hard kombucha ep1 pt2

Picasso and Lu Xun are starting a podcast. They talk about how they ended up making the podcast and their experiences in Germany and Spain. Picasso recently traveled to Germany and Spain, where he broke up with his girlfriend and had some interesting experiences. He describes the differences between Berlin and Los Angeles and the food and drink in Germany and Spain. Overall, he enjoyed the trip and seeing a different part of the world. Lu Xun comments on Picasso's accent and suggests that he doesn't belong in their current location. They discuss whether people in Germany and Spain live a simple life. Hello, this is Picasso. And this is Lu Xun. And you are listening to the Hard Kombucha Podcast. Thank you. Let's go. All right. So let's kick this off. What do you want to talk about first? So many things. Actually, the first thing is why are we even starting a podcast? Well, I don't know. You've been bugging me to start a podcast since I met you. That is not true. Well, not initially, but you've been bugging me for a long time. So we're finally doing it. Well, actually, it's not even just you that I'm bugging. I've been bugging myself for a very long time. Like, I was out in New Orleans. I was just like, I'm going to start a podcast, bought all the equipment. And then I had to leave. And then so I sold everything and I came here. And then you came into the picture. Hey, that's me. So how I see it is you're my accountability partner. And I thought it would be more fun to have a podcast where I'm actually talking to someone instead of talking to myself. No, I get that. I get that. Yeah. Well, this is fun so far. Fun so far. So can you tell us how we ended up making a podcast today? Well, yeah, actually, Lu Xun, you know, she called me up last night saying she had like a watch stuck on her wrist. And then like I didn't see it till like maybe 20 minutes later because I just gotten home from work. And then I was like, what? And then and then she was like, it's exactly how it how it sounds. And she showed me a picture and everything. And then she was like, you got any tools to cut metal? And then I was like, yeah, but you could wait till the morning. So yeah, like I came over this morning and I got like the clippers I used to cut like studs like when I do construction. And then and then I cut that watch off of her, you know, but she was all squeamish. You know, it took a while to get her to like actually let me do it. Hey, that's one point of view. How I saw it was there's this watch that okay, it's so tiny on my wrist and somehow I got it on right. And at the end of the day, it occurred to me that I want to take it off before I went to bed because it was starting to be uncomfortable. And that's when it hit me that I could not take off the watch. Tried everything could not take off the watch. Watch like in the back of my head. I was like, last resort, we're gonna have to cut this thing off. And when you came over, I was squeamish because just imagine having like metal against your skin. It just feels like the metal is gonna go into your skin. Yeah, you know. And then finally the finale came and the thing went flying. And here we are. So I was like, what better way to start off the day than to impulsively start a podcast? Finally. Yep. Some stuff done. All right. Shoot. What is your stage name? Picasso. Picasso. All right. So tell me what have you been up to in life? I've been just chilling, you know, working a lot. I just got back from I took a trip to Spain. And then also a little trip to Germany while I was over there. Wait, you went to Germany too? Yeah, I did. I spent three days in Berlin. I see. And what was the difference between Spain and Germany? Did you see the Nazis? No, I didn't see any Nazis there. I saw a lot of people protesting a lot of feminist ladies, you know, blue hair women. What were they protesting? I don't know. It was like Women's Day or something. Oh my gosh, I want to join in. I love blue. Actually, the girl who was checking out my groceries had blue hair and I was commenting on it. She was great. Go feminist. I mean, that's all you, you know, good for you. Well, yeah, no, it was beautiful in Berlin. You know, it's like, it's like the graffiti capital of the world. You know, I saw a lot of beautiful graffiti everywhere. And like the city was very like industrial, you know, like, like the metro and the train stations is like beautiful. And just like a lot of tall buildings, a lot of nice graffiti. I saw the Berlin Wall too. What is the difference between Berlin and Los Angeles? I mean, both cities have graffiti. Both are pretty industrial. And I'm assuming there's a lot of people. Yeah, no, it was actually very similar to Los Angeles, except for that it was like, it was a lot colder than Los Angeles. And I don't know, just a little bit different vibe, you know, like Los Angeles kind of has that sunny like California vibes a little bit. A little bit of that, you know, Hollywood swag, you know, Germany's a little different. They don't have swag. No, they got swag. It's just Berlin swag. You know, what's the Berlin swag? I don't know. It's a different kind of swag. It's a different energy. See, are people arrogant? What are people arrogant? I wouldn't say they're arrogant. I mean, like, in my experience, like they weren't that friendly, but like most of them spoke English. So it was easy for me to communicate with them. I see. What were the girls like? Are they super dressed up? Um, I mean, they're all dressed for like the cold weather pretty much. I see. Yeah. I mean, they're pretty ladies in Germany, but more so in Spain. Wait, weren't you out there to see your girlfriend? Well, she's my ex girlfriend now. No way. Yes way. You did not go there to break up with her. I didn't go there for that purpose. That ended up happening. So why did it happen? I was over some like petty stuff. It was like, I promised I would like buy her flowers. Like before I left, and I was going to on the last day, but then I got stuck babysitting her drunk friend. Oh, I see. I couldn't buy flowers. She was all mad. And then I don't know. I was just like, I was like, you know, if you're gonna be like mad every time over something small like this, I just like, I just don't think it's going to work out. Like, I'm not the guy for you. Dang, did it break your heart to say that? Oh, kind of, you know, I was very sad. Like, like that. It's like the last day I was there. So I was very sad that day. But in like, I don't know, I just felt kind of numb, like on the plane, like back. And then like, it didn't really hit me till like, maybe a day or two later. I see. Yeah, I'm doing good now. You're doing good now. Is there some new lady in your life? Actually, yeah, I got a date tomorrow night. How did that happen so quickly? I was some some girl came through the drive thru at my work. And I thought she was hot, but like, she didn't say anything to me. Like, while I was charging her, handing her food or anything. But she called the restaurant like later and asked for my number. That's crazy, Gavit. Stop that right there. All right, that's the first one. Yeah. All right. So on Germany, is there anything else you wanted to add? Oh, I mean, the food there was really good. It was better than like, I thought it was gonna be. What did you eat? Like, like, I don't know, like there was a dish, it was like pig's feet with like a sauerkraut and like mashed potatoes and like potato dumplings. Oh, I've heard of those. Are they called pogi or something? No, I don't know. I don't speak German. But no, it was very good. A lot of the meals came with like potato dumpling. I see. And then like people in Germany, they drink a lot with every meal. That's perfect. You blend right in. Well, yeah, they drink like a lot, a lot. What were they drinking? Just beer. Okay. Henneken? No, like they had beers over there that were like from there. Okay. Yeah, I don't know. Any notable ones? I had this one. I don't remember what it was called. But it was like a specialty like beer. Like they made it a restaurant, but it was like a beer mixed with elderberry syrup. It was really good. Sounds like poison. No, no, it was good. Sounds like Hunger Games. No, elderberry is like a sweet berry. It's like good for you because it has like high vitamin C or something. But like when it mixes with the beer, it's really good. I see. That's cool. People in Spain, they drink every meal too, but they drink less. So would you consider them alcoholics? Or Germany, definitely, yes. Spain, they're not really like heavy drinkers. Like most people, they drink one beer with like every meal. Do they have a beer belly? The people in Germany, like kind of, yeah, like some of them were kind of heavier. But in Spain, like everybody was kind of thin. That's cool. Yeah. And the nightlife in Spain was, or at least like in the city I was in, Madrid, like the nightlife there is pretty popping off. Like, it's normal for people to be out till like three in the morning, even on like a Monday. Ah, I kind of want you to go to New Orleans and tell me if it compares. No, maybe I'll go to New Orleans one of these days. New Orleans. I see. So overall, what's your takeaway from your trip? I just think it was good, like to see like a different part of the world and like kind of leave my little bubble of like the world. What's your little bubble? Well, like I haven't really left California. Like that was the first time I ever left the country, but I've only left California to go to like Nevada and Arizona. OK. Like I've stayed in pretty much the same like region like my whole life. So it was cool to go to a different part of the world and see like, you know, different things. You know, the first impression I had of you, and I think still it's pretty true, is that you don't belong here in your bubble. Like, I do not think where we live that you came from here. So it took me a minute to get your name because you were speaking with an accent. Everybody says I have an accent, but I think it's just because I talk low. No, it's not even that. Like what I've come to realize about you is that because you like mimicking people and you're good with mimicking accents, you take on all the accents that you've come across. And so your voice is like an amalgamation of all these accents. Oh, yeah. Maybe that's true. Anywho, do you think they lived a simple life in Germany and in Spain? I mean, it's hard to take away just from like being there for like how long I was here. I wasn't there that long, but I would say it's like Madrid. I kind of felt like the people kind of live kind of a simple life. What would you define as a simple life? Like not being too concerned with, you know, keeping yourself busy all the time or like too concerned with trying to make more money because a lot of the people there were like, they lay back, you know, like I met a lot of really nice old people. Like I would go places and these old people would talk to me for some reason. But like, I don't know, they're just really friendly over there. Okay. Like they live a kind of slower pace of life. So you think that you can be happy in that type of life? Yeah, I think so. I mean, I'm kind of a laid back person. Like I like a laid back kind of environment. I think I'm a very unhappy person. Why are you so unhappy? Huh? Why are you so unhappy? Why am I so unhappy? Well, it's because I read this book and it basically pointed out the reason why I am unhappy, even though if you were to analyze me, I have a roof over my head. I'm well fed. I'm a healthy person. I don't have any crazy addictions, not anything like mentally, physically to overcome. But the reason for my unhappiness has to do with this concept of time, right? And someone, this therapist told me that I was being dragged by time. And I was like, what do you mean by that? And he essentially says that a lot of us, like we get ahead of ourselves, right? And this book kind of speaks from that too. Like we don't focus on the moment. Like we don't focus on the moment. And instead, we're dwelling on our past and how our past is contributing to what's happening in this moment. Or what we do is we look into the future and we give herself anxiety, thinking about all the possible ways things could go wrong. And that also contributes to my sense of unhappiness. And then so this book essentially taught me that in order for me to be somewhat happy, it's like being on stage and I'm supposed to just stay in the spotlight. And the reason why is because when you're in the spotlight, you can't see the crowd in front of you and you can't see what's behind you. You're just in the moment. Right, so you want to be the main character? Dude, like I've been telling you, I have a feeling we're going to be famous. As cringe as it sounds. Well, that's what everybody says. Everybody says, oh, I'm going to be famous. I'm going to move to L.A. Okay, no, I don't care to move to L.A. I'm going to move to New York City. Or to New York City. Because I don't, because, well, like if you were just to look at the practical reasons of why I wouldn't want to be there, it's like it's too crowded. You can't even find parking. Traffic is insane. Getting everywhere takes at least 20, 30 to an hour and the traffic is not moving. And even beyond that, it's like, I don't know. It has been really just like boiled down to like just the connections that you make and how you network with people and how you can leverage other people to get ahead and make more money and gain more things. That has a lot to do with it. I think being famous has a lot to do with like who you know. You know, like people like as far as like actors or like musicians, a lot of them have inside connections like in the industry before they really break it big. Whether that's like they were like family related or like, you know, a lot of these people like to break it into like the industry like, you know, they go hang out with their you know, they go hang out up there and like party with these people and like try to try to get to know these people. And that's the crazy thing. Like that's the advice I've been told, not just by you, but other people that like if you want to be, you know, someone famous, like get these opportunities, like you got to party with these people. And I think that's kind of cringe. I think it's cringe too. I'm not really a party person. So how are we going to be famous if we don't like partying? We don't care for LA. We don't care for New York. And we're just trying to like make good shit. Yeah. I know what it is. Gavin, you got to commit to 100 episodes. 100 episodes? Yes, because consistency breeds excellence. And you can't be excellent at something you don't do often. That's true. That's true. And I've come to realize the reason why I felt so compelled to create a podcast is because I like to talk. I feel like you like to talk too. And it's a form of like artistic self-expression where we can just say shit under our stage names. And hopefully you just call me by my real name. All right. So every time I call you by your real name, we got to like buzz it out. Okay, okay. Picasso. Yep. What else? If anybody doesn't know, the reason I'm going by Picasso is because Pablo Picasso is top tier. You know, he's one of my favorite painters. Dude, I don't even know anything about him. What type of art like art does he create? It depends. Like he had a very long painting career. Like he started when he was very young and he lived to be pretty old. So like at the beginning of his career, he did more like, I guess like generic paintings, you know, just like paintings of like people and places. But like later on, he started doing like erotic art. And then also just like kind of like trippy art. Like he would draw things or like people with like weird proportions, you know, like unrealistic proportions. Is that surrealism or something? I don't really know like the term for it, but it might be. Did he go insane? Was he the one who chopped off his ear? No, that was Van Gogh, I believe. I see. Yeah, no. Pablo Picasso. There's a song about Pablo Picasso. It goes, some people try to pick up girls and get called an asshole. This never happened to Pablo Picasso. He was only five foot three, but girls could not resist his stare. Pablo Picasso never got called an asshole. Did he come up with that? What? Wait, he came up with that? That's a song about Pablo Picasso. By who? I believe it was originally done by the Modern Lovers. But. Who are they? Some like art rock band from New York. Like I want to say they came out in the 70s. But I could be wrong about that, but I'm pretty sure they're from New York. But I also don't want to be a starving artist. Starving artist? You'd rather be a well-fed artist? Yeah. Because I think when you're a starving artist, you do have to sacrifice a lot of quality in your art. You know, whatever artist that you choose to take on. So if you don't have the budget to, let's say, pay for just bare minimum equipment, you know, how quality of an art piece can you make? I mean, it depends. Like a lot of it is like, it's even like recording music, you know? Like if you have a good song, that's going to sound good. No matter what? No matter what equipment you recorded it on. Like it might not make it to radio because radio has like certain standards, like how they want things produced. But like people hear your song and go, damn, that's a good song, you know? That's true. You know, or like even like if you have something to say that's of value, like it doesn't really matter if you recorded it on a cell phone or something else. Like if you say something that really resonates with people, they're going to feel it, you know? Like regardless of whatever medium you recorded it on. I guess that's a very simple explanation. Yeah. What else, Gavin? What else? You're just going to have to bleep it out. Oh, okay. I'll bleep out my name again. None of y'all fools can know my name. It's top secret. All right. Why are we even trying to keep our identity a secret? I don't know. Because then people are going to be like, hey, you're that dude from that podcast. Oh my gosh. I'll be like, no, that's not me. And we're trying to do a video format as well. So I'm trying to get ski masks. No, I don't want to do no ski mask. You don't want to do no ski mask? Why not? Because I look silly, you know? No, I think it's just funny. Okay, fine. Then we can't do a video format ever. I don't know. Is this going to be like a porn where like you just cut off the face? No, no, no. It's not going to be like that. Then how do you propose that we do a video format without outing ourselves? Um. I don't know. I mean, I don't want to look like I'm about to rob the gas station just to record a podcast. I mean, that's a little bit much, don't you think? No. You got to go all out. Because we don't have the budget to publicize ourselves, I honestly think the crazier we are as individuals doing this video format, like the better it is. I might be wrong. I just want to do crazy things. I just want to be unique. I just want to be special. Don't you understand? No, but that's the thing. Like, when you try too hard to be special, you end up not being special or unique, you know? Like, if you be yourself, like, that's unique. You know what I'm saying? Like, you know, everybody, like, nobody's the same. Like, everybody's similar, but nobody's exactly the same, you know? And it's the little, like, differences that, like, make you unique. I see. Okay, so no schemas. Yeah, no schemas. I mean, you wouldn't catch me wearing a ski mask outside. Dude, I wear a ski mask. I don't ski, so. You can ski. Skiing is just, it's not just for the elite. Yeah, I don't know. I don't, I don't live in the snow, so. We don't live in the snow, but we can travel to the snow. That's why we are in California. Maybe we should bleep that out, too. Yeah. What else? Oh, yeah. I really want to talk about my mom. Oh, yeah, yeah. You told me some funny stuff about your mom that happened the other day. Oh, man. Here we go, you guys. So, I'm just gonna start off with the end. The end was that my mom ended up in the emergency room. And then, let's backtrack to how we get there. So, that morning, I took her out to eat. We had a grand old time eating curry. It was delicious. Yeah. And then, when I took her back here to my place, right? I had to do some stuff on the computer. I took her out to the living room to just relax. And I thought that was pretty much it. Next thing you know, my mom comes and uses my restroom. And she's complaining of having diarrhea. And on top of diarrhea, I realized that she was also puking. And so, the situation escalated until she was basically frantic. She was panicking. She was puking. Had diarrhea. It was a whole shit show, literally. And with my mom's condition, she's a diabetic. And I didn't know what else, like, that could possibly be wrong. I called 911. And then, when they came, took her to the ER, that's when I followed shortly. And to my surprise, she was so out of it. She was so delirious that she couldn't state who she was. And they just considered her like a Jane Doe until I came. Yeah. And so, I was in the ER waiting with her for the results to come back. And when the doctor finally spoke to me, it was a whole another show of, like, okay, your mom might have colitis. She's got some sort of, like, potassium, diabetic-induced delayed cognition, whatever the case may be. Like, just a shit show of things, right? And so, I'm here freaking out. I'm like, yeah, of course, like, keep her for the night. We need this woman to heal. And tell me why I came the next day. My grandmother and my aunt was there with her. And my aunt tells me, hey, did you know they found THC in her blood? I don't think my mom has ever been high. I don't even think she knows what being high means. So, when I hear that, I'm like, I freak out. And I'm like, where is she getting this? And it dawns on me, there's a bag of edibles in the living room. Looks like candy. She's a diabetic. So, of course, she's going to complain that her blood sugar is low and eat candy. And that's exactly what happened. Long story short. Yeah, I mean, that's pretty wild. I mean, it's not as wild for me because this is my second time hearing it. But, you know, for all of y'all. Anyways. Doing a podcast is a lot. I feel like that's all I have on my plate for now. Oh, yeah. Interesting, interesting. Well, in case y'all don't know, we're broadcasting from Santa Ana. And we are in Leanne's room right now. I'm noticing some interesting decor. Like, you got some, look like gold medals or something. Are you a gold medalist or anything? Oh, yeah. I was an honors student three years in a row. They give gold medals for that? Yeah. And then on top of that, I was just winning awards for it. I was just winning awards left and right. I'm telling you, I'm special. What kind of awards are you winning? I think I started collecting awards when I was in sixth grade. And I've won anything from honor student to the science fair to a band award to some sort of like club award. It was a lot. Yeah. I was a tryhard. Well, there you go. I mean, you got the medals to show for it. And then you know what I realized come high school? Yeah. I did not give a shit. It was like once I achieved what I had set out to do come high school, I think after freshman year, I went through three different high schools. And you might be like, why is that? And honestly, I just didn't want to study anymore. I didn't want to study the same bullshit thing and do the same boring, busy work. I was more invested in learning about the world and actually making money and like going out there and working. But that was a lot of conflicting interests. So yeah, three different schools later, here she is about to be a college dropout. Okay, okay. Very nice, very nice. I mean, that's the name of a Kanye West album. What, College Dropout? Yeah. So I mean, there you go. What about you, Gavin? What? I mean, you've spoken to me about education before, but why did you hate school? I just never like, I don't know. I've never really liked school. I mean, like, I remember watching like this cartoon called like the Looney Tunes show. It's not the original Looney Tunes, but it's like a later adaption. And then like Daffy Duck was telling some kid, he's like, school is like prison, you know? I should know, I've been to both. You learned from a duck that school is prison? No, I mean, but it just, I don't know. It's just weird for me because like when I was, I was homeschooled like a large portion of my life. Because like, my mother was very religious. So like she pulled me out of school. But you know, one of the reasons she pulled me out of school was like, you know, like they had her like meet with my teacher, like the principal or something. And like, they basically told her that like, oh, they're gonna have to like medicate me or something. Oh, do you have ADHD? Well, yeah, I had ADHD. I mean, I don't really think like my opinion on that is probably different than a lot of people's. But like, for me, I don't think it's right to medicate a kid for ADHD. Like, I think all kids like screw off and act silly, you know? Whether they're medicated or not. Yeah. And honestly, just I don't think it's ever good to take medication. Unless you like absolutely have to. Right. Like, I think that's more just on the fault of the teacher for not knowing how to keep the kids like behave. So what's an ultimatum that was presented to you or your mom that you were either going to stay in the public school system and be medicated or leave and be homeschooled without the medications? I mean, I don't know exactly how it went down, but I know like my mom got very offended. I see. She pulled me out of school. And just like, you know, it's very religious. It's kind of like, you know, school is the devil kind of thing. But I mean, I kind of agree with her, though. Like, I don't I'm not a big fan of school. Like I went to public high school and I don't know. I just don't like the way people view education, like especially like college education. Like in high school, like they would always tell me, oh, yeah, you don't want to get stuck like working like a blue collar job or something because those people are losers or whatever. Like that's the way like the teachers would have you view it. Like even though like they're like those people are making more money than they are. You know, like doing hard work. Right. But in school, they teach you to like be afraid of doing hard work, you know, and then like it's something to be frowned on. But I don't know. I just didn't I never liked that iridescent mentality, you know, like people say, oh, you have to go to college, you know, or like if you don't have a college degree, like you ain't shit to me, you know, like you don't matter or like your opinion doesn't matter on anything. If you like if you don't have this college degree or whatever, because to me, like, you know, a lot of these people like aren't that smart, you know, like going to school or having a degree doesn't mean you're smart. It just means that you like sat through all the bullshit and did like all the minimum effort work to get through, you know. Well, there's pros and cons with everything. And I would say earning those medals was not minimum effort. I did have to put in effort. But the thing is that it's a very structured effort. Yeah, it's a lot of ass kissing. I would say that. Yeah. No, that's why they teach you to hate like working hard or doing like blue collar work because they want you to like kiss ass, you know, those are the kind of people that hate kissing people's ass. Doing their own thing, building their own businesses. Yeah, they like to do their own thing, you know, but like to make it in like the sort of white collar world or like, you know, where you need to college education and all that, like you have to do a lot of ass kissing, a lot of brown nosing, you know. What's brown nosing? Brown nosing. It's just like ass kissing, you know, it's another term for it. They call it brown nosing because if you're kissing their ass, like your nose is going to be brown. Oh, yes, it's kind of nasty, but like that's the term people use. I guess I never saw it from that perspective, though, that if you were to choose the more elitist way, get a college degree and work in a corporate world where there are a lot of pros, right? Like you're, once you get a degree, it's a lot easier to transition into that world. And once you're in that world, the pay does not fluctuate as much as if you were to go the other route and be a blue collar business person, or you can be a white collar business person. It doesn't matter. But doing your own thing is just a lot harder. There's no guarantee, you know, and you might end up working your entire life. And what if your thing doesn't blossom? Yeah, but you can't say it's going to blossom if you had a degree. That's not guaranteed either. I know a lot of people who got degrees and didn't do shit after getting a degree. There's so many pathways, though, because I think how a lot of people see it is they'll get their degree to land a corporate job that ensures stability so that they can funnel some of that money into doing their own thing. And once their side passion hustles can stand on its own, that's when they quit their stability to work on their passion. Like, I don't ding them for wanting that because, I mean, I'm Asian. And I would say I grew up in, like, a very stereotypical and at the same time not stereotypical Asian household where, yeah, like being a doctor, an engineer, you know, those core jobs was a good thing because it meant that you could sustain, you know, the ability to survive post grad. And I still have a lot of conflicting feelings towards it. Like, I'm almost done with my degree and, like, I just need to get it done. Yeah. So this is why we have this podcast. Well, I mean, what degree are you trying to get? Okay, look, I was originally in for a computer science degree. Computer science is super hard. Yeah. And I realized I don't think I see myself being a computer scientist for 40, 30 years. I just don't. However, my friend recently presented another solution for me and he said he was in the same situation. Did computer science, realized that it was too hard, and then he switched over to geography and now he's working in the technology sector of, you know, geographic information. Yeah, that sounds nice. I mean, I don't really know what geographic information is, but it sounds sophisticated. It's not really sophisticated. Actually, funny enough, for someone who doesn't know that Spain is a country in Europe, geography sounds like the worst combination for me. Like, I'm spatially unaware, but I think that it's like a nice change where it's like geography is a blend of technology, which I do enjoy, and it's learning about like nature and hopefully other cultures as well. A lot of it is mapping. You're creating a lot of maps to help like the government sector. I mean, any sector could use more maps. But I don't know. It was all just hypothetical, though I am looking into it and we shall see. Yeah. So what about you, though? I know the first time I met you and your friend, you guys said that you played in a band. Oh, yeah, we do. And then my first impression off that was like, oh, it's like a cute little band. What do you have to say for yourself? I don't know. What do you mean? Hmm. I want you to well, actually, I was going to be like, explain yourself. Do you think it's a cute little band? But I feel like that's very degrading. And rather, why did you choose to form a band? Well, it's just the interest in music. You know, I've always loved music, probably more than anything, really. Like, I mean, when I was really small, you know, I loved like singing. Like I would drive people crazy. It's like singing all the time. They'd be like, would you shut up? You know, I don't see that. But well, that's because I became a lot more shy. Like, why is that? And I got older. Well, a lot of it had to do with being homeschooled for like so long. Yeah, I wasn't really allowed to go that many places. And like my only friend is my brother, pretty much. I've heard. So like, I had a hard time like talking to people and like expressing myself like outwardly. But you know, I got a little better since like, like when I first started like high school, it was really hard for me. But you know, I've gotten better since then. But tell me about your band. Oh, the band? Like, it's just, you know, I love the music, you know. I first started like, be like having an interest in music, like from a young age, like my dad kind of, he like pushed me towards that, you know. Because my dad has very great taste in music, at least in my opinion. You know, so I was always exposed to like the music that he was making. Like he was in a band before I was born. So I listened to like his old like demo tapes and stuff that they recorded, and just like other music that he was interested in, you know. Like I grew up listening to like Joy Division, The Cure, The Smiths, Depeche Mode, you know, stuff like that. And then, you know, whatever else my dad was into. And like, I don't know, I just always followed music. And then I learned to play guitar, like I was probably like 13, 12 maybe, somewhere in that range. And then I've just been playing guitar since then. You know, like back when I was in high school, I used to have a lot of time, you know. So I could play the guitar for like hours at a time. Like I can't play like that much anymore, just because I don't have enough time. But like, you know, I just stem from that. I started like playing in bands. I was in ninth grade, and I was asked to join a band. It's like some cheesy like pop punk band. But no, it was fun. And then what happened to it though? Oh, well, like I was asked by the guy who played. He's one of the guitar players in the band. He asked me to join. And then we were friends for a little while. And then, I don't know, we kind of like, our friendship like fizzled out. You know, and like he wanted to take the music in a different direction. What direction? Well, like he wanted to go more like, I don't know if you're familiar with what pop punk is. It's like, have you ever heard of the term? Maybe, but you can describe it so everyone knows. It's like pop rock, but it takes like elements of like punk. It's like a band like Green Day would be considered pop punk. I think I've heard of Green Day, but I'm not sure. Like Blink-182. I think I've heard of them too. I don't know, like he wanted to take it more like pop. And I wanted to take it more punk, you know, I guess. And then he wanted to sound like certain bands that I didn't really like. Like who? Like there's this band called Neck Deep. Or like a band called The Story So Far, like stuff like that. Yeah. Like it's like, in my opinion, it's very like, it's just too corny for me. I didn't like it. And then he wanted to kind of take it towards that direction. And I didn't really want to. So like, I don't know, we would argue all the time over like creative decisions and stuff. So you're surprisingly stubborn. I guess like, yeah, over that. And then like, after that, the band kind of broke up. Like we just didn't play shows for a while. And then we stopped like hanging out. And then I joined another band like in high school with a friend of mine. There was, I was actually introduced to him by the other guy that initially like, asked me to join that first band. And this guy that like, I would hang out with him like, we became friends because he would like talk shit about me all the time. Why? Yeah, he just make fun of me. But I just laugh. What did he say? I don't know. He like make fun of me like, for liking the music that I like, or like, or just like the way I dress or whatever. What did you dress like to be picked on? I don't know. I wear like, finals, basketball shorts, you know. I used to wear like skinny jeans too. Like only for like, only for like one year. Only for one year? How skinny were your skinny jeans? No, they were pretty fucking tight. Why would you do that to yourself? It might fucking hurt my balls to wear those things. But why did you wear it? I don't know. Like, was it a fashion statement? No, I guess like, I don't know. I thought at the time like, I was interested in like rock music and like the fashion of rock music at the time to kind of lean towards like skinny jeans. Oh, I see. Like when I was, it was only that one year, like ninth grade. Like I was wearing skinny jeans. But then like, after that I was like, you know what, fuck it. I'm not wearing skinny jeans anymore. Like it just looks gay, you know. And it just doesn't feel good, you know. So yeah, I stopped. But no, he would make fun of me for the way I dress or like bands I liked. But then like, you know, I thought it was funny. Like I never really mind if people make fun of me. Because like, you know, I make fun of people too. So I can vibe with that. I see. But yeah, like, I don't know. One time we were like jamming. I was playing guitar like in the hallway or something. And then I played like, we started like hanging out more. And he realized that I like a lot of music that he liked as well. And so I don't know, like we just became better friends. And then we started a band. And we played for like most of high school. And then it broke up during like the COVID thing. Like we just, we stopped playing shows because there really weren't shows at that time. Yeah. For us to play. And so once that band broke up, how did you end up in your current band now? Oh, like in like that band, like we had a second guitar player. But he like left the band. So I asked my friend Bryce to join. So he did. You're going to out Bryce like this? We're going to bleep out his name. We're going to bleep out his name. Yeah, I'm not going to be giving out people's names, okay? That's not what we're about. We want to give every respect people's privacy. No, but I asked my friend to join the band. And then he played with us for a little bit. And then he was starting a band with his friend. So he asked me to join, which was like right at the end, like right before the whole COVID scam started. So like, yeah, like I would like jam with them and like just like hang out. And then I became friends with the other guy in his band. So it all just kind of clicked. And we started working on music. And we couldn't play shows for a while because the COVID thing. But eventually shows like started happening again. And then we just kept playing. You know, and then now I'm still playing with that band. That's cool. Do you have goals for your band? Um, we just want to keep like making like music, playing shows. We're working on releasing an album. We're recording right now, like a full length album. Like we released, we had like a two song like release. And then we released the EP that had like five songs on it. And then now we're doing like a full length album. How many songs are in a full length album? It's usually anywhere between like eight to 12 songs. That's cool. It's a lot of work. Yeah, it's taking a long time. But like it's coming together. We're almost finished recording like everything. And then we're gonna have to mix it, which takes a long time too. I see. So mixing it is just making it better. Yeah, we have to adjust all the volumes and then get everything to sound good together. Because there's a lot that goes into it. You know, you have to like the volume for one, but then you have to EQ everything. Which is EQ is short for like equalizing. Like you like adjust the frequencies of everything. Because every sound or every track you record is like a frequency range. And like for certain instruments, you want to like kind of cut some of the frequencies. And then boost like other frequencies. And you just got to figure out how to make everything sound good together. As well as like, like mastering like, you want to make sure the audio is not clipping. That's cool. There's a lot that you can learn in the world of music recording and editing. Yeah. Oh, definitely. So with this like podcast. Okay, I don't want to say it like that. So we're going to cut that out. But I actually do want to set goals for the podcast. Because it might not be anything crazy, like 100 episodes right now. But I think each time we do it, I just want to make it better day by day, day by day. Do you think it's possible? Are you in? It's definitely possible to get better. Okay. Is it possible to get worse? Oh, no, I mean, I don't think it's possible to get worse. Why not? I mean, we could have like a worse episode maybe. But like to get worse in general, I don't think so. Unless like one of us hits our head or something. It's like speech issues. Oh, man. All right, should we wrap it up? Yeah. Well, this is the hard kombucha podcast. And thank you for listening. We God bless all of you. Merry Christmas. I'm just kidding. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. Happy birthday. Happy Hanukkah. Happy Mardi Gras. Happy Mardi Gras. Happy birthday to me. Happy birthday to you. Yep. Bye-bye. All right, peace out. Ciao. That was not bad. Let's go.