914. - Tom Junod

9:36Jason Stewart:I think it's a step in the right direction, but yeah, we have a guest today.

9:39Chris Black:Tom Ginote is a writer who has a new book out, a memoir.

9:45Jason Stewart:One of the best titles of a memoir ever. And the artwork, it feels like a Smith song. In the days of my youth, I was told what it means to be a man. A memoir. So good. Great title.

9:57Chris Black:But he's written several classic profiles for Esquire and GQ, et cetera, et cetera. He's also, he lives in Atlanta, which, you know, I'm going to get into some traffic stuff with him, no question.

10:09Jason Stewart:ATL, ho.

10:09Chris Black:Okay. ATL, ho. All right, let's get Tom on the line. ATL. ATL, man.

10:14Jason Stewart:Okay, slow down, slow down.

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13:17Chris Black:trial when you're ready to launch use offer code how long to save 10 off your first purchase of a website or domain enjoy it squarespace websites enjoy it here's my question so my i'm here in the

13:30Tom Junod:house with my dog who's totally going to make an appearance here and i want to know if that's okay with you or do you want me to go out to my car but i've done i've i've done many an interview in

13:41Chris Black:my car man no no it's fine it's fine as long as the dog's not too crazy he's not that crazy when

13:46Jason Stewart:you when you say what do you mean by your dog is going to make an appearance on this podcast this audio only podcast a little ominous of a warning and i'm interested in hearing more

13:57Tom Junod:So he's a shelter dog that we've had a year. He's a pit bull. And sometimes, you know, he can just launch himself into just the most frenetic barking ever. And you guys will know it's going to be a big one because he actually inhales beforehand. You hear him go, you know, it's going to be a big one. And then he just, when you hear the inhale, you know, it's going to be a big one. So we'll see how we do.

14:21Chris Black:We'll keep our ears peeled for the inhale then.

14:23Jason Stewart:I have the dog, anti-dog technology turned on for the Zoom workplace meeting. That's good. So we should use AI technology to eliminate your dog's breathing. Okay.

14:34Tom Junod:And here he is. And here he is. He just ate. We did an incomplete play session, but he's here. Wow, incomplete play session. All right.

14:44Chris Black:Tom, first of all, before we get started, your username here on Zoom is Perpetual Punctuation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. an LLC. Is that an LLC or is that a mantra?

14:53Tom Junod:No, that is, uh, so I, every time I get like a piece of technology, I name it, like, I think that there was, uh, you know, I mean, I think I, I usually name it after parts of speech. Okay. Yeah. So, so, you know, infinite one was infinite elephant and that's not a part of speech, but then there's like, sort of like, you know, perpetual punctuation semi-colon infinity that kind of thing yeah yeah yeah she was so good in um in the new leo movie wasn't she she was so good she was so good okay that's that's a very interesting

15:29Chris Black:naming convention that you've adopted a real twisted mind so tom you're is it safe to say

15:35Jason Stewart:you're a quirked up man i'm deeply quirked up okay and and this is just this is you know everybody

15:42Tom Junod:else just wants to talk about craft or whatever you guys want to talk about the quirks which is

15:47Chris Black:good we did i i could care less about the craft to be honest if we i don't even know what craft is it's a it's a tom colicchio restaurant otherwise i don't know exactly exactly so where are you guys right now are you in paris where we literally got to paris this this morning fantastic okay so you know what my dog's name is what what is it toulouse jacques oh wow okay so yeah yeah so you have a French bulldog. Un petit pit bull. I do.

16:13Tom Junod:Because he's a pit bull who has ears like a French bulldog, hence Jacques.

16:17Chris Black:You're talking like a real dog guy. This ain't your first rodeo.

16:22Tom Junod:It ain't my first rodeo. I'm a total dog guy. How many dogs have you had? I don't want to bring up a sore subject. No, no, it's not a sore subject. My wife and I have had, as adults, as a married couple, we have had six dogs.

16:35Chris Black:Okay. These are all one at a time and they've moved on to a better

16:39Tom Junod:place one of the well one at a time we made the yeah they've all moved on to better place we we made the mistake once of of having two dogs and they were they were i don't know if you've ever heard of the breed connie corso um it's sort of a it's like an italian yeah corso como cross pitbull breed and they're and they're yeah yeah exactly and they're and they're you know they can be they can be rough and and everybody was like oh you know you get you know you you know you get two dogs it's like half the work because they take care of each other no they fought each other and uh and so it was like it was it was dog work squared until of

17:17Jason Stewart:course you know and you get twice the shits to pick up twice the shits to pick up kibble to buy

17:21Tom Junod:the list goes you know but then but then the neutering happened so that that made it a little

17:26Chris Black:bit better okay you feel like a guy too far how far do you take it are you making are you making your dog's food on the no range no no all right all right you're fine that's where i draw the line i believe in i believe in kibble and cans kibble and cans yeah he's a man's best friend

17:42Jason Stewart:yeah you you have a lot of dog pics on the instagram tom i do which is sweet it's nice yeah um he's my guy is it could i could i have you ranked all of your dogs that you've had over

17:52Tom Junod:the years just you know well so so jacques is right here you know do you really want that doesn't mean jock's number one though i i i should i should well jock is is is he's the cutest dog that we've had but he's he's also he's also you know presents challenges um our guy uh we had a dog named dexter who was just kind of like the philosopher king of dogs you know he was just he was just a he was just a cool dog he was like you know he's like the the morgan freeman of dogs like he plays he plays god in the dog okay so he was he was he was really good wise beyond his years but but jocks is just it's wild like you have to play with this guy he's backing away from me now as we speak from this and he's gonna start to bark too but no no inhale um there he goes there he goes if he starts to bark i will you know i will go out to the car shock come here

18:50Jason Stewart:buddy yeah so far we don't hear anything so it's all good oh no i just right you have the ai we

18:55Tom Junod:We have the technology.

18:57Chris Black:So you live in Atlanta. I live in Marietta, Georgia. I say Atlanta. I'm from Atlanta. Well, Conyers specifically. My parents live in Decatur. But Marietta has a lot of nice parks, right? Parks or parks? What did you say? No, it definitely has nice parks. I know there was plenty of rich girls in our sights growing up. But I mean the parks. I feel like there's a lot of dog walking capabilities is what I'm trying to say. where you live i don't know i've never done that what do you never done that i've never used the park because your yard's so fucking big is that what you're trying to say our yard is so fucking

19:34Tom Junod:big okay and and it's got and it's got no grass it's all trees and it opens onto a pond how did

19:40Chris Black:you end okay how did you end up in in a suburb of atlanta if you don't mind me asking i assume it

19:45Tom Junod:was for love uh yeah i mean but it in this case it was for love it was for love of my brother my brother michael so i was in you know when i got out of college i was in dallas texas i was a handbag salesman and then um i lost that job what was your what was your commission looking like nema marcus or somewhere else uh no i had this huge territory i had this i i was the territory was the american southwest and it was texas arkansas louisiana and arkansas oh you oh you i see wholesale traveling wholesale yeah yeah i wasn't i wasn't like the guy in the store um you know but yeah i was i was a i was a a rep and uh and so i did that and it was it was a disaster on like a couple of different levels and then i lost that job and my brother who was a handbag salesman in atlanta said come on and live with me so i did that for a while and that's what got me here and i've been here for a long long time so bag selling runs in the family is what it sounds like handbags definitely and salesmanship what is the what kind of handbags are we

20:49Chris Black:talking about here if you don't buy me prying so ladies handbags number one i didn't sell man bags

20:57Tom Junod:i sold handbags so um uh there were it was my line was called uh felipe okay and uh it was it for a little time it was like a thing okay but it was a very very short time what was the price point on the bags i would say that they wholesaled in the 20s and sold at the time in the 50s or 60s

21:22Jason Stewart:okay okay just for inflation not bad so you know i'll check ebay for a nice felipe a nice

21:27Tom Junod:gently worn felipe a gently worn felipe i i bought a bag on ebay last year just to sort of remind me where i come from sure you need to still got it after all these years humble yourself with an ebay bag purchase it's no no shit totally that's a that's a good way i feel like that's a

21:48Chris Black:that's a pretty fun job for a young man i have to say oh maybe it was you know it was it was uh it

21:54Tom Junod:was it was a crazy job my boss was my boss was um was such a prick that i mean i wrote i wrote two pages of physical description of him for the book that um that my editor cut out and saying this is no place for revenge and settling scores so that was so that was there was like a long physical description of this guy it was like dickensian was there okay i actually disagree

22:22Chris Black:i think a memoir is the perfect place for that um maybe that's why i'm not your editor but i i guess

22:27Tom Junod:he had he had to cut something so he got that sure is this was this gentleman fun to describe negatively you know what i mean yeah yeah okay okay so so he had his shoe size his shoe size was 12 triple a meaning meaning that he essentially walked around on on pencil all right so okay so so that's so there it's a ultra narrow which was the weirdest ultra narrow you've never seen narrow feet than this guy and he was and he was a fat dude with this with this huge belly and these and he walked around on skates it was crazy and and of course and so i was in dallas and when he visited he came in his special extra narrow cowboy boots and you know i i i dream of that

23:15Chris Black:extra narrow cowboy i've yeah i've only heard of extra y yeah i've never even thought about

23:20Jason Stewart:extra exactly yeah so it's long but it's not girthy is what you're saying yeah and he he took

23:26Tom Junod:and he took reverse pride in his narrow feet but anyway you're you're getting to me oh he broke

23:31Chris Black:okay i see he was like he was like i'm not gonna hide this i'm out and proud right exactly exactly i work hard for these dainty feet i can yes i can respect that i can respect that okay well

23:41Jason Stewart:did did did you pick up some good life lessons and tactics and manipulation interview skills

23:47Tom Junod:in the uh in the commission sales world there was a you know i think i think and i so i think that you know a lot of a lot of you know people go to j school i definitely went to handbag school you know i said and there's and there's you know that really there really is something to walking up to a store pushing a sample case knocking on the door and say here i am there i mean that was that was i mean what better prep prep for being a journalist than that

24:16Chris Black:i agree i say i say all the time that that kind of job is real training for life no matter what you're going to do.

24:22Tom Junod:It's totally training for life. And now, you know, so I've written, you know, a book and the whole thing about writing a book that people don't tell you is that, you know, you write it in solitude and then you got to like go out and just like sell the shit out of it. So like I wrote a book to sort of get away from being a handbag salesman and now I'm a handbag salesman again, except that I have a book.

24:42Jason Stewart:Can I interest you in a memoir, size 12?

24:47Tom Junod:Exactly, exactly.

24:48Jason Stewart:No, I mean, I think I feel like that type of thing where you're knocking on doors of boutiques and trying to get them to buy bags wholesale you know your your calluses of of being told no yeah must be very strong and it's an amazing skill and life lesson to learn especially early it's it's a great life lesson to learn i

25:11Tom Junod:mean i remember being like going it was like the end of the day i was driving through some small town in Texas. And I stopped at, you know, at a boutique. I stopped at like a dress store and, you know, they had no idea I was coming. I had no idea I was stopping there. Walked in, you know, and the two women, the thing were just like watching TV in the back and they didn't buy any, buy any bags, but they felt so sorry for me. I just like sat there watching TV with them at five o 'clock in the afternoon at a dress store in like Natchitoches, Texas or something. It was

25:42Chris Black:crazy yeah that's a slice of life as as they say i think a little bit it is it kind of feels like

25:48Tom Junod:marty supreme a little bit just saying it does do you want to hear like a great handbag story that

25:53Jason Stewart:i couldn't get in the book that also we're in balls deep in fashion week tom let's go

25:58Tom Junod:no better time than now so so the the salesman my boss was was just he was a ruthless guy the guy with the narrow feet. But he was like, he made a shit ton of money as a salesman. And one time, this young woman with a store in College Station, Texas, came to my showroom in the apparel mart. And this guy, Bert, just like up-sailed her all day long. He like pushed me away. Hey, kid, get out of here because I got something to do. Watch Bert cook. Took her out to dinner the whole thing. And like a couple, like two months later, I'm about to go down to Houston and I'm passing through a college station.

26:47Tom Junod:Hey, Tommy, you're going to go see Shayla's shoes. You got to pay her a visit. So I said, yeah, sure. I'll pay her a visit. And so I walk in there. It's a small store in college station, Texas. And all it's full of is Felipe handbags. I mean, they were everywhere. They were on top of the counters. They were hanging from the walls. And I asked for Shayla, the woman, and the people just, and they said, where are you from? And I said, Felipe. And they just, they like looked at me and they looked at each other and they went into the back and they took out this woman, a very young woman who had like aged over the time since I'd seen her last.

27:29Tom Junod:And I said, oh, hi, Shayla, how's it going? And she grabbed me and said, you've got to help me. They're everywhere. And I was like, well, you do have a lot of bags. And she goes, they keep on coming. I haven't even opened all the boxes yet. She was like, you have to help me. You have to give me some money. I have to return them. I have to. I have to. I'm going to go out of business. And then I said, well, let me check in. And so I went out front. And back then, there was no cell phones. There was just right in the front, there was a pay phone. So I called Bert. I'm looking in at this woman who's near tears inside on the other side of the glass.

28:14Tom Junod:And I called him up. And I was like, hey, Bert, this is the situation. She says she needs help. And he goes, Tommy, where are you? I'm like, I'm outside. He goes, how close is your car? and i said it's right in front of he goes all right here's what you do you get in it and you drive away i was like well she's like crying inside he goes listen to me you get in it and

28:41Chris Black:you drive away and that's what i have to side with bert i have to side with bert on this that's what i did i got in it i drove away i would want to have sympathy but you knew what game you were

28:53Tom Junod:getting into yeah you know so that's my that's that's my like you know handbag day story that's

28:57Chris Black:a yeah that's a great job man that's a that's i would say better than writing honestly at least there's there's i feel like i feel like there's yeah but i was also a fanatic writer i have i have

29:06Tom Junod:all these felipe business cards that are filled with like microscopic print of like moments when i would you know the sun would be setting and i would stop to describe it on these like i mean you can't the print is so small in these business cards you can't even read it you've got entire

29:25Jason Stewart:chapters written on the back of the business card illegible to even you yes illegible to even me

29:31Chris Black:well i mean you know we talk a lot about magazines here on the podcast that's a that's a you know and also in our lives and and i think the world is now debating you know the end as they always do but i feel like you did anytime we get someone on how long gone the experience the heyday of the the sort of 10 ,000-word, take as long as you need type time period. How luxurious was it, or did it not feel like that at the time?

30:00Tom Junod:I mean, you didn't know it was going to end. So it didn't feel like, oh, I have this fleeting luxury here. It felt like it was going to last forever.

30:12Jason Stewart:Magazines, baby, top of the world.

30:15Tom Junod:Exactly, exactly. I mean, so when you like, so Art, you know, I worked for GQ from 93 to 97. And, you know, you'd go back into, you know, the editor-in-chief was this guy, Art Cooper. And you went into his back office at five o 'clock, you know, he would start drinking. And if you were, you know, on the inn with Art, you would start drinking too. He would like invite you back. And you felt like, you know, it felt like he was King Arthur and you were Sir Lancelot. and you were the knight that went out there to, you know, come back with these crazy stories. And I mean, the luxury, of course, was not just the length or the time or the resources.

30:55Tom Junod:The luxury was like, you could take crazy, crazy chances and God, you know, God knows I took enough of them. But I would, you know, I was, you know, you were able to write what you wanted to write. You got paid incredibly well. But, you know, I, so, but I got to say that, you know, that kind of you know that hasn't like totally ended for me because i after i left um esquire i went to espn where you know i still am able to write at length and write about you know sort of odd subjects i mean i grew i was able to write in 2022 i you know i spent a year with a another reporter. There he goes. Did you hear the inhale?

31:39Tom Junod:No. Can you not hear him barking? Are you really upset? I want that. Zoom has very good

31:49Jason Stewart:noise-canceling technology, believe it or not.

31:51Tom Junod:I want that. You've got to get that. I'll just go through life with that. Zoom headphones.

31:59Jason Stewart:I can add in some barking in post if you'd like. Don't worry.

32:03Tom Junod:Then no, I totally don't want you to have the booking. And just to prove that that can happen. But anyway, so when I was in 2022, you know, I wrote a 32 ,000 word story for ESPN about a Penn State player from my hometown who was like a horrific serial rapist. Wow. that was protected by Joe Paterno. So, I mean, I'm able to do stuff, but yeah, no one saw the end coming. And we were all so dumb in the beginning that when people, you know, when the internet was sort of came into being in the early 2000s, late 90s, it was like, oh, this is great. Everybody's going to be able to see our stuff now.

32:59Chris Black:Yeah, sure. You didn't realize. I mean, I think that just you talking about that story, I feel like sports is, for whatever reason, one of the last places where that can happen. Yeah, I agree. I feel like sports fans are the most dedicated. And we talk about this a lot. My friend Ryan does that. It's a series called Untold on Netflix. Yeah. They have that Lamar Odom documentary coming out. And I was talking to him about it, how I don't care about sports at all, but I will watch all of that and I will read a 32 ,000 word story about it without ever having to care about the team or the score or the stats.

33:36Tom Junod:I think that's a strange story was widely read is crazy. I mean, it was really widely read.

33:43Chris Black:And it seems niche in some ways. It does seem niche maybe on the surface.

33:47Tom Junod:It turned out not to be. The thing that's interesting, though, is like, so that was 2022. Would that still be super widely read in 2026? Because a lot of stuff has changed even since 2022. Things are going really fast.

34:03Chris Black:If you read the really bad parts on TikTok, maybe. I don't know if people are going to ESPN. No, no, I know what you're saying. I mean, I think that like that, I think sports just contains so many layers. But you're right. I wonder if it's even only a few years removed, if that would still capture the same amount of eyeballs. It took a year?

34:23Tom Junod:Almost, yeah. Yeah, I mean, it was me and Paula Levine, who's just an ace investigative reporter. And we had to break through a lot of walls to get to it. We had miraculous finding of documents. The documents had all been destroyed. And how we found them was just the craziest thing. I went to talk to, there was a judge who was a prosecutor who prosecuted this guy, Todd Hodney, when he finally killed somebody. And he became a judge. But he thought that Hodney was so dangerous that he kept the files on his own in his office in case anybody was killed.

35:11Chris Black:Something bad is going to happen, so I need to have these.

35:14Tom Junod:Yes, exactly. So if this guy is ever close to getting out of jail, I'm going to show these files to people. And he showed them to me. And it was an amazing experience. It was a total miracle.

35:28Jason Stewart:The smoking gun. Smoking gun, man. So you're a real gumshoe is what I'm gathering here.

35:34Tom Junod:I can do that.

35:37Chris Black:Look, it's not my favorite thing, but I can do it if I need to.

35:39Tom Junod:I can do it. And the handbag thing definitely offered me some training.

35:45Jason Stewart:Kudos to your journalistic integrity as well and doing all that work. Do you think we're entering a post-integrity world in the world of journalism or just, you know, essay writing or opinion writing?

35:58Tom Junod:I mean, I think that journalism is trying to hang in there with just the sheer amount of lying that goes on in the public sphere. I mean, it's difficult. Has there ever been a better time to be a liar?

36:43Chris Black:Book now at Hilton.com. Hilton for this day.

37:11Chris Black:for yourself. Shop Virtuo up exclusively at Nespresso.com.

37:17Jason Stewart:Chris and I say it all the time where like as dumb as it is you know let's say you get your you know your wife sees your phone and you've been texting all these girls and cheating on her the whole time and you could just say oh that's just AI somebody made that on Photoshop or whatever and like it kind of works nowadays you know it's like it's like plausible enough to keep a liar going a long way yeah

37:42Tom Junod:because if you swim in a sea of lies is are they lies you know it's it's if that's if that's the medium that you exist in and i don't mean medium as in like in terms of like television i mean

37:53Jason Stewart:medium in terms of air no and and if the lie is true and nobody seems to give a shit either way then that also makes it you know just like is it real is it fake i don't it doesn't matter the answer doesn't really matter anymore because we'll all forget about that that's what i was

38:11Tom Junod:yeah yeah that's i can't wait for the liar liar remake as an inspirational film jim carrey's liar

38:17Jason Stewart:yeah yeah jim carrey's liar liar you know jim's got other problems to worry about right now like

38:23Chris Black:his face but you know he's he'll get to it eventually no i mean i think we are in a post truth society for sure but i i think that like do you really think that like a majority of people have a hard time deciphering real from fake on the internet absolutely absolutely yeah i do i do but do you but do you think it's i guess it it what what groups of people do you think that particularly affects or do you think it affects all of us well i think that i think that everybody

38:48Tom Junod:likes to look at the other guy as the guy who is credulous true you know hold on one second i'm getting big jock up on the couch here here he is that'll slow down the barking um but anyway yeah i think everybody looks at the other guy that's credulous until you know you look at your own you know tailored you know fine-tuned sites and you know i listen i get i get a lot of liberal you know you know i'm on bulwark and you know all the rest of that kind of stuff and i don't know I don't know how much of it is, is true. I mean, a lot of, you know, I've been, I've been hearing on those sites for like eight years that, you know, we're going to get them now.

39:33Tom Junod:Trump is raised in our sights, you know, and the guys, you know, he's, he's roadrunner. He's, he just sneaks out of it. So I don't know. I don't know. Um, I, I feel, I feel, I feel, uh, manipulated all the time I like to think that I'm not susceptible credulous that I'm that I'm a yes susceptible that I'm a that I'm a very very discriminating news consumer but I have really no idea if that's

40:00Chris Black:true yeah I mean I I there's I know what you mean I I think there's there you're right it's easy to assume that you you got it and others don't it's a it's a thing that I you're you're a little bit

40:10Jason Stewart:older than us so you might have some some more insights but it's a thing that I worry about when everyone's you know talks about like um you know my grandpa got scammed out of his retirement or you know you know home equity loan and fucked it all up or just believing that a photoshopped image of fox news is real when it's not or ai footage of bombs being deployed in kuwait or whatever yeah and i feel like i have a good sense of knowing if something is real or not and i have keen eye but i know that at some point in my life i will become too old and the technology will sort of wash over me and i will not be able to discern it anymore and that's a scary thing it's definitely a scary thing to somebody who's grown up on the internet their entire life and

40:57Tom Junod:you know has sort of mastered it in some ways so i know i know two people that have gotten you know successfully defrauded over the last year yeah yeah one's one was old yeah and and and one was young smart people smart people and the successful smart people yeah and the thing that's the thing that's you know weird about now is like with all the scams and the fraudsters out there it's not neutral i mean they're coming at you it's not like it's not like it's not like you just have to sort of like fall into it i mean they are actively trying to defraud you i get you know i've i mean there's nothing more terrifying than looking at your junk mail i mean it's like holy shit hi tom we've been looking we've been watching you and you know we have pictures of it it's it's the most it's the weirdest thing and it's you know of course i know it's not true but at the same time it's just like i didn't even go to the island exactly

41:58Chris Black:exactly i swear to god yeah it was just a layover you're right i could see how at a certain point you start to be like wait a second was i wait was i there right hold on right yeah i mean i think that we all will fall victim to it eventually as the technology gets but i do think there's going to be at least maybe in some forms of media swing back to the to the analog you know for for lack of

42:21Tom Junod:better term I think like yeah I like my vinyl you know I I'm sure you do but I I mean listen

42:27Chris Black:to Steely Dan on vinyl and Marietta is is a you know that's a that's a small step for mankind I'm gonna do that right after we get off there we go I just I just mean I think that like the the the way that those kind of things get fetishized even the way like magazines are to some extent by young people whether it's you know tapes or vinyl or whatever I think the next thing is literally going to be like going outside yeah yeah like not just not being like not being on your phone is the real luxury right you know versus versus these more specific things you're actually buying it's like opting out is the luxury but as opposed to like buying it opting out from ai is going to be the luxury item in 10 years i mean we we talked about this a little bit but i think that like it's also going to um do you think it is possible it can make blue collar jobs much more desirable

43:16Tom Junod:Yes, all of it. Everything that you're thinking about that, I think it's true.

43:21Chris Black:That I'm interested in.

43:22Tom Junod:And I don't even know what you're thinking about it, but I think it's true.

43:24Chris Black:Yeah, I just mean the idea that a plumber is the job that people want now because they make money and it's secure versus a crypto trader with a penthouse in Miami because that could all crumble at any minute.

43:36Tom Junod:So car mechanics have always had you at their mercy. Now there's going to be car mechanics in every field just waiting to like, oh, I know how to fix this.

43:46Chris Black:car mechanics actually one of the best that's the best example of that i can't think of another one that's that long-standing right and cars are just computers now exactly and and and wait you

43:55Tom Junod:know wait till cars wait till cars um you know are completely are completely ai and and people

44:02Jason Stewart:no longer know how to drive that's when those reporters cars just randomly hit a tree sometimes

44:08Tom Junod:yeah i mean you start digging too deep brother so one of the weirdest things about being in atlanta now and going downtown i was i was down yesterday like around like 10th street you know somewhere around the midtown area midtown area and the you know the the way pro cars are there and i was like one time i was like crossing the street and i was in the car that was coming up to the stop stop sign was a way pro car i was like please don't kill me the way the way mo the way mo will

44:38Chris Black:Waymo The Waymo will become Like in LA it's so common practice That you sort of just You don't notice it anymore And I think Atlanta will be the same Because in LA Jason aren't they going on the highway now I heard

44:51Jason Stewart:Yeah they're starting to go on the freeway now In LA I'm sort of of two minds I'm with you when it first started appearing It was like a novelty And then you also didn't I didn't trust it or believe it or anything like that And nowadays I feel a little safer Around the Waymo than the average driver, you know, with one phone, you know, hand on the phone, hand on the wheel, sort of driving, sort of not.

45:14Tom Junod:Sure, sure.

45:15Jason Stewart:You know, but I mean, it's all bad and it's all weird.

45:17Tom Junod:But here's my question. Have you guys taken a Waymo?

45:20Chris Black:I have not, no. Yeah, I have a few. I mean, in LA, definitely, in San Francisco, it's even more prevalent, obviously. So a couple of times there.

45:27Jason Stewart:The main argument that people have for why they're taking it, it seems to be so they don't have to have a conversation or smell another human being or breathe the same air as them.

45:39Tom Junod:But the thing is, I love the conversation. Me too. Sorry, guys. I am the Uber guy talker. That's what I do. You and Jason both, my fucking nightmare. Every time I get into the backseat, and sometimes I have great conversations.

45:56Chris Black:Sometimes you strike gold. I think that's real. Honestly, the smell is more my issue. The Waymo smells extremely new car.

46:03Tom Junod:Have you talked to anybody about that?

46:04Chris Black:um i talk about it three times a week on this show for free howlonggone.com is the website um no but i i i understand both sides of it i don't i almost i think you take it as a novelty and then you realize how easy it is and you're kind of like this is funny yeah but i do think overall as a as a sort of impending doom uh signaler it is it is scary in that sense yeah

46:27Tom Junod:i just don't understand the advantage of it i don't understand the advantage of sitting in the backseat of a car with like nobody in the seat it's just it's just too weird for me and also

46:37Jason Stewart:whenever i take an uber it's a fucking escalade bro i don't want to get in some little hyundai white white jaguar with it it's a jaguar with your with your initials on the top that's just

46:48Tom Junod:i like that in the little that's fun it's personalized it's so pitiful it's so sad

46:52Chris Black:jason's talking a lot look yeah chris you are pitiful the problem with uber that we've said a million times is you have to pay for the fucking escalade for it not to smell bad and that's the problem and a waymo you can in a waymo you get the it's the same price across the board and it smells like a new car no one lives so we're back to we're back to the smell i was trying to get i was trying to give you an out no the smell no no the smell is my my issue the smell is my number one issue i would say i was that is clear in many ways how often all right so how often are you making the trek down 85 from marietta to atlanta proper where are you guys going to eat i went i

47:28Tom Junod:I went to, yesterday, I went to Gian Famous Foods. Oh, yes, of course. Yeah, the place on 10th. It's killer. Okay, so you're going to the city, what, once a week? No, I went to the city yesterday. I had to do an interview for the book. And so I was right around the block from Gian, so that's where I went.

47:46Chris Black:And you worked at Atlanta Magazine, too, right? Yeah, a long time ago. Yeah, that's a crazy one. Does it still exist?

47:51Tom Junod:Mm-hmm, yeah.

47:52Chris Black:It does? Yeah. How do you think it's doing?

47:54Tom Junod:I don't know. They did a story about me, and I haven't seen it yet. So I don't know.

48:00Chris Black:You're like, I'm withholding judgment until this story comes out. I'll let you know how they're doing financially if my story is good. I'll be able to determine.

48:09Tom Junod:The weird thing about Atlanta Magazine, and I think it sort of bespeaks the problem of magazines in general, it's no longer on the rack, on the checkout aisle of Publix.

48:23Chris Black:Yeah. you gotta go to atlantamagazine.com

48:26Tom Junod:that's a problem that it's no longer there because it's been there for as long as I've been in Atlanta and now it's like those special issues of National Geographic

48:35Jason Stewart:they only have fake magazines at Publix now Taylor Swift magazines

48:40Tom Junod:the Taylor Swift one or sort of a yet another take on Jesus

48:48Chris Black:yet another take on Jesus might be specifically Publix in the south but you're right

48:52Tom Junod:it's a it's a that's a pretty good podcast name guys i'm i just i just gave that to you

49:00Jason Stewart:yeah the the march issue of pro-life monthly is a great one you got to pick it up get that any

49:05Chris Black:local publics if you're if you're doing your shopping you can you might be able to get a gardening gun down there still though you can get a gardening gun you can definitely get gardening

49:13Tom Junod:gun but it's not but it's not on the checkout rack you're saying you have to you're saying

49:17Chris Black:you have to subscribe basically there's nowhere to like to subscribe or you have to either or go

49:21Tom Junod:to the magazine section of the of the publics rather than it being right there next to the

49:26Chris Black:candies i gotta say there's nothing better more depressing than a magazine section of publics it's nothing more depressing i mean it's like shit it's shit you cannot believe exists next to stuff that you can't believe still exists kind of is the combination shocking number of gun magazines at the publics well yeah yeah i mean i i you know i i don't know i guess that's the same thing as buying a car magazine if you're into cars i find it all a little strange but i and people have hobbies and i don't want to shame them for that i don't want to shame them for it i'm

49:54Tom Junod:just saying that you know you go to publics and you're like you think that you're gonna see harp you think you're gonna go to see harper's or the atlantic or whatever and it's like

50:03Chris Black:guns and ammo annual yeah no guns and ammo annual is definitely selling more in a publics and marietta than a fucking than a than an issue of the new yorker that's for sure the truth they got

50:12Jason Stewart:men's fitness up there just not the kumail issue you know what i mean we don't we don't play that down here in Georgia.

50:19Chris Black:We don't play that. We don't play that down here. So are you excited to be sort of promoting this memoir? Like, are you finding it fun to do this side of things?

50:29Tom Junod:I am. I am. And it definitely brings out the old, you know, business salesman in me.

50:36Chris Black:You're saying you can slip back into that mind frame when it's time.

50:40Tom Junod:I thought, you know, every time I think I'm out, they get me back in. Basically, it's the Godfather 3 speech. The drag you. I'm back to selling. And, you know, the cool thing about it is I think that the book is good. I think that the memoir is good. And, you know, I mean, the thing that I dreamed of when I was a handbag salesman was like one day writing a book. I mean, I was literally writing on the backs of business cards just to keep sharp or to prove that I could do it or whatever. And if somebody told me back then, when I was driving on Highway 20 from Dallas to Shreveport to sell bags, that I was going to have a book out 40 plus years from then, I just got to say, you got to be kidding me.

51:30Tom Junod:But here it is. So I feel pretty good. I feel pretty vindicated, to tell you the truth.

51:35Jason Stewart:Do you feel glad that you don't have to write a book again? Or now do you have the bug? All I want to do is write another book.

51:42Tom Junod:The last, you know, it took me, so this thing was hard. You know, it took me nine years because, number one, I didn't know how to do it. Number two, there was something I was out to find, you know, that I had to find before I finished it. But, like, the last, like, six months of that thing, I was just racing. It was just the coolest thing. so i want i want that again i don't want like the not knowing how part but the like i got this part

52:10Jason Stewart:you want you don't want to you want to skip the learning how to surf part and go straight to the

52:15Tom Junod:to the yeah bending over in the curl cruising the fucking waves yeah well i mean it seems like you

52:20Jason Stewart:you do have the gift of gab and you can just go have you thought about pivoting to the world of podcasting a little bit i noticed that your voice and the way you talk kind of reminds me of michael

52:30Tom Junod:lewis really has ever told you that before no no nobody go tell me tell me more mike michael's done

52:36Jason Stewart:well he he has done well i mean you know he he'll do like kind of companion podcasts to like stuff that he's done so there's like a big short podcast yeah of other sort of like investigative interesting little yeah yeah kind of pod things but i don't know your your voice just really reminds me of him and i guess you guys are a couple of peas in the pod but we're definitely

53:00Tom Junod:some peas in a pod i've only met i've only met michael once but you know i mean he's you know he's obviously great and has really you know he's figured out the whole narrative thing like extraordinarily well and i admire him so but listen but i have a i have a question to ask you guys yeah yeah about the pod please sure i hope you don't take it i hope you don't take it wrong

53:21Chris Black:oh here we go is it easy uh that is a good question um i mean easy is maybe the wrong word

53:30Jason Stewart:uh but i think it don't dodge the question chris don't dodge the question come on but i just think

53:35Chris Black:it's not i don't think it's easy because of i think that the problem with podcasting in general is that that's how people look at it and that's why so many celebrities that's why so many people stop and start podcasts because they think it's easy i would say that right my job as like doing all the booking is easier than jason's job which is doing all the editing but right that's just us sort of leaning into our skill sets as well i mean jason would you say it's easy or do you just like

54:00Jason Stewart:it so it feels easy most of the time it really is a 10 000 hours kind of thing of right it's it's it's easy for us to do it because we we talk a lot to each other and we're able to you know if it's it's easy for anyone whose podcast sounds exactly how they sound when they're talking to their friends off mic off record it's the people i think it's very difficult for people who are you know they speak openly one way off record and then when the podcast mic gets turned on then you have to sort of transform and metamorphosize into whatever you think a host of a podcast is and that can be draining and it can be difficult and you know if you really are trying hard to do a good job and not mess up you know it's only a matter of time until you're fucked so you really need to be okay with like sounding like an idiot a lot and making mistakes and not caring you guys

54:57Tom Junod:have done something you know and i'm not just kissing your ass you guys have done something really interesting in that you make conversation um sort of see average seeming conversation you know attractive and and um something that people are want to check out check into yeah all that

55:16Jason Stewart:all that stuff i think that we we're living in a time where we have podcasts we have music we have information and news and all these different types of media to consume and there's a lot it's it's it's an anxiety overload and i think nothing is more calming and relaxing while you're walking the dog or riding the subway or driving to work on in atlanta traffic than just two people who seem to legitimately be friends having an enjoyable conversation what it's about it doesn't necessarily matter it it's your your brain truly does turn off and you hit like a meditative state

55:55Tom Junod:i believe yeah yeah so when i when but when i meant easy i meant not like easy to succeed in because I don't think it's easy to succeed in. But I mean, just sort of, I mean, writing is hard. Like the psychological wear and tear. For some people, but, you know, it's not that hard for me. I'm just kidding. Sorry to hear that. The shit that you put yourself through as a writer is, every writer that I meet, you know, that I know, it's just like sort of crazy. I'm good friends with Seth Wickersham, my ESPN colleague, and he's always like, no way to make a living, man. You know, that's Seth's motto.

56:34Chris Black:I would say it's much easier than that. I will say that.

56:38Jason Stewart:Yeah, I think that being a good podcaster, and it is a lot of work, and it can be hard, but I've never heard the word excruciating be used when describing the labor of creating a podcast. Right. And I hear it, you know, every writer has said that word. Almost exclusively about writing.

56:55Tom Junod:That's a good day. Excruciating is a good day. No writer, nobody's like that.

56:59Chris Black:I mean, even when you said the last six months, i had fun because i was like in the zone i was locked in it was working it's like i i barely even hear shit like that you know what i mean like that's like the most positive version of it

57:11Tom Junod:more like six hours that was pretty cool that was pretty cool yeah six hours but this was six months

57:16Chris Black:what were you were you waking up and just going at it or did you have a different kind of schedule

57:20Tom Junod:i was i i would i would just i would wake up because i i spent some time you know we have a house up in Shelter Island on Long Island. And I went there by myself for a while. And I would just, you know, every day I would wake up around seven, go out to the shed and just, you know, I would write 2000 words, you know, over the course of the day. And then at night I would come in and like watch a TV show or a series that go to bed 1230 and then just do it every single day like that. It was pretty great.

57:51Chris Black:That, yeah, that sounds pretty good and reasonable. It was, it was

57:54Tom Junod:definitely reasonable but of course i was living in complete seclusion and it didn't have to you know didn't even have a dog at the time dexter died it was before we got shocked so hell no so

58:05Jason Stewart:you're really no time for a dog well it was who was the person that you would would call to sort of help unearth some of this info that you sort of remember but the really good stuff you had to call a you know a friend or a sibling or something um i mean there was definitely some

58:22Tom Junod:people who you know helped me help me through this crazy stuff um but you know my my wife janet being a central central there shout out to janet she knew she knew the story she had you know you know we we've been together since we were kids and so she knew she knew a lot of the story and and okay but i think that i think that the you know the the way it's presented in in the book was was also new to her because there's like you know there's a lot of a lot of details and it's told as a as one continuous story rather than as just as a series of semi-randomized discoveries

59:00Chris Black:yeah you don't have chunks and chapters yeah yeah that sounds like a yeah i mean that sounds like an idyllic way to do it obviously after nine years you deserve that six months yeah you earned it but yeah totally well well earned no doubt what's up with your shed though what's the vibe because

59:16Tom Junod:i feel like you're underselling it when you call it a shed no so so it was it was the it was it was a shed the guy when we bought the house you know one of the the shed was definitely one of the selling points but for like years and i'm talking about like like a long time it was the kind of thing where i mean it was so nasty that was the kind of thing where like people would go oh tom i can't wait to see your writing shed and then people like they'd see it and perhaps smell it chris yeah and uh and and and turn around you know and and flee because it was just such it spoke of such of such desperation and so a few but a few years ago i did i did fix it up a little bit

1:00:02Chris Black:and we did a small renovation ourselves or we brought some help no i brought i brought in a

1:00:07Tom Junod:guy i just i don't i can't renovate i have no skills in that way i didn't think you did but

1:00:12Jason Stewart:yeah so so it's not a man cave but you there's no more not a man cave no more leaks and things

1:00:18Tom Junod:like that it's just not as creepy as it was it was creepy for a while my question is there a

1:00:23Chris Black:bathroom no okay all right this is a shed then for some reason bathroom yeah would elevate it above yeah yeah there's there's not even there's not even something to heat up the hot water there's

1:00:34Tom Junod:not even like one of those little machines it's there's not that nothing but a typewriter and a roach clip out there huh buddy yeah yeah and a lot and a lot of exactly exactly uh exactly

1:00:44Chris Black:a typewriter and a roach clip I can see that but is there at least a great view?

1:00:50Tom Junod:no it's not nearly as picturesque as you're imagining

1:00:57Jason Stewart:the view that he's looking for is called Google Docs yeah actually what software do you use to write if I may ask so I use the worst

1:01:09Tom Junod:software Microsoft Word I use Pages what apple pages who the fuck who the fuck uses that i'm the only apple page interesting okay and so so here's the other thing that i'm the only i'm the only guy who still buys music on itunes

1:01:28Chris Black:i don't stream because you want to you want to own it i buy the song for a buck 29 my boomer king all right so do you keep them all on a hard drive like what the fuck you doing with it well they're

1:01:37Tom Junod:you know they're on my computer and i keep on buying more space on my computer and plus i use something called iTunes Match, which allows you to use the stuff that you buy and that's on your hard drive goes out into the streaming space, into the digital space via iTunes Match. And I'll bet you there are like 10 people still using this, and I'm one of them.

1:02:04Chris Black:Interesting. Okay, so you're saying iTunes Match is a service that basically mirrors the music you own into streaming versions so you can have it with you in the car and shit.

1:02:12Jason Stewart:so you could all of your old CDs that you've ripped into mp3s put on your computer I didn't even know that I've never even heard of iTunes match and I have a lot of mp3s

1:02:23Chris Black:so there really are 10 of you

1:02:26Jason Stewart:it's only days until this service gets discontinued I assume right

1:02:30Tom Junod:or they should give me some kind of award

1:02:33Jason Stewart:yeah you guys either

1:02:34Chris Black:shut this whole thing down or give me a metal trophy that says

1:02:37Jason Stewart:also the lifetime achievement award of iTunes some of the good the pro ai you know vibe coding situations is as soon as that program is sunsetted as they say yeah you can just you know type it into clod and it'll just make that app for you again in whatever color you want and whatever you know for your phone or your

1:03:02Tom Junod:laptop or whatever and and just to fuck with me they'll subtly change the music yeah it's got to be just a little different same artist just a little you know it's just a little different a

1:03:13Jason Stewart:little version a little it's all the remastered versions but they sound worse they sound worse

1:03:17Chris Black:i've never heard of this and this is a monthly fee no it's a yearly fee i think all right we're gonna check we're gonna look into this because this does feel like so i know i guess we jason and i probably know i i think because of our interest areas we probably know a lot of people that buy music still i would say maybe not on it okay okay but but you don't know anybody that

1:03:38Tom Junod:uses iTunes Smash.

1:03:39Chris Black:No, I do not. Never heard of it.

1:03:41Jason Stewart:That's good. And I'm a DJ. I feel very special. No, you are. The few, the proud. Have you considered downloading music illegally from these cool websites?

1:03:50Tom Junod:I used to go on these, you know, like the music blogs back in the day when the music blogs posted MP3s. That was great.

1:04:00Jason Stewart:Tell me about, tell me more about it, Grandpa. Yes. That was great. You guys remember 2009? It was great. it was so do you remember what music blogs you were on oh i do god i know what he was going to

1:04:13Chris Black:gorilla verse bear no no no there were like all these cover sites that i used to go on

1:04:18Tom Junod:like cover songs yeah cover songs that was one of them cover cover songs go pull up some string

1:04:23Jason Stewart:cheese incident mp3s on cover songs whatever it might be yeah yeah right yeah exactly like

1:04:29Tom Junod:this like string cheese string cheese incident version of like the devs playing in the band or And then it would have all of like, there was one site, God, I forget the name, it's a long time. But they'd have like one song covered by 10 artists. And I'd be the guy that downloaded all of that. Are you a jam band guy at heart? No, no, definitely not. I'm definitely geese over goose. Wow.

1:04:55Chris Black:Okay. Damn. Geese over goose. We might see geese tomorrow in Paris. I can't decide. I don't know what our time is going to be, Jason, but there is an offer. They're on at nine.

1:05:04Tom Junod:So geese is really, they have a thing, right? Which is super great. And very few bands can get away with it, which is that you don't know if it's good or bad. I love that.

1:05:16Chris Black:It's one of the most powerful things you can be. Exactly.

1:05:19Tom Junod:Pull that off.

1:05:20Chris Black:I mean, I think that being polarizing is a real currency in our attention economy.

1:05:26Tom Junod:Absolutely. Absolutely.

1:05:28Jason Stewart:What are some other musical artists or bands that fit that category as well?

1:05:32Tom Junod:well so tell if they're good or bad i am wearing i like since because i like i thought that there's a chance that this might actually be a video thing so i'm wearing my nick cave idiot prayer t-shirt right now now i don't think that you can think that anybody can think that like nick cave is bad because he's the man um but i think that it's i can definitely see people it's definitely polarizing musically i can see plenty of people not liking nick very much you know including including my wife janet who um sure sure she she's she's away she just left right before you guys checked in she just went away for girls weekend and so you know so i'm gonna put i'm gonna right after we get on tom's letting him hang this weekend steely dan and steely dan and nick cave We're going to go on that tour table.

1:06:26Tom Junod:All right. So what do we do?

1:06:27Chris Black:Yeah. All right. Wife's out of town. We're in Marietta. What are we going into the cellar for something nice and cranking up and cranking up geese? What's the plan for you? I live in Marietta.

1:06:36Tom Junod:So there is no cellar, man. There's a crawl space. Okay. Okay. Okay.

1:06:40Jason Stewart:I was got a couple of steaks marinating in the fridge.

1:06:43Tom Junod:I wish I went, but I went to, no, I don't. I don't. But I did go to Gian Famous and I got some, I got an extra, you know, takeout of noodles. I'm going to hit the Gianna gun tonight.

1:06:59Chris Black:So your wife's going out of town and you have some noodles in the fridge.

1:07:01Tom Junod:I have some noodles in the fridge.

1:07:03Chris Black:Turn up bro. We're really celebrating.

1:07:06Jason Stewart:Speaking of food, you are a James Beard award winning writer. But you were in an essay called My Mom Couldn't Cook. So it wasn't necessarily It seems like it wasn't an instructional recipe. no it wasn't essay you were writing it was something a little more emotional and deeper

1:07:27Tom Junod:but i did the i i was the uh i was on the board of the james beard journalism committee for five

1:07:34Chris Black:years i'm sure that's an unpaid opportunity it was definitely unpaid yeah yeah i mean it's what

1:07:39Tom Junod:are your culinary bona fides my friend i'm a wicked cook really good cook i've been cooking ever since i was you know i was a kid and my parents went out to the track and left me with the stakes so i i got good okay um went out to the track your parents were gambling on the ponies

1:07:56Chris Black:oh my god did they love it that's a cool thing for a couple to do though you know what i mean i feel like that's usually one or the other and usually the fella ish cool ish well i'm saying

1:08:06Tom Junod:given how much money was lost i wouldn't say that cool chris chris likes that the family's doing it

1:08:11Jason Stewart:together versus yeah i gotta you know i gotta go to try to get away from my bitch wife or whatever Yeah, exactly.

1:08:17Chris Black:I usually think of it as I got to get away from my bitch wife behavior. No, my mom. Let's go down.

1:08:21Tom Junod:You know, my dad did many things to estrange himself from my mom. A whole book's worth. A whole book's worth. But the track, man, she loved it. She was helpless. She loved the ponies, man. She just did.

1:08:37Chris Black:Okay, so she was the driving force behind the ponies.

1:08:40Tom Junod:Oh, I wouldn't go that far. But she just liked it, too. you know and a lot of the stuff that my dad did um she did not like of course or not even was was not even privy to but she definitely liked the ponies and and it was great because they used to argue about how to bet and you know my mom would go in bet favorites come home with 20 dollars dad would go bet long shots and lose a thousand it was it was just like two different approaches to the same two different approaches and yet you know even though even though my dad would lose a thousand my mom would win 20 he had nothing but scorn for her you know style of betting yeah you

1:09:20Chris Black:have to yeah it doesn't matter who's right it's not bad yeah it doesn't matter who's right or

1:09:24Jason Stewart:wrong what what uh what were their drinks what were their their horse track drinks my mom didn't

1:09:29Tom Junod:drink except maybe occasionally uh like a dubonet like a dry sherry kind of thing and dad dad dad Dad was a Rob Roy, straight scotch, martini, rum and coke guy. That was Dad's big four. It was diverse. It was seasonal. It was seasonal. There was your winter drinks. The rum and coke was summer and Christmas, weirdly enough.

1:10:01Chris Black:I feel like Scotch on the Rocks feels like a drink that I have never seen anyone order in public. It's only on television.

1:10:09Tom Junod:Dad was definitely a Scotch on the Rocks guy.

1:10:11Chris Black:I feel like it's a different time period. It was much more popular, but now I only see it on legal dramas after a long day.

1:10:18Tom Junod:I can't drink Scotch.

1:10:20Chris Black:I never drank Scotch.

1:10:22Tom Junod:A little too peaty, a little too peaty. Yeah, as my parents would say, it repeats on me.

1:10:30Jason Stewart:it does it does my uh my wife's dad drinks it a lot and i gotta force it down or else i look like

1:10:38Tom Junod:a pussy in front of him you know what i mean right yeah no i definitely that's why i know exactly what you mean i've definitely i've definitely forced down the scotch in my life and then it repeats on me so i just i'm not familiar with this phrase repeats on me it means that okay so we're gonna go deep right now it means that like when you belch you can

1:10:58Chris Black:taste it okay all right that's that's enough that's quite enough and it's a little little

1:11:04Jason Stewart:play on the words with the word pete and repeat in it you know yeah i got all that it's a double

1:11:09Tom Junod:word score next time i i listen to how long gone i want to hear you use repeats in a sentence

1:11:14Jason Stewart:all right professor tom i'll do my best well yeah after we record this pod we'll kind of take a shower and go get some escargot and do a little repeating and we'll let you know how it

1:11:25Tom Junod:goes that's right you're you just you just flex the france on it's not a flex sir it's not a flex

1:11:31Chris Black:part of me petite flex part of me would love to be in my backyard in marietta looking at a pond if a few things went the different ways that could be me right we're here we're here to look at a

1:11:40Jason Stewart:fashion show we're not here to you know dig ditches i think no that's just fine how's fashion

1:11:46Chris Black:these days pretty good so far i mean we won't you know in general um you know it's i would say industry-wise maybe there's some shrinkage happening um but that's the nature of the of

1:11:56Jason Stewart:any there's the destruction of the middle class of fashion it's only unattainable luxury items or hyper affordable cheap stuff right right that's that's the so what was and then what was what was

1:12:07Tom Junod:the what was the middle class um like in in like in men's clothing what what what would have been the middle class like was was was was zen i guess zenya would be middle class right zenya is very

1:12:18Chris Black:no xenia is very high end actually i i mean obviously they make different they have seven different price points but i think that nowadays xenia is considered luxury price point wise right

1:12:28Tom Junod:right um i remember i remember when xenia started moving up and started getting really expensive and for a while for a while it was pretty it was pretty well everything is now very expensive

1:12:38Chris Black:is the reality um and that's sort of i mean sometimes i forget that i'm in the vortex where this is like normal you know a button-up shirt costs twelve hundred dollars and i don't think

1:12:48Jason Stewart:that's like i have to remind myself that's crazy our uh our friend uh rachel tashin wrote a story recently like who like if if the only people who go to fashion shows are like mark zuckerberg and stuff like who who are these clothes for at the end of the day you know especially when those guys

1:13:05Tom Junod:have no sense of fashion whatsoever hey look when you make enough money you get hobbies i'd rather

1:13:12Chris Black:him be wearing Prada than buying another island in Hawaii or doing some sort of damage to our culture at large. I think it's a pretty victimless crime, really.

1:13:22Jason Stewart:Keep him front row in Prada so he doesn't have enough time to do ethnic cleansing.

1:13:27Tom Junod:That's a good idea. Keep the guy busy.

1:13:29Jason Stewart:That's exactly what I'm saying, Jason.

1:13:31Chris Black:Thank you. Keep him busy.

1:13:33Tom Junod:You have made me see something. I like that. You've turned me around.

1:13:38Chris Black:Alright, Tom, thank you for joining us today on How Long Gone. Your new memoir is in storage everywhere and jason pointed out the title and what's the what's the name of that

1:13:46Jason Stewart:memoir we got to do a little promotion here in the days of yeah we actually said it before in the intro but i mentioned that the the the artwork on the cover as well as the title of the book is

1:13:56Chris Black:reminiscent of the smiths for me yeah it's giving smith song that is so that is so cool great title

1:14:02Tom Junod:of course of course it's a led zeppelin song but now you guys know this right you guys know that

1:14:08Chris Black:I didn't know that. I don't like Led Zeppelin. I've never...

1:14:11Tom Junod:In the days of my youth, I was told what it means to be a man.

1:14:15Chris Black:Yeah, it's that song.

1:14:17Tom Junod:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:14:18Chris Black:There you go. It does sound more like a Smith song, but maybe that's because it's a book title.

1:14:23Tom Junod:The fact that it's a Smith song, I want to go to one of those old, closed-down MP3 cover websites that I used to frequent and hear a Smith version of Led Zeppelin's good times, bad times.

1:14:38Jason Stewart:I wonder if that exists. Well, I will fire up the AI machine and get that on your desk by Monday, sir.

1:14:45Tom Junod:When you have Morrissey on, talk to him.

1:14:47Chris Black:I'll talk to Morrissey. I'll text Morrissey and see what he's doing. He's in the hospital again. All right, thanks, Tom. We appreciate it. Okay, guys, thanks a lot. It was a lot of fun. Of course, Matt. We'll see you soon. Our pleasure. Later. See you.

1:14:56Tom Junod:Bye. Bye.

1:15:09Chris Black:There's a world where legends race across city skylines romance blossoms in glittering ballrooms and there's magic around every corner It's a world known to many as Great Britain You've seen the action on screen Now visit the real star of the show Visit Great Britain To discover more, go to tripadvisor.com slash Great Britain.