Episode 1: Transcript
Episode 1: Why isn’t there any There here? Originally published May 10, 2023
Episode 1: Transcript
Doug French (00:00):
So quick sidebar, if we choose Wednesdays..
Magda Pecsenye:
Mmm-hmm. <affirmative>
Doug:
Next Wednesday is Thomas's 18th birthday. There's something symbolic about that. What if we announce it on Wednesday, and officially our kids are adults, so we're launching this podcast on the day our son turns 18, and that way we can do–
Magda (00:16):
Hey, that's fine. <Laugh>, that's something that you're into. It's fine. I don't see as much momentum.
Doug (00:22):
See, this is how we work. I suggest dumb stuff. And maybe 15 years ago you would've just jumped out the window and now you're like, “Fine. Whatever.”
Magda (00:29):
Yeah, I know.
Doug (00:30):
Age helps. I gotta say age really helps. Age.
Magda (00:33):
Age does help. Oh God. I'm so glad to be 50. The forties were real rough.
Doug (00:37):
Yeah. You make it sound like we were alive in the actual forties.
Magda laughs.
20 seconds of intro music that has a kind of 2000s chill dance vibe, crossfading into more talk:
Magda (01:01):
You know what I mean? Like we can stick to one topic if we know that we can record another one on the other day.
Doug (01:08):
Right. We should try at least. To stay on topic. Or at least bring the boat back into the main tributary before we tie it up.
Magda (01:15):
Yeah. Well, yeah. Right.
Doug (01:18):
And actually that metaphor almost worked.
Magda (01:20):
<Laugh>
Doug (01:25):
So we're gonna publish every Monday.
Magda (01:27):
Yeah, I think, do we wanna do Monday or do we wanna do Tuesday?
Doug (01:30):
Let's do every Tuesday.
Magda (01:31):
Let's do every Tuesday.
Doug (01:33):
Yeah. When the flames Wednesday. Is that too weird?
Magda (01:35):
That's too weird.
Doug (01:36):
Is it too precious?
Magda (01:38):
It's too, like, 2006.
Doug (01:40):
Well of course you know what we should do is just since the initials are WTF, we'll just publish Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
Magda (01:46):
<Laugh>. We could, that's funny. I don't know. Well, okay, so, welcome to the When the Flames Go Up podcast, by Magda Pecsenye and Doug French.
Okay, so this is the first episode and it doesn't feel that weird to me ‘cause you and I talk all the time and you and I have been doing podcasting stuff in the background for years, but for people who don't know why it's interesting that we're doing a podcast: Doug and I used to be married. We got married in when? 1999.
Doug (02:18):
Yeah.
Magda (02:19):
Oh my God. The last century. And we got divorced–
Doug (02:21):
Back in the 1900s. Yeah. And in fact, the anniversary of our marriage, as opposed to our wedding anniversary, was just a couple weeks ago.
Magda (02:28):
I know it was, it would've been 24 years. 24 years of solid misery. Anyway.
Doug (02:35):
A little bit of liquid misery.
Magda (02:36):
Ooh, gas! We got married in 1999 and we got divorced, it was official in 2008. And we saw that– I mean for me it was really, everybody's reactions to our divorce. Our kids were little at the time. How old were they? They were five and three. No, six and three. And everybody just was like, “Oh, well is Doug ever gonna see the kids again?” And all this weird kind of stuff. And that wasn't the reality that we were living, so we started writing a blog together about co-parenting after divorce. And we called the blog “When the Flames Go Up,” it's the lyric from the song “Alive and Kicking” by Simple Minds, which definitely dates us. But the lyrics, the whole song, is “What are you gonna do when the worst case scenario happens?” Right? Like, when everything crumbles. And that was what we saw happening. You know, our marriage had crumbled, the family had fallen apart. What are you gonna do when the flames go up–
Doug (03:45):
–and the kids are young and you gotta rebuild the floor underneath them, and–-
Magda (03:49):
Yeah, exactly. But I mean, you know, like, Spoiler Alert: alive and kicking.
How long did we write that blog? I don't remember. A couple of years. And we always said that eventually the blog would just go away because things would get so boring. And that was partly what happened. I think you and I just
Doug:
Absolutely. I thought so, yeah.
Magda:
We got really into a rhythm of co-parenting. Well, I also think there was some stuff happening with our kids that we couldn't talk about publicly because they were middle schoolers and it was like, you know, little kid problems you can talk about. Every little kid has potty training issues and pacifiers and stuff like that. But once they get into middle school, it seemed more personal. And I didn't wanna be exposing my kid's stuff to the entire internet.
Doug (04:31):
Right, we had to tap dance around some basic things in order to maintain their privacy and their dignity and, but I think for the most part though, when Lisa Bekin interviewed us and she asked us that exact question, “Where is this gonna go? How will it end?” I think it ended the way we hoped it would because speaking for myself, I learned more about you and about us as a couple, and as a pair of people who are linked forever, during that year than I did during our entire marriage. Which tells you a bit about where the marriage was. But I felt as though, I mean that was the real bulwark of where we are now, I think , because we developed a system and we totally lucked out. This is not something that we planned out and, you know, knew would work.
Doug (05:15):
I mean, I'm interviewed many times saying, “I don't know if this is the best idea or the worst idea.” And it might not be a good idea for divorcing couples, but it worked for us just because we were bloggers at the time. It's kind of how we processed our lives, our emotions. At least how I did, in a way. And I think if you talk about the gulf between what life was like back then and the way it is now, you know, when we posted our announcement that we were gonna get divorced on our separate blogs, we were inundated. Hundreds of really helpful sympathetic comments rooting for us, rooting for our kids, confident we were gonna figure it out. And that for me, I had wrote two posts. One was called “Falling Down” and the following one was called “Up On One Knee.” And I remember reading through all those comments and crying, and that buoyed me a lot, more than I can say at this point. So if you left a comment, way back when comments were relevant, bless you. ‘Cause you have no idea how much it helped me.
Magda (06:17):
I felt guilty a lot of the time when we were writing that blog.
Doug:
Yeah?
Magda:
Because I would get comments from mostly women, but some men ,all the time saying, “Oh, I can't do what you and Doug are doing.” I felt like in some ways it made people think that we got along too well. Which–
Doug (06:36):
And it made us wonder, it made them wonder why are you guys even splitting up in the first place?
Magda (06:41):
Which again, I think is such a bizarre cultural thing, right? Like, the idea that if people can be in the same room together and talk to each other, they should be married is a little bit screwed up. Right?
Doug (06:56):
I used to tell people, you know, in order to save time and just not be belabor it too much, I would say we were a good match, but a bad team.
Magda (07:04):
Yeah. I think we've transitioned into being a good team and I think we're a good friendship match, right?
Doug (07:12):
Oh, for sure.
Magda (07:13):
You know, like, you're a friend to me. But I just felt guilty because a lot of people seemed to think that they were failing somehow because they weren't having the kinds of conversations about co-parenting that you and I were. That they weren't able to trust the other person like I could trust you and like you could trust me on a basic human level. Right? And that was SO unfair for those people because there are just elements of toxicity in other people's relationships that were not ever present in ours. Right? Like I never worried about the kids being with you physically. I never worried about a whole bunch of decisions that you were making. I never felt like you were trying to hurt me or get revenge or anything like that. I never felt like you were mentally unstable. Like, and there was–
Doug (08:07):
Well, that was really good subterfuge on my part.
Magda (08:08):
There are all kinds of people who are divorced or divorcing, or still, God help them, stuck in marriages with people who are truly trying to harm them or harm their kids. And it made me feel horrible that those people were trying to model after us. So.
Doug (08:27):
Well you took that on though. I never took that on because that's not my problem. And it wasn't yours either. This was us putting something out into the world. IAnd once you do and how it's interpreted is the interpreter's problem because we were just figuring this out. We were lucky in many ways ‘cause no one was the villain. Nobody cheated on anybody. Nobody did anything terribly toxic. It just wasn't working, The End. And that's one of the reasons we could salvage a friendship after the marriage blew up, I think.
Magda (08:54):
Well, I mean, Donald Trump helped a lot with our friendship.
Doug (08:58):
I don't know who you're talking about. I don't acknowledge that.
Magda (09:01):
I mean I remember, well, I was just sort of like constantly irritated by our situation and by you. And then Donald Trump got elected and holy crap, you figure out who your friends and enemies are.
Doug (09:13):
Wait a minute. How is, how is this relevant? We got divorced eight years before he became a political figure.
Magda (09:19):
Well, yeah, but I mean Doug, I dunno. It was like, for me that was a big deal. Trump getting elected, suddenly I was like, “Oh. Here's Doug.” Yeah.
Doug (09:32):
Really? Well, thank you, Mr. Trump, for bringing my ex-wife around.
Magda (09:35):
<Laugh>. There was a–
Doug (09:36):
There are no atheists in foxholes, I guess.
Magda (09:39):
That's exactly it, right? There was a long time where I felt like we stuck to a certain sort of safe list of topics that we could interact on that we weren't gonna have conflict about. And then Trump came into office and, like, basically the entire universe of topics were suddenly safe topics <laugh> for us.
Doug (09:58):
Well, even then, and I, I admit there are some things when I get certain news, especially about my family that no one else knows about, you're the first person I want to tell about it.
Magda (10:07):
I remember right in the middle of the divorce, and you and I were fighting over something kind of specific in the middle of the divorce, I don't even remember what it was. And then the news about the Elliot Spitzer scandal happened. And I remember texting you from work and saying, “Hey, I need to take a sidebar from our current disagreement right now. Did you see this thing about Elliot Spitzer?”
Doug (10:31):
I was un-shunned.
Magda (10:33):
<Laugh>. Yeah, exactly. Anyway, yeah. So no, I'm, so we're going off topic. So why are–
Doug (10:40):
Well, this is, it’s important that we expose our listeners to the kind of nonsense they're gonna be listening to because we are exactly to veer off the main river. But we are gonna bring it back home. I almost promise. But we should tell people like what the podcast is about. I mean this was an idea and, and it grew out of just the conversations we have because here we are, our younger son is about to turn 18.
Magda (11:02):
Mmm-hmm. <Affirmative>
Doug (11:03):
Which is a big milestone. He graduates this, I had that feeling this morning as I finally got around to changing my calendar, pulling off the April sheet and I'm like, wow, this is the last month that I'll have any responsibility as far as taking my kid to school.
Magda (11:20):
Yeah, I know.
Doug (11:21):
You know, when I tear the next sheet of paper off this calendar and my kid will be outta high school. Which is a symbolic moment, you know. I mean, nevermind the fact that, you know, you're not gonna be living here anymore very soon. It's a very transitional year.
Magda (11:37):
Yeah. I mean I guess, okay, we, so you just mentioned it, right? So we should tell the people who don't actually, like, know know us, I'm getting married in the fall to a guy that I developed a crush on in the fall of 1990 <laugh> at college.
Doug (11:55):
Just another person using social media to hook up with an old crush.
Magda (11:59):
You know what, I highly recommend it.
Doug (12:01):
It's all the rage. A lot of people are doing it.
Magda (12:04):
Right. So I had a crush on him. He never had a crush on me and then he developed a crush on me and then–
Doug (12:10):
No, you brought out the boom-chicka-boom and that's all she wrote.
Magda (12:12):
–he called me and that was it. So yeah, so I'm getting married in the fall.
Doug (12:15):
And you had to FaceTime him in a balaclava and that's what hooked him for real. <Laugh> <laugh>.
Magda (12:22):
Yes. We go out walking in the morning, and I was wearing a balaclava ‘cause we had gone out–
Doug (12:28):
And this is Michigan when it was January,
Magda (12:31):
–in Michigan when it was really fucking cold. So yeah. And he lives across the country. So I am moving there for three years. Anyway.
Doug (12:38):
Well, anyway, the announcement that you were marrying him, that's the day we became Facebook friends, which I think is an interesting development. And I
Magda (12:47):
Was after we became
Doug (12:49):
<Crosstalk>. But that was the catalytic moment though.
Magda (12:53):
Was it? I dunno.
Doug (12:54):
I think so. I associate fundamental causality there.
Magda (12:58):
All right. Well I mean I, it wasn't a surprise to you. You knew.
Doug (13:02):
It didn't matter to me either way. I frankly, ‘cause I'm rarely on Facebook anymore. But the fact is, I think that's an interesting development. There was just some sort of established pattern or the next thing you were gonna do and for whatever reason that that made the fence that much more porous.
Magda (13:22):
Well, yeah, and I also think you had been such a good cheering section for me and for my fiance when we were starting our relationship. But like, I sort of didn't want everybody to think, oh, how is her ex-husband gonna feel now that she's getting married? Right.
Doug (13:44):
Joke’s on you, everybody <laugh>.
Magda (13:46):
Right, exactly.
Doug (13:48):
We're very consciously uncoupled. You know, I'm
Magda (13:51):
<Laugh>. No, well I mean the fact that you–
Doug (13:56):
Oh, congratulations, Gwyneth.
Magda (13:58):
–making suggestions for the venue for the wedding and all that kinda stuff. So like, I think that's probably why I friended you on Facebook right after the announcement of the engagement. But I mean, you already knew we were gonna get engaged, but, I just think, I didn't want people to think like, “Oh, this is some weird point of tension.” But I also think it's strange that you and I are friends, don't you think?
Doug (14:25):
I don't think about it much. I just take things as they come. You know, I, it's a great thing when you reach 57 years old and you just run completely out of fucks. It's a really liberating thing. “So many faces in and out of my life, some will last, some will just be now and then.”
Magda (14:39):
I really hope that's the lyric to a song. And you didn't make that up.
Doug (14:42):
“Life is a series of hellos and goodbyes. I'm afraid it's time for goodbye again.” Yes. That's “Say Goodbye to Hollywood” by Billy Joel. And everybody from my high school sang it all the time at our graduation party. Also way back in the 19 hundreds.
Magda (14:57):
All right. Okay, so what's the podcast about? The podcast–
Doug (15:01):
It's about this, it's about just nattering nincompoops.
Magda (15:05):
No. Oh my God. It's not about nattering.
Doug (15:08):
Oh, sorry. We, let’s scrap that idea.
Magda (15:10):
Here's what the podcast is about. The podcast is about the fact that people who are our age, Doug's 57, I'm 50, we–
Doug (15:21):
My child bride.
Magda (15:23):
<Laugh>. We have been trying to parent in a very specific way to get our kids in a good position to be successful in life and in the systems that we were brought up with. And people call it all kinds of different things, but we focused our parenting on helping our kids finesse these systems. And I think some of that is because we–Generation X and older Millennials and maybe younger Boomers–felt like we didn't get enough help from our parents and the older people around us with pushing through and navigating the systems that existed.
I know a lot of people my age feel like they were kind of abandoned. Like, it was sort of like being a latchkey kid for your entire life and we didn't have a lot of guidance, and that felt kind of isolating and lonely. So we've sort of gone in the other direction and really tried to help push our kids into navigating these systems, doing the right thing, building the right resumes, building the right set of experiences, that kind of stuff. And now here we are and our kids are in middle school or high school or after high school or after college, and the systems have all kind of disintegrated. And we can either say, “We failed,” or we can say, “Wow, this was a bait and switch, it was a mirage,” something. And we can take our energy and our efforts, all that energy that we put into parenting our kids with all that intensity and love and say, “Oh, what is the situation ACTUALLY right now?”
Doug (17:10):
Well, that experience you talk about explains in part why we became parent bloggers. Why parent blogging was such a huge thing at the turn of the century. Just because, not only were we intent on becoming a new type of parent, we are also intent on sharing what our experience was. Writing about it, cross pollinating with other people, writing about their experience. And we were full of optimism. This was like the most enlightened open discussion about how to bring kids into the world, and shepherd them somehow into where we thought they should be. But now we're seeing the ravages of social media, which has turned a complete 180 as far as its effectiveness or its usefulness in, in my life anyway. Which is why I'm so grateful neither of our kids spends a whole lot of time on it. I mean, our older kid’s off it entirely. And the younger one's on the ‘gram a bit just to talk about the play he's in this weekend and to display his riz.
Magda (18:08):
<Laugh> Can we do an entire episode on Teen Lingo? Like, I feel like I was completely there along with them for years on the language. Right? Like “cap, no cap,” all this stuff. But now “riz” has come in at the very end of my experience of high school as a parent,
Doug (18:29):
There's two very separate lexicons we have to familiarize ourselves with now. We have to figure out how to keep up with our children, like, learn words like “riz” and “no cap” or whatever. That's probably old already. But also stay in touch with how Medicare works and–
Magda (18:46):
Right! Exactly.
Doug (18:47):
Because I have two 80-year-old plus parents, and I'm the oldest child, and I'm gonna be the one who's there for them executing their will and helping them transition to whatever is next when they can't live alone anymore. I mean they, they live sufficiently now. And I know every second is borrowed time as far as that goes. In fact, I'd like to move where you're moving instead so I can be closer to my parents and you can bring your husband out here.
Magda (19:11):
I would be fine with that.
Doug (19:13):
How about if he lives in your house, and I’ll go live in his house.
Thats the thing though, I think there's just, we were heading toward a very particular destination and we got here, and now there's no there here.
Magda (19:25):
I think you're very right about that. And I also think that's why parent blogging and parent social media has changed so much. And there are a lot of old guard people like us who are like, “Oh, it’s so shallow now, it's just the influencers.” Well, of course it's shallow and it's just the influencers because there are no answers! We thought that we had these answers and then we were doing all this intensive parenting and people are like, they talk about intensive parenting like it's a bad thing. I mean, what else is worth putting your time and energy and research and love into, if not parenting your kids? Right. So I don't think intensive parenting is a bad thing unless it gets out of control for you personally. Right?
Doug (20:15):
But it was always a lot of marketing anyway and it still is and it's, but there is still engagement. You have to work harder to find it, but it's there.
Magda (20:23):
Right. But I do think that of course now parent blogging is really about being an influencer and products and stuff like that, that people are using and the way things look because there's no there there. Right? Like you, you can't talk thoughtfully about what you're doing with your kids because there's no, I don't know. Oh my God, I really don't wanna use any sports metaphors. But you know, when the quarterback throws a pass and there's no receiver, I feel like that's what parenting is like right now. You know, we are throwing all of our energy into parenting our kids toward certain goals, towards certain systems and then they get there and there's nobody to receive them or to receive their energy or to receive their hard work.
Doug (21:22):
Plus we've got all sorts of exogenous things to deal with. We didn't realize the political situation would be like this. We didn't realize, but you know, there's, there's all sorts of environmental issues that we're coping with as people and explaining to our kids and you know trying to stay ahead of them and help build optimism for them because this bullshit is all they know.
Magda (21:44):
Right. Exactly. I mean how much of their lives has the pandemic been? Three years is a long time. If they’re 15 it's been 20% of their life.
Doug (21:56):
And it robbed our older son of a graduation and a prom and–
Magda (21:59):
Well, and honestly it robbed him of his college experience, too. So–
Doug (22:04):
For the moment. I mean, he's gonna find his way around. I, yeah, that's another thing, too. We had no idea college would be looked at with such askancity as it is now. You know? I mean–
Magda (22:12):
“Askancity.” Yeah. I mean for me, the idea for this podcast really came about when I suddenly thought, Hey, I should write a book called “What to Do When Your Kid Drops Out of College.”
Doug (22:23):
<Laugh> and Lives in His Car <laugh>.
Magda (22:26):
Right. And you know, I keep saying this to people and they're like, “Oh, you should write that book!”So, I don't know, maybe I'll write that book. I don't, it's not gonna be a very long book, but I'm not really into writing long books.
Doug (22:36):
Well see, this is how we are a better team because you have good ideas and I'm the one who'll give you a kick in the butt to make sure you do them <laugh>.
Magda (22:43):
You're like, “Where is it??”
Doug (22:46):
Well, you have ideas, but you know, you like to move on to another idea before you execute.
Magda (22:50):
Oh my God, I've got 8,000 ideas, 8,000 ideas. If only I had like 20 million dollars and 40 assistants. I could do all of them. Speaking of which, I would like to talk about the experience of getting diagnosed with ADHD in perimenopause ‘cause that's a really common thing now.
Doug (23:08):
And I suffer from all but two of those things <laugh>.
Magda (23:13):
So, I think we're gonna talk about a lot of the stuff. We're gonna talk about what it's like to be dealing with aging parents, whether you also have kids or not. What it's like to realize that maybe some of these things you thought were negative personality traits are actually, like, legitimate brain disorders or whatever, I don't know. They say ADHD is called a brain disorder. I don't really have any attachment to feeling like my brain is orderly or disordered. That kind of stuff. And I mean the whole college thing, the whole college thing is batshit now. It's completely batshit from a whole–
Doug (23:48):
It was always mercurial, you know, and I, I see too many people–
Magda (23:53):
Eh, but when you and I applied…
Doug (23:54):
Our generation is the generation of people whose kids are going to college now. And so many posts out there are equivalent to putting the sticker on the back of your car. I mean so many people have invested that goal as–
Magda (24:10):
Well, like, as proof of good parenting.
Doug (24:13):
Even though it might not be meant that way. It kind of comes across that way ‘cause it's like it's not about you, it's about them. And I think that's one of the things we figured out, too. When you help your kid find the college they need to thrive in, it can't be about how good you feel wearing the t-shirt. It has to be how good they feel arriving on campus.
Magda (24:32):
It's interesting to watch how parents are reacting to how mercurial the college admission cycle has become. ‘Cause I think even five or six years ago there was more predictability. You know, if your kid did X, Y, Z, had this gpa, may or may not have taken the dumbass standardized tests, all this kind of stuff, right? Like there was a certain formula you could predict where they were going to get in. And that has,
Doug (24:59):
Many schools didn't even take those anymore. Talk about an institution that's no longer.
Magda (25:03):
They don't. But the, I mean, admissions has gone completely nuts and I am talking to two different people from two different angles to talk to us about that on episodes. But what it means is that parents who were choosing lists of schools to try to get their kids interested in to apply to, you can't have any kind of reasonable expectations anymore where your kid is gonna get in. So that whole thing, just the feedback loop has been disrupted and whether it was good feedback loop or not, right? Like, whether what school your kids got into said anything about your parenting or not, at least it was a reliable feedback loop, and that feedback loop has totally been broken. And how do we adjust to that?
Doug (25:50):
Well anyway, yeah. So well let's give them quick and dirty here. Yeah. We're gonna come out every Wednesday. We're gonna have guests on who know more than we do. Sometimes it'll just be the two of us not knowing even as much as the other does.
Magda (26:04):
I also think it's important to say that we are gonna do sponsored posts only of things that we think are actually useful. I also wanna make a note that we are gonna try to be as accessible as possible.
Doug (26:15):
Oh yes. Listener feedback is crucial. This is a community. The things survive because we engage, we–
Magda (26:22):
No, no. I mean accessible like alt text for screen readers and transcripts and stuff like that. That is a specific goal for us. So if we are not providing something that you need, please don't feel like you're gonna make us feel bad if you say it, because we do wanna do it. And if we didn't do it, it was just an oversight. So to me that you saying something about it is as if you just told us we made a typo. Right? Like.
Doug (26:51):
Right. But which lends itself to the greater issue, which is I look at this as a podcast community. I mean, granted, yeah, we're gonna be having the conversations, but your feedback, your ideas, your pushback, we can take it all. And we want it all just because that's how we aggregate wisdom. I want this to be your resource. I want people to be able to look back on this. ‘Cause we're gonna talk about anxious kids next week with Dawn Friedman, who is amazing.
Magda (27:17):
Yeah.
Doug (27:18):
And if you have an anxious kid years from now, if you go back to, you know, episode one or episode two, we're building a library here of shared experience and acquired wisdom. And that doesn't happen unless you help.
Magda (27:30):
Right.
Doug (27:31):
Wow. We agreed.
Magda (27:33):
<Laugh> We do agree a lot. It just takes us a long time.
Doug (27:41):
Right. But this reminds me, one of the great things also about this is, this reminds me about how way back in the day, one of my first paid gigs was with a company that Oprah owned. And it was a blog called “He Said, She Said,” and they paired me up with a woman and we had meetings and said, “Okay, what do you guys disagree about the most? Let's stir some real shit up and we'll have a back and forth about it and rile up the silt in the fish tank.” And I'm like, that was just nonsense. It was nonsense from start to finish. I hated doing it when I did it. The gig was a gig and it was a gig and I enjoyed the fact that I was making money from my blogging experience. But we are so far past that now. I hope.
Magda (28:22):
Well I also think you and I, if somebody said, “Hey, argue about this,” I think both of us are good enough at writing argumentative essays that we could just pick up and take a side.
Doug (28:35):
Anyway, thank you for listening to episode one of the When The Flames Go Up podcast. If you enjoyed it half as much as we did then we enjoyed it twice as much as you
Magda (28:45):
Oh God.
Doug (28:46):
I'll cut that out.
Magda (28:47):
Alright, <laugh>.
Doug (28:48):
But thank you for listening and as I say, we'll be here every Wednesday and I'm looking forward to discussions with you ‘cause they're fun. I mean, the best part about this idea from my end was like, we have discussions like this all the time. I'd be talking to you on the phone and then look down and it's, it's been an hour
Magda (29:05):
Yeah, I know. Which is a little weird.
Doug (29:07):
That's the kind of thing, you know, we're already used to having discussions like that, so why not just put 'em in podcast form and inflict them on other people?
Magda (29:16):
Right.
Doug (29:16):
By the way, you should also know that Magda has two kinds of laughs. She has the right away cackle, or she has the I can't breathe. And you don't know if she's laughing or not, but then they'll be like 20 seconds of silence and then you'll hear <inhale shriek>
Magda (29:34):
<Laugh>. I can't help it. I just laugh the way I laugh.
Doug (29:37):
I know, but I've learned to figure out which laugh is which ‘cause I initially, I would panic. I'm like, either that wasn't funny or she's dead.
Magda (29:46):
Wel,, I don’t know which is worse, honestly.
Doug (29:48):
Yes, <laugh>.
Magda (29:50):
I think that's it, right? The first episode. So are people, I don't even know how people chat on the Substack, people can leave comments under this.
Doug (30:00):
Yeah. This is one of my favorite expressions: “We are building this plane as we fly it.” And any rivet that anybody contributes is a help. Hey, another transportation metaphor.
Magda (30:10):
Oh boy. All right. All right, <laugh>.
Doug (30:13):
All right, well, yeah, we see you next, next Wednesday. Yes. And thank you very much for listening. And I'm really glad that it's Wednesday, ‘cause otherwise we'd have to say, “See you next Tuesday.”
Magda (30:26):
Oh yeah, let's not do that.