#134 Death & Friends

Alright. Hello, everybody. Welcome to what's everyone? It's another episode of America Plus. I'm your host, Cole McCormick.

It's another week, another episode. What's going on, everybody? Welcome to

very late episode,

of the podcast, folks.

So I've been holding off doing this, and pretty much what I wanna do this week is catch up with you, man. So I've been gone,

and I've been depressed, and I've been sad, and I've been

really just going through the wringer of

a bunch of emotions.

Some negative, some positive, and,

you know, it's gotten to a point where I have lived through,

like, a mini chapter

of this moment in my life.

And,

that chapter is the death of my

father.

Oh.

Trying to bring some levity to this thing, dude. This is,

this is no good, dude. Oh, this is what it was. That's what I needed. The death of my father.

Serious. It's serious and dramatic.

It's so fucking sad.

Oh, shit. Hang on. My camera just fell. The YouTube video is gonna be hilarious. Just check that out.

Okay.

I

witnessed

my father

die

in the beginning of August.

My dad,

Kevin McCormick,

died on August 1st.

And it's been really hard, and what I wanna do is just share

a part of that story.

I don't know how much I wanna share. You know? This is really gonna be

this is really loose right here.

I've lived through it. I've thought about it, and it all led up to a certain moment

that will be,

a part of this episode as well. So I'm gonna talk about my dad's death and what I experienced, and then I'm gonna end it end this week

with, with a conversation

between me and Kyron Down. I actually got to hang out with Kyron,

who lives in Australia. He's from the mere mortals podcast.

His mom passed away,

this summer as well.

And so it was like a super niche

scenario.

I got to hang out with

a podcasting

2.0

friend whose parent died

this year too.

Like, I didn't know that would happen. I've known Kyren for a couple years, but it's just crazy how both of our parents passed away. And

we had an opportunity to hang out in California

at this convention called V con,

and

I don't really care about I I I I don't care about talking about V con.

You'll hear that conversation, so that's coming at the end.

Let me just try to, like, work through this too because

I've talked to a bunch of people. Right? Like, when it comes to talking about my dad's death,

there's been a ton of people.

We've already had,

you know, like, we have the urn, so my father's ashes are in the home.

We've had we put on a celebration of life,

not a memorial. We wanted to do a celebration of life

because that's just the way my family is, I guess.

And

we just saw more beauty in the moment, or we wanted to try to bring more beauty

from this dark moment.

And I think we did.

And so okay. So this is where I wanna start. This is where I wanna start the story. This is the story

from my perspective

of my father

dying.

It begins

somewhere near the end of July.

I had already been on a rhythm of visiting

my parents,

once a month,

since,

since May.

They came out for my birthday. We went to Legoland for my birthday. That was awesome. April was normal. April was pretty chill.

And then May came around, and then my dad is in the hospital for a week.

He has issues with his liver, and so I came out to visit him for that.

And then the next month, I came out towards the end

of towards the end of June just to see him again,

and that was a

good time. And there was a decline

happening.

And then I've and then, like, 2 weeks passed, and his birthday was coming up. So I came out for his birthday.

And between June July,

between the end of June

and his his birthday weekend,

there was a big

decline as well.

And, luckily, the whole family came out and celebrated him, and he was able to see the whole family.

His side of the family, at least. Like, his whole side of the family.

And that's grandparents. That's

that's cousins. That's nephews. That's that's nieces. That's, you know, that's literally everyone.

And it was really nice.

And,

and and then I go back to California, and I'm like, okay. So his birthday happened. Not too sure what's gonna happen now.

I was seeing a decline,

and

I wasn't sure what was going to happen.

And around, like, the twenties in July, like, the 21st or or 20th or I I don't know what it was.

I get a call from my mom. I was off work,

and,

my mom tells me that they

my mom tells me that that there's been an like, more decline,

like, really drastic decline, and hospice

will be beginning.

My mom

and dad together, I believe,

made the call to bring in the hospice, and they had

they had this, like, in home hospice

thing, which was

pretty convenient, to be totally real with you.

And they had already been there for, like, a day or something. Like, the like, the hospice people had already, like, met with my parents, and they've, like, brought in things over. And so, like, there's already been conversation with them, and my mom told me

the hospice nurse

told her that based on my dad's condition,

I need to come back home as soon as possible.

2 days later, I'm in Arizona

or day and a half later, whatever it was.

And it was really instinctual, dude. Like, I just really went for it. Like, I'm just like, fuck. Like, this is it, dude. This is it.

This is it. Like, I knew it. I knew it right there and then. Like, I mean, it it it's hospice.

Like, how how can you not think this is it when you hear hospice?

And,

because and so, musically, this is what I did after my mom told me that. I was home alone, and I I I was super sad. Right? I'm fucking crying,

and, like, I'm making plans to to come home. And

and I've been on a Michael Jackson kick when it comes to listening to music.

And I've been, like, I grew up with this, like, specific album, the album of his canceled tour, his canceled last tour.

He was making this song, like, these songs for his last one.

I grew up listening. Oh my god. This camera just fell again. Oh my god. I hope this is a good episode, folks.

The camera's falling.

He has a song on this album called this is it. That and and that's what Michael Jackson's last,

last concert was called. This is it. And so

I put on the orchestra version of that song, and it was just like it's a really emotional song, and it's a song about saying goodbye.

And it's a song about just, like it's a celebratory

and sad song,

and it was meant to be this, like, send off

for MJ.

And

and and I was already listening to it, but, like, the vibes of this song felt real, dude. Like, I don't know. I've just been connecting with Michael,

and

I'm fucking I'm fucking crying in North Hollywood while I'm listening to this song.

And,

the song begins like this. It it's Michael's voice, and it's like,

this is it.

Here I stand.

Light of the world, I feel grand. I'm thinking about my dad, and I'm fucking crying. I'm like, fuck. My dad's fucking dying, but he's so fucking amazing. My dad like, my dad's incredible. Like, fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

Fuck. Like, I'm literally, like, walking around

my neighborhood, like, trying to handle it. Trying to fucking, like, just just let it flow and handle it at the same time, if it's possible.

And I was able to cry a lot,

And and then I'm in Arizona.

Okay? And then and

I come home

not knowing what hospice will be like, not knowing

what the situation will be. I've already seen a decline. I'm like, I guess I'm gonna see more decline. I don't know what that looks like.

And I'm not gonna go into details of of that, but,

I will say it was it was 1 week of hospice.

And that one week of hospice

was

the most intense week

of my life.

Like,

I've never gone through boot camp or any military training, but, like, I just feel like

any amount of physical

exercise and some strange man yelling at me is, like, nothing compared to watching my dad die.

Like and and, like, helping him and holding him and, like

like, I I I seriously

went through

a traumatic experience,

and

I feel honored

for going through that,

if you can understand that at any level.

It was my father's wishes to stay home

in the last days of his life. He had our already communicated that. He wanted to die at home,

The home that he's been in since 2004.

The home that he's been building with my mom

for 20 years.

And so

in this moment, it was about the whole family.

Me,

my 2 sisters, Hannah and Lauren,

my mother,

and my grandmother. My dad's mom.

It was us that were the ones that had to hold all of this weight.

We were the only and and

I'm not trying to, like,

say, like, other family members didn't do anything. I'm just saying, like, we're in the home. You know? Like, when you're in the home, when you're actually, like, living in the home

and it's happening, it's like there's so much weight that's going on. There's so much

worry. And, like, it's like you're checking on a baby 247,

but that baby is someone that everyone relies on.

And and you're and you have to grapple with this thing, with this fact that, like, you're not gonna be able to to rely on them anymore.

And,

you know, there's just really beautiful moments between me and my dad.

The one thing that I wanna share is the prayer.

A full circle moment that happened with

my dad and I

during hospice was

there was moments where I had to help,

maneuver him,

and help hold him in place

while,

things were being changed and things were being like, wounds were being cleaned and and and things like this. So I had to hold him and

I was really physically close to him. Like, my face and his face were were really close. And,

there was when I was a kid,

when I was, like, under 5,

my dad would pray with me

right before bed. You know?

And there was, like, 2 times

that I felt,

that I should say that same prayer

to him.

It was like

it it wasn't like

a religious prayer. Like, it wasn't anything, like, from the Bible or anything. Like, it was just like his own little thing, you know, and I would just repeat that to him.

The

I'll just say it. I'll be brave. When when I was a kid, my dad would say to me

or or he would be praying,

god,

thank you for sending your angels to protect this house.

Thank you for protecting Cole. Thank you for protecting me. That he would, like, thank protecting people and the family.

Protect this house,

and

and just thank you for that.

I forget all the it's like it's like I I remembered everything, and then and then I said it, but I don't remember it now. But pretty much, like, he just said, thank you for your protection. Thank you for sending your angels to protect us. And and and and I was able to say that same prayer to

him while he was, like, in my arms. You know?

And, like, his face is right next to mine, and, like, I'm literally, like, holding his head.

And it just, like it was so fucking intense, dude.

And, you know, I I was communication was really low

in the last week.

Communication was pretty solid until the last week.

And he passed away

from specifically

liver failure.

The cancer

made his liver fail,

and then

toxins that the liver

filters

were collecting

in his body and brain.

And that's the way that was explained to us.

And so

when that happened when that happens,

you know, attention is sort of going away and, like, sort of focusing on different things and not really knowing what's going on. Sometime like,

not that you're confused, but, like, you're just quiet, and you're not really cooperating.

So it's like it's like it it's like this, like, distance thing.

And that didn't really affect me. Like, I was like, okay. So, like, he's not talking. Okay?

Like, for some reason, the the communication thing was barely an issue

for me emotionally

because he was still able to communicate, like, even up until the very end. Like, he was like, there was like, if you, like, really got with him, like, if you

if you asked him an extremely direct question, he could answer it. You know? Like, I was, like, I was doing my best to, like, figure out, like like, whatever the problem was. I was trying to get to that solution. I was trying to figure out his comfort with the perfect

wording of a question so that he can answer it as simply as possible.

Yes. No.

Yes. No. And I'm trying to, like, figure out, like, the best questions for these answers to happen

that will create as much comfort as possible. And

so I was just going through that, and

every day was a new day.

There was a new decline every day. Cycles of 24 hours,

learning how to move him, learning how to talk to him, learning

how to do whatever, and then the next day, it's a completely different thing. It's a completely different system. It needs to be completely we're throwing it out the door.

Bring in the new plans.

So that was just extreme stress, you know,

aside from the fact of cancer. You know? Just that sheer fact of, like, the entire

thing, the entire way that you're approaching the problem needs to change

right now, like, again. It needs to change again. You need to pivot again. You need to change the plan again.

You need to be diligent. You need to be vigilant. You need to be compassionate. You need to be on your toes. You need to be thinking about

and and people have jobs and people are, like, working and, like, it it was just so chaotic.

It was so chaotic, and so many people were coming in and out of the house,

all in love, of course, but it was just so many people. Like, in, out, in, out. Friends,

acquaintances,

close friends, nonfriends,

doctors, nurses, pastors, chaplains.

Like, it's just like, boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. I was just like, damn. It's like the house barely felt,

like, private. The house barely felt like a home. You know? So, I mean but but it was a home. You know? Like, we we made sure that it was a home, but it was so

it was just so chaotic.

And but in that chaos,

what I'm willing to say and what I'm willing to bet my entire life on is that

I can prove

or I have proven that my family

in this last week or in the last week of my dad's life,

my family brought heaven to Earth

for my father to transition.

This is something that I believe in firmly.

I believe in souls.

God is real.

We are in a spiritual war.

Earth

is in the process

of ascending,

And

I just witnessed my dad die in the most intense way possible, but my family did everything we could to make sure that love

was at the core of it.

My family

did everything we could

on a collective level and on an individual

level to make sure that love

and gratitude

was in our hearts.

This is something I believe in fully.

Along with the sadness,

along with the pain,

I firmly believe that my family

brought love to the forefront

of this cancer.

And we are not victims

of this cancer.

This cancer is like

some fucking rando who steals your phone charger out of your car when you're sleeping. Like, it's some it's just some random fucking shit. Like, Cancer is so random.

Cancer?

Like, who the fuck is Cancer?

Funny enough, my dad's astrology sign is Cancer. Does that mean anything?

Like, that was ironic.

Thank you. Thank

you. Thank you, God. I don't know.

So

it's like the end of July. Right? Where it's, like, 28th or 29th or it's a 3rd. It's late, dude. Like, it's late, and my dad's declining every day.

And I'm praying for him, and I'm crying, and I'm, like, thinking about what's going on, and I don't know when the last day will be.

That's the other crazy thing about this. You no one knew when it was gonna happen.

That's the craziest thing. I think that's the craziest thing about life right now.

No one knows

when they're gonna die.

But there's, like, scenarios that are, like, you're gonna die soon.

You're gonna die any day.

And it's, like, what does that really mean? It's, like and there's, like. And within life, people are like, don't worry about the doomers.

Don't worry about people who say you're gonna die from the chemicals

and the wars. Don't worry about this. Live your life.

Live your life. Don't worry about that. And then I'm seeing my dad die.

I'm worrying about my dad dying any day.

And so it's pretty fucking hard to have a positive mindset and to live your best life,

to own the day, to win the day,

and then I was to also see this. So it's like, I was just going through such a mind fuck, dude. I don't know.

Like, everything about my life has been about progress,

improvement,

and, like, it's like, I now I need to deal with, like, decline and death, and, like, it's not even, like

like, some people might say, like, a breakup is a form of death or, like, losing friends is a form of like like and I've been through those things,

but, no, those things are not death.

Death is death,

and death

happened.

It was July 31st.

Everyone went home. My grandparents and aunt had come over to say hello, and it was

a big tear fest, of course. And, you know, my dad was getting worse and worse and worse.

And it was like and and

it felt like a casual night. July 31st

was a very casual night for my family. We got through another day,

and I had been there

I had been there a week.

And,

you know, it was just,

like, alright. Let's go to bed. Let's get ready for the next day. Like, it was almost like it was almost like we were, like, ready for the next day. It was almost like we were, like, excited. Like, we're gonna fucking kill tomorrow, dude. Like, tomorrow,

the next August 1st

is about to be a good day. Like, we were, like, almost ready for it. And,

my mom

okay. So as the week was,

progressing,

as my dad was declining, my mom was put on a medicine schedule to to to administer

the medicine to my dad.

And we had transitioned him from

physical pills to liquid morphine,

and my mom was on a schedule of giving him that.

And

the night of July 31st, I said good night to everyone. I just said good night to my dad

casually. You know, he wasn't really talking, so I didn't really

like, I didn't really touch him or kiss him good night or say good night to him. I just said, hey. Alright, guys. Good night. I just said good night to my parents just, like, from afar.

And

my mom was on the schedule, and she had to wake up every, like, 4 hours or she had to give it to him every 4 hours. So

and she

she gave it to him at 10:30,

and everything was fine.

And

she had an alarm for 2:30,

and she gave it to him, and he was super unconscious, I guess.

He was, like, barely there,

but still sort of able to, like, accept that he was taking medicine. You know?

And my mom was just, like, looking at him and just holding him and

kissing him and loving him and,

just wanting to be there for him. And she was you know, my mom, you know so they're high school sweethearts. My parents met in high school.

My dad my mom started dating my dad to get her ex boyfriend jealous.

My parents lived through a 19 nineties

high school romcom

sitcom. Like, it's fucking

it's it's perfect. It's Romeo and Juliet

meets 10 things I hate about you

meets fucking Casino. Like, it's incredible. Like, my parents' life is incredible. My parents' love story is awesome.

And,

you know, I don't have my mom's perspective. I, I never will, but I can't believe I can't imagine what she was seeing.

But it was 2:30, and she gave him the medicine. And then

my my mom wasn't really sleeping a lot. Right? And

she wasn't planning on going to bed.

And for some reason, she's just like, you know, it's 2:30. It's 3 in the morning. Of course, she falls asleep. She just sort of, like, she dozes off.

And then my mom

describes

this moment of

she

just shoots up out of bed.

She sits up and stands up right away,

out of the blue.

And then or she doesn't stand up, but, like, she sits up right away. And she looks over to my dad,

and

she puts his hand on his chest. Like, she usually like like, she had been she had already been in a rhythm of putting her hand on on his chest,

just checking on him.

And in this moment,

he wasn't breathing,

but he was warm.

And she goes over to him,

and she checks on him, and she she just continues to just hold his chest for a moment.

And she's

and she's just

sitting with him right there, and she's, like, she's on his side of the bed now, and she's looking at him,

and and he's warm. His hands are warm. His face is warm.

And my mom begins to talk to God. She goes, god, did you just take him now?

Was it was it just now, God? Oh, Lord. Was it just now?

Really? Was it did this really just happen now?

And my mom checked if you know, my mom was sort of, like, worried that she overdosed him, first of all. So she's like, she double checks the medicine. She's like,

and she's like, okay. And it wasn't that. She didn't she administered it perfectly. She gave him she gave him, like, I think, less than the recommended dose, whatever, but she she was fine with that. That calmed down, and then

and then

she has she has, like, one more minute with him. She knows she takes her moment with her man.

My mom told us later on that she

sort of repositioned

my father's hands and

and head.

And,

my mom, like, got him ready

for us to see him,

which is so fucking real. Like, it's it's so insane. Like, it's just

it's just so

real.

And,

I woke up before my mom woke me up. I woke up, like, my

within, like, 2 steps of my mom being at my door, I woke up.

And then next thing I know,

like, I open my eyes and then I see her walking in,

and it's like, fuck. Like, I know exactly what's going on. Like, I now I know what's happening. And my mom whispers to me,

hey, sweetie. Sweetie, honey,

We gotta get up now. Papa's passed away. Dad's passed away now.

And,

the reason why

it's like

I don't know why. Like, I had, like, some crazy,

like, instinct. Like, I had some insanely weird, like, my mom's here.

And just just to hear my mom whisper that, like, I was like, oh my god. Like and it was it was like a peaceful thing. Like, it it wasn't like a shocking moment.

It was like a peaceful moment. Like,

honey, it's time to get up.

He's passed.

And it

I I wish I could, like,

I wish I could, like, transport what I felt from my heart to your heart. Like, that's just and I just like, wow. Like, I took in that moment, and I just sat up, and I held my mom's hand for just a moment.

I just I just wanna hold her hand. I just

I I just held it.

And then

I got up, and then we went to my sister's room.

And my sister Lauren, she woke up before I got in there, and I whispered to her, hey, sis, Laura.

We gotta get up. Dad's passed away now.

And then she gets up. She goes, okay.

And then I go to and then I go to Hannah's room, and that's where that's where my nephew is as well. And

and and my sister, like, her her biggest

as soon as I told her,

her the first thing that came out of her mouth was,

what am I gonna tell Wyatt?

Like, what am I supposed to tell Wyatt?

And that was just like, fuck. Like, fuck.

Like, we have to tell the 5 year old now. Like, we seriously have to plan to tell a 5 year old. Like, wow. Okay. So that's another stressful thing.

And

and then we saw him. We walked in. My my grandmother was up as well. My grandma was up going to the bathroom when we were all waking each other up.

So that was just a wild serendipity

thing. Like, we all had this wild instinct to just be up soon, and

and we

had a moment

with him. We had a lot of moments with him. We had a good while.

We had a couple hours.

And by this time, this is like it's it's like 3:45.

It's like 4 in the morning.

My dad passed away at 3:40

in the morning on August 1st

2024. It's just, like, surreal, dude. I have a recording. So I did do

a little recording,

like, audio thing on my phone. Like, I I I don't think I wanna share that. I I have been

in the last 3 weeks, I have been recording quite a bit of audio

between myself

and and my family,

but I don't know if that's, like, really appropriate to share.

You know? I I just it was like, I sort of treat I've been treating, like, audio recordings as, like, time capsules,

and I just had the instinct to record something to myself.

And the moment was just intense, dude.

Like, the moment was just intense, and it was so beautiful at the same time.

And everyone is crying, like, just to

just to live in the moment of your entire family crying in your home

because your dad has passed away.

To see my grandmother cry.

To see my sisters cry.

To see my mother cry.

You know, these are things that are, like, very sad,

and these are things that I hope, like I mean, I hope no one experiences, but so many people experience this.

So many people.

And when I say I saw beauty in it, I just I I couldn't stop while I'm looking at my dad

laying in the bed, I just couldn't stop thanking him about being a good dad.

Thank you for being a good dad.

Like, thank you. I couldn't stop saying thank you. Thank you.

Thank you, God. Thank you, Dad.

Thank you, God, for dad. Thank you, dad,

for being such a good dad.

And it's just, like,

it's so romantic and sad and

beautiful. Like, I and the one beautiful thing, the one nice thing, like, the thing that I'm trying to do

to move forward is

I can try

I mean, not try. Like, it it it is clear. Like, it's objectively true. My dad had a wonderful life,

and I can wrap up my dad's life and story in a beautiful gift.

And I can keep that gift

to myself

to inspire me and to help push me forward. That's what I've been trying to hold on to and trying to

like, that like, that's what I'm thinking about.

My dad lived a wonderful life.

He went he went skiing. He went he went snow skiing. He went jet skiing. He went to Cabo. He went to Costa Rica.

He went to New York. He went to California.

He started a business. He owned a home.

He ran a company for 20 years.

He held that company. He ran the company with his wife

for 20 years.

He had a teammate

for, like, 30 years. My parents were married. Oh, oh, oh, okay. So he dies on August 1st. Right?

And then 4 days later, August 5th, it's my parents' wedding anniversary.

So

great.

Hold awesome.

Thanks, world. Thank you, God.

Thank you, God. My mom was

really happy on that day.

It's just like, I I don't wanna say irony, but it is just, like, of course. Like, of of course. Of course. There's irony, and then there's, of course. Of course, that happened.

Of course, he died 4 days before their wedding anniversary. Of course, they were married for 29 years,

and he dies right before they can celebrate

it. I guess that's I I guess that's one way to get out of a gift.

I'm just doing my best to stay lively, folks. I'm doing my damn best to stay

somewhat

somewhat light.

So yeah. Just like Shakespeare.

He died.

Nothing else to say, dude. Like, I can go on and on and on about

about everything that happened. You know, I can't really I can

if you wanted to pull your heartstrings,

wait for the movie. Okay? But this podcast, like, this is just real. This is me being real. It fucking sucked.

It was traumatic.

I I held my dad in my arms like I never thought I would.

I

told him I spoke in his ear like I never thought I would. I I tried to make sure that he felt loved

and cared for in a way that I never thought I would.

I did I did so many things that I never thought I would.

And it's just it's like,

I I I have expand like like, a part of myself is broken,

and I'm trying to expand from that. Like, I know this moment is breaking me.

And I'm and and and I want I've been seeking a a more beautiful world. I've been seeking

a better life, an abundant life, a happy life, and it's just,

like, I'm trying like, I I need this

to be there's the camera again.

Freaking camera falling down.

I

need I will make my father's death

a catalyst

for this better life. I will use my father's death in life as inspiration

for fire.

I will use it as fire

in my stomach, in my chest.

I will use it for energy. Like, I'm trying to. Like, I'm I I have the intention to do that. I

I'm so I'm still in Arizona right now,

and,

I've been in Arizona for, like, the last, like, month and a half.

And,

just been helping with my family.

Doing my best to

just be there for them.

Just to talk, you know? Like,

it's really just about being around, you know?

That's what life is really about. Like

like, like, it

when someone's not around, it it's nice when they are around.

And so I haven't been around my family,

like, in this type of a way in a really long time. You know, just

like a month plus.

And,

so,

hopefully, like, my just the the sheer presence

of us being together, hopefully, that's that that's been healing. I I think it has been.

And, you know, I'm just doing yard stuff. Just

picking up dog poop. You know? Just trying to you know? I'm painting

things.

I'm painting. My mom wants me to paint things in the backyard.

Of course, my mom has a project for the backyard,

so I'm just trying to make her happy. Just want her to be happy and just trying to

make sure the backyard is good. Just trying to do my best for that. Just trying to put my effort, my energy into something productive, something helpful.

But it looks like I'll be going back to California

on Wednesday,

3rd or 4th or whenever that is.

I'm gonna go back home. I'll go back to California Wednesday, and then we'll see how my life is after that.

That is, like, the real beginning

of the new life.

Okay. So my dad died on August 1st, and I met up with Kyren

on August,

9th. Yeah. I met up with Kyron on August 9th. So

a week after my dad died, and I was debating on if I should meet up with him. So

so this is what's gonna happen. So

I'm gonna play a song, and then you're gonna hear a conversation between me and Kyron.

And, I was debating on being with Kyron to begin with because, you know, like, it's just serious shit. Like, I don't know if I should go or not. Kyron invited me. Kyron gave me a free ticket

to a convention in Los Angeles called V Con,

and

he invited me months prior to all of this happening.

And

because it had been, like, a week,

and because

his mom died as well,

I thought it might

be good to go out there,

you know, and just to just to regroup myself, you know, try to, like, reorganize, you know, the apartment. You know? Because Shannon is out in California still, and

she was only able to be out here for

a few days during hospice and a few days for like, after his death. So, like, she's been out there, and I've been over here. And

I just felt like like, I I I need to go over there. I I just need to be in California for a minute, and and so I went over there, and

it was really worth it.

It was really worth it, and I had a really good conversation with Kyren.

We didn't really talk about death. We we talked about so Kyren and I, we talked about death on, like, the first day that we were hanging out, but this was recorded on the last day that we were hanging out because that was when things were most fluid. That's when things were pretty pretty good. I mean, the whole thing was good, but, like, but, like, just, like, conversation wise, you know, podcast wise, like, that's when that's when things were were the best.

And so I'm happy I recorded it. I recorded it on my phone. I used Adobe to try to clean it up,

but I was just trying to insert myself into something of a normal situation.

So the conversation was a little therapeutic and

a little just trying to get back into the swing of things, and and I'm just grateful that I got to talk to Kyron. I I've been thinking about Kyron for multiple years now

just because of podcasting 2.0, and him and I being some of the youngest people involved

with it, or

have been following it the longest.

And,

so it was just very niche, like, just super niche. These podcasting 2.0 guys whose parents both died this year are hanging out.

So yeah. So we didn't talk about death, but we talked about, you know, just like we just chilled. It was just a nice little convo. So and that's why the I wanna end the episode on a nice conversation because I don't want this to be a downer. Like,

I want to just express that

I guess what I've been able to experience

in this era of my dad dying is

I experienced something really, really, really, really sad,

but I also had access and opportunity to be with friends

and to connect and to share

and to be oh, and to open up my heart with them.

I still had that opportunity to be open,

and I think that's, like, the biggest thing that people need.

The biggest piece of information that you need from this podcast is

to move through a tough situation.

You need to look

for opportunities

that will

keep your heart open.

You need to have the intention

to keep your heart open.

Because when your heart is open,

you'll be able to give yourself

to a new thing, or you'll be able to to lean into difficulty. When your heart is open,

like, it can seem scary, but that openness brings strength.

And it's only because of my hangouts with Kyron. It's because, like, I've been able to, like, sort of ground myself a little bit because I know someone else on Earth is going through something similar.

So just shout out to Kyron, dude. Shout out to Kyron down in the mere mortals down in Australia.

Like, that's legit, dude. Thank you so much for being you, Kyron.

Thank you for being a guy.

Thanks for thanks for being a guy, Kyron.

You're such a dude.

Okay. What do I wanna okay. But before I play the conversation with me and Kyren, I do wanna just do a little do a little, palate palate cleanse. I'm gonna play a song here,

a value for value song.

I heard the song on the podcasting 2 point o show. I really vibe with it.

The song is called it's from an artist named

who is this again?

From Cara Frazier.

It's called I wanna be your woman.

Just a romantic song, and they're getting okay. I'm also changing

I mean, at least for this episode, I'm changing the satoshi thing. So there's this, like, thing called boostograms.

Oh, shit. Do I gotta read the boostograms?

I don't wanna read boostograms this week. I don't wanna read boostograms. I'll read boostograms next week.

Boostergram so okay. So let me just tell you. Value for value, if you're if you're new to this. If this is your first episode,

this whole thing is based off of the value

you are receiving

and seek to reciprocate.

So

we're doing these thing in, like, modern podcasting apps. You can download a modern podcasting app

like Fountain or Podcast Guru. Go to value for value dot info for more info, then download the fountain dot f m app. It's the best way to support the show. Fountain dot f m is, like, a great way to, like, experience what I'm about to do. I'm I'm about to play a song, and you're able to support the musician

or the musicians

in this song.

And I'm giving them 90%

of your support. So if you're in fountain

and you wanna send in some Satoshis, which are small bits of Bitcoin, it's totally your choice.

During the duration of the song,

Kara Frasier and the Aqueducts,

who this song is featuring,

they're all getting 90%. They are splitting 90% of your of your satoshis, which is pretty cool.

I used to be 60, but now I feel like I should do 90. I don't know. Just an instinct. I like 9 90 is cool. 60 was cool. I just think nineties cooler. You know? The nineties are cool.

But this is a good song. So vibe with it. Chill with it. Thank you for listening to my cancer story,

and enjoy the conversation with Kyron, and just

believe in a more beautiful world, I guess.

Yeah. Go for it, dude. Don't don't don't be afraid

to move forward through difficulty.

I love you so much, dude.

So again, this is Kara Frazier featuring the aqueducts.

This is called I wanna be your woman.

Don't forget to set it up boostagram.

To the days

when we were young,

when I

was just a fool.

And you

were the boy foreigner next door.

Then you left this town

to make some friends of yourself.

Now they brought you back around.

Okay. Now we're good.

Beautiful.

We are sitting in my car in downtown Los Angeles. I am with Kyron Down Yeah. Of the Mere Mortals podcast. What's up? We are ingesting peanuts and

legal

cannabis products. Absolutely. We're at Vicon,

and this might be an America Plus episode. This might be a private episode. Could be, like, even just a clip that you put in as well. Just a clip. I mean, could be a long clip.

To me a long clip. Yeah. I do. But

oh, yeah. You'll have to take me through your process because I know nothing about

my drops for what? Anything related to,

joints or Or you wanna smoke this with me? No. Absolutely not. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm interested. Okay. But you're interested

in how I do it. So this is just a little pipe

that I bought at the dispensary.

I

was smoking out of a bong for a long time,

that the dispensary gifted me.

Do you notice anything, like, lung issues from smoking? Because that's the thing that always and not just smoking

anything. I've I've always just kind of that's why I don't like, hot coffee and and stuff as well. It's just ingesting liquids or gases Yeah. That really puts me off. Hot food as well, but I still do that. Me me personally,

I've only had

if I did have any lung issues, I would feel it with a vape.

Yep.

Whenever I do flour,

it's just a lot more casual. It's a lot more manageable. Sure. So, like, I'm just I'm just not worried about flour in any way because

it's the most I feel like it's, like, more digestible. Like, your body's able to handle it. Yeah. I Yeah. I'm not a connoisseur of of of wheat mejuana Yeah. Per se, but,

the time to have had it is and that's like less than 5 times, I think.

It was

apart from the first time, it was always through edibles.

I just Did you like that or no? Yeah. I prefer the experience of it. I don't know much about the different types of highs or the feelings.

It's always just been more out of interest for me rather than,

no.

It rolled out my windows to blow away from you. It's just hitting me right in the face. Oh my god. I'm sorry. That's probably it.

When you geek, when you eat weed, I think I told you this, your liver processes

a chemical that's 5 times stronger,

than

normal THC.

It might get enhanced. Yep. Yep. So it's like people have crazy experiences

on edibles.

Sure. Sure. So

And to be careful. Yeah. Yeah. Just be careful. Yeah. But I'm not not looking for a crazy time.

Although, t pain, who knows? They'll hype me up.

I'm looking to chill, dude. T Pain? No problem.

Okay. So Yeah. I was thinking a bit more in the back. Not Yeah. Yeah. Front row. Yeah. Not front row. That'd be cool, though.

You should check out this video, T Pain. He did a live performance

at a casino or some sort of hotel,

but he does a bunch of covers,

along with some of his,

songs. Is it is it the one with him as a there's, like, a violinist

and a guy in the piano? It's like a whole band in the back, and he's, like, dressed up. Okay. And it's like a pretty small room.

There's a lounge area. There's one which is him in the lounge area. That's just him and I believe a violinist and

a piano player. Yeah. It's like I think it's called To the Beat by Kurt Schneider.

T Pain or something. Okay. And it's a mix up, you know, of his soul. So we Yeah.

You know, go from buy me a drink

to,

helicopter, take your shirt off, or or whatever.

And my friend Joey,

Juan, and I, when we're in, I think it was Mexico, we were just obsessed with this. Just it's like acoustic T Pain. Yeah. And you realize, holy shit, he's got a really good voice. Oh, he was on Masked Singer. You saw that one.

No? No. Not really. That so the whole, oh my god, t Pain can sing normally Mhmm. Thing

came about because there's this,

game show. I know of it. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So he won that game show. Oh. And when you win it People didn't recognize his voice?

No.

And, like, he's, like, covered the whole time soon. So I get that, but I would have thought you'd know his voice. Right? I mean, just go to the music. Like, everything is auto tune. Like, T Pain,

like, Stone for, like like, Kanye did auto tune, but t Pain, like, popularized Oh, yeah. Auto tune. So

Absolutely. This is that era. 08, 09.

It's a wild time. Mhmm.

And then we sit so

the video I saw was called, like, a night with tea paint or something. Cool. Cool. I'll have to look it up. Oh my gosh.

What what have you taken away from V con from

the couple of days we've been here? It's definitely positive, and I think it's necessary.

I think a lot of the I think they might be reaching with some of the people. Like, they might be, like

sometimes the people

in the panels are aligned with what recon

is

on, like, a ideal level.

And some other guests, I can tell that they're just, like, there because

They'll bring in crap. Yeah. They had some leverage or they had something. I don't know. Yeah. So but I really appreciate the positivity.

I really appreciate just being here. It was like, you invited me. Out of the fucking world. It was. Out of the fucking world. I think I I had it in my mind a little bit earlier, but I I didn't have a solid plan yet of really coming to the US.

So it was more

I I can't remember. It was 2 months ago, 3 months ago, maybe?

I think it was in, yeah, June. Yeah. And

that's the same, like, I'm gonna see

PETA, the the baller booster, living in in Canada

on Monday.

That's when I fly there. And, yeah, with him, it was also just a month ago or something. I'm like, hey, what are you doing? Yeah. This date here. Yeah. And and he he had it for you. So I was like, absolutely.

But that's how it should be. That's how traveling should be. That's how meeting up with friends should be. I have an a relationship with this guy.

His name's Wes.

Mhmm. One of my, like I would consider him, like, a really good friend.

Our family has actually, like, spent a Christmas together,

and it was really random. Like, I wasn't prepared for that Christmas,

but, like, it it it's, like, cherished now.

And, before I moved to LA,

me and him and another friend of mine,

we had this,

we all went hiking in Sedona, Arizona.

And Sedona is

infamous not infamous,

famous for being beautiful

and

just good vibes. There's

on the spiritual side, people will say that there's vortexes, energy vortexes in certain locations. Okay. And they, like, help you feel better, like, you feel really good when you do these hikes. That's a good thing? Vortexes. Uh-huh. Okay. Yeah.

It's in Sedona. It's just beautiful. Beautiful sunset. It's

red rocks and green trees. Mhmm. It's a beautiful area. And we had this hike. That's fantastic. And,

like, right when we first parked,

there's these people coming from their hike and they're on horseback.

And they're walking by us, and they let us, like, sit on their horses.

And they do, like, a little, like, walk around the parking lot. And, like, we had just parked. Yeah. So, like, just perfect moments right after that. And then

him and my other friend Nate who was there, they're a little weird. They hike barefoot. That's that's horrible. So, like, as soon as we got on the dirt, they just took off their shoes. I was like, what are you guys doing? Yeah. So they were grounding for anyone. Did you, did you join along with them? I didn't partake.

I didn't partake. I was like, you guys are I don't wanna kick hold my shoes.

Funny you. You make decisions like that based on just pure practicality.

Yeah. It's not worth it. It's it can be like a

relatively

simple

like, could be a life changing thing, and you're like, yeah. But I I just don't wanna care about shoes, man. Exactly. Exactly.

Well, I didn't realize until, like, years later, like, oh, barefoot is actually pretty healthy.

I used to run barefoot.

No way. Yeah. I tried it,

I tried it on asphalt once, and I

got plain enough asciitis from that. So I did not do that again. Yeah. That's dangerous. Yeah. But, when I I do work out barefoot. Yeah? Yeah. Like, I like to as well. When I'm,

At the park? At the park,

you just get dirty feet sometimes. So,

and when I'm in the gym, I kinda have to wear socks because

it's weird.

You can you can take off your shoes and you're just in socks and no one will say anything. But as soon as you take your socks off, it's like, dude. Get your stinky feet

out of my face. Yeah. I don't know if it's a stink thing or if it's a grossness thing. People just don't like feet. I'm not sure what it is, but yeah, man. You start taking socks off, and people aren't happy.

Okay. So this is what I've actually wanted to ask you

about the gyms in Australia.

Out here, at least in my experience, the gyms are very

they have a corporate feel. They have a

grid feel to them. Go. Go. But sometimes when I see you guys

when I see the Mere Mortals Instagram,

both of your gyms, like, it seems like you and 1 go to different gyms, and they're both really interesting. Like, one goes to 1 with, like, ropes,

that go up to the ceiling, and he has rings, and it's a lot of power lifting. And you go to I'm not like, what's the type of gym that you go to? So he goes to 1 which is called,

yeah, Crossfittorium.

So it's a Crossfit gym. Crossfit. Okay. So basically just imagine

big warehouse

with,

padded fours and then they've just chucked tons of stuff. Come hand them to me. You can sweat, you can take your shirt off, you can grunt, you can yell.

Like it's kind of expected, I guess. Yeah. So that's why he likes it though.

He he did a bit of CrossFit, got into that for a while, and then I think he's he's backed off where he likes training lots of different things now. Yeah. Me?

I was in the most,

commercial,

what what would you call it, franchise gym called Good Life. Okay.

Welcome to the Good Life. Nice.

And it was good just because it was really close and it gave you access to lots of gyms, so you could go and train with like your friends at different places. Yeah. The whole yeah. The whole state. Yep.

And then I got tired of that and then I went to a really fancy one, which I'll probably join back in October again,

called

and when I say fancy, I mean boujee bed. Fancy, fancy. Yeah. You go in. There's this, you know, vertical hanging plants.

There's lots of wood everywhere.

You get the scent of pine. It's got a yoga studio attached. It it was

a properly good gym.

And,

yeah. The the equipment was all fresh and new. It was only a year old. Lots of really high ceilings. I love high ceilings and,

the light would come in as well. Like, lots of windows and stuff.

Mhmm. And that one was called Total Fusion.

And yeah. So I'm I'm probably gonna go back there again. I think it was That's cool. It it it had a good vibe. It had

it's like

I wanna it's it's cool. I guess because Brisbane

is

I imagine if you had this gym in LA, the people who went who would go to it, I would absolutely hate

because it is probably the most influencer gym Yeah. Okay. In Brisbane. Okay. But

because Brisbane's just it's still

even though there's 2,000,000 people and it's like the 3rd biggest city in Australia, it still feels

a little bit of a country town sort of thing. You know, that's not you know, I don't get real city vibes from it. Right.

So

the people there yeah. There's a couple of influencers, but we just don't really have influencers.

Yeah.

And

You have influencers. No. No. No. I can tell you. You have influencers. Fitness influencers? Sure.

The girls? It's it's

yeah. Look, maybe I don't live in that world much. So Yeah. I'm I'm probably a little bit out of touch with that. That that is correct. There's definitely a lot of Australian fitness Sure. I definitely know. There's there's this one girl there called,

Melissa Lamont. No. She actually,

I I should say she's a woman. She's, like,

older than me. Okay. Okay.

I feel like when I say girl and they're they're and they're in their thirties, it's like just house rock. It's a little yeah.

And

she's really nice though. Really really nice. Not that influencers aren't nice, but, you know, you get the perception that That's insane. Yeah. Sure. And and look, there was plenty of people today who I saw at Bcon where I just Yeah. Maybe I'm a bit too dismissive and judgmental, but I

I think it's probably the right move to bake and just go, nah. There's not much of substance to them. I'm not I'm not sure I'd really be able to can I tell you that oh, man? This one girl I met today. So Yeah. Tell me about the girl. So she was just standing outside. It was midday.

Looked like she was waiting for someone. I just walked out of,

the Flavor Flav and and was just going like what what the hell was that? Yeah.

And go out to her and start up a convo.

You know when people don't really look you in the eye much? And and and she was wearing glasses

all the time, so I could never tell if she was actually looking me in the eye or not. And,

we're chatting for a bit and I just I got these weird vibes from her. I'm like, oh, this is gonna be a hard conversation to to keep. But I'll I'll persist a little bit more.

And,

she asked me what I'd do, I told told her, you know, about the podcast. And I was like, oh, what do you do? She's like, oh, well, you know, I do this and that. I've got some hustles. I'm like, oh, cool. Hustles. What are your hustles? She's like, well, I've got small ones and then I've got some big ones. So vague.

That's Los Angeles. And and then and then the best the best bit of it was, you know, we'd probably talk for 4 minutes.

And then,

you know, we'd had that little bit, and I'm I'm starting to struggle.

And then she and then she says,

and I mentioned I was doing mining engineering.

And and she she had, like, a bit of, like, oh, you know, that's unsustainable

blah blah blah. I'm like, you know, all the steel around here is made of coking coal, so

you kinda need it. You kinda drove here. Yeah, yeah. And then, then she goes

so I think she asked me the probably the weirdest question I've been asked in a long time.

So what's the

quickest way to make a lot of money sustainably and ethically?

And I and I and I just

and I'm going Shouldn't she have that answer?

Yeah. And I and I went, that's that's a that's a big that's a big Yeah. Yeah.

We'd probably have to start off with what what ethical is and and, you know, go into the fill of You went Jordan Peterson home. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. You'll have to begin with what?

Yeah. And then and then it just

it petered out of my I'm I'm out of here.

There's nothing to value here.

This is weird. So here's your mistake.

You dug in.

I stuck around too. Them. Conversations in LA are They're meant to be

super surface. But I I can do that. I can do I can have shallow ones, but they gotta be at least a little bit fun.

Not shallow.

After they'd say what they say, just go to a new topic.

That's the problem. You were asking her about her hustles. Yeah. You're supposed to just know that she has hustles. Sure. Sure. Gotcha. And maybe I shouldn't be impressed by that. Yeah. Because she did say something about, oh, yeah. Well, we should we should like work or collab. Well, she's like You do think because she has nothing going on.

Yeah. So that's that that's how that works.

You

it's like you

you're supposed to project

potential,

and then

you hope you can make a deal with that projected potential. Sure. That's really what's going on.

Damn. Anyway. And that's why Gary says everyone's full of shit.

The amount of the audacity.

The audacity. Seeing okay. So I gotta tell the story. I we met Gary in life. That was crazy. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Tell that, bro. So

me and Kyren, we do these things. We're on this wandering schedule.

After we get bored with the panel, Kyren

goes, care for a wander?

Care for a care for a walk? Yep. And you say wander? Do I say wander? Which is very specific. Okay. I'm like, yes. It's wander. I love wandering.

That's like so it was like, when I hear wander, I think of Alice in Wonderland. Oh, yeah. So I'm like, let's go for it. Let's wander.

Let's go down the rabbit hole. Yeah, man. And,

we're walking, and

we're sort of talking about Gary. I don't even know what we're talking about.

But this woman who she didn't have any, like, badge on her. I didn't see anything on her. No. No. Random. Yeah. She looked like a businesswoman.

She walks she she, she walks past us,

and then she comes back

to us and, like like, around us and and she sort of gets our attention and she tells us, hey. Gary's over there. Yeah. And then just walks off. Yeah. Then just walks off. And she doesn't tell anyone else.

And that was a super strange. I was like, is she That was that strange. Yeah. In my head, I was like, is she lying, or is she really telling the truth?

And,

And we kept walking. Kept walking. And we could see down the

the street, the the Yeah. Alleyway, I guess, that we're on. Well, not an alleyway, but

the enclosure. And we could see to the end, and you could see Gary wasn't there because there was no crowd. Yeah. Yeah. Gary wasn't directly in front of us. No. No. So we had to keep walking. So he wasn't just over there. He was he was around there. He was far away, actually. It's on the other end of the park. He's down there. Yeah. So we kept walking

and then we see the entourage. We see the 3 cameras. We see

all the people and it was surreal to see him.

Like, I knew that he was tiny. You know, it's just funny. Guy. Yeah. It's funny to see a tiny person. Oh. Yeah. I'm tall.

Mainly, like, you think someone just, like, sort of normal height or I don't know. Like,

it's very interesting. Yeah. And,

I wasn't sure if I was gonna get to say hi because, like, you never know with those things, like, if they're gonna leave or if they're gonna,

cancel something or whatever. So Busy schedule, though. Yeah. Like, you don't know what's gonna happen.

So I was sort of preparing myself for nothing.

But I walked up there, and I was like, you know what? It's not like that big of a crowd.

Maybe there's a chance.

And,

all the people were pretty all all the people who spoke to him were pretty, like like, fast with it. Like, they're pretty quick. Yep. I was like, okay. I think there's a pretty good chance, like, this is gonna happen.

And then

finally, like, he saw me. I was like, oh, fuck. Yeah. What's up, dude? And then we dabbed on by Ogdung.

And I was like I was like, Gary, guys. I just gotta

I just gotta thank you so much for just being positive. Like, what you do is great.

I I think I said my dad just passed away.

Like, what you say about good parenting is just, like, really important. Like, I feel like I'm a product of of good parenting.

And he was like, I'm so sorry for your loss. I was like, thanks, Hank. Thank you. And then

and then,

I got and then I got a photo. And then I was like, my friend Kyron over here, he brought me here. And then I pointed and the crowd parted. And Kyron walks down to Gary and me. Yeah. Because I I was just content to sit in the back. Like, I've never been

really jumping forward and things like that. I've I've met him once before as well. Like, I've never really You shook his hand before? Yeah. Yeah. He he came to Brisbane once and, there was like a little meet up. So I got I got to, like, meet him there and and get a feel for the guy as a as a person,

for half an hour, an hour that he stayed there. Yeah. With a kind of pretty small intimate group. Mhmm. And

I didn't really have anything to say. Like, you know,

there's nothing in particular that really needed to be said.

But then you you dragged me in. So I'm like, oh, well. Alright.

Let's grab a photo while we do it. I didn't know you had met him before. It was cool. Yeah. I thought you Kyron did handstands in front of Gary, in front of the Gehring and and VeeFriend Canada group. That's the most I I I tell people, like, this this is just a a classic example of of the things that I find funny or weird and that and that I enjoy doing.

So

I need I wanted to get a handstand session in on the Friday

before the the whole thing started at 2 PM in the arvo.

And

I was like, alright, I'm gonna go to this park that's nearby. And that was just so happened there was a Canada V Friends meet up there, so there was probably

30, 40 people there. Mhmm. And so I've I've said hi to a couple of them and I'm like, alright. I'm gonna train so I'm just gonna do my thing. Not get distracted. And then I heard them say, oh, Gary Gary might be coming. Like, oh, that's cool. You know? Mhmm. There you go. We'll see him again. And yeah. Sure enough he came along. And then instead of joining the crowd and, like, listening to him speak about whatever he was gonna speak about and shake hands for Yeah. For 10, 15 minutes Yeah. I was like,

you know what? I'll I'll get a video of me training

with this crowd and maybe him in the backgrounds and, like, the in the background of the shot.

I'm gonna make Gary the background. And and and then it'll be like, you know it's it's just one of those things where I'm like, oh, that's kinda funny. Like, most not most people would go over there, but here's me doing my thing over here. That is funny. And that's

I seem to get pleasure from doing that.

Yeah. Yeah. It's just funny. Attention's on me. It should be on me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But here's just famous guy. I got one Brad Pitt in the background of my podcast. I'll make I'll make, yeah. I'll make I'll make Gary humble by Yeah. By, really putting this video on my end. I'm I'm not gonna put it on my end, but, it's,

yeah. It's,

that's just me, man. That's just me.

So Whether whether that's good or bad, I don't know. But

So you leave LA tomorrow.

Yep. Like, is LA

what you thought it was? Is LA crazy? Is LA annoying? Like like It's

from a Nazi. One of the things that

you gotta be careful for whilst travelling is just expectations. People

will give you or you'll give yourself expectations.

Yeah. This place is gonna be like this, I'm gonna love this place, I'm gonna hate this place, etcetera, etcetera.

I heard really good things about LA. The sunshine,

the, you know, beautiful girls, the it's got Hollywood. It's got all, like, the Beaches. Brits and Glitz, the beaches.

And then you hear the terrible negative things. It's for the homeless.

There's an app where which can tell you where the poo is on the street,

another one called Citizens app, where Oh, that's super famous. People use that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. My friend showed me,

showed me it. And so,

when I come and I realize, like, it's not as good nor as bad. It's it's kinda just shrunken in a little bit,

the both positives and negatives. So Right. Yeah. It's nice during the day, but then it's kinda cold at night. I didn't think it would be cold. Yeah. The the homeless population is

it's not bad. You can walk around downtown.

Yeah. If you go to Skid Row and check it out, kinda like I did, and you go, oh, alright. This is actually So you did check it out? I got it like 3 or 4 blocks in before I started to get a little bit sketched out. Yeah. I knew. Is it interesting how LA consolidates that? Like Yeah. That's the thing I don't get. Why

I if it was

brilliant weather all year round,

that would make sense to me. But it's not. Yeah. And surely there's places in the US where

it's just really nice weather all year round. And

but then, you know, I I don't know how your your governments are pretty different, I guess, in the way they treat homeless people and Yeah. And what happens with that. So Yeah. Maybe that's the reason to know. Yeah. Well, the week that you're here,

there was an, an executive order from the governor about getting rid of all the homeless encampments.

Okay. So there was, like, like, literally Yeah. Apparently, there was a big cleanup or something. Yeah. Like, a big cleanup. So I think you should stay in LA because the homeless are leaving.

I don't want them to come back if you leave.

Yeah. Yeah.

But yeah, man. LA is like, being out here for years, I can say that it's it's nice. I have there's access to cool things.

I've met tons of normal people as well. There's no Yeah. There's just plenty of people who are like, oh, yeah. I I can be friends with them. They're cool. Like even just outside here, you know, there's a bunch of people hanging around with cars. Mexicans,

blacks, Asians, all the races. So Yeah. It's super bright and it's super cool. There's a cute,

barmaid at the hotel lobby, like, bar where I'm at. So I'm like, oh, yeah. You know, it's cute. Yeah. There's

good looking

girls around Yeah. For sure. Yeah. I don't know what to expect, but

American girls do have very pretty faces, I think. Yeah? Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. I've been a bit surprised. I wonder what that is. Maybe that's all the mixing between the Irish rounds and Could be. The English longs Yeah. With their long faces. Yeah. Maybe. Maybe. I think they have pretty faces.

So what's better, Venice or downtown?

Because you stayed in Venice, like, pretty close to Venice Beach. A week. Yeah. I was a week in Venice Beach and a and a week in downtown. Honestly, I'd probably say I prefer downtown a tiny

little bit more. Because right now, being in downtown, I really enjoy it. I didn't think I would enjoy downtown this much. I've only been down here a

few, like, a handful of times

and never really enjoyed it.

And there's always just, like, this lore of, like, downtown is weird and scary. Yeah. But No. The if anything, I didn't like Venice because it was too crowded. There was too many people there. There's just a lot going on. And you're coming in on summer break too. So that's like vacation time. Yeah. That's that's when it was deep. In the thick of it. What I like is that you don't really get shouted at when you're walking down the pier, or even down the just the the broad walk there.

Uh-huh. The

the people selling stuff aren't in your face about it. I like that. That's nice. Compared to Compared to most touristy places you go, they'll be they'll be like shouting at you like, hey, come in here. Hey, do you want this? Do you want that? That's American customer service. Yeah. That's what that is for sure. What what poor customer?

Well, no. Like, just like I don't care or give or give a shit about you. Well, I I think there's just, like, this culture of just not being in your face, like, being open and available.

And,

I don't know. Like, I've just never been in anywhere in America, and they've been on my face. Sure. I've been to many other countries that Yeah. Are on your face. Yeah. Mexico's

was like that. A lot of places in America.

Did you ever go to Las Vegas? No. That didn't go. K. So if you ever go to Las Vegas, the most in your face,

like, people selling you something will be is, like, people on the road with these, like, cards of, like, of nude women,

to advertise the strip clubs. Okay. But they'll be, like, walking around and just, like, they'll be making a noise with the card. There's Yeah. They'll slap the card on their hand Yeah. To make you look. Gotcha. Gotcha. So, like, other than that, I really don't know any other sort of, like, retail or, like, marketing thing like that. Like, they just expect you to come into the store. Sure. Yeah. We just have such a culture of shopping

and, like, just consuming. Like, it's sort of expected to just go into the store and to just browse. Gotcha. Gotcha. Yeah. And and downtown's been pretty pretty sparse, to be honest. There's not that many people walking around.

The

Yeah. That's weird too. You can it's it's a very spread out city, so

I I I get

probably why that is as well. But even just, like, lots of space, we're in a just in a big empty parking lot at the moment. It is Sunday. Like, not a lot of things are going on Sunday night. But there was not a lot going on yesterday either or or any of the other days I've been here. Correct. You would think the city would be busy on Saturday, like Yeah. But But what's going on? Yeah. I guess there's just nothing really here to to look at per se. You know, all the touristy stuff is outside of the city. We have beaches. Yeah. Outside of the city. We have The Getty. You've got,

Hollywood. You've got amusement parks. 45 minutes one direction, it's 6 flags. 45 minutes the other way, it's Disneyland. Yeah. So then Yeah. You're going you're leaving the city to have fun. It's kind of a stop up stop off place. Yeah. Yeah. I get that.

The other problem is there's no real good parks around here, probably because of the homeless problem. Yeah. And the one I the one good one is has got gates and security in it. So So when you're driving around the wider Los Angeles County,

they do have more parks. Yeah. That's, like, something that I've actually really enjoyed about LA

is the parks because

you seem to know where they're at. Like, they're sort of, like, per per town. Yep. Like, per like, one town might have 3, one town might have 2 or something.

But if you were to drive around a bit more, you would find that you would probably enjoy the parks

a lot more because they are, in my opinion, they're consistently green. There are homeless, but

in my experience as well, like, the homeless aren't, like, messy. Like, the homeless would go to the parks. They, like, seem to be, like, legitimately camping. Gotcha. So they like, could I just care for that? So they have well, that's what it's, like, called, like, legally. Oh. They say camping. Yeah. And they're, like, called camper or something like that. Like Yeah. Camping

on the sidewalk.

But when you park but but when you camp in the park, it's, like, I think

I I've just never seen them be dirty. I've seen people do laundry.

I think that the classic, like, rose line attached to the light pole

attached to their tent. Yeah. But,

like, they're pretty self sustaining, which is weird. Sure. But the parks are green. They're clean,

and

just a few tents.

Nice. Just a few tents.

That's cool, dude. I'm happy you've been to LA. I'm happy you've seen this is like like Red Hot Chili Peppers says, this is the edge of Western civilization.

Yeah. Like, after everything that's ever happened in history. Yeah. It

all ends here. As far as you go. It all ends here. There's nowhere more west

Yeah. That you can go. Yeah. I mean,

the seeing this portion of America as well is is good. You know, if you go to Japan, I I think you kinda have to see Tokyo to really get an experience. Yeah. If you come to Australia, if you skip Melbourne or Sydney

and just see Brisbane,

I I think you'd be you'd get a good taste of what Australia's like. There's nothing special per se about Melbourne or Sydney. But why is Sydney in all the movies?

I I look, it's pretty. Then you've got little landmarks there. I've never seen any other Australian city in a movie other than Sydney. Yeah.

So there's some propaganda there. Maybe they have maybe Sydney has No. No. You've you've seen tons because we have Movie World in,

in the Gold Coast. So you'd have seen Aquaman was filmed there. A lot of a lot of movies get filmed around that area. Well, I know movies get filmed, but I mean, like, cities

debuting in a movie. Oh, sure. Yeah. Well, Brisbane's yeah. Like it's in Nemo. It's in Sure. It's in that Ryan Gosling, Emily Blunt rom com movie. It's in Okay. Okay. Like Sydney like the Sydney Opera House at least. Yeah. Well, yeah. If you're looking for a Sydney, for a city just to go to,

it's the most well known, for sure. Okay. So Okay.

Yeah. I mean, if you're if you're gonna film in

New Zealand, I guess

you'd go to Auckland.

Mhmm. Just because it's the,

is it the capital? I don't even know. It's the biggest city. Oh, that In New Zealand. So Interesting.

Yeah. Yeah. That's that's funny. But, I mean, I think Australian culture is pretty just

similar. Yeah. Everywhere you go, our accents are similar.

Certainly, the differences between the interior of the country and the the coasts. Right.

Interesting. But, yeah, seeing LA has been good because it feels like I can tick that off. Mhmm. Instead of Have you heard a California accent?

Yeah. I had a couple girls with Yeah. I guess the what was it? LA LA The Fry? The Vocal Fry. There was a number of names for you. There was Vocal Fry,

Valley Girl. Is that what you Oh, yeah. Valley Girl. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think I heard Valley Girl. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Valley Girl's funny.

Nice.

What else? What else? What else? What else? What else? What else? What else? What else? What else?

Yeah. It's just been good seeing you, man. Yeah. It's been always been awesome seeing you. Like, so cool seeing you. I was I was, like, I was really, like, bummed that

I couldn't have seen you more Yeah. Yeah. It would've been cool to go to a movie theater with you. I know. I wanted to show you. That's, like, that's why I love LA too because of the movie theaters. There's so many cool, like, little, like, little spots.

So many little spots. And especially since COVID shut down so many things, like like, those little spots are even more rare. Like, they're even more of a gem. Yeah.

But

life just happened. Like Absolutely. Like life just happened. It's crazy to have It's amazing. It's crazy to be with you right after my dad has passed. Sure. Because of your mom passing in May, my dad passing in August, like,

I'm happy it happened. It's crazy that it happened.

Well, I mean, part of part of my mind when I was organizing

coming here this last year was also,

you know, I might not be here because mum there's a chance mum could pass away in July or August Yeah. Which was, at that time,

I would have said that was just as good a time, you know, just as good just as likely a time as her to pass as any other time. So, Yeah.

Yeah. It's it's cool that we we managed to make it happen at all.

Were we adaptable?

Yeah. Well, I'd say so. I think Were we adaptable? Courageous? Courageous cook Throughout this time? We definitely were. Were we

humble.

Well, I I wasn't humble, but it's just before You weren't humble? No.

We Gary b in the background while all the all the videos are made. Prideful?

No. But it's it's funny. It is funny. I don't think it's I I I don't think it's not humble. No. I'm

I don't think I've I I don't think I fall on the arrogant side of things. Yeah. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. You gotta read a book called Humilitas.

Oh, yeah? And you heard of that? Yeah. I haven't. A whole book on humility. Okay. I'm not sure how old it is. I hope it meets your criteria for older book,

but I read it. It was, like, the first book that I read with a mentor Okay. When I was going to church when I was a teenager.

And that's, like, single handed one of the biggest influences on

how I view humility and how I, like, interact with people

about that. And every time when I hear someone talk about humility

Makes you think about. Makes me think of that, but also just reminds me of that. Like,

after I read that book and, like, discussed it and all this,

I have never had, like,

a renewal

of understanding humility. Like, there's never been, like, a new side to humility. That's true. Every time I hear about humility, it's exactly what I learned in the very beginning. Gotta have. Yeah. So

it's a good one. Nice. Alright. I'll keep that in mind. No.

What do you reckon? Should we close-up and start wandering over? Yeah. So we gotta go see T Pain. We're gonna rock out. We might get a drink.

I might get some alcohol.

I might pay. I'll have a I'll have a thing. Yeah. I don't like mixing.

Oh, you don't like mixing? No. No. Yeah. Not lovely. It's a little dangerous,

but we'll see. We'll see how I feel. I usually don't drink beer. They only have beer. They might have wine.

But

yeah. T Pain. This has been Vicon 2024

Absolutely. In the car.

Thank you for Kyran, thank you for being in bed. Thank you for inviting me, showing me around. It's been a blast.

You wanna do the America Plus, bitch?

Yeah. Yeah. Sure. In the car. So that's it. Bye. Should we do it together or Let's do it together.

Wait. Wait. Wait. You need to remind me the exact words. That's That's America Plus, bitch. Stay free. Yeah. Alright. Let's do it. 3, 2, 1. That's America Plus, bitch. Stay free.

AMERICAPLUS