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But anyways, this was my Sunday brainstorm.
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My Sunday brainstorm was here's three cool ideas.
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Dude, let's do like a life update because frankly, you and I mostly talk to each other.
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I mean, we spent so much time on this podcast, but we don't even like talk that much.
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I want to know what's going on with you and I'll fill you in on what's going on with me.
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I did a thing I've never really done before. It's not groundbreaking.
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I'm sure you or many people have done that, but I hadn't and uh Friday hit and I just put my phone in a drawer and I didn't touch it till this morning.
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So, I had a no phone weekend, which was pretty awesome and very unusual for me. You're not good at that.
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Like you're you're hardcore about your phone.
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So, tell me how that felt.
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Uh it felt like it withdrawals from an addiction.
0:49
Like I would find myself There was like funny things and then there was like little moments where I would notice it a lot more, right?
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So, Like grabbing your pants all the time.
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just keep patting my pocket.
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Like I would put my kids in their car seat, shut the door and I'm walking around the car to get to my side and I instinctively I'm trying to tap to check my Like why do I need to check my phone in this 3-second break that I have walking around my car? It's pretty crazy.
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And there was just like a hundred moments like that where I instinctively wanted to go and you know, just pull to refresh basically.
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I needed to go see a feed.
1:21
It's like I need to get my feed.
1:21
And so, you know, it was nice to to do that.
1:23
I found myself doing it random.
1:24
So, I was like humming a lot. I read a lot.
1:25
I was just like our kids are kind of picky eaters and we haven't really taught them to eat very well on their own.
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And so, like we feed them every meal basically still.
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And and so, I'm sitting there and I'm feeding them.
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And normally, I've got my phone, they've got their cartoons.
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We're we're basically all just cartooned up and I'm just shoving bites of mac and cheese in their mouth.
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And it really slowed me down.
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Like time went way slower, but not in a bad way necessarily.
1:52
It was a lot more peaceful, I would say also.
1:54
Was uh was a was part of the the upside of not having my phone.
1:58
Did you use your computer or Apple TV or cable TV Yeah, so the rule was I don't have to be like without the internet or without any entertainment. I didn't go Amish.
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I was allowed to watch TV and I was allowed to use my laptop if the opportunity presented itself.
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But on the weekends I'm pretty much fully in dad mode so we're not I'm not really on the computer a whole lot.
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And even just the physical distance of like the computer that's in your pocket all the time versus okay, I guess if I want to go on the internet I'm allowed to I'm allowed to go on Twitter if I want to but I just have to go to my computer open it up type in the thing and then like, you know, I can only be on my laptop for so long basically.
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So that was a good a very good break and something I'm going to do a lot more of because I don't like the idea of being addicted to something and I would say by any definition I'm completely addicted to my phone.
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If I don't have it I kind of freak out a little bit.
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I'm like, I got to go get my phone. Hold on. Wait, wait, wait.
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Whatever we're doing I got to get my phone.
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I left my phone in the other room. I got to go get it.
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And it's pretty crazy that that's the case.
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Finding myself instinctively reaching into my pockets or like really wondering like what time is it? Did somebody text me? It's like who cares?
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You know, I don't really need any of this. Did you follow the news?
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Well, that was of course the craziest thing is while I'm not on my phone my wife is like, "Oh my god, Trump got shot."
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I'm like, "Oh man, this is the one thing that like the craziest news in the world happens testing my my resolve here."
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And so I did get on my laptop a little bit later and check it out what was going on and and and read all the crazy stuff but I I stayed off my phone so that's good.
3:26
Have you ever heard of No Fap November?
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So I like how you just said that as if it's like a a scientific phenomenon.
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Like you were like, "Have you ever heard of mitosis?
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It's when the cells split."
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We just need to rebrand it.
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Like have you ever heard of non FAP November?
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Well, so like I think that's a great movement and they like and mix it with humor or whatever but there's like a reason you whatever.
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And basically for people who don't know, it's just guys who don't jerk off for November.
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And I don't I don't know if the rules are you can't have sex or if it's just masturbation.
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I don't know what the rules are, but I don't know.
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Never paid Never made it past day two, so couldn't tell you.
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Yeah, clearly not into it.
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We We got to have a cute funny brand for like no phone weekend no phone or something like that. You know what I mean? No No scroll Sundays?
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No scroll Sundays is good, but a lot of my Jewish friends and family, you know, they do no phones from Friday evening to Saturday evening.
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And they all say the same thing.
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They're just like, "This is the best."
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Like it's it's it's wonderful.
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So we have to we have to like do a take on that and we'll have to have like a some type of a cute way to do like Friday to Sunday no phone. Right.
4:31
Have you seen people who raw dog flights?
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Yeah, dude, that is so funny.
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So explain what it is for people who don't know.
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So raw dogging a flight is what I think it's mostly men.
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So men are like, "I'm I can't imagine a girl would ever care to do this.
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Raw dogging Raw dogging a flight is when it's like when a guy goes out on like a Delta plane and you know how like when you fly, you see the plane going across America and that's all you see and it's and it's guys who will just stare at that for the entire time.
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No music, no phone, no books.
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They just raw dog it and I think it is the the funniest thing going on right now.
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I love raw dogging flights. Yeah, yeah, exactly.
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I think it's I think it's hilarious.
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I'm I'm big on this though, this like no like control your inputs.
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I think in all all facets of life, right?
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Control the foods that you put in your mouth, control the information you put in your mind, control the people you let in your world, control the amount of the number of problems you are willing to make your problem.
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I think that that is probably the most underrated skill you can have as somebody who's trying to live a good life is learning how to control your inputs.
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So we're doing like a little bit of life update and I was going to say that's one of my updates is I am not really reading the news a lot.
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And I'm honestly, like I don't have Twitter on my phone.
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The news, man, particularly this weekend when a lot of crazy stuff went down, it is exhausting me.
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And like current events, I find it to be it wears me out.
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And um uh I'm just I'm trying to refer like mostly to to books when I want like entertainment as opposed to just scrolling through news. It kills me, dude. It wears you out. It 100% 100%.
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And I I used to get a lot of [ __ ] for this cuz I I haven't I watch the news.
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I haven't uh I never have a news app on my phone.
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I don't follow like new social accounts typically.
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Um you know, obviously some news just brute forces its way into your world.
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That's kind of what happened this this weekend with the with the shooting and stuff like that.
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But um but for the most part I uh completely abstain from the news.
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And I used to feel somewhat ashamed of that, like kind of ignorant.
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I just wasn't really interested.
6:37
It wasn't very hard for me to abstain from it. I called you that.
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I called I called you out on that one time when we were just hanging out off air.
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I was like, "You're not a good citizen."
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And now I've I've done a 180.
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I'm like, "No, it's not important."
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What's going on on like in most cases isn't isn't important.
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Well, my trainer gave me a great perspective on it.
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He was like uh it was one of the years when the election was going on, or maybe it was like the the state elections or some [ __ ] like that.
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And everybody was talking about voting and everybody was talking about it.
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It was kind of getting heated as politics tends to do.
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And he just said something in passing.
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He was just like he's like, "I don't worry about the government.
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I'm I'm trying to govern myself.
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I found that I can't even govern myself.
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What am I worried about what's going on across the country in Washington D. C.?
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I can't govern myself yet."
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And so he's like, "I focus on that."
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He's like, "If we all did that, society would be actually in a much better place if we all learned to govern ourselves a little bit better."
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And so he when he was talking about the the current election cycle, somebody was criticizing.
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They're like, "Oh, well, you know, you're not doing your your kind of your civic duty."
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He's like he's like, "I don't know about he's like, I don't know what you think a civic duty is.
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He's like, I'm in the grocery store.
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I'm helping the old lady. I'm over here. I'm talking to a friend.
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I see a kid doing something. I give him a compliment.
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You know, like there are many ways that you could be a good member of society and just being like fully up-to-date on the news and having an opinion on everything or like, you know, downloading today's big problem is not necessarily the only way to do it.
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I kind of like that of like govern yourself first, then be like a positive influence in your grocery store, in the place around you.
8:02
That seems like a much better way to actually have an effect than just you know, siping off CNN all day.
8:09
What else you got in the life update corner? Anything else good?
8:14
For me, so I'm I'm I'm currently in Connecticut where I'm staying for a little while.
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I go to the beach every morning and I go to the beach most evenings at 8:30 after the baby's gone to sleep.
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I'm 9 months walking or what are you what are you doing on the beach?
8:27
Dude, I have a scooter, like an electric scooter. It has an odometer. Through sand? What do you mean?
8:34
No, like I ride from my house to the beach a mile away.
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I have 2,000 miles on this scooter. I drive it everywhere.
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There sometimes I'll go 2 weeks without driving a car.
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I just drive a scooter everywhere.
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I'm 9 months into having a kid. It's the best. I'm so freaking happy.
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Like it's just I genuinely feel like a happier human being and I had a little mini not midlife crisis, but I've been asking myself like, what's the point of like this or that?
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Like I you ask yourself I've asked myself about it all type of things.
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Like why do I care about this? Why am I doing this?
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Being more intentional and I think it's because I'm so happy.
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Like when you get happy and you have less of a chip on your shoulder, that's kind of a weird feeling if you've spent like grinding and things like that.
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Oh, you're saying you're asking the question because you're happy. Yeah, because I'm happy.
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I'm like, why am I doing this or that?
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Like you know what I mean?
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You start questioning things.
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So I'm really happy right now.
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So that's kind of like the biggest update for me.
9:25
All right, guys, really quick.
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So back when I was running the Hustle, we had this premium newsletter called Trends.
9:29
The way it worked was we hired a ton of analysts and we created this sort of playbook for researching different companies and ideas and emerging trends to help you make money and build businesses.
9:39
Well, HubSpot did something kind of cool.
9:41
So, they took this playbook that we developed and we gave to our analysts and they turned it into an actionable guide and a resource that anyone can download and it breaks down all the different methods that we use for spotting upcoming trends, for spotting different companies that are going to explode and grow really quickly.
9:57
It's pretty awesome that they took this internal document that we had for teaching our analysts how to do this into a tool and are giving it away for free that anyone can download.
10:04
So, if you want to stay ahead of the game and you want to find cool business ideas or different niches that most people have no idea they exist, this is the ultimate guide.
10:13
So, if you want to check it out, you can see the link down below in the description. Now, back to the show. I'm with you. I got I got two things.
10:18
I saw a great Seinfeld clip the other day and it said uh it was Seinfeld talking and he goes, "You know why I believe in God?" And the guy goes, "Why?"
10:25
He goes, "God made it so that people who don't have kids don't don't know what they're missing.
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And that's the nicest thing they could ever do for somebody."
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And I thought, "Oh, wow, that's a really like powerful way of putting it." Cuz I'm the same way.
10:37
Uh like I just my my cup feels incredibly full just because of what's going on in my house regardless of really anything else, which not to get too sentimental, but it's pretty awesome.
10:47
And for everybody who's out there on the fence or or you know wants to wait or whatever, it really is amazing and it is a it is a hard to describe phenomenon, how good it feels to just especially like your your kids pretty young, right? She's only what? Less than a year old.
11:03
Once they're like two, three, four and you can play with them, it is like such a golden period of time.
11:06
Um I do have a a life story here with our life life little life hack. What's that?
11:13
So, we go to a birthday party, kids birthday party and um you know, there's a bunch of three-year-olds and four-year-olds running around and it's at a park and there's a it's like a park with like a splash area where there's like water coming out of the ground.
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And we show up and I notice something.
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I notice that there's like all the parents are standing on one side, kind of like standing in the heat, sweating, trying to get shade, just saying that kind of like, you know, kid runs up, needs drink of water, they give them water, and then the kid runs back and plays.
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And the And the parents are all making sort of awkward small talk with each other.
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And you can just see the like they're looking at the watch.
11:45
They're ready to get out of there.
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It's like, okay, we'll be here for an hour, then we got to go do the next thing.
11:50
And um so my kids run in and I'm like, I just see like while we're walking up to the party, I see like a fork in the road.
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It's like I can take the right path and I can go hang out with these parents.
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Or I could just go run around with my shirt off in the splash pad.
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And so Wait, was this during milk and cookies week?
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I chose the road less traveled.
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And I went down to the splash pad. And I had so much fun.
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And I just played with my kids.
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I'm up in the playground.
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We're We're going to splash pad. We're playing tag.
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We're doing like water like kind of like water fight.
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Um and I just have a blast. 2 hours go by. I look over.
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All the other parents are still just sweating and waiting.
12:28
And what I realized was like the the great parenting hack.
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Cuz before I had a kid, I did read a couple of books about like, you know, What to Expect When She's Expecting or whatever.
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Like, you know, how to be a dad.
12:37
You know, I want to be good at something.
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I'll read read a couple books and see if there's any good information in there.
12:41
I now have a book that I'll write, which has one line in it in it, which is don't worry about being a dad, just be a kid.
12:46
And the best part about kids is that they keep you they keep you fresh, they keep you playing, they keep you you have to act like you're astonished and things are fascinating to get them excited about things.
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And actually it kind of makes you excited and it makes you more curious cuz you're doing that for them.
13:02
But the other part of it is the easiest way to be a parent is to literally just play with your kid 80 to 90% of the time.
13:08
And sure, 10% of the time you snap back into adult mode and you make sure that, you know, the train doesn't go completely off the rails, but I found that I have so much more fun as a dad if I just lean in and just like completely play with them all day.
13:20
And I don't know why more parents don't don't do this.
13:25
Um like I'm in gymnastics class.
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I'm doing like literally cartwheels. I'm on the trampoline.
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Like I'm doing all the things with them.
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Cuz if I have to be there anyways, I might as well have a good time.
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That's contagious for them. They have a better time.
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I'm in a better mood, which makes me more patient.
13:38
You know, like it's a it's a complete life hack.
13:41
Dude, I could just see you like bouncing around gymnastics and break some kids [ __ ] femur because you sit on it.
13:48
Well, definitely not everything is built for for me.
13:49
So, you know, there's there's definitely been some some some spills. But yeah, it's great.
13:55
Like Yeah, I woke up yesterday. I literally woke up.
13:59
We go to a coffee shop, go to hit up a donut shop, go to soccer class.
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I'm playing soccer in the soccer class.
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And then after soccer, we just wanted to play some more.
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So, we're playing and now four other kids just joined me and we're it's me, my kids, and four other random kids that are all just like playing soccer afterwards.
14:12
Then we go to the pool and we're in the pool for 3 hours and we come home.
14:16
Then we're playing smash cart, which is this like version of Mario Kart that my kids are able to play cuz they're like toddlers. We're playing that.
14:22
Then we eat a little bit of dinner. We read some books. Then we go to bed.
14:25
And it was like I was just a kid for the whole day.
14:27
And therefore, I had a great day.
14:30
Are you going to have more? You've got three.
14:31
How many more would you want to do? No, my cup runneth over. I'm full.
14:34
I'm I'm completely happy as is.
14:36
I don't I don't really feel the need to have any more kids.
14:41
I've got Sarah bought into three, but in my head I'm like, yeah, you know, like but if we're if we're going to go three, like five would be interesting, right?
14:47
Like You know what I mean?
14:49
I I definitely am currently in the more is better at camp.
14:54
But like I don't have to push it out.
14:55
So, it's easy for me to say, which is Uh, but no, man, being a dad's awesome.
15:02
It has completely changed things.
15:02
I tweeted this out before we we had kids like years ago and I was like cuz I had a I had a bunch of friends who were were doing psychedelics cuz they felt lost.
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And some of them kind of went over the edge where they took too many and like they started acting a little weird where I'd be like, "Hey, are you okay?"
15:17
And I just think that having a child kind of filled that void for me where I didn't feel like I needed to do psychedelics cuz I didn't have a lack of meaning, right?
15:25
And so it's been it's been really it just makes me happy.
15:29
Um but you've got a lot of interesting topics here.
15:32
I got a lot of interesting stuff.
15:32
Okay, so I have three ideas that I want to I want to pitch you.
15:35
I'm going to basically tell you about a cool business and then I'm going to tell you a idea I think somebody could start that's similar to that cool business.
15:41
So the first one is Sketchy.
15:43
Have you ever seen sketchy. com?
15:45
It is kind of an incredible business idea.
15:50
I I I'm sort of jealous I didn't start this business. So if you go to sketchy. com, what do you see? All right.
15:57
Learning made unforgettable.
15:59
Sketchy turns what you need to know into creative visual stories you'll remember forever. Oh, this is awesome. Right.
16:05
Basically, it's learn to take the MCATs or the the medical board exams with cartoons and drawings instead of like boring textbooks.
16:14
And what they did was they created a Kaplan or like a G you know, what what what are the big like test prep instant review?
16:20
They created a test prep type of business, but they did two things.
16:22
One, they focused on a specific niche.
16:25
So basically med students.
16:28
So before you get into medical school, you want to take the MCATs or after you're in med school, you're you're going through your your um your medical classes and then eventually the boards.
16:38
And second, the twist was they were like, "Cool, but some people will prefer to learn in a way that's way more visual and way more um sort of like visual friendly you know, easy to remember rather than kind of traditional learning.
16:54
And I love this cuz A, that's how I like to learn.
16:55
Um that sounds more fun, sounds more interesting, and there's actually like a bunch of science around um why we learn better through visuals.
17:02
In the same way we talked about last last time about jingles, how how audio like a catchy earworm is a much better way to remember something.
17:10
So it's basically storytelling in cartoons to teach you things specifically for um doctors uh for test prep.
17:17
And do they make all of the cartoons and you pay a monthly fee? Yeah, that's exactly it. Got it. All right.
17:23
And so this business, I saw this.
17:23
I was like, "Wow, this is a great idea.
17:25
I'm so There's also just like a cool business.
17:29
It's like It's like a cool thing to do with your life."
17:30
It's kind of like Khan Academy, where the guy's like, "Yeah, I actually like I just kind of want to make like a course for every everything on the internet for free.
17:39
And it's just me kind of talking and writing things out and trying to explain things.
17:42
I'm I'm you know you I'm a pretty good explainer."
17:44
And that's how he's you know started just explaining things to his own nephews or whatever.
17:47
And then he published on the internet and people liked it.
17:50
And so I really like this business cuz I think it has like a cool mission.
17:53
I think it's a cool business model, and I think that it's a it's a fun product that that I'm glad exists.
18:00
And what's the business model?
18:00
Because it looks like educators use that.
18:02
So do they How's it How's it work?
18:04
Do they work with schools?
18:07
I'm sure they do a bunch of things.
18:07
My My thinking is that this is um it's very simple.
18:11
It's your student who wants to pass an exam.
18:13
That's the the the the bleeding neck problem, right?
18:17
That's the the highest urgency problem.
18:19
And so they're going to Is bleeding Yeah, you probably can't say that anymore, huh?
18:24
Is bleeding Is bleeding neck problem your No, it used to be hair on fire.
18:29
That's what Dave McClure said, and then somebody said bleeding neck. I like that too. Oh my god. All right.
18:36
So I think that's the thing.
18:36
If somebody wants to pass a test, they need a they need to help studying for it.
18:40
They see this and they're like, "Oh, this seems like more fun to to do than the other way."
18:45
And you pay, you know, something like 25 to 50 bucks a month for this, and you sign up for a 6, 12, or 24-month plan.
18:51
And then you go through it, you're like, "Wow, that was actually really useful way to study."
18:53
And now the next test happens.
18:55
Maybe it's your your your board exam, or maybe it's just a really hard course in med school.
18:59
And so they have like kind of the the supplemental thing for anybody on their like med school journey. Wow.
19:07
And the recent The only article I could find about them is in 2020, where it says that they were doing I think $8 million in revenue.
19:15
And then did they also raise 30 million bucks?
19:20
Yeah, they raised 30 million bucks.
19:20
It says on their website that 500,000 students have used their thing.
19:23
That's a lot that's a big number.
19:25
Um but I think so business like this is set to dominate a niche and I think that test prep is a is a proven business model.
19:31
This takes a 20% twist on it which is the visual cartoon thing.
19:36
And by the way, what a amazing name sketchy. com.
19:38
I think that's such a awesome name for a business like this.
19:42
I think this is a great business.
19:42
Um you know, congrats to the people who who did this.
19:46
I think this is really cool.
19:46
So now um what's the idea?
19:49
So so I tried to convince Do you remember Dylan and Henry?
19:52
The guys behind um clipped smart nonsense and clipped.
19:55
These basically if you don't know them, they're they're young guys.
19:58
We met them because they came to our house and built out our our podcast studio.
20:01
They were fans of the podcast.
20:04
And then what they started doing was they um they had their own podcast and they would cut clips.
20:07
They would cut clips for our podcast.
20:09
Then they started cutting clips for all in.
20:10
So right when all in blew up, they were the ones doing the animated clips for them.
20:16
And so they got popular there.
20:18
Then they created an agency called Clipped where you can hire like a video editor from them.
20:21
Um like a video editor in the Philippines who's a really good animator who can uh for a monthly fee be be your animator.
20:28
And that business is doing well.
20:28
So that got to kind of like low seven figures of of annual revenue.
20:32
And then they started using their own animators to do their own YouTube content and they both blew up on YouTube.
20:39
It's like Henry has like I don't know, millions of subscribers now on YouTube and he'll just do like really short form animated videos. are really good.
20:45
Like I've never seen someone take shorts that seriously.
20:47
So for the listener, it's basically him talking and he's clearly you got a green screen behind him behind him because you see all these weird interesting animations pop up to interact with him and what he's saying. It's awesome.
21:02
And so the those guys are awesome.
21:02
I I I really see a lot of myself in them.
21:03
I don't know how old they are.
21:05
I think they're like 25-ish years old.
21:06
And they remind me so much of how I was when I was 24, 25, 26.
21:10
And so I really like these guys.
21:13
And I think they do a bunch of dumb [ __ ] by the way. But that's okay.
21:16
I did so much more dumb [ __ ] when I was their age.
21:18
They're way ahead of where I was.
21:20
Like allegedly showing up to a meeting without a shirt on.
21:24
Yeah, they should Well, you can tell that story. That's a good story.
21:27
I don't I don't remember if it was them, but that seems like something in the wheelhouse for Yeah, it's their genre.
21:34
is we we got them a contract with HubSpot to do clips for us and other other things.
21:37
And I guess they showed up to one of the video calls without a shirt on, which is a cool by me. Actually, you know.
21:45
Common practice where I'm from, but I guess didn't fly so well in the Fortune 500.
21:48
So maybe maybe they lost that contract.
21:50
I I don't know exactly if that was the reason or maybe a contributing factor to the to They get a They get a pass.
21:55
They get a pass because they were like 21 and they they've redeemed themselves.
21:59
So I don't I I think they're doing good.
22:00
I don't want to [ __ ] on them. They're doing great.
22:03
And And so I I went to them.
22:03
I was like, "Guys, you should make this but for the SATs.
22:07
So do this for the SATs or for for APs or IB exams.
22:11
Start wherever you want." Great idea.
22:15
But I was like, "This is a great idea and there's no one on Earth better built to do this than you two because of their skill set.
22:21
They're amazing storytellers.
22:24
They are really good with animated cartoons and stuff.
22:26
I don't know if you've seen their newsletter, but they have like a oatmeal style newsletter. It's great.
22:29
They created a It's like character and they tell great stories through it.
22:32
I'm like, "Dude, just do that, but instead of doing it free for random subjects on the internet, charge for it and do it for something that people are willing to pay for, which is test prep.
22:42
Like people need to pass this test and move on to the next phase of their life."
22:45
Why would they not do that?
22:45
That sounds so much better than I mean, I was in the newsletter business.
22:48
Newsletter business is hard. This sounds way better.
22:51
And I tried to tell them.
22:51
I was like, "Guys, that's That's If that's okay or good, this is what great would look like in the same genre.
22:57
Like the same work you're doing, just applied it different way."
23:02
And they were like, "We agree with you.
23:05
Uh but we just don't want to do it.
23:05
We were we're going to have more fun doing this other stuff.
23:07
Like we don't know what, but maybe these other three ideas."
23:10
And I was like, "Hey, honestly, more power to you.
23:12
Like you know, that that's actually cool.
23:13
I support you guys in that."
23:15
But now I can give the idea away for free out here, which is like I wrote them a business plan.
23:18
I wrote them like a Google Doc and I was like, "Here's how I would do it.
23:21
Here's how we'll go to market.
23:22
Here's the Here's that how we'll charge for it. I'll fund it. Like just do this, guys.
23:26
This is like this is how you disrupt a Kaplan or a Princeton Review is you take a you take your black belt that they have in social media content.
23:35
Like they are top 1% level content creators.
23:41
But instead of competing for free views in the in the free market of of social media, apply it in this place that's like really backwards and stodgy and hasn't changed in 30 years, which is test prep for the SATs or test prep for the GMATs or whatever.
23:55
And um And so I think somebody could still go do this.
23:59
I think somebody could take Sketchy and do it in another niche.
24:00
You could do it in whatever it is, dentistry, nursing, whatever.
24:03
And I'm sure Sketchy will try to do some of those things. It doesn't matter.
24:06
I think this is a pie is big enough.
24:07
And I think if you just take the the principles of what they did, um I think you could have a lot of success with it.
24:14
So that's idea number one.
24:15
What do you think of that idea? What was Sketchy?
24:16
So it's that's actually one of the better ones that we've talked about.
24:21
But Sketchy wasn't always Sketchy.
24:22
What were they doing before?
24:24
Because they launched in 2013 or did it take 7 years to get to 7 million in revenue?
24:28
Cuz that's a pretty know.
24:29
I don't know their full backstory yet.
24:31
And then I see, of course, Turell and Group is the one who put 30 million into them.
24:35
And I'm like, "God damn it.
24:36
Everything I find that I'm like, 'Ooh, this is cool. This is interesting.
24:38
I'm ahead of the curve.'"
24:39
It's like oh like, you know, yeah, Turell and Group funded us, you know, a year ago. Right?
24:42
Like we were we did an episode on the guy the gardening guy at Epic Gardening.
24:48
And I'm like, "Dude, this guy could be big.
24:50
Actually, this could be really huge."
24:51
I'm trying to like tell people and they're like, "What? Gardening? I've never heard that."
24:53
And I'm like, I go to him and I'm like, "Hey, dude, I will write you a big check. Like, let me fund you.
24:56
I really believe in you."
24:58
He's like, "We're all good on funding."
24:59
Turn in give me like, I don't know, whatever, 20 million bucks.
25:02
He's like, "Here you go." It's like, "Oh, damn."
25:04
Um wow, how are they ahead of me on all of these?
25:07
I'm going to give this a nine out of 10. I think this is great. I think this is awesome. All right.
25:10
I think this is Sketchy's a great one.
25:12
Now, the next one, Babylon Bee. Yes.
25:17
Have you lived in Iraq a little bit?
25:19
I'm not saying this is new, but I don't think for most people they really appreciate this.
25:23
So, if you haven't seen this, it's a satirical news site.
25:28
So, it's like The Onion, but it's just like a variation of The Onion.
25:32
They have been around for a little while, but they just seem to be getting more and more popular.
25:36
And I think a big part of it is that Elon retweets them a lot.
25:38
And so, if you're on Twitter, you see them because A, they put out good content, but B, they had like a turbo boost from the most popular guy on Twitter.
25:49
And so, I just I I've I've seen this and I'm like, "Wow, this business model is really interesting to me.
25:53
It's a media company, but it's got a such a different approach, right?
25:57
So, the way a media company grows is you make content that's worth spreading.
26:01
And so, there's a tension there for most companies because you need to write what's going on.
26:05
You want to be trusted, but then you kind of need to clickbait the [ __ ] out of everything to get people to click and come to your site.
26:11
And so, you're constantly in this like too much clickbait, I kind of lose trust.
26:16
Too much just trust and factuality, too much dryness, nobody clicks my thing, nobody shares this, nobody reacts to it, nobody gets outraged and reposts it and says, "This is bullshit."
26:26
And then that's what gets people to share.
26:28
So, you kind of want to outrage people or you want to get them to share something, but then you don't want to be overly sensationalist.
26:33
So, they always have this tension.
26:35
And by the way, so I ran a company that was a media company that made money on advertising, and I hated that feeling that you're describing.
26:41
I thought email would solve it, a newsletter instead of a website, which it did.
26:45
It actually helped solve it.
26:47
Yeah, the news that comes to you. Yeah, it helped.
26:48
And then, but I was still mad at that I that that existed, so I thought subscriptions will solve that.
26:53
So, we launched a subscription thing that within year one was doing like 5 million in revenue. Still doesn't solve it.
26:59
You still got to do the same game.
27:02
A newsletter monetizes so much better than a just a general news website.
27:04
So, like, you know, you could have a million subscriber newsletter, and that business should be doing 5 to 10 million dollars a year, I would say.
27:17
Broad strokes, a million subscribers should get you, you know, 5 million plus in revenue.
27:21
If you do a news website and you get a million visitors a month, that ain't [ __ ] That ain't [ __ ] You might be not be doing anything.
27:26
So, like, you know, the Babylonian Bee or whatever, the Babylon Bee, these guys are they'll do 25 million plus visits to their site.
27:32
The biggest newsletters in the world don't have 25 million subscribers, right? So, it's or readers.
27:38
So, it's a it's a different game.
27:41
It's a volume game when you're trying to get the you're trying to make a a media destination versus a newsletter.
27:45
Anyways, I guess like the the the thing I'm trying to say is an underrated part of these media sites is this tension, this inherent tension between trust and viral kind of like spreadability.
27:54
And so, the beautiful thing about this category where you go and you try to be the Onion, you do fake news as a service, you do you know, satire, is it doesn't need to be factually correct.
28:06
So, you only have to win on that one dimension, which is shareability.
28:07
And in this case, you'll share it people will share because it's funny.
28:12
And it'll share because it strikes a chord with people.
28:13
And that's why this has spread so quickly.
28:16
And so, uh the the the backstory of this is I think it started by one guy, and then he kind of like sold it to the two writers of it.
28:25
Well, you're missing a big part here, which is so, the Onion, which is a satire website, although most uh satirical websites are left-leaning, this one is right-leaning.
28:33
I think also has a Christian component to it a a little bit. Yeah.
28:38
Uh so, whereas many of these things tend to be left of center, this is right of center. Exactly.
28:43
So, that's where I'm going to get to with the opportunity.
28:44
So, the guy who started it, calls himself a Christian entrepreneur, right?
28:47
And he started off with doing Christian cartoons.
28:49
And then it became Now, the guys you're right, it's more just about it's leans more conservative than it does the other way.
28:58
But, I think there's a lot more like the world is not just liberal and conservative.
29:01
There's like a hundred other variations and segments of the market that could be served with this same category.
29:06
So, I'll give you two that I think somebody should should go do.
29:10
So, I think somebody could go do the far more right-wing version of this.
29:14
So, I think that this is like super right.
29:19
So, so these guys I think are conservative, but they're still kind of like more centrist than they are are full right.
29:25
But, like if you go read like Drudge or InfoWars, like there's a whole appetite in the world for like really Drudge, really far Drudge, yeah.
29:30
Really far right-wing stuff.
29:33
So, I think you could go do that.
29:34
But, here's here's another angle altogether.
29:36
It's not political at all, which is just do The Onion, but only for fake news articles that appeal to just like the millennial mom.
29:47
And cuz like, you know, the millennial mom follows a certain set of news subjects.
29:51
So, you know, you maybe it's a little bit less on sports, but maybe they watch The Bachelor, so they understand The Bachelor memes.
29:58
Maybe it's that they are following the Taylor Swift stuff.
30:00
Maybe it's that they're following whatever whatever topics are of interest.
30:04
Do The Onion for that category cuz it's a very valuable category.
30:06
And by the way, this might exist already. I have I have no idea.
30:09
I don't I don't even know how you search for this.
30:12
But, I think that that would be a very successful version of The Onion.
30:14
That's not or or of The Babylon Bee, which is not political at all, but it's the same thing.
30:19
It's poking fun at a certain set of popular subjects, but make those popular subjects a different customer than the one who reads The Onion or the one who reads The Babylon Bee.
30:29
Here's why I know that that's that that's true about the millennial mom.
30:33
So, we had this couple over that have a 1-year-old over to our house.
30:35
And the kid started crying.
30:37
And so, I go to grab a bunch of toys to like entertain him and like show him off.
30:40
I'm like, "Oh, I bet you haven't seen this thing."
30:42
And I start like using this puppet or whatever.
30:44
And the mom is like, "Yeah, we have this toy. We have that toy.
30:46
In fact, all of the toys that you have, we have the exact same ones."
30:50
And I'm like, "Well, you guys just clearly follow like the same like three people on Instagram and you read the same blogs cuz you have bought all of the same stuff."
30:57
And like I couldn't impress this kid.
30:59
I'm shocked at how the millennial mother like there's probably like six buckets and it's like it's just a different persona for each thing.
31:07
But for each bucket it's like just buy all of this stuff, read all of this stuff. It's so interesting. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, exactly.
31:14
But I think every segment's that way, right?
31:15
I think I think there's a a Joe Rogan bro version of that where it's like, "Oh, let me guess. Your favorite podcast? Rogan, Huberman, right? Let me guess. You you cold plunge. Let me guess. You do this. Let me guess."
31:26
And you could kind of predict their life if you know one or two things about them.
31:29
And there's I don't know, a giant cluster of people that will fit that description.
31:33
Not everybody, of course, but there's a giant cluster of people.
31:35
That's kind of what you need when you're doing media is you need a giant cluster of people who kind of have a taste match.
31:40
And so I think you take that business model, apply it to a new segment.
31:43
And again, this might already exist.
31:45
It doesn't really matter.
31:45
They you don't have to be the first.
31:47
You just have to be successful at it, which means just do a good job at it.
31:50
And I think the way to start this, by the way, would just be Instagram.
31:53
You just make an Instagram account.
31:55
You don't even need a website.
31:56
And just make an Instagram account that's doing these kind of like funny news things.
32:00
Like there's a version of this in sports that I that I follow where they just post like funny sports like fake sports headlines that make fun of the NBA.
32:07
And I think that can be done so many times over and I think it's probably one of the easiest ways to build a media business.
32:14
You know what's interesting is the guy who started the Babylon Babylon Bee. You said he sold it.
32:18
His website his personal website is called Adam Fordy. com.
32:24
It's all dedicated to web comics.
32:24
It's just a web comic website which is intriguing cuz that's similar to what uh what's his name? Dylan and Henry do.
32:32
Um does is who owns Babylon Bee now?
32:37
I think it's those Seth and Seth and Dan.
32:40
There's like these the I think the main writers now.
32:42
It says in 2018, he sold it to them.
32:44
He kept a stake until 2023 when he sold the remaining stake to the to the Dylan brothers.
32:51
Do you know who owns The Onion?
32:52
Oh, the isn't it the guy who started Twilio or something? who started Twilio.
32:55
So, instead of like rich billionaires, you know, they like to Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post, one of those Facebook guys bought, I forget, some other one.
33:03
You know, Marc Benioff I think bought Time.
33:05
Jeff Larson I think his name is. He bought The Onion.
33:09
Which is actually like an interesting purchase.
33:12
Yeah, I think that's a great idea by the way.
33:14
That's that's what I like my billionaires doing. Right?
33:15
Do do interesting things. Go buy The Onion.
33:19
Make sure The Onion doesn't die cuz I think The Onion was kind of dying, right?
33:21
He like he's trying to save it.
33:23
He's trying to like reverse it out of like pretty much bankruptcy.
33:26
Yeah, so The Onion has been around I think since 1988.
33:27
So, it's been around forever.
33:29
And it just like it's a [ __ ] business to to have to run for a little while, particularly in the last like 8 years where digital media has just been crap. But yeah, it's hard.
33:39
It's a hard business cuz also when you think about what's adverti- what's the media business, it's advertising.
33:43
Who's going to want to advertise on an article that's fake? Do you know what I mean? Like Maybe. I don't know.
33:51
I I think that if you could curate the right high-value audience and they trust your voice to talk about a subject, it's kind of like comedians, right?
34:00
Why are why do people sponsor comedy podcasts?
34:02
It's like dude, these guys are older.
34:04
They're just saying random [ __ ] This is not like smart information. This is whatever.
34:08
But it's they have a trusted audience. The audience trust them.
34:12
And so, when they do the ad read, people dig it.
34:15
Um the people trust them because they've you know, they've kept it real in all these other subjects.
34:19
So, I think you could do it there.
34:21
I think there's not that big of a gap between, you know, a comedy, you know, brand and a comedy podcast, for example.
34:27
Yeah, I think the difference is that a lot of people think that the Babylon Bee and stuff like that, I think they think they're the the real and they share them as if it's real. Do you know what I mean?
34:38
Like that's actually a massive issue.
34:39
Let's do the last one, toxic tampons. Yes.
34:43
So, I saw this tweet about a Tik Tok that went viral.
34:46
So, there was a Tik Tok of a woman walking through kind of like a a store and she's she's in the aisle of the tampon aisle and she's talking about you see all the big brands, you see Tampax, you see whatever.
34:58
And 5 million people saw this video because Berkeley released a paper basically saying hey, the popular tampons all have like toxic metals, arsenic, and other contaminants in them.
35:11
And so, that's concerning and so, there's like a moment here where I think I don't know who is the leading player, who's doing native deodorant for tampons?
35:19
But whoever they're whoever that is, they're in a good position and whoever if nobody's doing it, somebody should go do that.
35:26
Or even if somebody's doing it, I still think it's a good idea.
35:28
Which is it seems like there's a general trend of people being concerned about gut health, about microplastics, about is your water clean or is there like you know, contaminants and heavy metals in your water?
35:40
Well, this seems like another category that's I think going to get transformed, right?
35:42
I think I think people are not going to if you can use the fear and uncertainty and doubt around the safety of tampons, I think you could build a new kind of like alternative clean clean brand around it.
35:56
What I'm trying to prevent here is a bunch of dudes talking about [ __ ] where like every woman's listening and they're like, yeah, we know, we use these eight brands. Do you know what I mean?
36:07
So, I actually I have no idea.
36:09
could very well be and I would love to be educated. Feel feel free to DM me. I'll tell you what.
36:12
In my home, I only see the popular stuff.
36:16
Yeah, and in general like I don't know how many hundred million dollar companies hundred million dollar year revenue businesses are there that are doing this?
36:22
There will be trust me, there will be one, there will be two, there will be three that are in this category.
36:27
Like the the current incumbents will either adapt or be replaced by alternatives that are going to uh that are going to play on these health concerns.
36:36
This is not going to go nowhere, right? Look at your detergents. Look at your soaps. Look at your deodorants.
36:40
This has happened in pretty much every other category.
36:42
They're going to do it here.
36:44
And this is a great product because high margin, repeat purchase, and you know, like the other thing is that it's usually women's products tend to be underserved compared to the ideas that most guys have around what businesses that they'll go start.
36:59
So, you kind of can compete in a less a less saturated field than um you know, making to-do list apps or whatever whatever like the average whatever the average bro idea will be.
37:09
Yeah, and what's interesting is that with a lot of these brands like they'll they'll be like, I need to come up with some innovative new thing.
37:14
And our friend Moiz, when he was selling native deodorant, the buyer of the company was like, "Well, how are you going to expand?"
37:24
He's like, "Well, can you write the word native on some all-natural shampoo?" They're like, "Yeah."
37:28
He goes, "That's how you're going to expand."
37:30
have the Do you Do you guys have a printer to do that?"
37:30
Like, "Would you guys be able to type this?
37:32
If I give you the font, could you type it on a on a shampoo bottle?" Yeah. All right, sweet. We should be good then.
37:42
And so, with a lot of these brands, you don't really need like a significantly more innovative thing other than you have to be able to make it clean enough that you can accurately describe it as as a a better-for-you alternative, but it doesn't need to be a significant thing.
37:54
Uh and it's not like native deodorant was original.
37:56
There was plenty of people selling it.
37:59
They just weren't savvy go-getter entrepreneurs.
38:02
They were like hippies, you know, who were selling it on Etsy.
38:06
Uh and in fact, dude, let's do this.
38:09
Go to Etsy and look up tampons.
38:11
Let's just see what what's available.
38:13
I like how you're making me do it.
38:13
So, I get targeted for these ads.
38:14
Um all-natural Here we go.
38:20
Um getting some interesting results that are not exactly what I'm looking for.
38:25
is an all-natural tampon really like a cup? You know what I mean?
38:29
Yeah, not not that natural. That's not what I found. We can take this out.
38:37
So, so I find this one, right?
38:37
The Honey Pot Company, 100% organic regular tampons, unscented, organic cotton with bioplastic applicator, no chlorine, no pesticides, no fragrance. I'm like, Oh, great.
38:46
And And review First review. A very good coffee.
38:50
Review comment WHAT THE HELL'S GOING ON? ALL RIGHT.
38:56
UH LOOKS LIKE we got still got some work to do with this idea. Wait, wait, wait. Go back to that.
39:01
What's going on with them? Why is that like that?
39:03
it must be that the shop has other products in it and that's for the shop.
39:07
It's like reviews from the shop, not the product. Yeah, okay.
39:08
The The shop has herbal teas and other things, too. A tampon coffee company. Yeah.
39:18
But anyways, this was my Sunday brainstorm.
39:19
My Sunday brainstorm were was here's three cool ideas.
39:21
Sketchy, which is doing visual learning in the medical space.
39:25
The Babylon Bee, which has taken off as a satire news website for kind of conservative political news.
39:31
And then this TikTok that was going viral, obviously tapped into some concerns people have, resonated with the public around the toxicity and the metals and the arsenic that's in um in the popular tampon brands.
39:44
And for each, I think you could just take a 20% remix and do it.
39:46
I think for Sketchy, I agree.
39:49
you could do Sketchy for another another test, another customer segment.
39:51
Maybe it's AP students or it's SAT takers or it's some obscure test, who knows.
39:58
Um I think you could do it for I think that the Babylon Bee I think could be done for other customer groups, other customer segments, like the millennial mom is the one I would go for.
40:05
And third would be this uh dude native dude native deodorant for tampons.
40:10
Uh and maybe there's somebody doing it, but this is my Sunday brainstorm of three ideas that uh maybe they're not great ideas, but they'll at least get the wheels turning in your brain.
40:19
It's kind of the promise I have here.
40:21
I think this is we got to keep your phone away from your for from other weekends. This is good stuff. Yeah, exactly.
40:25
This is what happens when I don't have my phone.
40:27
I want to talk about one more thing.
40:27
I don't want MFM to like talk about politics cuz I don't think that that's fun and I think that this is like a little bit of an escape.
40:34
I was going to start the podcast with you know, Sam and I have both sold newsletter businesses, so we feel pretty qualified to chime in here on Yeah.
40:42
what's going on in our country and but Is that's how every like business and tech podcast is?
40:47
They're just like you know, as a venture capitalist and where I started my career you know, investing in early stage tech companies, I just feel pretty qualified to talk to you about what's going on with the Supreme Court right now. It's maddening, man.
40:57
It's that's maddening and I don't want to become that.
41:02
But I saw that you're into Teddy Roosevelt.
41:05
Well, I went down this rabbit hole, right?
41:06
So I'm like uh the crazy Trump stuff happens and I'm like, "Wow, that's crazy. He got shot."
41:12
I'm like I was like, "I wonder how many presidents have been shot at?"
41:15
So I go to tell you Wait, let me let me let me don't answer that question.
41:19
Don't answer that question, but uh let me tell you something why I'm happy.
41:21
I have read not only the biographies of all of those presidents, but also multiple books on ea- each assassination.
41:29
And one of my And one of my So this is why I'm happy that you're able to talk about this.
41:35
I've walked into your wheelhouse.
41:35
I've stumbled into your wheelhouse. Welcome home, Sean.
41:37
Wait, one of the reasons and here's this is a trivia question that I would ask people all the time.
41:42
How many presidents and name them who have been assassinated?
41:45
Virtually no one gets the second two. The first two are easy.
41:50
So okay, easy easy assassinations that I can remember, let's say Lincoln, Kennedy, right?
41:56
Those are Those are easy. Yeah. Um let's see. What are the hard ones?
41:58
Um McKinley cuz he was he died right before Roosevelt, so that was uh I think Roosevelt was the VP, right?
42:07
Is that Is that how that happened?
42:08
You know, Then became president.
42:11
I don't remember exactly, but it they're in the same ballpark.
42:13
I don't know if Roosevelt was a VP, but it he could have been.
42:17
Okay, so we'll leave it there. He could have been.
42:18
Um and then Oh, you're right, by the way. I'm looking it up.
42:20
You're You're actually Yes, good job.
42:23
one I wouldn't have got, but I see it here in the notes, is uh Garfield, Andrew Garfield.
42:25
I I wouldn't have got that one.
42:27
And and and both of those guys, when they got shot, it was very It was a very solvable problem.
42:32
So, basically, up until like the 1910s or 1920s, we didn't really believe or we didn't know that germs were a thing.
42:41
And most of these guys, when they got shot, they got shot and then you go digging around in with a dirty surgeon's hand or a dirty instrument and they get infections, and that's how they died. Exactly.
42:51
So, like McKinley died like, I don't know, 8 days later of gangrene, caused by the wounds, not from like the bullet itself, you know, hitting him in the heart or something.
43:00
Garfield died like 6 weeks later.
43:02
So, I was pretty mind-blown.
43:02
So, basically, I want to know how many presidents have been shot at, either hit or missed, but a gunshot has been fired at them.
43:08
Do you know the number for this?
43:10
I think it's seven or eight or nine, like right around that. 13. Oh my god.
43:15
And there's only been 40 what, six presidents or something like that?
43:16
So, it's basically a 10% More than that, 25%.
43:19
25% chance of being shot at if you're a president. Dangerous game. It's insane, right?
43:27
And then of those, you know, four have died.
43:28
The crazy one that I So, there's actually two that I found pretty interesting.
43:32
So, I tweeted about one of them.
43:34
I didn't talk about the other one.
43:34
Can I tell you about the two that I found that were were pretty pretty interesting.
43:37
This is This is me just guess what the other one was? Andrew Jackson?
43:40
So, I know you know it was Roosevelt.
43:41
Was the other one Andrew Jackson? Jackson, yes.
43:45
The Jackson one is crazy.
43:45
So, here's my entertaining Fill in the gaps for me.
43:48
So, the story is Jackson is going to a funeral.
43:52
He And he's 67 years old. He walks with a cane.
43:54
He's a kind of an old guy, and he's not very popular.
43:56
He's He's walking He's at the funeral.
43:59
He's walking into the funeral, whatever.
44:01
And a guy approaches him with a pistol.
44:04
And the guy shoots at him.
44:06
The gun goes off, but the bullet doesn't come out. It's a misfire.
44:08
So, the powder explodes, but the bullet doesn't doesn't leave the gun.
44:13
And Jackson becomes angry, charges at him with his cane, swinging at him with the cane, trying to beat him up with his with his cane.
44:21
He almost beat him to death.
44:23
He almost beats him to death.
44:23
Well, I I There's conflicting reports.
44:24
One is he beat him up, and the other one is he misses.
44:27
And so, I I I don't know which one's true.
44:28
The other And then, the guy takes out a second pistol, does the same thing, shoots him with a second pistol, also misfires.
44:36
Other politicians who are there jump on him, kind of tackle the guy, and they then take both of the guns, and they're like, "Man, that We got lucky that this guy, or maybe he didn't really mean to do it. Are these fake guns? What happened?
44:47
We heard the gun fire, but no no bullet hit."
44:50
Um And so, then they shoot the gun again, and the bullet comes out, and both guns were actually functioning.
44:55
And they basically said that the odds of both pistols misfiring and jamming like this was like 1 in 150,000.
45:00
That's what they estimated.
45:05
The odds of that happening are are so low.
45:07
Um that's pretty crazy, huh?
45:09
And what's here Here's what's even crazier is when uh up until probably the 19 60s, after JFK, Secret Service wasn't really much of a thing.
45:20
So, the Secret Service wasn't a thing I don't think it was a thing when Garfield got shot, which I think was at 1900 even or so, maybe late 1800s.
45:27
Uh when JFK got shot, uh there was only like 150 uh service uh Secret Service agents.
45:34
Uh it was not big, and the budget was tiny, and they were overworked and tired all the time.
45:40
And when An- Andrew Garfield got shot, I You know, I have to look at the date, but I think 1881. 1881.
45:45
Uh Lincoln was shot 20 years prior.
45:48
You could still, after Lincoln got shot, you could walk into the White House and schedule an appointment.
45:54
Anyone could go see these guys.
45:54
And when Garfield got uh shot, he was walking from the White House to a train.
45:58
Him and a Him and a buddy were just walking, and someone walked up and shot him.
46:02
It was insane how like you could get away with all this stuff and and it it is just it's wild to think about that.
46:10
So the Teddy Roosevelt story was the one that just blew my mind.
46:12
So this the Teddy Roosevelt story goes as follows.
46:16
He um he's supposed to give a speech. He's having dinner. He leaves the dinner.
46:21
He's getting into his car and as he's walking up to his car, a guy comes up to him and shoots him and hits him.
46:26
Hits him right in the chest.
46:28
And Roosevelt got lucky for two reasons.
46:31
I'm sure you already know one of the two reasons.
46:34
I believe the first one was he had his speech in his chest in his chest pocket.
46:40
a 50-page speech printed out and rolled it rolled up into his jacket pocket.
46:44
And the second reason I think is that he was strong.
46:46
His che His chest muscles were just like he was a buff dude.
46:50
No, the second one was he had a his glasses case which was made out of steel.
46:53
So that I was making that up.
46:56
The bullet went through both of those.
46:57
So it went through the speech goes through the glasses case but it kind of took a lot of the heat off of it.
47:00
And it still hits him in the chest. And the story's crazy.
47:03
He's like um he's like so his secretary was an ex-football player and just tackles the guy.
47:09
And then he's like um you know people are swarming. He's like, "No, no, no. Bring him to me. Bring him to me."
47:15
He's like, "I want to look him in the eyes."
47:17
And he brings the They bring the guy up to his face and he goes, "Why did you do it?"
47:22
And the guy doesn't answer and he's like, "All right, forget it. Take him away."
47:24
He's like, "But no violence on this guy.
47:26
Like I don't want this guy hurt in any way.
47:28
Like I want him you know through the judicial system."
47:30
So they put him in the car and I guess he's like a hunter and like an anatomist like a you know a casual anatomist cuz he's like, "You know, I'm not They're taking him to the hospital."
47:40
He's like, "I'm not coughing up blood.
47:41
I don't think it's hit my lung.
47:43
Um so I think the bullet's lodged in there but I think it's okay because it didn't it didn't puncture my lung or my heart."
47:52
And um so he's like, "Take me to the speech."
47:54
So he goes and he's still deliver He goes and he delivers like a something like a 50 to 90-minute speech and they have the shirt that he wore and the blood is just soaking out of the shirt Kurt Schilling style with the sock just as he's giving the speech.
48:07
They now have this like whatever in a museum.
48:09
And um he's giving the speech and he's like he says, "Ladies and gentlemen, I don't know where whether you fully understand that I have just been shot, but it takes more than a bullet to kill a bull moose."
48:22
And that was the line that he gave during the speech.
48:24
After the speech he then goes to the hospital and they're like they take the x-ray they they see the bullets in there, but the technology wasn't that good at the time.
48:32
They're like, "Look, we can try to take it out, but it's risky.
48:35
I think this is how McKinley had just died Well, the the technology for the x-ray basically was sort of invented for Garfield.
48:42
So, I I forget what the scientist's name was, but around the world's fair time they were trying to invent x-ray and Garfield got screwed up and they were like, "Dude, we've heard that you have this thing.
48:54
Can you Can we be your test patient?
48:55
You got to find this bullet on Garfield."
48:57
And so like the x-ray basically it kind of was being developed because of yeah because of this this one or two examples.
49:07
Well, in the end the doctor decided just to leave it in because they're like it's too risky to take it out.
49:11
And so he lives with it for the rest of his life and people asked him they were like, "Do you feel Do you still pain from that?"
49:17
And he's like, "It doesn't bother me more than if it was a bullet sitting in my pocket." What a badass.
49:21
Did you know Did you know that he was partially blind because Roosevelt was a crazy person.
49:26
So, he liked to box and he liked be he was a man's man.
49:31
And like there's a story where I think it was one of his aids, but he would a professional boxer would come in and he'd be like, "Oh, you like to box?"
49:38
No, he would invite people to spar him in the White House, right? like, "Prove it. Let's see. Like you like to box? Let's box."
49:43
And he would box with these guys like professionals and he would like make people get out and they would spar.
49:48
Well, one time a guy I think it was his it was his aid or a partner of his like damaged his eye.
49:55
And so, one of his eyes was blind.
49:57
And during the boxing match, he was like, "Hey, look, we can't tell anyone about this.
50:01
Like, no one can know that we were fighting in here.
50:04
Otherwise, I'm going to get in a ton of trouble.
50:05
So, So, he didn't tell a lot people, but he was blind in one eye.
50:10
Yeah, he he had a detached retina from the boxing match.
50:13
And then And then he switched to judo and jujitsu instead.
50:19
There's also I guess some story I I guess like he was I guess when he was born he was born like with some condition where his organs were like too small for his body or something like that, right?
50:29
Isn't there something like that?
50:30
And that's why he was so active.
50:30
So, he was born with like a bad he they they were like, "You're probably going to die young."
50:36
I think they told his parents he'll probably die as a teenager and he'll be in bed most of the time and he'll die as a teenager.
50:42
And so, that's why he was so invigorated with life because they were like he A, he expected to die.
50:46
And B, his father was like, "We have to get you strong.
50:51
You have to You have to be strong so you can survive."
50:52
And so, he wanted to exercise and do all this stuff so he could live.
50:56
And so, that's one of the reasons why he was so active.
51:00
Yeah, there's like this is like the tip of the iceberg.
51:01
I think there's a bunch of other crazy stories about Teddy Roosevelt.
51:04
Also, the teddy bear named after him. Didn't know that?
51:08
I believe it's named after him because he was known for hunting bears and stuff like that.
51:12
And so, one group was like, "Hey, we'll take you hunting."
51:14
Turns out they had a bear like chained up to a tree or something.
51:20
And Teddy like sees this poor bear.
51:22
He's like, "No, guys, this is not how we do this.
51:23
You got to release that bear."
51:25
And so, it was something involving that story involved him having a teddy bear.
51:29
They call him a bear or teddy bear.
51:33
He didn't like being called Teddy, either.
51:35
Yeah, I don't think people call him to his face.
51:36
But there's a whole book called The River of Doubt.
51:37
And so, basically The River of Doubt, you read the you you hear that title and you think, "Oh, that has to do with you making good decisions or bad decisions and doubting your decisions."
51:45
No, there was a river called doubt, I think in Brazil, that had never been explored.
51:50
After he was president, he was like, "Well, I'll go I'll go figure out what's in what's what's we got to like map that out. Let's make a map. I'll do it."
51:56
And so he goes and he does this river for weeks or months or something like that, and he almost dies.
52:03
Uh and this is just him wanting to explore.
52:05
There's all these crazy stories about him like a lot of people accuse him of starting a a war just so he could go and fight cuz he had the it was called the Rough Riders.
52:14
It was his own crew of like these these military folks, but no, he was Him, DMX, who else? Had their own anthem. Teddy was pretty hard.
52:23
Teddy was a an interesting guy.
52:25
And by the way, he lost the election.
52:28
After the guy does this gives a speech during with a bullet in his chest, he ends up losing to because I guess he had his own third he was a third-party candidate at this stage, which is pretty crazy.
52:38
He was an interesting guy.
52:38
His he also his wife died giving birth.
52:44
And so the same day that his daughter was born, his wife died, and then in the same house that day, his mother died.
52:52
And he has the story where he said he used to journal every day.
52:55
And that was one day where he wrote in his journal, he goes, "The light has left my life." And that's all he wrote.
53:01
It's a very touching story.
53:02
And then he goes on this tear where for the next year he's crazy active, and they go, "Why are you being so active?"
53:08
And he writes, "Ceaseless action outruns depression."
53:10
And so he was basically like doing all these amazing things in order to outrun the sadness of that day. That's wild.
53:18
What Did are his journals like published anywhere or his diaries or whatever?
53:24
He was a prolific writer.
53:24
So his first book was actually I think he was in his teens or early 20s.
53:27
His first book was on zoology.
53:29
So he used to collect animals and take them apart and explain like he like he loved Darwin.
53:32
He was like right try to he tried to discover species.
53:35
And he wrote, I think dozens of book or if not dozens of book books like six or eight books.
53:41
So, he wrote many, many books.
53:43
So, yeah, he's really prolific.
53:44
So, you can go and read all of his writing.
53:46
He was a really impressive guy.
53:48
What's the best book on him that you've read?
53:50
I would read his biography.
53:50
His biography is amazing because he uh he had a lot of bad [ __ ] happen to him in his life and he was very optimistic. Wow. What a guy.
53:58
Billy of the week, I guess. Well, he was. His father started MoMA. The museum? The museum.
54:03
His father, James Roosevelt, like founded that cuz he was a wealthy guy. Huh, no way.
54:09
And but Teddy Roosevelt, by the way, horrible businessman.
54:10
He was a horrible businessman.
54:12
That was the one thing that he sucked at.
54:13
He like would invest in like horses and stuff and he would start ranches. Really bad businessman.
54:18
He was he he blew a lot of money.
54:21
Was he a good dude overall or a bad dude, right?
54:23
Cuz he's definitely like a sort of man's man in in all these interesting ways and has like legendary feats.
54:30
He really lived a very interesting life, but the character-wise, was he a good guy?
54:34
Like I mean, I've never read anything about him besides this.
54:36
I have one massive critique of him and this is when I kind of where the phrase all great men can be bad men.
54:40
Uh for example, he wasn't, I felt, like the most present father.
54:45
So, when his wife died, he goes to North Dakota or whatever to do his thing in the Badlands to do his thing.
54:49
He left his newborn daughter for like a year and a half.
54:51
And you could say like maybe he was like suicidal or depressed and he's like, "I got to get away."
54:55
And you could argue that, but he uh he kind of wasn't always around for his daughter, I felt.
55:00
But in general, he had high character.
55:01
Yeah, he was a good dude. Interesting. All right.
55:06
Well, I think that's a fascinating podcast.
55:10
I'm so glad that you you have this.
55:10
You and Shane Gillis, by the way.
55:12
Why is Shane Gillis like such a history like PhD?
55:18
Do you He has a history major. He studied history. I'm a biology major.
55:22
I couldn't tell you three things.
55:24
What How does he know He knows a lot about history.
55:27
Like too much about history.
55:30
Yeah, he he knows way more than me.
55:30
Uh he has a good like series of history podcasts and he's really uh talented at it.
55:36
Um I think it's really fun to read stories.
55:38
So, like you'll read in the biography about Andrew Jackson beating up this guy and you're like you're just reading it, but then you can take this other thing of like put yourself there and you're like that's hilarious or not hilarious, but like that's wild.
55:49
You know, that someone would do that.
55:51
And so it's fun to read in between the lines and like actually imagine some of these stories.
55:54
It's just I think it's fascinating.
55:57
I think it's also cool to avoid the mistakes that people make and just copy their the winnings that they do.
56:03
So, I would read any biographies and I but I read a lot about people and I don't know what the word for this is, but I basically will study the ideas and the ideas and kind of like core plot lines, but I don't care where they grew up, how they grew up, who they grew up with, what the scene was like, what their family life was like.
56:25
I I don't really care about a lot of those things.
56:27
And so I find myself fascinated by people, but I really want to know their philosophy and then the action of how they implemented that philosophy.
56:37
Like the stories of them implementing that philosophy or living up to that philosophy or failing on that philosophy.
56:42
That's really all I care about, which is like a very weird subgenre of studying history or these people.
56:49
Well, let me give you two recommendations.
56:49
So, the first recommendation is a book called Manhunt, the 12-day chase for Lincoln's killer.
56:56
The reason it's interesting is because you've heard the name John Wilkes Booth.
56:59
That's the guy who assassinated Lincoln.
57:02
He was He's an intoxicating character.
57:04
He was sort of like a cult leader.
57:04
He was a famous actor, not quite, but almost like Brad Pitt at the time where everyone recognized him. He was a celebrity?
57:13
He was a celebrity and he was a bad he was a bad dude. Like crazy racist.
57:15
He was a horrible guy, but he definitely had this intoxicating like I want to follow you to the death type of vibe where he was really charismatic and he entranced people.
57:24
And so the Lincoln assassination by definition was a conspiracy.
57:28
It was a group of like 30 people who worked together to make this happen. Yeah.
57:34
And he was gone for 12 days.
57:35
So they assassinated Lincoln and he escaped for 12 days and he almost got away with it.
57:39
He was very close to getting away with it.
57:41
And so the 12-day manhunt, the 12-day chase for Lincoln killers is is a book about the 12-day manhunt.
57:46
And it's a very good page-turning read. It's very easy.
57:49
The second one is Hellbound and it's about the assassination of MLK.
57:53
A lot of people don't know this, but James Earl Ray, the guy who shot MLK, and MLK was a great He had some downs He had some downfalls.
58:02
He was He cheated on his wife a bunch, but he was a net positive.
58:04
He was very a great guy in general, but he had flaws.
58:08
When James Earl Ray shot MLK, and he not only did he escape, he escaped for months.
58:13
So basically when he shot MLK, he escaped to I think he shot him in Memphis and then he drove all over America.
58:19
Then he went to Quebec and then he went to Europe.
58:23
And when he was in Europe, he was flying around from country to country.
58:24
And the only reason he got caught was he was in London on his way to Rhodesia Rhodesia, which is basically South Africa.
58:31
At the time it was run by a racist regime and he was like, "They're going to accept me with like wide arms cuz I just killed MLK.
58:37
They're going to love me."
58:39
He gets through security.
58:39
Once he walks through security, the security security guard who lets him in, he says, "Thank you, sir."
58:46
and looks look looks down and he sees that he has an additional passport in his pocket.
58:49
And they're like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, dude.
58:52
Why do you have two passports?"
58:53
And they pull it out and they're like, "Oh, [ __ ] The one you gave me was fake.
58:56
I just got the real one."
58:58
And he was seconds away from getting away from all this.
59:01
He He was gone for roughly 6 months.
59:02
He was gallivanting all over Europe. He was all over Canada.
59:06
He was very close to getting away with it and a lot of people don't realize that about that story.
59:09
And that book, I believe, is called Hellbound. Also a page-turner.
59:12
So if you want to read about assassinations, those are my two favorite assassination books.
59:18
Dude, we should make a you know, like blue ribbon when you were a kid or whatever like we should have our own list of like books that we think are awesome that uh that and and some commentary around them.
59:29
Like I wish we had just had our own We should just make a separate YouTube channel of just us doing like a book club or doing like read a book, talk about it, and share rate for people like the books that we think are just like really unbelievable books for the year.
59:43
Yeah, I I would love to do that.
59:43
Those those two rank really high.
59:45
Uh those are some of like I go through series.
59:49
So like I got obsessed with shipwrecks.
59:51
So I read like 10 books all on shipwrecks.
59:53
So I could tell you like in my opinion what are some of the coolest shipwrecks.
59:55
And then I did assassinations of famous people.
59:56
And the reason why I love these books and the reason why I think you don't like biographies, biographies don't have a very good beginning in a middle and an end. Right.
1:00:07
whereas I try to read books that are about an event cuz an event typically has a beginning in a middle and an end where it's uh you know, it's it's more succinct as opposed to 1,200 pages.
1:00:14
And so I like books that are on events, particularly events in America so I can relate a little bit more. All right, this was fun.
1:00:22
I'm glad we did this did uh did this at the end here. That's the pod.