah, maybe this, maybe I'll stop here, maybe I'll stop there. Yeah. Mom, what are you doing there? Get off that thing, that's no good. And then suddenly it's like, you know something, I'm just going to go to sleep, that's a bad one, right?

Starting point is 01:35:12 Yeah, that's a bad one. That's a bad one. I had one last question, how close are we before you have to go? I don't know what time is it? It's 12.05, I have to pee really bad, do you? I could pee, yeah. Oh, there was one question I wanted to ask you before we move on. How did globalization really ruin us?

Starting point is 01:35:29 Because a lot of times I think like, you know, Mike, I think like, like my mom grew up in Wyoming, Illinois, right? It's a small town and there are some, they used to have, I think FMC, they made like elevator parts and stuff like that or like the gang planks that go from the plane to the terminal. And my grandfather worked over there and Purina was like in like some of the nearby towns in Iowa and had like offsets in Illinois. And it was interesting because it was like, as a kid, your dad worked at the factory and so you had a piece of pride and whatever, oh, well this dog food, my dad, they make that

Starting point is 01:36:09 at the factory or this table, oh, they make that at the factory. So there was a sense of like what you were using, there was just a connectivity, a fabric of it all. It was local. Yeah. It's the grout we were talking about. The grout is that, you know, it holds communities together, it holds zip codes together, it holds towns together, states together, and it holds the country together.

Starting point is 01:36:34 Will it hold the world together? Well, I don't know. I'm suspicious of it because, you know, there's some very, very big differences between this country and Russia and China and Iran and the U.K. and France, for that matter. We're not fundamentally different as a species, but we're fundamentally different as a society. And so, you know, when you say has globalization wrecked the country, you know, my slip is showing here a little bit, but I'll tell you, I look at it like if you had a gifted and talented kid, really smart, right?

Starting point is 01:37:14 How would you feel about putting him in a public school? You'd worry, right? You'd look at him or her and you'd be like, I don't think that this is the best environment to nurture the qualities my kid has, right? So I look at our economy that way. Our economy is gifted and talented. We built an amazing machine in this country in the 20th century. We were not dependent on foreign powers.

Starting point is 01:37:47 We were not dependent on foreign countries, especially foreign countries who affirmatively seem to hate us, right? So I don't personally feel good knowing that our pharmacological needs are very important. They are completely dependent on China. I don't... Yeah, me either. I don't feel good about that. I don't feel good about the fact that your granddad or whoever was making those jetways,

Starting point is 01:38:20 you know, those jetways aren't made there anymore. Right. You know, purina is not purina anymore. And so, in almost every industry, there's been a hollowing out, you know, it's easy to talk about manufacturing and I do that all the time with my foundation because you can go through the Rust Belt and through Appalachia and you can see we're just not making that kind of thing here anymore. Oh, yeah, and it's heartbreaking.

Starting point is 01:38:42 I think it's heartbreaking because we're in this space where everything is designed to please the consumer and we forget that workers are also consumers. So the problem is, in my view, everybody in the country is a consumer, but not everybody is a worker. And consequently, what can you say about the reality of walking into a Walmart and being able to purchase everything you need at a really affordable price, that's all made possible because that stuff is not made here, right? And so, we made a decision, we made a bargain decades ago that says, all right, we're going

Starting point is 01:39:31 to put our gifted and talented kid into this low-performing school. And we're going to pay the price for that, but we're also going to enjoy what comes back, which is abundant, free stuff. Bad shelving. Yes, bad shelving, right. But I mean, I don't like... Like as much bad shelving as you want. That's right.

Starting point is 01:39:54 All you can eat. That's it. The good news is, you can have all you can eat. The bad news is, you're going to the golden corral, all right? You're not... I mean, with respect, no offense to those enemies. But you know what I mean? It's like, it's all you want of stuff that doesn't really nourish you.

Starting point is 01:40:11 And stuff that doesn't mean anything. And then I wonder, like in China, some of these places, and I'm obviously generalizing, but that's okay because I don't know that much. It's your podcast, dude. You can generalize. Yeah. And I miss today's being able to fucking generalize because I don't know what I'm talking about. So I'm bringing them back.

Starting point is 01:40:27 But in China, that guy doesn't care about the sweater he's making for somebody a million. It doesn't... So then he leaves work. There's no spirit in any of it. There's no like... Dude, that's brilliant. And you're right. And he kills those people.

Starting point is 01:40:41 That kid's dad comes home from work and the look in his eyes is like, oh, I made something for somebody a million miles away that I'll never even know and don't even care about. Back to the feedback we were just talking about. If you don't know how you're doing, whether you're hosting a TV show or a podcast or rubbing one off 11 hours ago, if you don't know how you're doing, you're going to be disconnected from the task at hand. And that's a really smart observation. If you spend your days and nights making widgets for people you never meet, then you will never

Starting point is 01:41:19 be connected to anything other than the transactional brute realities of your job. And that sucks. And that's why I stay out of labor disputes because unions have an argument to be made. And so too does capital and people who take the risk to create the companies. These two things can't be enemies, but we continually talk about them like it's constantly one against the next. And in the midst of all that screaming past each other, what do we do? We become more and more dependent on cheap crap made in China, more and more dependent

Starting point is 01:42:03 on really important things now. Our whole supply chain is baked in to the globalization that you're talking about. And dude, don't even get me started on energy. How dependent? How much do you want to pay for gas? Really? I mean, what are we doing? Why are we relying on anyone other than us?

Starting point is 01:42:26 We could do it. We could build the factories back. We could do it. I'm not saying don't trade. I'm not saying be isolationist. I'm saying you're going to negotiate from a much stronger position if you don't need them. It's fine to want them, but if you need them, you're screwed.

Starting point is 01:42:44 And I don't know why we would put ourselves in a position where we need pipelines that run through countries that hate us when we're sitting on an absolute abundance of affordable reliable energy right now. It makes me crazy. Yeah. Yeah. There's a new company I was reading about called Vespine, actually, and they process the methane gas.

Starting point is 01:43:13 And they put something over a landfill that processes it and turns it currently into Bitcoin mining, but eventually we'll be able to create a gas station that will power, you have energy to power vehicles. Yeah. I've seen it. It's related to carbon recapture. So there's some big, big companies now that are taking the carbon that is generated from fracking and blasting it back into the earth.

Starting point is 01:43:46 I mean, it's unbelievable technology and it's going to wind up leaving big energy companies carbon neutral in the next couple of years. I know. It's crazy. Yeah. There's one that does it for fracking and then this is a new one that's doing it with the methane, I think, and look, I'm speaking, I don't know about this stuff, but I know about the excitement of young companies like this and just the novelty of it.

Starting point is 01:44:11 Dude, good for you. Look, people tell me whenever I get into this world, it's like, hey, man, why don't you just stay in your lane? All right. Well, you know what my lane is? I'm addicted, man. I am an addict. I am addicted to smooth roads and affordable electricity and indoor plumbing.

Starting point is 01:44:29 We all have skin in this game. And mediocre coffee. And mediocre coffee that gets cooler and cooler every second. But look, I think it's great that you're talking about Vespine. In fact, you should call him. Get him a sponsor. Yeah. That's not a bad idea.

Starting point is 01:44:47 I brought you by Vespine. I'll do the voiceover if you want, man. Yeah. I've heard your voiceover is pretty. Oh, it's all right. It's a top dollar voice. It's all right. That's some 95 octane.

Starting point is 01:44:59 High above the vast reaches of the barren Serengeti, the bald eagle watches as the lonely wildebeest wanders away from the herd. That's the very first thing I ever got paid to do, a nature documentary for National Geographic. I was 22, and they thought I was like 40. Yeah. That's funny. God, yeah. Oh, I bet.

Starting point is 01:45:22 Dude, I bet you could buy beer. Just beautiful walking. You just had to open the door and be like, I'll take two cases of Bud Light. Yeah. Yeah. Any ID, sir? No, thank you. Just give me the beer.

Starting point is 01:45:32 Yeah. I don't have a lot of time. Yeah. I don't have a lot of time. And I'm pretty thirsty. Do you ever remember buying? Was there ever? Do you remember the first time you bought beer illegal or no?

Starting point is 01:45:42 I do. I walked into a place called the Old Philadelphia Inn. I was probably 16 years old with my friend Jeff Wilson, and Jeff wrestled. He was a 230-pounder high school, just a mountain of a guy. And I sounded older than I was, and they didn't even blink. They sold it to us. Hell yeah. Damn right.

Starting point is 01:46:06 Yeah. It was a simpler time for you. It was so much fun, wasn't it? It was so scary. Remember how scary it was? Oh, my God. I do. And remember when you give them, if they did ask you, I'd do you give it to them and

Starting point is 01:46:17 then try to look like you were older? Right. Like checking my watch. I got somewhere to be. My son, I'd say that to my buddy I'm staring there with. My son. He has epilepsy. I'd make up.

Starting point is 01:46:31 They're like, what? Epilepsy. Eight month old with epilepsy. This guy needs a drink. Somebody help him. God, I missed that. Is there a sport that you really like? I just went to an LSU game the other day.

Starting point is 01:46:42 Yeah. I played baseball through high school, and I still watch it. I was a big football fan. I grew up in Baltimore, and you know, it's really interesting. I go back to Baltimore a lot now, and somebody asked me the other day if I'd seen the Ravens game. It was a Sunday, and they had just played, and I didn't, and they're like, how do you not know what the Ravens did?

Starting point is 01:47:15 You're back in Baltimore. And I told them the truth. I said, you know, in March of 1986, I was about the biggest Colts fan there was. Season tickets. I was dating a cheerleader, and my best friend played in the Colts marching band. And one night, Robert Erse sent the Mayflower vans at three in the morning, and the next day they were gone. They're just fucking gone, man.

Starting point is 01:47:45 And I couldn't believe it. And to answer your question, something happened to me with big organized professional sports, and it happened in March of 1986 when the Colts left in the middle of the night. That's when I realized the players have their agents and managers, and the owners have their lawyers, but the fans have nothing. The fans have nothing. And the degree to which that team, the extent that they mattered to Baltimore, you just can't overstate it, and like that, they were gone.

Starting point is 01:48:21 And for that reason, I've never had an agent. I've never had a manager. It changed the way I thought about show business. It changed the way I thought about sports, and to really bring it back to where we started, that's why I watched Cornhole and Darts. That's probably why I was catching poop in midair. It was simpler. It was pure.

Starting point is 01:48:41 It was pure. It was like, I, you know... Fresh off the spigot. Yeah, man. You know what I'm saying? They're really pure. It's like, how pure can this get? I agree.

Starting point is 01:48:49 The NFL feels so un-pure these days, a lot of it feels. I love UFC, but came my favorite sport in the past few years, especially during the pandemic. I think because of some of the purity of the fight, getting to know some of the fighters and just seeing what it is. It's mono-e-mono out there, you know? So I was in, the guy who produced Dirty Jobs with me originally, Craig Peligian was his name. It was the same guy who produced The Ultimate Fighter for Spike TV.

Starting point is 01:49:19 And what? The boxing show? No. The Ultimate Fighter. Dana White's Empire. Oh, okay. The Ultimate Fighter. All right.

Starting point is 01:49:27 The Ultimate Fighter. Yeah. I walked in Craig's office one day, halfway through the first season of Dirty Jobs, and there was this big bald dude, and they were finishing up a deal. And I walked in just in time to see him shake hands. And then Dana looked at me, and he was like, hey, man, I enjoy your show. And I'm like, well, thanks. What's your deal?

Starting point is 01:49:46 And he told me what he was doing. And I just said very casually to Craig, I said, hey, man, I do the VO for that. That sounds like fun. I did 12 seasons of The Ultimate Fighter. Wow. Previously on The Ultimate Fighter. Right? So, and I really never got to see one, but I would go into the booth every week, and

Starting point is 01:50:07 there was always a stack of copy, and some of the Ultimate Fighter was always in there. So my whole experience in that world was just narrating it. And I hadn't, I didn't even see the show for a couple of seasons. Wow. And then I sat down and I watched it. I was like, holy crap, man. This is why boxing is over. Done.

Starting point is 01:50:29 This is why it's over, back to the authenticity. It's like, yeah, you're not fixing that fight. Right. Right. That's what it seemed like. There's no way to fix it. Nope. No easy way.

Starting point is 01:50:41 And, you know, it was amazing to watch that happen, that to bring back that level of gladiator ness. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's, listen, a lot of people have strong feelings both ways. But I think that was, in our culture, one of the early indicators that people were hungry for something else, right? People were hungry for something that was real, because reality was no longer real.

Starting point is 01:51:13 Nonfiction was bullshit. There were no podcasts yet. No. Joe Rogan wasn't doing his thing back when that started. So, you know, we've lived to see, like, some huge, huge changes, and your audience is a part of it, and you're part of it, and it's a trip to watch it, and I can't wait to see what happens next. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:51:35 Yeah, me either. I think we're about that time. Do you think we are, Mike? I don't know what's my clock say here. Somebody's picking me up in three minutes, so I got three minutes to say something like, really, really, really unforgettable. Hmm, let me think if there was something I would want to know. Oh, dear.

Starting point is 01:51:54 No, I'm tapped out. Oh, I'm curious. No, no longer curious. Do you remember your first kiss ever in life? I do. Yeah. Yeah. Her name was Donna.

Starting point is 01:52:05 Oh, Donna. Donna met a girl, and Donna was an angel. Yeah, God, and believe it or not, it was spin the bottle. God, was it, huh? Yeah, man. And it was dark, and I spun it, and it landed where I wanted it to land. And I remember scooting myself across the shag carpet in the basement, and she scooted herself toward me, and, God, yeah, it was something else.

Starting point is 01:52:37 Yeah. It was something else. I love that. That was a good one. How about you? There was, I think, one time, some people, I think, locked us in a room one time, me and this girl that had this, she had like this kind of chip tooth, this Lloyd Christmas going on, you know?

Starting point is 01:52:52 This girl named Chrissy, beautiful girl. Uh-huh. But part of me doesn't know if it was either that or this other time. We played a spin the bottle game, and there was this girl named Emily, or was her last name? Nice. Oh, we're doing last names now. Well, and I'm going to take that out.

Starting point is 01:53:11 For me, she looked like a million angels, dude. She looked like I could close my eyes and see her even more brighter than I could see if I was looking right at her, and I was like, oh my God, she's really going to do it. I just thought any girl I lay on, they weren't really going to kiss me, you know? Like I just felt like such a failure in that space, and I got close to her, and I'd only seen people kiss like by opening their mouths and kissing like French kissing or something. And so I like went at her like a fish, you know? Like you're taking a bite out of an apple.

Starting point is 01:53:45 And I put my mouth, my mouth like over her mouth, and it made no sense, and everybody was like, what's happening? And I think it just got, it just went downhill. I kind of like went like that. I did the same thing, but not on my first kiss. There was a girl, a couple, like maybe a year later, and I realized that every kiss I had ever attempted up to that point, I was doing what you were doing, not to that extent, but I was always on the outside of their lips, you know what I mean?

Starting point is 01:54:19 It made me feel like, okay, but this girl, her name is Debbie. I'm not using the last name because you might not take it out. But she had it in her head that her job was to be on the outside of my lips. So the first couple of times we tried to make out, it really looked like two people trying to eat each other's heads. Yeah. Right, it was just bigger and bigger and wider and wider, and eventually both her mouths were as open as they can be with these awful tongues just flailing around and just nose

Starting point is 01:54:48 to nose. And I remember opening my eyes and seeing that her eyes were open, and she's like, what are you doing? I'm like, what am I doing? What are you doing? You don't know how to make out. You know? We should probably just start groping.

Starting point is 01:54:59 It's simpler. It's a simpler time. Like some blind beta fish, huh? Dude, and I remember this to be, I tell you this, man, one girl, she let me like touch her like chest, kind of, we were like probably 5th, 4th, I don't know what we were. But they, her... 34. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:55:21 Her dad was a Elvis impersonator, right? But we live in a small town, you don't need one, you know? So he just really was an alcoholic. And he kept his kids in an electric fence in their yard, and this girl let me feel her move through that electric fence. Through the electric fence? On top of her dress. Okay, man.

Starting point is 01:55:41 Look. Still counted. That's where we have to probably, I mean, look, it's your show. I got to go. Yeah, that's a dirty name. But, but, but, I mean, that's one of the greatest metaphors of all time, reaching through an electric fence to gently cup the breast of a young love. So you're surrounded by consequences, you got danger everywhere, you're being allowed

Starting point is 01:56:05 to do a thing, but there's risk, right? There's risk all around you. I was at my cousin's once, and we had to pee, just like we had to pee here 20 minutes ago. And my cousin, son of a bitch, he said, yeah, let's just, this is a good place to go. And he had an electric fence that kept their horses in, and I don't know what he said to make me think it would be okay, but I peed on the electric fence. And the current that ran back up through my stream of urine, straight into the very essence of my middle, knocked me, it knocked me on my ass.

Starting point is 01:56:48 And I still remember this day as one of the most awkward moments of my life, lying on my back next to my cousin, laughing hysterically as the urine continued to shoot straight up in the air, like a horrible yellow fountain. And I just lay there and cow shit peeing on myself. And that's fracking. That's why we power wash, friends. Guys, Mike, thank you so much, man. What's your podcast called?

Starting point is 01:57:13 We want people to check it out. It's called The Way I Heard It. It's on every week. It's a little different than this, but you know what, in the end, I think we're trying to do the same thing, man. Just tell the truth to the people who got the balls to hang out and stick with you for two hours. Amen.

Starting point is 01:57:29 Mike Rowe, thank you so much, brother. Anytime to you. Appreciate it. Yeah. Now I'm just floating on the breeze and I feel I'm falling like these leaves I must be cornerstone. Oh, but when I reach that ground I'll share this peace of mind I found I can feel it in my heart, but it's gonna take.

This Past Weekend - E416 Mike Rowe

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