Better Than Ever (with Benen Dykstra)

We're back and better than ever in this episode. This week we're back with longtime friend of the show, Benen Dykstra. We're talkin' life, relationships, breakdancing, and looking back to when we first met four years ago. Make sure to tune in to The Sit Down Stand Out Show wherever you listen to podcasts.

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"A Psalm of Storms and Silence"

Recording date: 08/14/2024

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Transcript

0:44

What about you, grandpa? Bart, where have you been? What's good? Well, I've had a few. You got to put the mic near your face. Yeah, yeah. I've had a few minor problems, but, getting them resolved. My, my wife's car got, damaged. A fella parked behind it. A 90 year old guy that lives in the same building we live in. Apparently, instead of hitting the brake, he — When her car was parked, he hit the accelerator and smashed her car, and, it's put in salvage. So we've been running around looking for another car and, dealing with the insurance company, trying to get paid, and, and other than that, everything's gone great, except for pantry moths that fly around, that are a problem. Let me see the pantry. Oh, and I somehow dropped a cap in my, bathroom sink, and, it totally clogged up the sink, and I bought a, snake trying to get it out. And sludge is coming out. Everything. But it's still sort of blocked up, so, anyhow. But other than that, everything's been gone. Super duper pooper scooper. Whatever I do. Yeah. I've had that issue before. I've dropped like, I've had a Gatorade bottle top. I get into my sink and I could not for the life of me get that thing out, man. It got fit– it fits in there perfectly. And it's like, right. I don't know, I think I gotta to use a plunger at some point. I can't remember how I got that thing up. It was awful. I've. I've plunged with I've used two gallons of this, stuff that's supposed to remove problems. I snaked it down, like, 4 or 5ft. Six feet. And sometimes it’ll run and sometimes it'll clog up. And it seems like unless you tear the wall open and go into the pipes, you can't get at it. But what what? Something good. What what's happening with you, Phines? Oh, yes. All the good things. I'm reading a lot. Reading the Hulk. I read some Blade. I remember the last one we probably talked about it I was reading Blade since then. I read that, read a book about Underground Railroad, which isn't fun, but it was entertaining. And, I learned a lot. Let's see what else have I read? Been drawing, like usual. Working. Watched the Olympics. Go America. We won. But no, nobody's no one's, beat Hussein Bolt's speed on the 100 meter. Yeah, it's going to happen. What good things happening? I went to a comedy show yesterday. Was nice. It was fun. Listening to Benen’s podcast has been great. Love hearing artists and see them, like, know them and then see them just do stuff. It's very just inspiring and cool. Thank you. Have you been listening to every episode of Benen’s podcast? Yeah, I just recently I think the last three I haven’t because I was like, I have too many podcasts. I listen to way too many podcasts. So I stopped listening for a second. So I'm going to give it a break. I have a like a binge thing. I'll probably sit there and draw one day and listen to all the rest of them. But I'm pretty. I'm pretty up to date for most of it. Yeah. Ain't no worries, man. I've done nearly 100 at this point, which still surprises me at times. Yeah, it's all hours work, so go ahead, go ahead. Yeah. Like the one that dropped this morning is like number 92. And it was a physiotherapist all the way from Australia. And he's been basically working at trying to help people for the last 35 years about, dealing with spinal cord injuries, with brain injuries from car accidents and stuff like that. And he's basically at this point because 35 years long time, he says, if you're not willing to put the work in, bye-bye, I'm not going to help you, pretty much. And so that's why I called the episode,“No BS with Daniel West”, because he has a rehab facility called No Bullshit Rehab. I get that. If you want to work with people, it's like I don't, you know, you want to work with someone that wants to work. It’s hard. Don't want to waste everybody’s time. And how about you, Brandon? How's your. I'm sorry. About my life? Yeah, yeah. And all the summer. So much in the last four months, I, I'm out of, I'm now single again. I'm out of a three year relationship as most people besides Ben and probably know. Let's see, I moved across the country from Atlanta to LA. Yeah. Like, pretty much every aspect of my life is is pretty different. So I have this this manager in LA and, just auditioning a bunch and. Yeah, I've done a couple of cool things. So Do you feel that you’re making more progress in LA than in Atlanta or New York? Yeah, I, I lost like 35 pounds. Like immediately Geez. I moved away from the barbecue Foxboro and I. I, I. I was talking about your career, not your weight. I think they're very related. No. Yeah. The career has been going good. I think it's been. Yeah. I'm I'm doing quite a bit better than I was, I would say a couple of years ago, so. All right. I don't know if anybody else hears it, but you're going in and out a little bit, Brandon. Does my Wi-Fi suck? Is that why? Probably. You know what? That's the real proof of the change is your. Your internet is better than it's ever been. Oh, and and you're still losing me. You're still losing. Ouch. I live I literally, like Brandon. Used to vanish. No, this is peak. This is peak. Okay? This is the. This is a record, Brandon. Connection. Okay. God damn it. Oh. No. Benen, he would drop out. He would disappear. There was one day he was like, guys, let me put a bunch of shit in the Chat GPT, like the most RAM intensive web app I can think of. And then he just. Disappeared for like 30 minutes. Those were dark times. We didn't know, we didn't know about Chat GPT then. The audio will go away. The and the— Guests would drop out randomly. I have no complaints today. Wait, am. I wrong that. That Brandon's image is a little bit fuzzy? No, you're not wrong. It is on our end. But when I. See myself get all. The footage together, it's going to be crystal porcelain. I have 134 mbps download and I have ten mbps upload. Am I delayed for anybody else or no? Mmm…Do you want to…mm You’re doing great, man. I bought the best internet package in the entire neighborhood for this. For this pod with this podcast in mind. They were like, you can stream seven devices on here. You can be on eight different conference calls. It won't be a problem. Love and respect you no matter what speed you're coming in at. It’s much better than it used to be. Great. Brandon, how do you like the Hollywood area in general? I mean, you know. The Hollywood area is horrible. I yeah, I don't live near there, but it's it's very bad. It's it's like the equivalent of, like, Times Square in New York City, you know. And, I remember you, Benen. Oh, I remember you very well, sir. Yes. And, how has your summer been? Well, actually, I think it's been more than a year since I last spoke to any of you guys. And a lot has happened since then. I moved out of my parents house, and now I'm living in my own apartment on my own. I've done ten virtual theater plays with a company out of New York who, after several discussions with the director, I got tired of working with them. So I left, and, I've got nearly 100 episodes of my podcast done at this point. We've got, merchandise store available, which you can check out on the website, where you can get T-shirts, coffee mugs, a Sit Down, Stand out Teddy bear. If you got a little one in the house. And I'm working on a book for Audible right now. Wow. Sounds really busy. It sounds like you're doing well. Well, I was raised by a family of workaholics, so kind of have to be. Can you tell us. Last time we saw you you didn’t even start the podcast, right? No, I did not, because I saw like five, four, three, two, one on the screen. So. Yeah. That's so cool. And Phines How is your artwork coming along? Oh, swimmingly. Swimmingly. I'm doing, cool stuff. I, I drew a picture for someone's comedy show. That was pretty fun because I don't usually do commissions. I'm not a big fan of commissions. So I went outside my box and did it, so that was pretty cool. Yeah. No, this has been good. I'm, interested in looking at your your merchandise, Benen, and, do you did you say what the podcast, name of it is? I mean, I know what it is, but. Oh, yea. Did you already say it to the (audience)? Oh yeah. Okay. I forgot. For the listeners who want to check out my podcast after listening to this episode, it’s “The Sit Down Stand Out Show” podcast. Big fan. And if you want, you can go to our website at www.rollingdragonmedia.com and click “Stand Out Merch”. It'll take you right to our merchandise store where you can pick up a mug, a t shirt, or a teddy bear or whatever. We've already had a few customers, one from Canada where I live and one from a lady in Israel just recently purchased one of our shirts. Nice. And why is it called“The Sit Down Stand Up” podcast? Well, “Sit Down, Stand Out Show”. And I do that because I— Sit Down, Stand Out. Yes. My guests usually are individuals with physical disabilities like myself. I have cerebral palsy or individuals with unique mental health challenges. And our story is designed to provide a judgment free platform for people to share their stories of how they've overcome the challenges associated with being born with a unique condition, or dealing with mental health challenges on a daily basis, or just in general, standing out in a unique way. Even if you have to spend your life sitting down. That's what I was going to ask. Hearing your voice, which is great. Can you tell us about the audiobook? Did you get hired for what's going on? Is or is it secret? Is that hush hush? Well, what I will say is I was given I, I had done about 59 auditions prior to getting this offer. So it's my first offer. I'm not going to disclose the title of the book when it will come out, because I'm still working on it, but it is a book regarding, it's a guidebook to take care of a particular breed of dog. Sounds fancy. That is a ton of stuff. For two years. I want to talk art. Since we got all the artists in here about putting all your artwork out for, like, how do you been feeling, putting all the stuff out for the last two years, like, are you are you going nuts? Are you? Because I would I feel like I would be, like, going nuts, but I'm projecting. How are you doing? Well. I would say I'm somewhere in the middle, like 5050. Just because it's means so much in such a brief space to where it's like, I almost wish I could hire someone like Sierra to help me out with the stuff that I don't understand. Like, for instance, I've been trying to get all the episodes of the podcast on my own YouTube channel, which just goes under the show title that you can click on. I've only got like the first 12 up so far, because I'm just trying to introduce the show to a different audience on YouTube, and it's basically you're just looking at the picture of the guest in the episode thumbnail while the audio plays. So just introducing a different audience to the same episodes that I've been airing for weeks. But at the same time, with all the stuff that I'm doing, it's almost like, boy, I wish I could afford some staff to hire to help me out with the hard parts or boy, I wish I could just take a break sometimes, but then you realize, you know what? Just take a breath. You don't have to do anything today. Go outside, order yourself a hamburger from the local place across town. Yeah, I, have been. This is what I've been justified by. Not doing stuff like this is because I'm like, man, for for an artist to be an artist nowadays, you have to be. You have your bag has to be deep of not just artistry. You have to also know how to just like maneuver tech and maneuver marketing and maneuver things that, It seems like quite a bit, if that's what you're interested in, in trying to if you're trying to get your product out there. And it's, it's a lot to me at least. But were you about to say something, Brandon? Well, 100 episodes in, like, less than two years is— How do you do that many episodes? You do it every week? Yeah, I do it every Wednesday. So that around the same day of the week that you guys drop your shows. Because number one, if you use social media the right way, it's not hard to find unique individuals on social media to be a possible guest. I think the the thing is, is that I started out with recording a couple episodes before I actually launched the show as well. It also helps that you try your very best to interview or try to send out multiple emails, like, because what I do to keep my show under control is there's always months of the year where there's conditions that you need to be aware of, or we're raising awareness of, say, for example, every month there's a type of cancer that we want to raise awareness for. There's types of events that we want to talk about all the time. That kind of helps categorize the guests that I look for. Then you just use hashtags on social media. And for every nonresponse, you just keep working at it. Yeah. This is so nice. I missed you guys. I missed this, too. Great seeing you all. Benen. Is is a cerebral palsy what Roosevelt had, or did he have a different condition? Roosevelt he had polio, I believe. Okay. And the effects, the the symptoms are dissimilar? Yeah, well, similar in the sense that he became paralyzed. But his condition as he got older slowly deteriorated the rest of his body because for a good chunk of his life, he was fully able bodied and was able to do all of his stuff. Whereas the polio is a virus, what I have is a premature birth condition. I see. Because I was born about ten weeks prematurely. Have you worked with any of the the last two years with the people that, I know you've worked with them on the podcast, but like outside of the podcast, have you worked with any of your guests? I have definitely. I feel like I've become friends with. A few people. But I can't say that any project has come up that's outside of the podcast. Like there's one lady who, while she works at Windsor University in Windsor, Ontario, who I'm good friends with. I, did an episode with her because her son has a condition called cystic fibrosis. It's a genetic lung disease that you can get diagnosed with as a baby, which involves, like, tons and tons of treatment and parents who will go the extra mile to try to make sure that their children, despite having a disability or a condition, make them feel like life is still a beautiful thing, really gets to me because my mother tries her best to do the same thing. So I think we become friends because of that. Wow. Yeah. Is it two years on your own? Two. How long you been in? How long you been in your apartment? Or is it an apartment? Yes, it's an apartment. I moved into that, this past October. And that's the first time that I lived, like, full time on my own out of my parent's house. Prior to that, I lived on college residence. But I don't count that because I had the college prepaid meal plan all the time. So I wasn't really cooking. And then I had a roommate, so I don't really count that as living on my own. That’s funny. All right, well, how is it living on your own? I think it took me about a month to get adjusted to that, just because we had gone through several things before moving out. Like, first of all, it's only half an hour away from where my parents live. So in the event of an actual emergency, it's just a text message or a phone call. And then, pretty much the only things that I need help with now is someone to help me get groceries, because you got to go into town to go get that stuff, and I the apartment complex is out of or pretty much out of town, like, it's a small town called Minden. And then pretty much help with laundry just because, for whatever reason, the building just doesn't have enough machines. And then the laundromat is on the other side of town, so my parents are willing to help me out with that. So other than that, I do all the cooking and then most of the cleaning, with the exception of like once every two weeks, I have people coming in Yeah. That’s a lot of visitors, too. Dang A boy I could use, I could use you out here, Benen. I have a lot of cleaning to do. According to my mother, they're not that expensive because they just live, like within the area. So I think maybe they only charge a couple hundred per maybe. I don't know exactly how much, because I didn't read up on that. My mother signed me up before that, but I would imagine that it could be affordable given the exchange rate. I did set the house alarm on fire, or I did set off the fire alarm once or twice. Okay. Yeah. Trying to figure out how to properly cook a chicken thigh. Yeah, that’s alright. I done seen Brandon try to cut a chicken. You gotta, you gotta you gotta remember to always put the tinfoil rack on there, and then it's like, okay, you gotta put this in the pan. You can't leave this on a rack. And then at one point, like, the people from next door literally had to come in and help me because I had overcooked the chicken by mistake. And the smoke is going all over the building, and I'm like, I'm sorry, everybody, because I don't want you to hate me. Yeah. That was that was an interesting experience. I mean. Do you drive, Benen? No, I'm not physically able to drive. I have been able to drive a golf cart, but what we had to do for the golf cart was we had to put a piece of wood under the gas pedal so that my feet could have a reasonable amount of throttle. Like, without that piece of wood, my foot would be on the gas full throttle and I wouldn't be able to control it. I see, so you have use of your feet. It's just, hard to control or? Well, it's, what I have is called spastic cerebral palsy. And there's like, four different levels of cerebral palsy. I believe what I have is like level three because it affects both my legs. Both are in one of my arms. What I can do is I can walk, but I need a walker to be able to hold on to something. I can stand up if someone needs me to. I am a little out of shape, but that's my own personal choice. Because I didn't listen to physical therapist as a kid, but otherwise I'm pretty good. Yeah, same with all of us. I think. Yeah. Well, I don't know what a about being out of shape. I have a problem getting out of bed in the morning. I do too, sometimes, but I attribute I just blame the rain if that happens. Yeah, because I have the same thing. If it rains, my joints are killing me. And I'm. I'm 26, so it can happen to anybody. Yeah, yeah. My knees went out on me. And this. When I was walking up the stairs. So, Brandon, I want to ask you a question. Brandon. Yeah. You you've had a lot of a lot of training, in your profession. Going to put the mic closer. I can't hear you. Are you still learning every week? Yeah, I'm in class pretty much every week. Or any of the, directors that you've worked, whose films or shows you work for stand out as far as their, you know, their competence or ability? You know, it's crazy. I just directed, I mean, I've worked with, like, a lot of really cool people. I just directed my own short for the first time, like, a month or two ago. I don't know if I told you about that, grandpa. Yeah. And, Gosh, dude, it's so. It's so fun. It's so cool, directing. Like, I really, really loved it. I thought it would be something I wouldn't like, but I really liked it. Trying to think of a specific director that. How can we watch it? I just started it. Oh, I'll send it to you. It's going to take me to 2 or 3 months, but, Yeah. And and the actors were. How long? How long? A short 25 minutes. How long? Yeah, like a half hour. That's a short that. Yeah, it's an hour and 25 minutes. Oh, I thought a short was like 30s. No. Yeah. That's, I think that's a TikTok short or. Okay. Because I'm thinking of, like, those little shorts that they would have at certain like, oh. Was it Disney films that they would have those little animated shorts before them? Yeah, sure. It yeah. Yeah. What do you like about directing? Do you know, I don't know if you can put it into words. Well, there's actually, there's, a lady named, Kathleen, Kelly who, directed me, and she just knew how to make every actor, like, feel amazing. And I think that's something that was really cool. The thing that I thought I wouldn't like about their acting is I hate, like, leading anything. I hate being like, a group leader. But, like, everybody on set was so cool. What is the motive?…and so chill that I didn't really feel like I had to. I just had to sort of set stuff up and then work with the actors and, like, make sure everybody was good. And the thing that I loved about the directing, I would say, was just like, I've been acting so long that I knew how to get exactly what I wanted from the people I was working with, with the actors. And, and it was just weird, dude, because I've had, like, visions in my head or ideas of like, specific shots. And then to see it, like, come to life is very trippy. It must be like being an artist, you know, where you can, like, see something in your head and then actually create it exactly how you see it. It's about, a watchmaker who applies to, like, the world's leading watchmaking apprenticeship. And he, he's, like, in his 30s, and he still lives with his parents, and he's— his parents, like, hid the letter from him. So he doesn't know if he got it or not. Yeah. It's it's it's like a very, kitchen sink, comedy or whatever. What’s that mean? Yeah. No, my, it's based off of my friend the. The lead guy is, an actual watchmaker who lives with his dad. So I wrote it for him. What’s the kitchen sink thing mean? Does that mean, like, homemade? Or? Kitchen sink is just like. Yeah. Just like, you know, they they stand around a kitchen sink and talk, you know what I mean? There's, like a kitchen sink. Just, like, at a house. Simple drama. Yeah. Okay. Okay. This. Everyone's working on projects, doing their thing. No, no. What do you mean, you don't know? It's great. I like hearing what you're passionate about. Keep it up. Affirmation. Thanks, Phines. Yeah, man, I appreciate that. I feel like I'm at such a different place in my life. And there's a lag, so if I'm talking over you, I'm sorry, but, like, I just, I don't know, I. I give so little fucks about so many things now, well, as a, like, just in regards to, like, art and like… So like, I'm doing shit that I just like, oh, this would be fun. And I just want to do it. And I'm like, it's not going to go anywhere. But I just wanted to because I really liked it, you know? I hear you. Because I remember and I know our situation is a bit different. And I remember when, there would be times where I would be, like, trying to record things for the podcast because I started the podcast long before I moved out of my parents house, and there would be a lot of things that I would have to navigate around, and I would have to be like, okay, dad, I need you to keep the volume on your NASCAR at a minimal volume. I'm trying to trying to record this particular thing, or I would have to ask them be like, okay, can you guys help me get in the shower to be able to just take a shower? And now that I live on my own, it's like, it feels so freeing to think, you know what? You can take a shower whenever you want. You can cook whatever you want for dinner. It's like there's very little distractions unless you make your own distractions. It's very freeing. Yeah. Yeah. Is there anything today in robotics that can give you more control? I would not know about that because I don't really pay attention to the world of robotics. I do know that there is a lot of work in terms of like getting prosthetics are possibly getting better, but because I have pretty much all functioning limbs, I haven't really been paying attention to that. Plus, I saw too many Terminator movies to have faith in robotics. The media. And also like because of all the evolution of AIs or artificial intelligence, I'm a voiceover artist for a freelance living. Like narrating the audiobook, doing a voiceover with so many people thinking, oh, look at all this AI technology that's improving. Sure, there's a degree of improvement upon AIs. Like, for example, I would love it if they were somehow able to create a create a replica of the late Christopher Lee's voice so that we he could narrate stuff posthumously. Oh, they’ll have it soon. I don't I don't want people who are passionate like me about voiceover and stuff losing jobs to AI. Yeah they will. It's it's all really fucked. I just want to say it's so cool that you're feeling good and independent, Benen, and living. Because I remember the last time we talked like, you definitely were not in as happy of a place as you are now and you've, like, accomplished so much. So that's pretty awesome. Well, thank you. And I can definitely like I even have spoken to my parents since then. And I just said, you know what? Well, some moments I'm not going to apologize for because in the, in the moment, But I realized that like now some of the arguments that we had now that I'm living on my own, just how stupid some of those arguments were because it was over such a little thing. Now that I'm out on my own doing my own thing, and I have far more options compared to what I used to have, it's like, look, I'm sorry I was immature and I was so frustrated because there were times where it was like, mom, dad, I've got issues and I don't know how to deal with it. So now that we're in a better place, it's like, sorry, I tried. Well, I think that even people that have great love for one another when they're together, they still have some arguments or, you know, disagreements. That's that's true. That's kind of what makes relationships interesting. Yeah. If we got along all the time, it would be very boring. Yeah. It wouldn't. Yeah. Screw you, Grandpa. Let's fight. What happened? What happened to Sierra? I'm here. Oh, okay. Just listening to make sure that we're not technically screwing up. I'm soaking it all in. And then she'll talk smack later. Do you have a scarecrow behind you, grandpa? What is that? Scarecrow. Oh, yeah. Yeah, but the mic goes to your face. I can't hear you. You're talking about Rosie? No, no. Look behind you is like a live scarecrow. Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes. Yeah, I've been been hitting. I've been hitting, what they call, pantry moths, which are real pain in the neck. And I was messing up my ceiling trying to swat them. So now I have a vacuum cleaner, and I vacuum into the thing, and they're just every day there's, like, 5 or 10 of them. I legit thought you had a scarecrow. But what's behind you? To keep the nets afraid, which I don't…? What would that work? No, but it would be amazing. Well, there's always something to annoy. To annoy you. You know, you need to get like, one of those. I don't know what they're called exactly, but there's, a bug zapper that you can get that's about the size of a handheld lantern that you could attract moths to. That would just fly right into it immediately, get fried up. You know what? I have one. In fact, one of the lights that's on right now has that in it. It has an ultraviolet light in it, and it has a zapper. And I don't think it works at all. I've spent all kinds of money trying to get something that would work, and the problem I have is that I don't want to spray with something that can injure the birds. Right. Maybe there's something you could put on it that it's like, okay, something that the birds hate, but bugs love like a scent of some sort because bugs have weird interests. Yeah, a “pheronome” or whatever they call it. Yeah. So Sierra. Bonjour? I kind of miss not hearing from you. You mentioned that you've been doing a lot of reading, I think. Right? Yeah. That's wonderful. Yeah, I haven't been I hadn't been able to do it for years. Well, just not as much as I wanted to because I had like a ton of neck pain. And so just trying to, like, sit and bend down and, like, read for, like hours, like I used to just like not possible. So I'm reading a lot more now and like sometimes I can read while I'm exercising. So combining that coming together really nicely. Nice. I've been reading a lot more too, because for Christmas last year I got, an Audible subscription for a year, which is like, you get one credit a month and you can use that credit to buy whatever book you want. And I've been reading stuff like, The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien, Kitchen Confidential by the late Anthony Bourdain. Couple of wrestling biographies. I just read that, too. I just read it, Benen. That's crazy. Which one? I listened to the audiobook, Kitchen Confidential. No, but which book? Oh, really? Okay. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And Medium Raw. And I started Lord of the Rings. So, like, we literally have been reading the exact same things for the last month. Wow. And you do look a lot like me, so it's almost like we're twins. That’s hilarious. That could be a book club. Brandon and Benen. We were switched at birth. Yes. I'm not well read at all when it comes to novels. Or, the only thing I read is kind of more, scientific or mechanical things. Electronics. So what is the difference, that you gained from reading a book relative to watching, like, a TV show or a movie or whatever? Well, I would have to guess that if you're reading a paper book versus watching a television show, because you can flip the pages at your own pace. So it's it's a different level of processing the information. Whereas television goes by so quickly, there's going to be things that you'll want to pause, rewind, go back and look at again because of how quickly television goes by on a screen. And at the same time, if you are reading instead of listening on an audiobook, you can also create like what the characters might. You can visualize what a character would look like. If you're reading, you can think of a voice that would be saying the words in the book yourself. Like, you don't have to be subject to listening to somebody that you don't like. Well, oftentimes when I hear a voice, and then I see the person that, that who's who had spoken or who's speaking, they look very different than what I had anticipated. Yeah. Like I've watched— I've listened to a lot of books that have become films. Like, if you read Lord of the Rings and then you watch the film, how often would you imagine that the voices of the characters would sound like the ones you thought of in your head, like I did not? Like, I watched the movies first, so it was easier to say, okay, this is what Legolas sounds like. But if you were to just read the book, you could be able to come up with your own voice. Those are great things. Yeah, those are, I feel like, reading a book is, without picture, without having anything. It gives you freedom, the audience, to have their own perspective instead of, in a movie— which there’s nothing wrong with a movie too, like someone else or a TV show, someone telling me their perspective, or showing me their perspective. But I think reading a, a book gives you a little bit more freedom, even. I guess you're reading from the writer's perspective, but, you know, you get what I'm saying, grandpa, right? And Benen? I’m seconding what you were saying. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Just basically, with, with, with words, you make your own pictures, the pictures you shown it live. Someone's given me . Phines! Phines. Can you show us any new artwork that you've done? If you've done any. I don't know, because we haven't been on for the Facebook googly. This is a Facebook googly eyes. I'm drawing this right now. It's a guy I'm drawing. I don't know what I'm doing. He’s got hands, though. What else? This is a face. This is poo. What is that? That's something from my DND crew. It's a character from DND. Because I'm always sketching. I don't know, I've been. Oh, man, I been collaging so much I haven't put anything actually down. I just have a bunch of, like, clippings, so I look like a serial killer. It's gross. You couldn't possibly look like a serial killer. You’re too nice. Folder. That's the one you most suspect. I know, right? It's the nice one. It's so organized. That look real normal. Well, in that case, I'm a mass murderer. That's hilarious. Ay, Benen. We shouldn't be outing ourselves out here. But, no, this is great. I've been loving collage, and it's been, like, folders of stuff. It's all these, uh-oh. It’s a bunch of collage stuff. Phines, your art looks so much more like your personality now. Like it? Oh, like I see it and it feels like Phines. Oh, yeah. To the sky. I'm only at the very beginning. I hope to make more. As I was going to say, though, I'm really proud of us because two, three years, four years ago when we were talking about we were interested in it's just so cool to see. You're now directing. You start off just acting and doing improv and us doing that. And now you're directing and you've gotten so much deeper in the game and, and, and then Sierra is always proud, like with her, like the voice acting and doing like just more producing and stuff like that. And she's working on projects and, and Benen, like, and Grandpa. Everybody's just working on stuff. And I'm, I'm just happy, you know, sometimes—So many times artists fall off, not purposely or nothing, but I'm happy that we have been keeping going and I'm proud. It gives me joy. Do you guys feel do you guys feel different than you were four years ago when we started as people? Oh, geez. I feel like an entirely different person because, like, since I've started doing all this, it's like I never expected to ever be on my own. Like, I was always thinking like, okay, you'll live with your parents. Until then, you get passed off to another relative and then it's off to the home, basically. Just because it was not like we had these deep discussions about the future. It wasn't like we talked about like, well, here's the plan for when you move out. Here's the plan for we want you to move over here for simplicity reasons. And then it was like most of the podcast at one point was just an idea. And to think, now that I've interviewed people from Canada, the U.S, Australia, England, Scotland, like all over the place, I go, wait a minute, what happened to me? I love it, but what happened? It's awesome, Benen. It really is. Yeah. Grandpa? Huh? Grandpa is like, I don't know, I don't remember four years ago. Like that. Like you worked on at least at least 2 or 3 projects, right? How about four hours ago? I guess you. Always like, hey, look at this. Grandpa is like, every episode's the first episode to me. Grandpa, how do you keep it so fresh? I don't I don't I don't know where I am. Febreeze. I love you, man. I have a fun side question for everybody. Everyone wants to answer this is because I've been in I've been in the Olympic mood. If there and there's so many things that they're a part of Olympic, there's so many like different events. My question to you guys are, if there was a random ass event that you think you could train four years in right now and maybe compete, what would it be? I'll start. Okay. You, me start off so I can make it break the ice so you guys understand what's going on? Or do you guys want to just go in there? You tell me. Okay. Oof! I probably could medal. Oof! I don't know what I'm good at. Let me think. Okay, okay, I got it. I play Pokemon trading card game. Maybe you give me one deck for four years to practice with. I probably could beat some people. I probably could at least compete in almost metal because Pokemon trading card games would become Olympic sport. So I can try. Does anyone else have. Okay. Okay, rule for something similar? I would say not Pokemon cards, but I would say Duel Monsters. If you guys are familiar with the Yu-Gi-Oh! Franchise. Oh yeah, that one. Or I would say like most Reese's peanut butter cups eaten in an hour. There we go. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I feel like I could competitively eat professionally, like speedy as well. You should watch, Beard Meats Food on his YouTube channel. It's both hilarious and disturbing. Okay. How much he can eat. Yeah. I don't I don't like watching people with beards eat. It's just. Where is your sense of adventure, good, sir?…A random trivia night. I could do an Olympic trivia night. Something very neat. Yeah? Yeah. What was yours? Sierra? Brandon? I'm sorry. I mean– Not Brandon, Grandpa. I don't have any ideas, but it amazes me that they have breakdancing. That was my vote. As an Olympic sport. I could crush the women's breakdancing competition tomorrow. Wasn't that like a style of dance in the 90s? It's. I mean, breakdancing is like, everywhere now. Evidently. No, but I'm. Saying, didn't it start in the 90s or? Maybe—No… I want to say like 70s, 80s. Before my time. Started with, it started with hip hop. So whenever hip hop started. Oh, I was that like hip hop was at its hottest when NWA was on top. Maybe? But the old school like original hip hop that doesn't even have anything to do with, like, you know how many felonies you can commit in a day? Yeah. Way back before then. Yeah, I probably couldn't even get away with saying half the stuff Back then. You know what? Damn it, I can learn. Did you see this lady from Australia? Yeah. Rolling around on the ground, like a Swiffer jet? You know, this is also. Not even kidding. My issue with the Olympics is— Yeah, is they shouldn't be doing any— I don't think you should have art in the Olympics, because how do you judge dancing? How do you does someone sing like this? All objective. Right. So which was the gold medalist bad or something? I we I mean objectively, I don't know. Alright, pause.

So. This is what happened: 46:01

The first year ever breakdancing was in the Olympics. The men did fine, the women were not fine. And I don't know what the deal was. I'm going to choose to believe that the women didn't find out that they were going to be allowed to compete in the Olympics until, like 18 months ago. So they didn't get the full four years? No, a little bit of shade because it just wasn't the same as the men's competition at all. Just they're not even close. Yeah. And and really breakdancing as far as I know, is like a skill of your balance, endurance, core strength practice. So it's not like, you know, gymnastics where like women are going to have some skills like flexibility and different things like that, and men are going to have other skills where like they can have really strong shoulders and, you know, all that, lots of like muscles in different areas, like you're doing, you could do be you could be doing the same moves men or women if you're breakdancing. So I don't know what happened with the women. There was it just wasn't as good this there was this one Australia Australian woman who competed, who clearly had never done any breakdancing in an actual like competition or setting with other breakdancers because they would have bullied her out of existence for the way that she was dancing. And and she won? She won the gold? That she was like, no, she didn't win. She's literally like, you got point—Every round you get points from each of the judges. So I think you could have got like nine points each round. She got zero points every single round. No one else did that. No one else in the entire competition got zero points. I really just don't get it. It’s just not— It's just. What are they? What are they going to let— I just take away dancing. Damn it. Don't make sense. We’re lost for words. Take away dancing, period. What they gonna have next? Limbo? But I thought this was a cool idea because breakdancing is a very particular skill and there are a lot of ways to demonstrate it. I just think they went in a really terrible way about determining how to grade the performances and obviously about who to let in, because again, I'm just going to encourage you to look up Australian Olympic breakdancer. And it's not just Australia. We're not going to shade Australia because the men's Australian dancer was just fine. It was just her. She was saying she has a PhD in breakdancing and she studied it for years. And again, I'm not really sure what the deal was with her, but like there were other people, there were other performances that seemed really, really good. And then the judge in the round, like at the end of the round, the ratings would come out or the scores would come out and they would hardly get any points. And I think it would have been better if we could have gotten like some kind of like graphic, like an overlay of like, what are the rules? How are you scoring people? What is going on? Like, yeah, that's why I don't like it. This slippery slope I don't, I, I don't want it. It made it frustrating just to watch. It's not going to be in the next Olympics. Thank goodness. I don't think any I don't think because I can see the slippery slope. Slope. Next thing you know, we're going to have the American Idol at the Olympics, which I'm not against. But it's just like, I don't know, man. Stick to the Athletics. This was the coolest thing. I think we should have the UFC at the Olympics. We have boxing at the Olympics. Yeah. UFC makes more sense. We have ice skating at the Olympics. We need more violent sports to make Olympics interesting. Yeah. Well, Phines, I had exactly the same thought or feeling that you have that. How are you going to judge breakdancing? I mean, synchronized swimming and stuff, too. I mean, I take I love watching these things, but I personally I'm like, how do you win? You like watching that synchronized dancing? Yeah. No, I thought you said synchronized swimming. And I'm like, oh, I bet you enjoy watching that. It's the same thing. They changed. The whole thing was called synchronized swimming anymore. They call it like something different. But yeah, I don't mind it. Yeah, yeah. We talk them off for the ladies. I like this game. But I don't know I don't. Yeah it's okay. They're okay. Okay. Yeah. No. So so that's my vote I would say I could, I could stomp breakdancing competition. I could, I could get a medal in that or something that doesn't exist. I think I could train hard enough for “kazooership”, or some kind of kazoo related. Yeah. Skill, event. I think I would, I think I would eat on kazoo. For the most dramatic kazoo whistle. You get the gold. Right! Yeah. Kazoo performance. Maybe like kazoo on an obstacle course. Kazoo while riding a bicycle. Like something to put the athleticism back into it. But kazoo related. I thought you were talking about, like, that little thing that you blow the kazoo? Yes. The kazoo. It just added. Find out a way to finesse some athleticism into my kazoo-ership. And that's my pick. That's my choice. Okay. Brandon, what if there was.— If we could put Duel Monsters in there, We could put a Pokemon in there. I want my kazooership. That's true. Brandon, maybe we can team up and be like, A sketch duo team, or improv. We could. We get zip, zap, zoop each other to the gold. Yes. If, if there was improv in the Olympics, they would just shut the Olympics down. They would just. Just be like, we're done. We can't watch this anymore. It'd be like a jazz aids. The audience would be like, what is going on? There would be nothing more horrible than improv comedy on a global international stage. I don't know, I think it'd be pretty funny to see two different, two different cultures go against each other and we can see which one—and then— You definitely know who sucks right away? Yeah, yeah, most people suck at improv comedy. Most improv comedy sucks. So it'd be, it'd be rough. Wow. I would love to see who would. I would love to see the top three nations of, of—Top three countries of improv. I would. Then I'd know where to live. Oh, I'd love to see like Russia, China and Japan go at it. Improv. It'd be like, wait a minute. We definitely need translation. Yeah, like none of the jokes would land because they're all. Different languages, and they mean different things. I love Putin. Yes, I love Putin to the end. Like I love Putin. No. Give me Mitsubishi so I can get out of here. Yeah, we didn’t get anything. We should have one. Just terrible sport choice every four years. Just one. Just–we need just one. Every year we're just like, “Well… why?”“How do we get here?” Oh wait. No, that's I was thinking we should put sledge hockey in there, but I would imagine that's in the Paralympics. Maybe. What is it? Sledge hockey? What is it? Is it like curling? Well, no, it's like regular hockey. The only difference is, is if you have a disability, you're sitting on a sled, and either you're pushing yourself with your arms and hockey sticks, or someone is pushing you on the ice. Oh that sounds fun. I used to play that when I was younger. Holy crap. How do you— Do your fingers get jammed? I'll be so afraid my fingers would get smacked. No no no no no no no no no. Because your arms are on one side and then you hold the sticks and then you just kind of push down on the ice to give the to move forward or to move backwards. So it's like an. Like kayaking almost. Right? Almost. But with like hockey sticks on ice or someone is pushing you like holding the back of the sled and then moving on the ice. Which one did you do, Benen? That seems like polo, which seems exhausting. Was someone pushing you or were you doing the hockey sticks on? Like, my dad was pushing me most of the time because I like my arms have never necessarily… like I've got one good arm and the other one is like, I can work with it, but I'll be much slower if I try to use both. So. But it's the same thing. You play regular hockey, everybody is just sitting down and is either pushing themselves or getting pushed. How’d you do? Were you good? Well, it was kind of like it was just a kids thing. It wasn't like we're professional teams playing against each other all the time. You were either on the red team or you're on the black team. And then depending on who was able to show up, you would you would sometimes switch. And then the end of the season you'd play against the local police. Oh wow. And then I would say, “Hey guys, where your donuts now?” That's hilarious. Then says “The scoreboard!” You like,“There's your donut. Scoreboard.” Yep. Yeah that's cool. I don't think I've ever played hockey in my life. Ever. Well, I'm Canadian, so it's kind of against our wishes, whether we want to or not. That's hilarious. That makes sense. I was wondering why I was like,“Hockey? That's so interesting.” Well, it's like literally embedded in every Canadian to know something about hockey. Like, there were times where teachers would force us to watch the Olympics. And I, quite frankly, could throw the Olympics in a trash can for all I care, because it's not that amusing to me. But and as far as, like to me, like we're all people of planet Earth. So patriotism to me is not a big deal. Like we should all just be nice to each other. So I don't really necessarily like the competitive, like how crazy things get. And all the controversies that happen every year to me is just like a waste of time. So for me, it's like that. So in Canada, pretty much everybody knows a little bit about hockey. And teachers in school might make you watch games as far as like an assignment to be like watch how they're doing these exercises prior to training and stuff like that. And then maple syrup is also ingrained into us. That’s funny. But we don’t, like— Not everybody in Canada says “eh” I think Seth MacFarlane gave us that stereotype. No not everybody. And lumber. I think that's, I think that's a provincial thing because there are certain areas of Canada that have a much larger forest area, like Alberta, probably. There's so many, like all the best artists and comedians are from Canada or like a lot. I think Mike Myers is actually Canadian. And Norm MacDonald was Canadian. He's like one of my favorites. Was? What happened? Oh yeah. He’s still Canadian. In spirit. Seth Rogen’s Canadian. Canadian forever. He is? Yeah, Seth Rogen is Canadian. Seth Rogan. Oh my God I'm thinking of Joe Rogan. I'm sorry. Oh, God no. Hes… I’m sorry! That guy’s…That guy’s weird. You guys can have him. That would be hilarious if he was like, if he wasn't American but was. So yeah, “Amurica!” There are memes online, but it is true about them. I couldn't help but when I was watching the Olympics get like in my American bag. And as soon as, as soon as the Olympics were over, I'm like, I hate it here, ghetto ass place. But as soon as we were watching the Olympics I was like, America! America! Go! Go! Yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, yeah, it’s just very sad. I just find that annoying. Yeah. It is, it is quite annoying. Well, I mean, also, it's like. Sure, if we like, I can understand in some ways, like, hey, we want to represent our fellow like countrymen. I totally understand that. We wanna honor the freedoms of the sacrifices that people made to make the country what it is,. But at the same time, it's like, can we all just not be nice? Or can we all just be nice to each other? Could we try to avoid the two pointless world wars that we had over the last 100 years? Yeah. I mean, I guess essentially kind of what the Olympics are as they bring us together and go, “hey, we all know how to throw a ball, right?” Essentially, instead of, I think that is– I would hope that is one of the goals of the Olympics, is to bring everybody under the same roof to have one commonality, which is to win something. But I do understand. Yeah, that's what we hope for. But if you go back in history, I remember, Germany hosted the 1936 Olympic Games and they pretty much just used that as a propaganda tool. Yeah, but– To show that they were, like, a powerful nation. Yeah, I believe that, too. But I wouldn't say the Olympics was like the cause of anything or made things… I don't… I think there are worse things out there than the Olympics of, of, ruffling feathers of other nations and whatnot. But I do get what you're saying, though. Yeah, like Ukraine going into. Russia, they should have came in there with Olympics first? Should have been like,“Hey, this is the Olympic game” before they went in there? Well, actually, Russia wasn't in the Olympics. Sorry we're late. We're busy winning. As they come into Russia. Sorry we were late, comrade. We were trying to persuade the Ukrainians to share our ideals. Yes.. Maybe the Olympics would be like putting people together and go, hey, American and hey, Brazilian person, you guys are now synchronized swimming, dance. And then they'd figure it out. Throw ‘em in the water. They should be like. Get it to figure it out. Oh, I just thought of something. If they do do comedy, they should say, you know, Russia, they have the biggest tanks. You know, they might be compensating for something. There you go. And he whips his dick. What do you think about Ukraine? What do you think about Ukraine invading Russia, grandpa? Or not invaded, but like going into their territory? Well, it could get very serious. And same is true of, of, Israel and the Palestinians. You know, that's another issue where Iran is getting and, Israel is attacking Iran now. And Lebanon. All of it is– could be very dangerous. Do you think they would— do you do you think, if all the nukes go off in the world that, Philadelphia would be first or Los Angeles or New York? I was googling this today. I was just sitting there like, hey, wait, am I am I going to get…? Do I have even a minute? If the nukes go off? Well, actually, since you were talking about Israel being under possibly under attack by Iran, I recently interviewed a guest, from Israel, and she sent me an email that has to be up there is the most bizarre email that I've ever heard of. She just says, I thought it would be responsible of me to give you a heads up, that there's a possibility that Iran might attack Israel, and that we might be hiding in shelters for our own safety. So if the power goes out and I'm not able to make our interview, you know why. So at that point it was like, okay, now I've read everything in an email. And in terms of if all of the nukes go off, if there was any place that got hit first, I would honestly have to say, I think New York, just because of the sheer size of everything there. Like, it's very simple. I'm. I'm only 5’9”. Barely. I’m lying. I’m not 5’9”. I’m like 5’6”, maybe. You're fucked, Phines. You're. Oh. But I'm not that big! but you know, but New York is such a symbol of, like, America's success. America's alleged power. Or America’s, like, prosperity that I would assume that whoever doesn't like America would want to attack it first. They've tried before and failed, but this would be a big win if they ever decided to do it. Big win. I am a big deal. Well, that's that's true. It seems somewhat obvious, but if you look back when the United States bombed, Japan, they didn't bomb Tokyo, the biggest, city. And in Japan, they bombed. Yeah, but smaller. Nukes were just being tested at the time. They they were not aware of its full scope back in the 1940s. I think because we've seen so many tests now from other nations that if somebody was to drop a nuke, they would know exactly. Okay, we've done X amount of tests in the desert. We know the power that this thing could unleash if we put it in the right place. And they could possibly, even if they wanted to drop it in the ocean and cause giant nature catastrophes so they can say, oh, we didn't drop a nuke. It was a tsunami. Tsunami… Yeah. We’re just dancing at the end of the world. Well, I don't know if I would do synchronized swimming if there was a bomb in the water, but. Maybe. What can I say? Except you're welcome. Yeah. There it is. That's a good one. I see you still. I see you still have a sense of humor, Phines. Still there. I love it. Yeah. No, I keep thinking I'm not going to be funny. And then, lo and behold. This is the air. This happens. I don’t have to try sometimes. Maybe actually is. All the great stuff is happening. I tend to make, you know. Well, guys, unfortunately, I'm going to have to go. My battery’s at 10%, but it was a pleasure to see everybody again. I'm glad everyone is doing just so well. I will come on any time. You guys just send me an email and I will jump right back on here. But it's been a great time to come on. Everybody here, check out the Sit Down, Stand Out Show as soon as you're done listening to Grandpa and Chill. Buy my merch. Buy. Darn it. Yeah. Buy it. Hey, man, we we love you, Benen. And, we’ll, you know, we'll come on your podcast sometime. All right. We'll see you guys, down the road. Nice seeing you again, Benen.