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Year of the Amateur Podcast Guest I’ve been on a couple of podcasts this year, Talk Funny and Minimalist on Air. Nothing that gets millions of listeners of course, but I think I did okay. Both the podcasts were very kind to me and a lot of fun to do. I felt like carrying on a fairly rational conversation for thirty minutes or so wasn’t too difficult. But even though I’ve been on a few podcasts now I still feel like a complete fanboy when it comes to podcasts like The Joe Rogan Experience, Waking Up with Sam Harris, or the great live podcast Kill Tony.
The Dream That hasn’t stopped me from dreaming big though. My new goal in life is to get really really high, go on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast and talk about aliens, AI, Big Foot, and whatever else comes into my head at the time.
Even though I imagine the weed on Joe’s show would render me vegetative in a very short order and I’d end up silently contemplating the intricacies of the foam covering on the microphone I’d still love to give it the old college try though.
DBC (Dumb But Curious)
Part of his podcast’s appeal is that Joe comes across as everybody’s every man. A lot people easily identify with him on a lot of different topics and issues. No doubt about this. I believe though that Joe’s broad appeal also has something to do with a condition I like to call Dumb But Curios (DBC for short). And I also believe myself, Joe, and probably a lot of his listeners are all suffering from said condition. I would guess a lot of his guests are similarly afflicted. Sometimes people tell me I’m smart because I know the answer to some obscure question. I’m not smart though, just curious. I read a lot and I have a talent for remembering and regurgitating what I have read. At least those things that capture my interest. If you’ve listened to Joe’s podcast enough you’ve have undoubtedly heard him say he’s not smart or if dummies like me were running the world we’d all be in a lot of trouble. And yet when he isn’t too high, Joe does a perfectly adequate job of hanging with intellectual heavy weights like Neil deGrasse Tyson, Sam Harris, Lawrence Krause as well as many others.
When I listen to Joe discussing some very heady topics with those guys I feel like maybe I could do that. It makes me think maybe I’m not completely delusional and that I would be able to ask meaningful questions and make relevant points rather than just sitting there making banal and dumbfounded nonverbal sounds of agreement as those geniuses wax poetic on topics like cosmology, politics, society and physics.
The Episode that Broke Me
I don’t think I have a whole lot in common with Joe. I am roughly the same age, I do stand up comedy semi-professionally, and have a background in traditional Martial Arts. And, like Joe I started smoking cannabis fairly late (26 for me). In my case, though I only indulge when I’m back in my home state of Washington where it is legal, unlike Japan. But beyond that I’m just a fan. I don’t remember exactly which episode I listened to first. I know Ms. Pat was on there and it was hilarious, though not really mind bending like many of the episodes I listened to later. But I do remember the episode that had the biggest impact on me, #906.
Is it possible for something to simultaneously inspire you and break you at the same time? I think so. Hearing Joe and Hank (Henry Rollins) talk about how they knew they couldn’t do a regular 9–5 job and decided early in their adult lives to chase their dreams no matter what hit me hard.
I don’t really have anything to complain about. I have a wonderful wife and seven year old son. I live a good middle class style in Japan. But still, part of me can’t help but wonder, what if? What if I would have hit the writing hard in 1997 and just kept at it like Joe and Henry did with their creative projects? What if I would have sacrificed the safer route of becoming an English teacher in Japan and instead, slugged it out in the literary trenches and focused all my energy and effort on becoming a successful novelist? Hard to say. Maybe I’d be getting my dinners from soup kitchens or dumpsters somewhere or maybe I would have become the next Chuck Palahniuk, William Gibson, or Irvine Welsh. Recently my writing has started to get some attention, I published a novella in May (The Adamantine River Passage)(Yes, I’m plugging that shit) and I have started to get a little bit of attention on Medium and a few other places where I post my writing. But still, I can’t shake the feeling that maybe I could have gone a lot further if I had devoted the last 20 years to solely to writing.
Anyway, as Joe, Henry Rollins, and many of his other guessed have said, “Bitchin about it ain’t gonna get the job done,” so I will shut up here and get back to writing.
PS: I imagine it is more likely that Big Foot will contact me to do his podcast in the forest, but Joe, if you happen to read this and by some bizarre twist of fate you don’t happen to have any guests for your podcast just remember I would be happy to hang out for two or three hours and be your stoned DBC podcast partner.
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