Only Eggs Are Eggs (w/ Jason Mantzoukas)

Summary

Staying Alive with Jon Gabrus & Adam Pally

Episode: Only Eggs Are Eggs (w/ Jason Mantzoukas)
Release Date: October 23, 2025
Podcast Network: SmartLess Media
Guest: Jason Mantzoukas ("Zooks")

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Episode Overview

This episode dives deep into themes of aging, nostalgia, personal health journeys, and the ever-complicated relationship with technology, especially as it relates to social media and phones. Jon Gabrus and Adam Pally are joined by Jason Mantzoukas, and together they have an honest, wide-ranging, and frequently hilarious conversation about the realities of getting older, physical fragility, maintaining passion for creative work, and what it means to be present in a world accelerating with distractions. The bonds of improv, old friendships, managing allergies (and especially the perils of eggs), and the struggle to maintain good habits—all thread through the conversation.

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Main Discussion Points

Reconnecting with Old Friends & The Power of Nostalgia

• Jon Gabrus recounts (00:49–05:34) a recent emotional reunion with childhood friends he hadn’t seen in decades, reflecting on how pivotal these relationships were to his formative years.
  • They reminisce about “firsts”: first D&D games, basketball, Ninja Turtles movies, and how losing connections over time shapes you.
  • The friends plan a nostalgic football weekend, testing if bonds forged in childhood still hold.
  • Memorable quote:
    • "Three guys who've never hung out in 25 years, drinking alcohol nonstop for 48 hours and traveling around, going to live sports. Really pressure testing if we are good friends." — Jon Gabrus (04:24)
• On nostalgia:
  • The hosts and Mantzoukas discuss how milestones (like Adam's son’s bar mitzvah) amplify nostalgia and make the passage of time more palpable (06:00–07:08).
  • Mantzoukas: “Time passing is—I find it—it’s getting so much faster. A year now, to me, feels like it goes by in about seven months.” (07:49)

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Aging, Health, and Physical Fragility

• Physical vs. Mental Age (08:27–09:08):
  • The group discusses how men often perceive themselves as perpetually young until the body inevitably changes.
  • Gabrus: “In my body, I’m in my 50s. In my brain, I’m in my 20s.” (08:27)
• Ben Rogers’ lifelong sense of fragility (09:08–09:30):
  • Rogers shares that, due to health conditions from birth (including a severe egg allergy), he never felt invincible and had to operate with much more caution.
  • Gabrus: “You’ve never put out the vibe that you live life like a bubble boy—or something.” (09:30)

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On Teaching and Improvisation

• Improvisation as a metaphor for growth and creativity (15:59–23:05):
  • Adam, Ben, and Jon reflect on how teaching improv classes greatly shaped their own skills.
  • Discussion about the uniqueness of every performer:
    • Mantzoukas: “What I love about improvising...is everybody’s way of doing it is different.”
    • Pally: “You don’t want Gemberling playing like Wengert, and you don’t want Wengert playing like Gemberling.” (21:53)
  • Notable moment: Recalling the joy of performing and teaching in a collaborative, creatively chaotic space, and the value of synthesizing one’s own experience to help others grow.

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Egg Allergies, Control, and Trust Issues

• Ben Rogers’ egg allergy as a lens for control and vulnerability (24:40–29:47):
  • Adam remembers a close call during a bit involving eggs, and they discuss how a life-threatening allergy impacts daily life, trust, and psychology.
  • Rogers: “Only eggs are the thing that will kill you. You’re treating other things like they might also kill you... But if something innocuous like an egg can kill you, it’s hard not to think the next thing is natural trauma.” (28:13)
  • Childhood stories: Ben describes being forced to eat a cookie he warned an adult about, resulting in an allergic reaction, and the lifelong mistrust this instilled.
  • Key theme: The allergy fosters both necessary self-advocacy and a broader sense of mistrust, extending to expectations of control in adulthood.

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Being Present: Stage, Sports, and the “Flow State”

• Performing as therapy and solace (32:22–34:19):
  • For both Ben and the others, being on stage is one of the few times they feel truly present, free from anxiety about the past or future.
  • Pally: “That hour on stage is one of the only times I’m not on my phone... flow state.”
  • Mantzoukas on phone distraction: “It takes you about 20 minutes to get into deep concentration... it only takes you two seconds to lose that concentration.” (34:24)

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Phones, Social Media, and Technology Addiction

• The struggle to set boundaries (37:09–41:26):
  • The group compares phone/social media habits, with Ben being notably offline (no social media), which both Adam and Jon admire.
  • Ben: “I don’t sleep with it in the room with me.” (40:05)
  • Pally: “I feel like it’s now part of my job to check my phone to see where I’m at on the Internet before I even brush my teeth.” (40:31)
  • Discussion of the pandemic exacerbating device dependence, the erosion of real communal spaces, and the loneliness epidemic especially among men.

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Health Setbacks: Ben’s Spinal Surgery

• Recent major surgery and impacts (43:03–47:44):
  • Ben reveals he’s in the worst shape of his life due to spinal surgery:
    • Had his lowest vertebrae fused to his pelvis, with a piece of cadaver femur used as a spacer.
    • Was in severe chronic pain for a year prior, leading to a loss of sleep and major mental health strain.
    • The process of healing and the psychological impact of being the youngest patient on a hospital floor full of elderly people.
  • Rogers: “The last year of my life was untenable.” (47:52)
  • Group conversation about pain, sleep deprivation, and mental health.

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Identity Crisis & Redefinition in Middle Age

• Shifting sense of self as bodies and roles change (59:44–60:40):
  • They share honest reflections on what happens as archetypes shift (the “big fat party animal” that can’t party, the “hot guy” who ages out of that role).
  • Gabrus: “What does the big fat party animal do when he can’t party and be fat anymore? This is like what I’m struggling with. Who am I?” (59:44)
  • Rogers: “This is an identity crisis.”

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Parenting, Phones, and the Next Generation

• Raising kids in the age of screens (65:27–68:53):
  • Adam talks about the challenges in trying to set good screen-time examples for his kids in a world where everything is increasingly app-based and digital.
  • The difficulty in restricting technology and the hope that their kids come out okay, just as they survived their generation’s supposed vices (TV, video games).
  • Strategies like “no phones at the dinner table” and the mixed results.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On nostalgia:
  “We are deeply in it right now.” — Adam Pally (05:56)
• About the passage of time:
  “A year now, to me, feels like it goes by in about seven months.” — Jason Mantzoukas (07:49)
• On living with an egg allergy:
  “Only eggs are eggs. Only eggs are the thing that will kill you. You’re treating other things like they might also kill you.” — Ben Rogers (28:13)
• On teaching as learning:
  “Something about having to synthesize how I’ve thought and felt or how I acted on stage in a way of explaining it for a class’s consumption...was so helpful and informative.” — Ben Rogers (17:26)
• On the “flow state”:
  “It takes you about 20 minutes to get into deep concentration. It only takes you two seconds to lose that concentration.” — Ben Rogers (34:24)
• On identity and aging:
  “What does the big fat party animal do when he can't party and be fat anymore? ...Who am I?” — Jon Gabrus (59:44)
• On the struggles of parenting in the digital age:
  “You want your kids to have better phone health...maybe if I'm not on my phone when we're all sitting around, they're not.” — Jon Gabrus (65:50)
• On sleep rebellion:
  “I rebel against authority...Now I’m noticing it's included in me: ‘You should go to bed early tonight.’ I'm like, fuck you, dude.” — Jon Gabrus (51:31)

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Key Timestamps for Major Segments

• Childhood Reunion & Nostalgia – 00:49–06:00
• Aging, Physical & Mental Disconnect – 07:49–09:08
• Teaching Improv & Creative Growth – 15:59–23:05
• Egg Allergy as Metaphor for Control – 24:40–29:47
• Stage & Flow State vs. Modern Distraction – 32:22–34:24
• Phone & Social Media Addiction – 37:09–41:26
• Ben Rogers’ Spinal Surgery – 43:03–47:44
• Identities In Flux and Redefining Self – 59:44–60:40
• Parenting Challenges in the Digital Era – 65:27–68:53

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Episode Tone and Takeaways

The episode is both deeply funny and surprisingly poignant, balancing honest personal stories and thoughtful insights with the trio’s signature quick-witted banter. The mood moves fluidly—laughter around silly bits and improv memories, then emotionally honest when discussing loss, health crises, or the struggle to adapt as the world (and one’s own body) shifts.

Three veteran comedians reflect on how to “stay alive”—not just physically, but emotionally and creatively—in a time of constant change, distraction, and redefinition. With stories that move from childhood to middle age, and themes ranging from control to flow to the need for real human connection, the episode is rich and engaging for anyone contemplating their own health (or their phone usage) as they age.

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For further context or laughs, listeners should check out the full episode, which maintains this rhythm throughout—and delivers plenty of bits and asides that only these three could pull off.

Transcript

[John Gabris]

Smart. Blast me up. Welcome to Los Angeles, Mr. Pally.

[Adam Pally]

I'm having a blast. I got here today. Today early.

[John Gabris]

I know.

[Ben Rogers]

I love.

[John Gabris]

I text you like two hours before. I'm like, you want to grab. When do you get in? Do you want to get dinner after we record? You're like, I just landed. And yes.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

I'm like, Jesus, 100.

[Adam Pally]

You know, life is good.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

I'm happy to be here. Tell me about real quick, because if we have time to tell you the story, we can edit out other stuff, but tell me the story about where you're going. You started to tell me you're going with friends that you haven't seen. I haven't seen.

[John Gabris]

These are friends from when my elementary school. I moved when I was 12.

[Adam Pally]

But this is such a classic Gabriel story, too, because you are such a warm, open person that this story would happen to you. You know what I mean?

[John Gabris]

It's like crazy.

[Adam Pally]

Could only happen to you. I feel like.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. These are two of my buddies from when I was 12. I stopped seeing them when I was 12. I.

[Adam Pally]

You moved?

[John Gabris]

I moved. Jimmy, one of the guys moved even earlier.

[Ben Rogers]

Okay.

[John Gabris]

He moved down to Florida when we were like. Like 10 or whatever. His dad dying was the first. Maybe we were 13. I haven't seen them since then. But his dad dying was the first grown up. That wasn't that I knew that passed away that effective.

[Adam Pally]

Is that why he moved?

[John Gabris]

No, no, I think. Well, I think his mom had family down there and he had.

[Adam Pally]

He had.

[John Gabris]

He's like one of five because they're Irish, so he had to fly down.

[Adam Pally]

Huge loss.

[John Gabris]

Huge loss. It rocked me. It was the first time my dad, like, sat me. I have all. It's all visual. I can see it all in my head. He sat me down in my childhood bedroom. Was like Big Jim because his dad had the same name. It was like he passed away on the 10. I'm like, but why? Like, I remember not understanding it. So he's always locked in. Mutual friend. Like our three. Our. Our trio. It was actually four guys. One of the guys fell off even harder. But our trio, this guy Chris is also part of it. And Chris and I kind of stay in touch because of social media. Jim's not on it. We're staying in touch randomly. I get a text from, hey, Chris gave me this number. It's Jim. I see you're going to be in Chicago doing a show. I'm going to be there, too. Would you be down to meet up for a drink? This would be the first time I saw him in May, 25 to 30 years.

[Adam Pally]

He's like, 13.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. And so I'm like, yeah, Jim, I'd love to. We meet up for drinks.

[Adam Pally]

Was it awkward?

[John Gabris]

It was. It was awkward for like, one full beat. Because we never even had the. Like, we used to drink and hang out.

[Ben Rogers]

Because you're 13.

[John Gabris]

We were babies, like, you know what I mean? We never hung out without, like, parents around. You know what I mean? Like, we were like neighborhood rapscallions, kind of. But, like, so it was like this fully, like, new dynamic for him, for us. And we're drinking and he's like, what's going on in your life? I'm like, this, that, the other thing. He's like, oh, I obviously doesn't even know I'm married. He doesn't like all this stuff. Cause he's not on social media either. And so I'm like, what's up with you? Are you married? He's like, I was. My wife passed away. I'm like, God, that's fucking heartbreaking. Dude went back and got. He took a year. Sabbatical. Kids? No kids.

[Adam Pally]

Okay.

[John Gabris]

Went back and took a sabbatical and went back to college to Notre Dame, which, when we were kids, Chris was a Miami Hurricanes fan. He was a Notre Dame fan. I didn't care about college. Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

You're like, I'm never going to go to college.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, I'm not going to. I'm New York Giants, the second city.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

I'm going to go pro football. And so he's like, I just enrolled in a master's sport. He had a doctorate in economics. He's a professor now. He's taking classes from people who have lower degrees than he does. But he's just so excited to go there. He's like, I went to the football games, blah, blah. So he reaches out this weekend and he texts a couple weeks ago, texts me and Chris and goes, hey, I got tickets to Notre Dame Navy. Do you want to come see this game? And I'm like, in Indiana? I'm like, in South Bend. I'm like, fuck, yeah, dude. And I'm like, I'm also seeing that Giants are playing at Chicago the next day, and they're New York kids. Chris is a Jets fan, but, you know, I would see a Jets game if I was traveling, too. So he's like, all right, let's do that, too. So we're going to see football on Saturday night in South Bend, Indiana, and then Sunday morning in Chicago. We're going Back to back football. And on this text thread, I just said, hey, three guys who've never hung out in 25 years, drinking alcohol nonstop for 48 hours and traveling around, going to live sports. Really pressure testing if we are good friends.

[Adam Pally]

Like sideways on steroids.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. We're just going to find out if we actually still.

[Adam Pally]

What a great movie idea. You should option this. This is an amazing movie.

[Ben Rogers]

It is pretty.

[Adam Pally]

I mean, because, like, part of me is like, like, you know, will you cry? Do you think there'll be tears?

[John Gabris]

There has to be. Like, we have, like, such an insane. I don't have. These were my friends from before I was 13. No one else in my. Every other friend that I'm still in touch with is from the age 14 on.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

No bait, no childhood baby friends. Like these guys. And these are the first guys I played DND with. The first guys I played basketball with. Like, we did all this first. We watched the Ninja Turtles movie. We watched comics.

[Adam Pally]

They know your dad.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, of course I knew Big John. Cause Chris took karate with me. And my. Of course Big John also took karate.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, my God.

[Adam Pally]

You're gonna cry right away.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, fuck.

[Adam Pally]

It's like, there's gonna be. And then.

[Ben Rogers]

And then.

[Adam Pally]

Are you gonna.

[John Gabris]

And then Chris's dad died recently.

[Ben Rogers]

Right.

[John Gabris]

And Jimmy's dad died.

[Adam Pally]

He lost his wife.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

And then. So then next question. Are you gonna go to strip clubs?

[John Gabris]

Yeah. Well, that's when I'm gonna do my crying. That's where I do my best crying. All right, enough about us. Let's talk to Jason Mantzoukas. Oh, I forgot.

[Adam Pally]

Zooks was here.

[John Gabris]

Right before. And Devin saved us from going too deep into this. We were kind of talking about at the age we're at now. Jason, who's a little bit older than the two of us, was pointing out that you come to a point where you start looking back.

[Adam Pally]

Oh, yeah.

[John Gabris]

And Adam.

[Ben Rogers]

And nostalgia is dangerous.

[John Gabris]

We are deeply in it right now.

[Adam Pally]

I mean, well, the worst thing. And I'm going through this, you guys. I'm sure you have this same thing in your life. Mine is centered on my children, which is the iPhone sending you a pic of what happened this day a couple of years ago.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, interesting.

[Adam Pally]

Like, sometimes, like, my phone just. I'll pick it up and open it, and it will have, for some reason on the thing. It'll be like eight years ago today, and it'll be like a picture of me in Laurel Canyon with, like, Cole on my back at, like, 4 years old. And I'll. And I'll be like bawling in the middle of a Starbucks on like 46, you know, because you're.

[Ben Rogers]

That is I. Because Gabriel says I. And I too. Childless men.

[Adam Pally]

No, but I.

[Ben Rogers]

You have that mile marker. You have those. You have that living thing in your life that is like always changing. And always you have it to. To. To like, be like, oh, I'm bouncing off of that. And this is now a fully formed adult.

[John Gabris]

Coles Bar mitzvah is like a time when I first started to feel really old. I'm like, this is the kid. I have nephews and stuff. But that was like the first kid I knew who was born. Yeah, because you were like my friend who had the kid first.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

And I'm like, shit. Cole is like this zero year old that I'm familia. And now I'm at his fucking bar mitzvah, which means 14 years. I'm like, what the fuck?

[Ben Rogers]

The thing that is giving me that right now, like, really hard is this year, this year specifically, I've had at least 10 of my friends drop their oldest off at college.

[Adam Pally]

Wow.

[Ben Rogers]

So I've seen an enormous number of threads or people on threads being like, here we are. And it'll be like this absolutely incredible, exciting, but heartbreaking picture of like my.

[John Gabris]

Friends, of like Brian Husky Huskey dropping.

[Ben Rogers]

Off his daughter or Owen or Cordry. All these people dropping their kids off at school. And what a seismic event that is. But similar to what you're saying. I knew all these kids when I knew them in utero, like to have. And that must. Oh, no, that must mean that I am. And I am about to be 53, which is wild, you know, and time passing is. I find it. It's getting so much faster. A year now, to me, feels like it goes by in about seven months. Yeah. That's the. The time it seems like, in that same way that, like, how old do you feel in your. Like in your body, how old do you feel? There is that thing that.

[John Gabris]

That, like, in my body, I'm in my 50s. In my brain, I'm in my 20s.

[Adam Pally]

Right.

[John Gabris]

Real complicated.

[Adam Pally]

There is like a male. I. I don't know anything about where this is from, but there is like. The male mind sees itself as like a. As like 18 to 25.

[Ben Rogers]

Constantly.

[Adam Pally]

Until. Until physical. Like there's a physical drop. Degradation.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

And then you start to see yourself as like a crotchety old man.

[Ben Rogers]

Sure.

[Adam Pally]

But that doesn't happen till like later. Later.

[Ben Rogers]

I got very lucky. Like, I had certain physical ailments. From birth that made me never feel like I never had.

[Adam Pally]

You came out with that beard.

[Ben Rogers]

0Oh, yeah. I never had.

[Adam Pally]

You're like, mom, no eggs, baby.

[Ben Rogers]

With. I knew from the jump that I was fragile, that I was breakable. I did not have that invincibility that young people have that teenagers have that 20 somethings have that we're gonna go and take over the world because nothing bad can happen to me. I was like, oh, a cookie is the bad thing that could happen to me.

[John Gabris]

I know this about you, and I've known it as long as I've known you, but you've never put out the vibe that you live life like bubble boy or something. Not at all.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah, you have a very. Like.

[Ben Rogers]

We.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, we say it two different ways.

[Ben Rogers]

I'd love for you two to keep figuring this out. No, it's de panic in Gabri's eyes as he started it.

[Adam Pally]

I was like, I had to finish. I was like, I'll finish it.

[Ben Rogers]

You know John the.

[Adam Pally]

You know John De trying to think.

[John Gabris]

Of a word and looking to my lifelong friend, comedy partner, like, not the guy to help me.

[Adam Pally]

You're right.

[John Gabris]

I can rely on you for a lot. This is like, one of the few.

[Adam Pally]

Rather ask me for money.

[John Gabris]

Trust me, I'd rather be asking you for money. And that's coming on next episode. I won't do it in front of Jason. When the flu is keeping you up at night, don't try to tough it out. Knock out your flu symptoms with nyquil Intense Flu. You got this. It provides powerful relief of your flu symptoms so you can sleep well through the night. Nyquil Intense Flu. The nighttime sniffling, aching, aching fever. Best sleep with a flu medicine. Use as directed. Keep out of reach of children. I've been dealing with a lot of younger people in my life, and it's been, like, activating me in a way of like, fuck, it's making me feel a little old. But then every once in a while, I have a few friends who are a little bit older and still living, like, a life that I would be excited to have. You know what I mean? Sure. I want to throw you in as this example of like, fuck. It's. You're. You're eight years older than me, and that does not mean, like, I. I'll be so happy to be where you are. You know what I mean? Oh, no, I'm. I'm thinking of the. When my dad was 50, which was only for, like, a couple years.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

But like, when so and so.

[Adam Pally]

Wait, Your dad was 50 for only a couple years. Right. But how many years was he? 50?

[John Gabris]

In his 50s, he was 50 for like 365ish.

[Adam Pally]

How many days was he. But yeah, that, that. I agree. Like, you have. I feel like you're one of those people as well that's like, able to live your life in a way that is just like.

[Ben Rogers]

Free.

[Adam Pally]

Free, like, where it's like, I would aspire to have a life like that.

[Ben Rogers]

I appreciate that. I very much. I'm. I feel very much. And I feel like my peers and I are always now talking about. Our conversations are so full of the. Looking back, what we were talking about before we started recording. The nostalgia that starts to creep in in your 40s and that really starts to hit in your 50s. That. That understanding that we will never get back to that that will never happen again. That. Not even like a blush of that. It is done. So, yeah. And then you start to have real issues. You start to lose people. You start to have health problems. Other people have catastrophic health problems. And that stuff starts to become the dominant conversation. The dominant conversations now are a lot of text chains that I'm on are like, does anybody have a good Fill in a doctor. Right. Does anybody have a good, you know, any of these things that are like, oh, these are the challenges of now, you know, but none of it, for me does it make sense in a psychological way to who I think I am.

[John Gabris]

Right.

[Ben Rogers]

So I just did. I'm on the Disney show. Percy. No. Yeah, the show. Percy Johnson.

[Adam Pally]

You're so good on it, by the way.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, thank you.

[Adam Pally]

And that is a hard job, like doing. Doing a show like that is a hard job because you're like, you're really threading a line of like, how can I get mine? How can I be funny and make this worthwhile while also doing a kids show.

[Ben Rogers]

Yes. And being in service of this big, epic kid adventure show that you don't want to. It's not a comedy.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. But you also are like, there's a reason I'm here.

[Ben Rogers]

I am funny. I'm meant to be funny, as are some of the other adults. But for the most part, it is a straight, you know, kids in a mythological universe kind of having a gigantic adventure, you know, and I play one of the, you know, curmudgeony adults. And so we were doing this thing where we were. We were recording the podcast for the show. So it's all like 14 to 19 year olds and me on a panel, and we're just talking around whatever, and I mentioned that I'm 52 years old. And it flipped these kids out. They were like, you're 50? When they figured out that I was older than all of their parents, they like, couldn't make it make sense.

[John Gabris]

Because you're kind of peers.

[Ben Rogers]

Because we are hanging out, we are chatting. You're funny.

[Adam Pally]

You're not. You don't have a social media presence, which I also admire, but you are online. You. You know what's going on in the world. You're not like. You know what I mean? Like, you understand current events. If I text you a video, you're like, seen it. You know what I mean?

[Ben Rogers]

Like, although one of them showed me ChatGPT for the first time. Oh, really? One of them showed how she uses it, you know? And I was like, whoa. And she was like, you've never seen this.

[John Gabris]

And that's what I was not even on Facebook.

[Ben Rogers]

Hunt. Truly super funny. But, like, they were like. I was like, oh, this is interesting. How old did you think I was? And they kind of batted it around for a minute. They settled on 37 because I got.

[John Gabris]

The oldest age you can imagine.

[Ben Rogers]

That's how old I feel.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

That's also how old I feel. I was like, so they correctly have sussed how I feel. Like I act, but my body is like, hey, bud. Remember, you are disintegrating. Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

37 was 16 years ago. Yeah. Isn't that nuts? No, I know.

[Ben Rogers]

Isn't that nuts? We all knew each other.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Oh, yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

By then, right? Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Oh, yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

Okay, you guys, I can't remember exactly.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. I start. It would be 20 years.

[Ben Rogers]

20 years.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. You know, we weren't like, friends.

[Ben Rogers]

No, no, no. But that's. That's certain.

[John Gabris]

I was in your class in 04.

[Adam Pally]

I was in your class. Yeah. Back to back. Because you said I wasn't good.

[Ben Rogers]

I didn't say. No, no, no.

[Adam Pally]

I had a lot to learn, and they. I had a lot better.

[John Gabris]

What you said. What he heard was, I'm not good.

[Ben Rogers]

But I think what he was told was, take that class again.

[Adam Pally]

No, truly. Owen said you have to take Jason again. Yeah, it was. Owen was like, the thing you're missing is that you. I don't think you retained what Jason was saying. You have to go back and do another eight weeks with the same guy. But it. Bro, look.

[Ben Rogers]

Look at.

[Adam Pally]

No, but truly, like, I wouldn't classes.

[John Gabris]

With a worse guy for sure.

[Adam Pally]

And I wouldn't be. You're the only improv teacher I had. That was like, okay, buddy, here's like, very early on you were like, look, you could do this the way you're doing it and be fine and probably be fine, but it's not like game. Doing the math of game in your head before everyone else is not. What do you want, an award? Yeah. I mean, I believe that's what you told me.

[Ben Rogers]

Essentially, like, great, like, you can do this.

[Adam Pally]

You're funny it out before everybody. Congratulations.

[Ben Rogers]

There's, like, so much more.

[Adam Pally]

You blew it now and no one's bored. Like, I was like, what? Like, you really have to learn how to, like, take what you think you have and, like, learn how to use it. You know, it's like a while.

[Ben Rogers]

And make it work for you. Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

And not just be like, I get it.

[Ben Rogers]

See, it's right there.

[Adam Pally]

Yes. You know, I had to learn how to be like, I see.

[Ben Rogers]

It's right there.

[Adam Pally]

Wait, now? Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

Like, you know, it's like Delaney said.

[John Gabris]

To me one time that the fact that I'm People just think I'm funny is a blessing and a curse. He's like, it'll be good for you when you. But you'll be rewarded for not great stuff. And I was like, he's right. And then I, like, that made me, like, buckle down and be like, now I want the good laugh, Jason.

[Adam Pally]

Also, I remember that the second time I took the class, the thing that really you worked with me on and like, really hammered on me, which I think is luckily was acting. And like, that.

[Ben Rogers]

Well, that's what that class was.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

That was like a purpose of. It was not game, not funny. It was just like, perform these, like, actually, like, do scenes that have emotional weight. Even though you're gonna need that class.

[Adam Pally]

Now, I could use it again.

[Ben Rogers]

It was so helpful. And it was also, I will say, helpful for me to teach that class. I felt like. I feel like the period in which I got the best or got better the quickest or fastest or had a more cumulative understand. Understanding of how to get better was during the period where I was doing a lot of performing, but where I was teaching a lot. Something about having to synthesize how I've thought and felt or how I acted on stage in. In a way of ex. Explaining it for a class's consumption and watching people succeed and fail as a result was so helpful and informative. Also, selfishly for me.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, I felt that same way too. There was a period in my life where I was performing a bunch and teaching a bunch, and I was like, growing exponentially as an improviser because it Was like, why is. Why did I hate that scene? Why did I like that scene?

[Ben Rogers]

What?

[John Gabris]

And then I start and I'm pitching all these. I'm like. Like you're saying, synthesizing it all. Then you start to say, like, as I'm explaining it to you, I'm understanding.

[Adam Pally]

Right. Yeah.

[John Gabris]

But then I walked off a cliff of like, I cannot teach anymore. This is making me hate.

[Ben Rogers]

Interesting.

[John Gabris]

I got to a point where watching bad improv was making me, like, performing it less. And then it was almost. Maybe it was like, too much.

[Adam Pally]

You're seeing Matrix too much?

[John Gabris]

Yeah, just too much where I'm like, well, I don't want to do improv this week. I already worked for three hour sessions, coach, and I needed the money, so I couldn't completely.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

But then eventually I was like, well, I don't like performing anymore. I'm like, this feels like a bad move. And I quit teaching. And I just, like some people do.

[Adam Pally]

Eventually get so enthralled with the idea of teaching that the performing becomes second and the flip.

[Ben Rogers]

There are people I know who are genius improvisers. So I remember years ago when we were. When mother was a team, asking certain people to coach us, and they were like, I don't do that. I don't like doing that. I don't. It upsets their sense of. I just do this thing.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

So having to kind of explain it to you doesn't make sense to me.

[John Gabris]

Like, Gemberling coaching your Harold would be so weird.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. Cause like, he could because he'd do.

[Ben Rogers]

It just as Goo Goo, the Italian baby, which is like, literal. Favorite Gamberling character. A literal character that he then later in, years later, introduced himself in a scene as Goo Goo, the Italian teenager. And I lost my mind afterwards. I went up to him and I was like, are you telling me that's the same character who's now growing? He's aging.

[John Gabris]

He's aging me off camera.

[Adam Pally]

Meanwhile, no one saw the first show. They're all dead. They're all gone. He's doing it just for you.

[Ben Rogers]

He is just one of the most joyful performers I've ever seen. He is electric to watch. He. We did one of the funniest table reads. The big mouth table reads were some of the funniest things. And when he did his character, I'm not gonna remember the character's name. The first time at that table read, I thought the room was gonna, like, collapse to the ground.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, makes sense.

[Adam Pally]

He's the funniest.

[Ben Rogers]

So funny.

[Adam Pally]

And I Think I learned the most from being around him for those years. Like, I just. You're just like, watching. He's like. Does it effortlessly, you know, and, like, he doesn't.

[Ben Rogers]

And joyfully and joyful.

[Adam Pally]

And it's all fun. It's all just like.

[Ben Rogers]

And if it's not fun, he's not gonna do it. A true agent of mischief in the best possible way.

[John Gabris]

Inspirational. You can't do what he does.

[Ben Rogers]

No.

[John Gabris]

Almost no one can.

[Ben Rogers]

In that way. You can't teach that. You can't. It is his. And, you know, listen, what I love about the thing. We're talking about improv a lot, which is my favorite thing to talk about. What I love about improvising, what I love about the thing that we all do is everybody's way of doing it is different. And it's the same way. Pally, you just did a. A special, an HBO special that is all about playing music.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

You know, and it feels very musical to me. It feels very much like learning an instrument, knowing how to play an instrument, but nonetheless having to play. Learn to play together in a band.

[John Gabris]

Now you could be a jazz drummer. We're playing hardcore music, so you're gonna have to drum hard, figure it out. You probably have a little jazz.

[Adam Pally]

And then we'll. And then all of a sudden the song is a heavy metal. Jazz.

[Ben Rogers]

Yes. Yeah.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

And that's what's great, I think, because. And that's what sometimes I used to feel like would be dangerous or limiting in terms of how we taught improv, which was if everybody. If we teach it the same to everybody, that not everybody's receiving this the same. Not. This doesn't. You can't really lay this out as this is how you do this.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

You know, because you can teach people the tools, you can teach people the stuff, but really everybody interprets it their own way because of how their brain works.

[John Gabris]

You don't want Gemberling playing like Wengert, and you don't want Wengert playing like.

[Adam Pally]

Gemberling, and you want either of them going near Matt Dacosta.

[Ben Rogers]

And those juxtapositions are some of the best things. When, like, I'm sure, have we all done play by play or Heinz Brothers. Heinz Brothers Improv show, where there's an improv team doing an improv show, and the Hines brothers, Kevin and Will, are off to the side with microphones doing color commentary on the show. So essentially, what they're doing, we're still.

[John Gabris]

Doing it in LA every Tuesday night at 10 o' clock for listening to. We've done it.

[Ben Rogers]

It's a blast.

[John Gabris]

It's a blast.

[Ben Rogers]

But I stepped out with Wengert once, and I can't remember which of them said this, but the. And this is the perfect line, which was mantzoukas and Wengert step out for the first scene. Two opposite ends of the energy spectrum. And I was like, yes, that's it. Like, it's. And I love when the text is spoken and it's not the subtext of the scene. It's so delightful. But also, that is what's great about Wengert and I in a scene, is that we. Our approaches are radically different, but woven together. Fantastic.

[John Gabris]

I remember when we did it together, Will Hines, you and I stepped out and he goes, a couple of real wallflowers here. We're like immediately in the first scene screaming.

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[Ben Rogers]

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[Adam Pally]

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[Ben Rogers]

The last one I needed for my set.

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[Adam Pally]

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[John Gabris]

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[Adam Pally]

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[Adam Pally]

There's a cleaner in there, inside the pad.

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[John Gabris]

Need to clean a toilet.

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[Adam Pally]

You were talking before about when you were a kid, and I. You were saying. I know you have a ton of like. The egg allergy is pretty prominent. I almost killed you once in an improv show, but I remember it was a match game and I was playing Belushi. Oh, and I did a bit where that's funny. Hard boiled eggs yeah, yeah. And when I did it, you went, no, and you were next to me and you ran. I don't understand. And then I put two and two together, and then everyone was trying to get me to.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, that's. Get me to try and get me.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. And I was like, I think he'll die. He'll die. But, you know when you're at 4am, when Seth is like. Like, go over to Jason, Seth is like handling you, moving your eggs.

[Ben Rogers]

So funny.

[Adam Pally]

I did that. How did that did that affect you growing up where you're like. You mentioned you. You were fragile. So like, juxtapose that with getting into comedy and I know music beforehand, that those are things that you're considerably have to be strong for. You know, you're out there, you're vulnerable.

[Ben Rogers]

Sure.

[Adam Pally]

You're on stage. Not a lot of fragile people.

[John Gabris]

Minimal egg interaction in these two professions.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. So the least bit of job, short.

[John Gabris]

Order chef, brunch guy, can't do that.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah, no, of course. That would have been way more brave.

[Ben Rogers]

But it's so interesting because.

[John Gabris]

Thank you for your service.

[Adam Pally]

First responder in a diner, short order cook.

[Ben Rogers]

For me, I genuinely feel like I feel in those worlds, in worlds that are. That were music to begin with and then especially comedy, I felt as though I wasn't fragile. These are. These are spheres and worlds that I felt like, yes, I can do this. If I practice enough playing drums, you know, when I was a teenager and stuff, if I study with this teacher, if I do the lessons, if I pop up, I will get better, I can get stronger. And I think that a lot of times I was drawn to things that for me felt like limitless possibility versus anything physical. And in my body, I felt mistrustful of, you know, like, I felt like, you play sports. In high school, I played sports, but not super competitive competitive. Like, I played. I was on the soccer team, I ran track.

[Adam Pally]

But it was social.

[Ben Rogers]

I did. I did fine, but it was social. I was a good athlete, but I didn't try too hard. I didn't go too hard. I. I just. It might.

[John Gabris]

You didn't find your. That as much enjoyment, and I found.

[Ben Rogers]

Enjoyment out of it from the social component, which I love. But I don't think I've ever. And this is interesting to contemplate, I don't think I've ever felt as though physical excellence was ever going to be possible for me because I was constantly being told, oh, you've got. You're weak, you've got problems. You are. You Gotta be careful. You really like when. And this is jumping ahead a few years, but when I went to see a doctor in New York, my first appointment with a gp, and I've told this story before, so forgive me if you guys have heard it, but I do my medical history. Ba, ba, ba. I list all the stuff and I'm meeting with him and he's going through it and oh, and this and oh. And he gets halfway through and he stops and he looks at me. Very sweet guy, still my doctor. And he goes, wow, you really got a bum unit. Meaning my body.

[Adam Pally]

You're a lemon.

[Ben Rogers]

My body is a lemon. And that has only proven true the older. The farther I go. And the older you get.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, I don't think lemons get better when you put more miles on.

[Ben Rogers]

Truly. Truly. So that.

[John Gabris]

Or leave them out.

[Ben Rogers]

And I feel like. And my therapist is like, I wish he hadn't told you that.

[Adam Pally]

It is kind of.

[John Gabris]

Because I want to tell you, you got a bum brain too, kid.

[Ben Rogers]

Because I think she is like that might you have internalized that too much? Like it's creeping too far into other elements of your life. You know, I had a therapist once be like, only eggs are eggs. Only eggs are the thing that will kill you. You're treating other things like they might also kill you. Like they are also life and death. But if they are not, if something.

[John Gabris]

Innocuous like an egg can kill you, it's hard not to think of like.

[Adam Pally]

The thing next is natural trauma, right? You're like. And. And then you go, eggs are in everything.

[Ben Rogers]

Eggs are in everything.

[Adam Pally]

So you get distrustful of ingredients.

[Ben Rogers]

And also I'm just. Just what it the. The true heartbreak or difficulty of it was growing up with an allergy that young in the. In the 70s and 80s, what only just served to make me not trust people. Like, I don't trust people. Like, I've been to the hospital three times in the last year. You know what I mean? Just because. And they were all like five star restaurants, you know, that were like demonstrably telling me, we are taking you seriously. Putting a dish down in front of me and being like this, like dessert for everybody and then bringing me a sorbet and being like, this is special for you. Two scoops in. And I'm like, will you double check this and make sure it doesn't have eggs. And they were like, it has the yellow of the egg a little bit. And I was like, I'm gonna need.

[Adam Pally]

You to call it. That's crazy.

[Ben Rogers]

And so it really Is just trust is a. I would say, would be the casualty of this.

[John Gabris]

I remember a story you told me a long time ago. It's burned into my head of like a friend's parent or a friend of your parent. You, like, you going, are you sure there's no eggs in this? And they're like, we promise. And then they made a mistake. And I was like, right. You lose all faith in grownups.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, yeah. As a kid, not only that, but I would have to frequently and did frequently have to advocate for myself and get into fights with adults, get into arguments with adults. The story you're talking about, I believe is a. And it was an issue because my mom then had a problem with this parent because I got into a fight with the parent. And the parent was like, you don't talk back to me. If I'm giving you cookies, you eat the cookies. And so I ate a cookie, had an allergic reaction. They had to call the ambulance. And my mom was like, why didn't you listen to him? Like, why didn't you just listen to him? Yeah, he knows what to. You know, he knows. And so having to be an adult as a kid and in charge of my.

[John Gabris]

And this is like, arguably in the pre.

[Ben Rogers]

Allergies, people believe that, oh, this is like 1978.

[Adam Pally]

If you had the ice storm.

[John Gabris]

So you had it like 10 years ago, and you were dealing with this, like, every place. Everybody that's fine, we have simulated eggs or whatever, you know, everything would work out.

[Adam Pally]

I'm surprised your mom could. I'm surprised your mom could talk to that woman, much less find her key in the fishbowl.

[Ben Rogers]

You and I are going to talk later, but for now.

[Adam Pally]

For now, I'm gonna use this metal ice cube tray. I'm gonna go visit the neighbors.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah. Crazy.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. But like, that is that. But that is also. I'm sure you're. You unpack this daily. Like, a mistrust of people is a huge thing that must. You must look at when you're also asking them to laugh at you and to cry for you and to, like, be and to listen to your music. Because you're like. You're saying it's. It's a. It's a. It's. You're almost saying, like, trust me. Like, now I'm in control now. You can't serve me eggs up here. And I know everything going on up here is under my control.

[Ben Rogers]

Well, I think. Yes. And that's it. The last word is the. Is the word control under my. What is under my Control. And I think for better or worse, that allergy made me then inappropriately and appropriately seek as much control as possible in any situation. And I think that makes me very good on stage because I am very comfortable from the jump. Very comfortable, confident and in control on stage.

[Adam Pally]

Right.

[Ben Rogers]

Because nothing's gonna get me up here.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

You know, and in the moment, like, it's the only time, I would say, when I'm on stage, for whatever period of time that is the only time in my life, I am truly present where I am not worrying about some future catastrophe that I am currently consumed by or some past something that I'm less of a. I'm less about looking back and regrets or annoyances. I'm much more, like, anxious about where I'm going.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

You know, on like a macro level or a micro level, because I get it on the micro level where I'm like, and don't forget tomorrow, 3:30. And I'm like. And don't you. And. Well, if you want to go to the gym, you go to the gym. At one, my brain starts doing that.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, yeah.

[John Gabris]

But.

[Ben Rogers]

And I gotta start. Tomorrow's this and that. But I'm like, what am I doing? I'm. I'm with friends, I'm on a hike.

[Adam Pally]

I'm.

[Ben Rogers]

I want to be engaged and present and with. With my buddies and. Or whatever.

[John Gabris]

Stage and. And the sports field are the only places where that goes away in my brain. And I'm like, I have to be in the pocket.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. I think stage. I don't even think I. In sports. I get it. I think, like working out or playing sports. I think I still.

[John Gabris]

It doesn't quite working out. Yeah. It doesn't hit for me, but like, when. When I'm watching the ball or something.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

It really just.

[Adam Pally]

But there is something nice also, which you and I talk about a lot is like, the last time I did improv, I had a really weird thing where it was doing an ascat and I turned my phone off and left it in my pocket and went out. And the second. And I came back the second I checked my messages and I felt weird, like, while. Cause it's like an ass.

[Ben Rogers]

Because you were in the headspace of the show.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. Yeah. But then I like went back and got my phone. I pierced it. Yeah. And I was like, I shouldn't be looking at this. And I put my phone in my pocket and went back on stage, but it was in my pocket. And then during scenes, it was like vibrating. And I just felt like the second Half was ruined. Totally ruined. And like. But what I realized from that is, like, that that hour on stage is one of the only times I'm not on my phone.

[Ben Rogers]

It's flow state. You're talking sports. It's being in flow state, whatever that is for you.

[John Gabris]

Drumming, guitar, whatever that is.

[Ben Rogers]

But it's. Yeah. Or sports. Or. Yeah, all of it. Any kind of deep concentration that you can get in. There used to be a great podcast out of WNYC called Note to Self that was all about the intersection of technology and our lives. It was. It was. It. It was a podcast that was only around for a couple of years. In the couple of years where we were all becoming phone people. Right. You know, and so one of the things they. So they would talk about all these different things. Manouch Samaroti, who now hosts, I think, the TED Hour. Anyway, the one takeaway from this that I always like that lives in my brain is it takes you about 20 minutes to get into deep concentration. So that can be writing, that can be reading, that can be perform. It takes you 20 minutes to get into a real sense of, like, deep concentration or flow state or whatever that is for the thing you're doing. It only takes you two seconds to lose that concentration. So an alert, a notification, and this is what it was about. It was all about having these notifications, these dings, these pings, these things that interrupt our lives, depletes the sweeps and the creeps. Yeah, it only takes two seconds to lose concentration. It takes 20 minutes again to get it back. So I was like, oh, what's happened since the Internet, since WI fi and all this stuff has been available, and I can get a phone or I can get messages. Everywhere is I'm never getting into a concentration. And that's why I haven't read a book in years. And that's why I haven't made real progress on scripts that I'm writing, is because I know when I go to the coffee shop, I used to get many pages of writing done a day because there was no WI fi in the coffee shop. Once I was there, all I could do was write, you know, but once there was the Internet and WI fi and my phone and this and that, I was like, oh, I'm distracted constantly.

[Adam Pally]

You don't even know what you're distracted from anymore because the day starts and you wake up and you start distracting yourself. You wake up, you grab your phone, you start scrolling, and the next thing you know, you're like, and I do have to be somewhere today. And you're not. And then.

[Ben Rogers]

Then you. And then you're not prepared or it's.

[Adam Pally]

Or it's not fully there. I think about that all the time with, like, surgeons.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, yeah.

[Adam Pally]

You know, like, yeah, I don't want.

[John Gabris]

Them, like, watching 12 reels.

[Adam Pally]

And they definitely have Instagram, right?

[John Gabris]

Like, yeah, surgeons, nurses definitely do. I've.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah, for sure. You mean you follow a ton of them.

[John Gabris]

My family's on.

[Ben Rogers]

Their friends are all mental hygienists.

[Adam Pally]

They're online.

[John Gabris]

I felt mostly a hot topic.

[Ben Rogers]

Nurses, busty physician's assistant.

[Adam Pally]

But like, they're. They're. I always think. Or like pilots, you know, like, sure. It's like we're all online and I'm careless and I'm backing up into a.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, sorry about that.

[Adam Pally]

Like, is. Is someone, like, suturing it up and in their mind, they're thinking about the dua lipa reel that, like. You know what I mean? And that's great. That feels horrible.

[Ben Rogers]

It's scary.

[John Gabris]

It's terrifying. There's. We're talking about flow state, all that. There is something at this age with my friend group that when we discuss things that we're enjoying, we accidentally learn that one of the undercurrents of it all is that the phone is removed from it.

[Adam Pally]

It's like, this conversation is a pattern.

[John Gabris]

Well, it's just like, no, there's like, dude, I just love going to the movies. And you're like, oh, yeah, I go into the movies. Or then someone's like, dude, I do tennis. Two classes a week, one out. Like, I swim laps and when I'm in the pool. You know what I mean? Like, there's all these things that you remove the phone from your life by accident on stage, shut it off. You know what I mean? Like, playing sports. If you play sports, like, you shut. And then you're like, man, that was a lot of fun. And then it's like, oh, it was one part because the actual swimming was fun, but it was 55 minutes where I didn't look at my phone. Now did I look at it as soon as I got out and was still dripping wet. Yeah, because I'm broken.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

There was that hour where I didn't look at it.

[Ben Rogers]

I feel that it was pandemic. Made everybody more phone. More phone more of the time. And I think people. People gave themselves permission to do more on the phone during the pandemic. Right? To be more online, use the pacifier more.

[John Gabris]

Yes.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

Because they were like, it's so hard right now.

[John Gabris]

Yes.

[Ben Rogers]

I'm gonna do alcohol.

[John Gabris]

And phone usage probably skyrocketed. Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Alcohol coming down, phone uses still going down.

[Ben Rogers]

And now all that stuff is just baked in. You know, I think that's now baked in people's. I mean, everybody talks about, you know, male loneliness epidemic and all this other stuff, and truly, it's just because everybody is only talking to each other on these devices. Right. And people just aren't seeing each other because I feel like. But part of it is we are out of the habit of it. And certain of those kind of communal activities have gone away. Like all of the, you know, the. The Elks Lodge or the, you know, the bowling league or the. All of these kind of. Or church or whatever, and all blew.

[John Gabris]

Up over the pandemic because it's like, oh, that space shut down. Or like, now I've replaced that time with something else because that was with a Reddit group.

[Ben Rogers]

Now I've joined a Reddit group. And so now these are my guys.

[Adam Pally]

Right. Or like a sub. Substack. The rise of everyone having an opinion written. Written down. Not just like, podcasts are like, you. You don't listen. You don't listen, but then you're getting emails like, this is. I wrote this piece about this, and. And this is now my job. It's like, cacophonous.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

[Adam Pally]

You know, you can't. You can't think.

[John Gabris]

The phone. That. That shit is nuts. Like, I went out to dinner with some friends, and I'm very good about not being on my phone if I'm being upset.

[Adam Pally]

You two are the best friends I have about it. Yeah, you. You are the best.

[John Gabris]

Well, he has social media, which is.

[Adam Pally]

Like, you are a monk. You are a monk. I always am amazed at how Zen you are about it.

[John Gabris]

But then also when you talk to Manzu, because he's like, yes, of course I listen to that podcast. Of course I.

[Adam Pally]

You know that he's online.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, yeah, of course I watch that movie.

[Ben Rogers]

But you're.

[Adam Pally]

You're. And it must be amazing for your ego. You are the second best friend I have because you just dip your toe in. You're like, I'll see what's going on. But really, you're like, I don't sleep with it in the room with me.

[John Gabris]

That's.

[Adam Pally]

It's like, you're. The two of you are amazing at it. I feel like me and Paul and I have gone off.

[Ben Rogers]

Thank God this year, because he will. Without him, I wouldn't know what's going on.

[Adam Pally]

I know, I know.

[John Gabris]

I think Sheer has to be on his phone because if he's working, he also has 21 other jobs.

[Ben Rogers]

He's the best.

[John Gabris]

The guy's got more output than any human being.

[Ben Rogers]

It's amazing.

[Adam Pally]

I feel, I feel, I talk to him about. I feel like I'm, I'm like. I wake up and it's like, feels like, well, this is now part of my job to check my phone to see where, where I'm at in the. In the. Where. What's going on in the Internet. Where am I in this thing before I even brush my teeth?

[Ben Rogers]

It's.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah, where am I? Where do I stand at 6 in the morning after I went to bed at 1? Right.

[Ben Rogers]

My thing is, and I'm like, took.

[John Gabris]

A five hour break from this, from this phone.

[Adam Pally]

Where do I stand?

[Ben Rogers]

And has it changed? Has it irrevocably changed?

[Adam Pally]

Yes. And you know, am I now, Am I now viewed in a different way?

[Ben Rogers]

Everybody watched and decided I'm trash. Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Did that happen? No one told me, better check in.

[John Gabris]

Or else Italy will be. And then. Because if I check in, I could do something.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah, like throw a flyer out there. You're like a selfie.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah, selfie into the water. Everyone likes this, right? Everyone likes this. Everyone likes this, right? Everyone likes this.

[John Gabris]

Oh, good. Smart. Let's tag me in something. I could, I could, I could post that to my stories.

[Ben Rogers]

I'm alive.

[Adam Pally]

I'm cool, Thirsty and pathetic.

[Ad Read Announcer]

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[Ben Rogers]

And there it was, that hologram trading card.

[Adam Pally]

One of the rarest, the last one.

[Ben Rogers]

I needed for my set.

[Ad Read Announcer]

Shiny like the designer handbag of my dream dreams. One of a kind. Ebay had it. And now everyone's asking, ooh, where'd you.

[Adam Pally]

Get your windshield wipers? Ebay has all the parts that fit my car.

[John Gabris]

No more annoying, just beautiful.

[Ad Read Announcer]

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[Adam Pally]

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[John Gabris]

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[Ben Rogers]

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[John Gabris]

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[Ben Rogers]

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[John Gabris]

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[Ben Rogers]

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[John Gabris]

Authentication and report phishing scams. And for comprehensive Identity protection. Lifelock is your best choice.

[Ben Rogers]

Lifelock alerts you to suspicious uses of.

[John Gabris]

Your personal information and also fixes identity theft. Guaranteed or your money back. Stay smart, stay safe and stay protected. With a 30 day free trial at lifelock.com special offer terms apply.

[Adam Pally]

We ask everyone this and it's the only thing we ask, but how are you in such good shape for someone who considers themselves fragile?

[Ben Rogers]

I'll be honest, I'm in easily the worst shape of my life right now. I'm the heaviest I've ever been currently and in the worst shape of my life simply because, and I think both of you know this. I had spinal surgery excused three months ago. Huge spine surgery. I'll show you the picture later. It's nuts.

[John Gabris]

You sent me that. The picture of the screws.

[Ben Rogers]

Now I have a picture that is the before and the after. That is where one of my Vertebrae is like 12 millimeters out of alignment, you know, and it looks crazy.

[Adam Pally]

So did they put screws?

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah, they put a whole bunch of stuff they put.

[Adam Pally]

They acted as they like dug out where.

[Ben Rogers]

So basically my lowest vertebrae was disconnected from my spine entirely. So as one surgeon described.

[Adam Pally]

Through injury or through just being fragile?

[Ben Rogers]

Both so. And I don't know what the injury was because it was old, you know, but at some point my lowest vertebrae had a fracture on one side that made it weak and that fracture shredded the disc above it, which made. So basically what happened is my lowest vertebrae was. One surgeon described it as loose in there, which was terrifying.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

But he's on.

[Adam Pally]

He's like, hashtag loose. Yeah, he's like, well.

[Ben Rogers]

And I was like, it's so true because I met with three different surgeons, like in a real Goldilocks scenario. And like easily went with the oldest of them. I was like, I'm older than these other two. What am I doing?

[Adam Pally]

They don't even know what the old guy right back my age would look like.

[John Gabris]

Being older. Being older than doctors is crazy because I. The first step of that was when you became older than cops or older. For me, it was older than the Playboy model. When you were like 20. When you were like 23. And then you were like, she's 18. I don't want to look at that. She's too young.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh my God.

[John Gabris]

And then you're like, oh my God. And then you Realize cops are 22 year old kids. When you're 30.

[Adam Pally]

Cops is the worst. Cops is the worst.

[John Gabris]

I'm call this guy to save my life and he's like, my brother's age. My brother's the dumbest guy I know.

[Ben Rogers]

I remember getting pulled over in my hometown, and the cop was a guy I went to, like, junior high and high school with and be like, you're a police officer?

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. What do you do? I'm an improv comedian.

[Ben Rogers]

I do. Yes. And have you.

[Adam Pally]

It's comedy.

[Ben Rogers]

Are you still doing your little shows?

[John Gabris]

Just give me the ticket, man.

[Ben Rogers]

I'm on a smart list podcast. Oh. Anyway, so basically, they had to go in and screw that vertebrae to my pelvis, which is just below it, so it wouldn't move anymore. And then in place of the disc that was gone, this is where it gets wild. They put in a piece of a cadaver femur bone so that it would space it correctly. They hammer that. Literally separate my spine and hammer the femur bone like a shim. Yes.

[Adam Pally]

Like when you have a car that's stuck in sand.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

Truly hammer it. And they were like, it's very violent. Surgery was six hours. They hammer the femur bone in, and that now occupies the space between my lowest vertebrae and the vertebrae above. And then they screw everything in around that. And what's happening now is fusion. So basically, that piece of organic femur bone is growing all this other bone around it. So everything now will be solid.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

And won't be able to.

[Adam Pally]

So you're not really working out at all.

[Ben Rogers]

You're like, I can't lift. I can't bend. I can't pick up anything off the floor. I can't carry anything.

[Adam Pally]

Can you hike?

[Ben Rogers]

I can't hike because I can't go uphill, but I can walk on flats. I just passed my three. I can. I just started pt. I'm doing pt. But the PT is, like, when I was doing. I had, like, a week of recovery in the hospital. Just like, straight up in the hospital, writhing, pain, impossible. Everybody else on my floor. It was just all spinal care, elderly. All elderly people and me. And, like, I had a walker for two weeks. I was walking with a walker for two weeks, and it was just all I had. You. I could only do circles in the. On the wing. And it was just me and a bunch of old people. And I was like, this is talking about getting older. I was like, I am closer to them than I am to the youth that I feel like I am. You know, that was like. That really fucked me up psychologically.

[John Gabris]

There's a lot of stuff going on there because you're like, I am one of these people. But also, every time I'm in an Environment where I'm the youngest person, which is a rare thing when it does occur. All of a sudden I'm like, like, this is kind of cool.

[Adam Pally]

You know, you were the. Of the walk of the spinal fluid.

[Ben Rogers]

Except this happened to them at their age. If it's already happened to me at my age, what's coming next? Or am I ahead of you? Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Or are they like, good that you.

[John Gabris]

Took care of it now?

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, very much. That is very true. Right.

[John Gabris]

Because it was a long running problem, right?

[Ben Rogers]

Correct.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. Like you were in pain. You were in pain from that pretty daily, right? Like excruciating.

[Ben Rogers]

The last year of my life was untenable. You know what I mean?

[Adam Pally]

Like, pain is a fucking like mental thing as well, because I feel like I've had injuries. The pain that you have from, like, even if it's not that every day being reminded that you have pain.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Is a mental struggle.

[Ben Rogers]

And it was.

[John Gabris]

Makes you understand. Luigi. Luigi Mangione. Yeah, I'm back pain.

[Ben Rogers]

I'm not kidding at all when I tell you that my diagnosis was identical to Luigi Mangione.

[Adam Pally]

You have Mangione spine.

[Ben Rogers]

I have the exact same setup. And I went into the surgeon and I was like, you know, because, you know, they gave me my diagnosis and I was like, okay, okay, okay. And I was like, great. And then I'm looking it up, and a friend of mine finds the Reddit community for my spinal problem in the time that I get that diagnosis and this Reddit community find that Reddit community, it is shut. It is locked. Because Luigi Mangione is a frequent commenter on that community on that. On that subreddit. And, And I go, I'm. I then have a meeting with the doctor and I'm like, you know, I just found out that the Luigi. The killer has the. Has this too. And, and the doctor was like, like, I'm not gonna lie to you. You have the same thing he had. He. And I was like, well, I just don't.

[Adam Pally]

I. Because I was like, I get it.

[Ben Rogers]

I'm in pain. That is so outrageous. For so long. And it is so front of mind that I understand wanting to murder. Yeah, I understand.

[John Gabris]

Chronic pain will drive me crazy.

[Ben Rogers]

It does.

[Adam Pally]

Because you can't. You, You. You just feel this endless. It's like hope is gone. Because no matter what, you reach for a coffee and you're like, fuck. You know, and it's like, just that you're like, why ever be able to.

[Ben Rogers]

And it's insidious because for me, the worst Position. I couldn't find any position. And the worst was laying down. So I couldn't sleep. I was sleeping in like hour or two chunks, like here and there and it. So that started to.

[Adam Pally]

And then you sleep apnea, you get sleep deprivation. Yeah. Which is.

[John Gabris]

Well, you're talking about like three things that would drive like that do. To torture people. Drive them crazy.

[Ben Rogers]

Correct.

[John Gabris]

Constant pain.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah. Not sleeping, you know, and it really started to like.

[John Gabris]

And your upstairs neighbor played that same song on loop.

[Ben Rogers]

Something.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah, well, yeah. And you shared an apartment with Ed Gein. Right? You Luigi, Ed Gein. That's.

[John Gabris]

So the not being able to lay down is like, oh, it must be torture.

[Adam Pally]

I mean I. It can drive you crazy, I think.

[Ben Rogers]

And I will say, and this is, I mean the most obvious of obvious things. But. But sleep is it like, sleep is. We all did. We all went so hard in those 20s and 30s. Late night New York, do a show at 9 or 10, go to McManus afterwards till 3 or 4, 38, cheeseburger at 4am like just madness, madness, madness. And then sleeping for three hours, getting up and for me going to work at JP Morgan and being like.

[John Gabris]

Going to be a PA at best week ever. Exactly.

[Ben Rogers]

And being like, yeah, three, four hours sleep, that's all I need. And all the way through. Like I was such a. And I'm still a night owl, but I will now like I started, I feel like so late like when I was probably your guys age, about 10 years ago is really when I started to be like, okay, hang on a second. I need real sleep now.

[John Gabris]

The word, the phrase you hear a lot is sleep hygiene.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. And I've like, I've started to get into that. It's part of the reason why the phone isn't in the room with me anymore. Nothing in the room.

[Ben Rogers]

No tv.

[John Gabris]

I don't have a TV either.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah, nothing in the room.

[John Gabris]

I have this rebellious streak in me that I've noticed. I rebel against authority, against people telling me what to do. But it started to in the last and probably my whole life, but now I'm noticing it. I. It's included in me where I go like, you should go to bed early tonight. I'm like, fuck you, dude. I'm not missing out on shit.

[Ben Rogers]

Whoa, here's. Okay, can I, can I jump on that?

[Adam Pally]

And you can hear your own voice and hear yourself rebelling your own voice.

[John Gabris]

I can hear, I can see going like, like I have to go. Like, well, I gotta wake up early to go hiking today. It's like, I should go. It's like, you should not have any more food. And I'm like, who the fuck do.

[Ben Rogers]

You think, yeah, I can do what I want?

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

It's the needless contrarianism that I feel like is baked into all of us to a certain degree. I feel like you guys got into it with Mitchell a little bit in that episode. And I feel like there's something about it that is so insidious and so terrible because I. Why not believe experts? Like, what if. If a doctor says X, Y or Z, why not believe it rather than be like, yeah, but not for me. Or like, there's a way in which, like, for me, it talked about sleep specifically. I grew up at a time when, you know, the only period of time that was my own in my teenage years was when everybody else in my house went to bed. Yeah, when everybody else went to bed, I had a couple of hours to myself and I was like, whoa. And that's. I feel like what turned me into a night owl, really. Like, I could listen. I mean, like. And this is what I did with it. I listened to music and the radio. I read comic books. I, like, I watched movies, I hung out and did the stuff that I want to do.

[John Gabris]

Things you still like, by the way.

[Ben Rogers]

Things I still, weirdly enough, still do, but I still stay up late doing them. But I'm the only one. There's no one saying I could do all the comics, movies, whatever I wanted to and still go to bed at 10:30. But I don't. I'm still up at 2:00 in the morning being, like, looking around for new music online.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, dude, same. Can you. Do you sleep in, though, at least?

[Ben Rogers]

I do.

[John Gabris]

So, like, if you're getting your eight, like, yeah, that's okay. But if you were. If you were going to bed at 2 and waking up at 7.

[Ben Rogers]

But what I want is, I want to take back some of those morning hours. I have. I have essentially, until just recently, almost written off the morning entirely. As if to say, that is not for. Unless I'm working. The morning hours are for sleeping until 10, right? And then from 10 to noon is when I'm like, waking up, waking up, making coffee, answering emails, moving slowly, and then suddenly it's one in the afternoon and I'm like, fuck, I've done zero.

[John Gabris]

And you have friends whose kids are coming home from school in one hour and you're like.

[Ben Rogers]

And they've gotten so much done. Not all of us. We go for a hike and they're like, I did so much today and.

[Adam Pally]

I'm like, I just got you by not claiming those hours. I think mentally you do. You do fall into a bit of like a. Well, I'm not needed anyway. Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

No one's thinking versus those hours could be yours to do with whatever you want.

[Adam Pally]

Written something or worked out or I could have seen anything.

[Ben Rogers]

Even. Like the. Even just walking.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

Like when I'm like all I need to. Why not just force myself to go for a walk? Well, here is scary. Here it's scary. Here it's scary.

[Adam Pally]

Walk la. I feel like LA is scary. Like every time I walk in LA and a car goes slowly, I'm like, why are you pulling up? You know what I mean? Like New York. I'll get out for a walk in the. In what would be considered the worst neighborhood.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

And feel totally like going along with my day.

[Ben Rogers]

It's the best about being in New York. And whenever I'm back, it's. It makes me. It gives me. I was just texting with our friend Jesse Falcon, who's there right now, who was like, I'm alive again in New York. And I was like, yes, the. The city is giving you something. The walk you are walking. You are engaged with the city and its population and you are. Are constantly in the. In flux with everyone else. And it's somehow recharging your battery in a way that I feel like LA is parasitic and it drains. It is a vampire pulling the energy out of you, pulling the youth out of you.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

New York is somehow like gives me everything. Everything I want when I go to New York and I just. Just from the. The basics of meeting you for coffee or having dinner over here with these guys or whatever. Beep up. I lose six, seven pounds in a week.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. You're like, oh, I'm like 3.6 miles a day by accident.

[Ben Rogers]

And I guess by accident. Exactly. Just through passive living.

[John Gabris]

Wait, quick aside about the New York nostalgia thing. I was back there for a month earlier this year recording with you. I was staying with my cousin in Greenpoint who lives near my old apartment in Williamsburg. I did ASCAT at the new ucb. They had cans of PBR in the fridge backstage.

[Adam Pally]

It's great. UCB is great.

[John Gabris]

I'm 20 years older, 15 years older than ever. Everyone on stage with me, I feel. But I'm feeling like I'm in New York. I'm drinking a couple of BBRs, go across the street, the new locations, like right in the East Village. I go across the street for A beer with a friend, eat some mushrooms. Having the time of my life. Take the L train. I'm gonna, like, I'm gonna get off in Bedford and walk up Bedford to my cousin's apartment. And I'm like, I am listening to music from my 20s. I'm smoking. I'm listening to the Strokes, to be honest. Smoking a joint on the street corner. And I'm like, Like, man, I'm fully nostalgic. And a car pulls up and goes, Gabri. And I turn, take out my headphones, and it's Matt Fiser and Doug Mo.

[Adam Pally]

Two friends of ours.

[John Gabris]

And I'm like, two guys I haven't talked to since my 20s. And I'm like, what you? I'm like, you guys have no idea what I'm going through right now mentally. But you just arrived. You walked on perfectly into my scene.

[Ben Rogers]

I love that.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. And I was like, what the are you doing? They're like, we're driving home from an improv show. I'm like, I'm walking home from a different one. We're all in our 40s and maybe 50s or done.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

I was like, holy.

[Ben Rogers]

Guys, when we were coming up, there wasn't a. An older generation. Maybe for you guys there, a little.

[John Gabris]

Bit was right, but it was you.

[Ben Rogers]

It was older. Not really. I mean, but for me there, really, when I was in my 20s and 30s doing improv in New York, there was no 50 year olds. There was no mid 50 year olds. There was no. There was no older generation. We were.

[John Gabris]

Because you're the first.

[Ben Rogers]

We were a cohort of pretty similarly aged people. Some of the guys on the Swarm were five, six years older. You know what I mean? Like Billy Merritt and Delaney, they were a little bit older, but just that. Just a little bit. And so it's interesting now to be doing shows with young people and having them be physical and this and that and being like, oh, I can't do that.

[John Gabris]

Being on stage in Ascat. You're with someone. I'm 43. I'm with someone who's 59 and someone who's 24. And I'm like, we're all just on stage trying to make. Stay alive and valuable.

[Adam Pally]

Dude. I got on Phil's shoulder at a show the other day and huge mistake. We needed someone to sit underneath him to hold his legs. And I was. And I. And I on his shoulder. I was like, I'm so sorry, dude. He's like, it's okay.

[John Gabris]

Let's just keep going.

[Adam Pally]

And it was like, we were the oldest people on that stage by years. And we were doing something that we thought in our mind, well, this is what you do.

[Ben Rogers]

Absolutely.

[John Gabris]

One time. Not to brag about old feats of strength, but one time during like a live show on Torco, I was. Me, Brandon Gardner, Fran and Neil Casey used to tour together all the time. We did this big venue. We all got a little drunk before we went on stage. Brandon got Fran, like, on his shoulders, like, chicken fight style. And then I went and scooped up Brandon and he kept Fran on top. And we went three people high on stage. And I'm like, holding and I'm like, that's like when I was at, like, peak, like, powerlifting strongest. And I was like, this. And Gardiner was like, that was the craziest thing I've ever been part of. Fran was like, how do you think I fucking felt? She's like 12ft in the air and we're all drunk.

[Ben Rogers]

That is the kind of stuff that I very much believe you would still try and do that now.

[John Gabris]

Yes.

[Ben Rogers]

I'm like, that's your nunchucks thing we need to get comfortable with. That was then. Yes.

[John Gabris]

I'm not that person.

[Ben Rogers]

Not only am I not, I cannot be. No, I cannot be that person. So who am I now? But how does that energy still. How do I redirect that energy so that it's not that feat of strength that is demonstrably what makes me connect with the audience or truly surprise and blow the audience's mind by this feat of strength? I instead need to channel that in a way that is doable without harming myself.

[John Gabris]

What does the big fat party animal do that when he can't party and be fat anymore? This is like what I'm struggling with. I'm like, who am I?

[Ben Rogers]

This is an identity cross crisis. Yeah. Like, to be. And you guys touched a little bit on this with Mitch, too, is like to become. To be a big guy who gets smaller. Who are you then? If you have been slotted in situationally, whether it's creatively or in this business. Because all this business wants is to tell you what archetype you are. Yeah. You know, because that's the easiest for them. And then. And then. Or if the. If you're me, they're just like, we do not know what to do with you. We are unclear.

[Adam Pally]

Well, when you.

[John Gabris]

When you read as white, you're begging to be an archetype so that you can have something that different are white.

[Ben Rogers]

But don't read as white is a.

[Adam Pally]

Real head start for Everybody, like, I'm.

[John Gabris]

So happy to be cast in this, but I can't do this accent without being cancel.

[Adam Pally]

I would love to work, however, can.

[Ben Rogers]

I audition for the white guy part? And they're like, of course not.

[John Gabris]

I do not speak Farsi.

[Adam Pally]

Jason. Jason.

[John Gabris]

It's J. My name is Jason.

[Adam Pally]

Jason, man.

[Ben Rogers]

Jason. It's not Yaso.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah. My. My problem has always been because I'm hot.

[Ben Rogers]

Hot.

[Adam Pally]

And it's like. It's just. You're so hard.

[Ben Rogers]

It's hard.

[Adam Pally]

It's like I come out and people are like, what? What is. There's going to be another thing besides those blue eyes. He was given another thing. A rapier's wit.

[John Gabris]

A rapist wit.

[Adam Pally]

No, I didn't say that.

[Ben Rogers]

Wait a minute. Wait.

[Adam Pally]

Rapier?

[Ben Rogers]

You chose that word. A good word.

[Adam Pally]

It's a 10 word.

[John Gabris]

I'm rapier than the rest, baby. Wait, that does not. That's not what I meant. You've got wit, but I've got rapier wit.

[Ben Rogers]

What?

[Adam Pally]

Let me show you.

[Ben Rogers]

He's rapier than some of the other guys, wit wise. Well.

[Adam Pally]

It is, kind of. People have said that when they play, I don't let them get a word in.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

Well, you're talking to two guys who might understand that.

[Ben Rogers]

Three steamrollers on one show. This road's gonna be flat.

[Adam Pally]

I wanna commend us. This is the most patient, I think the three of us have ever been in talking with each other.

[John Gabris]

And I was thinking it's easier at podcasting.

[Ben Rogers]

It's easier at podcasting, but it's also like. Like the conversation lends itself to listening and chatting more.

[Adam Pally]

Sure.

[Ben Rogers]

Like, if we were just doing bits, people would have turned it off because it would just be the three of us screaming the whole time. Yeah. Hell on earth. But.

[Adam Pally]

But that's.

[Ben Rogers]

That's.

[John Gabris]

It'd be like playing three different songs at once.

[Ben Rogers]

All songs.

[Adam Pally]

I love three great songs, but you.

[John Gabris]

Don'T necessarily need to listen to them.

[Adam Pally]

Like straight out of Compton. Playing underneath Wonderwall Playing underneath A love supreme A love supreme yeah. Yeah.

[John Gabris]

I guess in this crew I might.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

Dude, look around.

[Adam Pally]

Boston Zooks, you're the best. Thank you so much for.

[Ben Rogers]

Gentlemen, great show. I love the show. I love you both.

[Adam Pally]

We love you, boy.

[Ben Rogers]

What a delight.

[John Gabris]

Like, I wish you a speedy recovery. I know you're deep into it and by the time this comes out, you're probably posting Instagram videos.

[Adam Pally]

I keep doing pull ups to see.

[Ben Rogers]

Guys, huge news that I didn't say earlier. I am currently at least 3 to 4 millimeters taller than I was. Is that true when last we met.

[Adam Pally]

Like the Pedro Pascal character in that movie in Materialist?

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, yeah, that's the same.

[Adam Pally]

That reveal was bananas. So weird. It made me also feel old because I was like, is that a thing that young people do commonly now?

[Ben Rogers]

No, I don't think commonly, but I do think that is a thing that I think. Cause I think it's very expensive. It's not like you eat a turkey for hair, but there are people.

[John Gabris]

There are people who are double dipping.

[Ben Rogers]

Oh, are you?

[John Gabris]

Who are like, I'm going to Turkey. I'm short and I'm bald, and I'm coming back tall with hair.

[Ben Rogers]

Well. Cause I was gonna say afterwards, after I saw Materialist, I was like, oh, I bet that leg surgery will become in the next 10 years what the turkey hair tries to do.

[John Gabris]

100%. You're right.

[Ben Rogers]

You will get to be going someplace else for an affordable version of adding 2 inches.

[John Gabris]

I went down talking about Reddit subreddits. I went down, like, the leg surgery subreddits.

[Ben Rogers]

Really?

[John Gabris]

I was just very curious.

[Ben Rogers]

Cause you're tall.

[John Gabris]

Yeah. I would never.

[Adam Pally]

You're trying to get short.

[John Gabris]

I mean, all of a sudden, that.

[Ben Rogers]

Feeling, can I donate 2 inches of.

[John Gabris]

Femur in my mid-40s? What you take out in my mid-40s. I just am 6 foot 7. Out of nowhere, I'm like, fuck it. Let's just go for it. I can't walk. My legs hurt.

[Adam Pally]

Go to the beach volley. U.S. olympic beach volleyball.

[Ben Rogers]

Anybody else notice that every year Gabrius goes away for a month and comes back an inch taller, still fat.

[John Gabris]

I think you should just try losing weight.

[Adam Pally]

His hair is super thick. His hair is a mane.

[John Gabris]

I'm £300. I always joke that I would go to Turkey to get chest hair, and I have to, like, fly back, laying back, like, with all the little. With all the little dots in my chest, because I want chest hair so bad.

[Ben Rogers]

Gabrius took all the hair off his head and put his balls now. But his chest, he's absolutely covered.

[Adam Pally]

Robin Williams.

[John Gabris]

I believe they call the surgery the Zangief Zoox. Thanks a bunch.

[Adam Pally]

You're the best. Really. We appreciate you.

[Ben Rogers]

Absolutely.

[John Gabris]

Three more goodbyes before we actually let you.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah, more bits, More bits.

[John Gabris]

Holy shit. That was a fun conversation. Always is.

[Adam Pally]

He's the best.

[John Gabris]

I want to put my phone in, like, a block of ice right now.

[Adam Pally]

It was so good, and I feel like he would. He would be happy listening back to it, because I think we got to the heart of the matter of something with the three of us and people like us struggle with, you know, which is like the phone and what it means.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

And we haven't talked about it that much and it's certainly talking to someone who's not on social media.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

Is wild.

[John Gabris]

And to still be addicted to your phone without social media is. Is the power of the phone.

[Ben Rogers]

Of course.

[Adam Pally]

I mean because like everything's there how it's wild to not I the restraint it must take for him not to go on these sites. Like there's everything.

[Ben Rogers]

Is there anything you want? Is there?

[John Gabris]

I kind of want to set my like give myself like the 90 minutes a day on Dude.

[Adam Pally]

I hit ignore limit every day.

[Ben Rogers]

It's part of my.

[Adam Pally]

It's part of my ritual is like oh, ignore limit.

[John Gabris]

I moved where Instagram and Twitter are on my phone and I still could just go like I just move it.

[Adam Pally]

Once to the side.

[John Gabris]

I just, I go down type I Instagram pops up, click. Added three steps and it does not slow me.

[Adam Pally]

It actually made it quicker.

[John Gabris]

I think it's like putting my heroin in like a lower drawer.

[Adam Pally]

Truly.

[John Gabris]

Maybe I'll never go down to the bottom drawer.

[Adam Pally]

Nothing to stop me from anything. But I think, I think it would be hard pressed. I worry about my kids too a lot. Even though they're like you want to.

[John Gabris]

Set a good example too. As you're saying about setting example.

[Adam Pally]

I worry about the effect it's going to have on them. They're great kids but like they are on their phones, you know, a lot. And I wonder if it's going to happen like make them disassociate later on it.

[John Gabris]

It can't be good cuz we know what it's doing to us and. And their brains are even more developed. And I don't mean like your kids, I mean kids in general fight it.

[Adam Pally]

One of the hard thing is when.

[John Gabris]

You take it away from them and then they're like a pariah.

[Adam Pally]

Well not even that. It's just like I need to be in touch with them. I need to get in touch with them. I need them to have a phone. When I take away social media from them, they're going to be 15 years old. It's like they're. They're going to eventually get on. It's like it's very hard.

[John Gabris]

No, I don't. I'm not envious of that situation at all. Because you don't want your kids to be like my kids are the weird. They watch Black and White cartoons at home on the projector and they don't have a computer. You know what I mean?

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

Like, everything in life is apps anyway. Like, you're like, oh, to log into the school, you gotta go to app, you know, like, truly.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

To get into school, they have to show their phones that has the barcode, like, Right. What am I gonna do? They're gonna be the only ones that are carrying an iPad right around because it, like, doesn't have one. Social, like, and then they're getting around it anyway, and you kind of feel like, well, well, I don't know. Everyone said video games were horrible, Everyone said movies were bad and TV was bad. And like, it was. But you are kind of still an okay.

[Ben Rogers]

Like, right?

[Adam Pally]

We kind of managed to be okay.

[Ben Rogers]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

That's what makes you want to, like, help your kids have better phone health.

[Adam Pally]

Exactly.

[John Gabris]

Like, like, that's because that. That's what I meant by like, making yourself self conscious about, like, well, maybe if I'm not on my phone when we're all sitting around, they're not. You know what I mean? And you're like. Or we're like, no phones at the dinner table. You know, you, like, do these small things.

[Adam Pally]

We're getting that a lot right now, especially with our youngest who's on his iPad. And most of that is because he's still young and he's still hard to like, you know, it's like, he doesn't.

[John Gabris]

He's not gonna sit still and enjoy a conversation at dinner.

[Adam Pally]

Exactly where my older two now are. Like, they would much rather be engaged with an adult at dinner than be on their phones. That's like. That's like the most interesting time for them is when I take them to a dinner and someone's like, how's school?

[Ben Rogers]

Then they like, get to be like, whoa.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, they get to be a treat.

[Adam Pally]

Like a grown up. But we still are fighting that with him because it's. It's hard to keep him. But you want to bring him to dinner, right? You know?

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Ben Rogers]

So that's. It's just.

[John Gabris]

You don't want him freaking out either. It's like, don't ruin everyone's time. Here, take your iPad. But then you're like, eventually you're gonna have to eat dinner without.

[Adam Pally]

Yeah.

[John Gabris]

I don't know when.

[Adam Pally]

I don't know when. And I don't want to fight it right now.

[John Gabris]

Yeah.

[Adam Pally]

That's the whole thing of parenting. But it's like, I do wonder. I didn't talk. We didn't talk. About that, but I. I just. It's one of the many things just like. Well, I hope they're okay.

[John Gabris]

Okay. That's all you can do much longer. You mean you're just leaving them? Yeah, I'm going for cigarettes, going to Maui for cigarettes, going to la.

[Adam Pally]

I didn't even tell them I was leaving this morning. I dropped them off at school last night. Yesterday. Yesterday. Picked them up from school, took them home, went to work and was like, see you.

[John Gabris]

See? I'll see you on next Sunday.

[Adam Pally]

If that's when your mom lets me back in. Hey, you beat me. You beat me. I don't even wanna try.

[Ben Rogers]

Stay.

[Adam Pally]

What?

[John Gabris]

Fuck you. You have been listening to Staying Alive with John Gabris and Adam Pali. A Smartless Media production in association with Sirius xm.

[Adam Pally]

Produced by Devin Tory Bryant and Anne Harris. Engineered and edited by Devin Tory Bryant, who also also wrote the music.

[John Gabris]

Associate producer and video producer is Maddie McCann. Social media producer Tommy Galgano.

[Adam Pally]

Assistant engineer Kyle McGraw. Special thanks to Jared O' Connell at SiriusXM.

[John Gabris]

Executive producers are John Gabris.

[Ben Rogers]

Ooh, me.

[John Gabris]

Adam Pally. Ooh, you. Will Arnett, Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes, Richard Corson and Bernie Kaminsky. Do us a favor, Just rate and review the podcast. It actually helps.

[Adam Pally]

Just so everyone knows, we do not.

[John Gabris]

Not have a discord. Don't reach out to us.

[Adam Pally]

See us on the street. Walk the other way or you'll catch hands.

[John Gabris]

This conversation started because in the Action Boys live show, I did like a nunchuck demonstration and then chugged a beer. And when I sat down to talk to Ben Rogers dressed as Charles Bronson.

[Ben Rogers]

I was like, all of this totally normal.

[John Gabris]

Yeah, totally, completely normal for me.

[Ben Rogers]

Speed through it because the audience is.

[Adam Pally]

Like, duh, I know what you think. I actually do feel like our audience is like, well, if Ben Rogers wasn't dressed like Charles Bronson, where were you.

[John Gabris]

Smart last Medium? Tonight's meal, Tilapia surprise with boiled cabbage. Begin cooking steps 1:50 now.

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