Minecraft

0:03Conan O 'Brien needs a fan. Want to talk to Conan? Visit teamcoco.com slash call Conan. Okay, let's get started. Hi, Brad. Oh, my God. Hello. Wow. Let me quickly describe to our listeners that the gentleman who's just appeared on screen is wearing a protective helmet, a bright orange, looks like a construction jersey, and your shirt is covered in dirt. So, sir, your name is Brad, I'm told. Is that right? Yes. I'm calling you from Manitoulin Island, Gore Bay, Manitoulin Island, Canada. Okay. And so you're on a, is this a large island or a fairly small island? I'd be about a two hour drive across.

0:47It's about 12 ,000 residents. Okay. I'm going to say, so it's larger than Gilligan's Island, but smaller than say the big island of Hawaii. Okay. I'm just trying to get my bearings here. And are you a crossing guard who just fell down a hill? So what I'm just curious, I'm trying to judge that you've got this big white safety helmet, which, by the way, I think is a good idea for anyone calling into this podcast. You should be wearing protective gear. Tell us, what is it you do? Because you are literally wearing your profession on your sleeve. I just can't tell what it is. So I work in mining. Currently, I work on capital projects, so building new mines.

1:34But in the past, I used to work underground as a shaft miner or helping with building. So you are the classic, you are a miner, a man who goes down beneath the earth, deep beneath the earth to extract ore. Is that correct? Yes, my role isn't specifically mining, but I helped with, I started with mine design and now I do scheduling and project controls. But for a period of five years, I did work underground. Yeah, Brad, you keep sort of saying, I don't go underground anymore, but look at your shirt. now either you just got into a terrible bar fight uh i mean you were covered in in what looks like coal dust frankly so you've been down underground recently have you not yeah these are my coveralls and uh i go down about once every two weeks i'm from home primarily now okay um all right but uh i work on projects in in sudbury and also some in america okay okay well you can throw those in the wash you want okay i'm just saying that's your business not mine um do you have a lunchbox i used to have a metal lunchbox so that's a famous thing so they made a metal so you could sit on it yeah while you're waiting for the cage i didn't know that i didn't either that's a good that's a good question uh sona no it is a good like no no it is a good it is a good question because I don't have, I have never had a profession where I needed a lunchbox, you know, and I think it's, I've always been a little envious.

3:15I haven't had a lunchbox since I was a kid, but I bet this lunchbox you had is badass. I mean, it's like you could sit on it, and what kind of food did you have there in your lunchbox? I'd just bring a sandwich, nothing too extravagant. That's where you're working. I've worked in conditions where it's constantly raining on you so it's not like you're setting out to uh you know eat a nice meal kind of thing oh so it mean raining on you what about when you're did you ever have a meal when you were deep deep deep underground yeah the one of the projects i'm working on the mines 8 500 feet underground so about 1.6 miles what um what hard pass okay no one was asking hey you want to go down in a 1.6 What kind of lunch can you have?

4:01How many miles underground? Six miles or 0.6? 1.6 miles underground. Okay, so sort of in the middle. 1.6 miles underground. That's not good math. 1.6 miles underground. And you crack open your lunchbox. Can you eat when you're that far down? What? You usually, when you're that deep, the rock itself is about 123 degrees Fahrenheit. Right. So you go to a place called a refuge station, which is air conditioned. And it's like an office space where you can have a lunch. Oh, come on. That's in it. No, that's wimping out. If I were you, I'd bring eggs down and crack them on the rock and fry up, fry up literally earth's heat, make fajitas.

4:44Yeah. Make fajitas down there, sizzle them up on a rock. That's so cool to be eating a fajita that was cooked by, by earth's molten core. That's an amazing thing. You could then send them to the surface and have people say, hey, do you want a molten core fajita? People would buy those. Don't you think? I think so. It might taste a little different, a little metallic. Yeah. Oh, I don't want that. When you're deep, deep, deep down in the earth, beneath the earth's crust. Why are you making that sexual? I know. I'm not at all. It is. You're like deep, deep, deep. Adam is shaking his head. No, he didn't think it was sexual.

5:24And Eduardo didn't think it was sexual. So I think that's you. We did, but we were closer to you. Maybe we can sense the musk. When you are just driving that shaft. I still don't know what you guys are talking about, but you are pounding away, pounding away at the rich loam that is the fecund earth.

5:49When, but no, seriously, when you are down there, do you have any insights? Does anything ever come to you when you're 1.6 miles beneath the surface of the earth? I've never had that experience. Does it ever give you any profound thoughts about, I don't know, the whole thing? It is really neat when you take a fresh blast, so excavating the tunnel a little bit further, that you're like the first person that stood in that place. Yeah. Oh, that is cool. So yeah, it is pretty fascinating what mining does, And there's a lot of people that work to make that happen. Sure. I have to admit that the idea of having that much earth above me, I don't think I'm claustrophobic, but that might get to me.

6:34Have you ever had anybody, and I'm going to use a term that Matt Gorley uses a lot, have you ever had anyone wig out, just sort of flip their wig down there? That is you. You say that all the time. That's the way he talks. You got me. You talk like that all the time. Have you ever had anybody just go, and this is another Matt-ism, you know, Coco Cabana crazy down there. Coco Cabana crazy, that one I do. But do you have people ever just lose it down there because they can't handle it? Yeah, it does happen. Like when you're traveling in the cage, which would be like the elevator shaft, a lot of times people just have to go back to surface.

7:13I can't handle the darkness and or the thought of it. I'd say it's quite rare. A lot of people are fine with it. But yeah, and there is challenging conditions for sure. Now, let me ask you a question, Brad. There's a lot of effort to make it very safe. Brad, you're clearly a fan because you called in, unless this is a wrong number, which only happens about 20 % of the time. But Brad... You can actually call in. Let's say, please, I'm using the old term. Yeah, you sure are. Anyway, Brad, when you picked up the phone and hit the old rotary dial. Oh, it's sexual again. Brad, let's say that I was going down on the mine with you and you were like, oh, we know each other now, we're friends and I come by your island.

7:59What's the name of the island again? Manitoulin Island. Okay, Manitoulin Island. Okay, I come by. It's in Lake Huron. Okay, well that's not helping at all. It helps a bit. No, no, I see no Lake Huron here on my map of the world. But anyway, oh, now you're going to say it's one of the Great Lakes. Whatever. We'll get into that. The greatest one. Let's say I'm going down the cage with you because we're friends. I say, hey, Brad, it's me, Conan, from the podcast. You're like, oh, cool. Nice to see you. And I go, oh, wow, still pretty dusty. You could clean that thing once in a while. And you go like, yeah, I know.

8:32Then we get in the shaft and we start to go down, down, down in the cage. If I started to freak out, would you immediately take me back up? or was there some part of you that would like maybe, is it possible that you would slap me in the face and say, get ahold of yourself? Yeah, we'd let you work down there for a while. Just work it out, sweat it out. I'd sweat it out pretty fast if it's 123 degrees. I'll tell you that much right now. I would love to slap you in the face and go, get it together, man. Well, listen, and you've said that before when in your words, I flip my wig. But yes, in the old days, it was acceptable if someone was wigging out or getting crazy to slap them, to bring them around, but you can't do that anymore.

9:09We're not allowed to slap people, which I think is, we live in terrible times.

9:24Tell me about, is this for the area where you grew up? I grew up in Sudbury, which is where a lot of mining happens for nickel and copper. An asteroid actually hit there two billion years ago, roughly. and that's what created all that metal in the ground. Are you kidding? And I grew up in the crater. You grew up in an asteroid crater. Yeah. Wow. You're like Superman. Yeah, I was gonna say, you might have abilities that others don't have because you grew up in an asteroid crater. It's gotta have some effect on you. I mean, that's gotta just be packed with all kinds of metallic, you know, various structures and ores, if you will, or I don't quite know what I'm saying, But you have to admit that you grew up in a crater that was formed by an asteroid.

10:14You might have. Can you read my mind right now? That's a song from Superman. I can, but I'm scared of what I'm reading. There's nothing in there. Listen, those killings were self-defense. Oh, no. What do you mean? I would say if you grew up in an asteroid crater, there's a good chance you won't get hit again. so statistically speaking you're safest from an asteroid so that's a great point no okay no no that's true that i think how many times can an asteroid hit one place well i think it resets every time what do you mean actually it's randomly flying no no i think what matt is saying if you're really getting into hardcore statistics is correct that when something like that happens it does reset so that the chances of it happening there again are the same as the chances of it ever happening in the first place or any other place yeah yeah so so would you i think actually you should go yeah that's a little extreme okay um but sure hey so brad i'm curious about something uh i sometimes when my kids were littler i would play minecraft with them does that give me the same amount of technical skill in mining as what you possess.

11:30Pretty close. Yeah. It's right there. Yeah. How about Dig Dug? What's Dig Dug? What do you mean what's Dig Dug? What's a Dig Dug? It's a video game from the 80s. No, it's not. Anyone here know it? I know it. Oh, Eduardo knew it. Yeah. What's Dig Dug? I did a thumbs down. Adam just gave it a vicious thumbs down. I got to get with some people that know culture. I was disgusted you brought it up. Where did my Dig Dug head back? So Brad, you're saying that if I've done Minecraft with my kids, I kind of have not the same amount of knowledge as you, but I have a similar amount of knowledge. Yes, you're right up there.

12:06Hey, you can start tomorrow if you want. I have a question. When you dig a mine, let's say you dig a really deep shaft that goes like two miles down. Oh, yeah. And take it easy. And it's a really deep shaft. Do you ever get down there and there's just nothing? Just don't stop. Ew. Just a little bit more. A little bit more. Too much, Matt. Matt, too much. Do you ever get down and you've spent a lot of money and you went two miles down and there's nothing? Yeah. And you think to yourself, whose fucking idea was it to dig a mine here? And then everyone looks at you because you were the one that said, I'm pretty sure there's going to be some good copper down there.

12:44Let's go for it, fellas. Has that ever happened? There's certainly cases where it hasn't happened to that degree, where the amount of ore is not as much as they thought. So they drill a bunch of holes in the ground before they would do that. But yeah, there's cases where a mine that they thought was going to happen economically couldn't make it work. Right. It's just a stinker. Now, are you the one that takes the heat for that? Or can you... Oh, definitely not. Definitely not. Oh, good, good. Well, I bring it up for a reason. I bring it up for a reason, which is this happens in comedy too, where I'll think there's a funny area and I'll convince some of my friends over the years, we should write a sketch about this.

13:26And we really spend a lot of time digging down, mining this area. And then we read it at read-through at Saturday Night Live or The Simpsons or whatever or my show, and it just doesn't work. This feels to me like - Life and death. You and I understand what that's like, meaning I know what it's like to be a manly minor. No, you don't. You don't. No, you don't. You know what it's like to be in a superfluous career. It's not superfluous. I have found many a magic coin in my comedy diggings. That's all I'm going to say right now. Does it smell bad down there?

14:03It does near the washroom, but for the most part, it's - What do you mean? So there's no odor down towards the center of the earth, right? You don't smell sulfur or anything like that. Not in a hard rock mine. If you were in coal mines, there might be gases that you would smell. But for nickel and copper mines, it's pretty standard. Yeah, we pump air underground, so it's constantly circulating from underground back up to surface. I'm learning a lot about mining. You design mines. I have helped design them, yes. But I don't understand. Don't you just go straight down and then you have some shafts that come off the side, or is it more complicated than that?

14:47It's pretty complex. You spend years going through different stages to figure out the best path to access the ore. So lots of people involved. It takes probably about 10 years to build a mine. What? Before you even... I didn't realize there was that much thought that went into it. Hey! It's just like a sketch. What is like a sketch? I've spent 10 years on a sketch. Oh, God. I've spent 10 years on a sketch. Oh, okay. Listen, don't belittle what I do. I think what I do and what Brad does is exactly the same. We both risk our lives digging deep to try and find something of value. And so I often get quite dusty.

15:28Yeah. I'll say. Criticizing the dirt on his outfit. I wasn't criticizing. I'm just saying aesthetically, you know, before you go to a cocktail party, you have a little washroom. That's all I'm saying. Hey, hey, hey, Brad, do you have a question? Oh, no, no, no. You're not getting me off this quickly. Brad, I have a question for you, which is I. This idea just occurred to me. It's standard for people to be buried six feet underground. Is it possible? Is it legal? And could you see to it that when my time comes, and I hope that's not for at least three years, is it possible that i could be buried 1.6 miles underground i technically yeah you could thank you thank you i accept your offer like for a cave-in or something no i just want me to be they take me down in the cage and they they dig out a little area and they put me there and then i'm 1.6 miles underground they're not gonna build a cage like they're just gonna dig a hole and then throw your body in there why would they put that much work no take the cage that exists down go down 1.6 miles and then, hey, over there to the left, there's a nice spot.

16:35Dig, dig, dig, dig. They shove my - You want to be buried in a mine that already exists? One that's going to fry your body? Yeah. Yeah, it'll cook it slowly over time. Oh, no, that'll smell awful. No, it'll smell like roasting ham, trust me. That's what happens when I go to the beach. People say, who's cooking bacon? See, Brad, I dug a shaft and I hit gold. Did you have a question for me, Brad? Yes. If you worked in mining, what mining position would you work in? Oh, here we go. And these are real names. What do you mean? A shaft miner, a clam operator. Oh, boy. Oh, boy. A scoop operator, boom truck driver.

17:21That's the stuff. Jack leg driller. Oh, my God. Or a jumbo driller. Well, okay. All right. I'm a jack leg driller, if anything. Oh. I would like to be known like, hey, what's Conan do? He's a jack leg driller. I'd like to say that in a bar. Hey, friend, what do you do in the mine? Jack leg driller. I think it sounds cool. I don't know what it does. What does it mean? That's probably the toughest job in the mine, jack leg drilling. Yeah, that's probably why I'm drawn to it. I'm not afraid of a little hard work. So what does a jack leg driller do? Jack leg is a handheld drill. It's about 100 pounds.

17:56It's metal. and you're drilling holes about eight feet long into the rock to either blast or put in ground supports and the rock doesn't collapse. Hey, who's the guy that blows stuff up, Ralph? Yeah, what is Ralph? There'd be a loader, a loader blaster. I would love to blow stuff up and I would love to be the guy that lights the fuse and then starts running but trips and then notices that my leg is stuck and I'm looking back and I'm going, trying to blow the fuse out, But it's getting closer and closer. Does that ever happen? Or is that just something I saw in a cartoon? Definitely more cartoon than real life.

18:34I prefer cartoons. Hey, Brad, it was nice talking to you. You are the first miner that I've spoken to, I believe. And I'm glad you're doing that work. That's good work. You're bringing us the precious metals. You're bringing us everything we need to build a better tomorrow. And I thank you for it. Well, thank you. If it's not grown, it's mine. So there's lots that mining contributes. Yeah. And I also want to, I know you don't like compliments. No, no, no. I'm dying for one right now. Thank you. Such an honor to speak to a comedic legend, Mr. Gorley.

19:14Direct hit. And Sona. And Sona. That's great. You hit. you Brad you hit the mother load so congratulations yeah well thank you so much and I'm sure they thank you as well they don't get a lot of compliments so that's a huge thing for them that's true you know really it's few and far between I suppose get a lot not sure why I don't I often listen to the podcast driving to Sudbury get up early so it brings a lot of a lot of laughs a lot of joy so thanks for everyone that's involved well Brad we're happy to be a part of your life and thank you very much for contacting us. It was cool talking to you.

19:53Great to meet you all. Take care. Thanks so much. Be safe. Conan O 'Brien Needs a Friend with Conan O 'Brien, Sonam Ovsessian, and Matt Gourley. Produced by me, Matt Gourley. Executive produced by Adam Sachs, Nick Liao, and Jeff Ross at Team Coco, and Colin Anderson and Cody Fisher at Earwolf. Theme song by The White Stripes. Incidental music by Jimmy Vivino. Take it away, Jimmy. me. Our supervising producer is Aaron Blair, and our associate talent producer is Jennifer Samples. Engineering by Eduardo Perez. Additional production support by Mars Melnick. Talent booking by Paula Davis, Gina Batista, and Britt Kahn.

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21:00This has been a Team Coco production in association with Earwolf.