B (123:00)
No. And my family took it hard. My grandmom and my uncles were like, I might as well just got on crack. Been on the street, they're like, I went to heating and air school and got a degree and worked a year with Barringers heat and cooling out of Zeblin, Georgia. And I had me a truck had my name on it, you know, Michael, you know, and had me my refrigeration tools and every Christmas my dad, boy, I got you another flaring kit. I mean, just blue collar culture. And all of a sudden, you know, I'm coming in telling the family like, hey, I don't know if I'm gonna keep doing the heat and air deal, you know, like, what? Like, you got a truck, son, you got your own uniform, you know, you, you got benefits. I'm like, yeah, but there's this camouflage company want me to take Dale Earnhardt turkey hunting. And. And my dad was the only one that got it. Everybody else is like, it was an intervention. Like, I'd go to Christmas and like, hey, nephew, and pull you aside. Now, you know you can't make a living at this hunting and fishing thing, you know. You know, like, well, I don't know, but I'm young and man, this would be really cool. I love this more than anything. But it was kind of that whole situation of it wasn't a job before, it wasn't a job and I was trusting them. But I was sitting there thinking, like, I'm pretty sure Bill Jern's rich. I mean, he's. I saw him with a Mercedes. He had a Mercedes Benz. And matter of fact, there's a real funny story about that Mercedes Benz. But I couldn't believe it. And so my grandma was like, son, when you get tired of this, just go have fun with it. But come back to it. Almost no different than if you're a young kid. Like, I'm going to Nashville. I want to play a guitar and sing. Maybe I can be the next Luke Bryan. And somebody in the family was like, oh, when it gets right, he'll come back, jump in the family business, start putting these shingles on the roof. He'll get back into Sheetrock and just give him a chance. Hell, he was one of the best concrete guys I knew. That kid would work. He could run a bull float like some bitch, you know. And so that was me. And, and all of a sudden they offer me a full time job. Wasn't a lot of money. And I remember going back and saying, you know, hey, they got all these things, 401k. I got benefits, help, I got eye and dental. And I get to go on all these epic trips. And I met amazing people, hunted with people that I was just shell shocked. I remember I met Leonard Skynyrd band in a NASCAR suite one time. The maddest ever got at Bill Jordan. Maddest I ever got it. Of course, you know, Ronnie was. Had passed on and half the members, but it was Johnny Vanzant, and it was Rossington. And I'm sitting there, redneck kid. I'm at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Like, I can't believe it. There's Mark Martin's wife and co. I'm like, man, I have made it. And I'm over here, chicken fingers. And bro. All of a sudden, I look, the door opens, and there was just people in that. And there is the Lynyrd Skynyrd band. Looked just like, you know, like what I pictured. And I'm like, oh, my God. You know, I'm freaking out. And Bill said, hey, ain't that your band? I said, that's not only a band. That's Leonard Skynyrd. And Bill Jordan said, what are they saying? I said, I swear to God, I ain't never hit my balls, but I'm about to knock you out. You know, are you kidding me? And I never forget. I went over there and I was just, you know, I got a chance to meet him, but so many people I met, and I couldn't believe it. And one thing led to another, and really, what. The biggest break I had was David Blanton, who was like a big brother. I mean, like a. Like a father. And he was just such a good guy, Good Christian guy, good hunter. Outdoor Channel was just coming on. Outdoor Channel was really kind of coming on. But at the time, you know, the. The kind of beat your chest kind of pride was the fact that you could be on ESPN and or tnn, and then TNN had been through a situation where I think it was Viacom had some big merger that was part of the MTV thing. And so they quickly, through their kind of culturally said, hey, we need to kind of do away with this hunting thing. These guys are killing stuff. And it become the Nashville. It was a Nashville network, then it become the national network, then it becomes. Become Spike tv. And so everything moved over all the. The big Sunday night block, move over to espn, but you couldn't show impact. Well, about that time, they started the Outdoor Channel on cable tv. They were looking for distribution. And so it was David Blanton. He said, michael, we need to come up with a cool hook, and we need to create a show over on Outdoor Channel. And so getting back to meeting these people and what I found, it was fascinating. And it's just the same with these conversations. You have these people that you just look up to. Yeah, you meet some people that are interesting and weird, but for the most part, you're like, wow, these guys are super cool, super talented, and that's what I was finding when I would run into a country singer. I remember Mark Chestnut sitting around and drinking whiskey and him playing a guitar and singing Hank Williams Jr. Song, running into Bo Cephas, running into Leonard Skinner and all those guys. And I was like, man, these guys are so down to earth and cool. And I realized that there was more to this hunting than just the staunch. You know, here we go with the Inconus Ranch. Today we're hunting the mesquite flats of Inol. You know, the coyotes, abundant. There's a big buck around the corner. How you going to do? Yeah, and it was just like, at the time, it was so sanitized. It was so sanitized. Everybody was starched. You go to a hunting show, everybody had on khakis. I mean, it's almost like it was a facade. And. And I remember telling David Blanton, I said, I think. I think what we're missing is the culture and the fun, and everybody was very serious. And you should be serious if you're going to go take a bow and arrow or a rifle and take the life of a wild animal. But the camp life was so amazing. And we'd have different personalities, different NFL athletes. We would have comedians, people like Jeff Foxworthy. And I was just so pleased that these people that I adored and was big fans of was people that you could sit around and have a glass of sweet tea or a cold beer and just laugh. And they were as real, possibly more entertaining in person. Kind of like you talk about Theo, people ask if he's really funny. Well, you should have been with us at this UFC fight. We couldn't even watch the fight. The guy's, you know, cracking us up. And so I told David, I said, I think most of these people, if we could do a show kind of documenting just the camp life and the reality of how much fun you have, I think we could sell that fund. And so David said. Said, do it. He said. He said, matter of fact, you host it. And I'm like, no, no, no. I'm not coming in here to pitch you to. For me to host a show. You know, behind the scenes, I'll guide, I'll run camera, I'll help edit, produce. I. He had sent me to Maine to this international film and art school to learn how to edit on non linear. The first avid.
