In this confab, Max catches up with Chet—long-time friend of the show, pleb miner mafia stalwart, and one of the most hands-on mining pioneers around. We reflect on the evolution from pleb to pioneer, the value of craft mastery, and the realities of living like a “mining monk” to keep uptime high. Chet opens up about humility in markets, his thesis on used miner pricing, why community matters more than adulation, and how building a circular economy means choosing who you spend your sats with. We dig into balance, burnout, OPSEC trade-offs, and finding purpose beyond number go up—whether that’s family, fitness, or a well-built deck at home.
Max and Chet also dive into gas mining as the next scrappy frontier, mineral rights and licenses, and how Big Tech’s energy appetite will reshape competition. On the privacy front, they discuss Ashigaru’s rebirth of the Samourai-style toolset (including its new Whirlpool), practical wallet setups with Cake Wallet and node linking, and the importance of meetups like Lake Satoshi for real-world learning. It’s a candid, wide-ranging chat on building, belonging, and the grind required to make Bitcoin living, not just Bitcoin listening.
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(00:01:45) BOOSTS
(00:05:31) THANK YOU CAKE WALLET
(00:06:38) THANK YOU FOUNDATION
(00:08:22) Reunion on the Mic
(00:12:17) From Pleb to Pioneer
(00:19:30) Thanks for the Memories
(00:22:53) The Mining Monk
(00:26:54) Getting Into Gas
(00:33:34) Paying it Forward
(00:36:21) The Value of Wholesome Work
(00:41:34) More Hash Sluts
(00:48:00) Doing It Live
(00:52:53) Living Life or Basement Dweller OPSEC
(00:56:41) Grassroots Education
(01:03:03) Ashigaru, Samourai and Whirlpool
(01:06:47) We'll Make it Happen at Lake Satoshi
[00:00:04]
Unknown:
Bitcoin is close to becoming worthless.
[00:00:11] Unknown:
Bitcoin.
[00:00:16] Unknown:
Now what's the Bitcoin?
[00:00:19] Unknown:
Bitcoin's like rat poison. Yeah.
[00:00:22] Unknown:
Oh. The greatest scam in history.
[00:00:25] Unknown:
Let's get it.
[00:00:27] Unknown:
Bitcoin will go to fucking zero.
[00:00:41] Unknown:
Welcome back to another confab episode. This one is with Chet, a good friend of the show and a pleb minor mafia member. He's been around for a long time, basically, since the start of everything I've done with John, and he's been a huge supporter of the show and a lot of the spin off projects around the ungovernable Misfit sphere. It was really good to have a catch up with him. It'd been a couple of years. Chet's a perfect example of a pioneer. When we talk about this concept, we're talking about getting away from just being a pleb, jumping into doing things properly and mastering your craft. And when it comes to mining, especially Hydro, Chet is the man to speak to. If you're listening to this and looking to set something up with Hydro, he is definitely the man to reach out to. Before we jump in, I wanna say a huge thank you to everyone supporting the show, whether that's sharing with friends and family, boosting the show, sending in XMR chats, or any of the other many ways that people help.
Last month's confab was with business cat. If you missed that, definitely go and check it out. That was a really fun one. Thank you to Rod Palmer from the Bugle News. He says, hashtag forty hours per week and sends 21,000 sats. Thank you, Rod Palmer. Thank you very much, mate. Fundamentals sent 10,101 sats and said, great pod. So glad this finally happened. I knew it would be a banger. Otis Bittmeyer sent 5,420 sats and said a good vibes discussion of black pill subject matter. Noah looked crazy until he didn't. Late stage HODL sent 5,000 stats and said, Kareem's sample just keeps getting better. I always enjoy a, that's fine, thrown in the middle of the conversation, and John's voice saying, fucking parasites was perfect.
Good work, Karen. Pay this man more to keep up the good work. Fucking hell. Alright, mate. Great conversation with business cat. I look forward to the four man confab and lots of grumpy old man stuff. Yeah. Me too. Hopefully soon. Confgas says heroes bring greatness. Jason c, love the ISOs, Max. Lean into that. Block seven streamed 1,140 sets. Rev Huddl said being prepared for the pole shift means being prepared with more than financial capital or physical form of capital. I'm working on being prepared spiritually too. Caz Peland streamed 440 sats. User one one three four two seven nine one streamed 590 sats. Wood Butcher sent 420 sats and said two Thessalonians.
Oh, this has gotta be a bible thing. One seven ten. A I b l e, wonderful conversation and a long time coming. I've been taking the poll shift seriously, though I know we may not survive it. Even if it doesn't happen in your lifetime, a Western society continues its steady decline. Anyone would be well served to follow the advice of business cat Max, John, Kerim, and others in being prepared for life as you know it being flipped on its head. God bless RBP and the misfits. Yeah. Totally agree, mate. More and more I'm thinking about that. Because the worst case scenario, if you are prepared, is you have tools and food and things and preparations that you can use anyway and generally come in handy anyway, whether it's a poll shift, whether it's just food shortages, shipping issues. Like, it could be anything. The worst case is you're a bit more prepared. It really is worth thinking about. Stack Jarrow sent 250 sets saying, having a low time preference for such a cataclysm definitely makes sense to a certain degree, not necessarily going full prepper mode. But I think it's important to realize such a thing could happen, and it's important to be able to respond accordingly if one is capable.
God Seth said thank you, gentlemen. Mark said oh, Mark sent 210. Do you know of any other mobile wallet with silent payment support? Good question. I'm not sure. I think Sparrow has it, but, obviously, not that's not a mobile wallet. I think there's one that only I think Seth mentioned the other day that only does silent payments and nothing else, but I can't remember what it's called. You have to listen back. I think it was maybe last week's Freedom Tech Friday or the Monero monthly. It was one of the two. Thank you to everyone who's been supporting the show, all the messages, all the sats, XMR chats, everything.
We really, really appreciate it. Before we start, I wanna say thank you to my show sponsors, Cake Wallet, Foundation, and My Nimbox. I'm very, very happy to have these guys on board. It's amazing to find such aligned companies, and I'm very happy to be suggesting these services to friends, family, listeners. And maybe that's kind of the same thing in many cases. If you want a world class mobile wallet, check out cakewallet.com. They support silent payments, Monero, linking to your own node. You can run it over tool. They have Cake Pay where you can spend your Bitcoin and Monero, buying gift cards, Visa cards, all sorts of things. They have some of the best features out there, and they are always building. I've literally just got off the call for the Freedom Tech Friday with Seth, and they're building out a Visa card that you'd be able to top up and use within Google or Apple Wallet and just use it for everyday spending, which would be amazing.
They're just always innovating, I think. They've got over half a million users, and they really are incredible. Thank you also to Foundation. Foundation have been supporting this show for a very long time now. We would not be here without them. They make my favorite hardware. It's my favorite hardware because it's beautifully designed. It's fully open source. It's piss easy to use. They have an amazing companion app, Envoy, which makes it very simple to set up friends and family, and they've got an incredible team. Bitcoin q and a included in that team, obviously, a huge part of ungovernable misfits and really cares about making sure that people are secure and private where they can be. Go to foundation.xyz.
You can use the code ungovernable for a discount. And if you have any questions, you can reach out to me or q. And finally, my inbox, the newest sponsor of this show, and they've been incredible. If you are looking at hosting, whether that's running a node, setting up BTC pay server, setting up a VPS, or really any hosting service. You really should consider using them. I recently did a confab with random NIM. Go back and check that out if you haven't already, but we go through all of the trade offs, the good, the bad, the ugly, everything that you need to know.
Pay in Bitcoin, Monero, or any other cryptocurrency. They don't take any details from you. You can do this very privately, very securely, and you don't have to be hugely technical to do this. If you have any questions for me or for random Nim, you can reach out, but check them out at my nimbox.net, and enjoy the show. We finally have him on the show. Chet is back. Still with the same mic, still with the same computer, and I have to say, probably still with the same beard, isn't it? It's looking long. Yeah. Definitely. Well, nice to have you back, mate. There's very few people who have been around in the, Bitcoin mining scene and mesh Dadell and everything that I've been doing with John as long as you. Like, you've been there pretty much right from the start. I was definitely fortunate.
[00:08:54] Unknown:
Got to hear y'all when John first came on, and I knew right away. I had to meet these guys. Yeah. You were what were you you were down is it Guatemala, you said, or something at a lake? Yep. Well, the first time I heard y'all, I was in Miami staying in a hostel at a mining disrupt trying to just get out and meet anybody I could. The first time we recorded, I was in Guatemala doing the, the oil. They used cooking oil, putting a genset, and trying to they run minors.
[00:09:27] Unknown:
So it was something like from memory because it's when was that? That was '21 maybe, was it? Something like that or 2022?
[00:09:36] Unknown:
It's either '21 or '22. Yep. It was when John was doing the, hash the torch. That's it. And he wanted me to go meet Carl. So we had Carl and I, that's the first time we met was on the podcast or chatted or or anything.
[00:09:48] Unknown:
And now he's becomes, you know, a great homie. Oh, I love Carl. He's such a wise man. We say it all the time, but just like, if you wanna survive in an apocalypse, he's probably one of the people you want on your team, isn't
[00:10:00] Unknown:
he? Oh, yeah. I'd bug out to Michigan. Like, if I had needed to to bug out, I'd go to that community and try to fit in up there somewhere where I could just work and get in. Yeah. We got a good group. So, I mean, since then, like,
[00:10:12] Unknown:
spinning up the hash, the torch, and all these people meeting, you, me, and Carl, and everyone else, and the and and Matthew and everything. We never really knew what it was gonna be. It's turned into something really cool. Like, whenever I think about, oh, I wanna learn how to do this or I wanna build that. I wanna know about something. There's almost always, like, with almost any subject, someone that you can reach out to who's either really skilled or really knowledgeable in a certain area. And that's not really something that I've seen most other places within Bitcoin and, like, all these kind of groups and pods and stuff. Like, the fact that you've got, like and spin offs like Lake Satoshi and all these other things that sort of come out of it where you have these core groups that could all go meet.
That's like a real just like a huge value because the lot of the rest of the space that I look around in, like, I don't wanna associate myself with 99% of them. Like, I find it quite embarrassing the way that people act, and nothing's, like, real. It's all a bit gross. And then it's like this little gulch of people that can do and will look after each other, which is pretty awesome.
[00:11:25] Unknown:
No. I agree 100%. Like, the community y'all have built, it's second to none. So there was a while there where I found myself tearing away from where my roots came from, like, where I started in Bitcoin. Right? The people that actually helped me to progress in my progression on the Bitcoin trajectory that I was on. Mhmm. And you get in some of the groups, and it's just strictly all these Tradfry bros, all these people that just are just so niche, and they don't let really anyone else into their community. Right? You wanna try to get in and fit in because you think they're the ones that can get you to the next step that you wanna go to. And I was following myself where I was kinda, like, not in a rut, but just not surrounded by exactly the people that I came in with and the ones that I wanted to be surrounded with. And I kinda had to step back and just kinda hunkered down,
[00:12:14] Unknown:
stayed more focused, and and been grinding pretty hard right now. Do you think there's, like, a level of you know, like, when you first start seeing a girl, doesn't matter who they are, you have this, like, electricity that is, like, running through the two of you. It's like a an excitement, a palpable feeling of intense excitement. And no matter how much you love that girl, that is gonna fade, and it fades on both ways. That explosive chemistry. Do you think it's kind of similar in the Bitcoin world? Because, like, we do come in, you don't wanna fuck Bitcoin, but, like, you can't shut the fuck up about it. You are, like, amazed by it and you can't stop. And then to some degree, it's like however many years you are down the line, you're like, I still love this thing, but I'm not as excited. I think so. I don't think it's particularly Bitcoin's fault.
[00:13:03] Unknown:
It's sometimes the people that you associate with Bitcoin. Right? And we've always say Bitcoin's gonna get everyone. Everyone and everything's gonna come to Bitcoin on a long enough timeline. For me, it was just I was searching or trying to get to what I thought I wanted and what people look at as success and this and that. You know? Success is measured in many different forms. And I just wasn't I don't know. I just didn't feel right for a while there where I was at and what I was trying to get into and and grinding towards. I had lost some of it's funny because the fiat ways still try to corrupt you on this journey in Bitcoin. Mhmm. I don't know. It's hard to explain.
[00:13:44] Unknown:
Was that, like, in terms of, you know, you started getting into mining, then you really heavily have got in. Like, John always says to me, he's like, oh, yeah. Like, Chet really knows his shit. Like, he really embraces our sleep in the mind, bro. Like, I'll take a roll up mattress. I'll be there, and you do things to a very, very high spec and know your shit. Like, obviously, that gives you a I imagine anyway, like, mastering your craft gives you, like, a really good feeling inside. There's, like, a value to doing something, doing it well. And when you go to sleep, you're like, fuck. I'm nailing this. But it's easy to get corrupted. I'm sure, especially in that industry, what you're saying is, like, chasing just the numbers.
[00:14:29] Unknown:
Exactly. For sure. I mean and then also wanting the adulation of people that don't really matter or do matter. They they matter. Everyone matters. Right? But it just didn't matter for what the accolades or what I was trying to achieve. And then, you know, you find yourself feeling more hollow than the fulfillment that it should have felt to get to to where I thought I was trying to like you're saying, master your craft, and I'll I'll never master Bitcoin or mining. You know, I had a thesis on miner prices that I'm about to be very, very humbled on. Bitcoin has a way of humbling you to your core.
A thesis that I thought was gonna play out, and it still it still could. Right? I still could get humbled for the next month or two, and then boom, something happens and, you know, minor price use minor prices and just minor prices go off the charts again.
[00:15:18] Unknown:
Your thesis was to HODL Hash because the value of the miners would increase.
[00:15:25] Unknown:
100%. Or I I thought used miner prices would be more than, like, $2 a Terahash, $1 a Terahash right now. Mhmm. It's very humbling. I did not see that coming. So now I'm sitting on a bunch of Avalons and a bunch of these miners that are just sitting over here, and it's like, well, that's fine. And then not cease. But, yeah, definitely not gonna be able to hash the torch in essence at a good value for me and for them. Either I'm gonna have to sell them or just give them away like I've done with so many s nines, or Bitcoin has a way of of teaching you not to have a thesis and stick with it too long.
[00:16:05] Unknown:
Yeah. And it also has a way of, like it's like it's watching. When as soon as you sell any significant amount for any type of expense, you know it's gonna just fucking pump in your face. And it just like it's like a massive like, fuck you. You should have held. And then the other way around as well. As soon as you need it, it's like it's it's dropping. It's one of those and everyone says it. Like, everyone I speak to who's like, oh, yeah. I bought a house and and then but it just fucking pumped its nuts off after I'd held for, like, three years or whatever it is. It's it's always the way. I had to sell a load six months ago, and then we've, like, doubled. And I'm just like, yep. That's that's fucking goes. One thing I've noticed over time personally is my care about holding Bitcoin has shifted.
I used to have this thing where I was like I still do a bit, but I used to think I'm gonna hold, and I'm never fucking selling you cons because you're not having my Bitcoin. And I don't want you to have it. Like, I'd rather take it to my grave. I'd rather you cannot buy it and you fuck yourselves up with paper Bitcoin and everything else, and I don't want you to have it. And it was like a bit of a way of me, like, voting in a way. But then I had kids and medical bills and things and stuff and life. And I guess that kind of, like, changed where I'm like, there's still the fuck you, but also it's not anywhere significant enough to actually change anything because I'm a little weasel small fish.
The memories matter more. Like, I I sometimes regret not going when friends have invited me to, like, oh, come away with us, and we're gonna go and do this, and we're gonna have this amazing adventure and do the stuff. And I'm like, no. I've gotta stack. No. I'm not gonna, like like, come out to dinner. Like, we're doing a birthday party, and I'd be like, oh, I can't. And I'd, like, pick up extra hours and, like, do extra work and, like, not spend the money. And at the time, it's like, oh, yeah. If I buy Bitcoin now, it's gonna be worth this and, you know, then I can do what I want. It's like, well, you can do what you want a bit now as well. Like, you've gotta what if you drop dead and then you've never experienced life? Then you're actually an idiot. Like, your risk, You're worried about risk, and that's why you're in Bitcoin.
But then you're not actually looking at the risk of, like, you can just have a heart attack. Like, I know people not much older than me, like, friends of mine who have had heart attacks. It's like, well,
[00:18:45] Unknown:
fuck. Like, you have to enjoy the life as well. It's a hard mental hurdle to get over. Right? I think we all struggle with that. Probably the struggle of trying to have as much Bitcoin as you can never ends. Oh, yeah. But one thing I've definitely done is I've definitely used a lot more. I'd rather you know, if I can use Bitcoin, I'll find myself going out or spending that money or, you know, good time, the adventure, whatever it is. If I can use more of my Bitcoin in doing that and funding that, then I find myself doing those types of things. If I can't and it's harder for me and it's restrictive where I have to, you know, get more fiat, I, a lot of times, won't do those things. If I can use my Bitcoin to do it, I find myself definitely creating the memories. And I would rather have the Bitcoin going to someone else in order for me to enjoy that time, whatever that is Yeah. Yeah. Rather than turning it into dollars to fiat and then trying to go and have that good time. I have a vacation coming up. I had been doing every year until I moved into the mines. And then the last couple years, I haven't done it. I've just literally been, you know, just grinding, grinding.
But gonna do it again this year and taking my family. I can pay in Bitcoin for the condo, and so it's a no brainer for me. Had I probably had to turn that into dollars and the people that owned it made it difficult, I probably wouldn't have taken the vacation or or the adventure.
[00:20:07] Unknown:
Yeah. In those sort of cases, you know, it's going to someone else of quality. There's, like, a level of if I was gonna buy maple syrup, I'm gonna go and buy it from Karl in person. I'll put the Bitcoin to him, and I'll know, like, okay. This is gonna be used wisely, and this is to a good person. Yep. A 100%. If I could go and spend it in a shop, it's different. It's almost like like my precious. You're like, I don't wanna let go of you unless I know you're in, like, safe hands even though you're not even a thing and you're like, do you know what I mean? It's like there is a there's definitely that, which is kind of cool. And if lots of people do it, then that does grow out a circular economy, and it does make it go into better hands rather than just sell, goes to an exchange, fucking Michael Sailor buys it, and boomer type finance bros who are, like, finding all these different new ways to reexplain Bitcoin just over and over again and, like, selling it to their boomer maze. It's like, that is kind of sad to me. Like, it's good for the price, but it's kind of sad because it's like, I don't really want them to do it. And it takes the coolness away from it. It takes the, like, cypherpunk ethos away from it. They're just gonna have it stored with Coinbase.
They're not running nodes. They're not tinkering with this stuff. They're not using coin joins. They're not experimenting. They're not building. They're just I don't know. I kind of find them, like, a little bit like a fly in my drink, and I'm like, you fuck this up.
[00:21:48] Unknown:
You know, I try not to get too deep into that stuff. I do. Don't don't get me wrong. I do. And when I do, sometimes I can get down in the hole about the whole Bitcoin thing. But if I go too deep in some of that stuff, it's not good for me mentally. I know why I came to Bitcoin. I know what it's gonna do on a long enough timeline. Like, I have no doubt it consumes everything in our world, and I just had to keep my head down. You know? Like I said, I found myself getting too deep into some of the other aspects of it. You can start questioning again why you're doing things. I don't wanna be questioning why I'm Bitcoin. Like, I know why I'm Bitcoining, and and I'm not gonna let other people coming in, governments, the sailors, the paper Bitcoiners, whatever, pump my bags. It's fun. I'm living my best life I've ever lived because of it. Yeah. If I go too deep in that, I I find myself getting depressed or get angry at things or not happy. When the headspace isn't good, nothing else seems to you know, you go looking for trouble, you can find trouble.
You wanna find good things, usually, you'll find good things, and I've been very fortunate.
[00:22:48] Unknown:
And you're kind of like a mining monk is how I see you. The The fact that you're like going and sleeping in the mine with little rollout mattress. I I really like that. Like, do you find some peace in that? Like simple, you're doing difficult things, but like there's a simplicity to like work, sleep, head down, up again. Like, you almost aren't surrounded by a load of other things that can cloud your thoughts.
[00:23:11] Unknown:
Exactly. I have to be submersed in it. If I get out there, I'm I can't be easily distracted. Right? My mind can go a lot of different places. If I'm submersed in it, my mind's in one place, and that's the good place. That's where most of the time I need to be. And then when I get out the mine, you know, as John and and some of the other guys know, I like to enjoy life. We have some fun. I was talking to Barn the other day. Oh, speaking of maple syrup with about Carl, Barn's gonna do some maple syrup jerky dispatch. I don't know if you caught that, but I'm really stoked on that. He's gonna make me some hot maple syrup jerky. Really stoked on that.
[00:23:49] Unknown:
So what? Like, spicy maple syrup jerky?
[00:23:53] Unknown:
Exactly. He's gonna soak the meat in maple syrup, but put some spice his his normal spice in it, the hot.
[00:23:59] Unknown:
We'll see how that goes. I'll send you a bag. I don't know if he's gonna make a ton of it, but I'll keep you a bag if you want one. Thank you. That'd be nice. I'm obsessed at the moment with there's a place that I know it's not very Bitcoin or, like, you're supposed to just eat fucking steak and whatever, but I love pizza. There's a really good pizza place near me, and they do one that's got, like, all the pork, like, really good proper sausage, nice ham. It's got salami. It's got all these different, like, meats and stuff, and then, like, caramelized onions. Oh. Yeah. It's so good. And then but then they get this hot honey.
So they got a hot honey drizzle with chili in it, and it's like local honey from the guy, like, literally who makes the pizzas. It's so fucking good. He drizzles that over the pizza, and it's so good because it's got that spice and that sweet, and it's just, oh my god. I just started there's a pizza place here, and someone said, have you tried their hot honey on it? And I'm like, what? Oh. What are you talking about? And then they said that that's exactly what they said they do. And they said it's killer. Oh, it's fucking amazing. Next time you go, just try it and Alright. At this moment and just, like if if it's a problem and it really upsets you, you can give me a slap when we actually see each other. But I promise you, you're probably more likely to be like, oh, you've changed my life. As long as it's local, honey. It's gotta be the local, honey. That's the key. Yeah. That's what you want. Nice.
What island in Italy are you in getting this? Yeah. I'm in the Shetland Islands at the moment. Okay. As one likes to say, with my little ponies. So, I'd like to be in Italy. Although, actually, to be fair, when I've gone to Italy, the food hasn't been that good. I've been twice. I think I was maybe in, like, too much of a touristy area, but, like, I would go. Like, it's I think it's also the expectation. I was expecting, like, I'm gonna go and I'm gonna have amazing coffee, and I'm gonna have amazing food. Well, sure. And then I was a bit like, it was okay. Maybe I was spoiled being near London. Like, there's so many good places around to eat, so you kind of get spoiled, like, a little bit. But, yeah, I've never found somewhere where I've gone to Italy and have that kind of, like, classic why I imagine go have a little espresso and then, like, go and have some, like, ham and melon or something and some wine and, like And then your limoncello.
Oh, lemon I I had that when I was there. I got absolutely fucking battered on limoncello. That's not bad. Don't let the Italian homies hear you say that. They'll be upset with you. Yeah. I know they will. It's fun, though, sometimes to wind them up. Definitely. Get some pineapple on the pizza When you're not in the mine and you let your thoughts wander and do other things, like, outside of Bitcoin, the things that you can talk about, is there anything that is exciting you at the moment? Like, as an example, a lot of people, once they start doing a little better in life and maybe they buy a home or they take up some hobbies, they might start going down the fitness and health route, or they might start learning to build, like, learn a trade because they're doing stuff around the house. Or they have things that are sort of loosely tied to Bitcoin. And I see it really often, especially with our groups that we have. Like people start to spend less time listening to the Bitcoin podcast, start to drop off a little bit and immerse themselves in something else. Is there anything that you've started doing like that?
[00:27:24] Unknown:
No. Not really. So my fitness is one of the things that I definitely am not disciplined in right now. That's something that I just, like, I'm gonna make a commitment to here. I started the other day just trying to eat better, get a little more active rather than just sitting looking at computer screens and moving around doing mine things. But, no, I really haven't. Gas mining, I guess, would be like I went from the hydro to really learning those and having those systems. And now I'm really trying to get into gas. I don't think miners, we can't compete with the Apples, Amazons, Googles, Microsofts of the world that money wise to bid for energy price. I think they're gonna start outbidding and start consuming more energy or a lot of energy.
And I think the Bitcoin miners are gonna have to get more scrappy. So I've been really trying to focus and learn some gas mining, learning mineral rights and operator's license and gas purchaser's license. And there's just so much nuance, and it's such a good old boy type of community. My dad was in oil and gas for his whole life. He worked in oil and gas, and it's one thing I really wish I had him here because I think he could really have got opened some doors for me and got me into some places that have been really tough for me to get into. And my brother my brother before he passed away, he, you know, he wanted to get my brother and I into oil and gas. I didn't take the opportunity. At that point in time, I was I thought oil was almost kind of the devil. I didn't realize what energy was or any of that. I it's ruining the planet, this and that. I'm not gonna get into it, and I moved out to the woods.
My other brother got into it, and now he's kinda come full circle. I've worked on him for years. I buy cows from him in Bitcoin or this and that, and so he's gotten to see over the years how it's gone. He saw the number go up for the most part. Right? And now he's hounding me to they bought mineral rights to a gas well. We're just grinding now. So he's been hounding me more and more excited about it. He's like me. When he gets into something, he's he's very passionate. He dives head first and goes all in pretty much. So that's where I've really been focusing a lot of time. And then, obviously, the few hydro's mines that I that I take care of consume a lot of my time going around and, you know, making sure that they're as close to a 100% uptime in mines online as I can. And that's I mean, if you start getting into thousands of miners, it consumes a lot of time. It really does. And then, you know, there's times where I will go out or be out at Lake Satoshi for a couple days, and maybe there's a few miners down. Where is that balance coming at? How does the balance come in? And that's that's been something I've really tried to work on too is balancing where I'm putting a lot of my time or most of my time. And it's still Bitcoin. There's no doubt about it. The people in Bitcoin, I feel like a lot of times I don't communicate. Like, Carl tried to call me the other day.
I was getting on a flight back from Finland, and I didn't answer, and I haven't called him back. And, you know, that those things start to weigh on me too. Am I not being good enough homey to my Bitcoin friends that I've met along the way? Am I not giving them enough time? You know? It's just a constant struggle in the mind. There's a burnout as well. I wouldn't feel bad about not replying to someone for a couple of days. First of all, we're like batteries. We have a certain amount of energy in us. And when that energy is gone, we're dead. We have to use it wisely. Like, there is just so much, and you don't know how quite how much it is.
[00:30:42] Unknown:
You just use it wisely. But on top of that, like, the ability to spin a certain amount of plates, if you've got shit going on, you're looking into this stuff with your brother, you're trying to work out all the mineral rights stuff. I've seen it with John. Like, John is Yeah. Fucking exhausted. People say it like, oh, man. I'm so fried. I'm so John's fucking exhausted. And that's because he's doing his job, and he's been still being a good dad and husband and all the family stuff. And then on top of that, he's doing the gas stuff. So I see that. And if you're in that state where you're really busy, anyone who's a real friend isn't gonna get upset about it. You go, look. He's fucking tired. He's busy. He can't spend another play. And next time you're taking a shit, you've got five minutes to yourself, then you're gonna respond. Like, I don't think anyone who's actually building and, like, really pushing themselves in the Bitcoin space, who's been around for a long time, is ever gonna think less if you sort of, you know, give things a few days. I think it's more important that you're building than it is to, like, be part of the groups and saying GM every morning and that kind of stuff because you're building a future. Like, the the fact that if you're making stuff and earning the Bitcoin, it's gonna be in the hands of someone who can hold it and use it in the right way. That's more important than, like, being involved in the latest choke or meme or whatever it is that's going around, to me anyway. I think that's more important.
[00:32:09] Unknown:
I agree. It's still it's, you know, weighs on the mind sometimes. Yeah. You know, you have some homies that are better, you know, or closer to you. Sometimes it starts to weigh on my mind if I'm doing enough. You know? I never think that I'm doing enough or I need to give more. Right? I don't give enough a lot of times, and it always weighs. Where's that happy medium? I'll probably never know.
[00:32:29] Unknown:
Yeah. We'll probably never know. But it's cool that you're doing something with your brother. That's a nice but your dad you said he's not with you anymore. Like, if that comes together and if there is a heaven, then if you're looking down, like, that's the dream for any dad is like, oh, my sons are gonna work together, and they have this passion project they're working on. That's fucking cool. I appreciate that, and I I hope so. It's gonna work out. One way or another, it'll work out. It's just the grind. Right? Me and my brother are a lot alike, so we sometimes can butt heads.
[00:32:57] Unknown:
As we've gotten older, it's gotten better, though. So this should I mean, it should work out. It's, you know, it's not a ton of MCF. We'll see. It's like, you know, John, I've been watching you know, I went up there and saw his, and I need to get up there again to go look at it. He's done a lot of work since last time I was there. So but it's a grind. You know? He keeps me motivated too. I see him and chat with him and, you know, both y'all on the podcast, and I don't know how y'all y'all have time to do it. You know? But I I love I'm I'm very thankful for y'all giving your time to the podcast to listen. I don't know how you have time. It's appreciated. Well, thank you. It's it's definitely
[00:33:31] Unknown:
not quite the same as it was. We had more time to make more jingles and do more fun intros and just, like, more time to prep and more time to plan and Yeah. Like, all that kind of stuff. But so now it's a little bit more loose and a little bit more, like, jump on when we can. And the recent one we did, John was recording from the mine. I was out and about, and it was pissing with rain. We make it happen still. It's not quite the same, but I think it will probably get there again because I've been in Fiat fucking nightmare stuff for sort of six months, and John's grinding away. But it's, like, getting to a point where it should be less of a problem soon. And he's also got a father figure within that space. We're gonna do a probably two or three part series on it, so I won't give too much away. But the guy that he bought his mind from, really luckily, has just taken him under his wing. Like, obviously, just seeing, okay, John's a good guy. Like, I'm gonna help here. Sold him it, and he's just been there to mentor him and walk him through things and just give that, like, old man advice of like, look, son. I've done this for fucking forty years or whatever it is. Like, I know this inside down, back to front. I could do this in my sleep, and I'm gonna help you. And so he's built this really amazing friendship with this guy who just kind of helped him and been there, and I think that's an important thing. We I think we touched on it actually either in the last episode or the one before, but, like, that's an important thing for us as we do what we're doing to, like, think forward. And that's something that me and John have talked about is, like, sometimes we go, look, fucking, let's just put this the pod on pause list. Like, it's too it's too much. It's too tiring. Like, I can't do this anymore. But then it's like, well, no. Don't be a bitch. Like, you need to pass on some of what other people have done for you. Like, there's so many people that have helped us through the years with our Bitcoin stuff, and now someone helping him with the mining, with the gas stuff. And, like, if we just say,
[00:35:32] Unknown:
yeah. We we're done. Bye. You're not paying it forward. Agreed. A lot of people that guy probably would have been willing to help, but not everyone's accepting as John. Right? You have to be open and not think you know more than you know about what you don't know. Sometimes I find myself like that, and we all have to be willing to listen and open more. And John's great at that. I I love listening to advice from John, talking to John. Like I said, that that core group when I was coming in, I kinda started to drift away from, and I found myself, you know, not feeling as good as I had in the past. And I just had to really get back focused on some things that matter and and where the priorities are gonna be put because you do start getting spread too thin.
[00:36:16] Unknown:
Yeah. It's what's, like, wholesome stuff as well. I was having this conversation the other day. So we've recently got a new place here. Like, I wanted a family home, and that was, like, a big part of the move. Look at you. Yeah. It was, like, a big part of doing it. Well, because my previous businesses was property. So, like Okay. Buying, flipping, extending, renovating, selling, then rebuying stuff, leasing it out. Like, I did that for You were like a slumlord? Literally. Yeah. Since I was I bought my first property when I was 14.
[00:36:49] Unknown:
Nice.
[00:36:50] Unknown:
Basically, at 14, I was in with a family who were doing it. Like, I didn't have a good relationship with mine at all. They kinda took me under their wing, and the mom was, like, really into property. I was like, how are you fucking buying stuff? Like, you live a good life. Like, what's going on? And she was, like, talking to me about it, and I just learned and learned and learned. I was was like, can I come to some of your meetings? Like, can I just, like, sit in? And she was like, yeah. Yeah. You can come in. And then she was like, after about six months of me going to all these meetings, like, taking notes and stuff. I was like, look, I've managed to make some money. Is there a way that I can go in with you on a property? I've done the calculations. I know you're gonna buy this one. Like, what if I front it up x? And so that was how I got into it and then just kept doing it. And then I found Bitcoin, and then Nice. I was like, oh, this is dumb. This is really fucking dumb. Like, putting money in property is fucking retarded.
So everything that I had, I sold and bought Bitcoin. The home I lived in, everything got rid of everything. Lived as frugally as I possibly could and didn't want any property. But then since having a family, there's always been this thing in my head that's like financially it makes no sense to buy a property. I'm much better off renting, but it's not mine. The home base. Yeah. That's right. It's like, it's not ours. There's a certain amount of like, now we've got a home. I'm really obsessed with learning to be more skilled with carpentry because there's a lot of wood there. Like, I can do I can build decks. I can do a lot of handy stuff, tiling and whatever. But I wanna get really good at carpentry because I wanna put these personal touches onto our home that I'd never do anywhere else. But because it's my home and hopefully my kids inherit this, I want what I'm doing with that deck or what I'm doing with that door to be really fucking beautiful. And then when I go to sleep, because it's been hard work, I could have done other things that could have been more financially better for me. Not buying the house would have been smarter financially.
Hiring someone here to do the work for me would be better. It'd be better me working and paying someone rather than me doing it myself slower and more expensive for my time. But I sleep better because I'm like, I've done something that's gonna hopefully be around for a long time, and it's, like, done beautifully, and my family get to enjoy it. That's way more interesting to me than, like, oh, I'm gonna do a business deal. It's more wholesome. Yep. It's all about that time. Right? Putting that time in is worth it, time
[00:39:17] Unknown:
for the kids to see your personal touches as they grow up, and they will appreciate it. Right? Like, there's no doubt about that. They might not now, but that appreciation will be there someday.
[00:39:26] Unknown:
That's awesome. One day when I'm, like, old and fucked, maybe they'll go, do you know what? Like, we never appreciated that, but that was quite cool what you did there. But when they're kids, unfortunately, you never get that. Like, ah, you know, you didn't eat today so that we could have that toy. That's we really appreciate that, dad. It's more like Ah, wah, wah, wah, wah. Little fucks. Yeah.
[00:39:49] Unknown:
No. That's the truth. I know I look back and and appreciate, you know, more and more of what my parents did in the time that they spent doing things or putting into the effort to make us feel
[00:40:01] Unknown:
special or good on, you know, whatever day it was or or anything like that. It's weird, isn't it, Tom? Like, you were saying earlier, the things you chase, you chase the money because you think it gives you the ability to do the things that you think you want to do, but then you get so far down the road of chasing that you don't have time to do the things that you thought you wanted to do, even though you've got the money. It's like that old adage where it's people go on holiday and they're on a little fishing boat, the wealthy people on the fishing boat with the guy who's chartering it. So, yeah, can you imagine doing this every day? I'd I'd love to do this every day. The fishing boat man says, I do. It's like that person is far less wealthy financially, but do they have a more fulfilling life? And, like, yeah, probably.
[00:40:47] Unknown:
Yeah. It reminds me of rafting. Right? I would take these sometimes super wealthy people from the Bay Area rafting. They'd come up and be like, you're so lucky. You're living this life. You're out here in the woods just rafting the river every day. With anything, there's sacrifice being made. Right? I'm not maybe making the money that they're making, but the beauty of nature. And they think I'm lucky, and I'm like, well, shit. I'd rather be living in the bay and flying cross country and living in million dollar homes. What's the yeah. I don't know. What we want, what we don't have a lot of times. Right? And it's like so I've been thinking about, should I get a girlfriend? And you got you and John need to do more jingles. You gotta do more jingles every now and then. I know it's you're both busy, but we need more hash sluts. Alright?
Gotta have some more jingles. But
[00:41:35] Unknown:
I We need more hash sluts. Everyone needs more hash sluts. Yeah. Definitely.
[00:41:39] Unknown:
You said you were thinking about getting a girlfriend, but I guess you're still Oh, yeah. Okay. So sometimes I think I want a girlfriend. Right? Like, it's a lonely life out here, this and that. But I know myself well enough where if I get a girlfriend, when I get into that situation, I'm gonna be like, why did I do this? And then it's gonna be, like, this almost hassle type thing where I end up making the girl hate me to get out of the relationship rather than just, like, know to not even get in one, just enjoy things. It's yeah. Time and the mind are funny.
[00:42:11] Unknown:
Maybe it's finding the right one. You reckon? Well, you're always gonna have like, you always think you want what you don't want. You're single and you're shagging around and you're living that life and you're like, I'd like someone just to, like, look after me today and just I'd like someone just to be around and, like, have a girlfriend. I think you want that. And then it's the other you know? I think a life I don't know. I think the best part of my life is the kids. So, like, I think that without having the girlfriend, it doesn't give you the opportunity to find potentially the wife or long time partner, and then it doesn't give you the opportunity to raise a family. Not a like, a broken family, which is what me and, like, almost everyone you know is, like, part of that. Like, mom, dad, yeah, they got divorced. They've got other partners and whatever. And it's like this you know, or they didn't get on. There's, like, the shouting all the time and, like, the bullshit that you'd, like, most people grow up with. Yep. But, actually, if you're building something that's really valuable, at least in my mind, probably fuck it up. Everyone does. But, like, I wanna do my best to try and build this family where it's you have the mom and dad, you have the kids, you have the home, and you put that first. And if you can do that and build that, I think that, like, everything else pales in comparison in terms of, like, those moments of just giving your kids the best possible opportunity and showing love to them so that because it's all cyclical, isn't it? Like, a lot of the bullshit that we have is from our parents and, you know, from theirs and at the same time, the good things. So everyone knows, like, having mom and dad together if they're a strong unit and you've got kids seeing that, they grow up very differently to have growing up in a broken family. So that's kind of where I look at it as, like, that's the most beautiful thing that I can do. That's the most, like, exciting thing for me to do with my time. But you have to have the girlfriend first to do that. Like, I've got mates who, like, very, very successful with the ladies and, like, live that lifestyle still.
But, you know, they're, like, knocking 40, some of them older, and then they're like, I'm just probably not gonna do the kid thing. And I think there's, like, merit to it, but also I do think you miss out. Like, there is there's just nothing like having kids. It's fucking annoying, but, like, without that, I don't know. It's not quite full. I mean, it's the perseverance.
[00:44:34] Unknown:
Not many have the perseverance to endure another human's
[00:44:39] Unknown:
Bullshit.
[00:44:40] Unknown:
Exactly. Their their drama, their baggage. And people just don't have that where they wanna endure that and make it through. It's just a, no. Not gonna do it. Not gonna put the time into this. Right? It comes down to time again. Freak. What? It's like how I'm not gonna do that because they can't see the backside, like you're saying, with the kids and those types of things. I had one early in life. I had a son early in life, got married,
[00:45:03] Unknown:
did that, And now I'm to the point now where I don't think I wanna start over again. Like, I see my brothers with young kids, and I get fulfillment from them and hanging out with them, and I love it. But for me, I just don't think I wanna do it all over again. I get that. Like, if you've already got a son, that's fucking cool. So you know this thing is awesome. Really annoying probably, but, like, amazing. Like, what gift to have a child. It doesn't mean you have to go through that again. I agree. I've seen, like, one of my closest mates, fucking hilarious guy. He's, like, must be, like, 65, nearly 70
[00:45:38] Unknown:
Jamaican guy. Up there. Okay.
[00:45:40] Unknown:
Met him, like, my dad used to have pubs. I met him there. He was, like, always really successful young kids. We always got on. He always, like, mentored me. Like, anytime I've had, like, big problems, I phoned him up. I'm like, mate. I'm fucking I've got problems. And he's like, yeah. Come over. Like, really wealthy, like, big fucking mansion, big pad, all the toys, like, all the money that you could ever ever think. And he says that to me. He's like, I'll never have kids again now. Like, it doesn't and and I'll never be in a relationship again now. Like, I have girlfriends. I have the Tinder profile. They see the house. They see the Range Rover. They see whatever. We go and have some fun. Like, I exclusively date, like, 28 year olds. We go on holiday every other week, and we do this, and I just fuck. And they don't care about me, and I don't really care about them. And that's how it is. And you can look at that as, like, as this is soulless or lifeless or, like, there's no joy. But he's like, oh, I enjoy it, and they have a good time too. And I still have my kids, and I see them on weekends, and I love them to pieces.
So you kind of have the best of both worlds in that sense. They're like, you have, like, the wholesome stuff with the family. You look after them, but you can also have your fun. So that's my role model right there. That's where I wanna be at 60,
[00:46:51] Unknown:
65, straight up 28 year olds. That's my cap, and I'm golden.
[00:46:56] Unknown:
It's fucking hilarious. It's, like, down to such a fine art. He's so skilled at his. Absolutely hilarious. But, you know, he's had the kids. He's done the things, and he's just like, never again.
[00:47:06] Unknown:
I think we definitely start to learn ourselves the older we get, and it's you know, for me, it's just one of those things. Like, I've had few great girlfriends. You know, I haven't had a ton of girlfriends, but the ones I've had have been really good, really taken care of me and loved me. And I've ended up you know, at a certain point, I find myself not wanting to be in a relationship after, you know, five, six, how many every years. I can't see myself doing that again. I really can't. You never know, though. Right? We never know. You never know. Maybe my next, my next Bitcoin cutie comes along.
Hash Latte. I know. Where did she go? She hasn't been around. I don't know. Breaking my heart.
[00:47:45] Unknown:
Maybe we scared her off with the jingles or You could have been. The HashSlut commercial.
[00:47:50] Unknown:
Probably John. John scares people. Creepy. I think that's the thing.
[00:47:58] Unknown:
Yeah. We'll try and bring it back. I think, like I said, a couple of months from now, we'll have a bit more time and, like, be able to create in a different way. But it just takes so much time. It's you know, John was sat there for, like, I don't know, half a day a day doing show prep, and then I was spending a day or two days, like, editing and adding in the music and doing all the stuff. We have an editor now, but then all the money from sponsorship goes to editing. So then you're back to that square one of, like, oh, fuck. It's like drain. So it is definitely a labor of love.
[00:48:27] Unknown:
You like doing the live shows? I've been listening to a few of the Freedom Tech Fridays Oh, yeah. With Ewan's q and a and set. What do you think? I like them. I think they're informative. I usually don't catch them live. I usually catch them after the fact. But the one where y'all each named an app, and there was, like, the note taking app instead of using notes and then, obviously, signal, and I can't remember what the other one was. But usually good info on there. I like it. You know? It's
[00:48:50] Unknown:
something I was really, really against for ages. Why? Control Freak. I like to have the control with the editing. I like to do things at my own pace. I liked not being in a completely rigid structure of, like, it is being recorded on a Friday at this time, so you have to be there. Like, there's no, like, rearranging. There's none of that. Mainly the control part. And then Jordan pushed me and pushed me and pushed me, and then Q kept pushing and saying, look. Look. We should do this. And then, eventually, I was like, fuck it. Let's just do it. Let's just give it a go.
Expecting not really to enjoy it, but, like, let's just see. And, actually, it's probably become the most enjoyable one because I know when it's done. So I've gotta do, like, a little bit of sorting out the levels, and I might spend half an hour just fucking around before it can go on the feed or an hour tops. But it's not what the normal editing process is. And then it's quite nice. Like, I I quite like that we've got obviously, Q and Seth are like the big brains. Like, between the two of them, they seem to fucking know pretty much anything that I could ask about anything.
And then we've got all the people in the live chat who jump in, and they ask questions, but they also answer questions. So we've got eight Mithrandeers in there. He's, like, smart as fuck answering things and on and, like, all these other guys who are in there, just SPA and people like that. Like, there are areas that even Seth and Cube might not know so much about, like, specific bits, but guarantee you some of those guys in the chat, they really, really know their shit. And so they're in there as well. And then you got me just like Mongoloid, like, bringing it down to the level of the knuckle draggers, which I think is important as well because otherwise, it gets too lofty and too unapproachable because you forget how much you know to some degree. And then a new person coming in, what happens is they'll end up, like, tuning in and go, oh, what the fuck? Like, I don't even know what this means. And then they'll tune into, like, Pete the cunt instead, and they'll listen to that.
And then they'll get scammed fucking
[00:50:56] Unknown:
whatever, like, compass or whatever the the latest thing is. I've been using Cake Wallet trying to move I mean, Blue Wallet's usually my daily driver, but I've been getting into Cake recently and got some payouts going in there. Still trying to figure out silent payments and this pay join and some of these other things in here. So that's a good one. He's a pretty smart dude.
[00:51:17] Unknown:
He's fucking he's so smart. He's so smart. There's, like, levels of shit. Yeah. Like, on Twitter, I've always followed him, and he's always been in this other camp and different things, but he's a he's a smart one. I think he winds a lot of people up because he just Yeah. Outstates his opinions. And, like, he's also not an aggressive typical Bitcoiner type. Like, he's happy to have a nuanced conversation. He and he, like, isn't gonna attack people. And, again, I think people are like, oh, he's a bit wishy washy or he's this or he's that. And, like, all I can say is that I've known probably for about a year and a half now pretty well. Like, we speak most weeks, and he's a really fucking solid guy, a good human being. Every interaction that I've had, there's been times where I've laid things out where he could have been dishonest or fucked me over or made things not as good for me quite easily because I've laid things out a certain way. And he never has. It has always been absolutely honest. So He's never honest. And the same with Q. Like, I've known Q for much, much longer. Have you I got to meet him in Vegas.
[00:52:25] Unknown:
Oh, you did? At the bugle the bugle party. I That was funny. That was hilarious.
[00:52:32] Unknown:
I wish I'd have been there. That looked fucking old. Didn't you have, like, midget wrestling and stuff? Yes. In the ring. That was it was crazy. Are you gonna come this year? No. It's unlikely. It's unlikely.
[00:52:43] Unknown:
You just don't get out much. What about Lake Satoshi?
[00:52:45] Unknown:
If I'm gonna go anywhere, it's gonna be Lake Satoshi. Nice. If I go anywhere at all, it will be there. We sort of loosely planned a trip where we go to America, and we tie that in with a couple of other things that we wanna do there. Do it. Do it. Do it like Soluxe does. Yeah. My honestly, my genuinely, a re main reason that I don't go to a lot of these things is an OPSEC thing, especially with family. It's something that I worry about maybe more than I should. I'm still work as a nim with this podcast, which gives me the rights to sort of not the rights, but, like, the ability to be a bit more honest than someone whose face is out there probably would, and that's quite valuable to me. And then just like a safety aspect as well with the family and everything else. So that is honestly why, like, I don't go to so many events. Like, I've been to events before where I've been there as a NIM and, like, a couple of the inside group know who I am. And then, like, someone's like, oh, yeah. That's Max.
And I'm like, great. Now another person. And it's happened a couple of times to people where, like, I really didn't want that person to know who I am. I really don't wanna share this information with this person because glowy types walk among us, like, in a big way. I I know they do.
[00:54:00] Unknown:
I'm probably too lax with it, honestly. Like, I'm probably too far the other way where I just if you're gonna come get me, come and get me, I guess. And that's probably not a good way to be there. I need to be
[00:54:13] Unknown:
Well, I'm not someone who's like, oh, I'm massively worried about a $5 wrench attack or that kind of stuff because it's like, a, you're gonna have a hard time, and b, you're gonna be so disappointed. But it's more like the future problems of, like, he said this and done this and been honest about a setup or being honest about this, and now there's a potential vulnerability. Like, either, like, legally or it's it's more that kind of stuff where I'm just like, yeah. I'd love to just go to Lake Soshy with the family, not give a fuck about it, and I think just enjoy it and, like, get them all meeting people and everything. But, genuinely, that's the reason. There's probably, like, 10 people who have seen my face and shook my hand and, like, we know each other, like, in the real world, which is a massive shame. That's wild.
[00:55:00] Unknown:
Yeah. I've never even met John. That's wild to me.
[00:55:04] Unknown:
John's never even seen my face.
[00:55:07] Unknown:
Never seen your face?
[00:55:08] Unknown:
No. He's never seen my face or Jordan or Oh my goodness. Or Seth. Like, anyone in our crew, the only person who has is q because he was one of the first people I ever met.
[00:55:18] Unknown:
Gotcha. Yeah. Well, it's probably good. Like I said, I take my OPSEC probably a little bit too loose, but it it's the same principle. Like, if you're gonna $5 wrench attack me and some of the things that you guys say, definitely, when you guys talk about security and things like that, it's good. It's good to have that thought being put into people's head because, like, I would never really think of that. Like, it just doesn't cross my mind, I guess, because maybe I yeah. I don't know. It's weird. But I need to be more OPSEC secure.
[00:55:47] Unknown:
Well, there's levels to it, isn't there? And there's there's a lot of people that sort of overdo things, and you might not ever need to. And, also, like, I think if you're really good with digital stuff, if you're like a Seth or a Q, do all the clever encryption this and flash drive that and keep that in the cloud, whatever it is. Like, do all the shit. But if you're, like, more of a physical person, keep your shit in the physical world. Like, if you know I can secure stuff, I know, like, I have different locations. I know my physical surroundings, and I'm much better in that world. Lean on that. I know I'm a fucking idiot when it comes to technical stuff, so I don't go too hypertechnical because I'm just gonna shoot myself in the fur. I'm quite good in the real world, like, in the physical world, so I lean on that. That's just I think don't be too clever. I think loads of people shoot themselves with that.
[00:56:35] Unknown:
Oh, I definitely do. Like, right today, I just bought another two terabyte hard drive start OS node or my start nine node is full. So I got, I don't know, five, ten million sats on there, and I'm like, I can't get to it. I can't get to my Zeus wallet. I'm like, holy smokes. I'm freaking out. So thank goodness at the Lexington meetup, we have a guy there that's super smart. He's actually helped me set this node up. So I'm gonna go visit him here. He's messaging me right now. I'm gonna go visit him and hopefully get this node back up and running. Nodes have always been so hard for me. They're just fucking, man. Nodes. It's like, how do I can't keep on running from the first umbrella I ever built to the start nine has been good, though, by far the best one I've ever had.
[00:57:18] Unknown:
Me too. But I had this exact same thing. I had to upgrade to it from one to two terabyte and Yep. Had exactly the same thing that I had lightning that I couldn't access, and the backups weren't working. And then it ended up being some fucking SATA or whatever it is, SATA. SATA drive. That case that I bought wasn't compatible or didn't have enough power or whatever. Some fucking stupid shit
[00:57:41] Unknown:
and, like, took days and days and days. And then it worked, and it was fine. It's always worrying with lightning. Yeah. I haven't started freaking out too much yet. I'm like, alright. My homie knows what he's doing. Like, he this is his realm, so I'm just gonna take the computer in today to the meet today's the meetup. The the every Tuesday, there's a Lexington meetup. So I'll go up there and take the computer and hopefully get this thing back working. And I'll learn something. Right? That's what's great about Bitcoin is I'm constantly learning, especially in that other side of the world. On the even in the mining side, I'm every day. But the node side is it's it's foreign to me. I'm still scared to hook up. I'm gonna ask him if he can hook up my cake wallet to it today because I know they have their node sync and that kind of stuff, and I'm just I'm scared to do it. Like, I'm just not good at it. Just not as comfortable with it as I am going out and throwing a miner in and knowing exactly what's going on with it. What's good you have a meetup that's a hands on one that's actually, like, doing that stuff? That's cool. No. There's a guy there that's couple guys there that are really smart. And then I ask you a lot. Right? Like, when someone gets a foundation, we had a guy that hosts here. Who'd be here? Gets a foundation device. I'm like, hey. Use the code on governor. We'll get this foundation device. Then he asked me some basic questions, and I'm like, Max. Max. What what's going on here? What do I say?
And, it's funny. Just take note of that foundation that I do shield code, but people just don't use it. They just don't use it. And I'll do your customer support for you as well. So just know that. Well, yeah. Exactly. So what I tell you one thing. He said foundation, like, when he got into the videos and stuff, he's like, they did a good job on the tutorials with those because he's very new. He's got it all set up and good to go now with his envoy or all that stuff. Yeah. What was it you were saying? He was like, oh, I can't see it on the device or something. Exactly. And this I don't think you're supposed to see it on the device.
[00:59:26] Unknown:
Yeah. These are all things, though. Like, I remember thinking exactly that. I was like, oh, it's not not in here. And then, like, you get it explained. You're like, yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. That makes sense. Well, it's good you have that meetup, and, yeah, hopefully, more of them grow out and more people do some more, like, practical stuff rather than just talk about price and all that kind of stuff. But that's why, like, we shill as much as we do with Lake Satoshi because even though I've not been there, every single report that I have back is just like, yeah. There's, like, the proper people that help you with anything,
[01:00:01] Unknown:
good family atmosphere. It's got all the makings of where you wanna send someone new to Bitcoin to meet the right people and learn the right stuff. So that's yeah. We just we should it where we can. They're good homies for sure. It's it's growing. It's definitely growing, and you can kinda see some of the other crowds kinda starting to come in, I guess you'd say. A little bit, but, you know, John and those guys took over the hill, and it was a good one. The meetup scenes, I think, are where it's at. Like, had it not been for the meetup scenes early on in my trajectory, there's no telling who I woulda gotten in with or where. The meetup scenes were really, really crucial to my development, the community that I built. We all talk about circular economy or circular economy this and that. But if you're not going to the meetup or you're not getting out there amongst it, it's gonna be really hard.
I mean, you got lucky because you have a lot of good Telegram groups and community there. We're not as big really on Telegram. I don't like to, like, be type in and and putting a ton of stuff on Telegram. Like, when I see people, sometimes, I guess, I'm judging when they're writing stuff on some of the chats. I'm like, oh, this guy's a fucking gooper or dweeb. You know? And it's like, oh, and I don't wanna have that same judgment put on me, so I don't necessarily write as much out there. And I'm more of an in person guy. Like, you know, when you see me in person and we chitchat and talk, that's when you get to feel me out rather than just some on Telegram writing, oh, have me on stick
[01:01:27] Unknown:
whatever it is. Yeah. It's like, okay. I don't know. I get you. Those meetups are important. We've got one already, but we're trying to do, like, a load of tutorials and presentations that any meetup can just download and use. And the idea is that I'll then send a T shirt and a hoodie or a hat and a hoodie as, like, prizes. So the person who does the presentation gets one, and then they have a quiz at the end on what's discussed. So we get that kind of ungovernable misfits, the important topics covered. So we did one on Ashigaru, and then we'll do one with, like, setting up cake wallet and linking that to your nose and doing all that kind of stuff and one for foundation. So the Ashigaru one's done.
So if anyone wants that who's running a meetup or going to meetups can suggest it, and the other two are coming. I'm working with queue and with one of Seth's marketing guys for the k quality one. I think that's the kind of stuff where it's useful. That's what we wanna do more with Ungovernable is, like, get into the meetups at grassroots level to say, look. We're gonna provide you with this info. Here's, like, a premade talk that you can do, but do some prizes, do some giveaways, do that kind of stuff because it helps us, like, bring new listeners in as well doing that kind of thing. That's what we're really gunning for. So any of these meetups that you go to suggest it, and we'll, we'll send some stuff over. Will do. And the Ashigari,
[01:02:54] Unknown:
like, I don't know much about that. I hear you guys talk about it a lot. It's a coin joint, right, or a mixer, kind of? Obviously, samurai went away. Yep. And then Ashigaru
[01:03:05] Unknown:
is I don't know how you'd call it. Like, it's like a rebirth of samurai, and no one knows who's behind it. But I've had them on, the devs on, with voice changes and everything. And that was that was good to chat to them. But, basically, it's like, okay. Samura wallet was a fucking amazing wallet, but, obviously, now it can't be worked on anymore. So whoever it is behind this has said, we still wanna have all these tools. And they brought back the wallet, but without Whirlpool, which was the CoinJoin implementation Okay. To start with. And so they still had the post mix spending tools and everything like that.
They've developed it, made it really, really slick, have all the pay nims and all that kind of stuff. And then they've actually brought out Whirlpool. So there's a new Whirlpool, which has been running for, I think, three months or something like that. Me and Jordan jumped on and and tested it the day it came out and, like, did live testing and and did all that. We've got that on the pod. But it works, and it's like it works in the same way that Whirlpool did. It's really fucking slick. I would say now Ashigaru is a better wallet than Samurai ever was. At this point, it's really, really slick. Where I thought we'd never have Whirlpool again, and that's a big problem. We now do, and it's starting to grow. There's still some, like, concern around it Of course. Because no one knows who's behind it, which you can kind of understand, and it's new. Yep. But then also, it has to be someone that no one knows because otherwise well, we've seen what's happened to samurai, and they're, like, they're good guys. Hats off to them. Fucking yeah. I mean, you know, they're they're really good guys who put everything on the line and didn't have to. You know, they weren't in a situation. They're like, oh, fucking the world. We really need the money, and look what's happened. So you can understand. No one's gonna wanna pop their head up and go like, oh, yeah. Send me to prison, please.
[01:04:58] Unknown:
Yeah. Right? Craziness. I think it's only gonna get worse too, really, before it gets better. You know? Yeah. We know what's coming. It's been talked about and told, and these things play out. That's one thing I've learned throughout my time in Bitcoin is I compare it to the bible sometimes, you know, with these prophecies Mhmm. That we I watch them get fulfilled all the time, except for my thesis on miner prices. But I got a feeling that that's gonna happen at some point. I'm gonna Just when you sell them. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. Thanks, Bitcoin. You humbled me to my core again. I'm sitting here on my knees crying, and here we go.
[01:05:37] Unknown:
Yeah. Well, I hope that plays out for you, mate. It's been really good chatting to you. It's been good to have a catch up and You too, Max. Someone who's been around for the whole beginning of the plug miner mafia and someone who's become a real pioneer. So we appreciate you, mate. And any sort of closing words of wisdom or shills or anything you wanna do? No. I mean, I I appreciate y'all accepting me for me. I've had my freak outs in a couple of the chats, and
[01:06:04] Unknown:
I appreciate y'all not. It's easy to say, Oh, that guy's crazy, and just turn your head away. And you and John and most of the guys in the Meshedale and Clubminer Mafia, whatever you want to call it, they've been good to me. I appreciate the welcomeness that I feel every time I interact or get on or anything like that. And I love y'all's podcast. You know? A lot of times on my drives and like you were saying, like, the progression of when you come in. Right? I was listening to tons and tons of podcast before forty hours was even a thing, right, and all this shit that the bugle does. I was listening to so many hours, and then my progression has now moved to kind of books.
Mainly books. Yeah. I'll listen to books now, and only a few podcasts still remain in my thing. Like, you know, the ungovernable. Misfits is one. I listen to the bugle now. Still listen to Pod two fifty six. I like Eco and what he does. You know, Ashigiri, he likes the same kind of things as ungovernable, so it's good. There's not many left, though, that that I listen to, and it's just the progression. The time is times everything.
[01:07:07] Unknown:
That's it. Well, mate, I appreciate you taking the time today. Hopefully, we'll catch up again in another few years where your mining thesis has played out. Ah. Your ball. Hopefully, we,
[01:07:17] Unknown:
we'll get a chance to meet at Lake Satoshi someday too. I'm sure we'll meet. You know, you stood me up when I was coming through London there. What was that? About eight months ago, six months ago, something like that. It was. You're busy, though. I get it. And it's it's not easy. It's not easy, but I do wanna drink a pint with you.
[01:07:33] Unknown:
Definitely. We'll make it happen, mate. I promise. Sounds good. I appreciate your time. Thanks for having me on. Alright. See you soon, mate.
[01:07:40] Unknown:
Alright.
Bitcoin is close to becoming worthless.
[00:00:11] Unknown:
Bitcoin.
[00:00:16] Unknown:
Now what's the Bitcoin?
[00:00:19] Unknown:
Bitcoin's like rat poison. Yeah.
[00:00:22] Unknown:
Oh. The greatest scam in history.
[00:00:25] Unknown:
Let's get it.
[00:00:27] Unknown:
Bitcoin will go to fucking zero.
[00:00:41] Unknown:
Welcome back to another confab episode. This one is with Chet, a good friend of the show and a pleb minor mafia member. He's been around for a long time, basically, since the start of everything I've done with John, and he's been a huge supporter of the show and a lot of the spin off projects around the ungovernable Misfit sphere. It was really good to have a catch up with him. It'd been a couple of years. Chet's a perfect example of a pioneer. When we talk about this concept, we're talking about getting away from just being a pleb, jumping into doing things properly and mastering your craft. And when it comes to mining, especially Hydro, Chet is the man to speak to. If you're listening to this and looking to set something up with Hydro, he is definitely the man to reach out to. Before we jump in, I wanna say a huge thank you to everyone supporting the show, whether that's sharing with friends and family, boosting the show, sending in XMR chats, or any of the other many ways that people help.
Last month's confab was with business cat. If you missed that, definitely go and check it out. That was a really fun one. Thank you to Rod Palmer from the Bugle News. He says, hashtag forty hours per week and sends 21,000 sats. Thank you, Rod Palmer. Thank you very much, mate. Fundamentals sent 10,101 sats and said, great pod. So glad this finally happened. I knew it would be a banger. Otis Bittmeyer sent 5,420 sats and said a good vibes discussion of black pill subject matter. Noah looked crazy until he didn't. Late stage HODL sent 5,000 stats and said, Kareem's sample just keeps getting better. I always enjoy a, that's fine, thrown in the middle of the conversation, and John's voice saying, fucking parasites was perfect.
Good work, Karen. Pay this man more to keep up the good work. Fucking hell. Alright, mate. Great conversation with business cat. I look forward to the four man confab and lots of grumpy old man stuff. Yeah. Me too. Hopefully soon. Confgas says heroes bring greatness. Jason c, love the ISOs, Max. Lean into that. Block seven streamed 1,140 sets. Rev Huddl said being prepared for the pole shift means being prepared with more than financial capital or physical form of capital. I'm working on being prepared spiritually too. Caz Peland streamed 440 sats. User one one three four two seven nine one streamed 590 sats. Wood Butcher sent 420 sats and said two Thessalonians.
Oh, this has gotta be a bible thing. One seven ten. A I b l e, wonderful conversation and a long time coming. I've been taking the poll shift seriously, though I know we may not survive it. Even if it doesn't happen in your lifetime, a Western society continues its steady decline. Anyone would be well served to follow the advice of business cat Max, John, Kerim, and others in being prepared for life as you know it being flipped on its head. God bless RBP and the misfits. Yeah. Totally agree, mate. More and more I'm thinking about that. Because the worst case scenario, if you are prepared, is you have tools and food and things and preparations that you can use anyway and generally come in handy anyway, whether it's a poll shift, whether it's just food shortages, shipping issues. Like, it could be anything. The worst case is you're a bit more prepared. It really is worth thinking about. Stack Jarrow sent 250 sets saying, having a low time preference for such a cataclysm definitely makes sense to a certain degree, not necessarily going full prepper mode. But I think it's important to realize such a thing could happen, and it's important to be able to respond accordingly if one is capable.
God Seth said thank you, gentlemen. Mark said oh, Mark sent 210. Do you know of any other mobile wallet with silent payment support? Good question. I'm not sure. I think Sparrow has it, but, obviously, not that's not a mobile wallet. I think there's one that only I think Seth mentioned the other day that only does silent payments and nothing else, but I can't remember what it's called. You have to listen back. I think it was maybe last week's Freedom Tech Friday or the Monero monthly. It was one of the two. Thank you to everyone who's been supporting the show, all the messages, all the sats, XMR chats, everything.
We really, really appreciate it. Before we start, I wanna say thank you to my show sponsors, Cake Wallet, Foundation, and My Nimbox. I'm very, very happy to have these guys on board. It's amazing to find such aligned companies, and I'm very happy to be suggesting these services to friends, family, listeners. And maybe that's kind of the same thing in many cases. If you want a world class mobile wallet, check out cakewallet.com. They support silent payments, Monero, linking to your own node. You can run it over tool. They have Cake Pay where you can spend your Bitcoin and Monero, buying gift cards, Visa cards, all sorts of things. They have some of the best features out there, and they are always building. I've literally just got off the call for the Freedom Tech Friday with Seth, and they're building out a Visa card that you'd be able to top up and use within Google or Apple Wallet and just use it for everyday spending, which would be amazing.
They're just always innovating, I think. They've got over half a million users, and they really are incredible. Thank you also to Foundation. Foundation have been supporting this show for a very long time now. We would not be here without them. They make my favorite hardware. It's my favorite hardware because it's beautifully designed. It's fully open source. It's piss easy to use. They have an amazing companion app, Envoy, which makes it very simple to set up friends and family, and they've got an incredible team. Bitcoin q and a included in that team, obviously, a huge part of ungovernable misfits and really cares about making sure that people are secure and private where they can be. Go to foundation.xyz.
You can use the code ungovernable for a discount. And if you have any questions, you can reach out to me or q. And finally, my inbox, the newest sponsor of this show, and they've been incredible. If you are looking at hosting, whether that's running a node, setting up BTC pay server, setting up a VPS, or really any hosting service. You really should consider using them. I recently did a confab with random NIM. Go back and check that out if you haven't already, but we go through all of the trade offs, the good, the bad, the ugly, everything that you need to know.
Pay in Bitcoin, Monero, or any other cryptocurrency. They don't take any details from you. You can do this very privately, very securely, and you don't have to be hugely technical to do this. If you have any questions for me or for random Nim, you can reach out, but check them out at my nimbox.net, and enjoy the show. We finally have him on the show. Chet is back. Still with the same mic, still with the same computer, and I have to say, probably still with the same beard, isn't it? It's looking long. Yeah. Definitely. Well, nice to have you back, mate. There's very few people who have been around in the, Bitcoin mining scene and mesh Dadell and everything that I've been doing with John as long as you. Like, you've been there pretty much right from the start. I was definitely fortunate.
[00:08:54] Unknown:
Got to hear y'all when John first came on, and I knew right away. I had to meet these guys. Yeah. You were what were you you were down is it Guatemala, you said, or something at a lake? Yep. Well, the first time I heard y'all, I was in Miami staying in a hostel at a mining disrupt trying to just get out and meet anybody I could. The first time we recorded, I was in Guatemala doing the, the oil. They used cooking oil, putting a genset, and trying to they run minors.
[00:09:27] Unknown:
So it was something like from memory because it's when was that? That was '21 maybe, was it? Something like that or 2022?
[00:09:36] Unknown:
It's either '21 or '22. Yep. It was when John was doing the, hash the torch. That's it. And he wanted me to go meet Carl. So we had Carl and I, that's the first time we met was on the podcast or chatted or or anything.
[00:09:48] Unknown:
And now he's becomes, you know, a great homie. Oh, I love Carl. He's such a wise man. We say it all the time, but just like, if you wanna survive in an apocalypse, he's probably one of the people you want on your team, isn't
[00:10:00] Unknown:
he? Oh, yeah. I'd bug out to Michigan. Like, if I had needed to to bug out, I'd go to that community and try to fit in up there somewhere where I could just work and get in. Yeah. We got a good group. So, I mean, since then, like,
[00:10:12] Unknown:
spinning up the hash, the torch, and all these people meeting, you, me, and Carl, and everyone else, and the and and Matthew and everything. We never really knew what it was gonna be. It's turned into something really cool. Like, whenever I think about, oh, I wanna learn how to do this or I wanna build that. I wanna know about something. There's almost always, like, with almost any subject, someone that you can reach out to who's either really skilled or really knowledgeable in a certain area. And that's not really something that I've seen most other places within Bitcoin and, like, all these kind of groups and pods and stuff. Like, the fact that you've got, like and spin offs like Lake Satoshi and all these other things that sort of come out of it where you have these core groups that could all go meet.
That's like a real just like a huge value because the lot of the rest of the space that I look around in, like, I don't wanna associate myself with 99% of them. Like, I find it quite embarrassing the way that people act, and nothing's, like, real. It's all a bit gross. And then it's like this little gulch of people that can do and will look after each other, which is pretty awesome.
[00:11:25] Unknown:
No. I agree 100%. Like, the community y'all have built, it's second to none. So there was a while there where I found myself tearing away from where my roots came from, like, where I started in Bitcoin. Right? The people that actually helped me to progress in my progression on the Bitcoin trajectory that I was on. Mhmm. And you get in some of the groups, and it's just strictly all these Tradfry bros, all these people that just are just so niche, and they don't let really anyone else into their community. Right? You wanna try to get in and fit in because you think they're the ones that can get you to the next step that you wanna go to. And I was following myself where I was kinda, like, not in a rut, but just not surrounded by exactly the people that I came in with and the ones that I wanted to be surrounded with. And I kinda had to step back and just kinda hunkered down,
[00:12:14] Unknown:
stayed more focused, and and been grinding pretty hard right now. Do you think there's, like, a level of you know, like, when you first start seeing a girl, doesn't matter who they are, you have this, like, electricity that is, like, running through the two of you. It's like a an excitement, a palpable feeling of intense excitement. And no matter how much you love that girl, that is gonna fade, and it fades on both ways. That explosive chemistry. Do you think it's kind of similar in the Bitcoin world? Because, like, we do come in, you don't wanna fuck Bitcoin, but, like, you can't shut the fuck up about it. You are, like, amazed by it and you can't stop. And then to some degree, it's like however many years you are down the line, you're like, I still love this thing, but I'm not as excited. I think so. I don't think it's particularly Bitcoin's fault.
[00:13:03] Unknown:
It's sometimes the people that you associate with Bitcoin. Right? And we've always say Bitcoin's gonna get everyone. Everyone and everything's gonna come to Bitcoin on a long enough timeline. For me, it was just I was searching or trying to get to what I thought I wanted and what people look at as success and this and that. You know? Success is measured in many different forms. And I just wasn't I don't know. I just didn't feel right for a while there where I was at and what I was trying to get into and and grinding towards. I had lost some of it's funny because the fiat ways still try to corrupt you on this journey in Bitcoin. Mhmm. I don't know. It's hard to explain.
[00:13:44] Unknown:
Was that, like, in terms of, you know, you started getting into mining, then you really heavily have got in. Like, John always says to me, he's like, oh, yeah. Like, Chet really knows his shit. Like, he really embraces our sleep in the mind, bro. Like, I'll take a roll up mattress. I'll be there, and you do things to a very, very high spec and know your shit. Like, obviously, that gives you a I imagine anyway, like, mastering your craft gives you, like, a really good feeling inside. There's, like, a value to doing something, doing it well. And when you go to sleep, you're like, fuck. I'm nailing this. But it's easy to get corrupted. I'm sure, especially in that industry, what you're saying is, like, chasing just the numbers.
[00:14:29] Unknown:
Exactly. For sure. I mean and then also wanting the adulation of people that don't really matter or do matter. They they matter. Everyone matters. Right? But it just didn't matter for what the accolades or what I was trying to achieve. And then, you know, you find yourself feeling more hollow than the fulfillment that it should have felt to get to to where I thought I was trying to like you're saying, master your craft, and I'll I'll never master Bitcoin or mining. You know, I had a thesis on miner prices that I'm about to be very, very humbled on. Bitcoin has a way of humbling you to your core.
A thesis that I thought was gonna play out, and it still it still could. Right? I still could get humbled for the next month or two, and then boom, something happens and, you know, minor price use minor prices and just minor prices go off the charts again.
[00:15:18] Unknown:
Your thesis was to HODL Hash because the value of the miners would increase.
[00:15:25] Unknown:
100%. Or I I thought used miner prices would be more than, like, $2 a Terahash, $1 a Terahash right now. Mhmm. It's very humbling. I did not see that coming. So now I'm sitting on a bunch of Avalons and a bunch of these miners that are just sitting over here, and it's like, well, that's fine. And then not cease. But, yeah, definitely not gonna be able to hash the torch in essence at a good value for me and for them. Either I'm gonna have to sell them or just give them away like I've done with so many s nines, or Bitcoin has a way of of teaching you not to have a thesis and stick with it too long.
[00:16:05] Unknown:
Yeah. And it also has a way of, like it's like it's watching. When as soon as you sell any significant amount for any type of expense, you know it's gonna just fucking pump in your face. And it just like it's like a massive like, fuck you. You should have held. And then the other way around as well. As soon as you need it, it's like it's it's dropping. It's one of those and everyone says it. Like, everyone I speak to who's like, oh, yeah. I bought a house and and then but it just fucking pumped its nuts off after I'd held for, like, three years or whatever it is. It's it's always the way. I had to sell a load six months ago, and then we've, like, doubled. And I'm just like, yep. That's that's fucking goes. One thing I've noticed over time personally is my care about holding Bitcoin has shifted.
I used to have this thing where I was like I still do a bit, but I used to think I'm gonna hold, and I'm never fucking selling you cons because you're not having my Bitcoin. And I don't want you to have it. Like, I'd rather take it to my grave. I'd rather you cannot buy it and you fuck yourselves up with paper Bitcoin and everything else, and I don't want you to have it. And it was like a bit of a way of me, like, voting in a way. But then I had kids and medical bills and things and stuff and life. And I guess that kind of, like, changed where I'm like, there's still the fuck you, but also it's not anywhere significant enough to actually change anything because I'm a little weasel small fish.
The memories matter more. Like, I I sometimes regret not going when friends have invited me to, like, oh, come away with us, and we're gonna go and do this, and we're gonna have this amazing adventure and do the stuff. And I'm like, no. I've gotta stack. No. I'm not gonna, like like, come out to dinner. Like, we're doing a birthday party, and I'd be like, oh, I can't. And I'd, like, pick up extra hours and, like, do extra work and, like, not spend the money. And at the time, it's like, oh, yeah. If I buy Bitcoin now, it's gonna be worth this and, you know, then I can do what I want. It's like, well, you can do what you want a bit now as well. Like, you've gotta what if you drop dead and then you've never experienced life? Then you're actually an idiot. Like, your risk, You're worried about risk, and that's why you're in Bitcoin.
But then you're not actually looking at the risk of, like, you can just have a heart attack. Like, I know people not much older than me, like, friends of mine who have had heart attacks. It's like, well,
[00:18:45] Unknown:
fuck. Like, you have to enjoy the life as well. It's a hard mental hurdle to get over. Right? I think we all struggle with that. Probably the struggle of trying to have as much Bitcoin as you can never ends. Oh, yeah. But one thing I've definitely done is I've definitely used a lot more. I'd rather you know, if I can use Bitcoin, I'll find myself going out or spending that money or, you know, good time, the adventure, whatever it is. If I can use more of my Bitcoin in doing that and funding that, then I find myself doing those types of things. If I can't and it's harder for me and it's restrictive where I have to, you know, get more fiat, I, a lot of times, won't do those things. If I can use my Bitcoin to do it, I find myself definitely creating the memories. And I would rather have the Bitcoin going to someone else in order for me to enjoy that time, whatever that is Yeah. Yeah. Rather than turning it into dollars to fiat and then trying to go and have that good time. I have a vacation coming up. I had been doing every year until I moved into the mines. And then the last couple years, I haven't done it. I've just literally been, you know, just grinding, grinding.
But gonna do it again this year and taking my family. I can pay in Bitcoin for the condo, and so it's a no brainer for me. Had I probably had to turn that into dollars and the people that owned it made it difficult, I probably wouldn't have taken the vacation or or the adventure.
[00:20:07] Unknown:
Yeah. In those sort of cases, you know, it's going to someone else of quality. There's, like, a level of if I was gonna buy maple syrup, I'm gonna go and buy it from Karl in person. I'll put the Bitcoin to him, and I'll know, like, okay. This is gonna be used wisely, and this is to a good person. Yep. A 100%. If I could go and spend it in a shop, it's different. It's almost like like my precious. You're like, I don't wanna let go of you unless I know you're in, like, safe hands even though you're not even a thing and you're like, do you know what I mean? It's like there is a there's definitely that, which is kind of cool. And if lots of people do it, then that does grow out a circular economy, and it does make it go into better hands rather than just sell, goes to an exchange, fucking Michael Sailor buys it, and boomer type finance bros who are, like, finding all these different new ways to reexplain Bitcoin just over and over again and, like, selling it to their boomer maze. It's like, that is kind of sad to me. Like, it's good for the price, but it's kind of sad because it's like, I don't really want them to do it. And it takes the coolness away from it. It takes the, like, cypherpunk ethos away from it. They're just gonna have it stored with Coinbase.
They're not running nodes. They're not tinkering with this stuff. They're not using coin joins. They're not experimenting. They're not building. They're just I don't know. I kind of find them, like, a little bit like a fly in my drink, and I'm like, you fuck this up.
[00:21:48] Unknown:
You know, I try not to get too deep into that stuff. I do. Don't don't get me wrong. I do. And when I do, sometimes I can get down in the hole about the whole Bitcoin thing. But if I go too deep in some of that stuff, it's not good for me mentally. I know why I came to Bitcoin. I know what it's gonna do on a long enough timeline. Like, I have no doubt it consumes everything in our world, and I just had to keep my head down. You know? Like I said, I found myself getting too deep into some of the other aspects of it. You can start questioning again why you're doing things. I don't wanna be questioning why I'm Bitcoin. Like, I know why I'm Bitcoining, and and I'm not gonna let other people coming in, governments, the sailors, the paper Bitcoiners, whatever, pump my bags. It's fun. I'm living my best life I've ever lived because of it. Yeah. If I go too deep in that, I I find myself getting depressed or get angry at things or not happy. When the headspace isn't good, nothing else seems to you know, you go looking for trouble, you can find trouble.
You wanna find good things, usually, you'll find good things, and I've been very fortunate.
[00:22:48] Unknown:
And you're kind of like a mining monk is how I see you. The The fact that you're like going and sleeping in the mine with little rollout mattress. I I really like that. Like, do you find some peace in that? Like simple, you're doing difficult things, but like there's a simplicity to like work, sleep, head down, up again. Like, you almost aren't surrounded by a load of other things that can cloud your thoughts.
[00:23:11] Unknown:
Exactly. I have to be submersed in it. If I get out there, I'm I can't be easily distracted. Right? My mind can go a lot of different places. If I'm submersed in it, my mind's in one place, and that's the good place. That's where most of the time I need to be. And then when I get out the mine, you know, as John and and some of the other guys know, I like to enjoy life. We have some fun. I was talking to Barn the other day. Oh, speaking of maple syrup with about Carl, Barn's gonna do some maple syrup jerky dispatch. I don't know if you caught that, but I'm really stoked on that. He's gonna make me some hot maple syrup jerky. Really stoked on that.
[00:23:49] Unknown:
So what? Like, spicy maple syrup jerky?
[00:23:53] Unknown:
Exactly. He's gonna soak the meat in maple syrup, but put some spice his his normal spice in it, the hot.
[00:23:59] Unknown:
We'll see how that goes. I'll send you a bag. I don't know if he's gonna make a ton of it, but I'll keep you a bag if you want one. Thank you. That'd be nice. I'm obsessed at the moment with there's a place that I know it's not very Bitcoin or, like, you're supposed to just eat fucking steak and whatever, but I love pizza. There's a really good pizza place near me, and they do one that's got, like, all the pork, like, really good proper sausage, nice ham. It's got salami. It's got all these different, like, meats and stuff, and then, like, caramelized onions. Oh. Yeah. It's so good. And then but then they get this hot honey.
So they got a hot honey drizzle with chili in it, and it's like local honey from the guy, like, literally who makes the pizzas. It's so fucking good. He drizzles that over the pizza, and it's so good because it's got that spice and that sweet, and it's just, oh my god. I just started there's a pizza place here, and someone said, have you tried their hot honey on it? And I'm like, what? Oh. What are you talking about? And then they said that that's exactly what they said they do. And they said it's killer. Oh, it's fucking amazing. Next time you go, just try it and Alright. At this moment and just, like if if it's a problem and it really upsets you, you can give me a slap when we actually see each other. But I promise you, you're probably more likely to be like, oh, you've changed my life. As long as it's local, honey. It's gotta be the local, honey. That's the key. Yeah. That's what you want. Nice.
What island in Italy are you in getting this? Yeah. I'm in the Shetland Islands at the moment. Okay. As one likes to say, with my little ponies. So, I'd like to be in Italy. Although, actually, to be fair, when I've gone to Italy, the food hasn't been that good. I've been twice. I think I was maybe in, like, too much of a touristy area, but, like, I would go. Like, it's I think it's also the expectation. I was expecting, like, I'm gonna go and I'm gonna have amazing coffee, and I'm gonna have amazing food. Well, sure. And then I was a bit like, it was okay. Maybe I was spoiled being near London. Like, there's so many good places around to eat, so you kind of get spoiled, like, a little bit. But, yeah, I've never found somewhere where I've gone to Italy and have that kind of, like, classic why I imagine go have a little espresso and then, like, go and have some, like, ham and melon or something and some wine and, like And then your limoncello.
Oh, lemon I I had that when I was there. I got absolutely fucking battered on limoncello. That's not bad. Don't let the Italian homies hear you say that. They'll be upset with you. Yeah. I know they will. It's fun, though, sometimes to wind them up. Definitely. Get some pineapple on the pizza When you're not in the mine and you let your thoughts wander and do other things, like, outside of Bitcoin, the things that you can talk about, is there anything that is exciting you at the moment? Like, as an example, a lot of people, once they start doing a little better in life and maybe they buy a home or they take up some hobbies, they might start going down the fitness and health route, or they might start learning to build, like, learn a trade because they're doing stuff around the house. Or they have things that are sort of loosely tied to Bitcoin. And I see it really often, especially with our groups that we have. Like people start to spend less time listening to the Bitcoin podcast, start to drop off a little bit and immerse themselves in something else. Is there anything that you've started doing like that?
[00:27:24] Unknown:
No. Not really. So my fitness is one of the things that I definitely am not disciplined in right now. That's something that I just, like, I'm gonna make a commitment to here. I started the other day just trying to eat better, get a little more active rather than just sitting looking at computer screens and moving around doing mine things. But, no, I really haven't. Gas mining, I guess, would be like I went from the hydro to really learning those and having those systems. And now I'm really trying to get into gas. I don't think miners, we can't compete with the Apples, Amazons, Googles, Microsofts of the world that money wise to bid for energy price. I think they're gonna start outbidding and start consuming more energy or a lot of energy.
And I think the Bitcoin miners are gonna have to get more scrappy. So I've been really trying to focus and learn some gas mining, learning mineral rights and operator's license and gas purchaser's license. And there's just so much nuance, and it's such a good old boy type of community. My dad was in oil and gas for his whole life. He worked in oil and gas, and it's one thing I really wish I had him here because I think he could really have got opened some doors for me and got me into some places that have been really tough for me to get into. And my brother my brother before he passed away, he, you know, he wanted to get my brother and I into oil and gas. I didn't take the opportunity. At that point in time, I was I thought oil was almost kind of the devil. I didn't realize what energy was or any of that. I it's ruining the planet, this and that. I'm not gonna get into it, and I moved out to the woods.
My other brother got into it, and now he's kinda come full circle. I've worked on him for years. I buy cows from him in Bitcoin or this and that, and so he's gotten to see over the years how it's gone. He saw the number go up for the most part. Right? And now he's hounding me to they bought mineral rights to a gas well. We're just grinding now. So he's been hounding me more and more excited about it. He's like me. When he gets into something, he's he's very passionate. He dives head first and goes all in pretty much. So that's where I've really been focusing a lot of time. And then, obviously, the few hydro's mines that I that I take care of consume a lot of my time going around and, you know, making sure that they're as close to a 100% uptime in mines online as I can. And that's I mean, if you start getting into thousands of miners, it consumes a lot of time. It really does. And then, you know, there's times where I will go out or be out at Lake Satoshi for a couple days, and maybe there's a few miners down. Where is that balance coming at? How does the balance come in? And that's that's been something I've really tried to work on too is balancing where I'm putting a lot of my time or most of my time. And it's still Bitcoin. There's no doubt about it. The people in Bitcoin, I feel like a lot of times I don't communicate. Like, Carl tried to call me the other day.
I was getting on a flight back from Finland, and I didn't answer, and I haven't called him back. And, you know, that those things start to weigh on me too. Am I not being good enough homey to my Bitcoin friends that I've met along the way? Am I not giving them enough time? You know? It's just a constant struggle in the mind. There's a burnout as well. I wouldn't feel bad about not replying to someone for a couple of days. First of all, we're like batteries. We have a certain amount of energy in us. And when that energy is gone, we're dead. We have to use it wisely. Like, there is just so much, and you don't know how quite how much it is.
[00:30:42] Unknown:
You just use it wisely. But on top of that, like, the ability to spin a certain amount of plates, if you've got shit going on, you're looking into this stuff with your brother, you're trying to work out all the mineral rights stuff. I've seen it with John. Like, John is Yeah. Fucking exhausted. People say it like, oh, man. I'm so fried. I'm so John's fucking exhausted. And that's because he's doing his job, and he's been still being a good dad and husband and all the family stuff. And then on top of that, he's doing the gas stuff. So I see that. And if you're in that state where you're really busy, anyone who's a real friend isn't gonna get upset about it. You go, look. He's fucking tired. He's busy. He can't spend another play. And next time you're taking a shit, you've got five minutes to yourself, then you're gonna respond. Like, I don't think anyone who's actually building and, like, really pushing themselves in the Bitcoin space, who's been around for a long time, is ever gonna think less if you sort of, you know, give things a few days. I think it's more important that you're building than it is to, like, be part of the groups and saying GM every morning and that kind of stuff because you're building a future. Like, the the fact that if you're making stuff and earning the Bitcoin, it's gonna be in the hands of someone who can hold it and use it in the right way. That's more important than, like, being involved in the latest choke or meme or whatever it is that's going around, to me anyway. I think that's more important.
[00:32:09] Unknown:
I agree. It's still it's, you know, weighs on the mind sometimes. Yeah. You know, you have some homies that are better, you know, or closer to you. Sometimes it starts to weigh on my mind if I'm doing enough. You know? I never think that I'm doing enough or I need to give more. Right? I don't give enough a lot of times, and it always weighs. Where's that happy medium? I'll probably never know.
[00:32:29] Unknown:
Yeah. We'll probably never know. But it's cool that you're doing something with your brother. That's a nice but your dad you said he's not with you anymore. Like, if that comes together and if there is a heaven, then if you're looking down, like, that's the dream for any dad is like, oh, my sons are gonna work together, and they have this passion project they're working on. That's fucking cool. I appreciate that, and I I hope so. It's gonna work out. One way or another, it'll work out. It's just the grind. Right? Me and my brother are a lot alike, so we sometimes can butt heads.
[00:32:57] Unknown:
As we've gotten older, it's gotten better, though. So this should I mean, it should work out. It's, you know, it's not a ton of MCF. We'll see. It's like, you know, John, I've been watching you know, I went up there and saw his, and I need to get up there again to go look at it. He's done a lot of work since last time I was there. So but it's a grind. You know? He keeps me motivated too. I see him and chat with him and, you know, both y'all on the podcast, and I don't know how y'all y'all have time to do it. You know? But I I love I'm I'm very thankful for y'all giving your time to the podcast to listen. I don't know how you have time. It's appreciated. Well, thank you. It's it's definitely
[00:33:31] Unknown:
not quite the same as it was. We had more time to make more jingles and do more fun intros and just, like, more time to prep and more time to plan and Yeah. Like, all that kind of stuff. But so now it's a little bit more loose and a little bit more, like, jump on when we can. And the recent one we did, John was recording from the mine. I was out and about, and it was pissing with rain. We make it happen still. It's not quite the same, but I think it will probably get there again because I've been in Fiat fucking nightmare stuff for sort of six months, and John's grinding away. But it's, like, getting to a point where it should be less of a problem soon. And he's also got a father figure within that space. We're gonna do a probably two or three part series on it, so I won't give too much away. But the guy that he bought his mind from, really luckily, has just taken him under his wing. Like, obviously, just seeing, okay, John's a good guy. Like, I'm gonna help here. Sold him it, and he's just been there to mentor him and walk him through things and just give that, like, old man advice of like, look, son. I've done this for fucking forty years or whatever it is. Like, I know this inside down, back to front. I could do this in my sleep, and I'm gonna help you. And so he's built this really amazing friendship with this guy who just kind of helped him and been there, and I think that's an important thing. We I think we touched on it actually either in the last episode or the one before, but, like, that's an important thing for us as we do what we're doing to, like, think forward. And that's something that me and John have talked about is, like, sometimes we go, look, fucking, let's just put this the pod on pause list. Like, it's too it's too much. It's too tiring. Like, I can't do this anymore. But then it's like, well, no. Don't be a bitch. Like, you need to pass on some of what other people have done for you. Like, there's so many people that have helped us through the years with our Bitcoin stuff, and now someone helping him with the mining, with the gas stuff. And, like, if we just say,
[00:35:32] Unknown:
yeah. We we're done. Bye. You're not paying it forward. Agreed. A lot of people that guy probably would have been willing to help, but not everyone's accepting as John. Right? You have to be open and not think you know more than you know about what you don't know. Sometimes I find myself like that, and we all have to be willing to listen and open more. And John's great at that. I I love listening to advice from John, talking to John. Like I said, that that core group when I was coming in, I kinda started to drift away from, and I found myself, you know, not feeling as good as I had in the past. And I just had to really get back focused on some things that matter and and where the priorities are gonna be put because you do start getting spread too thin.
[00:36:16] Unknown:
Yeah. It's what's, like, wholesome stuff as well. I was having this conversation the other day. So we've recently got a new place here. Like, I wanted a family home, and that was, like, a big part of the move. Look at you. Yeah. It was, like, a big part of doing it. Well, because my previous businesses was property. So, like Okay. Buying, flipping, extending, renovating, selling, then rebuying stuff, leasing it out. Like, I did that for You were like a slumlord? Literally. Yeah. Since I was I bought my first property when I was 14.
[00:36:49] Unknown:
Nice.
[00:36:50] Unknown:
Basically, at 14, I was in with a family who were doing it. Like, I didn't have a good relationship with mine at all. They kinda took me under their wing, and the mom was, like, really into property. I was like, how are you fucking buying stuff? Like, you live a good life. Like, what's going on? And she was, like, talking to me about it, and I just learned and learned and learned. I was was like, can I come to some of your meetings? Like, can I just, like, sit in? And she was like, yeah. Yeah. You can come in. And then she was like, after about six months of me going to all these meetings, like, taking notes and stuff. I was like, look, I've managed to make some money. Is there a way that I can go in with you on a property? I've done the calculations. I know you're gonna buy this one. Like, what if I front it up x? And so that was how I got into it and then just kept doing it. And then I found Bitcoin, and then Nice. I was like, oh, this is dumb. This is really fucking dumb. Like, putting money in property is fucking retarded.
So everything that I had, I sold and bought Bitcoin. The home I lived in, everything got rid of everything. Lived as frugally as I possibly could and didn't want any property. But then since having a family, there's always been this thing in my head that's like financially it makes no sense to buy a property. I'm much better off renting, but it's not mine. The home base. Yeah. That's right. It's like, it's not ours. There's a certain amount of like, now we've got a home. I'm really obsessed with learning to be more skilled with carpentry because there's a lot of wood there. Like, I can do I can build decks. I can do a lot of handy stuff, tiling and whatever. But I wanna get really good at carpentry because I wanna put these personal touches onto our home that I'd never do anywhere else. But because it's my home and hopefully my kids inherit this, I want what I'm doing with that deck or what I'm doing with that door to be really fucking beautiful. And then when I go to sleep, because it's been hard work, I could have done other things that could have been more financially better for me. Not buying the house would have been smarter financially.
Hiring someone here to do the work for me would be better. It'd be better me working and paying someone rather than me doing it myself slower and more expensive for my time. But I sleep better because I'm like, I've done something that's gonna hopefully be around for a long time, and it's, like, done beautifully, and my family get to enjoy it. That's way more interesting to me than, like, oh, I'm gonna do a business deal. It's more wholesome. Yep. It's all about that time. Right? Putting that time in is worth it, time
[00:39:17] Unknown:
for the kids to see your personal touches as they grow up, and they will appreciate it. Right? Like, there's no doubt about that. They might not now, but that appreciation will be there someday.
[00:39:26] Unknown:
That's awesome. One day when I'm, like, old and fucked, maybe they'll go, do you know what? Like, we never appreciated that, but that was quite cool what you did there. But when they're kids, unfortunately, you never get that. Like, ah, you know, you didn't eat today so that we could have that toy. That's we really appreciate that, dad. It's more like Ah, wah, wah, wah, wah. Little fucks. Yeah.
[00:39:49] Unknown:
No. That's the truth. I know I look back and and appreciate, you know, more and more of what my parents did in the time that they spent doing things or putting into the effort to make us feel
[00:40:01] Unknown:
special or good on, you know, whatever day it was or or anything like that. It's weird, isn't it, Tom? Like, you were saying earlier, the things you chase, you chase the money because you think it gives you the ability to do the things that you think you want to do, but then you get so far down the road of chasing that you don't have time to do the things that you thought you wanted to do, even though you've got the money. It's like that old adage where it's people go on holiday and they're on a little fishing boat, the wealthy people on the fishing boat with the guy who's chartering it. So, yeah, can you imagine doing this every day? I'd I'd love to do this every day. The fishing boat man says, I do. It's like that person is far less wealthy financially, but do they have a more fulfilling life? And, like, yeah, probably.
[00:40:47] Unknown:
Yeah. It reminds me of rafting. Right? I would take these sometimes super wealthy people from the Bay Area rafting. They'd come up and be like, you're so lucky. You're living this life. You're out here in the woods just rafting the river every day. With anything, there's sacrifice being made. Right? I'm not maybe making the money that they're making, but the beauty of nature. And they think I'm lucky, and I'm like, well, shit. I'd rather be living in the bay and flying cross country and living in million dollar homes. What's the yeah. I don't know. What we want, what we don't have a lot of times. Right? And it's like so I've been thinking about, should I get a girlfriend? And you got you and John need to do more jingles. You gotta do more jingles every now and then. I know it's you're both busy, but we need more hash sluts. Alright?
Gotta have some more jingles. But
[00:41:35] Unknown:
I We need more hash sluts. Everyone needs more hash sluts. Yeah. Definitely.
[00:41:39] Unknown:
You said you were thinking about getting a girlfriend, but I guess you're still Oh, yeah. Okay. So sometimes I think I want a girlfriend. Right? Like, it's a lonely life out here, this and that. But I know myself well enough where if I get a girlfriend, when I get into that situation, I'm gonna be like, why did I do this? And then it's gonna be, like, this almost hassle type thing where I end up making the girl hate me to get out of the relationship rather than just, like, know to not even get in one, just enjoy things. It's yeah. Time and the mind are funny.
[00:42:11] Unknown:
Maybe it's finding the right one. You reckon? Well, you're always gonna have like, you always think you want what you don't want. You're single and you're shagging around and you're living that life and you're like, I'd like someone just to, like, look after me today and just I'd like someone just to be around and, like, have a girlfriend. I think you want that. And then it's the other you know? I think a life I don't know. I think the best part of my life is the kids. So, like, I think that without having the girlfriend, it doesn't give you the opportunity to find potentially the wife or long time partner, and then it doesn't give you the opportunity to raise a family. Not a like, a broken family, which is what me and, like, almost everyone you know is, like, part of that. Like, mom, dad, yeah, they got divorced. They've got other partners and whatever. And it's like this you know, or they didn't get on. There's, like, the shouting all the time and, like, the bullshit that you'd, like, most people grow up with. Yep. But, actually, if you're building something that's really valuable, at least in my mind, probably fuck it up. Everyone does. But, like, I wanna do my best to try and build this family where it's you have the mom and dad, you have the kids, you have the home, and you put that first. And if you can do that and build that, I think that, like, everything else pales in comparison in terms of, like, those moments of just giving your kids the best possible opportunity and showing love to them so that because it's all cyclical, isn't it? Like, a lot of the bullshit that we have is from our parents and, you know, from theirs and at the same time, the good things. So everyone knows, like, having mom and dad together if they're a strong unit and you've got kids seeing that, they grow up very differently to have growing up in a broken family. So that's kind of where I look at it as, like, that's the most beautiful thing that I can do. That's the most, like, exciting thing for me to do with my time. But you have to have the girlfriend first to do that. Like, I've got mates who, like, very, very successful with the ladies and, like, live that lifestyle still.
But, you know, they're, like, knocking 40, some of them older, and then they're like, I'm just probably not gonna do the kid thing. And I think there's, like, merit to it, but also I do think you miss out. Like, there is there's just nothing like having kids. It's fucking annoying, but, like, without that, I don't know. It's not quite full. I mean, it's the perseverance.
[00:44:34] Unknown:
Not many have the perseverance to endure another human's
[00:44:39] Unknown:
Bullshit.
[00:44:40] Unknown:
Exactly. Their their drama, their baggage. And people just don't have that where they wanna endure that and make it through. It's just a, no. Not gonna do it. Not gonna put the time into this. Right? It comes down to time again. Freak. What? It's like how I'm not gonna do that because they can't see the backside, like you're saying, with the kids and those types of things. I had one early in life. I had a son early in life, got married,
[00:45:03] Unknown:
did that, And now I'm to the point now where I don't think I wanna start over again. Like, I see my brothers with young kids, and I get fulfillment from them and hanging out with them, and I love it. But for me, I just don't think I wanna do it all over again. I get that. Like, if you've already got a son, that's fucking cool. So you know this thing is awesome. Really annoying probably, but, like, amazing. Like, what gift to have a child. It doesn't mean you have to go through that again. I agree. I've seen, like, one of my closest mates, fucking hilarious guy. He's, like, must be, like, 65, nearly 70
[00:45:38] Unknown:
Jamaican guy. Up there. Okay.
[00:45:40] Unknown:
Met him, like, my dad used to have pubs. I met him there. He was, like, always really successful young kids. We always got on. He always, like, mentored me. Like, anytime I've had, like, big problems, I phoned him up. I'm like, mate. I'm fucking I've got problems. And he's like, yeah. Come over. Like, really wealthy, like, big fucking mansion, big pad, all the toys, like, all the money that you could ever ever think. And he says that to me. He's like, I'll never have kids again now. Like, it doesn't and and I'll never be in a relationship again now. Like, I have girlfriends. I have the Tinder profile. They see the house. They see the Range Rover. They see whatever. We go and have some fun. Like, I exclusively date, like, 28 year olds. We go on holiday every other week, and we do this, and I just fuck. And they don't care about me, and I don't really care about them. And that's how it is. And you can look at that as, like, as this is soulless or lifeless or, like, there's no joy. But he's like, oh, I enjoy it, and they have a good time too. And I still have my kids, and I see them on weekends, and I love them to pieces.
So you kind of have the best of both worlds in that sense. They're like, you have, like, the wholesome stuff with the family. You look after them, but you can also have your fun. So that's my role model right there. That's where I wanna be at 60,
[00:46:51] Unknown:
65, straight up 28 year olds. That's my cap, and I'm golden.
[00:46:56] Unknown:
It's fucking hilarious. It's, like, down to such a fine art. He's so skilled at his. Absolutely hilarious. But, you know, he's had the kids. He's done the things, and he's just like, never again.
[00:47:06] Unknown:
I think we definitely start to learn ourselves the older we get, and it's you know, for me, it's just one of those things. Like, I've had few great girlfriends. You know, I haven't had a ton of girlfriends, but the ones I've had have been really good, really taken care of me and loved me. And I've ended up you know, at a certain point, I find myself not wanting to be in a relationship after, you know, five, six, how many every years. I can't see myself doing that again. I really can't. You never know, though. Right? We never know. You never know. Maybe my next, my next Bitcoin cutie comes along.
Hash Latte. I know. Where did she go? She hasn't been around. I don't know. Breaking my heart.
[00:47:45] Unknown:
Maybe we scared her off with the jingles or You could have been. The HashSlut commercial.
[00:47:50] Unknown:
Probably John. John scares people. Creepy. I think that's the thing.
[00:47:58] Unknown:
Yeah. We'll try and bring it back. I think, like I said, a couple of months from now, we'll have a bit more time and, like, be able to create in a different way. But it just takes so much time. It's you know, John was sat there for, like, I don't know, half a day a day doing show prep, and then I was spending a day or two days, like, editing and adding in the music and doing all the stuff. We have an editor now, but then all the money from sponsorship goes to editing. So then you're back to that square one of, like, oh, fuck. It's like drain. So it is definitely a labor of love.
[00:48:27] Unknown:
You like doing the live shows? I've been listening to a few of the Freedom Tech Fridays Oh, yeah. With Ewan's q and a and set. What do you think? I like them. I think they're informative. I usually don't catch them live. I usually catch them after the fact. But the one where y'all each named an app, and there was, like, the note taking app instead of using notes and then, obviously, signal, and I can't remember what the other one was. But usually good info on there. I like it. You know? It's
[00:48:50] Unknown:
something I was really, really against for ages. Why? Control Freak. I like to have the control with the editing. I like to do things at my own pace. I liked not being in a completely rigid structure of, like, it is being recorded on a Friday at this time, so you have to be there. Like, there's no, like, rearranging. There's none of that. Mainly the control part. And then Jordan pushed me and pushed me and pushed me, and then Q kept pushing and saying, look. Look. We should do this. And then, eventually, I was like, fuck it. Let's just do it. Let's just give it a go.
Expecting not really to enjoy it, but, like, let's just see. And, actually, it's probably become the most enjoyable one because I know when it's done. So I've gotta do, like, a little bit of sorting out the levels, and I might spend half an hour just fucking around before it can go on the feed or an hour tops. But it's not what the normal editing process is. And then it's quite nice. Like, I I quite like that we've got obviously, Q and Seth are like the big brains. Like, between the two of them, they seem to fucking know pretty much anything that I could ask about anything.
And then we've got all the people in the live chat who jump in, and they ask questions, but they also answer questions. So we've got eight Mithrandeers in there. He's, like, smart as fuck answering things and on and, like, all these other guys who are in there, just SPA and people like that. Like, there are areas that even Seth and Cube might not know so much about, like, specific bits, but guarantee you some of those guys in the chat, they really, really know their shit. And so they're in there as well. And then you got me just like Mongoloid, like, bringing it down to the level of the knuckle draggers, which I think is important as well because otherwise, it gets too lofty and too unapproachable because you forget how much you know to some degree. And then a new person coming in, what happens is they'll end up, like, tuning in and go, oh, what the fuck? Like, I don't even know what this means. And then they'll tune into, like, Pete the cunt instead, and they'll listen to that.
And then they'll get scammed fucking
[00:50:56] Unknown:
whatever, like, compass or whatever the the latest thing is. I've been using Cake Wallet trying to move I mean, Blue Wallet's usually my daily driver, but I've been getting into Cake recently and got some payouts going in there. Still trying to figure out silent payments and this pay join and some of these other things in here. So that's a good one. He's a pretty smart dude.
[00:51:17] Unknown:
He's fucking he's so smart. He's so smart. There's, like, levels of shit. Yeah. Like, on Twitter, I've always followed him, and he's always been in this other camp and different things, but he's a he's a smart one. I think he winds a lot of people up because he just Yeah. Outstates his opinions. And, like, he's also not an aggressive typical Bitcoiner type. Like, he's happy to have a nuanced conversation. He and he, like, isn't gonna attack people. And, again, I think people are like, oh, he's a bit wishy washy or he's this or he's that. And, like, all I can say is that I've known probably for about a year and a half now pretty well. Like, we speak most weeks, and he's a really fucking solid guy, a good human being. Every interaction that I've had, there's been times where I've laid things out where he could have been dishonest or fucked me over or made things not as good for me quite easily because I've laid things out a certain way. And he never has. It has always been absolutely honest. So He's never honest. And the same with Q. Like, I've known Q for much, much longer. Have you I got to meet him in Vegas.
[00:52:25] Unknown:
Oh, you did? At the bugle the bugle party. I That was funny. That was hilarious.
[00:52:32] Unknown:
I wish I'd have been there. That looked fucking old. Didn't you have, like, midget wrestling and stuff? Yes. In the ring. That was it was crazy. Are you gonna come this year? No. It's unlikely. It's unlikely.
[00:52:43] Unknown:
You just don't get out much. What about Lake Satoshi?
[00:52:45] Unknown:
If I'm gonna go anywhere, it's gonna be Lake Satoshi. Nice. If I go anywhere at all, it will be there. We sort of loosely planned a trip where we go to America, and we tie that in with a couple of other things that we wanna do there. Do it. Do it. Do it like Soluxe does. Yeah. My honestly, my genuinely, a re main reason that I don't go to a lot of these things is an OPSEC thing, especially with family. It's something that I worry about maybe more than I should. I'm still work as a nim with this podcast, which gives me the rights to sort of not the rights, but, like, the ability to be a bit more honest than someone whose face is out there probably would, and that's quite valuable to me. And then just like a safety aspect as well with the family and everything else. So that is honestly why, like, I don't go to so many events. Like, I've been to events before where I've been there as a NIM and, like, a couple of the inside group know who I am. And then, like, someone's like, oh, yeah. That's Max.
And I'm like, great. Now another person. And it's happened a couple of times to people where, like, I really didn't want that person to know who I am. I really don't wanna share this information with this person because glowy types walk among us, like, in a big way. I I know they do.
[00:54:00] Unknown:
I'm probably too lax with it, honestly. Like, I'm probably too far the other way where I just if you're gonna come get me, come and get me, I guess. And that's probably not a good way to be there. I need to be
[00:54:13] Unknown:
Well, I'm not someone who's like, oh, I'm massively worried about a $5 wrench attack or that kind of stuff because it's like, a, you're gonna have a hard time, and b, you're gonna be so disappointed. But it's more like the future problems of, like, he said this and done this and been honest about a setup or being honest about this, and now there's a potential vulnerability. Like, either, like, legally or it's it's more that kind of stuff where I'm just like, yeah. I'd love to just go to Lake Soshy with the family, not give a fuck about it, and I think just enjoy it and, like, get them all meeting people and everything. But, genuinely, that's the reason. There's probably, like, 10 people who have seen my face and shook my hand and, like, we know each other, like, in the real world, which is a massive shame. That's wild.
[00:55:00] Unknown:
Yeah. I've never even met John. That's wild to me.
[00:55:04] Unknown:
John's never even seen my face.
[00:55:07] Unknown:
Never seen your face?
[00:55:08] Unknown:
No. He's never seen my face or Jordan or Oh my goodness. Or Seth. Like, anyone in our crew, the only person who has is q because he was one of the first people I ever met.
[00:55:18] Unknown:
Gotcha. Yeah. Well, it's probably good. Like I said, I take my OPSEC probably a little bit too loose, but it it's the same principle. Like, if you're gonna $5 wrench attack me and some of the things that you guys say, definitely, when you guys talk about security and things like that, it's good. It's good to have that thought being put into people's head because, like, I would never really think of that. Like, it just doesn't cross my mind, I guess, because maybe I yeah. I don't know. It's weird. But I need to be more OPSEC secure.
[00:55:47] Unknown:
Well, there's levels to it, isn't there? And there's there's a lot of people that sort of overdo things, and you might not ever need to. And, also, like, I think if you're really good with digital stuff, if you're like a Seth or a Q, do all the clever encryption this and flash drive that and keep that in the cloud, whatever it is. Like, do all the shit. But if you're, like, more of a physical person, keep your shit in the physical world. Like, if you know I can secure stuff, I know, like, I have different locations. I know my physical surroundings, and I'm much better in that world. Lean on that. I know I'm a fucking idiot when it comes to technical stuff, so I don't go too hypertechnical because I'm just gonna shoot myself in the fur. I'm quite good in the real world, like, in the physical world, so I lean on that. That's just I think don't be too clever. I think loads of people shoot themselves with that.
[00:56:35] Unknown:
Oh, I definitely do. Like, right today, I just bought another two terabyte hard drive start OS node or my start nine node is full. So I got, I don't know, five, ten million sats on there, and I'm like, I can't get to it. I can't get to my Zeus wallet. I'm like, holy smokes. I'm freaking out. So thank goodness at the Lexington meetup, we have a guy there that's super smart. He's actually helped me set this node up. So I'm gonna go visit him here. He's messaging me right now. I'm gonna go visit him and hopefully get this node back up and running. Nodes have always been so hard for me. They're just fucking, man. Nodes. It's like, how do I can't keep on running from the first umbrella I ever built to the start nine has been good, though, by far the best one I've ever had.
[00:57:18] Unknown:
Me too. But I had this exact same thing. I had to upgrade to it from one to two terabyte and Yep. Had exactly the same thing that I had lightning that I couldn't access, and the backups weren't working. And then it ended up being some fucking SATA or whatever it is, SATA. SATA drive. That case that I bought wasn't compatible or didn't have enough power or whatever. Some fucking stupid shit
[00:57:41] Unknown:
and, like, took days and days and days. And then it worked, and it was fine. It's always worrying with lightning. Yeah. I haven't started freaking out too much yet. I'm like, alright. My homie knows what he's doing. Like, he this is his realm, so I'm just gonna take the computer in today to the meet today's the meetup. The the every Tuesday, there's a Lexington meetup. So I'll go up there and take the computer and hopefully get this thing back working. And I'll learn something. Right? That's what's great about Bitcoin is I'm constantly learning, especially in that other side of the world. On the even in the mining side, I'm every day. But the node side is it's it's foreign to me. I'm still scared to hook up. I'm gonna ask him if he can hook up my cake wallet to it today because I know they have their node sync and that kind of stuff, and I'm just I'm scared to do it. Like, I'm just not good at it. Just not as comfortable with it as I am going out and throwing a miner in and knowing exactly what's going on with it. What's good you have a meetup that's a hands on one that's actually, like, doing that stuff? That's cool. No. There's a guy there that's couple guys there that are really smart. And then I ask you a lot. Right? Like, when someone gets a foundation, we had a guy that hosts here. Who'd be here? Gets a foundation device. I'm like, hey. Use the code on governor. We'll get this foundation device. Then he asked me some basic questions, and I'm like, Max. Max. What what's going on here? What do I say?
And, it's funny. Just take note of that foundation that I do shield code, but people just don't use it. They just don't use it. And I'll do your customer support for you as well. So just know that. Well, yeah. Exactly. So what I tell you one thing. He said foundation, like, when he got into the videos and stuff, he's like, they did a good job on the tutorials with those because he's very new. He's got it all set up and good to go now with his envoy or all that stuff. Yeah. What was it you were saying? He was like, oh, I can't see it on the device or something. Exactly. And this I don't think you're supposed to see it on the device.
[00:59:26] Unknown:
Yeah. These are all things, though. Like, I remember thinking exactly that. I was like, oh, it's not not in here. And then, like, you get it explained. You're like, yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. That makes sense. Well, it's good you have that meetup, and, yeah, hopefully, more of them grow out and more people do some more, like, practical stuff rather than just talk about price and all that kind of stuff. But that's why, like, we shill as much as we do with Lake Satoshi because even though I've not been there, every single report that I have back is just like, yeah. There's, like, the proper people that help you with anything,
[01:00:01] Unknown:
good family atmosphere. It's got all the makings of where you wanna send someone new to Bitcoin to meet the right people and learn the right stuff. So that's yeah. We just we should it where we can. They're good homies for sure. It's it's growing. It's definitely growing, and you can kinda see some of the other crowds kinda starting to come in, I guess you'd say. A little bit, but, you know, John and those guys took over the hill, and it was a good one. The meetup scenes, I think, are where it's at. Like, had it not been for the meetup scenes early on in my trajectory, there's no telling who I woulda gotten in with or where. The meetup scenes were really, really crucial to my development, the community that I built. We all talk about circular economy or circular economy this and that. But if you're not going to the meetup or you're not getting out there amongst it, it's gonna be really hard.
I mean, you got lucky because you have a lot of good Telegram groups and community there. We're not as big really on Telegram. I don't like to, like, be type in and and putting a ton of stuff on Telegram. Like, when I see people, sometimes, I guess, I'm judging when they're writing stuff on some of the chats. I'm like, oh, this guy's a fucking gooper or dweeb. You know? And it's like, oh, and I don't wanna have that same judgment put on me, so I don't necessarily write as much out there. And I'm more of an in person guy. Like, you know, when you see me in person and we chitchat and talk, that's when you get to feel me out rather than just some on Telegram writing, oh, have me on stick
[01:01:27] Unknown:
whatever it is. Yeah. It's like, okay. I don't know. I get you. Those meetups are important. We've got one already, but we're trying to do, like, a load of tutorials and presentations that any meetup can just download and use. And the idea is that I'll then send a T shirt and a hoodie or a hat and a hoodie as, like, prizes. So the person who does the presentation gets one, and then they have a quiz at the end on what's discussed. So we get that kind of ungovernable misfits, the important topics covered. So we did one on Ashigaru, and then we'll do one with, like, setting up cake wallet and linking that to your nose and doing all that kind of stuff and one for foundation. So the Ashigaru one's done.
So if anyone wants that who's running a meetup or going to meetups can suggest it, and the other two are coming. I'm working with queue and with one of Seth's marketing guys for the k quality one. I think that's the kind of stuff where it's useful. That's what we wanna do more with Ungovernable is, like, get into the meetups at grassroots level to say, look. We're gonna provide you with this info. Here's, like, a premade talk that you can do, but do some prizes, do some giveaways, do that kind of stuff because it helps us, like, bring new listeners in as well doing that kind of thing. That's what we're really gunning for. So any of these meetups that you go to suggest it, and we'll, we'll send some stuff over. Will do. And the Ashigari,
[01:02:54] Unknown:
like, I don't know much about that. I hear you guys talk about it a lot. It's a coin joint, right, or a mixer, kind of? Obviously, samurai went away. Yep. And then Ashigaru
[01:03:05] Unknown:
is I don't know how you'd call it. Like, it's like a rebirth of samurai, and no one knows who's behind it. But I've had them on, the devs on, with voice changes and everything. And that was that was good to chat to them. But, basically, it's like, okay. Samura wallet was a fucking amazing wallet, but, obviously, now it can't be worked on anymore. So whoever it is behind this has said, we still wanna have all these tools. And they brought back the wallet, but without Whirlpool, which was the CoinJoin implementation Okay. To start with. And so they still had the post mix spending tools and everything like that.
They've developed it, made it really, really slick, have all the pay nims and all that kind of stuff. And then they've actually brought out Whirlpool. So there's a new Whirlpool, which has been running for, I think, three months or something like that. Me and Jordan jumped on and and tested it the day it came out and, like, did live testing and and did all that. We've got that on the pod. But it works, and it's like it works in the same way that Whirlpool did. It's really fucking slick. I would say now Ashigaru is a better wallet than Samurai ever was. At this point, it's really, really slick. Where I thought we'd never have Whirlpool again, and that's a big problem. We now do, and it's starting to grow. There's still some, like, concern around it Of course. Because no one knows who's behind it, which you can kind of understand, and it's new. Yep. But then also, it has to be someone that no one knows because otherwise well, we've seen what's happened to samurai, and they're, like, they're good guys. Hats off to them. Fucking yeah. I mean, you know, they're they're really good guys who put everything on the line and didn't have to. You know, they weren't in a situation. They're like, oh, fucking the world. We really need the money, and look what's happened. So you can understand. No one's gonna wanna pop their head up and go like, oh, yeah. Send me to prison, please.
[01:04:58] Unknown:
Yeah. Right? Craziness. I think it's only gonna get worse too, really, before it gets better. You know? Yeah. We know what's coming. It's been talked about and told, and these things play out. That's one thing I've learned throughout my time in Bitcoin is I compare it to the bible sometimes, you know, with these prophecies Mhmm. That we I watch them get fulfilled all the time, except for my thesis on miner prices. But I got a feeling that that's gonna happen at some point. I'm gonna Just when you sell them. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. Thanks, Bitcoin. You humbled me to my core again. I'm sitting here on my knees crying, and here we go.
[01:05:37] Unknown:
Yeah. Well, I hope that plays out for you, mate. It's been really good chatting to you. It's been good to have a catch up and You too, Max. Someone who's been around for the whole beginning of the plug miner mafia and someone who's become a real pioneer. So we appreciate you, mate. And any sort of closing words of wisdom or shills or anything you wanna do? No. I mean, I I appreciate y'all accepting me for me. I've had my freak outs in a couple of the chats, and
[01:06:04] Unknown:
I appreciate y'all not. It's easy to say, Oh, that guy's crazy, and just turn your head away. And you and John and most of the guys in the Meshedale and Clubminer Mafia, whatever you want to call it, they've been good to me. I appreciate the welcomeness that I feel every time I interact or get on or anything like that. And I love y'all's podcast. You know? A lot of times on my drives and like you were saying, like, the progression of when you come in. Right? I was listening to tons and tons of podcast before forty hours was even a thing, right, and all this shit that the bugle does. I was listening to so many hours, and then my progression has now moved to kind of books.
Mainly books. Yeah. I'll listen to books now, and only a few podcasts still remain in my thing. Like, you know, the ungovernable. Misfits is one. I listen to the bugle now. Still listen to Pod two fifty six. I like Eco and what he does. You know, Ashigiri, he likes the same kind of things as ungovernable, so it's good. There's not many left, though, that that I listen to, and it's just the progression. The time is times everything.
[01:07:07] Unknown:
That's it. Well, mate, I appreciate you taking the time today. Hopefully, we'll catch up again in another few years where your mining thesis has played out. Ah. Your ball. Hopefully, we,
[01:07:17] Unknown:
we'll get a chance to meet at Lake Satoshi someday too. I'm sure we'll meet. You know, you stood me up when I was coming through London there. What was that? About eight months ago, six months ago, something like that. It was. You're busy, though. I get it. And it's it's not easy. It's not easy, but I do wanna drink a pint with you.
[01:07:33] Unknown:
Definitely. We'll make it happen, mate. I promise. Sounds good. I appreciate your time. Thanks for having me on. Alright. See you soon, mate.
[01:07:40] Unknown:
Alright.
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