0:00:15 - (Ben): I'm sitting here with my dad. Just about 800 miles separates us, literally. Teab bagging, that's what I'm doing. And your name is you is of the forest. And that's where I find myself right now. And my name is Ben, last name Johnston.
0:00:45 - (Scott): And I'm Scottt Johnston, Ben's father, as he would say, sitting 800 miles to the south with a view of some tomatoes growing out the window. So what's the name of this podcast?
0:01:07 - (Ben): That's a good question.
0:01:09 - (Scott): Yeah, I figure it out later.
0:01:13 - (Ben): I've always been really bad at naming things, so that's something that doesn't, doesn't, doesn't come very quickly.
0:01:24 - (Scott): Yeah, or great them. We can let the podcast name itself.
0:01:29 - (Ben): I like it when pets come to me already named. I'm not sure if there were any pets that I actually named growing up. Maybe I named that one lizard we first had named Speedy. But I think that was.
0:01:43 - (Scott): You named major, didn't you?
0:01:46 - (Ben): Oh, that's true. I did name major, except that was I. Yeah, major the Oscar fish, that name was. I knew about that name, and I knew I was gonna use it at some point in life because we read animal farm in school, and for some reason I just loved the idea of is major of a very formid non human being being named major. Just, it was powerful and respectable. Major. Is Major a. What.
0:02:28 - (Scott): What character is major in Animal Farm?
0:02:32 - (Ben): It was a pig. Yes. Yeah, yeah, he was the good pig. So before, before everything went to shit and the other pigs started abusing their power, Major was actually a really good tyrant. He was an example of the, of example of when a monarchy can go actually pretty well. And I don't actually know if that's what George Orwell's point was, but that's as like 13 year old self. That's. That's how I interpreted it.
0:03:15 - (Ben): Um, but yeah, he was the good point being good autocrat named major the fish. But that was long. He was an autocrat. Yes.
0:03:25 - (Scott): Yeah.
0:03:26 - (Ben): He was kind of the leader of the oligarchy though, right? Yeah. But it. How I name things is kind of on par with just how I live my life, too. It's happens, I take things very slow and there's a lot of thought behind most everything I do good and for.
0:03:49 - (Scott): Ill, that's not happenstance, right.
0:03:53 - (Ben): So when people ask me what should we, what should we name this potato that's funnily shaped that we're going to keep on our kitchen windowsill, I. Floyd spud.
0:04:04 - (Scott): I mean, spuddly.
0:04:08 - (Ben): I'm. I've transitioned from the intuitive to the feeling. Or was it. I don't know. I don't know what. I. I overthink everything. So when I do the Myers br. It can't answer it. Actually answer the questions. Anyway, what's the name of this podcast? Maybe you should name it.
0:04:27 - (Scott): Maybe not. I do name things, but I don't come up with, you know, o I got to be careful what I say since I named, you know, your mother and I named you after. Yeah. You're the good brother. Oh, he froze on that, huh? Yeah. Well, from these podcasts I've listened to, I don't know if you're hearing me now because you're not there. But, you know, other than freestyle discussion, they sometimes focus on segments.
0:05:21 - (Scott): And now that all got recorded, but I'll wait till you come back. Are you there?
0:05:37 - (Ben): Yeah. Right now, I'm in the middle of the wood. I mean, I'm always in the middle of the woods, but right now, I'm at the retreat center.
0:05:45 - (Scott): Yeah.
0:05:47 - (Ben): Caretaking responsibility. So, things you would think they would figure out the Wi Fi. What.
0:05:56 - (Scott): What are caretaking responsibilities?
0:06:01 - (Ben): Well, they supposedly need a 24/7 presence on the land, which isn't, you know, not really the case, but to.
0:06:12 - (Scott): They defend.
0:06:13 - (Ben): There needs to be someone that's there overnight.
0:06:16 - (Scott): Yeah, I. You're guarding the property.
0:06:19 - (Ben): Like, if there's a fire, I think maybe. I mean, it kind of. It makes sense to an extent, because, say, say there was not a caretaker around, and then, like, well, what's. What structure is there for there to be someone on the land, at least somewhat consistently? It's like, are. Is there gonna be someone there five days a week? What, like, a lot going on? Yep. A lot of neighbors about. Keep it in touch with people.
0:06:59 - (Ben): Can. It makes sense. But you don't have to be here 24/7 you can go grocery shopping and hang out with friends for a day.
0:07:10 - (Scott): You told me you were.
0:07:11 - (Ben): What's.
0:07:12 - (Scott): What you were involved in shuttling.
0:07:15 - (Ben): What?
0:07:15 - (Scott): What were you shuttling?
0:07:18 - (Ben): Humans. There was a group here, about 70 people, doing their retreat thing. See? So they came in on Friday night, and then there were some people that were commuting back and forth on and off site. So I hope commute people in Friday, and then someone helped them, help them get back to their cars later on Friday, because at the retreat center, there's this. So, you re. You're driving ono this island, and you turn onto our driveway, and the driveway is about half a mile long, and where we have most of our parking is pretty much at the start of the driveway.
0:08:10 - (Ben): So we kind of stationed ourselves to pick people up and then drive them all the rest of the way in. And it's so. Yeah, and because people, half the people were commuting on and off site every day, that meant in the morning and in the evenings, I was getting people back and forth.
0:08:31 - (Scott): I think they should redo that and include hiking to your car as part of the, you know, whatever experience.
0:08:42 - (Ben): People. Some people are into it, but there are some people that are like, I'm not gonna. Like, I paid $2,000 for this weekend.
0:08:50 - (Scott): I'm not like, I'm not walking half a mile.
0:08:53 - (Ben): I don't want to hike. I'm not going to hike. Like, even this golf cart seems precarious to me. Going down this bumpy road, that's like, wait a minute, why are there potholes here? What is this place? So it's, people expect the five star treatment, but also expect to get out into the woods and expect it to be half wilderness, half the lapse of luxury. So it's an interesting balance.
0:09:24 - (Scott): Yeah, right. It's like a dude ranch, except it's, you know what a dude ranch is?
0:09:32 - (Ben): Walking. Walking the trails or walking the road?
0:09:35 - (Scott): No, it's where, like, people would go play being a cowboy, like in Montana or something. If you went to a dude ranch, you like, ride horses and rope cattle, but you'd still want sort of the posh experience. So you're offering sort of back to nature, but not too close to it, or not too in the middle of it. And now a word from our sponsors.
0:10:05 - (Scott): I just wantew did. That's what it's coming to. I had my reasons. I need you. Allone. I need you on the phone. You know me, remanetce Sunine all along day with a whole long day you over a whole long day with a whole long day with a whole long day.
0:10:38 - (Scott): And that's the taste of alone, the first single off of Skinny Pete's Anger Management EP, played by Elton John on his Rocket man podcast. He said he'd be listening to the rest of the anger management ep when it came out, and now it is. Maybe you can beat Sir Elton to listening to it. Joey Legitino of the early rising music review site wrote, alone was quot and owed to the lessons of codependency in relationships and learning where shame and anger come from.
0:11:12 - (Scott): Self Discovery is the best way to love each other to the fullest, and we have to learn the hard way that pretty much applies the whole ep as well. Pete wrote performed and produced or co produced all the songs on the ep. Originally a drummer in some famous and infamous bands out of California, he spent the last four years turning himself into the all around artist he knew he could be. More is coming from Skinny Pete in the future. But for now, check out the anger management EP on any of your favorite music streaming systems like Spotify or even buy the V EP on Amazon or Apple Music.
0:11:57 - (Scott): And don't miss all the videos on YouTube. Radio Flyer should sponsor him. Also, thanks to anger management music for letting us use another clip from the ep in the intro and outro to our new podcasts, which is called that's a good question in case wonder we thank them for their sponsorship.
0:12:25 - (Ben): Welcome back.
0:12:28 - (Scott): And welcome back. Thanks to our sponsors. That's where we put in the sponsorship. Yeah. So no.
0:12:51 - (Ben): I've never had this this I've never had it this bad. Every once in a while we. There's a. This wouldn't you wouldn't really be able to pie of podcast together with this. Right. For long enough and then the whole thing will just crash.
0:13:12 - (Scott): Well this is go going toa be a fun to, you know, edit out the blank spaces in garageband.
0:13:22 - (Ben): Yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah.
0:13:27 - (Scott): Re welme ongoing. There we go.
0:13:32 - (Ben): I'm no, no, I'm y. I'm not at work. I'm re all gone. So they're all gone now. I'm not. I don't really know what to do anymore because.
0:13:44 - (Scott): And gone. What's it like?
0:13:46 - (Ben): And originally I was gonna be able to go home at this point, but the person that was gonna take over after me got sick so now I'm still here and soah. I'm just. I mean I'm just.
0:13:59 - (Scott): What's your reaction?
0:14:00 - (Ben): Don't have anything to do for the next 2 hours.
0:14:03 - (Scott): Yeah.
0:14:04 - (Ben): Yeah. Right. One thing I was thinking about before we just before I logged on was because you asked me, Ben looks at a piece of his dad's bio, his work bio, and doesn't what up with that segment or you know, I know just the vibe of what up with that, but. And something that I've been thinking a lot about is people ask me, well, what do they do at the WBE institute? And I feel like my answer is always changing.
0:14:42 - (Ben): So it's. It would like just in terms of my own work, it's like, well, what does Ben do? It's like Ben tries to tell people what he does and it's like what he. What does he tell people this week? Yeah.
0:14:56 - (Scott): What would you tell? Well, we already kind of covered it. You're shuttling people. You're shuttling people in a golf cart down a rural, rural road. That's what you did this week. No, today.
0:15:14 - (Ben): Yeah, right, right.
0:15:25 - (Scott): So.
0:15:28 - (Ben): Right. All right. Exactly.
0:15:32 - (Scott): Like, well, wait, whatever. Now it's what you say.
0:15:35 - (Ben): I didn. That might be funny, though. Like, it's like, it was just like three words you said, and someone's like, just respond with, I didn't catch any of what you just said. All these ##eah okay. Okay. I guess that that wraps up the first episode of whatever this podcast is called.
0:16:04 - (Scott): Thanks. You haven't listened to it yet.
0:16:09 - (Ben): Yeah, I did.
0:16:10 - (Scott): O I guess. I guess. Did you?
0:16:13 - (Ben): You name it? Did I miss that? You named it?
0:16:16 - (Scott): Yeah, and then I referred to it in the ad.
0:16:21 - (Ben): What?
0:16:22 - (Scott): No, you named it.
0:16:24 - (Ben): I. Oh, God, my memory.
0:16:30 - (Scott): Really?
0:16:30 - (Ben): That bad?
0:16:31 - (Scott): I asked, what's this podcast called? And you said.
0:16:36 - (Ben): I don't really know what this podcast should be called. I'm bad at naming things.
0:16:41 - (Scott): No, you said, that's a good question.
0:16:43 - (Ben): Oh, that's a good. Oh, okay, okay.
0:16:48 - (Scott): I went and researched it, and, uh, there's a. That's a good question. Exclamation point. Um, podcast that's, like, not broadcasting anymore.
0:16:59 - (Ben): U hu.
0:17:00 - (Scott): So this is like a period or no punct. So that's what's unique about it.
0:17:07 - (Ben): Okay. Yeah. So there's a slight difference in.
0:17:13 - (Scott): Setting it up on, let's see, what's it called? The distributor, the distro, is buzzsprout.com.
0:17:23 - (Ben): Dot this mean we're not independent?
0:17:29 - (Scott): Oh, this is just seems like it.
0:17:31 - (Ben): Should be a larger conversation.
0:17:33 - (Scott): Pardon? No, this is just a free website that puts it up everywhere so you don't have to deal with Spotify or.
0:17:46 - (Ben): If the service is free. We are the product, dad. Who are we selling our souls to here?
0:17:52 - (Scott): Okay, okay.
0:17:54 - (Ben): We're not a truly independent podcast. Wow. This is.
0:17:58 - (Scott): We'll talk about it.
0:17:59 - (Ben): Okay. Okay.
0:18:02 - (Scott): So I was just going for that slack of, you know, not having to do all the uploading and ob publicity by yourself, but you're right.
0:18:17 - (Ben): Y. Well, I guess I'll read the fine print. Maybe never, but this won't get uploaded.
0:18:28 - (Scott): For a while, so no worries.
0:18:32 - (Ben): Okay'm. Not sure why that should put me in ease, but I'll take it. Yeah, well, yeah, that's a good question. I'm here for it.
0:18:48 - (Scott): If we don't give them any content ever, then how can we be the product?
0:18:55 - (Ben): So we recorded this and never release it.
0:19:01 - (Scott): Okay, yeah, but that goes. That goes against the spirit of improv, you know?
0:19:09 - (Ben): Yeah.
0:19:10 - (Scott): You got to just put it out there.
0:19:13 - (Ben): Yeah. Okay. Worst case scenario, some chinese billionaires have our information and start trying to sell us better toilet paper.
0:19:26 - (Scott): Yes. Y we're gonna be targeted by more scams than we are currently.
0:19:35 - (Ben): By imag. Extra. Yeah, we'll get one extra phone call every week from spam risk, right? Yeah.
0:19:46 - (Scott): And one of them would have been somebody. You'dly listen to the podcast?
0:19:51 - (Ben): Okay. Yeah, I'm. I'm willing to sign it over. Sounds good. Okay. Um, I just. I did. Zoom kept crashing everyone.
0:20:03 - (Scott): That's why it sounded so.
0:20:07 - (Ben): That's why this first episode sounds kind of, like, weird, or I think at some point, dad, you say, where'd he go? Or just goes. Everything goes. There's no recognition what happens. It's just. It's not that we re horrible conversationalists. It's you. No. Zoom kept crashing. But in the spirit of improv, there we was, the first conversation as part of this podcast. That's a good question. And we're rolling with it, and we have to distribute it.
0:20:46 - (Ben): The magic was there. The technology was not, but the magic was there. Okay, bye bye, everyone.