a thing happened

Brandon is playing Chess. Collin is flying. Wake us up when September is over. 

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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE

PROVIDED BY OTTER.AI

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

podcast, Brandon, Collin, September, Green Day, school, kids, hallway, Alamo, Riverwalk, San Antonio, conference, hotel, chess, internet

SPEAKERS

Brandon, Speaker 4, Speaker 2, Speaker 3, Speaker 1, Collin

Speaker 1  00:04

Foreign Welcome to Oh brother, a podcast where we try to figure it all out with your host, Brandon and Collin on last week's show, a thing happened?

00:17

Ahoy, ahoy. Sorry, I

00:20

don't know when, how long you've been sitting there. I apologize.

Speaker 2  00:22

Well, it's all right. No, I was it was doing the thing again, where it, like, connected, and then I had to, like, find the unmute button, right? So I was like, waiting, okay, so it was just a couple seconds,

Speaker 1  00:34

cool, yeah? Cuz I was like, Oh, I pulled it up, and I was like, let me just tootle over here, and I'm working, working. And I'm working, working, and then I kind of lost track of time, and I looked

Speaker 2  00:43

over and you were there. How is it going? Oh, it's too hot, really. Is how it's going, right? It's not came back. And I'm so I know stinking September, right? I think always gets me Green Day's got the right idea. Wait till it's over, to wake up. Brian's really hanging out. So have to make the obligatory Green Day joke in September.

Speaker 3  01:12

That's, this is the law. I think, I think it's the law. So it is required Absolutely.

Speaker 1  01:20

Oh my goodness, yeah. So, yeah, it's September. Good, um, yeah, what? How's your, how's your September been so far?

01:29

Yeah, fine, I guess you know?

Speaker 2  01:32

Well, it's just like school getting things over,

01:35

doing stuff, trying to get the kids to not

01:39

and then you stop touching

Speaker 2  01:41

each other in the hallway. It's a weird always, like pushing and jumping all the time. Why? Like, why? Why all the time there's like, hockey players in the hallway. What was the matter?

01:51

Why? Ridiculous, right?

Speaker 2  01:59

Absolutely ridiculous. Okay, yes, there's always like, doing weird things like that. But other than that, it was fine. Just like, oh, gosh, why? We had a talk on Friday about, like, oh, we need to do these things. And I was like, what are some things we need to focus on for, you know, this blah, blah stuff and yada yada. And they were telling me all this stuff. And then at the very end of day, they were like, running down the hallway, shoving each other. I just like, yelled at them. Was like, oh,

Speaker 1  02:22

at him, maniacs.

02:28

I mean, little baby, what are you doing? Do they

Speaker 1  02:30

give a reason for why they're doing it? No, they're just

Speaker 3  02:33

ridiculous sixth graders. Mostly, they're just like, always

02:39

doing it, all the time, all the time.

Speaker 3  02:44

They always use anyway, like security always do this. They always touch each other all the time, like pushing and shoving and like, all all

02:53

the time. So always, it's so weird. Like, I don't know why.

03:00

It's a mystery, but that's how I

Speaker 3  03:02

ended my Friday was, like, so mad. Like, what girl?

03:07

So start over

03:10

tomorrow and

Speaker 1  03:13

start with rule number one, and we'll go, Yeah, that one for me. All the time. Ridiculous people.

03:22

So, yeah, that's pretty much it Oh, it's fine, it's okay.

03:29

We did start yesterday, right?

Speaker 3  03:34

Was it is September, right? And you're like, man, need to read a little something, right? Keep what should I read in September? Oh, oh, I think we know the answer this question, right?

Speaker 2  03:49

You have to start the Lord of the Rings in September. That's just the law too. That's the other law, right? Yes. Oh, busting that out.

03:56

It's good. We just finished.

Speaker 2  03:59

It's almost build his birthday, right? So Inferno almost build on frodo's birthday, right? Coming up. So, you know, busted out here. Just,

04:14

yes, it's good.

Speaker 2  04:20

That's all I've really been doing this week, right? You You made up to much more exciting things, right? Like we

Speaker 3  04:31

it's all the Alamo. Oh, there you go. Yeah, we went, Oh yeah, it's tiny, yeah.

Collin  04:39

So, yeah, so it our, our travels were fine, like, so we flew out of Springfield. It's great. I still really liked that airport because it has a terminal, oh yeah, it's really handy. Like, it's so nice. Oh man, it's great. I am so every time I'm like, You know what? I know it's two hours away. Yeah, from where I live, and whatever, and Kansas City is, like, way closer I could like, but no, I'm not gonna put myself through that heartache.

Speaker 1  05:11

No, just so nice. So we showed up about 45 minutes before plane was taking off, and we had no problem. It was perfect.

05:22

And oh yeah, sorry, travels. Catch up with you recovering,

Speaker 1  05:28

yeah, but it was nice. Monday, we landed, and I had intended to, like, practice my talk on the flight and stuff. No, I didn't,

05:42

but

Speaker 1  05:44

I didn't. And also, we flew from Springfield to Houston and then from Houston to San Antonio, and you're like, but aren't Houston and San Antonio? Like, a, they're in the same state, yeah? But, but B, also, aren't they kind of, like, I don't know, close together, yeah? Not like, really, I mean, but plain they are, yeah, they are 40 minutes from each other. That was wheels up to wheels down. It was a 40 minute flight,

06:13

yeah, which means how many hours

Speaker 1  06:16

of that being a car, though, like, that's like, it's two and a half. Yeah, right, yeah, exactly. It's fantastic. That was the weirdest flight I've ever been on previous to that, the shortest flight that I have flown on was from Lubbock to Dallas, which is similar, Dallas is like five hours away, but four but it was like, every seven minutes they were doing an announcement like, boom, we're at cruising altitude. Then you can use your computers, yeah, and then, boom, We're descending. We're getting to descend. Oh, okay, so nothing happened on that. And then we cut out, and we did a, did an Uber from the terminal to our hotel, and we got we got shagrat. And shaggerat is from Afghanistan, and he was awesome. He was so cool. And he kept on telling me how much he was like, Where are you from? I was like, Missouri. It kept on telling me how much he wanted to move to Missouri because he hated Texas. It was awful. No more there's too much competition, and everybody's here can't drive for living like he used to, and so he wants to move to Missouri. And I was like, Are you, like, where there's nobody? Like, yeah, but lots of people to to drive around. It's like, really? Cuz I don't know if people Uber well

07:38

maybe like Kansas City

Speaker 2  07:40

and stuff, like, not in, like, Springfield, I don't think that's a thing, no, right?

Speaker 1  07:44

Like, it's not, it's not, but it's great. And, I mean, I guess,

Speaker 2  07:48

like, downtown on like, Friday nights, that's a thing, right? But like, on a Tuesday at four o'clock now, yeah, I don't think that's really I mean, it may be to the

07:58

airport, maybe. But like,

Speaker 2  07:59

also, I don't think that's a big deal here. I think the problem, yeah, the problem is you need to be where people want that, not at a place where everyone owns a car,

Speaker 1  08:09

yeah, when it's driving culture anyway, like, yeah, not good. So he was great. He knew just enough English to complain about not being able to drive very much like he used to, and that was it. It was like, perfect. This is, I

08:25

mean, like, I think that's just like,

Speaker 2  08:27

international cab driver. I think that's bingo, right? That's what you got to know. That's, you know, that's it.

Collin  08:35

That's in, that's in the manual tape. Dropped us off, and we immediately put our stuff down because we had been in the we didn't we got two. We let me see. Here we were. Our flight left at nine, so we were in the airport at eight. We went from eight to two, and we had basically just sat all day long. So yeah, yeah, we were like, We need to get up and walk. And so we walked to the Alamo first day. And yes, I, don't have, I have never been there before, except Yes, you have, okay, you were very small. Okay, you were there. Yeah, yes, we went there. I was very small.

Speaker 3  09:11

I was probably in. It was somewhere around fourth or fifth grade. Maybe, okay, maybe, maybe it's the summer between, like third and fourth grade. Okay, perhaps this that feels right, but it could be that. Could be incorrect. It could be earlier than that. I kept on. So this is like 93

09:38

by four or five.

09:39

Yeah, so you were there, but you were not like, I

Speaker 1  09:42

wasn't present, yeah? Because okay, I thought you

Speaker 3  09:46

could be forgiven for not remembering, but you were there. There's pictures of you sitting on one of the cannons or something somewhere at home, dad's house, that's okay.

Collin  09:58

So, yeah. So I don't remember this at all, but yeah, it's very weirdly underwhelming and overwhelming at the same time, because you like come out into the plaza and it's just surrounded by skyscrapers, except for the both the Alamo and the mission gate that they've kind of rebuilt there and made it a thing. So that was kind of off putting.

Speaker 1  10:22

We didn't go in because you had to have reservations to do the guided tour. You couldn't just go in willy nilly.

Speaker 3  10:28

We can just, like, wander about. It's like five feet square. What do you mean? You can just wander about. What was there to see? Like, I think

Speaker 1  10:35

that's why they require you to reserve a time. Now, had I been savvy enough, I probably could have done it on my phone for within three minutes when we needed it, but I didn't want to, so we didn't go inside, which is fine. We just wandered about. You don't need to remember it that badly. It's okay. I mean, yeah, it is there.

Collin  10:54

Coolest thing about that, not the actual church, but the longhouse thing that is the oldest building in Texas,

Speaker 1  11:05

standing there. Oh yeah. And my favorite part about it is that every six feet, they have signs that say, do not touch. Do not touch this building. Do not touch this building. Just fall over. Do not touch this building. Couple that with all of the Texas Rangers about I was like, You know what, I don't think I'm gonna touch the building. Not today, not today. I wanna get arrested. Hotel was right on the Riverwalk. Walker, Walker.

11:33

Texas Ranger, like, right, yeah.

Speaker 1  11:37

Hotel right on Riverwalk. Took me a little while to figure out what all was referred to as river walk, and what did not qualify as Riverwalk.

Speaker 3  11:46

Yeah, that is true, because, like, some of it's on the river, but, like, not officially part of the race.

Collin  11:53

And there's, like, a weird downtown loop that originally I thought was the Riverwalk, but then, like, there's a huge section of just the San Antonio river that is also the Riverwalk. That's the big north and south sections where most people think of as the riverwalk is just this little one and a half mile loop that goes through downtown.

Speaker 1  12:15

And, man, it's a weird place. That's a very odd place, you know, totally artificial. It's a canal. It's actually a flood control system. Is what?

Collin  12:28

Yeah, if we want to be very honest, yeah, there are massive metal doors that slam shut and it's flooding so that it doesn't flood downtown. Yeah. And some guy in the 1930s was like, we can do something with this. People. What if we put a boat on it? Pretty What if we put a boat and sold tacos next to it? Tada, yes. Thanks. Hug man,

Speaker 3  12:54

yeah. Even though, even though the whole Alamo thing was so that we weren't part of Mexico, what if we probably took their tacos, really tasty right now we have if we don't want to be oh yeah, by the way, fun fact, the reason why maybe you shouldn't Remember the Alamo is because they wanted to break away from Mexico so that they could keep their slaves

Speaker 1  13:21

anyway, the Riverwalk, but it's such a weird economy, because then I realized the riverwalk of like, it's a city park. It's classified as a city park, is it? Yes, city parky. It's not. It's in a city park, and they have their very own dedicated Park Police that walk around horses. Yeah, it's a city park. So that was also weird, because they didn't know that widely, highly commercialized. Obviously, yeah, yeah, it doesn't. It's not like reading Park, right? It's like, huge buildings, chain stores, restaurants, not real parky, I guess, yep.

Speaker 3  14:10

I mean, it may is there even trees there. Like, yep. I'm working off very old mental images here.

14:19

There's

14:20

water, there's

Speaker 1  14:22

water, large cypress trees. Okay, it claims to be the number one attraction in Texas. And I feel like that's

Collin  14:29

wrong. I feel like that's very wrong. It's very interesting.

Speaker 3  14:35

The number one attraction in Texas, that can't be true.

14:39

No, there can't be true Fort Worth exists. I know exist. I'm sorry, no.

Speaker 3  14:51

I mean the Fort Worth, like cattle yards are a thing. Yeah, there's places in Fort Worth that people travel across the world to to get a hat. Right? So, like, I don't know, yeah,

Speaker 1  15:04

so I don't know, they are very proud of this, but yes, it is part of their parks departments, and which means that all of this money is run, like, for the upkeep and maintenance. It's also because that was the other thing. Like, they had crews out there who were trimming palm trees and working on the big bald cypress, they had people who were scrubbing sidewalks and watering all these plants. And I was just like, who pays for this, right? Who pays for the sky to sit in a boat and drive around and water all the plants like,

15:32

it's

15:34

Texas City of San Antonio? Yeah,

Speaker 1  15:36

and all of the tourism taxes. When you book a hotel and it says, like, you know tourism, oh yeah, those go to crazy.

15:43

The sales tax of the mega store that's like 10 feet

15:46

away, yes,

Speaker 1  15:48

yes, yep, so they worked really hard to build. No way does Texas have sales

15:53

tax, nothing.

15:54

They're very grumpy about

Collin  15:56

taxes. Still, no. They do have sales tax. They don't have property taxes. Oh, right, right, right, yep. So it's, it's one of the it's a, it's really big. Apparently it's also it links up something like 2000 acres of public lands, or something like that, wow, across all sorts of stuff, you know, that includes connecting to the Alamo, well, I mean, yeah, those things, and then everything out there. But we walked it. It was nice. It was fun. Water is apps, it's down, it's, it's, again, it's a canal, people, it's disgusting water. You don't want to fall into this. It's that, are you that I kept looking around? I was like, wow, look at all these trees and the lights in the trees. And it was almost as if everything was doing all it could possibly could to get you to not look at the water like upsetting because it is. You're just like, if it's stagnant, it's not moving. There's no movement. Yeah, like some days it's moving to East, and then other days it's moving west. Who knows people?

17:01

Depending on where the wind is blowing.

17:07

Exactly how distressing?

Speaker 1  17:10

Yeah, that was the part where I was like, and then I learned, on average, almost 400 people fall into the riverwalk every year.

Speaker 3  17:20

Oh no, oh no, oh yeah. And I thought that's

Speaker 1  17:24

shockingly low. That is that that's fair, but like, but yes, it is still. Ah, that's durable. Yep, they used to. They used to close it down, shut the floodgates, and then pump out the water and dredge and clean it once a year. Oh, I bet that was awful. That was I couldn't. Could only match. They only do that now, like as needed, and when they determine that they need to. I don't know when the last time that was done. I don't know when the bottles start to poke above the surface of the water, maybe, yeah, yeah, when the tourist boats that are driving through hit, you

Speaker 2  18:07

know, scraping mountains and beer cans that have been thrown into the river, yeah,

Speaker 1  18:13

but yeah. And, you know, because I was like, Well, yeah, like, it's the river walk. So of course, now you have institutions and businesses that would lobby to do what never shut down the river. Yeah, that's revenue for that's true. So you kind of have this antagonistic relationship of the park is like, well, we need to keep upkeep and maintenance, and also all of the walls of the canal and all the concrete and all the structures that you have to maintain. But then the businesses are like, but when you don't have water, I don't have people who want to come and sit on my terrace and drink really dumb, expensive coffee. Oh, this leads to my favorite sign on the entire Riverwalk.

18:56

All right, let's go. Okay,

Speaker 1  19:00

there's a sign, okay? It's all these restaurants are out right by the Riverwalk, and you can sit and they're all themed, right? That's all. All of them have different theme. There's an Irish okay, there's an Irish pub,

19:11

of course, there is in the middle of

Speaker 1  19:13

Texas. That's it has on the sign, the best Irish coffee on the Riverwalk.

19:25

Oh, dear. Now

Speaker 1  19:27

you may be asking Collin, how intense is the competition for Irish Coffee along the Riverwalk? And that's a great question you're asking Brandon, because

Speaker 2  19:36

I was really curious, like, how much could there possibly be that? Right there must

Speaker 1  19:41

be around every river bend, right every just around the river bend, there could be yet another Irish Coffee Spot. And the answer, after some Googling, is there is only one Irish coffee shop, and it's that one. It is that one. And I love the sign, you're not wrong. But also I. I we walked by the side so many times, and I died laughing because I was like, It's so dumb. It's so they must be saying this, tongue in cheek, there's, there's no other Irish coffee. One would hope this is so weird. What a weird thing to hang your hat on then.

Collin  20:19

And then there's a church over there, and it, all it says is, it says it's like, St Mary's the only church on the Riverwalk. Man, okay. Man, fair,

Speaker 3  20:35

this is making me really sad, that, like I'm pining for the

20:43

Danish canals right now. That was really what I'm doing right now.

Speaker 1  20:45

Like, No, way better. They're way nice, way nicer. It also was not like, 92 degrees out

20:54

there. That's also true. But like, like,

Speaker 1  20:59

so yes, we walked Riverwalk quite a bit. We only ventured and our hotel was right on the Riverwalk. It had basement access. So you go down to the basement, it used to be an old bank, and so you go down to the basement, and they've built like this tunnel that comes out and it dumps you right onto the Riverwalk. So that was nice. We never had to leave. We did walk off campus, whatever, one time, left the riverwalk for one dinner. And I was like, Oh, well, in the end, um, San Antonio is just a large, dirty, disgusting city with a canal and with a canal, like, it's not really that nice, yeah?

Collin  21:43

Like, gotta be honest, it didn't help that everything within, apparently, like a 20 mile radius of where we live, was under complete construction, like, I think the public works department went, what if we need to dig under every square foot of roadway right now nice. And so walkability was gone. It was just we were constantly crossing, criss crossing streets like nothing, oh yeah, which is awful. And like one lane street suddenly was like, I don't know where the other cars disappear too, but I guess I just have to go this way. Yeah, run for it, right? Like, yeah. Like, not fun. That was not I was like, oh, okay, that does not sound fun at all. Not good. Oh, man, but the conference was fine. Met some people. Talk went well. It was, I was, I was the opening talk, but I was before bingo. So hey, all right, had to, it was a fundraiser bingo. So at the end I had left it, I timed, I did a 52 minute talk out of my hour. And they were like, does anybody have any questions? Any questions? And I was like, or we could get to bingo and then to dinner early, so keep that in mind. And, yeah, we just went do jokes.

Speaker 3  23:04

Get laughs. They hit, right? You get Okay, all right, good laugh

Collin  23:09

and and sometimes, again, people don't

Speaker 2  23:13

sometimes they were even real laughs. They weren't even like sympathy laughs. They were like, they're somewhere real.

Collin  23:19

I think part of it is like, I I don't like, they're very deadpan delivery. Well, yeah, obviously, obviously, it's the only way to give jokes. One of my jokes that I was on stage with, I was talking about the different, like the confusion that we often have of motion versus movement in life and in business, and when a lot of times we feel like, well, if I'm just doing a lot of things, that means I'm productive, and I'm getting towards my goal, but it's I'm actually moving. And I give the example of that classic physics problem of when you're trying to calculate work, and it shows that picture of the guy who's all this big, muscle bound, you know, weightlifter. And then I just said, obviously, modeled after me. And I kept going, Yes, right, perfect. Like, that is, that is how you're supposed to deliver that. And there was, like, a really long pause, and then people were like, snickering, because I was like, like, it was, it was that delayed response. Took him a minute to figure out what was happening. I was like, perfect. This is, this is, this is my

24:22

goal. This is what I want. So it was things like that,

Collin  24:31

and I, I enjoyed that a lot. So

Speaker 1  24:35

anyway, so that, then we were a vendor. So because of that, we had to sit at our booth. And we couldn't just, like, leave early, which was not like, So Megan went in, and she went in and, like, watched most, most of the talks. I stayed outside and manned the booth and gave out stickers and stuff people as they stopped. Stopped by and worked. So that's what we did, the hotel, oh, yeah, the hotel that we stayed at, they had free breakfast. They also had free dinner. Whoa, yes, this is a curveball. This is, this is not a curveball. Yeah, dinner that was between five and seven while you could eat like things, wow, yes, yeah, now was it like a smorgasbord of things? No, but who cares? Yeah, yeah, oh yeah, that was the thing. Between four and five, you could show up and you could start having unlimited like they just had fountain drinks. They had soda fountains there plus water. They had coffee 24/7 that was brewed and changed out periodically. But between four and five, you could show up, they would pop popcorn, and you could get water or soda, and you could have that. And then dinner was between five and seven, and then as part of your stay, they gave you three free alcoholic drinks every night. Well, yeah, world, this is, I know

Speaker 3  26:09

this hospitality is unheard of in the US, like, What

Speaker 1  26:13

in the world is going on? I know I was very shocked by this. So it made the hotel. It was, it was hard because it made the hotel like, where you wanted to be at in the evening, like you just want to be there. However, it also meant that, like you did so did everyone else. Yeah, you didn't really go out to see the rest of the town. Well, you know, right. So it was, I was caught, which is why one day we were like, I'm we just need to go have dinner with a group of people off property. Like, that's what we need to do, yeah, but, like, it turned out not being very good. And yeah, oh no. Enjoyed it just fine, mostly because we sat across one of the guy, one of the one of the hosts that invited us out there. They were a pet sitter, and they were, they were local, and she, she, she invited us out to her favorite spot, and she invited her family, and then she sat down at the very far end of the table with the other pet sitters and left like a chunk of us, just with her family. Oh, that's not weird, not at all, and her brother, who's like in his 60s, was telling us some story of like, how he traded, what did he do? He traded the hide and skull of a Texas Longhorn to a friend in Australia for alligator skins that he turned into boots like I don't. That's all I

27:42

know. Okay, the most Texas thing I've ever heard.

Speaker 1  27:46

Yeah, I do, what on earth? I said, How did you ship a long horse skull, a Longhorn skull with the horns on it? And he said, UPS.

Speaker 3  27:56

I went, Okay, well, I mean, that's one heck of a box. Wow. Yeah, imagine the shipping charge on that sucker. I know.

Speaker 1  28:08

I know. So, yeah, so that was interesting. But otherwise, like the hotel, we stayed in the convention hotel, so, like, the the conference was on like floor four, and we were staying on floor eight, and breakfast was on floor two, but we were walking the riverwalk a long time. So it was fun. I enjoyed it. It was something different. But yeah, then I was really ready to be home, and so they we missed them announcing where it's going to be next year, but they did say

Collin  28:41

Albuquerque, New Mexico. Oh, oh, yeah.

Speaker 3  28:49

Well, they have nice bridges in Albuquerque.

Speaker 1  28:54

They also have a design tram thing that goes up to the mountain.

Speaker 3  28:58

That's true. I've, I've been to Albuquerque. Yeah, there's not a lot else. There not a lot. I mean, yeah,

Speaker 1  29:06

yeah, yeah. It's also, it's also, if you talk to people who are from Albuquerque, they will tell you it's not a nice city.

Speaker 2  29:15

Yes, I've heard this as well. Like, it's kind of weird. It's little you know,

Speaker 1  29:20

hey, yeah, we love listeners in Albuquerque. We love you, but you're

Speaker 3  29:24

sitting, yeah, Albuquerque saved me one time, right? Albuquerque saved my life. So another love for Albuquerque and your sweet bridges, right?

Speaker 1  29:36

But I got Megan and I have been to the I believe they have an aquarium there. I think we've been to that and, like a little bit of a zoo thing. I have been hiking around there. Megan, I went there twice. So that's, there's that the AB, yeah, the ABQ biopark is what we went to. I had to look that up. Yeah, this giant starfish.

30:03

Oh, wow, how exciting is that?

Speaker 1  30:09

So, yes, I'm, I don't know I am, because Megan and I were like, Oh, next year, because also we, like, desperately missed our kids. I was like, Oh no. Like, pictures of like, ducks. And like, oh, we wish the kids could see the ducks. So we were sending the pictures of ducks, yes, whatever. And we were like, oh, wherever they are, we need to take them see because that'd be fun. And now I'm like, Hmm,

30:36

maybe not Albuquerque, though. Like

30:41

Albuquerque. Oh, yeah,

Speaker 2  30:43

desert, Southwest, you know. But also, I mean, also

Speaker 3  30:47

helps, not that, I mean that exciting, yeah, I think

Speaker 1  30:51

to like, your Flagstaff is where, I think,

30:55

I mean,

Speaker 2  30:55

even there, right? Even there, it's kind of like, okay, it's fine. But like, maybe Sedona even there. Like, they'll get the incense and they'll be like, Oh my god, Dad, why does it smell so bad here? Sorry, it's this, it's the incense. Okay, sorry, yeah, still, vortex is bro, actually,

Collin  31:17

I do think there is a, I think. Okay, so I'm gonna do a live look up here anyway. So that was flight back. Was good.

Speaker 1  31:29

I The Little, I love, a little airplanes that come into Springfield. We did so we flew out of Houston to come back. Do you like? Yes, I do. I do love these, and we had to go out onto the tarmac.

31:48

Oh, wow, there you go. Yes,

Speaker 1  31:50

yes, it's wonderful. I was very excited about this in order to I haven't done that in forever. Oh, so I was so excited. You have no idea I was speaking. I think

Speaker 3  32:03

the only time I had to do that, we had to do that when we went to was it Montana?

32:09

Is that right? Yep, we had to do it there, yep. I think

Speaker 1  32:15

on the way there, like billings or whatever, maybe tiny or Pocatello, Idaho. I don't know what we I don't remember where it was.

Speaker 3  32:23

Well, one time we went, now, when we went, I don't know we went to, we flew into Idaho. We went to Yellowstone, yes, right. But when we went to Glacier, we flew into, like, Billings or something. But that

Speaker 1  32:37

was, and that was a prop plane. You remember that? Yeah, yes. I also

Speaker 3  32:41

remember, there's a little kid kicking my seat the whole time. I think we also flew maybe from Pocatello.

Collin  32:46

Maybe we went from Idaho to there, yeah, I don't remember. I don't think

Speaker 3  32:50

probably not Denver straight to Billings. I feel like that might not happen. I don't know, but I pretty we were, we ended up in Wyoming. Yeah, right, that's all I know.

33:04

Yeah, I'm pretty sure

Speaker 3  33:07

we had to go out the tarmac for that one, because it was, like, you did have props, right? It was a little teeny thing, like, I couldn't even stand up, like,

Speaker 1  33:18

it's magnificent, no? So we yeah, we find those little like Ember air, whatever, whatever is where there are. It's got the one seat and then an aisle, and then the two seats, then two Yeah, yes, oh yeah, Ember air 170

33:36

Oh, they go.

Collin  33:39

So much happy. Uh, seat map is 171 75 anyway, what I just that I thought that I learned, I knew I could take the train from where I live to Albuquerque. Ah, I can take the train. There you go.

33:57

So this felt six day training.

Collin  34:02

Yes, no, it's, it's, it's only 21 hours and 11 minutes. Oh, okay, that's not so bad, I guess. No, no, now you can try. Oh, good. Oh no, you could write, okay, you could write code. Oh, my gosh, coach, for $105 it could be on an in for

Speaker 3  34:27

21 hours. I mean, you could get up, you could stand up, though you can, right? If you're in scum class, are you allowed to walk to the dining car? Is that, yeah, you can. Can you get up and walk? Okay, yeah, all right, see, it'll be fine.

Collin  34:44

Oh my gosh. Or you could get a private room.

34:51

You know,

Speaker 1  34:53

could do that. Yeah, that's not round trip, yeah, that's hard that.

34:59

Yeah, it's. Big. It's a big jump from that.

35:02

You could a business is 100 Yeah, Coach was 105, a private room was like $1,500

35:08

so, yeah, you see, hmm, quite a jump.

Speaker 1  35:12

Yeah, that's, that's odd. Oh my gosh, yeah. Hold on,

Speaker 3  35:18

hold on. You don't have quite the economy of scale on the train, but,

Speaker 1  35:24

man, a train. Oh, I'm so excited about this. Now I just have to figure out how to convince Megan to spend $3,000

35:29

on a train ride. Yeah, I'm gonna go with no two days on a train.

Speaker 3  35:35

Yeah, in coach, right? You're gonna be coach. Don't worry, it's okay. You take the train all you want, but you're not getting room.

Collin  35:44

That's learning goodness. So yeah, we are. So now we're good though, we're back. I'm super tired, and oh yeah, it's not like you have to turn around

36:01

and go do another one real quick. Another one real quick. Oh, wait.

36:05

Oh, wait.

36:08

Oh, joy. That's the whole time I was sitting there and I'm like, just like, right, right, I have to do this. Oh,

36:22

well. Oh, fine, Yep,

Speaker 1  36:26

yeah, so that's in, yeah, that's in, what, 10 days and days,

Speaker 4  36:35

yeah, fine. Just,

Speaker 2  36:45

I'll tell you a little bit about my other thing I've been up to right here. Here. This is portion video shall be

36:56

called, should you learn to play chess on the internet in 2025

37:02

oh, okay, right. What

Speaker 3  37:04

kind of intro music I'm gonna get for that? But we'll figure something. Yeah, it's fine. Here's the short answer, no, you absolutely should not, right? It's Oh, now, here's like, here's why, right? Here's why, here's why. You should not do this.

37:19

Number one, if you're like me,

37:22

and you really only are vaguely aware of how chess works,

37:25

you are bad,

Speaker 3  37:27

yes, oh yeah, and that means you will be playing other people that have, like, low ranking or whatever. Yes, that's how it works. Yes, you're like you win games, your ranking goes up. You lose games, it goes down. That's how it works, right? And that's how they know to like, match you with people, yeah? Matchmaking, basically, it's like the over the board matchmaking thing. It's all internet games right? Now, when you're bad at thing, right? And you're trying to learn it's the worst thing of all time, right? You'll hear people talk about chess being like a strategy, right? Where you're trying to, like strategize and come up with a plan to outwit your opponents. And there's a lot of like, tension and stuff in the game at low level. This does not exist. This. This is a lie, that that version of chess is doesn't exist right there. It's just, it just doesn't so like, you will not be playing like

38:29

Gary Kasparov. Level of people here, right? They're just like the,

Speaker 3  38:33

it's the worst chess you've ever seen, right? Most of these people, what they've done is they've seen the like shorts or like videos about, like, Oh, here's a classic way to win a chess game in like six moves, and that's all they do, right? They will just like, try, like, the cheesiest garbage all the time. Like, their moves don't make any sense, right? If you, like, watch any videos about, like, chess strategy, if you're playing people with low ranking, none of that is real. It doesn't exist. Where it's not it's not there. So it's very difficult to, like, try to understand positions and stuff when the people that you're playing against are worse than you, but you can't figure out why their moves are so awful, and they like still beat you, right? Like, you know that they're doing things that they shouldn't be doing, and you know that they should be losing this game, but they're not, because you're also not good, right? This is okay. This is it's it's so bad. It's just like, the trashiest trash ever. It's like, it's like, all the junk where it's like, oh, uh, second move. Queen out, right? Oh, bang. Like, what are you doing? Why are you doing that? And then sometimes, if you take their queen, they will immediately resign and quit the game. Oh. Like, if you outsmart them, like you, if you trap them, they're like, they just quit. You're like, bro, what they're like, Oh, my thing didn't work anyway. Moving on. I mean, what were they hoping to do? Like, there's several, like, pretty like, cheesy ways of like, if you're gonna do this thing like that, you can, like, checkmate people, like, real fast if you just, like, blast out your queen and like a bishop, right? And like, do these certain things, like, it's these, like, well known things that you can do, right, interesting, but like, they will just, like, crash into your line with, like, the Queen, like, just out of nowhere, like, no strategy, like you're trying to, like, if you're, like, trying to do because, like, chess, you have like, openings, right? Like, whichever pieces you move first, kind of, like, is the strat, right? Like, there's a strategy about, like, Okay, I want to go do this thing, so I'm gonna move these pieces first, right? But you can't do any of that stuff a lot of time. And you can't, like, learn about, like, which one or why you should do this, or this, like whatever, in like, certain situations, if their moves don't make any sense, right? Because, like, on the one hand, there is, like, chess like theory that you're kind of supposed to follow, I guess, like high level players do it, but like, I guess you don't really need to, you know what I mean, but it's just like a thing like, a thing like, Oh, if, if you move here, I know that that means you're doing this, so I need to respond this way, right? These people are just like, throwing pawns, like, it doesn't even matter, sure, like, doesn't even matter. And if you it's sometimes you can beat them, because if they see that there is an open line to your

Brandon  41:47

piece, they will just take it. Right. No, waiting, no, like positioning. Oh, I can take that piece. Bam. Does it matter that your piece is actually being guarded, and you can immediately just

42:02

take their piece back.

Speaker 3  42:04

No, they they didn't ever think about that. They don't care. They're just like, oh, a piece, bam, I put take that. Oh, there's another piece. Bam, I could take that. So sometimes you get up on pieces real quick because, like, they're just snapping at things, and you're like, What are you doing? I think

42:27

stopping,

Speaker 3  42:30

but it is the most frustrating thing in the world.

Collin  42:37

I mean, do you think that's are they? That doesn't sound like they're they're using good strategy. Like, are they, or are they just, like, kind of doing trash play to trash.

Speaker 3  42:50

I don't know. I think it's just going for it. I think I don't know some now, sometimes you'll get a person and it's like, really good, right? There's a once a while you get person and like, Oh, this is really playing. Like, really good. And it's like, where it's more like, what you think a game of chess should be, like, Sure, right? It's like a little bit, it makes sense. You can understand what they're doing kind of, right? Like, okay, I understand you're, like, developing pieces and like trying to get your pieces active and like doing stuff, right, like taking up space on the board, these are the chess concepts that allegedly you're supposed to be playing with, right? Allegedly, right. What does Magnus Carlson know? Right? Oh, he doesn't know anything. Just like, throw your queen out and move three and later, yeah, he doesn't get it taken. And then don't have any other pieces on the board, like one pawn and a bishop out. And when I take those away from you, you're like, dang it, I don't know. Ah, rats.

Speaker 1  44:00

So dumb, huh? So it's not a pleasant experience, right?

Speaker 3  44:06

It's not. So I was thinking about this, right? So you do this, right? Here's what happens. You watch one chess video online. Now your entire feed is like the history of chess, right? You're learning about, you know, Michael tall and all these like crazy people, right? But, like, but the other part of this is, like, at some at some level, like, there, I think there's a medium point where chess is like, fine, and it's like acceptable, and it's like fun, right? Where I am currently, that is not the place, right? It's miserable, slog of awfulness, right? I think somewhere in the mid level, I think chess is probably fun, but then it kind of sounds like, at like, the highest level of chess, it's just like nine. Fun again, right? For a completely different reason, and that's just that people study things so much they just like memorize all kinds of different positions, and then they just like see them, and then they know what to do based on having memorized them. That's also not fun, right? Like, yeah, I'm glad you know whatever, but that's That also sounds miserable to me.

Collin  45:33

Like, that's hard, because you're right. They are just going to, they just have

Speaker 1  45:40

that encyclopedic knowledge of, yeah, of what they do and and for them, though, sometimes the you can throw them off whenever you you when you don't know what you're doing, and they

Speaker 3  45:56

probably sometimes, but like, most of them are good enough that they're just like, whatever You're done, like, man, like, they know how to manipulate the board in such a way that, like, they can put, they can counter punch that stuff, really, and just be done with it. Like, real fast, right? I don't really know that, but like, they can do that. But like, again, they're using, like, it's like, especially the modern people, they're using like, these, like, like, high powered, like, chess computers to, like, study, right? And so they're like,

46:26

kind of, they're not,

Speaker 3  46:30

like the newest generation. I was reading this interview with some people, right? And they're talking about how, like, what they're doing is they're not studying because, like, we used to you study games of, like, chess masters, right? You study, you know, like Michael tall and like Bobby Fisher and like Kasparov and all these guys, right? You study their games and you learn about what they did. These people are just like, studying the computer moves I and they're like, Oh, this is what the computer says is the best thing to do. So that's what I'm gonna, like, think about doing. Like, what does a computer say makes the most sense? Not like, what did a person say made sense? You know what I mean. So like, on the other hand, if that's all you're gonna do,

47:16

what's the point? Right?

Speaker 3  47:19

Because the computer can already do this, right? The computer beat Casper off in like 1996 right? The IBM beat him, right? He was, he was mad about it.

Collin  47:28

But, yeah, you know, I mean, fair, but, like,

Speaker 3  47:33

that happened already, right? So we know, we know for a fact that computer is better than you, right? It is infinitely better than you. Now a chest, it's it's done, right? It's over.

47:44

So why

Speaker 3  47:47

would you just want to try to be like that? Like that doesn't seem like

Speaker 1  47:55

an interesting way to go about it, right? Like, I don't, well, yeah, because I guess what you're asking is, is, who, who is your opponent

48:03

at that Yeah, right. Like, you're just gonna beat

Speaker 3  48:09

somebody because you remembered more computer moves than they did. Like, are you even really playing a game at that point?

Speaker 1  48:18

Like, no, you're just playing, okay, okay, here's my analogy. It's like two people who are trying to, they're doing it's Pi Day, right? And they are just trying to see who memorized the longest, yeah, the most decimal points after pi.

48:36

That's true. And you're like, how do you calculate pi? Like,

Collin  48:42

all they're trying to do is just regurgitate pi. Yeah. They're not even calculating out by hand, right? Because it's already been calculated. So they're just remembering it. Yeah, that's a good analogy. I like that. And it's just oh, they and because they each know what the sequence is supposed to be, right? It's like, okay, well, I do this one, and then you're gonna do that one, and then I'm gonna do this one, and then you're gonna, they're, they're just playing long term memory,

Speaker 3  49:14

yeah, and I mean, there are variations in where you can be like, Oh, now if they do this, then I have, but like, still at that point. Like, what is why? Why would you want to do that? I don't know. So, like, I feel like somewhere in the middle, like, I imagine chess is fun somewhere, right? It's definitely not in, like, super low rank, because, oh, my days, it's, this is the worst thing of all time, it's just trash. Of course, all any game you play online and you low rate, it's gonna just suck. Like, this is that everyone's gonna be bad and it's not gonna be pleasant, but then once you get better, it's hard to get out of that, right? Like, the grind is real, and it's like, really hard. You. To raise up out of the muck.

Collin  50:05

You know? What piqued your interest in doing this? I was

Speaker 3  50:13

trying to find something else to do with on my phone, other than just like, sit and scroll on random things. So I was like, Okay, I should let me try this. That's what I try. That's basically it, right? I think some random chess video came up on my feet, and I was like, Oh, that might be cool. And then I was like, oh, no, this is awful. Oh, it's the worst thing ever. So bad.

Speaker 1  50:34

Yeah. Well, I know there are, yeah, there are, like, beginner leagues and stuff that you can sign up for, oh yeah, right to, I know sometimes you can play anonymously. And I think I've heard Magnum Carlson talk about how he'll jump on there anonymously

50:53

and just, oh yeah. Just like,

Speaker 2  50:54

whatever, oh yeah. I'm just, I've just been playing on, like, the hashtag, non sponsor, right? But like, just like chess.com right? Because that's like,

Speaker 3  51:01

what plays out. So you can just, like, if you use a mega profile, and you it's just, like, free, you just sign up, and you can just, like, hit a button, and you can just be paired with like, a random person, and you just play, right? So it's kind of fun. And they also have like, bots where you can, like, practice and stuff. I've been mostly doing that because the people are

51:19

just so, so awful.

Speaker 3  51:23

The first two games in a row I played were like that, like the first two it was just like the trashiest, like, Oh, I saw this tick tock win in like, three moves. So I'm gonna do that to you. Like, bro, what in the world? And the problem is those kinds of players are going to be the same level forever, and I don't think they care, right, huh? Because, like, if that's all you're doing, you're not really gonna be, like, advancing far, because at some point, like, people know how to stop you, right? Just again, not me yet. Like, I think I can't be I got a little bit, right? I've done a few times, but, like, it's very annoying, right, right? But, yeah, you know, once you that's the other thing you kind of like, at very low level chess, you have to, like, sort of abandon, like, the theory and like, openings and stuff like that, that you can't really do a lot of that stuff I'm imagining until you're, like, higher level, right? At low, low level, really, what you'd have to do is just, like, hold on, right? Just make sure all of your pieces can see each other, so that, like, if they just snap your piece up, you can just take it back, right? You need to, like, have them connected like that. And then just hold on, because they will, somebody will, they will screw up somewhere. They will just leave a piece, like, dangling there. And then you can just take it. That's the only, that's the only real advice that there exists for, like, very, very low level chess. You just hold don't panic, don't move too fast and wait. It's very difficult, right? It's a very difficult thing, but you just have to, like, be boring,

53:14

don't do anything crazy, and then just

Speaker 3  53:19

take all their pawns when they've left them hanging out there, dangling for no reason, right? When they don't, because they will not see, they'll just like, forget your bishop exists, yeah, and all of a sudden they don't have a queen well, and then they resign. Like, what the guys like, It's so insane. Like they will lose every single piece on the board. But if you take their queen away, or you offer them a queen trade, they run, they're like, No, I can't do that, like I did the last time. Like the guy, he did this thing, and he's like, snapped his queen right out there, and I just moved my queen in front of it, and he wouldn't take it because he knew that's the only piece that he was like, Oh, if I take that, then you'll take back, and then we'll both just down Queens. And I was like, Yeah, let's do it. Let's go. I'm ready. Let's go. And he would not do it. He was too that's crazy. I just started hunting the queen. Dad, though, around the whole board, he's kept running from Oh my gosh. He didn't care about the king anymore. He was just like, No, I don't take my queen. I was like, bro, there's other pieces move. Like, what do you mean? There's other pieces you can move. Ah, stop.

Speaker 1  54:36

Well, then, yeah, you're right. Like, this shows a lot of sure, is the Queen, like, very powerful and flexible in that one. But like,

Collin  54:45

no, like, you have to use all your pieces to your

54:48

advantage. Yeah, they're all there for you know?

54:52

They give them to you for free, right? Yeah, he actually, like,

Speaker 3  54:55

he just was not having it. It was so funny. Like. Bizarre. Bishop trade, absolutely snapped it up, right? Knight trade, snapped it up. Queen trade, oh, no, run. He ran. It was the weirdest thing. I was just like, No, take it. Do it. Do it. He just, I offered him, I think it came up like three times, and he would not, that's, he was scared.

55:31

It was hilarious. It was so bizarre.

55:36

So, you know, whatever.

Speaker 3  55:38

Okay, so that's, that's where we are currently, bad, low level chess. The other thing I've been doing

Speaker 1  55:45

so interested to see you start rising through the ranks.

55:49

Yeah, that's probably not gonna have any time soon, so we'll see how it goes. Right? So if you want to play me, let me know. I send you my username. We can hang out

Speaker 1  56:00

very bad chess as well, move pieces willy nilly, no, yeah, pretty much, right, and go, Ooh, I remember this piece can move like this. So, yeah,

Speaker 2  56:14

good. That's this has done fantastic. It's a thing. I Yeah,

Speaker 1  56:26

yeah, I that's we're just good. We're just back to the family stuff here, and till I'm not, that's all right, I did. I guess we're kind of closing out here as sensing. I do have a haiku, no, yeah for right in here. Yes. Okay, so this was, we'll see. We'll see if you can tell, well, sunlight, on stone wall Texas, heat pumps through the air, echoes guard

57:08

attack. It turned it

Speaker 1  57:12

now turn it right at the end. Far as Oh, it's actually a serious one. Ah, it's not Collin was wanted to touch it. That's the stone.

Speaker 2  57:21

Yeah, no, definitely not, definitely not, definitely not Collin also was forgetting drink water in the heat. Definitely not that either. He would never do what I do.

Speaker 1  57:38

Goodness, back at it, ready for it to cool down, ready for the rain, yet, same. Okay, well, we'll, uh, pack it up and

57:55

do this again soon. All right.

Speaker 1  57:58

Very good. Love you. Love you. Bye. You

58:01

you.