B (7:47)

Oh, just a kilometer. I've been having, like. I think I caught Rich's back pain. We could talk about that. I think. I think I have. Do you ever have, like, sympathetic pain with your spouse? And so, like, I. I never had it with Rich before, but I got like a herniated disc flare up, like, right around the time he started really talking about his back pain on a podcast.

A (8:09)

It's like, psychosomatic.

B (8:10)

Yeah, it's like two months ago now, and so it's like, finally kind of coming out. It's still not great. So I'm not pushing it, but I'm doing a little bit more.

A (8:18)

So I think that's like the best pool in the world.

B (8:20)

Oh, my God. It's up there. Icebergs in Sydney and that one.

A (8:23)

Yes. Yeah, yeah, yes. I was in Australia last summer, and there's something about where you're like, how long is this going to last? Because, like, the ocean gets higher and.

B (8:33)

It always gets wrecked. Did you know, like, when I went and visited icebergs and swam in it for the first time, it was just getting refurbished and redone from something. And then the king tide came again and smashed it. It's been closed again at least once since then.

A (8:47)

Yeah.

B (8:48)

And it was more recently. Yeah, yeah.

A (8:50)

So the idea of being sucked out into the ocean by the ways is not a fear you have to have in springs.

B (8:57)

No, there's none of that. Raging ocean smashing into the rocks. And with the king tides are becoming more prevalent, but usually you can. I'm not even sure you could get. I mean, I've seen it in other little pools there, too, where the. Where the. Where the tide gets high and it starts crashing.

A (9:11)

There's a famous story about some. It's like the most Australian thing ever. It wasn't that one. It was maybe the one in Manly or something where like a shark got washed into it.

B (9:20)

Yeah.

A (9:20)

And this Rich actually sent it to me and like this woman was swimming when it happened and she went over and grabbed it and just threw it back in and then kept swimming.

B (9:31)

That's very Australian. Yeah, it's like the most Australian thing.

A (9:34)

Yes.

B (9:34)

We like manly. I mean, that's where April's from, Sydney, and so she was living in the Northern Beaches when we first got together.

A (9:42)

Yeah. Some of the other ones might be better. They're not as. They're not as good of a pool, but they're like prettier.

B (9:48)

Yeah, they're more. But they're more just kick back and have a dip. They're not really lap pools like icebergs. And there's another one. There's a, there's a one in like downtown, like the central area, not far from the Opera house that Rich likes as well. That's not quite. It's a little bit more removed, but it's also one of those natural pools.

A (10:05)

They are kind of the same era as Barton Springs where like people like we used to build things.

B (10:12)

Yeah.

A (10:12)

Do you know, like, we were like, hey, this should exist for everyone and we're going to spend.

B (10:17)

Yes.

A (10:18)

Our money on making this thing. And it's going to last for 100 years.

B (10:22)

Right.

A (10:23)

It doesn't really happen anymore.

B (10:25)

No, we should. I mean that's, that's definitely like the Works Progress Administration kind of started it. Right. Like in the New Deal stuff that was happening. And it was not like a negative check mark to anyone that the government was trying to improve your lives or invest in infrastructure. It wasn't like a big fight or battle, some of that might be. It was just cheaper. Like things like the inflation hadn't happened. It was like, well, not just like.

A (10:49)

Financial inflation, but just like that. Everything is insanely bureaucratic, difficult and takes forever. They were just like, we're going to have these kids build a swimming pool because there's no jobs and they don't need to be like world class engineers or whatever, you know.

B (11:05)

Right.

A (11:05)

That's true. Just do stuff.

B (11:06)

That's true. They just do stuff. And. But you know, at the same time though, like this, at the same time that was happening, like the Army Corps of Engineers was, was concreting all the rivers. And so like there's like as many good things. There were also kind of mistakes because my theory on it is like we wanted to improve life because life was so hard in the early part of the 20th century. And so like we look back, say as environmentalists now, we say, how could you make the mistake of concreting all the rivers and getting all the rainwater out of the city and into the ocean, but, like, in those people are dying from floods. Exactly right. Exactly right. So we wanted to save lives and. And life super cheap then, and so we do it now. It's kind of the reverse where we're so concerned about not offending or say, you know, that we can't get anything done. So.

A (11:53)

Yeah, well, it's like the things that were awesome are still here, and then the things that are terrible, truly terrible, like somebody died, and so we destroyed them, or we just. We just assume they were always there, so we don't think about whether they should be there or not. So that's a really good point. So, yeah, we build Barton Springs, and then also we cut cities in half with interstates, bulldozing and raising whole neighborhoods, not thinking about what we were losing in that process. And now you're just like, there must have always been a freeway here. And it's like, no, this didn't exist until the 50s or 60s in some cases. Right. And now. And there was a vibrant neighborhood and community, and you could walk places, and that's all gone.

B (12:37)

Yeah.

A (12:38)

Why aren't there more stuff? Why isn't there more stuff? It's. We learned the wrong lesson, and then we overlearned the reaction to that lesson, and then we can't do stuff. If you're ever in Texas, there's a better one than Barton Springs.

B (12:50)

Oh, really?

A (12:51)

Well, in Austin, so there's Barton Springs, which is incredible, and then there's Deep Eddy, which is on a little bit further up. I guess it's on the other side of the. Is that on the other side?

B (13:01)

Other side of the river, Right?

A (13:02)

I think it's on the other side, yeah.

B (13:03)

Is it a river or a lake?

A (13:04)

It's a river. It's the same river that's behind us.

B (13:06)

Right.

A (13:07)

But it's dammed, I think, five or six times. Okay. So there's a series of lakes. And again, because there was terrible flooding. Right.

B (13:14)

Like.

A (13:17)

There'S a sign over on the trail where it's like. You're like, wait, the water went up to here. This would have made the entire place uninhabitable. So anyways, it's damned here. You can get in the water because it's a real river there. It's not only pretty stagnant, but one of the dams broke at some point, and so that whole area is filled with, like, concrete and rocks. And rebar. That's why you're allowed to paddle board on Pound Lake, but you can't sw. Oh, interesting. Except for once a year they do a triathlon where they're like, the danger doesn't apply because it's a group of people.

B (13:49)

Right.

A (13:50)

But anyways, on the other side, there's deep eddy, which is a. It's a pool. I think it's 30 yards. That's filled with the same water from Barton Springs.

B (13:58)

Okay.

A (13:59)

But it's a pool.

B (14:00)

So the spring fed. But it's actually a pool, so no chlorine.

A (14:03)

They drain it every night and refill it.

B (14:04)

So it's 180 yards. 180 meters or whatever.

A (14:07)

30. It's 30.

B (14:08)

30.

A (14:09)

Okay. That one's awesome. That's more like what you have in Australia. It's like that area but like six hours from here. There's one called Balmorais or Balmoria.

B (14:17)

Okay.

A (14:18)

How we pronounce things in Texas is ridiculous, but it's like three times bigger than Barton Springs.

B (14:23)

Really?

A (14:24)

Yeah. It's much a quarter mile in terms of gallons. Okay. It's just like unimaginably big. And it's so big and so old that it has a species of fish in it that is extinct everywhere else. Like, they captured them in this pool and then we killed them everywhere else. And like the Comanche pupfish is the only place in the world that exists in this one pool.

B (14:48)

That's amazing. Yeah, it's like the army Corps captured it and there's no fishing in the pool.

A (14:53)

Yeah.

B (14:53)

Otherwise the fisherman would already have taken it.

A (14:55)

Yes, yes. Or we would have killed them by.

B (14:58)

Pollution or drought or whatever, somehow.

A (15:00)

And then. And then the other funny thing is to go to the point about learning lessons, it has this stone high dive. And if you notice, like, no pool, no public pools have high dives anymore. People get hurt. But it's protected by the National Register of Historic Places. Like, the high dive is protect. They can't take the high dive down because it's protect. So it's like two different government sort of like statutes are in. Like, normally you'd be like, you can't do this. The government says it's not safe. And then here you're like, but the government says we can't touch this. So the. It's just there.

B (15:32)

And yeah, Jonathan Haidt would be very happy. He wants risky play.

A (15:36)

Yeah.

B (15:36)

He wants kids jumping off high dives.

A (15:38)

Yeah, yeah. It's awesome. And then, so anyways, that's the best. That's probably the Best natural pool in the United States.

B (15:44)

It's interesting. You know, it was the more free use of imminent domain in those days, and you could do that. And. And it's partly because these communities didn't have a voice or they didn't know, or they just, like, if the government said so, they said, okay, we'll go over here. Whatever it was probably some mix of all of it, and so that you could use it, and now you could never do that. So there's so many reasons why it's not happening now. And a lot of it's just political will, and just, like, people are just scared.

A (16:08)

What's political will and political power? Have you read the Power Broker?

B (16:11)

No.

A (16:11)

The Robert Carroll book?

B (16:12)

No.

A (16:12)

Do you know this book?

B (16:13)

No.

A (16:13)

Oh, so it's about Robert Moses, who was the. It's a famous book. And then I'll give you another. He has a shorter one called Working, where he talks about himself as a writer and how he learns lessons. But, yeah, like, Robert Moses built bridges and parks and did all this stuff because he just. It's like he really cared about parks and bridges and stuff, but he also just really didn't care about Puerto Ricans and black people and poor people. So he was like, well, I want the bridge here, so. And then because he didn't care, he was able to do it. So there's something about the brutality of it that's both appalling and, I mean, as they say, you can't make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. Like, the reaction, counter reaction. You have Robert Moses, who's like, fuck everyone. I want to build a bridge. And then you have Jane Jacobs, who's like, but I love my corner grocery store. Little, tiny, you know, old building. And then the result is, like, not enough people can afford to live in Greenwich Village. And that's why it's so expensive. And the tension between these two things is, like, as fascinating. It's like, you want to know why things are the way they are.

B (17:21)

It's stuff like that that's interesting. It's like the unintended consequences of good intentions is kind of the demise of everything. It's like. It's like we think everyone thinks what they're doing is the right thing to do. I mean, almost everyone.

A (17:32)

Yeah.

B (17:32)

Like, there's certainly horrible people that know they're doing the wrong and they want to do it. But there's. But a lot of. Most people, 98, 99%, think what they're doing is exactly the right thing.

A (17:41)

Yeah.

B (17:42)

And whether it's right or wrong, there's all these unintended consequences. Sometimes this thing that we all dread is to benefit us, right? Like 10 years later, 20 years later, and vice versa. So it's interesting, you know, in la, the good example to that is Chavez Ravine and Dodger Stadium. And we love, you know, we're all stoked, we love, I mean, Dodger Stadium. To go there in a home game, it's like a power spot for la. It's like this place where all of LA comes together, we rejoice together. It really is a beautiful experience for those of us who live there, especially like long time residents or lifelong residents. And so it's one of those places, but it was built with imminent domain. It was the destruction of a community. And, and sometimes that bubbles up and you hear about it. There was a book about it. But was it worth the sacrifice? Like long term? Like, not, not personally, but just if you look back, not because I'm happy there, but like just all the people affected in a positive way, was it worth the sacrifice? You know, like, that's a, that's a question.

A (18:36)

It always comes down to political power. So the story Robert Caro tells, I think is really interesting. So Robert Moses is building this highway that's like gonna go to this park or something. And so like the highway's gonna cut through somebody's property, right? And if it goes this way, which is the most natural way for it to go, it cuts through these like sort of Gold coast mansions. And specifically it will cut through the private golf course of some, you know, billionaire from the when, whenever, Right? And so obviously it doesn't. No, it doesn't, because they have political power. And instead it goes, you know, it veers this way, goes around the golf course, it goes this way and it cuts through this guy's farm who had 40 acres and now his farm is cut in half and he has to get to his other acres. He has to go down here to a turnaround. And Robert Carroll just really dives into like the physical cost to this one dude. Like, it ruins his farm income and it ruins his property value. But just like the hours every day that this guy has to go to do this loop to get to his own property so this guy's golf course can remain untouched. And you go, yeah, like, things are the way that they are, right? The core of it is power. Like, do you have power? Yes or no? And I think we would like to think power doesn't exist or doesn't matter. And it's like, no no, somebody had. Lyndon Johnson had power in Texas and he was like, build this. Like Lyndon Johnson was in charge of. Is it the WPA or the youth wpa? So those things exist because he had favors and power.

B (20:11)

Right.

A (20:12)

And he used some of it for good and some of it not for good.

B (20:15)

And his power in Texas is the reason he became vice president and president eventually anyway. Like, that's the reason jfk.

A (20:20)

Yeah. Yeah.

B (20:20)

Adam to the ticket.

A (20:21)

Yeah.

B (20:21)

So it's interesting. We. I used. Before I became a writer, like the last day job I had was at Tree People. Tree People is an environmental group in Los Angeles famous for planting trees in neighborhoods and at schools. My job was to take out blacktop and put trees in with kids. It's probably the, the most opposite of development. Yeah. The most impact I've probably ever had in my life is the trees I planted with kids years ago. And so what we, our base of operations was park above Beverly Hills, between Beverly Hills and the San Fernando Valley on Mulholland called Coldwater Canyon Park.

A (20:52)

I've been in that park.

B (20:52)

Okay. So Coldwater Canyon park was our base. And that was William Mulholland's.

A (20:56)

Yeah.

B (20:57)

Ranch. That was where. So we live now. It's like fancy offices. But where we worked were these old break like tumble down shacks were literally where Mulholland would plan his takeover and his diversion of water from the citrus farms in the San Fernando Valley. And he created that valley, I mean, just through the, through his power. And so it's really interesting to, to think about the. You're right, like that, that changed the face of Los Angeles. And on the other side of it, Santa Monica, where I live, at one time the people in Santa Monica wanted the port of LA to be built there.

A (21:29)

Yeah.

B (21:29)

They didn't want like where the pier is, that would be the port of LA instead of Long Beach. And so it's two competing factions. And they thought they lost. Santa Monica thought they lost.

A (21:39)

Yeah.

B (21:39)

And instead of having a big port like Long beach, which is awesome in its own way, we have like this tourist destination, Santa Monica with these awesome beaches, with Venice and Santa Monica. So it's, it's a trip, right, to think about how it really does come down to like you say, these people with power. I like used to be very much interested in politics. I mean, I'm still interested in it to some degree, but I was like an activist.

A (22:02)

Yeah, yeah.

B (22:02)

When I first came out of college, I was an activist, I was an environmentalist. I was like into justice. And, and now as I as I get older and kind of understand it a bit more. I'm less interested in trying to build political power and more interest just observing it and seeing where it goes, but.

A (22:18)

Also writing about it and detailing about it and explaining it is a form of sort of activism.

B (22:23)

Yeah, for sure.

A (22:24)

My friend Brent lives in this ghost town in California near Owens Lake, which is the classic Mulholland example, right? He's like, I want this fucking water. We need this fucking water. You live in the sticks, you have no political power. We're gonna steal that water, we're gonna take it. Which he does. And then you go like, wait, wait, there was a lake here, like a Lake Tahoe esque lake that just is now a dust bowl, right? Because one guy was like. And you go, oh, it could have been something else, it could have been something different. It could have been otherwise. But this guy had the political power, he had the political will. And the other people didn't think it was important or didn't have the political power or didn't understand what was happening. And they got outmaneuvered. And now like you're on Mount Whitney and you should be looking down at a gorgeous lake and instead you don't just look down at a dust bowl, you look down at an environmental. They have to now reflood it with water. Because when you take the water out, then the things at the bottom of the dustbed become this giant toxic cloud, right?

B (23:27)

Yeah, yeah.

A (23:28)

It's now like the illusion of a lake because they have to put just enough water in it that it doesn't do that. And you go, this is the legacy of one human being. And history is the unintended consequences of those kinds of decisions.

B (23:40)

100% like, that's it. The unintended consequences of good intentions is what got us into this mess. And it's also going to save us.

A (23:47)

Yeah, well, it's all messes for all time. Everything is unintended consequences.

B (23:51)

That's what I think I love about your stuff so much is like when you go back into it, like, and I'm sure that's the fun of it, of going into these books and looking at the Stoics and looking at history is it's all already happened. And you even say it in wisdom, it's all already happened a million times. Like nothing we're doing now is really that original. Nobody's that original, essentially.

A (24:11)

No, no. Like there's this line, Truman, he was like, whenever I had a problem in politics, I would read Plutarch. Who is this Greek Roman biographer 2,000 years ago. And he said, nine times out of 10, I would find the solutions to the problems there. And you're like, well, how could someone 2000 years ago help you when you're setting up the UN or well, it's like, cause the Greeks had to ally against the Persians and these disparate states had to come together and band against an ascendant enemy in a global power crisis. Or you had a Caesar. Okay, so that's like a MacArthur character or Stalin esque. The same personality types are always there doing the same things that they always do do.

B (25:01)

Yeah. It's interesting, you, you seem to attracted to like the Trumans or the Pattons. Like, like, not that Patton wasn't a great individual, but he's not MacArthur. Like you seem attracted to these thoughtful like, well read kind of not really the top people people think about. Right. Like Truman and, and even Lyndon Johnson gets a lot of flack and rightfully so. But like in some respects. But like you see and, and like I think of it like you're finding these. The like Eisenhower. I think of Eisenhower. Yeah, Like Eisenhower as a Republican president. Like, like when you grow up and you start thinking, oh, was he any good? And then you actually go back and see and he was really not into billionaires. He was really into fairness. More so than like the Reagan ideal that everyone lifts up. Eisenhower is interesting. Like I wonder if you looked at him.

A (25:47)

Of course.

B (25:47)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

A (25:48)

Well, so that it's like right about that era. So it's like 50 to 70 years. You stop caring whether someone is a Republican or a Democrat. And they're just like a person. Right?

B (25:57)

Yeah.

A (25:57)

And like the, the partisan labels don't matter as much, so you can kind of study them. He's a fascinating person. I've written about him a bunch of my books. But like, you know, he faces like McCarthy and the rise of McCarthyism and he has to do it. But there's this great book called the Hidden Hand Presidency that's all about how Eisenhower deals with McCarthy but never gets his hands dirty. Like he's sort of maneuvering to shank this guy without challenging him publicly. That was his thing. He's like, I never deal in personalities. Like, he would never say if he didn't like someone or he was opposed to them. He would never say their name and he would never address them directly. He would just work behind the scenes. And that was kind of his thing to go to our point about power is like, we think power is like I condemn you from the podium. And it's like, that's like what a weak person does. A strong person who can actually move the needle knows, like, hey, it's actually better if I don't tell you that I'm coming for you.

B (26:52)

Right.

A (26:52)

And then when you get shanked, you're not even gonna blame me for it.

B (26:56)

Or even the way Abraham Lincoln, the ultimate power broker. Right? Abraham Lincoln, who doesn't even want to come for people, but he wants to utilize people wherever they are. And he'll only come for you if you come for him, essentially. And even then, he's like the ultimate matador, right? Yeah.

A (27:12)

He can still use you. He'll keep using you until he's done with you, and then he'll find a nice exit for you.

B (27:20)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

A (27:20)

And that goes to the savviness of power, too, is like, we don't. We just go, oh, Abraham Lincoln was this nice, honest guy. And it's like, he was. And he was a brilliant operator. And I think. Think the problem with a lot of activists is they think it's like, well, what matters is that your heart's in the right place or whatever.

B (27:37)

Right.

A (27:37)

Which it does. But then you also have to be a savvy operator. You don't get anything done. Well.

B (27:41)

Right. I mean, the problem I've had, like, so coming from kind of environmental politics and just being involved in politics as an activist back in the early 90s, like, I was the only one that cared about it. Like, none of my friends cared that much. I mean, they all were kind of aligned with positive causes. I mean, California in the early 90s. But, like, for the most part, their lives did not revolve around it.

A (28:02)

Yeah.

B (28:03)

And so I was one of the only people out there trying to push people to get more political. Now it's the opposite. Everyone's too involved.

A (28:08)

Yeah.

B (28:09)

And at the time, early on, I was like, God, I wish just more people would care. And now I realize, no, no, no.

A (28:15)

Actually makes it harder.

B (28:16)

Less people would care.

A (28:25)

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B (31:06)

Yes.

A (31:07)

But that's not who lights you up as a writer. It's never like the most well known, most famous, most generally admired of the people that make the best stories.

B (31:20)

Right?

A (31:20)

No, you want to find the. It's the characters or the people that are doing things they shouldn't be able to do or they do it in a way that doesn't really make sense. Yeah, that's the most interesting.

B (31:31)

I think so. I mean for me it's a function kind of. It's more of functional. Like I was never a staff writer so I could, I never. You didn't have the access, I've never had that. I've never had that. So even, like after I published a book, after I'd been published in New York Times several times, like, I still couldn't get interviewed by like, small papers when I was in a financial crisis. Yeah. And so I was, I was kind of by nature drawn to the underreported stories.

A (31:56)

Yeah.

B (31:56)

Because I couldn't tell the, the, the well reported stories. Right. That's a staff person's job.

A (32:01)

Yeah.

B (32:02)

So for me, I just followed that. It's almost like just like survival in a way. But also like, I'm not an analytical writer. I'm an organic writer. And the analysis comes in at the end. It's not like that my work isn't related. It's that I'm not really overly thinking the process through. I'm following it and kind of flowing with the process. Does that make. And that's true of the kind of writer I am too. I make a plan, I outline, but then I also kind of allow it to organically unfold. And so I think my career is an expression of that kind of. Because I had to follow that.

A (32:33)

I actually do think that's good career advice. I think people go like, let's say you want to be a writer. They're like, I want to be a writer. And then so I'll get a job at Rolling Stone. Some of these are dated, but I'll get a job at Rolling Stone and then they'll assign me a cover story about Bad Bunny and then I'll get to meet him and write a story about him.

B (32:49)

Right.

A (32:49)

And it's like, maybe, maybe there's one person that gets to do that.

B (32:53)

Right.

A (32:53)

But actually it's. You have to find these obscure or unknown figures or the fascinating stories that other people aren't reporting. And that's your way into those things.

B (33:04)

100%.

A (33:05)

And so, yeah, most people are kind of sitting around waiting to get picked or they're like throwing themselves against this closed door that it's never going to happen. And meanwhile there's all these equally fascinating, unknown, undiscovered things. And that, that's actually your way in 100.

B (33:23)

Like finding the underreported stuff, but then also just saying yes to all the jobs. Like, I said yes to everything. Like, my first business card was all things Written. And I was literally, I think you had some of this too. Like you would write anything someone gave you. So I remember, like, at one point I had a, like some, I don't know, like some Rob Report of Like South Florida hired me because this person found a story of mine. She goes, I want to just hire you for my very small vanity publication.

A (33:49)

And.

B (33:49)

And they said okay. I said, okay. And they're like, can you write about these knives? And some Japanese knife company sent me a bunch of knives and I literally had it on my website. I probably was in 20, 30 stories on my website at that point. And like, I mean, it's hilarious now if you think about, I'm writing about like very seriously about these knives because I wasn't, I wasn't really self conscious of it or embarrassed by it. It was like I needed work and.

A (34:11)

I wanted reps too.

B (34:13)

Exactly. And so you just get better. And so like, ultimately it's hard to hear that though when you first start, really it's about getting better. It's not about the story you're writing. It is, but it isn't. You have to care, but it's really not. The outcome is not there. But it's hard to hear that when you're young and you're starting and you have ambition, you know, it is hard to hear, but it is true.

A (34:31)

Also, it's like I've written press releases, I've written scripts for explanatory videos. You know, I've just written like thousands of things. Do you know what I mean?

B (34:41)

Ads.

A (34:42)

Right?

B (34:42)

You wrote ads.

A (34:43)

Ads. I mean, when I was at American Apparel, I probably wrote the press Release release for 50 to 60 store openings. You know, there's like one after another. And how do you do that and not blow your brains out? Like you have, you have to find a way for it to be interesting to you, you know, and so the challenge of that, plus the challenge of just actually doing the thing and then you're, then it actually does get read by people and you're like, no, you just do this over and over and over again and even think like the thing that you're so like, it's weird to think like this book, your new one, could be reps for a future book that you can't even conceive yet 100%. But you, you have to care about it in the moment and think, this is my, the best thing I've ever done. This is so important. I cared about it. And then also somehow in the back of your mind know at some level that like in the future you will, you will look back at this and cringe.

B (35:38)

I might.

A (35:38)

No, I mean like, like my first book I had to do, I did a five year anniversary and I'm doing a 15 year anniversary now of it. And it's like, it's weird to go like, hey, my first book is. Was practice for all my future books. And now when I read it, I mean, obviously I think it's good at some level. I'm not like ashamed of it. But you're like, I published this.

B (35:58)

Yeah, right.

A (35:58)

You know, like, because you. That's how it should go. Because you should get a lot better.

B (36:03)

A hundred percent. I mean, that's the, the ultimately. But it's funny because with books like in record albums, artists probably think their later stuff's better and people aren't really that into the later stuff. So it's funny how timing plays such a big part, I'm sure, in success. I mean, American Apparel being like, you guys were the zeitgeist at that time. It's funny to think about it now. And not just, not just that this brand did well, but the aesthetic around the, around the framing of this brand was very original. Right. And you see it now kind of, of coming through.

A (36:35)

Yeah, it's been, it's been gone long enough that there's nostalgia for it. That's fucking crazy. And then also though you do these things and you go, this is going to be on my resume. You say you throw something up on your website.

B (36:45)

Yeah.

A (36:45)

And then you're like, like literally no one even. That's not that they don't care. It's that like, it doesn't register to them at like, like for 10 years when I would get introduced as a talk to be. He's a former director of, of marketing and American Apparel. And now if someone says that you can hear, it's like, it's like a record scratch. It's just like, what?

B (37:05)

Well, I had no idea. Rich told me about it, but before I finished, the afterword of Wisdom Takes Work. I didn't know about that yet. And so in my head, because I came to you through the stoic and through the daily Stoic on Instagram. I mean, I was aware of your work obviously prior to that, in 2016, I think is when I first heard about you. But I wasn't clued into your pathway to being an author. And so when I started to clue into like what you're doing with the Stoics and bringing them forward and this old wisdom, which is very close to my heart because I've been studying the dao for a long time time. I do it, I read it almost every day. And so it's, it's, it's kind of a parallel thing But I've never been a classicist, so everything I hear about from. No, but these are kind of classics, like the. The Western classicists, Like. Like Greek and Roman. I had no idea about these guys. Like, I didn't know about them. And so. I mean, Marcus Aurelius I heard about in Gladiator. Like, that's my. That was it.

A (37:59)

When I said I'm not a classic, I meant that I have no training in this stuff.

B (38:03)

Right, but I thought you had. So in my mind, like, I'm like, this guy's fucking smart. He's. He must be. Like, he must. Where did he go? Like Princeton or Yale, I thought. And then I found out you're. That you have a much scrappier backstory. And I was like, whoa. Because I. I had no idea I'm one of those people that would have been introduced, that I'd be like, wait, who? What? When?

A (38:19)

Yeah, you know, I mean, there's sort of a metaphor for this in writing, which is like, what, the first draft and the finished draft often don't resemble each other, like, at all. Yes. And like your sort of life and your career is that, too. There's echoes of it, but it's like it. Sometimes not a word of it from here makes it to here. But that doesn't mean. But. But. But certainly this would not have been possible without that dude.

B (38:48)

You know who exemplifies that the most? Is it. Is it Lauren? Lauren Groff. Laura Groff. Lauren Groff. She wrote Florida. She's a short story. She's a great, great writer. And she. Short stories and novels, and she's got a little bookstore in Gainesville. So she's kind of like.

A (39:02)

I just hear.

B (39:03)

Yes, And. And so she is incredible. And what I heard. I don't know if it's true because I don't know her, but I heard from Liz Gilbert that what she heard. Because she likes her tune. They never met either. But what she heard was that she writes everything out longhand.

A (39:18)

Yeah.

B (39:19)

And then she gets, like. She writes her story, then she shreds it or whatever, gets rid of it, and then she starts again.

A (39:25)

Wow. And just the memory of it is the only part. Part that is connecting that. That handwritten draft to the. The next one.

B (39:32)

Yes, exactly.

A (39:33)

Wow.

B (39:34)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So. And she's. I mean, as a short story author. I mean, she's. I've only read her short stories, but I'm sure the books are. The. The novels are good, too, but, like, remarkable. Like, one of the best going right now.

A (39:46)

I Know, there I do all my, my research handwritten, like, and then I do think there a lot of the great biographers, like McCullough and Carol, they write longhand. Susan Strait, who was just here and she was telling me she's like a great California writer. She was out her process and then she was going to that bookstore. So that's how I just.

B (40:05)

Okay, cool.

A (40:06)

But. But she does all her stuff longhand too. I think there's something about the inefficiency of it.

B (40:11)

Yeah.

A (40:12)

And the, the just sort of going through the motions of it there. There's probably something to the hand.

B (40:16)

The hand, the, the, like the hand of the brain thing, you know, like we're babies. We have our, our hands here. And so there's some connection there. I used to do all of it, like notes in notebooks. So everything was notebooks. So when I first started writing before, when I was journaling, before I even had of trying to do this for a living, it was always kind of like a notebook and a pen. And then as I was started to get into reporting, it was obviously the same. And the early Lonely Planet stuff. And then at some point I switched to the Notes app because Lonely Planet was switching to like a content management system. And the guy came out to shadow us on the road and he's like, listen, we want you just for this one, don't use your notebook, just use your Notes app. And just to see, just for an experiment, you just go back on your phone. Yeah. Just type it. And I thought that's not going to work. It takes too long. But blah. But now, like from that moment, I'm like, I'm like a trained dog now. It's always the Note app. So it's still kind of the same thing. It's still a dump site. It's still like if you go through, you know, you could see my, my box of old notebooks. It's probably not that different. But I do miss it. You know, I miss the, the hand to paper.

A (41:23)

Well, I find it's like. So it's like if I'm typing it and then I need to use it again or whatever, I'm copying and pasting it.

B (41:28)

Yeah.

A (41:29)

And like, so what I'm losing is one. One step where I have to do it again.

B (41:34)

Yeah.

A (41:34)

You know, so I wrote the process where I'm writing it by hand and then I'm typing it again. And you can imagine like if, if you do your things on a typewriter or, or you do it longhand and you're like, I Want to move this section over here? You have to do it again.

B (41:48)

Yeah, you do.

A (41:49)

And in doing it again, you're doing, you're almost certainly doing it better.

B (41:53)

I agree.

A (41:53)

Because you're, you're fine tuning it. And like, I gotta imagine when you did the audiobook for Can't Hurt Me, were you editing as you were recording still?

B (42:03)

No, it's kind of punch and roll. So like if you flub or anything. But we weren't editing the manuscript. The manuscript, no, it was done.

A (42:11)

Cause I do my audiobooks in here and I have never once not made cuts and changes, having been forced to say it aloud.

B (42:20)

Yes.

A (42:20)

Because then I'm like, oh, this like every interaction with the text in a new context forces you to reexamine it.

B (42:27)

Things and, and you can write for audio much more. Like this book. I'm still like, we're still doing the last pickups for audio. There's so many alliterations. And I'm reading the book, it drives me nuts. I'm like, I'm not going to write like this. I'm not going to write like this anymore. I'm going to write for saying it. Because you can stumble over the. Sometimes it sounds good in your head.

A (42:46)

Yes.

B (42:47)

But speaking it is harder. Yes, but so the reader, I don't think they need to be the same. So my, my feeling is like going forward is they shouldn't be the same. We don't need them to be the same. But there's this thing in publishing where it has to be the same.

A (43:00)

Yes.

B (43:00)

That's going to go away at some point.

A (43:02)

I think so too. Like for instance, like, like when you're writing, you should say like he said, she said, whatever. Like it's obvious when you're hearing dialogue.

B (43:12)

Yes.

A (43:12)

You know, especially like what I hate is when you're listening to an audiobook and it, it's like the voice of the person and then it's like, like he said, it's like.

B (43:22)

Right.

A (43:22)

The voice. You would never do that in a movie. Like, like.

B (43:25)

Right, right.

A (43:26)

I agree that they're going to diverge more and more and I know with that one you guys like, you added in extra stuff. Yeah, yeah.

B (43:31)

So that, that stuff we did and, and, and we did, we did a couple, multiple takes of some of the in between stuff a couple of times. But no, the book was done because you know that it was a very.

A (43:43)

Compressed production, wasn't it?

B (43:44)

I guess it was. I mean, it started, we started to write it the beginning of 2018 and it was out by November. So. Yeah, so it was. But because, you know, David is such a master storyteller. Right. He'd been telling this story back when he was in the Navy. Like it's in the book. Like he would. He would recruit for the Navy.

A (44:05)

Yeah.

B (44:05)

So they sent him out. So he was telling his childhood story. Not. Maybe not the ultra version, but he was telling his childhood story. Meanwhile, he was out training, training with kids at these little stops. Whoever wanted to run with them, he'd run. So he was telling those stories too. So it was just ingrained in him.

A (44:21)

Yeah. His greatest hits.

B (44:22)

Yeah, he. And he is like, just a master oral storyteller. Like. Like there's a great American tradition of them. It goes way back, you know, and so he's one of them. And. And so when you're working with someone like that, it's like this process and we. A chapter by chapter process. It's easier to build something that's super tight by the end. It's not the same as us rattling around in our own constantly kind of changing and think. Not that. Not that we didn't tinker and make sure it was perfect. But, but, but I think it's a slightly different experience.

A (44:54)

I also think on the audio front, I don't get. Since it's a file, like, why isn't there like five narrators? Like, it doesn't. It ca. Like, for a big book, Like, I did a kids book and I was like, I'll read it. I'll have my kids read it. I'll have someone with a British accent read. It's like just put like 10, like it.

B (45:11)

A past niche.

A (45:12)

Pick what you want to listen to.

B (45:13)

Oh, and you let the people pick. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's interesting.

A (45:16)

You know, there's just no reason that it's like, I like that idea. This is the narrator. Take it or leave it.

B (45:21)

No, no, no. Yeah, I know. I like that like a chosen well. AI is going to make that.

A (45:25)

I think it'll make it easier. But at the same time, like, also why. I don't get why every audiobook doesn't have what you guys did, which is just like cram a bunch of other stuff in there.

B (45:35)

Right, right.

A (45:36)

It's a package.

B (45:37)

Us and Gladwin Gladwell. Once he started doing revisionist history, his most. His more recent books, he basically writes for audiobooks. He's. Yeah. And he's just. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. But yeah, we. We did that first and it was just kind of like a natural thing to do because he's so good. Extemporaneously. On the mic. So it's like you want to have that as much as possible.

A (46:04)

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B (49:31)

Yeah.

A (49:31)

Last time I saw you at Rich's place, she was there, but then my producer was telling me you're in Eat, Pray, Love.

B (49:36)

I am.

A (49:37)

I didn't know this. That's such a random thing.

B (49:40)

I met her in Bali in 2004. It was my first time kind of bundled. I bundled a few assignments from like, kind of secondary magazines. Not bad. But like Islands magazine, which used to be a good travel magazine, but. But it wasn't like Trav Leisure. So I got a few of those and I packaged them together and fronted my own travel cost. This was me becoming a travel rider. This was my first kind of big step in that direction. And so when I was out there in Bali, because it was in Indonesia at that time, hotels were blowing up in Jakarta, bars were blowing up because it was like, you know, Al Qaeda, Indonesian. Al Qaeda was literally blowing. Oh yeah. We were like, Indonesia was on the State Department watch list. So that was kind of part of the, of the pitch to the editors. Hey, let's go to this place. Place somewhat dangerous. Lots of cool stuff happening in terms of spiritual energy as well. So let's go check that out. And so I did that. And so somehow, through a contact of mine, said, hey, you got to meet Elizabeth Gilbert. She's in town. She's awesome. She's here doing a book. I'm like, okay. And so I didn't really know who she was. Then we connected and we just became fast friends. And then pretty soon, like, I realized who she was because she had written Coyote Ugly for gq. And that became a movie. Oh, she wrote that. She wrote that.

A (50:52)

That.

B (50:52)

She'd written a novel that's really, really good called Stern Man. Kind of a coming of age novel about a lobster woman who won't. Can't get in the game, you know, like a young woman who wants to do it. And so just a remarkable person. And so we just. She became kind of right away this person that. That helped me right away, like, as a mentor and so a friend and a mentor. So just hung out with her in Bali. And so I was at. But when I first met her was at like some birthday party. And. And that's when I met her. And so, you know, some kid was there and said, the kid asked me what my favorite animal was. And I said, I don't know. Pelicans. And that's the word. Pelicans. That's my line. And he probably. I've just name checked. I have no impact on the story. It's just a name check, just an inclusion. I'm like, oh, all right.

A (51:37)

Is it you as like, full name or are you a character?

B (51:40)

No, no, it's just me.

A (51:41)

That's so funny.

B (51:42)

I'm the guy. I'm the sky that's.

A (51:43)

That likes pelicans.

B (51:44)

The California. The California bro at the. The party that likes pelican. I still like pelicans.

A (51:49)

Pelicans are awesome. They're weird.

B (51:51)

They are weird. Have you ever seen them?

A (51:53)

Yeah, it's nuts.

B (51:54)

It's gotta hurt the way they eat.

A (51:55)

Yeah.

B (51:56)

No teeth. You swallow it and it's like.

A (51:57)

Well, and then it, like, you think. Cause it's like a bird's beak, you think it's like this hard thing and then it's like this weird. So I don't know. I never touched it.

B (52:05)

It's lodged in there.

A (52:06)

Yeah, but it's just that, like. It's like this expense. I don't know.

B (52:09)

It's weird. It's weird. No longer my favorite animal, though, I would say.

A (52:12)

What is it? Tigers.

B (52:13)

Right now it's tigers. Right now. Right now it's tigers. Probably whales, but then tigers.

A (52:18)

Yes. Yeah, I like all whales except for killer whales, like, I find orcas just existentially horrifying and scary.

B (52:27)

Oh, interesting.

A (52:28)

Like, I don't like. I like the Pacific Ocean, but I don't like the Pacific Northwest.

B (52:32)

Interesting.

A (52:33)

I just find it very ominous. And like. Like, you go to Hawaii, you're like, the ocean's amazing. And you go to the Pacific Northwest and you're like, this ocean will murder you. Don't go in here cold and.

B (52:44)

And creatures. Although there's never been. Been an account of an orca killing a human being in the wild.

A (52:50)

Really?

B (52:50)

Yeah. Never. Not one.

A (52:52)

It doesn't. Doesn't do anything. It doesn't. Doesn't make it any better.

B (52:55)

All it means is it's gonna happen soon. Right. Maybe.

A (52:59)

I don't like that they can go on the beach. You know, I don't like that they can. They'll break the ice to get at things that they want. It's. It's. It's just. I don't know, it. I think everyone kind of has, like, some animal that fills them with dread.

B (53:14)

Yes.

A (53:15)

And that's. That's mine.

B (53:16)

That's yours. Okay.

A (53:17)

All right.

B (53:17)

I don't know.

A (53:17)

Do you know John Valant? He wrote.

B (53:19)

Yeah, of course.

A (53:19)

Yeah.

B (53:20)

I don't know him, but I know the book.

A (53:21)

Right. Because he wrote a book. But he was telling me the story about, like, I think I was telling him about this, but I think what to me encapsulates the Pacific Northwest is like, you'll see these logs up on the beach, and they're just, like, as smooth as they could possibly be. And you're like, that was a very large, large, very rough pine tree or redwood. And you're like, the ocean just took this thing and turned it into a. And he was saying, there's some cliffs up near Oregon or Seattle or something where, like, the ocean will hurl these big logs at the cliffs. And it makes a sound like it makes us. Like, they'll vibrate like a musical instrument.

B (53:59)

I was just like, that's crazy, dude. I read Passage to Juno, if you're familiar with that book. The author is escaping me. I. I'm really, really sorry. He wrote a book called Badlands. Also. He's a great English author that moved to Seattle. And this is all about him sailing his boat from Seattle to Juneau through the Inside Passage. And. And one of the scary things about it is, like, he has to be on. On watch for these logs.

A (54:23)

Yeah. Because they. They. Either they fall into the ocean or it's from those logging ships that are moving Them around, they escape.

B (54:30)

Right. The barges and they'll submerge and they could just wipe you out.

A (54:34)

Yeah, just a 200 foot floating like speed bump of death or something.

B (54:40)

Next thing you know, you're. You're floating around by yourself.

A (54:44)

I was going through some of your. Your New York Times pieces and I was fascinating. Like in a way, it's like, it's all these different sports. Yeah, right.

B (54:53)

Yeah.

A (54:53)

And yet at some level, you're writing about like the same person every time.

B (54:57)

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

A (54:57)

Does that ever strike you that. That like. Like one of them swimming 90 miles, the other is running 500 miles? Or this one's trying to dive this deep or this one's. But like it's the same maniac, male, female, different cultures, but it's the same maniac every time.

B (55:14)

It is. I think, I think there's an archetype there. Right. Like that. The. Whether it's. I think daredevil's the wrong word. It's the, it's the archetype of the person that. That needs to find the edge. I don't know what we'd even call it, but it's like, it's like is. Is themselves most who they're supposed to be when they're trying to find the edge of what's possible. And so that's kind of the archetype, I think. I haven't thought of it that way, what I thought about recently, because I had to redo my website, you know, for this kind of stuff. You redo everything and rethink.

A (55:45)

Sure.

B (55:46)

And like I said, I'm not that analytical. But looking back, what I notice is that all my work ties together with this idea of there's more to this life, there's more to yourself than you know, and that you. That you allow yourself to know because. To just get through life where these bubbles kind of floating around and we all have that bubble, even these people that we're talking about, their bubble is just much closer to the edge. But you gotta pop it and take a look around and see. Wait a second. There's so much more to learn, so much more to understand about myself and about this world. And so I think that is the through line. And so these particular people are learning it through ultra endurance or through trying to dive as deep as possible. One breath. Or. Now I'm. I'm into the wingsy base jumping. I'm researching a book on that. And so that is like that crowd of trying to find. That's more the daredevil that's More daredevil. But it's the same thing. It's the same people who are trying to find an edge because that's giving their life a different perspective. That's more like the people who are using, like the Buddhists who are meditating on death. It's like this kind of unconscious meditation on death.

A (56:54)

Right.

B (56:55)

To give your life meaning or like the free solo guys. It's no different.

A (56:58)

Yeah.

B (56:59)

And so I think that's the way I look at it. Is this. This. This kind of opening that we are more, we can do more, we can be more, and we are just more naturally. Also, it's. Yeah, also it's.

A (57:10)

It's like they're like, engaged in this, like, perennial battle against the self and whatever limitations the self perceives like.

B (57:20)

That's right.

A (57:20)

Can a human being do this? Or how can I get to the point that I can't not do it?

B (57:25)

Right.

A (57:26)

And that. That's the edge they're looking. It's not like an edge in a. There's some. It's about, like, finding the edge and then seeing if that's actually the edge.

B (57:34)

Yeah. And they're not doing it for any glory. I mean, except for the. Except for the really top people. They don't get money.

A (57:40)

Yeah.

B (57:41)

They don't get notoriety. Really.

A (57:43)

Yeah.

B (57:43)

They are doing it for the experience itself. And that's kind of what I think. Not just myself, but the sports editors that I work with who are constantly doing stories on the. The big sports and like all these athletes that. That want the global story, they loved doing these stories with me because it was like the purity of sport. Right. The purity of finding out, can I do it? And. And the humility that's. That comes with it because, like, I mean, the best freediving competition in the world, they still have to bring out the diving platform themselves. It's like imagine the Ironman athletes before the race having to set up their own barricades. That's what it's like with some of these sports that I cover.

A (58:21)

So I think they're not just not getting paid. It's an expensive hobby.

B (58:25)

Right, Right. Exactly right. That's 100% right. I mean, the only professional athletes in high altitude mountaineering, I mean, for the most part, unless you're the really top guys, are the. The Sherpa.

A (58:35)

Right.

B (58:36)

You know that, that.

A (58:37)

Oh, yeah. Climbing Everest. The only one getting paid is the. The person that lives there. They're the professionals. Yes.

B (58:41)

Everyone else is a tourist. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

A (58:44)

And I mean, I guess you probably saw this with Goggins, Is it like a. A wound? Is it a death wish? Is it a competitive desire? Like, what is the. I'm sure it differs from person to person, but what motivates someone to go like, no, I want to swim a hundred miles, or, I want to. I want to dive further than any human has ever gone, or, I want to run for. I want to run for 36 hours straight. What. What makes a person do that? Like, once it's like, okay, I think a normal person can relate to that, right? Like, everyone's like, I want to try. A lot of people like, I want to try a marathon. I want to try ultra marathon, maybe. But the. The people that do it as a thing they're trying to master. What is that?

B (59:27)

Well, I think I could. If we take kind of three examples, right? Like, let's take the ultra marathon example. There's a marathon. You know the marathon monks in Japan? No, it's like a Zen Buddhist sect that they run every day. Like, I forget how many days in a row, but like 50 miles a day for however many days in a row. And it's kind of like you get into a meditative state. So anytime you're doing these ultra events, you're coming up against the point of delirium, because there's sleep deprivation. You're coming up to the point of. Of pain and injury. And then when you get through it, there's this euphoria, and we call it the second wind. But there's also this euphoria that. Wow. I. You know, David calls it the 40% rule. Yeah, we all think we're done at 40%. And after that, there's this amazing wonderland of energy and strength and power that you tap into. I think breaking through that surface, especially for ultra runners, is the. Is the what gets you to want to do it again. Got it. I think there's this breakthrough, this power, this euphoria, this. This. This. This energy that you get, and that's why people do it over and over again. I don't think it's the suffering itself, although certainly there's people who are masochistic. But I think it's what comes after that that is. That is a thing, and it's not.

A (60:45)

Breakthrough, transcendent moment is what they're chasing, I think so.

B (60:48)

I don't think it's to say I did this race, because how do you explain a guy like Harvey Lewis that's just doing it over and over and over again constantly? He's chasing an energy, he's chasing a feeling.

A (60:58)

Right.

B (60:58)

Other kind of people, like say Lockbasherpa, who's the first woman to climb Everest 10 times, she grew up kind of powerless in this male dominated society. And for her, get, getting into the mountains and climbing the mountains and defying the sexism that was inherent in her culture and in mountaineering, its itself was empowering. And Alenka Artneck, one of the deepest women ever as a free diver. She was just a shop girl living in Slovenia and kind of partying at night and feeling kind of like her life had no meaning until she stumbled into a free diving pool session. And she found this thing that gave her life energy and power. And so we started off thinking about power. Right. And I think it all comes down to personal power.

A (61:41)

Power over the self.

B (61:42)

Yeah. And not just power over the self yourself, but a sense of your own, not power over it, although that is. Right. But I was speaking more of the important power that we all have to feel good about your life.

A (61:54)

Yeah.

B (61:55)

Like that's the empowerment we all can tap into. Like, for me, it started back with, you know, in, out of college. I started reading the Carlos Castaneda books right out of college. Robert Green, your mentor, talked about it on, on a video not too long ago. And Carlos Castaneda is now being posthumously canceled. Yes. And I'm not, I'm not commenting on him at all. But those books meant a lot to me. And one, one thing that they got me to do is I would just go out on the trail in nature and I would just contemplate nature and try to tap into the power that I heard, you know, that Don Juan was teaching, you know, the Carlos Castaneda may care. Forget his name now. And I was like channeling that. And that's the first kind of sense of individual power, power that I ever had. This power to kind of feel good about my own life through connecting to this, this source. And I think that the source for a lot of these athletes is their. The medium is their source and that's who they are. And it's not just identity, it's something beyond that. It's like this tap into a power source.

A (62:58)

Yeah. There's a stoic line, like he is powerful who is under his own power. So like, you know, you, you're. I want to be king. I want to be senator. I want. That's what you think power is. But if, if you're doing that because you want to be loved or you want to be remembered or whatever you're actually, or you're addicted to it, that's Actually not power. You're powerless because like this thing has the power. And also whoever decides whether you get it is the powerful.

B (63:24)

That's right.

A (63:24)

But when you're like, no, this is who I am, this is what I do, this is what I'm working on. And then your success or failure at the thing is up to you.

B (63:33)

Yes.

A (63:34)

That's a magical thing. Like, like, I think we probably love the same thing about writing. Like it's. Publishing is one thing.

B (63:41)

Yes.

A (63:41)

And it comes after the thing you actually love, which is doing the thing and being in it for months or years. That's the part you control. And if you love that part the most, you'll do really good work. If what you love is that feeling of exhilaration of making or not making the bestseller list or checking how, when the, when the advance check arrives.

B (64:02)

Right.

A (64:02)

One of those is, is a, is a very self contained approach and the other is a very externally motivated approach.

B (64:09)

Yeah. 100%. We, I think we do have the same feeling about writing because we love it, but we also recognize it's also not that fun a lot of the time. And. And like.

A (64:17)

Like running an ultra marathon.

B (64:18)

Exactly.

A (64:19)

Not fun.

B (64:19)

Exactly. And this book particularly challenged me in so many ways because like, for the first, like, I don't know, year, year and a half I was writing it. I didn't think it was good. And I'm like, am I wasting my time? Is like, I'm going. My family's kind of doing their thing. Like Zuma was a. April was working hard on that. And I'm sitting here doing this thing and it's not making us any money. And like, is it, am I completely screwing up and wasting everyone's time? And it took a long time to get to the fun part with this particular project. It took a long time. Not that I didn't find it worthy, but like the project worthy. But I wondered if the book would be worthy. It's kind of if you go back into my career. I didn't know, you know, I was making it as a writer. I was already doing Lonely Planet guidebooks. I was. But I didn't know that I was really any good.

A (65:03)

Yeah.

B (65:04)

Until I suffer from the external thing. Until I got my first New York Times assignment and I realized how the editors were treating my work.

A (65:11)

Yes.

B (65:12)

And it was like. Because I was always fighting from the outside in and any, any kind. It was like a constant battle. And when they anointed, when I felt like they approved, then all of a sudden I'm like, okay, I Actually am pretty good. And it took a long time for that. That's my own self loathing.

A (65:28)

It's a hard thing because I think it's hard in anything to like feel like you've made it or you're part of it. But then it's hard in a profession where anyone can call themselves the thing.

B (65:38)

Yeah.

A (65:38)

So it's not just that. It's not that you necessarily feel the imposter syndrome, although I think everyone does. But there is this like, am I being one of those posers or am I actually one of the handful of people really doing it? And like that, that, that kind of self consciousness is probably good. And then it means you're not like an egomaniac. You know, probably like that, that's a good, that's a sign of humility. But it is hard. Hard. Like when you can get to a point where someone says, what do you do? And you're like, I'm a writer and you're not. Like, you know, and, and then, and then when they go like, and what do you write about? And then you can confidently just be like, and this is external stuff can help with that.

B (66:14)

It totally helps. It totally helps. I mean, even with this, I was like, I felt like. I did feel. I do feel like this is some of my best work. I mean, I'm not going to judge it against everything, but I feel very good about this book. But you know, we didn't find a major publisher for this book.

A (66:27)

Right.

B (66:27)

And so, so it was fucking with me. It was like, I don't understand it because everyone I was handing it to believed in it, UTA believed in it, all these people believed in it.

A (66:36)

And you have a decent track record. Like, it must have been frustrating because if you'd had any kind of more conventional or down the middle idea, you know, they would have fallen over themselves based on your track record to spend a lot of money on it. And then you're like, is it a bad idea? Is it I'm not doing it right? Or, or is it that they have some blind spot? And that's a hard thing to parse.

B (67:02)

I think ultimately what I came around to is it's a mix of things, but like, it's not really that it's a bad idea, but the, the, the blind spot is that it doesn't fit the boxes right. And it took me a long time to come to that. So for like a year. I was pissed.

A (67:15)

Yeah.

B (67:15)

Like I was. Well, we were looking for. I just couldn't understand it because I read a lot. I'm like, I'm not trying. I mean, I. I do have some humility, but at the same time, I know what a good book is. Yeah, I know know what's good. And so I was like, I was just puzzled by it and confused. And I felt like maybe these people don't care about, like, the Goggins book. Maybe they don't care about these things. Maybe it doesn't register to them. And I think it doesn't in some ways because David went outside the system to publish his book. And so. And also it's his book, and also it's fiction. And so there's this. Nonfiction.

A (67:44)

Yeah, yeah.

B (67:44)

So it's nonfiction and fiction divide. So there's all these things I'm trying to break through. And so my whole goal was, well, if I write something bulletproof proof, it won't matter. And so my goal, I thought I had something bulletproof. I didn't. And it's a good lesson. And I think, coming back to your point about external versus internal, what happened for me was I realized that I was waiting to be anointed. And I realized that I was still trying to be called something called a novelist, because I always loved novels. That was why I became a writer. Right.

A (68:16)

You wanted the novelist people to go. You have been invited to join us.

B (68:21)

Yes.

A (68:21)

And this, this counts.

B (68:23)

Right. I wanted to. Like, I've always. I think my progression as a writer has always been it's been hard for me to be. Get on the inside.

A (68:29)

Yeah.

B (68:30)

You know, I've always felt like I've had to scrap on the outside, which is why I find these underreported stories.

A (68:34)

Sure.

B (68:34)

But eventually what I came to realize is I talked to Rich's wife, Julie, Julie Piat, and she said, you're waiting to be anointed. You don't need to be anointed. You'll. You'll. You'll find a way to publish the novel as soon as you decide you're a novelist.

A (68:47)

Yeah.

B (68:48)

And that was it. Like, the light flicked on and I was like, wait a second, she's right. And then I've looked it at, into it. Jane Austen self published Sense and Sensibility. Charles Dickens paid for the publication of Christmas Carol. So it's like this thing that I thought I wanted, I didn't need, and because of can't hurt me, I was able to do it. And so I thought, you know what?

A (69:06)

And by the way, most of those people that. Whose space you would want, you would want to be part of their. They got $3200 as an advance and the book sold 17 copies. And like it feels like that's actually the better safety for Cooler Club. And it's, it's only because you don't know. Not you. But it oftentimes the thing we want desperately is actually not better. It's just safer. And it seems safer because it's more conventional.

B (69:34)

Right.

A (69:34)

That's just something we made up.

B (69:35)

You have like someone behind you saying yes, you know, but, but I, I.

A (69:39)

Those would kill to actually be in your position financial or contact or platform wise.

B (69:45)

Well, totally. Like here I am sitting with you talking about it. And so it's like, it's, it's, it's to be able to do that is awesome. But also coming back around, like when I was going through this process at some point I looked at the blacklist, you know, the, the like or the.

A (70:00)

Scripts that didn't, yeah.

B (70:01)

Franklin Leonard's thing. And they, he started a fiction one. And so this whole time I'd been like wondering why didn't. I still don't understand why, why not me? Why didn't they pick me? And then I'm looking at this blacklist thing and said, you can join and you can pay a little money and you join this contest and you know, and we'll celebrate you if you're the of one. One of the picked novels, the unpublished novels. And it asked me to pick a category for my book. And that's when I realized I could, I couldn't pick a category.

A (70:28)

They had a point like that. You, you. Yes. Like, you realize a lot of times just not being clearly one thing or another is a huge disadvantage. Not like as far as quality or it just. You're asking a lot of people.

B (70:44)

You are for, for, for the people who are packaging them.

A (70:46)

Yes.

B (70:47)

But for readers it won't matter. Like, that's what I thought. I'm like, okay, so no one's being an.

A (70:53)

No one wants to spend a ton of money on a book from the guy that wrote David Goggin's books, his novel. That's hard to explain.

B (71:01)

Right.

A (71:01)

If it works, of course. But like you don't make any more money for buying a good book in publishing, but you definitely get fired if you fuck up or do something that's makes you seem stupid.

B (71:12)

That's right.

A (71:12)

And, and that's what you people don't realize. They're often bumping up. It's like, why won't these VCs fund me? It's not that that it's a good idea. Or a bad idea. It's just they don't want to be laughed at by their peers. And as you're currently presenting it, it could potentially be something that puts egg on their face.

B (71:30)

Right.

A (71:30)

That's. That's the main thing they're trying to avoid.

B (71:33)

Right. I mean, this book isn't that hard to explain on some level, but what it gets into is much more subtle. And, you know, we're talking about a. A book where. Where there's a tiger slinking around the suburbs and of la. Right. And that's based on a true story I reported for the LA Weekly 20 years ago. And so it was a true story. And so that's it. So everyone understands that. That concept, I thought, always worked. And it's kind of like a tight timeline. It's over the course of this search. Is there a tiger? Is there not? But what makes the book work, and I think why people are responding to it, who have had a chance to read it, is that it's just a deeper experience. And so what all to me, what all great books. Books do, what your books do, what the things I write I try to do, is they wrestle with the fundamental question of what it means to be alive. And that's, I think, what all great books do. Right. That's why people come back to Meditations for. So that's what's amazing about Marcus Aurelius. Right. That he was wrestling with it.

A (72:29)

True.

B (72:29)

I mean, a guy in his power was wrestling with it.

A (72:31)

It's an insane fluke. But talk about a book that doesn't work in a category. He wasn't thinking about it as a book. He didn't want it to be a book for 500 years. It wasn't a book. You know, it just. It's a random confluence of circumst that it even exists. If you had pitched it to someone, they would have been like, no, thanks, you know, Exactly.

B (72:51)

And then I think what you explained with Elon Musk, by the way, I mean, you're Elon. It's the best I've ever seen anyone explain Elon Musk. I haven't read Walter Isaacson's book, so, I mean, obviously you have multiple sources. That's one of them. You write in the book. But like, the way you explain him and build him up and take him apart is, I think, the best I've ever seen. And. And one of the things that he, he is, is a guy that doesn't wrestle with what it means to be alive.

A (73:20)

Sure.

B (73:21)

And that's. And that's the. The dangerous people out there are the ones that don't wrestle with it. They're not interested.

A (73:27)

That means a lot to me that you point that that was the hardest thing in the book to write and it took the longest and I had to read the most. And it's also the scariest because you're writing about a vindictive person with unlimited resources who, by the way, owns like half this specific town. Realize that until after all of his stuff is here. Yeah. And like, people that work there live on my streets, you know, they agree.

B (73:52)

With you, I'm sure.

A (73:52)

I don't know. But that. Yeah, that was a challenging one. Yeah. There is a stunning lack of self awareness or introspection, which is probably his superpower in some ways.

B (74:02)

Yeah.

A (74:02)

But, yeah, that was a. That was a rough one to write. Speaking of which, I was thinking of this book because when I drop my kids to school sometimes we like on the New York Times app, you can listen to stories.

B (74:10)

Yes.

A (74:10)

So it's like instead of their terrible taste in music or whatever, we'll all, like, pick articles. When I'm reading the news throughout the, like, you know, I go, oh, I think my kids would like this story. And there's a story that I saved. We listened to it. There was a report of a lion in Ireland, like two weeks ago in the woods in Ireland. And so the.

B (74:29)

An African lion.

A (74:30)

Yes. Which seems crazy, which. Except for. Which I'll get to in a second, but there was reports of this African lion. And it turns out it was just a dog that a guy had shaved. Weird. And it liked to trot around in the woods and they found the dog. And so it was this huge story because now this dog's like a hero. And everyone loves this dog. It's a very famous dog. But anyways, that's the first half of the article. The second half of the article is, of course, you're probably like, how would an African lion have been in Ireland? Obviously that's dumb. That people. Ireland was at one point like the breeding capital of. Of lions.

B (75:05)

It was. It really.

A (75:06)

The MGM lion is from Dublin. It was bred by a lion breeder outside of Dublin or something. And you're just like, man, life is so fucking weird.

B (75:16)

Oh, dude, it was way weirder in the first half of the 20th century. Like around the turn of the century, in the 20s, people were doing all sorts of shit. Like people would have, like, chimpanzees as pets. Big, like all the kind of weird, exotic pet stuff starts then.

A (75:28)

Yes.

B (75:28)

Yeah, yeah.

A (75:29)

Because Rich people could travel and there wasn't like, strong. So it'd be like you took the boat to Africa and you took a lion home with you or whatever.

B (75:36)

Like.

A (75:36)

Like that. You know that famous viral video about the lion running and hugging those people? Yes, that they were. They lived in London. That's where that lion was. They bought that. That lion at Harrods. Yeah.

B (75:49)

Did they really?

A (75:50)

Because they sold. Yeah. The like, thing about British colonialism, by the way, up until much more recent than you think.

B (75:57)

Yes.

A (75:58)

And nothing brings that home to me, by the way. I was just having to talk to my UK publisher because. Because I. There's a bookstore in Australia that wanted something from me.

B (76:07)

Yeah.

A (76:07)

And. And British publishers still exist in the. In the Empire, like the Common.

B (76:14)

Is that right?

A (76:14)

Like, so when you sell, like.

B (76:15)

That's right. You could have UK rights. Include Canada and Australia and all India. Yeah, yeah. In India. It's insane. In India too.

A (76:23)

English. India. That's funny. The English translate in the English language in India. That is your uk. South Africa.

B (76:30)

Okay.

A (76:31)

I don't know about Kenya, but you're just like, okay, this is like, this is because publishers from 50 years ago were still part of this system.

B (76:38)

How many other businesses are like that?

A (76:40)

It's crazy.

B (76:41)

I'm sure, like the imports of like, commodities.

A (76:43)

Yes.

B (76:43)

That's got to still exist in that same.

A (76:45)

Yeah, yeah. Like, I'm sure, like, if you buy teak, right. It's probably some company in Thailand owned.

B (76:52)

By a British dude. And certainly tea.

A (76:54)

Yeah.

B (76:54)

Tea from India.

A (76:55)

But anyways, yeah, I thought I was like, the MGM lion is from.

B (76:59)

Is from Ireland and the MGM lion has a tiger dubbed in.

A (77:03)

Oh, that's what the roar is.

B (77:04)

Yeah, the roar is a tiger. Because if. Because the proper roar that we all think of with lions and tigers is only a tiger.

A (77:11)

The.

B (77:11)

The lions have a more cough type of roar. It's like, it's a growl. Plus, like a, you know, they belt something out. But it's not the classic, like, clean roar that's tigers.

A (77:21)

Well, when I first saw it, I was like, oh, is it set in Texas? Because Texas has the most tigers, right?

B (77:26)

Yeah, I mean, I mean, you know, in those days. So what the backstory is of the. Of the true story is that a tiger king type couple moved their managerie of cats from Riverside county to Ventura county and they had a 30 day grace period. Like, you don't have to tell the game wardens of the new county. It's just a law. Like, like they have 30 days and then they lost track of two cats just lost a. And they didn't tell anybody. And the links turned up first. The game warden Festival. The links. And then these guys came to pick up the claim, the links. And that's when the game warden went to their place.

A (77:58)

Lose anything else? Yeah.

B (77:59)

And they denied it.

A (78:00)

Yeah.

B (78:00)

I mean, imagine the strange psychosis of, like, losing. Knowing you lost track of a tiger.

A (78:05)

Sure.

B (78:06)

And denying it.

A (78:07)

Yeah.

B (78:07)

Like, that's nuts. I mean, that's another level of nuts.

A (78:11)

And you think you're dealing with, like, the federal government, but, like, what happens in Texas, for instance, is like. It's like, okay, there's some national laws or statewide laws, but it's like, most of the things are, like, ultimately regulated at, like, the city or the. The county level.

B (78:25)

Right.

A (78:25)

And like, most counties are not, like. And then let's make sure we pass a law that says you can't own tigers.

B (78:31)

Yeah.

A (78:31)

Because the assumption is there's no tigers here. If people don't have tigers. It's kind of. Oftentimes this only happens because something like this happens.

B (78:40)

Right, right, right.

A (78:41)

The safeguards are there because the absurd exception proved the need to have it in the first place.

B (78:47)

That's right. I mean, that. That's the history of lawmaking. Right. But so what happened is prior to 20. 2022, it was state by state. It was governed in the state. And so certain states allowed breeding, certain didn't, but it was all pretty legal to own them. And then in 2022, they passed the Big Cat Safety Act.

A (79:02)

This is the great legacy documentary.

B (79:05)

Exactly. And so that happened. And so now breeding is illegal. Tiger petting is illegal. So it's all recent that. This is like it used to be. In 2021, you could still go to a tiger petting, like, concession in the United States.

A (79:17)

Every time I. We drive down to Florida a couple times a year, and every time we drive from here and we're passing through New Orleans, I tell my son that when he was a baby, we were driving through and we stopped at the tiger truck stop, which had a tiger in a cage at the gas station. And he just, like, can't wrap his head around that being a thing. I'm like, not only was it a thing, people went. I watched someone walk into the gas station, buy lunch meat and throw it into the tiger cage. You're like, this. This is not ancient history.

B (79:48)

No, I mean, I did it. When I was researching this book, I went to, like, five or six of these kind of amateur zoos. One was outside the Sequoia national park still exists. These places still exist because in California. Yeah, in California. All of them were in California. One was in the high desert, one was outside the national park. Couple. One was in Santa Clarita. Tippi Hendren's place.

A (80:07)

Yeah.

B (80:08)

Some one was outside San Diego. They were called. Some of them were refuges. So like, places that the bad actors would have to. They.

A (80:14)

They'll take them because somebody else had one.

B (80:16)

Right. And they can. They a better situation and they have more better management, but they're all like, not that great. And so then you. But you can feed them at some of these, like, the worst ones you can do tiger feeding. I fed them like this crap.

A (80:29)

You have a zoo down the street. It's like $20 to feed the line. Actually, I have a. I have a picture of my. They had a thing, like, they had a dingo there and a dingo had puppies and you could go. And so as a picture of my kids, like, just being jumped on by dingo puppies.

B (80:44)

Is that right? That's hilarious. That's cute. That's cute.

A (80:47)

But yeah, you're just like, this is. Is not. Life's weird. It.

B (80:49)

It is weird.

A (80:50)

Drove to work the other day, I saw a zebra in someone's front yard.

B (80:53)

Is that right?

A (80:53)

This is weird.

B (80:54)

Well, you get that also outside the Hearst Castle, you know, there's zebras.

A (80:57)

Well, that's why it's the Simi Valley thing. Like, because some of those zebras are like, Hearst Castle, he had a crazy zoo. You can still see the zoo.

B (81:03)

Yep.

A (81:04)

But like, he. Some of the zebras got out and bred with, like, horses and stuff. So they're still like.

B (81:10)

They're on the. They're in the plains, like, right below the castle hill. They're still part of the hearse property. Yeah. In San Simeon. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, yes. I mean, you know, the.

A (81:19)

The.

B (81:19)

The Simi Valley part of it was interesting because, like, for a long time I was hesitating writing this book, and I was trying to figure out, like, the best way to tell it. And so I was thinking, like a journalist, I'm going to get all the information I can get. I went back. Yeah. When. When I was covering for LA Weekly. I was there when they were doing it. So I went back to some of those game wardens and tried to get as many files. U.S. department of Agriculture, who brought in the trackers wouldn't give me anything. They sent me this redacted file. I don't know if you ever got redacted files, but, like, it's like a funny game of Tetris all black and then, like. And what are they hiding? I don't know. Like, it's. This is just a Tiger story for 20 years ago. Yeah, I know. So I couldn't get everything. And finally I decided, you know what? It's fiction.

A (81:58)

Yeah.

B (81:59)

I don't have to set it in sunny Valley. I can kind of change Simi Valley to suit the.

A (82:03)

Make it a store. If you can't get the material, make it a story.

B (82:06)

Exactly. And so I. There's a lot that's true in it, but then there's a lot. There's a. There's the opportunity to kind of get magical with it. And so. And for the whole time, though, I thought I was going to treat it. Get pretty honest to what happened until the end and started writing the ending and I realized, no, there's. There's something else that could happen.

A (82:22)

Well, to go to your point about power, and then I want to show you some books in the bookstore. Yeah. I thought the funniest thing, like, it's like, okay, William Randolph Hearst, I'm rich, I'm powerful, I need to own a bear, and whatever. And then, I mean, obviously this is what the Romans did, you know, and kings and whatever have done forever. But I thought the funny. There's this interview with Ridley Scott when he's being asked about the new Gladiator because there's a. Have you seen the Gladiator too?

B (82:45)

No, I have not.

A (82:45)

There's. So they are obligated. You have to see. I should have been asked to do a cameo.

B (82:52)

You should be at the premiere.

A (82:53)

Yeah, but, but, like, they used to flood the Coliseum and have naval battles.

B (82:57)

Right?

A (82:57)

Which, like, we only discovered relatively recently.

B (83:00)

Talk about imminent domain.

A (83:01)

Yeah, yeah, but in the movie they do that. But then there's sharks in the water and this journalist, like, so, like, how'd you have the idea to do that? I mean, he's like, obviously the Romans didn't have sharks in the. In the Coliseum. And Ridley Scott, he gets fucking mad. He's like, you don't fucking know. He's like. He's like, do know how hard it was to build the Coliseum? And then they flooded it with water and then they. They. They put ships in and they have naval battles. Yeah, he's like, I don't know. Maybe someone caught a shark and put it in there. It's not that crazy. He's like, so mad.

B (83:34)

Don't you love that he's still so passionate about his, like, some of this stuff now, like, These old men that are doing it, like, some of them are more wise. Like, Scorsese is kind of, like, more humble than he used to be.

A (83:45)

Turned the volume down.

B (83:46)

Yeah, not him.

A (83:47)

No.

B (83:47)

He's gone the other way.

A (83:50)

But it was just like, oh, this is what lights you up. And you're. Yeah, like, you're right. Like, there's something kind of cynical and. And smug about, like, obviously they didn't do this.

B (84:00)

Right.

A (84:00)

And his view is like, maybe they did.

B (84:02)

Right. Well, why are we attached to. When you're talking about story and fantasy or whatever it is, why are we attached to keeping the rules the same of our known world? Right. Like, the whole idea of. Of, you know, the hero with a thousand faces and the hero's journey, which we're all on. Right? We're all on that. That's one thing point out to everybody is you have power of your life. You can become your own hero. You can follow these masters and do it, too. If we're on the hero's journey, the worst thing you can do is tell. Tell yourself that you already know the ending.

A (84:32)

Yes.

B (84:33)

Yeah, I mean, we do all know the ending.

A (84:36)

Instead of just going like. Instead of just going like, hey, that was a cool scene in this fictional action movie.

B (84:42)

Right?

A (84:42)

You're like, it didn't really happen that way.

B (84:44)

Right?

A (84:44)

It didn't happen at all.

B (84:46)

Right. It didn't happen. That point isn't that it happened. The point is, here's a story that you can use to relate and inform your life. Right? I mean, like, that isn't that the point? So. And maybe just to entertain you, which is all we need sometimes.

A (84:56)

That's what art is. Yeah.

B (84:57)

That's all it is, man.

A (84:58)

You want to check out some books?

B (84:59)

Let's do it.

A (84:59)

All right. Thanks so much for listening. If you could rate this podcast and leave a review on itunes, that would mean so much to us, and it would really help the show. We appreciate. Appreciate it. And I'll see you next episode. A master murderer, Israel Keyes lives between two worlds.

B (85:39)

There's the person that everybody knows and loves, and then there's the guy who spends every waking hour planning on how.

A (85:45)

He'S going to kill someone. On Mind of a Monster, the Cross Country Killer, we find out how this deadly predator went unnoticed for so long. I've had some confessions in my history, but nothing to that detail. I'll give it glow by blow if you want. Listen to Mind of a Monster, the Cross Country Killer, wherever you get your podcasts.