585. - Willy Staley

All right, this episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Stateside with Kai and Carter, a new podcast from The Guardian. And they are using this podcast to slow down the news and wrestle with the questions that we all have about what's happening in the world. And they do it three times a week, Jason. Does that sound familiar to you? We don't really talk about, you know, a lot of international global news items and climates and cultures and sports and things like that. We do talk about fashion and wellness, but for everything else, Kai and Carter are a great place. All right, so who couldn't use more news? Listen wherever you get your podcast. or watch on YouTube. Loud-ass Chris. DJ them jeans. What's really good? Is that loud-ass Chris? Oh, you know, just some December gloom. The last moments of gloom happening. How are you feeling? I mean, the weather's been tragic, but it seems to be, it's sunny over here. Uh-uh, uh-uh. Yeah, I'm just, um, you know, we, today's the 22nd, but you're going to be hearing this next week after Christmas, ticking the day off. Sorry about that, guys, but, you know, I needed to unplug from my Ableton. Self-care. Self-care Saturdays. I mean, you should be hanging out. Going hiking with your loved ones on Christmas anyway, right? You shouldn't be hiking alone. I mean, I guess I would maybe hike alone. I mean, luckily, I did check today. Equinox is opened on Christmas Day, so I have plans. I know. I saw that, and I was like... Christmas Day. I was a little upset that I wasn't going to be able to see what it looked like. I bet it's going to be at 9 a.m. 9 a.m. won't be busy, but I bet like 11 a.m. will be. The 11 to 2 stretch is going to be high octane. Christmas doesn't matter anymore. Like when I was a kid, everything shut down. It was like everything shut down. It was like the fucking, you couldn't do anything. You know, the grocery store was closed, everything. Now you can kind of go about your day.

Things close a little early, but you can hit the coffee shop. There's some restaurants that are open. Is that good or bad? Is that better or worse? Or are you different on it? No, it's better. It means that Christmas means less, which is what I'm going for. That's what I'm pushing for. It means that you haven't won the war against Christmas, but this is a battle for Team Black. This is a W for Team Black. I mean, I don't know how much further it's going. gonna go you know um but i would love for like a full just it's a normal day you know maybe a breakfast with your family if you have to but then the day continues on okay we all get back to work we're on the laptop no more slams laptop shut shut till 2024 memes It could be good. It could be good for us as a society, I think. Okay. So you're going to unplug from Ableton, but you're not actually unplugging when you're in Cabo. Well, you mean like from Twitter? I just mean like when people say they're going to unplug, I think there's obviously varying degrees of that. Of course. And I think most people are full of shit. It begs the question for me, at least, was I ever plugged in to begin with? Do I have a plug to unplug from, right? But what does it mean to you? What does unplug mean to you? Because I think some people means they delete Instagram from their phone for a day and then they lose their mind and have to re-download it. You know what I mean? What is your vibe? I'm way too afraid of what will happen if I ever deleted. social media from my phone that's cuckoo but i think for me i um it might it might not surprise you that i don't have a plan for unplugging okay good thank god i'm just hoping that it'll magically happen and work out this is why we do this um i mean you're gonna be you're gonna be forced i think honestly if i had to answer this question gun to my head it might mean i will i will try to not look at my screens as much as possible the least amount of screen time as possible and usually that means you know just reading a bunch

just disassociating with a good novel. Well, you need to disassociate from your American Express app. You've got to turn those noties off while you're at the Nobu, just so you don't... Okay, let's see. Okay, that's a good tip. You don't need to know. You know what I mean? You don't need to know how many $10 lattes are hitting the account. It's better. Ignorance is bliss. That's how Santa would want it, I think. Yeah, it's true. It's true. I've made peace with it. There's no point in doing it if you're not going to do it. And I know I'm... i will have a fun time and i will be relaxing and i do look forward to you know getting some reading done and just you know reflecting hey dude hey look bro it's cool carolyn's not listening to this you don't have to do this But, I mean, what else am I going to do? No, no, I know. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Catch up on emails? I would love to be catching up on emails. No, you have the right attitude. You often have the right attitude. That's one of your best qualities, actually. Oh, there we go. Yeah, I mean, it's a different time of year. You know, we had to drive last night. It was a nice 50-minute drive over to Eagle Rock. for a dinner party that was, I had a great time, but I was like, wow, the holidays really suck the fun out of. But I got an update for you on, so my car came with Sirius XM subscription. I had never really, I mean, I'd used Sirius XM before to listen to like Howard Stern or something, but we were listening to it last night and it rocks. It's awesome. Okay. And it's like fun. Are you listening to Andy's? What's Andy's radio station called? Radio Andy? Radio Andy. No, I was listening to John. We listened to John Mayers a little bit. But then there's several hip-hop stations of varying degrees. They're kind of like, you want new shit, we got it. You want the shit when you were on coke in the club, we got that too. You want the shit when you were in middle school, we got that. You want old school, do you want gold school? I recently learned about gold school. Yeah, rock the bells is not on my playlist. Gold school means it was old school when it was good for me.

Oh, I thought that... Which I think that just means 50 Cent. Yeah, definitely, yeah. Which is 50 Cent old school now? I guess he is. He is, yeah. Damn, that's rough. I mean, you know, 20 years old. Yeah, that's true. That record came out? But Sirius XM, I liked it so much, I'm afraid I'm going to have to continue and pay for the subscription when the free one runs out. I really liked it. It was nice to get in the car and just listen to music and not have to think about it and open my apps and, like, scroll. So you finally understand... What, NTS? Because I think, well, yeah, just like you understand the benefit of Sirius XM Radio. It could have something to do with decision fatigue and you get in your car and I have to pick something. And is my wife going to like this? Is my friend going to like this? Is Chris going to judge me? Oh, it's not worth it. I'm just going to listen to classical or something like that. When you put on Bruce Springsteen, the East Street Band radio, you know what I mean? You can't really miss. That's the other thing. They only have boomer stations. That's where you're wrong, Josh. There's Pearl Jam. There's The Grateful Dead. There's Bruce Springsteen. I'm like, damn, this is the most boomer-ass stations you could possibly have. But that's who subscribes. I listen to a little... Outlaw Country? John Mayer was playing some Johnny Paycheck on his station last night. So it was a... I think that... Wow. I mean, unfortunately, it was followed by Ed Sheeran. Try that in a big time. You can't win everything. But yeah, I think I'm serious-pilled. It made the drive a little more fun. Okay, beautiful. Maybe one day we'll become serious creators. Yeah, I would love to have the How Long Gone? serious radio station where we just program... music like Andy, but it's good music instead of just Madonna and the Grateful Dead. There could be a market for that. We'll have so many episodes. We'll have such a large, deep archive like Friends or Frasier. We'll be able to go how long gone in syndication on Sirius. Did you see that headline about Matthew Perry and his OD on ketamine is affecting the ketamine community?

It was like... I was like, yeah, you think... Ketamine's the one drug where an overdose affects it negatively. Fentanyl's like, yeah, shit happens, bro. But ketamine, everyone's like, okay, this is bad. We need to do something about it. Yeah, I was like, yeah, what do you mean? What? Yeah, of course it's bad. I was just so confused by the whole thing, the way it was worded. Yeah, I mean, maybe it's one of those things where... I guess people are upset to learn that a party drug that turns you into a brainless zombie could have negative side effects, maybe. A drug that most people are too afraid to do because a common side effect is entering a K-hole where you're unable to think, speak, or breathe. Yeah, but that doesn't mean death. You know, that's the thing. Death is when it gets too far. K-Hole is over at some point. Death is forever, Jason. You know that. Merry Christmas, everybody. Death is forever. Damn, preach, preach. Death is forever. I might be in a bad mood because I watched Trevor Noah's special on Netflix last night. Oh, my God, dude. We watched it, too. It is atrocious. him doing the german accent like the german accent it's worse than my british accent it's unbelievable there's a lot of german stuff in there he loves german stuff he loves it's weird because i i think i watched it to try and study him and because carolyn was like why the hell is he so like huge playing on this huge stage he's so big he's so popular and she's like what i just want to watch it just to see what the deal is and we were both just like fucking shit bro i mean he literally he literally quit doing a tv show because he can make more money doing stand-up oh for sure you know like that that's it's so crazy he's so bad it's shocking i think i was trying to look into the crowd and it's a lot of kind of older people like npr yeah for sure which is fine not necessarily the funniest bunch but i think the the material was really speaking to kind of

I don't know, it's an interesting thing because you hear about comedians, like the biggest ones are the ones who are kind of the dumbest, lowest common denominator, you know, the Theo Vonses and the whatevers, hillbilly, blue-collar comedy, all that shit. Trevor Noah is sort of thought of as a smart, intellectual, well-read person, so he doesn't get lumped into that category, but the majority of his material is sort of scholastic in nature. but it's focusing on the sixth grade level history. It's all about the national anthem and just stuff that you learn about in textbooks in middle school. What it's not focusing on is humor. That's the problem. There's not a single joke in the whole thing. I didn't even crack a smile. It's unbelievable. I didn't know that he was so reliant on doing uh racial accents like white guy black guy irish guy german guy i didn't know that either asian guy like that's that's like half of his whole the meat of his of his act is just doing different voices and it's really don't watch it to me it seemed like it must tickle you uh to you know to watch it as maybe a youngster i don't know like nerdy 12 year olds might be like gagging over i don't know i don't think that's who it's for i think it's who exactly you think it is like 44 year old liberal like live in a city and think they're a little smarter than everyone else like that's who watches the daily show like that's exactly watches the daily show like people who are yeah who are blue as hell and think they're a little smarter than everyone else. That's exactly who the audience is. That's what I thought, but I'm dubious because the subject matter to me feels so elementary that if I was a substitute teacher in Minneapolis, I'd be like, okay, this is cool, but...

You know, I need something a little bit more heady, stimulating, intellectual or something like that. No, I think it's like I think they hopefully they get stimulated other places because they get stimulated by Trevor. That's for sure. All right. We have a guest today, a friend of the show, and he's been on before in the early days, Willie Staley. You know him from Twitter dot com. Maybe his work and writing the New York Times. He's he's our skate Twitter correspondent, whether he likes it or not. Yeah. You want to you want to talk about. parallel parking in the city of Brooklyn. You got to go through this guy. This is the number one guy for that. This is the number one guy. He's who you tap in with. He's who you tap in with. So we're going to get the full Park Slope parking report from him. And you guys stay tuned for that. I know you're biting your nails. Let's give him a call. Give him a call. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Squarespace. Obviously, Jason, you and I spend a lot of time on the World Wide Web, so do all our peers, our listeners, our friends, our colleagues, maybe even your parents if they're freaky. And if you're doing anything in the world, writing, taking pictures. I do topless boxing. You need a website. Exactly, a website that works, that does what it's supposed to do, that allows you to be creative but also business-minded. Jason, there's one place to go for that, Squarespace. Yeah, Chris, I'm over here. I'm modifying calculators and putting Claude inside of them so you could cheat at school. And I just want a place where I could, you know, have everything all in one place. I can have the SEO tools so those future graduates can find me. And, you know, I'm able to accept, quote, unquote, donations for my services that might be gray area. You know what I mean? And then email campaigns. Hey, I got a new 2.3 version upgrade. Boom, boom, boom. Get the analytics going. Raise some money. Show your investor all of your cool analytics of what's going on. They're going to want to get in early. And we can use Blueprint AI to make your website look as professional as your competition, if not more. So head to squarespace.com slash how long for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, use offer code how long to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or a domain. Oh, this is huge for me personally. This episode of how long gone.

It was brought to you by TaskRabbit. Oh, baby, let me tell you something. This is not a joke. I use TaskRabbit a lot because I can't do anything. You need some art hung? TaskRabbit. You need a fucking something put together, a cabinet. Got to reach that cheese grater on the top shelf? TaskRabbit. Anything you need, TaskRabbit can take care of it for you. And, I mean, how it works, TaskRabbit connects you with skilled taskers in your area. They can help you move. They can assemble furniture. repairs, yard work, mounting, and more. You can search for a Tasker based on cost, skill set, availability, and past client reviews so you know exactly who's showing up and can have confidence that they know what they're doing because Taskers have assembled over 3.4 million pieces of furniture, completed 700,000 home repairs, handled 1.5 million moves, and the numbers are just going up, Jason. Yeah, throw a little money at the problem. It's not so expensive, and that job that you really don't want to do is something that another person out in the world, is very good at doing and would gladly do it in exchange for a little bit of money. So when life happens, your to-do list grows. Get ahead of it now and get $15 off your first task at TaskRabbit.com or grab the TaskRabbit app. using promo code HOWLONG. Taskers book up faster, especially for same-day tasks. So book Trusted Home Help today. That is $15 off your first task using promo code HOWLONG with the TaskRabbit app or at TaskRabbit.com. All right, Willie, you're coming to us from the tower. This is an iconic New York background. Roaches and rats. Some construction going on. Just classic stuff. Guys eating tuna fish sandwiches on an iron beam. That's nice. We've got it all happening. You might even see the automatic blind. Something's moving in the building. Oh, wow. So you're at the New York Times building right now in your office, in a office, in a co-working space? In a office. I'm one of the only people on the floor today because it is the Friday before a little break. So I just grabbed the corner office that I think the TV people own. Okay. Is there an eerie vibe in the office?

Being so empty, or do you normally WFH? I got really used to this around 2021. I was here all the time when no one was really back at the office yet. So I brought a putter, some golf balls, knocked some balls around, made the most of it. So it kind of brought me back to a period of my life that I only sort of remember because I spoke to so few people. Okay, hold on. a six-pack of Titleists and your putter to the office like a bad boy, are you simply putting a cup down on the floor on its side? I want to know how you get that thing past security. I know it's tight down there. Do you have a green? How serious are you taking it? Is there a vintage sharper image putting green piece? It would be nice. I temporarily had a little green when we worked out of the time life building during the densification years. They moved us out of the Times Building into Time Life Center up by Rockefeller Center. And we each had our own offices, the editors, which was like, you know, hasn't been the case for a really long time. That's so money. When I had it, I got myself a little putting green. Definitely took a few strokes off the game. And when we moved back, uh it we went back to open plan and and i think the what we discovered is like the putting green kind of smelled like it was like off gassing the whole time like it was just like it's just pretty unpleasant to have around and so we got we got rid of it uh so i just put there's little vents on the floor like all around the all around and the center part of the vent is like about the size of a Golf hole. Good enough. That's the target, so I knocked a few around today, actually. I'm just imagining the owner of the New York Times listening to this right now, thinking about how his...

Precious overhead and office space during these trying times is being used. Well, we're back. We're back. No offense. Yeah. If AG is listening, you should know that it's all being put to good use. And, you know, maybe I'm on a phone call where I'm knocking the butts around. We don't know. That's true. That's true. You keep your Beats Pro on while you're doing your little putts, just in case. I did a lot of phone calls in [redacted address]. That was a lot of my life was putting around the office on phone calls with writers or whatever. That sounds fun. I would want my editors to be shaving strokes off their game as well. It's kind of good for the brand overall, right, when you're closing those deals over on the Manhattan golf course? You don't want an editor who's like a 20 handicap. That's bad. I only like to work with people who are good at it. stuff whatever that may be you know what i mean so like if if i was a bad golfer like that's embarrassing that would hurt my career you know if i if i took i think you i think you are a bad golfer no but i'm saying if i if i if i promoted myself as a golf lover and then willie and i hit the hit the links And I'm duffing them all over the place. You didn't have the stroke. I'm duffing them all over the place. My stroke game is weak. That would be bad for business. You're in the rough. You're in the wet. You're in the drink. I would understand and respect it. That's not bringing golfer or skateboarder mindset to this. There's a lot of things that have really tough learning curves. I respect anyone who loves the game. What is the relationship between skateboarding and golf? Obviously, there's the famous Eric Costin crossover from our youth. I think Willie just said it's the learning curve is probably the key signifier, right? Well, I think, I mean, I've given this a lot of thought because there's Costin, but there's a ton of other cases. Sean Malta, I think, like Javier Sarmiento. There's a ton of that. crossover appeal exists you have metalwood those guys out in la i think there's some skate oh i'm familiar with their um camo hats that i see on guys i try to avoid but otherwise yeah javier's mid-range game is something uh yeah yeah so i mean i i do think i do think there are similarities though i think that you know it's you against a kind of constantly changing environment you and your your your equipment

uh you're you're tough and and and there's i think there's you get punished for hubris as much as for you know wussing out so i i mean you get more tries in in skateboarding than in golf you can hurt yourself in skateboarding in ways you can golf but there is there is sort of like uh there's there's you need to like find the exact sort of like midline between trying too hard and not trying enough and then try to get it and it's so so it's like you can sort of tap into that same part of your brain that's sort of satisfied by finding success right at that midpoint i guess and and pushing yourself to go a little further so i do think i mean god i'm being like 10 times more sincere than i thought i would be on this fucking podcast no no this is this is honestly interesting because Because I think people think of skateboarding as such like a even still. We're going to suck the sincerity out of you. It's so popular, but I still think people think of it as like, you know, like not. I don't think most people could ever see a through line with golf is what is what I'm I guess is what I'm totally. I mean, I think it's not in it. Look, not everyone finds their way. to it that way. But I, but there is, there are more than, than you would think. I think more, well, do you, do you just like drinking canned beer or do you really love the sport of golf? No, I really, I really love playing golf. Okay. I don't even, I probably won't even, I might have one beer at the turn. I'm not a guy who goes out to like avoid his wife and drink. Well, I don't know about that. Your two, your, your two hobbies are, it sounds like standing around a parking lot with a bunch of dudes. or four hours on some grass with a bunch of dudes. So it sounds like you are trying to avoid your family. No, that's not true. That's not true. I think as a family man with a career, you need to proactively find time to politic with your bros, right? That's true. It's not something that happens organically like it did in our earlier days on the Embarcadero or wherever it was, really. You have to sit down with a piece of paper and schedule it out. I'm going to go hit this curb sesh. I'm going to go hit the back nine, whatever it may be. That's exactly right. I mean, skateboarding slots into a New York City dweller's life much more easily than golf. Golf is, I mean, really, like, a round of golf can take upwards of, like...

It can take, like, six hours in New York. With the commute. Well, I would love to see you. On the course, like, it's so slow. Those courses are so clogged. It's just like it's, yeah. You get stuck behind a couple of grannies, and we're sitting around looking at our watches. We're sitting around looking at our funky Cartiers all day. It's tough. Okay, so, you know what I love seeing, and one of the great joys of living in Manhattan is the kind of... the guy that's carrying the golf clubs to, like, the train, you know, and he's got the full, he's got the Titleist hat on, he's got the fucking, the flexible chinos, he's ready to smash some, and it just looks so out of place every time I see it. He's heading up to Connecticut? Yeah, it's just like, you gotta have a car. Is that more out of place than the surfboard on the train, though? Which one is more out of place, Chris? That's a good question. They're kind of in a similar league, I think. Yeah, I mean... Obviously, surfing is cooler, so there's that. No offense, Willie, but you would agree. No, obviously, that's indisputable. You would agree. I guess it's just fun to see, especially when the guys do the thing where they add the second strap to the golf bag, so it's a cross chest X. to help support their lower back. And I want to call them pussies because obviously that's not cool. You're carrying 14 clubs. You're getting off the top of the one train, walking all the way to Van Cortland. Then you're walking 18 on top of that. You're going to want to even out, I think, the weight distribution. Slow down, Eric Adams. I don't know all these words, all right? First of all, Willie, if you're playing for real, you obviously have a caddy. So I don't know what the big deal is. Or you're at least... I don't know what you think happens on a municipal golf course, but it's not that. I'm more of a country club guy. Caddies are kind of unusual in general, Chris. That's absolutely not true. They're not uncommon in a lot of... Maybe you southern sloths. No, Willie, tell him. They're very common at nice courses, at a free public course. I mean, at the highest end, yeah, people may do that. I have a lot of friends who are golfing at high-end golf courses, and none of them use a caddy. Not using one and not having one available to you are two different things. Yeah, you can say that about anything. Well, caddies change. From what I can tell, caddies are what really can make the difference, because you only know so much. You need someone to confer with about the break.

the wind. I've seen some golfing documentaries and it seems like the caddy... is the closest person to the golfer. The guy watches one Netflix doc. He knows everything. He's a real John Daly, huh? Willie, historically, the caddy is an important part of a champion's game. I believe that's true. I'm not very conversed in how pro golf really works. But yeah, sure. You want to talk about pros? Sure, that's one thing. That's like talking about powerlifting and going to Equinox. They're two different things, Chris. No, I agree. Not everyone can afford a trainer like you. The thing I learned about golf from watching shows about it is that the guys, they're more in shape than I thought they were or they used to be. These guys were in the fucking lab like they were a professional football player. Just like skating. Yeah, and that is a nice crossover. It's true, Jason. Speaking of skateboarding, Willie, we were talking about a tweet that you tweeted a couple weeks ago. You know the one. I know the one. Buckle up. And I think the question that I was asking, for our listeners who don't know, you posted a video of a guy attempting a trick, and it showed him fall, fail, bail, biff, slam, whatever you want to call it. How would you call it, by the way? What word would you use? I mean, it was a mix. It was Tom Knox, this British skater, and there's a clip of him doing, I think it was one of the enders of his most recent part, and it was a hippie jump. over a rail so like his board stays on the ground he has his feet in the center of the board and jumps over the thing and lands back on it and then like maybe five six feet later he always like i don't know 12 13 stairs or something he has to quickly land back on a board with the perfect footing to holly a gnarly set of stairs yeah with like a crack at the bottom and you know and so he oh there was a crack he keeps like he keeps either he maybe he like bails off the hippie jump or he lands it and he sees he only has a second to decide whether he's even going to try and go at the stair set not even a second i mean i mean less and so yeah and so you were you were i listened to this segment uh and jason you had the complete wrong attitude about this christmas i i feel like i i told you as much

On Instagram that Chris had it. Well, I'm more of a friend to the skateboarding community, which is weird because Jason grew up in Huntington Beach, a mecca for our four-wheeled friends. Well, the question that I was asking has nothing to do with one's relationship to skateboarding. It's more about editing and filmmaking. The question that I asked, and only one question. All right, Spike Jones, calm down. How many failed attempts? do you show before making the trick is too many? Obviously, at a certain point, if the guy falls 380 times, the video takes eight and a half hours for him to do it. You're going to say, okay, that's too many times. But is there a general number? Obviously, every trick is different. Every spot is more dangerous and treacherous than the other one. But at a certain point, you have to agree. You have shown enough failed attempts that I get the point. This is hard to do. And at a certain point, is the attention lost? Are you hurting the fact where you're like, obviously, he's going to land this trick, and it's going to be cool, and his friends are going to take a board and go like this. And his friend's going to dap him up. And then you know what's going to happen. You know he's going to land the trick. So why do I just show him fall 10 times instead of 38? That's all I'm saying. All right. So, I mean, there's two things to it. to address here. I mean, one is that that clip you're watching is not in the edit of the video in question. So that was like, it was a special thing. I think Thrasher put on Twitter just as a little, a little video for the head. It was a for the heads moment. Yeah. Yeah. And I, and I think for people who want to see how the sausage is made. Yeah. And the Thrasher does a thing called my war that, I mean, I talked about, I talked about this. I've watched a lot of them. I really like it. It's incredible. And it's a great little video series. And this guy, Anyway, they track guys who are trying to trick over the course of years or months or whatever, and they return to the spot, return to the spot, return to the spot. That can be pretty long, but the whole point of it is to show how much goes into something you see in the middle of an edit for like 10 seconds, if that. In the edit, you get maybe like two to three bails, I guess. I don't know. No more. But this Tom Knox video, I thought it was, and this is what I said on Twitter, I thought it was great because

Tom Knox, the way he skates, he's a Londoner. If you put Los Angeles at one end of the spectrum of skatability, London would be way far. Cobblestones, mud, rain, puddles. The weather's bad and whatever. There's just a million reasons why it's tough. Paris isn't even like that. There's European capitals that are great for skateboarding. So anyway, London's terrible for it. He like finds ways to challenge himself in the environment. So sometimes I think his skating can shade a little bit, almost like kind of weird to watch this year. It did in particular where you're like, I get that that was really hard, but like, I didn't even see what went into it. And it's just so weird. The thing he's doing or the thing he was trying to skate that, that hippie jump to Ollie was like really just, I think you see it in the video and it is impressive, obviously, but it was like, it really like the number of different bails and the different ways he had to bail did clarify just how insane it was. So I found it, I found it very, uh, yeah. Okay. Actually. I mean, just as a person who, who edits for a living, you know, these are, these are the philosophical questions that enter my mind when I'm watching something like that. You know what I mean? It can, I mean, look, anything can go on for too long, but knowing that that wasn't in the official. Video. That makes a little more sense. Oh, you mean me, Jason. I meant you editing the podcast. Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't put them. We don't put bales in the articles. That's the whole idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's a sick editor, bro. He takes out all my bales. It's so sick. There's no slams in my story this week. I do take out all of his bales. But it's important to leave one or two in to keep it natural, you know? Otherwise, people, it'll have too much of a sheen and polish to it. An Amish quilt, kind of, yeah. Exactly, yes. I wanted to pull up a couple tweets of yours since you are a tweet master. Oh, no. So this one, because we're both huge fans of your Twitter, this is not a roasting or a skewering, don't worry. You have thought-provoking tweets.

The things that it do to our minds. Okay. It's true that none of your Instagram followers want to sublet your apartment for a week. But if there was a searchable platform that could connect people who have temporarily available housing in New York with people looking to visit New York, I think that would be great. Okay. And I was asking you. And I wanted to know, I mean, obviously, I read that in a sarcastic tone, and this tweet could be sarcastic. My mind is wondering, are you alluding to the obvious app known as Airbnb, where you can conduct this business separate from Twitter? Or is this a general plea or desire to create a newer, better, more specific app for this specific type of Greenpoint subletting? Can you watch my... cat for four hours while I go to the dentist or something, you know? Now you live in, because you live in Highland Park or whatever, you don't know about this, but in New York. Glendale. Glendale, sorry, sorry. And I have been to New York. It's the Armenian Highland Park, just so you understand. Got it, got it, okay. It's very nice. So. In New York City, a couple things have happened with both short-term rentals and the hotel market that have been kind of disastrous. They basically made Airbnb all but illegal in the city. Thank God. Ban it. Ban it. Put him in jail. Lock him up. At the same time, there's an old de Blasio-era regulation to... to make every single new hotelist to go before the community board that was sort of like a thing the hotel workers union lobbied for. I was wondering how long it was going to take you to bring up a union, but go ahead. I'm a union man, all right? But that is the reality of the situation here. None of this is making the final cut. None of this is making the final cut. These two things... These two things sort of came online kind of simultaneously. And so now there's no Airbnbs and hotel rooms are like $900 a night. It seems like it'll be cool temporarily getting dinner reservations around the holidays or something. Things like that will be easier. But I do think in the long term, making it so that it's impossible to do tourism in New York City could wind up having...

It's bad. So this was a genuine plea for a new novel system because you see a hole in the market for it. And New York has famously been a real us versus them. The locals hate the tourists and, oh, don't go to that part of town. That's blah, blah, blah. Tourist trap. But also New Yorkers realize that they need that influx of tourism. For money and business, right? Airbnb never really worked in New York, is the reality. It existed, but every time in its heyday when people would do it, it would be like a full scam. Really? Oh, the shower was in the toilet. The toilet was in the shower, and it was like actually, you know, it's like every picture's on .5. You're actually renting a room in an apartment, not the apartment. Airbnb only works if you're spending over $1,000 a night. in Europe or Palm Springs. That's the only way it works. Everything else, it's a fucking dump. And we haven't even got to the toilet cams yet, Willie. What do you think about toilet cams? He's a fan. Toilet cams? People have cameras in toilets at Airbnbs? Don't play dumb with me. Yeah, the kind of Airbnbs that you're staying at for spending $200. That's what happens. They're going to get a pound of flesh somehow. I was going to say, I've had some good affordable Airbnb experience. It's still in the last... It's going to cost. Make sure you get a wax before you check into your next one. That's all I'm saying. I think the real issue with Airbnb is that the owners began to demand a level of cleaning that made it not fun. It was basically, well, no, I could stay in a hotel for the same price and have room service and the bed made up every day. Why the fuck? I'm not taking out the trash. That's your job. Yeah, yeah. And then there's a cleaning fee on top of it. I mean, that stuff is obviously... obviously outrageous and you should probably just i bet if you just hotel the place to clean you know it probably ends up being okay we only stay at hotels where i will know i might never stay at an airbnb again i might never i just the hotel and restaurant podcast but i just it is but i just hate the idea of having to and airport and airport the idea of having to meet a stranger to like talk about how to take care of their house it's like i mean

Nightmare. Nightmare. You typically don't do that. You punch in a little key card. Well, now you do. But back in the early settler days, you would have to, like, meet someone. Back when Lyft had a mustache. You know what I mean, brothers? Exactly. Exactly. My wife and I stayed at an Airbnb, like, cottage in Montana once. And, like, the guy wasn't around. We checked in. And then he pulled up, like, pretty drunk and was open carrying. And we, like, had to talk to him for quite a while. All right, this episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Quince. Jason, the temps are warming up. It's getting hot out there. Summer always changes how I get dressed. I need pieces that feel lighter, more breathable, and they're just easy but still put together. I don't want to look like a slob. That's why I keep coming back to Quince. They focus on high-quality essentials that feel and look amazing. Breathable linen and soft organic cottons. Well-made basics, but without the luxury markups. That rare balance where everything feels elevated, but still effortless. Yeah, Chris, linen season is here. I wore a linen blazer to dinner a few nights ago in the warm California sun. But, you know, you got that Italy trip coming up this summer. And quality European linen pants and shirts. Upgrade that look starting at just $34. You know, if you get a nice linen suit, a little t-shirt underneath it, some chill shoes, you're looking good, but you're staying cool. The inside of your special areas are nice and dry as you turn up with your besties. So elevate that summer wardrobe, go to quince.com slash how long for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns, even on a nice holiday now available in Canada. That is Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash how long. That'll get you free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince punto com slash how long. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by a new podcast from The Guardian stateside with Kai and Carter. This is covering a lot of our bases, Jason. It's trying to slow down.

The news and wrestle with the questions we all have about what's happening in the world. And I know you particularly have quite a lot of questions. A lot of questions. But how often? Because we do this podcast three times a week and that's a sweet spot. How many times do they do? Three times a week. And I have a feeling just based on the platform and these talking points that they're maybe going to be covering different stuff than we do. That's just a guess. The Guardian is not some billionaire owned. They're not afraid to say what they want to say, brother. Yeah, Rupert ain't sniffing around in what journalists Kai Wright and Carter Sherman are up to over there at Stateside. But yeah, listen wherever you get your podcasts. You can watch it on YouTube. It's three times a week. And who couldn't use more news? Especially when it's not from here, let's say. Give it a listen. Give it a listen. As someone who comes from an open carry state, you have nothing to worry about. That's just a guy exercising his rights. It's nothing. He's not looking to harm anybody. You don't hurt me, I don't hurt you. He's like a cougar nearly killed my son or something. He had all the shit to say, and it was interesting. So he had to kill coyotes on his land. Whatever you want to call them. Yeah, cougars. Okay, so do you have, I guess there's that couch surfing app, which is sort of a little grassrootsy still. and it removes some of those cleaning fees and things like that. But have you put any thought into what this service or app might be? We have a lot of angel investors listening right now. I'm not asking you to pitch right now. Oh, God, I'm missing an opportunity. Fuck. That's right. No, I don't. Like I said, I was doing an ironic bit about Airbnb. This discourse. Now you're fucked. Now the pressure's on. I need a deck on my desk Monday, and then we're going to have a few pre-seed meetings with some of my guys. I just don't want to lose steam on this thing right now, Willie. Well, the other thing that exists in New York is Listings Project, which is... That's right. People use that, but that's like... But there will be like four apartments a week, and then... No, it's big now. That's the thing. It's like a lot more. Yeah, but it's still like...

My three-bedroom open concept in Red Hook, you know, it's like no one wants to live there. You know, no one wants to live there. Even though it has a pottery wheel, I'm still good. Red Hook's all right, dude. You don't really cross the bridge much. Red Hook is not all right. It's the middle of fucking nowhere. It's not. It's like it's Gowanus. It's like I don't need to ever go to those places. You know that. You don't need to go there either. You don't need to go there. Unless you host a scripted podcast, there's no reason to spend any time in those cities, right? Why do you go to Red Hook for the burger at the Red Hook Tavern? Be honest. That is one reason I've been to Red Hook. A close friend lives in Red Hook. Sonny's Bar, which I actually really only like in theory and not in practice. Okay. But there's Sonny's. I've heard of this. But how good is this burger at Red Hook Tavern? Because I have heard lore. It's quite good. If you're going to spend $30 on a burger, you might as well do it. What kind of burger are we talking about? Classic? Smash? $30? Does it take the trash out when it's done? What do they give you for $30? This sounds like an Airbnb cleaning fee, Willie. I think it's like $28 or $29. And you got to tip them? It's a thick burger. Okay. It's thick. Yeah. It's got just a bunch of raw onion on it, maybe under it. Some kind of house-made cheese situation. It's very simple. Okay. So the patty speaks for itself on this Red Hook burger. I'd like to give it a try. It's good. It's good. Go there with some friends. You have two martinis. You have a cheeseburger. You're leaving happy. You go to Sonny's Bar and you say, I think I like this place. You don't actually have a good time. That's a good night out in Red Hook. The night in Red Hook sounds great except for the hour to and from to get there. That's the only issue I have is the commute. I could be in Connecticut. That's a new problem. I guess, yeah. It's not that long. You pull up the app, car, 12 minutes maybe.

Oh, I thought – so you're not driving the VW over there and getting kind of parking because you're having a couple with the boys. This is not – yeah, I'm having a couple drinks. I'm out for dinner. The VW stays at home. And that's – precautions and other legal concerns aside, the parking would just be a fucking nightmare. Sure. It's more of a parking issue. It's not drunk driving you have no problem with. And I don't either. I don't either. Let me be clear. If we were to set those aside, which I wouldn't, then the parking would – would preclude the possibility. Yeah, I mean, getting a DUI in New York, that just feels... You'd have to try. I do think you would have... Yeah, that actually is funny. You have to plow into six parked cars. Getting a DUI here in California to ride a passage. Yeah. Part of culture. I was, like, for a parking spot by my house the other day, and just, I was, like, across the quadruple yellow line and, like, did a three-point turn in the middle of, like, a slightly busy street. And as I was turning around, like, doing the reverse part of the turn, I saw just a cop car right there. I was doing it right in front of them. And it didn't even flash me or anything to be like, you know I can get you in trouble for this. They just waited patiently for me to do it. Look, in New York City, unless you're a poor... child trying to jump a turnstile the cops aren't aren't doing they're not doing much they don't they really they don't give a shit they don't really give a shit it's hard enough yeah yeah they they only want to police those who don't need to be policed is the is the issue they're experiencing millennial burnout i think at at one pp they well i read i mean i brought that up because i read that they spent 180 million dollars on like policing the subway this year or something and it was like up It was like a percentage that I can't name the amount it went up this year, and it just seemed really egregious. Yeah, I mean, you see him around the place. thing is they seem they like to look at their phones a little bit kind of like we all do on the subway when we're standing around this platform but uh it's a little different it's a little different when you got a gun on you you know what i mean yeah like you couldn't you can't look at your phone when you're like waiting tables you know like yeah like you're waiting tables your manager will swing by and give you the old if you can lean you can clean kind of talk but uh you have a gun yeah and the power to uh

To use it and to put people in jail, you can kind of kick it on the phone. You can ruin my life while you're on Tinder. It's crazy. That's absolutely crazy. You can put me in jail for life. I've always wondered about the possibility of cop Twitter, which would be like if they have their own world. They probably have a great NYPD Slack channel that's super active, I'm sure. Yeah, it's called Truth Social. Well, speaking of parking, the parking spot, did you drive your car to the office right now? No. I'm in the middle of midtown Manhattan. I took the subway. Okay. So your car is parked in front of your house right now. I actually found a spot. I repatriated it to the block last night. I found a spot on the block. Okay. That's big. And how would you rate this parking spot on a scale of 1 to 10 compared to where you normally park on a normal basis? This is like a 9 and only not a 10 because it's right where my car was last. Or first, I should say. vandalized by a lunatic person. So there's some bad memories associated with this parking spot. Okay, so it's parking PTSD, but you're able to power through because it's such a prime locale. That's exactly right. It's right on the corner. You're gaslit by this person who vandalized your car, yet you still keep coming back for more trauma. I just think that's interesting. I have no choice. What kind of vandalization are we doing? They put a little shit under your door handles? No, it looked like they took a screwdriver, kind of the driver's side panel going at the lock maybe, but not in any sort of fashion. Your car was stabbed with a screwdriver. And then maybe whipped it with a bike chain or something. Coming on top, there's some damage to the top panel and the windshield. They beat the Jetta like it owes him money, is what you're saying. The Jetta talked back and got got, is what it sounds like to me. The Jetta was mouthing off. Okay, so you're parked in a triggering parking spot. Despite all of that, it's still a 9 out of 10. How long will you leave the car parked there because it is such a good spot? Well, that's...

Another great question. They had a whole Seinfeld episode about this. So it's a Tuesday spot for alternate side. So that means I missed the holiday alternate side. There are Monday spots across the street. That's another reason it's not a 10 out of 10. It would be a 10 out of 10 if I had a Monday across the street, but I have a Tuesday. That's like your parlay hitting. I have one of the hardest blocks to park on possibly in America because you can't leave it. The ASP move. is that you leave it just double parked and you can come back to it after they clean the street. But for my block, a bus route goes down it for one block. So you can't double park. So you've got to go find another spot. And to circle the block, there's five lights. I won't explain why because it will narrow down where I live. But there's five lights to circle the block to get back. So if I see a spot open up, It's like fucking – it could be like 10 minutes to get back around. So you have to put a lot of thought into this. Yeah. It's really one of the – my kids kind of here and parking, moving the car is like kind of right around. Can I ask a question? Is this kind of your thing or does your wife participate as well? That's another great question. My wife does not participate very much in the car. I couldn't possibly ask her to. I think that it would be – it would just be – there are lines in every relationship. And I think we just have to understand and respect this. Okay, so she's like, your things are parking the car, playing golf, and skateboarding, and she has her things, and you guys – you're able to live a life that way. Is there a situation where maybe we could hire a hypnotist to get you to get rid of the car? What's it going to take? Is there a way that we can free yourself from the shackles of the Passat wagon? It's a Jetta. I just want to be clear about it. It's a smaller sedan. You could have lied to him. Passat's a little bit more expensive. This is not a car you look at and you think, wow, that guy's impressive and must have a nice life. You look at it and say,

That's been vandalized a few times. It's not screaming corner office. This guy definitely does not putt at work. So, I mean, the thing is I need the car. But do you need it? Is this a dad excuse? Do you need it for work? Do you have to deliver the paper yourself or do you just edit it? I use it to, for example, go to the beach with my family in the warm months to go. on upstate vacations with my family to visit family that live in the East, which we have some of. I use it to go to the golf course, but also to the grocery store almost every week. And I take my kid there. Okay, look, you're making a good case, but I also feel like without this car, you wouldn't recognize yourself. And I think that's the real issue. My friends of mine have made... I've made similar arguments. So you guys are getting close to something here, which is that at least that I should have a different car. I think that they believe the Jetta, I am chained to the Jetta in an unhealthy way, and that I love it, despite the fact that there are obvious problems. They think changing the make and model will fix these problems? I don't see the correlation there. I don't either. You guys don't know enough about... the car and sort of the, the car claw car problems that I've had. How long have you, how long have you had this car? It's, I'm assuming it's paid off because it's a jalopy. It's paid off. Okay. Okay. And then I got in, uh, 2017. I got, uh, off this lot in, uh, Greenpoint, um, cash. Oh, damn. Okay. Big baller. Well, it was, it was not, it was not very expensive. Um, and, uh, I had quite a few miles on it. And, you know, and I've been learning a lot about. Doesn't drive great. Yeah. No, just drive fine. Zen and the art of Jetta maintenance. What is the thing I learned about my car like five years into having it was that my wife is like digging around the center, like armrest thing, trying to figure out like the Bluetooth, which I'd never really managed to work out.

And, like, you know, it has, like, a center. It has, like, a JVX thing in the middle that's, like, custom. Like, that, like, lights up and does all sorts of stupid shit. Anyway, she pulled the rubber mat at the bottom of this thing and discovered that the previous owner had carved, like, a stash spot in the center arm nest. I don't know what was happening with this car before. Nefarious activity. The jet is hot. It's had some... they kept some bricks in the center or is it a small is it just a little weed you think maybe could have been like yeah pills or pills maybe i don't know or something you know i i had a friend uh i had a drug dealer friend who um he he got into customizing cars for actual like drug runs like like fully chop shop and it was one of the most impressive things that i have ever seen like you pull up in the nissan centra and it's got 10 bricks in it and you and the bank gonna find the dogs don't know it the federales don't know it i watch a lot of tip to catch a smuggler it's a very high paying it's a very high paying obviously it's a high paying job yeah specialty this was like he took a bread knife That's what I was thinking. For our Fed listeners, where are you putting these bricks? Is it in the door panels? I'm not telling you. Yeah, I'm not telling you. You look like a Fed. I mean, that's the reality. Look, you could be a cop. I'm usually the cop on the podcast, but today, you take the... Yeah, the next time you're at a hotel, throw it on Nat Geo, and you'll see all the hiding spots. Yeah, Blue Lives Matter Willie over here is trying to tell me. Okay, so I also wanted to talk about something you tweeted about. Somebody was talking about how they're unable to watch. Like, what is it called when I'm unable to watch a movie or a TV show without the subtitles? And this is a kind of mean one. Well, I'm not going to say what you said. It's despicable.

It's something that has been in sort of the discourse for the last year or so. Maybe since COVID is when people started realizing that I need to watch Friends with the subtitles on because I'm also on TikTok and Zillow and Uber Eats at the same time. And it's just like, oh, it's easier for me to watch. And then some time from COVID to now, I think it's transitioned from it's easier for me to watch. It's necessary. I can't watch a movie or a TV show without the subtitles. So we've shifted from low-key liking them to outright needing them. Have you noticed the same thing as well? Is there any end in sight? Is it going to get worse? When I turn on the TV and someone's talking on it, my brain still processes it just like I'm talking to you here. Okay. No closed captioning. So I don't – this is one of these things where 25-year-old, 25 and unders just mystify me. And I think I have no fucking idea. What I said for the record of this tweet where this person said that they can't actually understand speech without subtitles anymore, I said it's called aphasia and that you may be having a stroke. That's just so easy what the joke was. Because Jason made it sound so cruel. But I don't understand this. Because subtitles would seem to require more attention. Yeah, I would agree. I don't use subtitles. In fact, I try to avoid anything with subtitles. Yeah, I agree. If I can. Because you're a patriot, but that's a different conversation. That's partly American pride, but partly because I don't read good sometimes. I want to distance myself from Chris's reasons for not watching it. Of course, of course. That goes without saying, but it should be said. I think that it can often hurt, especially if you're watching comedy or something.

The delivery or the punchline on a joke will be displayed in text before the person has a chance to say the joke with the perfect nuance and timing that they've been crafting for years. So a lot of times I'll be watching TV and I'll have the top part visible in my mind and I'll mentally block out the letters. But sometimes, you know, if you've had a hard day, it is kind of nice to have the... It's like watching a TV show with training wheels as if... watching a tv show was hard before it feels no it feels absolutely insane to me this is one of the dumbest this is like like we should i'm not proud of it closed captioning from from televisions let's take it off let's take it off who needs it shout out well i'll say i'll say deaf people for one yeah oh well the deaf community is obviously i'm not speaking about the deaf community i'm speaking about the TikTok community, obviously. I'm a friend to the death. I do always wonder if you're watching a foreign movie or something with subtitles. I feel like you are not appreciating the subtleties of the performance. Definitely not. I do worry I'm missing something, so it really surprises me that someone who is able-bodied, native tongue, all this stuff, putting on to understand exactly what Ross and Rachel are saying to one another. I don't know. It makes me worry. You're right. When I watch when I watch, obviously, my French, you know, art films, you know, and that there's a lot of nudity, which is cool. They're smoking and stuff. I am missing, I think, some of the nuance of the performances because I'm having to read the drivel that they're saying to each other when really those films are about the beauty of cinematography. And that you make a great point. Yeah. To me, it's kind of like when people play video games with the cheat code on the entire time. It's like I only want to play if I can never lose. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like you can do a little keystroke, A, B, up, down, select, and then you have limited lives or you have every crazy weapon. Jason, I really –

Thank you for sharing this, but I really would like to know how you know this. Is that true? I have no idea. I can't substantiate these claims, and neither can Willie. And I also don't know you to be a gamer, so I'm wondering what your source is. I pay attention to all forms of media, including gaming. And I have played video games in my life. I don't currently do it, but I'm familiar with the way the system works. And I know that even when I was a little kid playing Nintendo games, they had... cheat codes, you know, A, B, up, down, select, start. Yeah, sure. No, of course, of course, of course. I mean, I... That shit? The only thing I follow in video games is when they make people players on NBA. Yeah, Peter Griffin. Yeah. Well, I was going to say the one thing I do know about happening in video games currently is you can play as Peter Griffin in Fortnite. See? And that's not... That's unnatural. You can play as Drewski on NBA 2K. He's my Peter Griffin. I've never totally figured out... He just makes funny videos. Drewski's the only person that makes me laugh more than Jason. Drewski videos kill me. Kill me. I mean, Stitch is doubled over, and it's the dumbest shit. There's just so many classics, but also it's because it's an Atlanta-based operation. Okay. So I think maybe I do feel a kinship to him. Home cooking. But we saw him at the GQ Man of the Year party, and I was like starstruck. I was like, I can't. I couldn't say what's up to him. You didn't say. Let's link and build. Let's get you on the pod. I want him on the pod so bad. Chris was shooketh. I was shook. He was the biggest celebrity there for me. He practically strong-armed Jacob Elordi and Sidney Sweetie out of the way to make room for Drewski to enter his peripheral. Drewski was kind of talking to our crew that we came with. He's friendly with Lil Dicky and Benny Blanca or whatever. They all know each other. That's who you guys came to the GQ Man of the Year party with? He was chopping it up with Lil Dicky. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you're wondering, it was a movie. We were in a sprinter with several celebrities. Oh, yeah? Several Hulu-level creators. Wow, dude. All right, so next time you're there, see what they think of a sort of 30-minute dramedy.

about the life of a mid-career magazine editor. It's sort of semi-autobiographical. Not really, but not not. It's like Mad Men, but for now. Yeah, that's a great way. How far are you along with the script, this concept? Because I do think that media needs a little bump, and I think this could be good. This is putting lipstick on a pig, if you will. Well, yeah. Everything that I've written... that involves Willie on Hulu is, is on Twitter for public consumption. You know, I don't want to hide the ball. Any execs who are out there. So cool that you've been so transparent about that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, especially after the strike and this is like powerful. Yeah. And I think the market is, is yearning for kind of, uh, newspaper procedural in 2023 uh-huh yeah you know that kind of explosive oh yeah newspaper newspaper magazine yeah i see it more like the justin timberlake movie where he works at gq and has sex with mila kunis you know and it's like they go to cafe habana and stuff in new york gone are those days though he's the in demand hot art director you know is his vibe and he falls in love with his recruiter i think you could take some cues because we could take you if you were Going to hotspots, I think it would really help. So you could hit Carbone and stuff like that and have an expense account, which is obviously fictional. And I think that would kind of endear the story to more viewers. Mila's not going to go to Red Hook. A little sexier. Okay, I got to sit down and talk to you guys about what the hotspots in New York City are. I'll get a list. and we'll work them into the scripts. Maybe you guys could have a cameo. We're in the markets for cameos right now. I would love to go to a restaurant that I've read about on Dumois with you on the show and kind of you get spotted with podcasters out. That's fine. I was kind of thinking like I go in with my date to Carbone or whatever and you guys are like fighting with the hostess showing them something on your phone. That's good. It waved right through. Yeah, you go right through to your table. And I'm like, no, I used to be verified on Twitter, but I don't want to pay for it. So, like, I have a screenshot. Okay, so another thing that you tweeted, and speaking of the NYC as well as comedy, you were talking about the SNL.

The weekend update last week where every year the two hosts will read each other's jokes that they wrote for each other, and they're often racially charged. And it meant to be embarrassing for the person to read that joke. And you said that it's interesting that SNL tells viewers that they're doing something intentionally outrageous and gives them permission to laugh at it. They seem to really enjoy it. Many shows used to operate. with these assumptions built in. And I guess I would just like to hear more about that because I agree with you, but are you yearning for that time when we were able to just assume the obvious? Or are you upset that we now have to lay out the obvious? To protect ourselves? I'd like to hear more. I'm so glad you brought this one up. I think, I mean, it's kind of all in there. I think it's interesting that deal where Justin Che swapped. jokes is like but it was that shit was funny it was that was funny which is rare i mean i really yeah that's because that's because bow and yang's the star now so that's that's why yeah but but luckily we still have weekend but but this this recurring segment on weekend update it's been happening for a few years now and it's always a funny thing to look forward to it it's always funny it's always funny and i think i mean it's just it's designed in a really clever way to give the audience permission to laugh at something they wouldn't normally laugh at i think and to and to like uh I mean, it is specific. Like there are often specific racial dynamics with the swap or like the joke that. that Che puts in Jost's mouth, supposedly, about drinking before watching his wife's movies. I like that you added supposedly. Well, I mean, we don't know how they actually... I mean, I can't believe Jost is... I mean, the fact that Jost is married to her is still baffling, much less does he watch her movies drunk. I mean, Jost is... I reviewed Jost's memoir for Slate some years back, if you wanted the whole download on my...

My complex journey with Colin Jost. Are you guys friends now? No, I didn't hear from him. He didn't get back to you. I'm 1700 deep on the ferry. I don't think I'm going to get that back. Yeah, damn your NFT membership to the ferry or whatever. What is his book called? Is it like a humorous memoir? Uh, yeah, it's called a very punchable face. Oh yes. I remember this. I remember this. Going back to the tweet. I mean, yeah, like they put up these, they, they say you look, you can laugh at this because of these special circumstances and people do laugh at it. But of course, watching a comedy show of a late night variety comedy show was already sort of a special circumstance that had maybe a sort of, uh, implied contract between audience performer that like, you're just sort of recreating a sort of like meta layer within the. variety show to like allow this to to live again i just thought i don't know it's like it's a little naughty yes i don't think you wouldn't want to hear this kind of joking all the time obviously well i mean like it's like eating foie gras every night at a certain point it's too much but it's it's the but it's the if it's the only funny thing happening i do want to hear more of it you know what i mean sure sure i know i know what you're saying i i agree with you but i'm saying if it's it's sandwiched between you know garbage then we might need more of it. I guess my thought on it is I like that we're able to have this level of, you know, ball-busting, you know, comedy that's on the fringe and it's a little yee, any way that we're still able to do that and make fun of each other and laugh and love each other. And it can be a little racial. It can be insensitive to many other things. But we're all friends and we're all joking and it's all good. If it means we have to have a little stamp beforehand saying like, hey, this is just a joke and this is what happened, for that to happen, I think that's good. It's a bummer that it's not implied and that we do have to explain it, I guess. But it's better than not being able to do it, I suppose. And I think, do you think as time continues to go on and we become more aware of hurting each other's feelings with offensive jokes?

where it's going to get harder and harder to do this is this a segment that won't last or do you think what do you what do you think will happen in the future i don't know i mean things feel pretty fragmented now i mean i feel like streaming is like if you just look at like the comedians netflix is putting out there's not like any hard and fast rule i don't think that it's like i don't think that it's like everything's trending like too woke or something like i i wouldn't i wouldn't say that that's what's happening speak for yourself Netflix put out specials by, for example, Shane Gillis, the guy who was canceled from SNL. He was fired, I should say, from SNL for comments on his podcast. And Stavros Halkis, a guy from a podcast that's pretty... out there and so i like that i like that you won't say the name of the podcast because it wouldn't be printed in the paper i've never heard of it i i you know i've just you know yeah sure you've never heard of it yeah yeah yeah it's kind of out of your zone yeah so um oh i i i agree i think that i think that honestly the protest would come from inside the house before it would come from anyone like at the network like i feel like other cast members would be like that's actually offensive before it would before it would be like an outside person potentially yeah but but i think it's for stand-up it's a little different for some reason stand-up shows still get to operate in their own little special world but do you think netflix would have like a tv show tv series or a film that that had that level of potentially offensive stuff i don't know No, no, I think they definitely would. I feel like tons of people like there was a moment when like all this stuff was being renegotiated. And I think a lot of smart people have been thinking how to like, well, how do I accept this and move past it? You know, and how do I how do I make part in this new context and not be totally beholden to discourses I may want to question or whatever? I mean, I think like like think about like the White Lotus season two or something which like takes. takes in everything about sort of like social justice-y discourse and has a ton of fun with it and, like, makes fun of different characters different ways and doesn't feel at all beholden to these discourses or whatever and, like, isn't offensive but certainly doesn't seem, like, afraid of causing offense. I don't think, like, that sort of narrative that, like, we can't joke anymore is totally oversold and I didn't mean for my tweet to, like, sound like I was saying that. I do think that, like...

specifically with snl which seems like it has a hard time finding what like the mass audience thinks is funny it's like well the the like the naughty thing actually seems to play a little bit and this is yeah um and everyone understands what's going on there and they they trust you guys and i just think that there's It was like it's unusual to see something that you would normally think would be offensive taken out of that. Anyway, I made my point. But I do think that like all of which is to say, I think people are like comedy is always about navigating social mores. And there's like sort of novel ones bubbling up and people. It might take time to figure out how to navigate them, but everyone... People are, and all this stuff feels... I feel like there's a lot of good stuff out there these days. So I'm not... Anyway, I don't think that we're trending in a direction where it's all Hannah Gadsby. Sure. Wow. One of the most cursed of all time. Do you... I guess one last question. You are a tried-and-true Twitter user. Are you... In the last year, now that Twitter has taken a shit and turned to X and... seems to be going down the drain more and more. Are you staying strong? Jason, you sound like the woke mob now, but go ahead. Well, I love Twitter, and I use it every day, just like Chris does. Chris and I are both holding – we're going to go down with the ship. If it does go down, how have you thought about your relationship to this platform in the last year? Well, I wrote an article for the New York Times Magazine back in the winter spring. You can check that out, called What Was Twitter Anyway. About 8,000 words on this. 8,000? We don't got that kind of time. Can you summarize, please? I mean, but a lot's happened since then. I just wanted to plug your audience. I will listen to that article. It's about an hour, I think. So anyway, I do think it's gotten... worse in some ways i mean it continues to kind of empty out the ad situation is like kind of egregiously bad in a pretty obvious way not only does that indicate problems going forward for like cash flow for for the x business but also it just makes it kind of unpleasant you see the same weird bra ad like every three tweets when something misfires um and and so that's that's unfortunate um i i definitely i think i tweet

less than i was like in what i wrote the piece i kind of tracked my output to like make a certain point about how there's a very small tranche of users who really generate what seems like reality on the platform um and so i was really paying attention i was tweeting per day and it was it's i looked back at it recently it's substantially higher than like what i'm what i'm up to these days um because there's just like you there's just it seems like there's less happening plus there's all the egregious kind of just like accounts like fucked up videos. And they're like, want to see a guy get shot in the head when he tries to rob a liquor store? And you're like, I mean, not really, but you might end up watching it. Your for you page is twisted. Wow. No, that's everyone's. That's everyone's. I don't see that. I've never seen a video like that. I'm not exaggerating. I've never seen it. Interesting. Never seen. That's what I'm saying. I have a great experience every day. I hit the for you. I hit the following. It's all fun and games. Everybody's just complaining about nothing. It's all good, except for the ad thing. I'm saying the lack of ad revenue is going to be a problem. That's the only thing I foresee really taking it down. Elon has a high risk tolerance. I mean, it's very possible for work. I was actually reading the biography that came out. And there's this like anecdote about him playing poker with all these VC guys. And he like really didn't know how to play. And he just kept. buying in again he was just losing money losing money losing money kept buying in kept buying in kept buying in until he like kind of won it back so he was more willing than anyone to just pay money until it till it came back in some way and his career is kind of full of these long shot bets so i i don't i'm not not to say like trust the plan with elon because i i do think x and what and what he's doing is is pretty far out of his sort of uh Yeah. Unfortunately, his plan is not to make Twitter dope and awesome and amazing. It's to turn it into a payment system, banking platform, one global world order thing, right? So I don't want his plan to win. Yeah, it's like two businesses merged and made PayPal in the 90s, and that's how he got rich. That was called X.com.

whatever so he wants to like go back to this thing which is like social network payments I mean if you trust Elon and that with his you know your credit card and everything I'll give Elon my credit card right now thanks for joining us Willie it's been a pleasure see you guys thank you no no it was good to see you it was good to see you and Thank you for doing this. This is a special, this feels like a special holiday episode, you know, for the heads. That means a lot to me. It's great to be back on the pod. No, no. Look, you're a pro and you're welcome in. All right. Hold me to that.