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My guest today is a good friend of mine. I've been friends with this guy for a long time and he is one of the most hardcore backpacking bow hunter dudes on the planet Earth spends like two hundred and fifty days a year sleeping under the stars in the wilderness. And he is one of the guys that runs Cafaro. Cafaro is a hardcore backpacking company and he's just an interesting dude.

I always love talking to him and talking about his experiences and his wilderness trips and all the craziness that he's been through.

Please give it up for my friend Aaron Schnieder, girlfriend podcast, the Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, podcast by night, all day. What's up? Good to see you, man.

Finally did this. Yeah. Yeah. Good to see you. I, I had been pestered about four million times. Or when you're getting on Rogan's podcast, I'm like, yes, Grogan. I don't, I don't know. So when you finally asked them like who I was excited.

I feel like I've made it well so many people have asked me when I've worn your shirt this people what does this shirt reino shirt. What is that? That's Cafaro.

That's your backpack company. And because I've worn this on the podcast, people go, when are you going to get stone Rolling Stone.

Oh yeah. Yeah, I'm sure that gets old. I have to respect the amount of people that how many times you changed your phone number in the last ten years. Multiple. Yeah.

Keep it moving. Yeah. Got to keep it moving. I have to copy you and I've got one tenth of the following. You do.

I just it's hard to keep keep up and people express how sensitive they get when you don't respond to them and it's like they get angry. Yeah. And I'm like I've had guys like I know you're not that busy.

Like really you don't really know.

People get real weird, but that kind of stuff when they want something, you know, it's like, you know, there's some people that'll text you and then if you don't text them right back, they'll send you question marks. Like a question. Question. Yeah, come on, man.

Yeah, it gets it's weird trying to. Little did I know where I would end up in life. You know, we're kind of where I started from and then now. Well it's funny. My my wife, she knew me and we met in 07, didn't have a phone, no computer, lived in the woods, slept on a thermostat, air mattress.

You didn't have a phone or a computer in 07.

It was you know what? I think I might get a flip phone right around that time frame. And I was sleeping on.

And this is a no bullshit story. She'll tell you I had gotten divorced and I kind of made, you know, do whatever I wanted to get out in the woods a lot. So I slept on a thermostat, air mattress in my you know, you bring chicks over there like, fuck is this know, I just.

Twenty four inch wide backpacking air mattress, I slept on that and just say, you know, money for way of running, getting outdoors, and then she and I, you know, around dated for a while and we were apart for several years and we got back together. She's like, who the fuck are you?

Like, we're in Wal-Mart. They're like Snyder. And she's like that a friend of yours.

I'm like, I have no idea who that is. And because she skipped all that time and then I'm marketing and I'm wired and all the time she's like, are you a different person, a different body?

Because I was not different acting. She just you know, she she she knew me as the low tech dude. That just was a..

You know, and so because of your podcast, like and that's probably where and then gritty bohlmann before that. Yeah. Yeah.

All of that stuff forums and you know, whatever, all that different stuff just got well known and then. Yeah. Went from there.

Well that world, that world of outdoor enthusiasts and backpack hunters is such a rabid world. The guys who are really into that for people don't understand. It's like if you combined ultramarathon running rucking and hunting together. Yeah.

It's kind of all those things because it's you know, we've talked about it on the podcast before and I know I've brought you up before, but it's that world is it's the combination of athletic. I don't like when people call bow hunting a sport because I think it's more of a discipline. It's a weird thing to call a sport because it's not like there's a game going on. It's it's you're hunting an animal.

Yeah, but it's a discipline.

But it also requires athleticism and requires the kind of workout that, you know, I mean, if you're going to be able to make it fifteen miles into the back country with a 40 pound pack on, you have to be in insane shape and you've got to be able to get out with an animal on your back and multiple trips.

It could take several days like the the just the taxing effect that it has on the human body. So the guys that are into that shit, when they run into a guy like you that's legit, they get very rabid.

It's it's crazy. And I mean, there's that. Well, I would say Cam kicked it off, right. He was the the not the you know, people get sensitive about that.

Cam was not the original, but Cam was the original that everybody knew if they made a book to.

He's got a great book. Well, and he was the guy that, you know, going back like he was the first one to promote backpack hunting with a platform. Like I'm not the first stick bogi just for stick Bogi with a platform, you know what I mean? Like, I'm not the first dude that shoots a recurve that, you know, he's somewhat known work for people that don't follow hunting.

Let me explain you, Aaron. Got too good at shooting with a compound bow, which is probably one of the hardest ways to hunt. So he decided to shoot with a fucking like a medieval bow.

Let's talk about how that got started. So I was I was I was you. In fact, I made fun of stickball. Guys like I was bad. Like I was truly mean to them, like somebody to come down, you know? So for people to understand, when you go to an outdoor range, you've got one long line and you've got targets on the far right, which is like the five pound weights at the gym. And then on the far left, you've got the two hundred pound dumbbells.

That's 100 yard bale. So I'm over at the 100 yard bell shooting a Rhinehart eighteen and one hundred 120. And I would have stick bow guys come down to me and tell me I'm unethical for shooting that distance. And I would be like, you can't hit the bale down there at ten yards. You're at the chumped side. What are you giving me shit for?

Any guy would tell you you're unethical for shooting at a target. You're practicing at that range. Like, what were they?

It was weird. It was weird in it. Why is that?

The people want to do that. They want to tell you what you're doing is wrong. I, I a human nature I guess. And I ended up doing a podcast, talked about, you know, God forbid you break down mathematically. Right. You can break down the speed of an arrow and the accuracy and you take a guy, you know, shooting, whatever, 290 feet per second. How long's it take his arrow to get to 80 yards?

How long's it take an arrow to get from, you know, 170 feet per second to thirty five yards?

So I kind of evened all that up and said, well, here's apples to apples, oranges to oranges. This is it, FLOC. I got hate mail.

I mean, you're a horrible hunter. You're using your ability instead of hunting skills, you know, to shoot.

And so I was like, fuck it. I sold everything I had every compound, every side, every arrow. I didn't want that temptation. And I'm like, I'm going to shoot it up. We'll see. Right. I will see how good I can get because I never shot a steak bone.

So you just because of people's reaction to you, you decided to go to a recurve, which is for people to understand the difference.

So this can be absorbed by people don't hunt the difference. When you have a compound bow, you have a site on a compound bow that will allow you to scroll out. You can roll out to like. So my site is set at 30 yards. That's where it's normally set out. But you can go all the way to 120 yards. And when it does is it raises your pin so it changes where the pin goes up and down and the pin is how you.

So you can get really accurate, see if your guy like campaigns, I mean, he shoots at 100 yards all the time and you know, he can get into a small group at 100 yards. John Dudley, the same thing. It's a very accurate whereas with a recurve bow, there's no sight. You're doing it with the point of your arrow and you're you have to practice much more. And it's like throwing a rock like you get like these throw rocks all the time.

You kind of get a feel of where you can throw that rock.

Yeah, throwing that rock was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be. Let me tell.

So I'm very goal oriented and I add it a problem, which is much I don't I'm not very good at losing. And I'm not saying I'm a spoiled loser. I'm psychotic. When I lose it, something like my wife will tell you, I'll go to a tournament first thing I do when I get home, I'm having her filmi breaking down thing.

So I thought, well, we're going to see if I can if these people are right, I'm going to I'm going to find out. I'm going to do nothing but trad..

And so Trad. meaning traditional traditional archery. Yeah.

And so I I'm lucky enough to fall. Tom Klumb. Right. He's like the Yoda of the traditional archery. So I go down there with a wad of cash and I'm like and they've got several hundred recurve. So I'm like, hey, I'm going to shoot a stick bow guys. And they're like, they've seen me shoot a cop and they're like, cool, let's let's get you set up. And I'm thinking, good hand eye coordination since shouldn't be a problem.

Fuck man. I'm like I went from shooting fifty eight Xs on a five spot on average to I can't hit the target at twenty yards and I'm like oh this what.

I've only shot a record a couple of times but I did it recently in Hawaii like last summer and they had like some range out there and they had recomposed you could shoot. It's amazing how difficult it is to hit something if you don't have any experience doing it.

Well, and I was lucky because I had that whole family there to help me. Right. So there you know, it's like you have an Dudly and, you know, they took me under their wing and they're explaining this until I got what I thought was good pretty fast.

Which 40 yards with a stick so far.

But I hadn't hunted yet, you know. And so then I go out and I don't remember.

I shot that black bear and, you know, I'm within 40 yards of it for twenty minutes. And in my mind, I'm going to you would be so dead if I had my compound. I just couldn't get a shot. And I finally squeaked it in, missed it at like eight yards. And I'm like, Jesus Christ. Snider OK, so luckily and Tom had told me this, he said, you're going to get two or three shots in an animal.

They don't they don't hear the bow and they don't learn it by its feet. It kind of looked around and I'm like, oh, I'm not going to miss you again. Got it on the second shot. And I'm like, oh, this isn't you know, I get this.

Do you have any qualms about hunting with it? Like, how long did it take before you felt ethical enough to hunt with it? Well, I haina within three months.

Did you feel like that was a smart move or do you feel like you rushed it.

Well let me I was psychotic shooting ten hours a day like I was shooting constantly. So if I think I was fine because I had the coaching, I had to help and I had the accuracy I could hit.

I mean I was doing well to what I had to compare to around me. I was like, OK, this is good. So I didn't feel like I went into it unethical. Like I couldn't hit what I was aiming at, but I didn't have experience. And I mean, you look at knowledge and wisdom, right? Knowledge. You're reading about it. Wisdom, you're experiencing it. Well, I thought what I knew from shooting a compound, my hunting skills would be enough.

And they were I ended up shooting, I don't know, eleven, twelve animals that year.

But fuck, man, it was like every time I went out, I was learning something new and I had to totally change my hunting style.

When you think about it from a perspective of someone who a non hunter, they they question why you would want to shoot a bow and arrow in the first place, because they think that that would be less ethical than using a rifle. Like if you wanted to shoot something, you should use a rifle, you could kill it quicker. It's better to go from that to a compound. But it's like, why are you doing that? You know? And then they realize, like, oh, you can actually be very accurate with a compound bow if you have practice.

Yeah. And if you learn how to do it correctly and you're disciplined, but to take it another level and to go to a recurve like that's that's where it gets to in some people's minds, like, are you hunting for food?

Are you hunting for your ego? Like, what are you doing? Like why are you doing it with a recurve bow? And I think one of the best answers I've ever heard from anybody is that they said it is much more difficult, but also much more rewarding.

And when you're eating that animal, you have this insane sense of accomplishment that's actually another level past, even with a compound bow. Does that make sense?

Yeah, and you've explained it better there than I could. And I'm going to give it a whirl. So I went from your side of the things making fun of everyone to being addicted, to getting close. So now my the first year I shot him, Yulia, four feet in the cliffs, when I drew my bow back, my arrow was between its horns. When? I drew up Frank, took photos of it, and it's so crazy and but it was one of those things where now the the the reward from it like, yeah, that that feeling you have when you get it done is because it's much more difficult.

Much more. Yeah. Much more to think about, like what it must have been like to be the Native Americans.

You would have like he's fucking hungry is what I was like. I mean it I have technology on my side. Right.

And I have a lot of finders. Get binoculars, clothing. Right.

I got everything. And so that that year, though, when we were going in on a lot of these animals, I was able to get a couple turkeys and a black bear and I shot a mule deer and that mule there, like I said, when I was in those cliffs, my area was between its antlers when I drew back. So I shot at it three feet in front. Crazy.

It was crazy. And that would have never happened. How did you sneak up on it like that? Look. And when you saw Frank, he he was glassing it. And I circled it as a two and a half miles around. So you were above it on the cliff?

No, we were when I shot it, I was so, you know, we were across from it, however far we were.

I mean, over a mile. And I looped way around and I told, you know, Frank, I said, hey, when you see me, just give me the, you know, the touch down that I'm above it. And I lost I stalked the wrong rock twice. I lost my boots.

You know, I'm like, because because you took your shoes off to sneak in. Yeah. Except I sneaking in on a fucking rock.

Right. I wasn't at the right rock and I was to go that far and hit the exact same spot as is difficult because I lost sight of Frank almost the whole way because I couldn't expose myself. So when I looped around when I would see Frank he was so far away and I was so close to the rock that I thought the deer was under, I didn't want to make any crazy movements. And then I would go back to 100 yards, try and find my boots, get my boots back on loop back around to try to find the spots.

So when I finally got to the right spot, Frank stood up a mile away, held his hands up. And I'm like, it's got to be right in front of me. And I cut the top three inches of its, you know, its velvet antlers sticking up and it was windy.

So every gust of wind, which about every 10, 15 seconds I took a step, I got to nine yards and I grabbed a rock and threw it in the middle there.

Everything they tell you, everything you need to know in the top four inches there. And so I'm watching those to see if he moves. Didn't move at all. Nothing through another rock, nothing through another rock.

And I'm like, so explain to me what you throw in a rock to try to get this thing to stand up so you get a shot to get a shot, throwing a rock just to make noise. Yeah.

In hopes that he just starts get a reaction. Yeah. And anyway, he didn't move and I'm like, I'm going to climb on that.

Rocky's buried under and I'm on you and talk about you couldn't have put a flax seed through my ass with a hammer. I had just started doing this and that, this deer's feet from me and I got my foot on the rock he was on. And I'm like, I hope this, you know, the plant off on my right foot to spring up onto this rock. I waited for a gust of wind, so I'm. Twenty five seconds for me to you from this, dear.

He's got no idea I'm there. That gust of wind handed.

I pushed off and I was worried.

The shade, they'll think it's a mountain lion pouncing on him so I could see the shade of my fat head on the back of his neck. And I'm like, oh, you know, it's one of the most intense moments of my life, you know, as far as this goes. And so when I went to draw, I had to sweep my area right between his horns and drew back and shot him, you know, straight down. And he ran fifty yards and all that.

When you eat that animal, that's got to give you this insane feeling of accomplishment.

It is extremely, extremely rewarding to a point. It's hard to explain in in words because you've you've bested the animal in a lot of ways with your skill.

And I'm not saying that like I'm Billy bad ass. I'm just saying, like, you have snuck into its living room. There's a lot of air and you've earned it. Yeah. Yeah.

Because it's did it the right way is, you know, I've shot a lot of stuff pretty far away with a compound, which I'm not embarrassed of. But, you know, it's just now rather than hanging that badge of honor, how well I can shoot, it's also, you know, how well I can hunt. And it's been an uphill road to hoe.

I mean, there's been so how often do you think about like I mean, I find myself thinking about that all the time. Like, I'm real lucky that I could buy food in a store because this this is not even with a regular compound bow with a great binoculars and, you know, using rangefinder and all that jazz, it's not guarantee that you're going to eat.

No.

Do you think about that when you're hunting like this is it must have been insane to be one of the, you know, the American Indians on the plains.

Well well, you had Jordan on as well. You know, whatever the lone guy. Right. Like that dude had a huge advantage. I wouldn't want to go against him. I mean, that dude is born to live on nothing. Right?

So I always put things into perspective. And he brought it up to was when things are down, right.

When you're mentally or whatever, drained and. You think about it, it's like, all right, I chose to put myself out here, you know, all the people before me, they had to hack it out with, they didn't have, you know, any great sitcom gear. They didn't have Benos. They didn't have this.

They did have that. And so it helps motivate me for one. But I'm like is where does it sounds? I think of that a lot when I'm get my ass kicked basically is like if I had to live off this thing, I would have to put in that extra.

Not that they had to make their own bows. I'm not to that level. I mean, that's life.

I mean, I got it on this real long kick of Native American books. There's a guy named Cygwin and he wrote this book called Empire of the Summer Moon. And it's all about the Comanches. And, you know, a lot of it talks about their lifestyle and talks about the hardships that they had to go through. And, you know, mostly bow and arrow, bow and arrow hunting for deer and buffalo. And it's just that that life must have been insane, but that it also it also talks about one of the main characters of this woman, Cynthia Ann Parker, who was abducted when she was nine years old.

And then they recapture the Americans, recaptured her when she was in her 30s and she wanted to go back. Yeah, she didn't want to live in a town and live in a house. And she fucking hated it. Yes. Like that life of even though it's so difficult that subsistence hunting life, it's it's so insanely connected. You're so insanely connected to the to the forest and to the woods. To the animals. To the just to the earth itself.

You are. And I think on me it just I spent 150, 200 nights a year in the wilderness for the last year.

You probably do more than anybody that I know. That's one of the reasons why I wanted to talk to you about this, because you're you know, your company, Cuffaro, which makes, you know, some of this is some great backpack companies out there that make, like, amazing gear. But you guys make I mean, there's no arguing. It's top of the food chain shit. And one of the reasons why your company makes such good backpacks is because of your experience in the woods.

I mean, you fucking live out there.

Well, it's weird. So when I started Patrick, the owner, he same way, right?

I mean, he's eighty now or however, you know, 79, 80. He was the same way as I was. So when I when I started there, whatever decade ago he was, I wouldn't say enamored. He was happy to see a younger guy. They could not get out of the woods. And so what was crazy where most people end up getting stuck in an office, if he came in the office and I was in there and disgruntled, he'd be like, what are you doing?

Go get your shit and get in the woods?

And he would want you. Well, there's no way he would make me be like PAC man.

We got a lot of stuff going on, he said. And he always has glasses, right? He looks over the top and he's like, Son, it can wait. And I'm like, OK, so what he wanted was a guy and he was you know, there was a there was a long trial period to find his successor. Right. There was a lot of questioning if we backpack in. And he was like, hey, once you catch some fish, shoot a couple rabbits and a few squirrels for dinner, like, all right, cool, I'd do it.

Bring him back. He might want to clean them. I'm like, yeah, of course. I'm like, I didn't know he was testing. Yeah, I didn't realize that. I'm like, yeah. And then at one point in time he told me he's like, you have passed the test. And I'm like, I've been doing this since birth, Patrick. And he's like everyone says that very people have been my my, my background, my hometown's like two hundred people.

Right. I'm a logging community in Oregon. It's right off the Pacific Crest Trail. I mean, that's all we did. I was on a trail crew team, clear enough wilderness trails with a fucking crosscut saw and a hatchet at 14 years old. That's what I did in the summers for money. So that's crazy. Different lifestyle, right? I mean, my daughter and I love my daughter to death. And she's like, Dad, did you have a job?

When you're my age? I'm like, I was running a fuckin 72 inch bar. Still chainsaw, honey. Yeah, I had a job, you know, and she she's I've been able to pass a lot of those things on to her, but it's a different lifestyle. When I was in high school, you could have guns in your truck. You take them into the principal's office. He keeps in his office. And when you got out, you go deer hunting.

When you you know, and I'm not that much younger than you, but a little bit I've heard those days of college.

So, you know, it was something you're skipping school.

We'd skip school to hunt.

Well, they take off opening day. It's like a national holiday almost.

It was a big deal. And so, you know, we didn't have any money for the kids. We picked mushrooms, chanterelles, kamikazes, Morrell's. That's what I did for school clothes, split firewood. It was a different lifestyle. And so as I've gotten older, you know, all of those things that I learned have carried on to where now I'm pretty. I'm can sustain myself for just about any.

What part of Oregon were you in Detroit? And is that is that Roosevelt Elk Country?

So it's east of I 25. So they're hybrids, Rocky Mountain and Roosevelt. Yeah.

And it's so it's Kamini right beside. I mean, we're super close. Oh really. He's 45 minutes away from the first bow that I got, actually, I was 13, I'd mowed lawns all summer and worked or whatever, and we went to the bow rack, my mom. And that's just what, Springfield, Oregon? Yeah. And we drove down there and I don't even hardly remember. My mom was telling me and we bought a bow.

And I don't know what it's doing right now.

And I would say, like the way that, you know, at that time I was pissed because we'd go to football camps.

I'd have like the poor kids stuff and whatever. But it makes you a lot better person, I think.

Yeah. That old feeling when you're poor and you're young, that's irreplaceable. You know, I still think about when I was young, like not knowing if we were going to have enough food. Yeah, I think about that.

And we were on welfare when I was like seven years old. And I think about those days because I remember being nervous that that we wouldn't have enough food or people be mad at me that I ate too much. Yeah, I have never been mad at my kids if they eat too much. Yeah. But I remember that I would get people who get upset at me if I ate too much.

And I remember thinking, man, we might not have enough food and there's like a there's something that gets instilled in you when you're poor, when you're young there's a like a nervousness or a drive that I don't think you can replace in a kid that grows up affluent. I just don't think it's possible. I would agree.

And I mean, you've been around all walks of life like I have myself. And the one thing I wouldn't take back because, you know, now they'll be you know, of course, you get successful and people are like, oh, you know, he's got money, he's got this. And it's like, I remember my daddy worked for the highway department. He was a sole provider for the family of four, making like 4500 bucks a month.

And I had a sister and, you know, my both my parents smoked my dad drank a lot of beer. So whatever that 4500 went to, it was a lot less than that after those prices. Right. And so when I needed something, you had to work for it. I remember working my ass off to get a pair of Converse, which is a huge deal.

They're like fifty bucks or something where now, you know, my daughter, she works hard. So I try to instill some of those things on her. But I also try spoiler too much because I'm like, I do not want you to suffer a struggle.

Like I know it's not funny. It's like what makes what makes people interesting. I always say this about my friends, like all my friends that are interesting, grew up, fucked up, all of them, all of them grew up in like crazy households and fucked up and and now they're just like me. They all like really loving parents. They love being a father. Yeah. And and I'm like, God, we're giving these kids a life that is going to ensure they're never going to be interesting.

Yeah, that's no shit. I will say they got for my daughter because I whatever. She's five when we got divorced. And on my side of things you've got backpack hunters and power lifters, photographers, you know, team, you know, like a tier one group guys and ceilidhs, like all walks of life, she speaks two and a half languages working on a two and a half. She's not fluent in three. So I say two and a half.

Three. I don't want to say she's fluent three, but she's and she's shockingly Caucasian and she speaks fluent, fluent Spanish, like literally she's from Mexico. And so that kid, it's a good skill to have. Oh, was I just hired a Cafaro because, you know, we have different, you know, people some of our soldiers and things. It's super handy. She can speak it. Well, I I've we've done good between my ex-wife and I because that kid budgets to a point.

I want to choke her because we she just moved up here and I'm like, look, I'll just pay for it. She's like, no, I don't want any money. I'll do it on my own. I budgeted all this and I'm like, I must have done something right.

Because I, you know, I would have prayed for help because I didn't have help after.

I think sometimes it's just genetics do. It's what makes a kid a kid. Like I have one kid that's insanely ambitious and like super hyper focused. And she whatever she gets into, she becomes obsessed, just completely obsessed. And it's not because of want or need. It's just some weird drive. So it's like, you know, I think they call it epigenetics. It's something that's transmitted down from parent to the child, some desire to for perfection and things.

We should talk about that because that's interesting. I brought up I've never smoked weed in my life. Never. No coke, no heroin. No, no nothing. My dad is a huge pothead. Right. I am incapable of losing. I hate losing. My dad is the most uncompetitive man you would ever meet in your life. And it's weird something, Skip, you know what I mean?

Like, yeah, well, that's my family too. My mom is like real laid back. Like she's not ambitious at all. She's not. She's just real friendly and sweet and easygoing. Yeah. And I've always been just psychotically driven from when I was young I, I came home once, I was running in the snow and I was like sixteen and I had run up. We lived on the hill and I ran up the hill and then ran up the stairs into the house and I opened the door and it's snowing like crazy outside.

And she's got a cup of coffee and concern in the morning was like, I don't even know where you came from. She just goes into the kitchen, has breakfast. I tell you what, though, it is good, you know, I'm not father of the year by any means, but when we do, you know, simple things for your kid to see, like we do backpack cardio and Caylee comes, you know, and she can see you're giving it everything you've got, you know.

You know what I mean? They see that that shit, it's and it's you know, they learn impressionable, I guess. Yeah.

Hell yeah they do. Yeah.

They say like the best way a guy can be a father to his daughter is to, to especially like to set them up for the future is to show them how they should expect to be treated and show them how you treat other people like the way you behave around them is like what they're going to learn. Yeah. Like being if you're respectful and friendly, like the way you are, that is oftentimes better for them to see than even what you teach them and tell them, because what you tell them only goes so far.

But what they see when they see you drive or driven, when they see you work hard, when they see you diligent and respectful and friendly, that's that's what really like sinks. Yeah.

It's it's it's worked good. So I cross my fingers. She's nineteen so I mean, I wouldn't change anything when I was a little fuck it when I was a kid I was bad. Yeah.

I was a fuckin I was a fuckhead for sure. We were talking, you know, where I'm from, where we're bouncing around rabbit holes that I was. There's a lake I live on, it's like nine miles long and you're your product of what you're surrounded by. So, you know, the oh, my dad and his friends, you know, did not like tourists. Right. So we would cut boats loose and push them out in the lake for all the people camping.

Oh, my God. Yeah, it's old enough now. I get in trouble right now.

Dad was teaching you how to do that. He didn't teach you that.

He was just constantly complaining about tourists. Right. So then we would wreak havoc and then go Yogi Bear and, you know, get a camera up, go steal everybody's beer in the middle of the night.

Why did he why did he not like tourists? What was it? I don't know. California was probably the worst one. Right. I mean, friend from Oregon, you know, you from if you're from Idaho, you bitch about people from Washington, right?

I don't you know, my my world was so much different because I left at seventeen and I joined the army. I was in the army for a few years and then I got out. And so from how I was raised to how I end up, it's just it's just different, you know? I mean, I'm 200 people in my hometown. I live in Denver now, for God's sake. So big difference. Giant difference between well.

And I mean, social diversity as well. Yeah.

I mean, like now see from where I was to to like right now the the views I was raised with and I mean, everything has changed, you know, greatly for the better.

I mean, you look back, I mean I'm sure the same thing made you, you know, I mean well my dad was not exactly easy on me, but it made me tougher. So, yeah, I said it's weird. It's like you wouldn't want to go through it again. Right. You don't want to be. But there's some insanely valuable lessons in that. But I think, you know, I mean, I don't I don't think it's impossible to raise a good kid.

You know, if you're you're not struggling. I don't think it's impossible, but I think it's more difficult.

What does that old expression, it's easier for a rich man to pass through the eye of a needle than to go to heaven?

I don't know that way. I think that's an ancient biblical expression.

You my things are much different than that. And I usually get in trouble for them. But yeah, I'm sure that sounds I'm sure that that makes sense. I just bust out your Copan.

I did. Am I called it here. I said I need a bottle to spit it out.

I got this here getting the how often you have to chew that shit.

Funny you mention that about ten and a half a day but boy gave me some once and I swallowed it.

Oh did you, did you puke like Luke every time Luke was a dip. Oh you may end up. I didn't, it didn't even make me sick.

Luke puked all over yesterday just right in the film preview everywhere for the tournament.

And Luke is just yakking like uncontrollably. I'm like, oh good God, somebody get a camera on him. Jimmy thinks it's funny.

I didn't even know you swallowed. It was like that. I didn't know. It's unbelievable to know that, like, that's so disgusting. So I guess if you puked right away. Yeah. No, I didn't puke.

Yeah, that's pretty solid. It's weird. I drank for the first time with Luke not too long ago. I'm drinking a couple of decades.

Oh really. What made you have a drink. Told him I would. He said I want you to get you fucked up on my podcast that you I was his first guest. And so you know, you've known Luke for forever.

I mean, I don't know if you want him.

You don't look quite or we should say who he is. Luke Cogdill, he is involved in MMD, been involved in him forever. Used to be a fighter, works with just engaging. He has a UFC interim lightweight champion.

Yeah, I've known a long time. He's always been around.

Yeah. So we shoot archery constantly and. Back in, everybody listening, I have taken every bit of money from Loki's about to get divorced, just to remind you that Luke and you guys gamble and archery.

Oh my God. And I'm not a good guy to gamble against in archery.

So I didn't know gambling and Archie was a big deal. But it makes sense. It isn't bowling and pool. And we think about it.

If you have, you know, the pick guys, you get, you know, Dudley and Cam and me and you and I don't find Levi Morgan, another of the greatest archer to ever hold a bow in his hand.

I hunted with him in Utah last year. Yeah, it's super cool, dude. We're in camp together. Yeah. Great guy.

Think about the amount of money. If everybody's got a few hundred in their pocket and the shit Duncan starts. Well, yeah, the epic shit talker. But he does not have the skill level to to back that up so he just loves talking shit.

He does. And so I go to minde to gambling. So yesterday I think he's 45 dollars short of paying, but I'm pretty sure he's about to get a divorce from gambling too much. Oh no. Yeah.

Well in pool they would always tell you that you should gamble because it'll make your game better. Hell yes it will. Yeah. And I would imagine that that same thing would be said for for shooting because you would be able to fire under pressure.

Yeah. Well you pack and right now I'm pack and yeah. I'm going to put an upper decker. Upper decker.

Yeah. Do you worry about mouth cancer with that shit. I don't know. Jesus Christ.

Look at the size of that. What. Holy fuck dude. Oh my God. That was crazy. Yeah.

It's worse than the bottom lip. Hmm. I think I was like a handful of grass, like you just grabbed grab some mulch.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I sirtuins in we see. What's that. That fake though. It's not fake, it's strong but it doesn't have the the carcinogens in it. What is it that cracks me. No maybe. Jamie can you look at. Yeah.

How could they take the carcinogens so much. If people hear me coughing. It's not the covid folks. I did a standup this weekend for the first time in three months in Houston. Shout out to Houston and my voice shot from screaming. I'm I didn't realize it, but your voice gets in shape. Yeah. You know, and my voice is way out of shape.

After the first show, my voice was like a little hoarse.

You pack the house.

Yeah, well, it's supposed to be at 75 percent capacity. I think that's what they were. They're saying it was so it was it was packed, though.

It was it was a lot of fun, man. It was weird. It was very weird to be back on stage again. A lot of fun, though, but Ellie's bad right now. They just the Comedy Store just furloughed all of its employees. They were hoping to reopen and they had opened as a bar. So they had outside patio seating and they had it all set up, nice social distance and everything. And then the governor just came down with another order to shut all the bars down.

And now the Comedy Store has no money coming in. So they're fucked. And then it looks like it's not going to they're not going to open up any time soon. They were hoping to open the comedy club back up in August or July. That was the hope. And it looks like that's not happening now. So we're fucked. That sucks. It does suck because in Texas, they had it down.

You wear masks. People wore a mask in the audience. Everybody had masks like getting into the building. All the servers had masks. You know, they checked temperatures in places. They know how to keep people safe. You got to give people the opportunity to make their own decisions.

That's my thing. You know, if you want to wear a mask or stay home, that's your prerogative. Prerogative. But, you know, I'm not of course, you know, I'm young and healthy, so, you know, whatever. I'm not worried about it.

But you lock people in. I mean, I don't see anything good coming coming out of that.

And I know it's not it's not good for the economy. It's not good for the people. It's not good for their sense of, like, how they fit into the world.

Well, and I'm kind of with you. I'm all for fat shaming or I'd be fatter than I am now for one, for fat shaming the health. I mean, you think about how unhealthy people are getting to sit at home. It's not good.

Seventy percent of the United States is overweight. That's insane. I mean, that really is insane. And that's a real problem with covid. They say that one of the major factors in covid is obesity. Obesity, a huge factor.

Yeah. Which is, you know, in general or whatever. It's pretty. I get a kick out of how we're pretty soft, you know, as Americans, I mean, especially in Third World countries. And you look at like people are happy. They don't have to go to work. And I'm like, I no good God.

Like, a lot of people are actually making more money from unemployment. Yeah. Than they would be if they went back to work, especially like waiters and stuff like that, because you're dealing with a much smaller amount of people, the in the in the restaurants and businesses, because they're even in like Texas, even though the restaurants are open, I think I think they were at 75 percent capacity and then they just rolled it back to fifty percent. So if you're working as a waiter or waitress, you know, you're you're going to make less money.

So for some folks, it's actually better for them to say, oh, I don't want to do it. I'm I'm just. Collecting unemployment, and they actually make more money that way. I've talked to a bunch of people that have said that they make more money off unemployment.

Well, we get Kifah. We just kept we just kept paying everybody. You know, we took a four month off, I guess. Just paid everyone we would ever.

And we you know, I was looking at, like, how that worked. And I was like, good God.

Once I started reading about you talk about the unemployment, I'm like, Jesus, there's going to be a lot of people that don't go back to work and know Colorado.

But but it's it's sad, man. It's really sad because there's a lot of people that are losing their businesses through no fault of their own. They didn't do anything wrong. They work hard, they're disciplined. They show up every day. They put together a business and now it's folding. It's going under. And it might be happening to the Comedy Store. I mean, they don't they don't know what they're going to do. And I heard the laugh factor is about to go under as well.

So the state of comedy in California is in a real bad, real bad place right now. Real bad.

Yeah, that sucks. Yeah, it I don't want to dive into this too much, but I just, it just, it's, it's fucked up. It seems way blown out of proportion. And I'm not a conspiracy theorist but how many people do you know they're sick. Personally I know one guy almost died.

Yeah. And he's not an old guy. His name is Michael Yo. He's a comic and he there was a bunch of extenuating circumstances and one of them being that he has vitamin D deficiency, another one being that he flew to New York with very little sleep worn out, did radio and promotion, did TV shows, then did two shows at a comedy club, two shows the next night, flew back home again, very little sleep, got in his car with his family, drove to Vegas to be with his wife's family, and then drove back home on the same day.

So that's at least eight hours in the car just driving. And then he had auditions the next two days and he just was wiped out. It was burning the candle at both ends and he got real sick.

Real immune system was just crushed. Yeah, but that's you shouldn't do that.

All those things. That's too much. You know, it's just poor planning. And then, you know, on top of that, I think he was run down already, like he might have had a little bit of a call already. So it kicked in and it was bad. I mean, he was hospitalized for over a week and his doctor actually told him they were, you know, thinking about putting him on a ventilator. And his doctor said, if we put you on a ventilator, you probably die.

And it turns out his doctor was a wise man because somewhere around 80 percent of the people they put on ventilators in New York City died. Yeah, I heard that. That's crazy. The doctor was saying that if you put the guy if you put him on a ventilator, his body would stop working. It's like if if I give your body this machine that starts working for and your body stops working, there's no guarantee it's going to start working again.

It's going to breathe on its own again. Right. Scary fucking shit, man. Yeah.

That they you know, and but here's the big one, man, the real big one that drives me crazy. Why are they not talking about how to take care of yourself instead of all this fear of you got to wear a mask, you got a social distance and all that stuff is great. Yeah, you should do that. You should wear a mask. You should social distance. But, you know, you should also do drink a lot of water.

You should also get sleep. You should also stop eating sugar. You should also take vitamins, supplement your diet, try to get some sunshine, you know, do do all the things that you need to do for health, get exercise. You increase your cardiovascular capacity. It's a giant factor. And whether or not you, you know, you recover from this disease or how quickly you recover.

No, my my buddy John called and he was like going on a tirade about the exact same thing you're talking about. He you know, he he's you might know me press. He's shooter, long range shooter.

He is super fit guy lawnmower, you know, normally. Right. He owns like a lawn mowing deal anyway. But he's one of the better shooters in the United States or fucking North America.

Long range rifle shooting. Yeah. Yeah, he's crazy. I would not want him shooting at me in a thousand yards. And he you know, his thing was, is why the fuck aren't we given people dieting advice? Why are we telling people rather than having all these announcements, it's like, hey, we're losing so much money, like let's start focusing. People are dietitians. Let's let's get people on a health food kick later. Like, I mean, how many people and you pick one hundred people.

Ninety nine. Probably understand how to eat healthy right now.

Not their fault. Right. They just I didn't know how to talk. Yeah. Yeah. So I agree.

And I mean, you know, on my end I'm super lucky we live at 10000 feet. You know, you have my wife dropped me off the bottom of the mountain, so I have to hike home to get dinner. Right. You want you want a way to get healthy eating. So she dropped me off at the bottom of the mountain and I go to the top. She eats, she cooks all organic. And I talk to some of these people that have other issues and they're worried about covid.

And I'm like, we're about fucking covid, right?

You've got a hundred other problems. covid, right. You're like diabetic and a bunch of other shit. It's amazing not to get on a diet thing, but America's pretty bad as far as that goes. We should put some money into that.

Our health system is all about fixing you once you're broken. It's not about. Venting you from being broken, everything is about our health care system is all about care once you're injured or care once you're sick, it's very little is about preventative nutrition and making sure you take care of your body and education.

I mean, our governor, all our mayors, all these people are doing is just talking about wearing masks and talking about staying home, flattening the curve, making sure that, I mean, all this shit they're talking that no advice at all about taking care of yourself.

No advice at all on meditation. No advice at all on eating healthy and exercise.

Yeah, it's sad I say that as I just jammed a giant wad of chew and so on. But how bad is that for you though? I mean, if you I mean as far as like what is it doing?

It gives you a little jolt, right. Yeah.

Well for, for me obviously the worst things obviously cancer. Right. I mean, that's bad.

But other than that, I mean there's not how many people get cancer from that shit is a real common man.

I'd have to look that up. I don't know I. What's that? They're neuro gum.

This is the other kind of shit I'm addicted to. This is good stuff. This nootropics in mint form, you've already got me addicted. All that shit on on it. You know what?

The first time I took Alpha Brain, now that we're just diving down all the time, I had the most craziest dreams which I knew that shit worked because I don't dream. And but either way, I mean as far as the Copenhagen, I'm just my buddy was addicted to cocaine and Copenhagen to try to quit both. He still, too, in Copenhagen. So give me an idea. It's not easy to quit. But that then what we were talking about it.

It is just nicotine in it.

It's the iron. So that's why it's swinging.

And this first time in my life, I think I'm going to be able to quit. So I went from a can and a half a day to about a can every four days. There it is are Zenn.

Nicotine pouch is safe. Recently a novel non tobacco nicotine product in has been developed is similar similar to snus. I never knew how to say yes.

OK, thank you.

I think however, it contains no nitrosamines that the word nitrosamines or polysyllabic hydrocarbons which may be potential, may potentially be carcinogenic. The overall safety of ZENN is better than snoots. However, it only has a little bit less nicotine than snus. OK, what does that mean? I don't know. They just say don't read anything bad.

You're going to take away my birthday here. I so it's a pouch so you don't have to pack a water mulch and stuff it into your face. Yeah. Yeah. It's a little more professional. It just gives you a jolt.

I tell you what, I put two of them in the first time and I got dizzy as shit. So it's got some strong I mean because they said it's a hundred cigarettes and a can of chew really equal of Copenhagen. Oh my God. It's really. Oh man.

And one hundred cigarettes were the nicotine. That's what they say. So how many cigarettes were through that giant wad that you stuffed in your face.

I don't know how many, I'm sure to get some hate mail from this. I'm talking about being fat and unhealthy and I'm sure in Copenhagen.

But I. Well, what's a stimulant?

Yeah, well, the other thing, the physical addiction that's the problem with then you don't spit. Right. You know, get used to that. I mean, so you just hold it in your mouth. Well swallow it. I do it.

Taste good. Maybe that's why I got so dizzy. I got like a citrus one or whatever. But I just first time in my life where I've been like, yeah, honey, I think I might be able to quit.

One of the stunt guys I used to work with on Fear Factor, I used to swallow his chew and he told me that he learned he used to swallow the spit, you know, and he term me, learned how to do that on sets because you couldn't just carry a bottle around and spit into it or spit into a cup. Yeah. So he just would swallow the juice. And I thought it was so fucking disgusting.

It is disgusting habit. That's pretty bad. So but yeah. I don't know, whatever we'll see I guess in three months. If I texted you I'd be like, hey, I fucking quit. Do you drink a lot of coffee too.

No, I do not drink a decent amount of coffee. I mean I a caffeine you know, I get migraines so I'm five hundred milligrams a day. I really much map it out.

So you take caffeine to avoid migraines. No, I just know that I because I get as I say, that when I got on TRT, I get a migraine once every three months. I was getting them once a week. So whatever TRT did, which I thank you for that. Right.

Let's talk about that in a minute.

But I, I learned really quickly in neuropsychologists and brain doctors, they don't know a fucking thing about the human brain. They're like, here, take your pills.

No. And so I literally don't we're in real trouble.

They're giving me these bandaids. And I'm like, look, I don't want something that fixes after I got it. I don't want to fucking get them right. Like, you know, this thing could pretty much make my asshole turn around, start talking back to me. The fucking negatives to this pill I'm taking for my my migraines are so bad.

I mean, you was it one of those pills? There's some pills you take once a week. I just take it when I get one. So I have ocular migraines. I couldn't I couldn't tell you two apart. When I get home, I get blurry vision. Oh, an hour before I get the migraine.

So I take that. Soon as I get blurry vision now my head itches and I'm all kinds of goofy, there's some kind of anti anxiety or depression in that thing. A bunch of other shit, I don't know, but I don't get a migraine.

But those pills cannot be good for you. I wanted to get to a point. Is it my diet? I mean, is that what's giving me the migraine? Is it caffeine? You know, because there was a time I didn't take any caffeine. So I map out everything. And I kept a log of when I got migraines. And so once I got that's why. No, describe what it feels like.

I've never had a migraine was I feel like Jamie pounding a fucking nail through my eye socket.

Just so just intense pain, I guess, when I start to get a spinal epidural for it because I was heaving up blood because I was convulsing, basically. What I'm not the only ones.

Yeah. Yeah. So when you get them and they're not all that bad, but you get sick and you would vomit uncontrollably and then your esophagus would rub together whatever and you thought vomiting blood. And so, so you're from explaining like where's the blood coming from.

You said you're from the gas is rubbing, rubbing together, heaving no different. When your kidneys rub together and you dehydrate, you piss blood. Same principle, except it's yours.

That's what that is. Your kidneys are rubbing together as this all science. Yeah, I peed blood a few times on my backpack. Once you run out of water, kidneys rub together and you rub together.

That's what's causing it. Yeah, I guess so. It seems wrong. Well, I'm not a doctor.

I just play one on a podcast. But I've had doctors tell me that's why your kidneys rub together.

Well, so your esophagus is rubbing together from your heaving from the pain of the migraine. From the. Yeah. From the migraine motherfucker.

So people listening to this, I'm sure you're going to get all kinds of emails, because when I started talking about in a podcast, I started getting tons of people. This is what I took to get rid of them. You know, I mean, literally hundreds of people that have suffered from migraines. And I've had a lot of concussions, you know, shit.

So that I'm sure that's part of the problem. Well, part of the problem is my blood pressure is extremely low.

When did you get the concussions from the service or.

I had one bad one there. I had two bad ones and football, flipped a bike over, got kicked and kicked in the head once later on.

It was pretty bad. I was in a car wreck and another one. So I've had nine. And the migraines come after that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And actually I recently had. You'll like it. I don't, I don't want to listen to it. I had Steve Tetrault. He was a station with him in Korea. I got hit with an eighty four, got fired off a rocket launcher was right behind it. That's how I get that big. Not on my head up here. That was when they started. That was bad.

And so whatever Michael Yo who were talking about before, he actually played football in high school and college and he had some real bad concussions and he gets migraines because of that as well. Yeah, that's I think there's probably a connection.

Well, I would I would think that have to be.

But one thing I notice is my whatever's going on in my Melen, my blood pressure is low and I got a bit of a temper problem. And so when I my anger spikes up, my blood pressure rises, I get a migraine the next day.

That's the real connected, you know, like brain damage and temper is very connected. Well, I started working on meditation.

Like, I really you know, I've really helped in my shooting because I can really focus. I you know, I can get I mean, where does it sounds? Right. I become one with yourself. I try to so try and keep my blood pressure low.

Well, I think with the TRT, my blood thickened up. So from when, you know, when I wasn't taking it, my blood was super thin.

Maybe that's it.

When you say thickened like more red blood cells.

Well, when I say thickened, this has no scientific nothing. When they check my blood every three months when they first took my blood, it ran like water. When they took it the next time, they were like, hey, your blood sticking up, whatever that is. But red blood cell count, I don't know.

They were like, your blood is thicker. It is not is not as thin or runny as it was before. And I'm like, it's my blood pressure up there. I said, well, it's normal now for everybody.

Listening is welcome to another episode of two morons talking about medicine.

As we're saying that I told the lady that I work with and she basically said the same thing. She's like, well, we'll take credit for it, although I don't know that there's any scientific weight on the subject.

But the moment I started taking Terreros, testosterone increases the chance of clot formation in two ways. A common side effect of testosterone therapy is then we go with the words polysemy, which increases the body's supply of hemoglobin and haematocrit and hematocrit affecting the blood cells.

This can increase the blood pressure and thicken the blood slightly. Then you go see, I'm not full of shit like everyone.

I was 100 percent truthful. So science, whether that has to do with it, that's just a red neck.

We avoiding saying I don't get migraines anymore. And that could be why, whatever the actual scientific reason is, my blood is definitely. Thicker and my blood pressure is normal. Well, one of the things that happens also to people that have had a bunch of head injuries is your current system doesn't function properly. Your pituitary gland doesn't produce hormones correctly, and it makes people depressed.

Gocha makes you very lackadaisical and lethargic. It's very difficult to get motivated for things. And they find that with football players, particularly with soldiers, a lot of soldiers that are treated by my friend Dr Mark Gordon. He runs this traumatic brain institute. And the whole goal of this is it was essentially to try initially to try to figure out why these soldiers and football players and martial artists and all these people were experiencing so much depression, what was going on?

And it turned out that when your pituitary gland is really sensitive. Yeah, well, an endocrine system just get really fucked up by even jet skiing.

Well, luckily, like, they like having my blood tested every three months. You know, I don't go to the doctor. I'm bad about that. And so that was like the first time I had a physical, basically.

And so ever a couple of decades. Yeah.

I don't know. I got pneumonia once and I went to the doctor for that. I almost died.

I was too stupid to, you know, how a man or a woman, whatever, how a certain individuals brain works is stupid. Looking back at it, I thought I had like allergies or something. And I'm like, hey, let's go do cardio. Let me work this out of my system. I work my ass right into the hospital. I double pneumonia and. Oh, wow. Yeah, I'm an idiot for trying to push. Yeah.

Oh yeah. I pushed my way right. And almost death like the pneumonia when I was 19. It was rough.

Well I took me like six months to get back on track, but the lady was super nice. I remember going in and she's like, Hey, who's your doctor?

I'm like, I don't I don't have a doctor. And she's like, well, you have Kaiser Insurance. I'm like, if I have a doctor, I haven't seen him. You know, I'm like, you tell me who my doctor is because I don't know, you know, because they assign you right.

You're not one of those responsible people, not your doctor. Negative. I'm horrible. I'm like the worst adulterer known to man.

It's bad. And so she gave me the x ray and they're like, you have double lung pneumonia and adultery is hard. It is.

You know, people give me you know, you suck at anything good photography, shooting. I'm like, yeah, I'm fucking horrible to doting. I didn't file my taxes for four years. I've got a lot of downfalls. Oh, it's all taken care of now.

Well, it's when I have people at work, they come up with an issue and they're kind of embarrassed. I'm like, look, there is nothing you have fucked up that I haven't. Do not be embarrassed. I can help you because I focus on so many other things. Things like that just get pushed to the waist.

Do you find that because of all the time you spend the woods, that it's kind of difficult to concentrate on all that silly shit? Because it's when you're out in that primal environment, you know, like there's something about it that makes all that other stuff seem meaningless. You don't want to focus on it.

Yeah, because we live in a society where it's important that I'm not good at it. It's horrible. I talk about all the time at work. I mean, I hire people really smart around me because I'm just not you know, we could be sitting there in a meeting actually and say this out loud, which is an extremely important meeting. And I'm sitting here thinking what my gear list is and how much my caloric intake will be on a five day backpack hunt.

Is this normal, though? If you're spending fifty percent of your time literally sleeping under the stars, what's it?

Cause we'll get done with a meeting. I'm like, who took notes?

Because I, but I, I am now have gotten better at just telling people ahead of time like, hey, you're going to talk with me, we're going to do our initial bullshit session. You're not going to want to deal with me to ask them to let you down. I'm too busy. You're going to deal with Frank or Dana Ronda's or whoever that works for me. You're going to go with him. Don't expect me to come through because that my mind's on too much other stuff and I've had to get a lot better at that because I just don't function well on stuff like that.

Yeah, I mean, it's the one of the reasons why the company is so good and you guys make such good backpack's is because there's there's real like it's hard to put it down in the real world. You know, it's not like accounting or bookkeeping and like where, you know, oh, we have to do the work here, but doing the work of actually sleeping under the stars, actually camping, actually hunting and hiking, that's there's that's invaluable.

There's been a few heated arguments over that where they've given me crap about paperwork and I'm like, oh, you know, totally, I get it. I'm going to get better paperwork. But sure.

As it's coming with me on a ten day backpack hunt and you're not fucking slacking and you're getting water and you're building fires and you're spotting animals. And when we get done with that, if you're as good at that as I am, then I'm going to get better at paperwork. But until that fucking day, right now, what we're good at is making bad ass gear for the back country. That's why I hired you.

Yeah, it's kind of work together, right? Yeah. Well, you've got to be able to do that and they've got to be able to do the shit that you can't do.

Yeah. And we have a tight knit group now, which is great, like we have everybody knows their role and we're all supportive of each other.

And but there's times where I got to kind of stop and really take it like gut check where I'm like, man, I have so solely focused my life.

On living and not dying like like hunting and staying alive to wear, thank God for my wife, right? I mean, she's an angel because, like, she's we're getting hit by a house. Right. And so we I actually missed this. So we go to get credit. Right. Credit like a credit check. My credit score. When would you say is the last time I had credit?

I don't know. When was the last time you had credit? What would you take a guess what normal human four years ago. Twenty.

So they're like, well, your debt to income ratio is great, which is unheard of. And I'm like, oh, cool. Like, you don't need credit. And I'm like a cell phone.

Like, No, you don't have any credit because you don't have like a leased car or you haven't had a mortgage or any of those things been out of fucking anything.

And so I was like, so let me get this right. I'm not going to say how much I make, but I do good. I'm like, so my wife makes substantially less, has substantially more bills. And her credit score, she gets approved for more than I.

Well, they want to they want to show that you have a history of paying things back. Like I was told that early on, like to get credit you should actually get a loan. I was like, well, wouldn't it be better if I saved money? Well, no, it's actually better if you spend money and pay the bills.

Well, I can tell you, I made an ass of myself at that loan office because I was like, Are you fucking kidding me? I'm like, so I can go right now and buy a vehicle cash.

But that's bad and that's bad.

My wife is laughing her ass off because she knew how I live like a caveman. I mean, I don't get bills, I, I save anybody. Like, I bought a tundra, I paid cash for it.

But it should not be healthy. I thought it seems like it's fiscally prudent. You are wrong Joe, because I literally I was like so we had to go. It's so I go to believe it or not I go to discount tire.

I got approved for twelve hundred dollars, which is insane for what I make. And I'm like, so this is I can get four tires. It's all I got, you know, like well you don't have, you know, any credit. And so my credit score now is like seven, ten.

Oh that means so you have to just buy more shit with credit to get credit.

Oh my wife went and got we got to be in a photo card we got so we just got a bunch of cards that we could pay off. I maxed them all out so she can make payments.

It is fucking weird isn't it, that we exist like that. I mean that's the only way people could buy houses really though. I mean, how if you're making 100000 dollars a year and you want to buy a 600000 our house, that's like impossible. You'd have to by the time you're done saving you. I mean, the house would be worth more than that anyway.

Well, see, my wife gets a kick out of it because she knows how. I mean, you know, I'm super close to me. And so she knows how my brain functions. And I'm like, why don't people just work harder and, you know, go do some side jobs?

You figure shit out? Well, she's like, yeah, no, people don't do that. Honey, you're weird. They put it on credit and I'm like, well, I'll go put somebody's shower door and I'll figure it out.

Well, living your life that way for twenty years is not good.

Well, a lot of people are finding that out because of this pandemic, the living like that with credit and, you know, having high bills and paying those bills off. And that's what a lot of companies did because they thought it was the right way to do it. Yeah, and those companies are fucked right now because they've had no income coming in at all for three or four months and it's going to implode. My buddy Andrew Schultz said it best.

He said this pandemic has exposed weaknesses both in people's health and in businesses financial health. It's exposed the flaws in the way they operate.

Now, I it was an eye opener for me.

And this isn't like something to be proud of that I haven't been getting adult thing for twenty years, but I just I, I literally was like, oh, if I want a set of binoculars, I save up by Bernanke.

How many people contacted you to talk to you about hunting though.

Once shit started getting weird, an awkward level and not just hunting sustainment because. Yeah. Can I try to name a Baako. Yeah. I'm John Baquero, works with Sidcup Gear and he and I are. If he wasn't my brother you would have never known. Same mentality, same thought process, same ideas on gear. And he love that guy. He's great. We just did a podcast. He's like, are you sure this is going to piss anybody off?

I'm like, fuck it, they need to hear it. Right.

And so what were you pissing people off with the reality of how life works living in the woods and the people that fake it, basically, you know, how many people, you know, stay out there three days and all of a sudden they're experts, right? Yeah. The reality of photos. Yeah. Yeah, the reality of living, being able to survive and be happy and then what you read and everything else basically just, you know, talking about that.

So with the if OK, so everybody grab toilet paper, write in third world countries, you wipe your ass with your hand, you don't worry about toilet paper.

So toilet paper's gone, wet wipes are gone.

You go to the grocery store, everything that lasts forever is still there. Like you get pasta, Top Ramen, simple stuff. It's all on the shelves. But all these things that Americans have to have, I'm not saying I want to wipe my ass with my hand by any means. But you don't need toilet paper to survive, right? You need clean water, right? You need food. Your body will last quite some time, three or four weeks without food.

With water a couple of days, and so I'm looking at all these things leaving and I have on my I'm not like a proper by any means, but we've got Creped a house. And I was, you know, so that this came story time for my wife or I'm explaining to her what would happen if everything kind of shit hits the fan and what's going to happen. And Americans are so weird with the way that we think. And so I had tons of people from what kind of gun?

What kind of survival stuff? Firestarter, what kind of stove? So, you know, isobutane stoves, a canister stove. That's the one thing everybody uses those but a multi fuel still, when the world come on the world in, zombies are coming. A multi fuel stove, burns, kerosene, diesel gas, white gas burns, everything. No one uses those anymore. They're a little bit heavier. But things like that, that multifocal stove, everyone should have one of those because you can no matter where you go, you're going to have some type of fuel to burn in that thing.

So we talked a lot about that on the podcast.

That was a lot of the questions I got was, you know, sustainment muchly.

So, I mean, it's a weird world we live in. But I live I definitely live probably in a weirder one in some ways.

Yeah. I mean, everybody wanted to know how to get a gun. Everybody wanted to know how hard is it to go hunting for the first time. Those those are the questions that I got a lot like how do you get a gun was a big one. And there was lines also the L.A. gun stores.

It was really crazy to say, well, my wife was worried about I'm like, honey, don't worry, I'm going to take theirs. Like, don't worry. They don't know how to use it. We're good. So somebody comes, try to get your stuff.

Oh, well, in my with a local game warden, he was we text back and forth, he was like, dude, you would not believe how many people are like, I'm just going to go wait it out, drove their asses into the mountains and set up some Wal-Mart tent and then a snowstorm hit like this isn't a story.

This he's like, dude, we're pulling people out like crazy that they were doing this in March. Yeah. In Colorado. Yeah. So. Oh, Jesus. He was laughing. And he's like, dude, you would not believe the amount of people that were like, I'm going to go wait this thing out in the woods. And it's like you're camping beside the road. You're not really taking anything out.

So people don't even understand once you just one night by yourself out there and you would have a totally different understanding of what it actually means to exist in the wilderness without assistance. And it's very scary. We're we're so accustomed to life with assistance, whether it's buildings or electricity or air conditioning and federation and all the different things that we use. Supermarkets, we're we're so, so. Dowi Oh, yeah.

Well, so soft. Winzer what's the longest you've gone without talking to somebody.

Not very long. Jamie Maybe a day. So you look at like a loan, you know, explaining to my wife, I'm like the gear they have is enough, like they have enough to survive. It's like what kills people is they are alone. They don't have that many people to talk to. Right. They don't. The fear. Think about how many people are afraid of the dark grow from it and then what to you know, what to do.

If something happens, there's all that unknown.

And that to me, like we go out for fun for 14 days, backpack in with what's on our back for 14 days, and we're choosing to do that.

What about solo? What's your longest solo show? 14 14 solo. And boy, you better not have any fucking skeletons in the closet.

Man, I talk about this a long time. You want to talk about everything you fucked up in life by about day seven.

You're like, I'm a piece of shit. I should have done more for my kid. Why didn't I?

Because you have seven days to think about everything you've done wrong. And that's one thing that people really need to understand is getting right with which I've tried to work on a ton is just getting right with everything in life that, you know, up until that point, like any wrongdoings you've made any anything, any skeletons just to clean them up.

Well, if you stay busy in life, you can avoid all your mistakes. You stay busy, don't think about your mistakes. But when you're alone and you have downtime, that's when they creep into your mind.

Well, and then sleep deprivation, water deprivation, food deprivation, all of that along with, you know, being alone starts to take a toll on the human mind.

And it's funny, you see the same with alone, the same backpack on. You know, I get thousands of emails. You know what? I'm going on my first backpack going in for 14 days.

And I'm like, yeah, you're not going to go in 14 days. But that's your plan, right?

You're going to run about three. Colorado loves you. You're going to donate five hundred bucks to an oak tag and you're going to get in there. You're going to bitch out. You're going to head back out about three days. We're going to take your money and you're giving it back. Is that the average.

Yeah, yeah. Three or four. So a lot of guys think they're going to be able to do it. And what what gets them. You think what's the what's the first thing that gets them other than mentally weak.

Right. That's that's the what gets that's the big one. Right. Yeah. I mean you know, I mean you know not to bring up Cam again, but he blew that up like it was fun.

Right. He's crazy, I have to say.

Like like he's not a gear geek. Right. Camera's just harder than woodpecker lips. Right. He's he's not a gear.

When I say he's not a gear geek, he's so fucking tough. Like I talked about his demeanor the other day, I used him as example. He he pushed this Gore Tex Bivy, which is the worst thing in the world to sleep in. But he's so tough he didn't give a shit. Well, all these people are sleeping and it's a Gore Tex coffin, right. You don't get you can hardly punch your clown in that fucking thing, let alone have fun in it.

And so when weather comes in, you're in this cortex and you can't do anything your gear.

So Gore takes bivy is just like basically like a sleeping bag that's made out of waterproof material and you just sleep in it and it probably has no breathability or very little. Very little.

I mean, it has some. But you could condensation in your foot box and then if you use down your foot box is once it down flat, it's flat. It's no good.

It's a contractor's bag. Pretty much. Yeah. And I mean they make some that are decent.

But, you know, I would laugh so hard when Cam was coming up and people are reading all this stuff and I'm like, yeah, you're not fucking Cam, right?

Like, you know, you can do you can think you want to be. And when you go when you hike in, usually, you know, if you're you're coming from back east, right. You forums and all Facebook, whatever, all the shit you did forget in your pack and way too much shit. Right. Like gear list wise then go over in a minute. But you're packing probably thirty pounds of shit you don't need. And so then you're smoked going in and you've watched way too much Primo's videos and you think they'll just come in screaming in on it in that fucking doesn't happen and you don't see them.

And then the oh like my knees hurt right.

Or Oh I got to get back to my business. All the excuses come up, you know, and you can come up with some shit. Right. I've heard some amazing excuses for coming out throughout these. You're just not tough enough. And I'm not saying that, like, you know, me or Cam or Frank or whoever is tougher. But the reality is, if you are mentally tough and you really wanted it, you would stay as long as.

And a lot of that mental toughness comes with experience to it. Imagine, and it also comes with the experience of forcing your body to do tough things. You know, one of the things that Cam talks about is that he really got into endurance racing to improve his hunting. When he first told me that, I thought that was the dumbest thing I've ever heard, I was like, I don't even get it. Like you're running to prove your up.

But then once you do it for a while, you go, oh, OK, I get it. First of all, I had no idea you get that tired hunting, just hiking, just walking around the woods is fucking exhausting. Yeah. And then when you add a pack, especially if you're living off your back like you do, you know, just way I do it where I'm staying in a lodge or, you know, I've got a tent somewhere, just carrying your stuff that you're hunting with is exhausting.

But it's also something about continually and regularly pushing your body and your brain way past the point where you want to quit and. Doing it so that you're comfortable with being uncomfortable and most people in everyday life are not comfortable with being uncomfortable. They never really get to that place.

Yeah, if you become friends with pain, you'll never be alone. And that's what you look at it like. And I'm not trying to blow it out of proportion because it is fun if that's what you're into. But in reality, you're looking at two to seven to eight miles in it. And in Colorado, you're at 10 to 12000 feet.

When I think about preparing for those things besides the should the camp does, I think about that fucking machine that you showed me. That's an incline treadmill that has barbells on the side that you lift up. So you're carrying this thing where you're going up a treadmill for Macquarie.

What is that thing that hit middle legs? Pull that shit up.

So, yeah, we have a ridiculous we have the name for that which we can cuss on here. So it's called the Cocksucker because it I put forty fives on either side.

The problem with that name is some people like sucking cock and everybody likes getting a cock, so nobody likes getting on that goddamn thing. I think when we first got it.

So how I got which actually leads into that thing. So this thing you're doing a farmer's carry uphill on a treadmill. And folks, when I tell you, just looking at this thing hurts my feelings.

So how I got that, the guy you have to get one of those. The guy that's which I guess I could whatever we can talk about this, the guy that's actually purchasing safari with me, I took him on a goat hunt the day before we went on the goat hunt. He had that downstairs.

And I'm like, dude, that is like perfect. And he was like, man, get on it. So I got on it with no, wait. He had forty five on either side. And I'm like, this is made for backpack honey. All right.

Yeah. I would imagine that's probably other than actually hiking yourself, that's probably one of the best ways you could ever get in shape for that.

Well you think about it, you look at like his little video there. So what I do is I have a 45 to 60 pound pack and I have 245 pound dumbbells and then I'll do five minute intervals with just a pack and then I'll grab the dumbbells and I'll do five minutes of shrugs or just holding the weight up with 45. Then I go and I put it down to like basically a half mile an hour. And I do a truck pull and I put my hands.

And you're basically just driving forward with your body, not parallel to the ground, but just like if you're pulling a truck with a harness and I do that and then I do those three exercises and interviewing for 30 minutes and I'm pretty fucked up by the time I can.

That looks like pull that picture up again. The video that shot that looks like one of the hardest things you could do in terms of like something you could do in a gym if you're carrying that weight like that, farmers care and you're going uphill on a cell. It's a self-propelled treadmill, too, right? Yeah, I have one of those outside when those air runners. Yep.

I fucking love it.

Well, you can't break it is what's nice, right? The self-propelled.

Well it's just so hard to work on. Yeah but that thing's amazing. And does it vary the pitch. Can you raise it and lower.

You can't vary the pitch. You can just vary the resistance. So I hit the brake when I'm doing a truck pull I drop the brake on it.

And so you literally can vary the resistance of the treadmill. So yeah, there's a brake. Oh yeah. It's on the left side. Oh my God, that sounds amazing.

But one thing about stabilizer muscles, though, I would think that they don't necessarily have the same work. What if you did it with what do you wear those shoes that they got sued for? Kim Kardashian was promoting them. They're like real fat, mushy shoes. Yeah, like and so they made you kind of stabilize your ankle, OK? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I would think that those actually would be good to wear on something like that because it would be, you know, what a sand dune stepper is.

Yeah, they suck. Yeah. They'd good in a good way. I got one out here. Yeah. They'll burn out. Yeah.

They work different parts of your leg. Yeah.

You are stabilizing right. Yeah. And I would imagine like having a sand dune stepper type shoe on while you are going on that thing would be the ultimate.

Well you're right and people do not think about that.

And that's one thing that guys that just run on on pavement, flat ground, you're when you see a stabilizer muscle or whatever you want to call it, the left and right part of your shins, the first time you take a guy out that hasn't hiked side hills like 35 degree slopes with the 45 pound pack, their legs or their calves are smoked in the left and right side of their shinbone is just toasted because they're not working those in that lateral stability.

People understand. That's why I'm not a runner. So I don't like running, but I train with a pack on and I hike everywhere. And so we I do a lot of side hills just to get those muscles ready for that because it's a different world. And it'll it'll Chaohu I mean, you'll be down for a couple of days because they're so sore and stiff if you never use them in that treadmill does not help with that.

But when I said like that, the sand seper stucks. It's a good suck because it's a way indoors you can. Yeah, yeah.

One ways I try to explain to people stable stabilizer muscles is an upside down kettlebell press. I was like, take a kettlebell.

They compress. Fairly easily, like a 35 pound kettlebell. Most guys can press that overhead now, take it and flip it upside down so that the handle is on the bottom and the kettlebell is above. So you got to balance that sucker out. And as you're lifting it, it's way more difficult to do. And that's that's using your stabilizer muscles.

Yeah. And the other thing is those bamboo bars, if you ever use one of those. Yeah, yeah.

We put all those. Well, some of that shit I copied from you for my for my home gym, that's another one. Those you don't realize how much those kick the shit out until you get them. Yeah. Pretty amazing.

It looks so easy. But when you put when you've got a bamboo bar and I do it, I hang kettle bells with rubber bands. So I have like heavy resistance bands that are hanging the kettlebell. So it's all bouncy. Yeah. And so as you're lifting that fucker.

Yeah.

But you know, really stabilizes everything. Keeps everything tight. It's funny how much you can torture yourself with torture yourself with very little I, I got that big rope and I just my forearms, I got issues.

I talk to you about it, tendonitis or whatever. So me doing the rope workout, it just I wasn't doing, I was hurting my forearms and so I turned that into a rope drag. I hooked one of my belts from Cafaro and hooked a harness to it. And I pulled to that thing in half and wrapped it with gorilla tape and I dragged it up and down my driveway. Fuck me, that's horrible.

It's bad, but I say bad when you've kind of committed your life to backpack hunting, there's only so many ways that you can get you know, you just got to beat the shit out of yourself to get ready.

So like people say, I'm crazy. We live at 10000 feet. My wife dropped me off the highway and then she goes home and she goes with me a lot, too. But how far is the walk?

Anywhere from five to two to five miles, depending on where she dropped me off.

And it's getting a couple thousand feet. It's a climb. It sucks. But the best way if you're not feeling like working out is have your wife leave you in the middle of nowhere. You're fucking getting home, right? You're a necessity. Yeah, necessity.

And so when people don't, I try to put myself in a position to where I have to do something, if that makes sense, because there's days you just don't feel like doing shit. I mean. Right, so. Right. I just make my wife drop me off and I'll tell her, you know. Yeah. I would say earn my day like I've got her in my day, you know, and I keep track of my steps on my watch.

And so she'll drag my ass to bottom like her fifty pounds and she'll laugh leaving.

I always tell people one of the best ways to make sure you do something is have a list. Just have a list of what you got to do today. Just make sure you're doing it. Just write it down. It seems so crazy. But if you don't have a list, if you don't have it written down, well, you absolutely have to do, man. You're going to slack off. You're going to find reasons why you should do less, or especially if you do like.

What I do is when I left, I trained myself for the most part. You know, sometimes I work with trainers. I work with a kickboxing trainer now. But most of my weightlifting sessions I do by myself. So I have to I right out what I need to do. And if I don't do that, I mean, then I feel like a pussy. But if I if I have it written down, like today you're running two miles in the hills.

Today you're doing this. You're doing that. If I don't do that, it's you're not going to get it done. If you could just give yourself a manageable goal to start with, it's real simple.

Make sure, like for every day this week you're going to do forty pushups, you're going to do 50 sit ups. Just give yourself some kind of manageable go get a chin up bar. Do you know twenty channels every day. Just do that. Just see that's a manageable thing. Like you can do that in thirty minutes, you get all that done and you're good. But if you force yourself to do that every day man, you're going to feel real results, real results like at the end of the week you're going to go fuck I did it and then ramp it up some more, ramp it up some more.

But it's all about writing it down.

Yeah, I got a whiteboard and yeah, in fact I wrote something on the whiteboard once in a bunch. I think you and Jack who did a podcast because the one day I just wrote on there, just do something. Yeah.

And I think you guys must have done a podcast, talked about that because I, you know, people I mean, I know not everybody has a free schedule, but even when I worked construction, you can make time. Most people can make time. Now, I don't sleep that much, which isn't a good thing.

But the hours are good and I've recently got up to six, which is pretty good for me. I was at four for a long time. Damn yeah.

But if you heard my day when I, I said it because you want to sleep for I mean you getting up early or is it just you have insomnia.

I have insomnia. I just don't sleep. I sleep. I go to sleep. Well I don't sleep for that long.

And now when you wake up is waking up with something bothering you in your head or you just fuck, I'm awake.

I'm just like, fuck, I'm awake. And I got a lot to do. And so but it's gotten better to where I've been tracking it on my watch. I think you got a shock. That's why you wear this is one of those ones tracks my steps and calories and everything. So I sort a Garmin.

Yeah. The book is this Phoenix Axler. I think that work on solar power.

It helps it. Yeah. Helps battery life. So I didn't not like the original because they died pretty quickly, you know, batteries, the batteries, this. Less almost like three or four weeks, Realto, and the way that I navigate often UQM grid coordinate, I don't need to leave it on very long. So it works. I can use it for a long time.

So that work with navigation, how long will it last?

Man, if you left it on I would think. Man Three or four days maybe. Really.

So in that three or four days it's supplementing with solar. Is that what it is. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. So that's fucking amazing.

So the way that I, you know, navigate, which actually going back to the board, I can't agree with you more like I just write shit down and it may be three sets of 50 crunches, three sets of 50 push ups.

So you do it. Yeah. And then check them off the list. Right. And so in those are the days when I say I don't want to do anything, those days on my ass is getting dropped off the bottom. Hell, because you fucking have to do something that you're going to get home. But with the way that I navigate and I give people crap about this all the time.

Right. You got to watch in a garment in reach and a GPS. You got all kinds of shit to navigate. You don't fucking use it. That's like a big pet peeve of mine. You got all this technology put, you hit the easy button on everything. You never learned how to use it.

And so I'm like a real stickler on land nav, like learning how to navigate to a certain degree and not just using a GPS. And so what I do is I have a is an eight or ten digit UTM grid coordinate and I need a map.

And what does that mean? So the way the world was mapped, basically, and I'll try to explain this is I can from from top to bottom, there's lines drawn around it spaced and then there's Halling, horizontal lines drawn around it. And each one of those is a square. And as you break that down in squares, you end up with a thousand meter grid square. This is like a very plain Jane way to explain it inside of that grid square.

When I turn this on, it tells me inside of that grid square how far I am from left to right and how far I am from bottom to top, so easting and northing and so inside that thousand meter grid square. My pinpoint location is a ten digit grid coordinate within three meters of my location. So anyway, once it gives me that, I can plot out and up to where I am and said that grid score on my map and give me my exact location.

So what it means is if I'm all fucked up and have no idea where I'm on, I just turn on my watch and it tells me and then I plot it out on my map.

And then if I was OK, so it plot, it shows you on your watch and then you just look down at the map to save power and you actually know how to use a compass and navigate and actually use a map.

Yeah, exactly. That's on a map skill. You'll have all these different grid squares and so they draw for people.

Just listen. And he's drawn stuff right now on paper.

So if it's a thousand meters over and a thousand meters up, a thousand meter box. OK, so if I take a line and I'm 700 meters easting or to the right, so I go over 700 meters and then I'm 300 meters up, I go up 300 meters where those intersect. So then you know where you are and where I'm at.

And so what people don't understand, like if you talk about intersection and resection, if you're lost, so let's say Jamir been the woods very much.

So you're out and you don't know where you're at. But, you know, two known points. So meaning you can see a mountain over here and here and you know what those are and you have a map from where you're at. You can shoot and asthmas to the top of this mountain. What's an azimuth?

You take your compass and it's the basically out of the 360 degrees.

It's the the azimuth or the the the direction of that mountain from where you're at.

So you take that and then you do a back azimuth and you draw a line from the top of that back, the top of that mountain backwards. So if it's over 180, you subtract.

If it's under 180, you add till you look, you look at, OK, that's northeast. And so then you look behind yourself and you go that southwest. Nope, nope.

So if I'm, if I'm lost, but I don't I don't know where I am. And I know this mountain and I know this one and I shoot this, you know, asthmas with my compass and I know so right now. This is 90 degrees, so that's about 45 degrees, so that is under 180, so I add to it. And so one 80 plus 45 is, what, 225? So now I go to on my map the top of this mountain and I do an Smith and that azimuth is going to be 225 for each on the top.

Mountain is going to cross my exact location.

And you writing this stuff on the map, are you looking at it? All right, what a map.

And I go to this map and I do the exact same thing. And where those two lines criss cross is my exact location.

When you draw on your map, do you use a marker to use a highlighter? How do you do?

I have an erasable pin with me, just like it's just a little like a Sharpie erasable pen and I have a protractor anyway, just because this this is a course that takes weeks to actually learn how to do this from the military.

The skills I learned this originally when I was on that Trochu team, and then it was I learn more and more and more. When I was in the military, I went to some land schools.

And what they do is they drop you off and they give you you give they give you two, ten digit or eight digit grades, ones where you're at in ones where you're going.

And then you have to plot from I'm going to lose you here in a minute.

You're like, this is boring as fuck as it is, but you're going to have to you have to convert it from basically there's different Norths from where you're at. There's a grid north and a magnetic north before we get really fucking boring here. Once you learn how to do that, you're never lost. You can train associate, you can with a you know, with. And so I'm a real stickler on using all of those things. So I've taught my wife how to do it.

It's not that difficult.

You know, once you get going, as far as I know, this is something you learn when you were really young, when you were cutting trees, they're fourteen. So you first learned it then and then you learn more. Have you been formally trained in this stuff as well in the military?

I was formally trained in and I went to a class, but I was so young I can barely remember when I was working for the Forest Service.

And then now I teach courses for this because the the ability to get where you're going is kind of lost now because you just turn on a GPS or you use a base map or Onex or whatever.

Right. But the reality is, is navigating if you're in a hurry. So if you and I, you know, we're in the woods and we needed to get to a basin before dark, you're going to have handrails and catching features. You know, if you can look at that map and see it in a three dimensional way and I can grab my company and say, hey, if we head northeast, you know, the whole way half assed, we're going to hit this creek and creeks, going to intersect with a trail.

I don't have to use my compass anymore, really. I'm going to shoot an aspirin. I'm I look at the farthest point I can see to where we need to go that I'm going to go to see the whole way that compass is going to go in my pocket. We're going to haul ass eventually. We're going to hit a creek somewhere. But generally where that creek set, let's say a trail crosses it. There's a handrail and a catching feature there.

Anyway, this is boring shit, but it's not get there.

But what's interesting is, like, very few people know how to do this. And this is a critical skill. If you do get lost in a lot of fucking people, get lost in the woods. One of the things that you were talking about on your podcast once and I never really took any consideration, was the fact that a lot of binocular holders harnesses have magnets on them. Yeah, a lot of people love those. Like, I've got one of those one of those marsupials.

It's nice. Yeah, but those can fuck with your compass.

Yeah, you got it. You have to hold it out. He was giving me shit because we partnered up with them because he said my sales went down from you dickhead.

And I was like, dude, it's just it's got to be said right.

I mean yeah it's got to be said. Otherwise people are going to die. Well, it's funny because I even have I have a compass in my compass with me all the time. We really. Yeah, it's fucking weird. I know. Um, I went I had a shock.

I had a compass beside a wall on the wall beside it a little until the thing is, it's like when I'm when I was now dead in Texas.

I don't know where the fuck I'm at. Right. I you know, it's Texas. Right. And we're on these huge it's north Texas. So it's like big plateaus.

And that that Peligro Canyon where we were at, it's like the Grand Canyon. It's fucking crazy. So you know where we are.

You know, these guys have lived there their entire lives and they're like, oh, it's northeast to where you're at. I guarantee they know where they performed it.

Their whole lives were like, fuck, the fucking sun's not up. The clouds are out. Which way? It's Northeast. Well, oh, there's northeast.

So I just have always, you know, Kiran, you know, always have a compass with me. But being lost when you're young and almost dying, that'll help you probably want to learn to. Because when I was super young, dawn cotton and shit and snowing and rain in Oregon and you got lost. Oh fuck. Yeah, I almost died twice.

Really cold overnight. Eleven the first time. Jesus Christ.

You were by yourself.

Well, now I don't want to make this sound way worse than it was. I was a dipshit and I was with my dad. He's like drinking with his buddies. And I went after a deer and got all fucked up and couldn't find my way back.

Well, when you were eleven.

Yeah, with my God, I can't even I have a twelve year old daughter. I can't imagine. Oh, man.

My my poor mom dealing with the shit she had to deal with with me because I was backpacking when I was super young. Right. Like. Backpacking all over the place and and I've always like to do it so you can imagine your you know, nowadays, like with my daughter at 15 said, hey, I'm going go on a four day backpacking trip into the wilderness. What?

Oh, fuck me. Can I go right there with my mom? Had to deal with a lot of that. As a kid, I was always super adventurous.

I just think that that feeling of not knowing if you're going to survive and then surviving, I don't want my kids to have that. But goddamn, that's valuable.

Well, when you we talk about it all the time, that's one of the reasons I have so much respect for a guy like Frank or Jake. They have no fear of anything. When you get to the point where there's no mountain, truly no mountain too high, no valley to whatever fuck they're saying is there's nothing that stops you, you will get out. And most people lack that meaning if you've backpacked in whatever six miles and it long as you can get the animal out, especially mule there, you can pack it out and you see a mule deer two and a half, three mile more miles in.

And you have no you're like, oh yeah. It's like going to 7-Eleven. We're going. Right. There's not and this is normal for any backpack they can would say the same thing. There's nothing we can't get to. There's nothing we worry about. We have enough gear. It's it's a cool feeling, you know. I mean, I don't think about it anymore, but it's definitely helped put some animals on the ground.

Well, it's also there's a mindset that the hardcore backpack hunter has that they look forward to those challenges and overcoming those challenges.

And then when those things happen, it's something that you have prepared for.

So it's it's actually like almost like a positive experience.

Yeah. And then you get out and you tell people how far and with your nine, nine miles. Wow. Just pack it on one trip. Oh it was a big fucker. We had to take twice.

And I mean I know a lot of guys have ruined their body doing that too though I know quite a few guys that have sustained injuries with a heavy pack.

You know, I have like crazy stories when one of our buddies, I was he and I and he killed an elk and we were seven and a half miles in and we got on the ground bikes. Well, he's younger guy. And anyway, we split it in half and it was downhill the whole way. And I know I can pack you for infinite amount of time downhill. So I'm like, fuck it, it's downhill. I didn't want to come back.

So we're having our little hobnob meeting that next morning. We're getting ready to go out. And that night I ate everything I possibly could, like, drink water all night. And I picked up the pack and I'm like, hey, I think we can make it fuck it. If we can't, we'll just leave some of it on the trail, come back up.

So we got 178 pounds legit. We waited in the truck. Oh, my God, he had 184. Oh, my God.

So on the way down, these aren't bullshit. And this I took ten years of my life. So we go on the way down and I took his bow and he took my walking sticks. And we're bushwhacking for the first two to the trail. And Frank and I went and reenacted this because I'm like, dude, I got to see how bad this was because I was in fucking spirit world like half the time to you bad. And so Frank and I, we did it and we marked it out and it was actually plus or minus right in that seven mile range.

So we get to the trail. I'm like, look, dude, I'm not leaving you behind my fucking leaving you behind.

I can't go this slow. I'm like, I'll get to the truck, I'll turn around and come back and grab you because I was fucking hurt and bad and I called my buddy.

You seen him on there?

He's actually I can't say his name. He's a dude. I call him. I'm like, dude, I fucking need I need a pickup. I need you to come help us out. And he's hardcore motherfucker. He's like, yeah, I'll be up. Let me talk to my wife will be up there. So I passed him on the way out on the trail and I've got I thought like a half mile to go because I could hear the highway and he's like, dude, you got like a mile and a half.

I'm like, are you fucking kidding me? He's like, can you make it? I'm like, Oh, I'm fucking making it like it's mind games now. Like, I'm not letting this beat me. And I'm like, What, you got to go in and get my buddy? He's fucked up.

So I get to the trailhead, I get the pack off, I'm laying in my underwear under the truck. And if I had an idea, I would have gave myself when there's hikers. It was awkward, right? There's hikers. But I was like, fuck it, I'm done. So I'm just trying to get under. The truck was in the shade and the wind was blowing. So I'm laying there literally just sprawled out four points on a compass trying to cool off because I was worried about getting heatstroke.

I get hydrated and thank God, you know, my buddy went and helped my other buddy anyway.

He gets back and he's like, dude, he was fucked up. And I'm like, how bad he was. Like, when I got there and keep my my buddy did not know he had help coming. So he's on his hands and knees on the wrong side of the trail, looking for water in the creeks on the other side of the trail. And you can hear it.

So this is how and again, I'm not trying to blow it out of proportion.

It's just happens, right? You start talking about cognitive skills, dehydration and everything. So my buddy's like, hey, dude, what's for? Plus for like he's checking them. He's a medic. He's a he's a medic. And he was fucked up. He hadn't eaten anything and drinking water. His brain wasn't working. Right. And so that's just one example of how fucked up you can get. You know, you've got to be careful, like you can do damage.

How long did that high ground take? I did about a mile an hour coming out. Wow. So seven hours about.

Yeah, I was bad luck, but I'll give you an eye. You know, that's so long.

I mean, when I was with Pinch, she's the sniper guy he shot his goat at.

He was one of those dudes who wanted to shoot it at 40 and in with a bow or a thousand and out with a gun camera with exact yardage. But it was over a thousand yards. So he shoots this thing across this glacier. It took us six hours to go 11 or 400 yards straight line distance to a point where I'm like, we're going to fucking die getting down to this thing.

Like, at one point in time I slid down and my course I'm a dick. My knees slammed into my face and I'm like, we're all good, come on down. And when we only one in pain, right here comes everybody are sliding down and pinches like we're going to get out of this.

I'm like, well, we don't have a fucking choice now. We slid down it. We got to get back up. Right. And so we didn't get back till 2:00 in the morning still for miles then.

So when people, you know, like the idea of backpacking, hunting, that's what they're liking is the idea of it. Yeah. Glamorise the shit out of it. But again, painful.

He's not he's not a normal human. You can't go by his standards. No. His ideas. They say that she buntings the hardest.

They say that like like Alaska sheep hunting in terms of like just the difficulty of the terrain and the the dangers of it. Yeah, somewhat.

Yeah. I would say I've only been on a couple sheep hunts in Alaska. Right. Most of mine have been in the lower 48 or the NWT, the Northwest Territories.

The thing with Alaska that's easy is you're not gaining that much altitude distance distances far you're not.

But the weather is bad, like generally the weather's pretty bad. And then that the amount of pressure now and again, I'm not an expert on Alaska. The pressure is much worse than it's ever been in Alaska in terms of the amount of hunters.

Hunters. Yeah, yeah. A lot of hunters out there. Yeah. And then animals, grizzlies and shit. Yeah.

Which is a buck. And you've seen us get charged on video.

Yes. When you were at the Grizzly Bowman, that was terrifying. Yeah. It was crazy.

I tell you, I'm an adrenaline junkie. I'll tell a true story, OK, because it's not I thought like we're calling it moose and I'm like look in and I'm like I think there's a moose coming and a grizzly pops out.

I'm like, hey, get your camera. Let's call this thing in is the true story because we made it sound like it was know, oh, here comes a grizzly.

So I thought I was going to get to that fucking stump and stop.

Right. You called the grizzly in. I'm coming into a moose call. Right. So, oh, no. I'm like, hey, grab the cameras. Let's get this on video because he was looking for our moose calls. So this big pitch gets why that long?

And she stands up and she's looking around and I'm like, oh, cool. You can hear my shutter on the video.

I could hit the ground and it was coming. And I'm like, oh well.

And immediately me I've been charged enough to where I'm I'm an adrenaline junkie anyway. I'm desensitized. And I'm like, oh, he's going to eat fucking this other dude anyway. So I'm like, you can see my camera shifting right a little as I'm taking these photos. I don't know what weapon at a bow.

And so here, pretty quick, I'm thinking, oh, shoot this motherfucker. It's like 15 yards from us. Oh, my God. He fired off around it its feet. And I knew his gun jammed on the second round sometimes.

So I'm like, I know fix this shit doesn't jam on the second one or whatever it was. Right. Not saying a Brownings bad. What stopped you remember?

And it came again, I think it's like twelve, ten yards when it finally turned off and ran away.

But ten yards is nothing I tell you. Like that's almost like that wall.

Yeah. It was big too. Big one. But I was at ABC.

Yeah I was NBC.

In reality though, you talk to like bring up Lancasters or I went was when I stayed in the NWT for that two months time frame.

Those guys live up there.

I bet if you asked a BART or a Clay Lancaster how many times they've been blessed, charred left charge, it's like triple digits, like, oh, just hang with those guys.

The shit that they've done, triple digits, meaning 100 times at a minimum, and that's God.

So like the like the shit those guys deal with, they've been doing it since birth. Right. And so I was telling them like like Amy and Frank, I was like, OK, you guys know how much I've done and all the different thing, you know, honey, and how many animals are put on the ground.

It's a fraction. Lancasters been on 320 sheep hunts, 320. That's a lot. That's not including Cariboo Moose.

He's been all over the world. So the amount of experience those guys have in the stories, like when I get those guys on the podcast, it's hilarious because I you know, I just get to experience the two and a half months section of it.

We were literally from a light bulb, from a paved road hours from any electricity like it's a. Twelve hour drive to where the helicopter picks you up and then you're flown in another two hours, so when I got bit by that bite, it was funny like that. But Spider, it was funny it we're talking about.

Oh, yeah, I'm feeling a bit by Spider up there and I'm like, hey, my legs fucked up, I think a bit by something. He's like, oh, there's nothing poisonous up here.

Well my about plucking died, my my leg swelled up. More drawn circles around it. Well the first couple circles. Right. Wasn't that big of a deal.

So Klay cuts it open and listen to the podcast. He's hilarious because he squeezed that thing and acted like it didn't hurt I think was going to pass out from fucking shock. So squeeze the pass out.

Yeah, I don't know that it helped but it gave him pleasure kind of spider was it.

Man, you got to listen to a podcast, hear the whole story. But we ended up calling it the long cockblock hobo spider. And there's a story beside that. But I think it was a hobo spider. Those are dangerous.

Yeah, but I don't think they're overly poisonous. I think I was allergic to it. But the moral of the story, in six hours, my leg locked up straight. There was veins going up towards my heart and I had cold sweats. Heart rate was racing and crazy like, dude, we got to get you out here. You're going to fucking die like we are a long, long, long ways from anywhere.

How far? In a four hour helicopter ride, but then you're dealing with some fucked up doctor on the northern part of Whitehorse for your doctor, it wouldn't have been good.

So I called my my my buddy, who's a medic, and I was like, dude, what should we do? And he's like, all right, piss on it.

Bleach, ibuprofen, fuck them. Yeah, because I guess, like, bleach cleans everything out like he's given me. I can't remember.

Trump was right. I don't know what drill exactly, but I was like, holy shit.

I was like, OK, so we're poor and pee on it. We're like crushing up ibuprofen and you got to do you poor piano.

Do you let your buddy pee on it? So here's the thing. One of my buddies, we're a big Johnson because he was ready to pee on it right there. And I'm like, dude, pee in a fucking bottle. I'm like, man, I want to see your wiener while you're peeing on my leg.

And so you wouldn't want it right off the tap somehow or another. It's better if you open a bottle and then pours it on you.

It would've been awkward. And think of the stories that have been told after about them. It would be funny stories. Either way, we're poor and pee on my leg.

But if it was a matter of survival, isn't that funny that you'd rather have a guy pee in a bottle and then pee than pour that pee on you than pee on it?

I guess looking at it that way, where I get it, I feel I'm right there with you. I understand your thought process. Well, I think I'd let the guy piss on me, though.

At the time I was like, not overly worried. And then when my leg locked up, it was so it was if you measured my leg, it gained two and a quarter inch circumference inches.

That's how much my leg swelled up. Oh, wow. So it's a lot. Yeah, it was.

I mean, I'm laughing about it now, but what was funny is once it went back down, we just duct tape towels around my calf muscle to go on moose hunt because it was so fucking painful when the infection was going down because of the willows were beating it up.

And I'm like, I really want to see seventy inch wide moose. Let's just take we so we take towels around my calf.

So you never made it out of that. No. So you just dealt with it while you were in the woods.

I went away and like a 24 hours. Oh yeah. It wasn't that and wasn't. But you didn't think it was going to you thought you were going to die. Yeah.

I don't wanna make it sound worse than it was. It got a little nerve racking there. Towards the end, my fucking heart started racing like and I'm like, so your body is when you have an infection.

Infections are fucking dangerous, man. Well, I had veins going up my leg, but you can see the veins.

So you're saying that's when we Klay was talking about because of course you have veins going up your leg.

That's how you get blood.

Yeah. And it showed him a lot. So they were they were blue or some looked like an Etch A Sketch going up my leg. Dark. Yeah.

Yeah, dark. So you were worried that the infection was making its way to your heart?

Well, from what limited knowledge I had was that is this pretty much sure thing you're going to fucking die.

You carry any antibiotics with you or anything when you go into a hunt like that?

I do. When I go to Canada now because of their weird government, I, I shouldn't even say this.

I have friends that will prescribe them to me to take with me now last in eighteen. I remember my hands look like dead Paul's face from that milkweed or some shit I was fucking shit that happens in the back country.

What happened. So I'm on that mule deer hunt and my hands are swollen up and I don't know why.

And they look like dead Paul's face. And I'm like, what the hell's wrong with my hands? I'm looking around like what could be around me. It's not poison ivy in my hands are swelling up. Like, remember that movie Big Trouble in little China? Yeah. The Asian dudes hands well up.

Yeah, yeah. I look like that.

Well, as it turns out, it's hogweed or milk some fucking plant that does that.

And if you, if you now if you Google it, you pull it up, it's fucking nasty. But if you want to Google hogweed on certain humans, it has this crazy rash inflammation.

So my hands, it's affected by sunlight. It's worse. So I'm at 13000 feet and I'm on the spotter with my hands in the sun all day to a point like and in 13 out 13000 feet, the sun is way stronger.

Fuck. Yeah. Like you get really burnt up.

Use a solar charger. It charges up your shit twice as fast because you're that close to the sun.

Is that really what it's from or is it just a lack of oh my God, look at that giant hogweed. Look at the hands.

It wasn't good, let me tell you. So my head should look like those ones in the of that picture up on the right hand corner. That is crazy. The one the one that you see the large picture. The one. Yeah. Look at that. What the fuck man. That's from hogweed.

So go to go to the left. The one in the middle there. That's what my hands look like. The one, the one in the middle left.

That one. Yeah. Oh they look like that.

So Frank comes over and he's like, dude, what the hell is wrong with your hand. I'm like, you know, that's a good, good question.

So we come out here, it was bad. And I go so fast, the doctor. Right. And I'm like, you know, I go to the emergency room and I'm like, hey, what does that hogweed look like?

Just so I know. Some people have gotten third degree burns from it. Whoa, it's not good. Can we see an image like a little plant? That's it. That's stuff that's beautiful. And I was low crawling through that shit. Oh, my God. Giant Hogweed and its toxic cousins. Wow, that's crazy.

But those are the things you just don't think about. Right? So I went and they gave me, I know all kinds of steroid cream and shit and it went away in a day or two.

And we like back in this was like a flower I would have never imagined. So this is just how did it get on both your hands, your hands just rubbed up against it?

What do you figure? It's there's big fields of it. And I've got my Bo hanging and then I'm low crawling and I'm just like, oh, so to mitigate that, what do you do?

Do you wear gloves? Is there something you could put on your hands? I don't know.

I just look, I fucking touch it is. Yeah, I just kept my hands out of the weeds. The next year I got God Toxic Giant Hogweed Plant show up in Duncan Lake. You know, you just made too big Lake Kowit Chan Gazette.

Hmm. Yeah. Where's that Duncan. You know, no, look at the size that it's like fucking nine feet tall.

It wasn't that tall where I was that it was three foot tall. Right about even with your hands. So perfect.

Yeah. So just that weed has like some sort of an oil or something like that. That's what they said. The doctor is an I.V. type deal.

Yeah. Well it's funny because when I went they had no idea. I'm like, hey, my buddy from Alaska messaged me and he said, dude, I think that's hogweed. Like what I, I'd same reaction you did.

Fuckers alguien googled it drove across the road, Kaisers, whatever emergency room things like right across the road from Kafar.

I drove over there and I'm like, hey, you know I'm all screwed up and they're like what. You know, they don't know what it is. And I'm like hey this is what I think it is. They googled it just like we did. And they were like, Oh, well, that makes sense because they didn't know.

And then they gave me, like, this steroid cream to put on it and I don't know, to wait a couple of days. Jesus Christ. So between that and the bite, what was worse? Oh, the bite. The bite was that much worse.

I could I could have kept hunting with that. I just not knowing what it. Well, we'd been in there twelve days. I'm like about time to come out anyway. So right now what was crazy, we came out a couple of days, we go back in and Franks already got his deer. We go back in and Frank, I thought his appendix burst is it turns out he's just way too much sushi and it got clogged up in his stomach.

But Frank is harder than woodpecker lips. We get on these two deer we're trying to get and he's not getting out of the tent. And so Frank is not like that. And he's like, I hear him go, sir, I'm going to stay in a tent this morning.

And I'm like, Dude, you good. Now, keep in mind, Frank got pulmonary edema and that dumb shit hiked out with pulmonary edema.

He literally his lungs filled up with liquid and that's an altitude sickness or altitude sickness. And that fucker hiked out nine miles with pulmonary edema. Jesus Christ. He when he got back, he'd cough and it was like emptying a water bottle. So he's a tough individual.

So I'm like, dude, this guy I even texted Amy. I'm like, hey, Frank, fucked up. I might I might have to hit the beacon, like I may have to. I might have helped it out. So anyway, I go over, I shoot this deer.

So it's just sushi, I guess. So where did you guys eat sushi in Denver the day before.

So I think what had happened, we had starved ourselves for twelve days. Right. Dehydration. And he was in the woods. In the woods. We came out, you know, I took we all went out to dinner and I think he ate all that white rice and it just clung to his intestines like a woolly mammoth because he ended up just having take a big poop. Right.

But right in the middle where, you know, your appendix is, he's like, it hurts right here. And I've had gall bladder issues. I got I passed a kidney stone like six miles in.

So I was like, his appendix is abrupt. He's going to die back here.

And so it's a show you how the you know, the moxie that Frank has, he drug his ass out of that tent and film me shooting that mule deer.

And he hobbled his ass over there after I shot it. And it fucking mile and a half from where he's glass and, you know, flagging me in. And he just sat by the deer. I cut it up, whatever. And I'm like, Dude, I'll get most of it. You good. And he's like, yeah, I'm OK, I'm OK. And I'm like, I can tell you're not fucking OK. Like you're in pain.

And he he made it out and then he took giant poop and everything was OK.

But it, I thought he was going to I thought was going to begin.

That's so bizarre that it was just from rice and poop.

Well we're not doctors but that's what I chalked it up to.

Maybe food poisoning. Sure. It wasn't food poisoning. He wasn't puking. That was the only thing. But again, I'm not a doctor, but every time I've had it, I puked.

So those are the worst experiences. What about injuries you ever get, like, really hurt out there? I'm trying to think the kidney stone, that was a bad one. You have pissed that out. Oh, fuck. That was horrible how bad it was. I know. I'll tell the quick version of it. I think I was ten days into a hunt and I shot a mule deer.

We dehydrated, dehydrated, and I peed blood and gore. Like an idiot, and I'm like, oh, that's fine, whatever, and hype the media out, turn around. I met a buddy, dropped it off and then hiked back in.

And then like that night or the night after, I was it was pretty high elevation. But anyway, I went after this bull and something like knocked loose in my car, you know, I didn't know what it was. It's all of a sudden I had the shooting pain and I looked at that dude on the Green Mile trying to pee. Right.

And I'm like, what the fuck is going on? Like, I literally I'm like, I'm going to pass out from shock. What the hell is wrong with me?

Do you think it was a kidney stone? I didn't even I didn't know. Right. I did. I didn't. It was so much pain in my back area that I knew it had something to do with my kidneys.

But every time I tried to pee, I literally would drop me to my knees. And so I was like, OK, let's assess this. And I'm trying to think through should I take next to no gear and try and hike out, take enough gear to stay the night but didn't have the burden of the weight? You know what's going to be the best option? Because I didn't have any service and I didn't have I didn't have anything back with me that I could get a hold of anyone.

And so I'm like, fuck it, no guts, no glory. I grab the basic essentials and hobbled my ass out. And at one point I did have a phone by them service I. I texted my buddy Tony and said, hey, what is the nearest hospital to this trailhead? And I lost service.

And so all he knew was I'm fucked up. Right? So I get to the trailhead and I get my jeep and I had a giant jeep and I'm doing like 90 down the road and I get pulled over.

Well, the cop was looking for me because my buddy had called and said, I don't know what's going on.

He said, well, it was kind of a dick, right? He I get out and I'm like, Hey, man, I'm he wanted to call an ambulance. And I'm like, Look, dude, I just hiked out six miles. I'm not paying 3500 dollars for a fucking ambulance ride. I just like six miles out. I can make it to the hospital.

And so he was a little bit of a of a dick, but he followed me into the hospital and I passed it, I don't know, clinic in the toilet tank. And it looked like you. No, but it would look like a Chicopee chickpea, like a little spiky little bastard.

Oh yeah. It was horrible looking. How big was it? Not very big. But, you know, I wanted to baby your dick hole. Holy moly. Anything going through that?

What was crazy is right after that, I was good to go. I mean, once you passed it, I was fine. I went back in the next day.

A lot of fighters get those from dehydration, from weight cuts. And so I think although Jose also has gotten those before, I think more than more than one has gotten those workouts.

I think what they told me my my buddy mine's a doctor. When I was ride it out, I was taking in a lot of protein and different things that that there was a calcium build up from that or something. I don't know. I'm not a not a doctor.

Some people get them apparently from drinking too many green smoothies. Should be careful. I believe that. Which one is Thor? Chris Hemsworth, his brother. His brother had to quit being a vegan.

And that's one of the reasons why, because he was he was passing these stones and he had a wound up getting surgery. Here it goes. Australian actor Liam Hemsworth told Men's Health that he had to completely rethink his vegan diet after undergoing surgery surgery for a kidney stone. Some foods are high in substance called substances called oxygenates, which can increase the risk of kidney stones. These include spinach, potatoes, nuts and even chocolate.

There you go. I've heard of it from kale to eat a lot of people.

I rethink my raw kale smoothies. I was drinking a lot of kale smoothies in the morning when I found out about the dangers of oxygenates and oh, so I thought I was doing healthy. Yeah.

That well, whatever mine came from, it was an eye opener because that shit hurt. But I've been pretty, pretty lucky. I you know, as far as injuries and nothing, it bans intermeshed, you normal shit, right. I mean nothing too, too crazy. No blown out knee's out there anything. These are great shoulders. Great. That's what would scare the fuck out of being blown out of knee in the back country. And you've got to figure out a way to get in.

Yeah.

You know, like knock on wood. You know, I, I haven't had to I mean, I've been in some hairy situation on cliffs where storms rolled in, blacked out and just had to hunker down in like a cave. Right. And just wait it out. But nothing, nothing horrible. Your kidney stone was bad, but really like some of the things you'd think that would happen. If I die back there, it's going to be from a bear and praying a fall off a cliff like that's the one thing I would guess would happen.

That's how Cam's buddy Roy died. Yeah. What's a sheep aren't serious.

That's a that that one there is probably worse than any the chances of having to bury you is so slim. But lightning and in cliffs are the worst ones.

Yeah. Lightning is another fucking scary one, huh. That's a normal experience out there. There's lightning storms.

Yeah. In that one area, the songer to Christo's is a mountain range and it's. Like, scientifically worse there because of the heat from the ground and the cold from above, the lightning storms there we go down there just to photograph.

What do you do if you're in a lightning storm? Do you get near trees? Because if you get near trees, one of the trees get hit.

Going to give you horrible advice. I don't do shit. I just get my tent and doing really. So when there's a lightning storm, we just lay in your tent and hope it doesn't hit you.

Well, I mean, the reality of it is, is as they blow over, you may be causing and I'm not an expert at this. It's just I have the if it's my time, it's my time. So I just get in and I listen to an audio book and pretend it's not there.

I and that is probably horrible advice.

But the reality is my my buddy, what book would you listen to when you're almost dying from a lightning storm, the crow killer, Jeremiah Johnson.

Damn you get in serious mountain man.

Yeah, yeah. That one helps me go to sleep. That dude's voice helps me go to sleep. So but my buddy say I don't know if I can say his name.

She's on her own team, him and his buddy. This fucking guys get hit with lightning in the spot where we killed a bull. And he texted me and he said something about this reminded me of I think he got hit with an RPG or something. And I'm like, Well, dude, are you good?

Yeah, that's a hell of a buildup to a story with no finish. Right.

He's got scars where the lightning came out of it. Oh, no, that's where it entered.

And then it blew the front of his or his buddies sho out was like and they hiked out, hit him in the back and blew his buddy show off because they hit him both at the same time.

And so I would guess they were probably more trained and I was and whatever they did didn't work. So any more.

Francon I just hunker down and I listen to an audio book.

Remy Warren got hit with lightning in high school, if I remember correctly, and I think he lost a sense of smell. No shit. Yeah, something wacky like that.

Remember that movie with what was it that big the big dude actor where the guy gets hit lightning.

He's like six times and he's like, oh, you've been hit with lightning six times. He's like, no. Sixty six times. You remember that John Candy.

Yeah, yeah. The great outdoors. Well there's a guy that has been hit like a record number of times as one severe fan. That was one dude for whatever reason. They don't know what. They didn't understand it, but he's been hit by lightning multiple times. It's not because he's looking for it like he's he's particularly attractive to lightning for some strange reason.

I think I'm particularly attracted. How many times? Players? Seven times.

Good guy, Ranger. Park rangers. Yeah, come on, man, so Roy Cleveland Sullivan, he died in 1983, United States Park Ranger in Shenandoah National Park in Virginia. Between 1942 and 1977, Sullivan was hit by lightning on seven different occasions and survived all of them.

I would I would go home and talk to my wife, see, she put some voodoo on that reminds me of that saying I have if it was raining pussy, you get hit head with a dick. That guy's bad luck.

You know, that is often times it's crazy. That doesn't even make sense.

I just I don't I just don't worry about it though.

Any I would say, Jerry, this one is ten times ten odd little guys. I'll show you pussy ten times. Put a fucking metal hat on.

Yeah. It's just I think though you get desensitized to different things and lightning is definitely one where I just kind of hang out in the tent and it cooks you from the inside out like being in a microwave.

He says. Man, 61, survives being struck by lightning ten times. Melvin Roberts made headlines in 2011 for being hit six times in one year. Wife City has been struck another four times. South Carolina man suffered memory loss, headaches, speech problems and as nerve damage in his hands and legs. Like, I don't I'm so confused. I don't understand why he keeps hitting them. Let me see what that guy looks like. Well, he looks like a guy who's been hit by lightning 10 times.

Usually it'll blow the entire toes off. Really?

Yeah, and where the single lightning strike is made up of several 100 million volts. What the fuck, man?

Yeah, we've been on in lightning strikes where they hit trees close by. It just blows them up and hit shrapnel.

It's pretty wild. How does it not kill people? Yeah, that's where it exited the tower. Oh, Jesus Christ. Nerve damage in his leg and foot as a result of lightning strikes. Hmmm, it might change your life, says Roy Sullivan, is the current world record holder, and then he he was hit seven times, I gather we're talking about. He died in 1983 by his own hand. Oh, no, that's not good. Yeah.

You got to wonder, like what's left after you've been hit seven times, like your ship must be scrambled.

I don't know, man, but those are the things that will probably get you, you know, like talking about, you know, bears is like the last thing I worry about. Like lightning is it's a that's a real problem.

Is there a way to get it to hit something else? Like if you're in your tent when it hit the tent and not you, or would it just go right through the tent? I think you'd go through the tent.

I saw it hit an old growth tree once and blow a 180 foot tall tree into pieces. And I'm like, oh, I did not look appealing. You know what should happen?

Yeah, and that's not uncommon either when you get when you because you get if you have service, you can see where it's going.

Right. Like the one that passed two years ago. I knew Frank was fucking because it was going by me literally 400 yards. And I'm watching cloud to ground and I'm like, wow, text and Frank. I'm like, dude, buckle your shit up. It's coming. And it went right in front of me and over Frank. And, you know, Frank so funny. He literally called me. He's like, I'm officer.

And I'm like, how'd it go? It's like, that was not cool.

And he had video of it striken, you know, all around him. But the thing, like he said is, where's he going to go? Because he's just running into a storm. You're not going to outrun it.

What do you do? What are you supposed to do? You supposed to go into depression and hunker down into a depression, like some sort of a valley?

What's it say?

I was reading through Roy Sullivan's Wikipedia says he got struck two other times once when he was a kid, but it didn't hurt him, so he didn't claim it.

And then another time, his wife got struck while he was helping her with the clothes. But he didn't get hurt at that time either. So I guess he didn't claim that time. Well, is he a fucking alien?

Like, why would one guy get hit so many times? I'm trying to read what why it says, but like it does, there's no reasoning why or anything like that's so weird.

Like what about a person's biological makeup would be so different that lightning would be attracted to them?

I don't know. He's got some serious static electricity. The thing is, like with you know, the more you're out there, epic shit happens. Well, I guess you might not consider it epic, but I mean, the more he's a park ranger, right?

That's what I mean. Like, you're out there and then you you know, you think about how much time I'm out there. Crazy shit's going to happen if you're in the woods a lot. I mean, there's no. Well, the Wolverine.

Yeah, it's a one in a billion chance for that to happen. I mean, that's literally. But the more you're out there, shit's going to happen.

Well, Jordan's story about the Wolverine stealing is his moose fat was hilarious.

I know he had to one up me. I was giving him shit about that. Right. Like one of the only guys in history to shoot in with the recurve. And he basically killed one of the hatchet. I'm like, you son of a bitch.

But he said he couldn't eat it, though, so it was disgusting.

Yeah, it's I had I had a lot of people you asked me to eat. A lot of people ask me and I was like, yeah, I'm not eating that fucker. It's nasty. But, you know, talking like with that with, you know, coyotes and stuff. I think Rinella to Coyote. Yes.

Him and Remy Warren, they cooked it and it didn't seem that bad. Seemed edible.

It's not for me. I don't if you were starving I'd be starving. Yeah. Oh yeah. I just said I've eaten Marmite on purpose ma'am. It tastes good. You don't eat. The old ones are not so good ma'am.

It's like a rodent, right? Yeah. Yeah, it's pretty good.

We call it Rocky Mountain fish and chips get cutthroat brook trout and eat more.

They're really that good. No, they're not that good. But I've had Beaver Rinella cooked up. Beaver is actually pretty good. It wasn't the tail, it was the hindquarters. Oh no kidding. Yeah. He, he cooked. It was like a beef stew. He braised it and then slow cooked it in a crock pot.

It was actually very good. Like we were stunned. It was, it was quite delicious. Yeah.

I've had beaver but to tail more than anything Talum. Weird, right. Yeah. I didn't say it's very fatty is what it is, but yeah it's like a fat sandwich. Yeah.

I mean I get the idea of, you know, the eat what you kill or whatever, but I also get the idea that Wolverines eat the shit out of. They'll clear a basin, a mountain goats and sheep out in a minute.

Did you hear the whole story? That fucker bit the Erawan half on the third arrow and charged me after biting in half. Jesus Christ. Yeah, pretty crazy. It was cool.

It's a wild little animal man. I mean, they're in the Badger family and you know, Honey Badger don't give a fuck is a pretty famous.

Oh, you know, many Meems. I got a honey badger. Don't give a shit. Oh fuck.

It's crazy wild little animal to just the way it looks. Doesn't even look like a real thing. Yeah. Well it was crazy because they were fighting when we saw them and so we stuck down in on them.

I was like, you know, figured we're 30 yards away. And all of a sudden we realized, you know, Jesus Christ, they're like fourteen yards away.

Yeah. I've seen them chase off wolves from from kills. It's crazy. Seen them and video at least. Yeah. It's a wild little animal. It's just so funny how something so small could be so ferocious. Look at that fucker.

Look at that face. Yeah. I saw it like it six yards on my third arrow. But that's a honey badger. Yeah. Wolverine's real similar, but just just any kind of badger. So it's just a strange animal. They are.

And I guess there's a lot. Up in that mountain range, well, as I know there, encourage you to, you know, whatever. Shoot them because they they're hard on the ungulates.

So do they encourage you to they encourage you to take them out because they kill the look at that one with his mouth open in the middle loadout. Yeah. Yeah. That fucking Aimen, you know, their face.

Look at his fucking face. That doesn't even look like a real face.

Dude, I should send you mine. You can put it in here like every time you look at it. Scare the shit I get though. I kept the whole hide.

I just, you know, when I when we were in there, it was like said to me, I'll put it right there next to the chimps that fake this thing. This is a chain against the machine on Instagram. Maybe this whole notion that it's a chimp skull that he made out of Xeljanz symbols, you know, it looks like it says Xeljanz on the back.

It reminds me of that movie, Congo. Oh, right. A bad gorilla. I remember that to me. Yeah. Do you know why they you know what's interesting about that's a Michael Crichton book, right? Isn't it, Michael Crichton? Yeah.

What's interesting about that is I thought he was just making that up. But there is a giant chimp in the Congo is a giant. They called the Bando Ape TUJ, like six feet tall. They've caught him on camera traps. There's a I think he's from Sweden or Switzerland. I forget a wildlife photographer named Karl Amon and he was obsessed with these things. He saw one once, I believe, and then he set up all these camera traps. He spent years in there trying to document this thing because there's an enormous chimpanzee like a subspecies of chimpanzee that lives in the Congo.

And this place called Beeley. And you got photos of it? Yeah, they have photos. They have camera traps. These two guys who lived there shot one near an airfield landing strip. It's huge.

It's like a six foot tall chimp, the equivalent of seeing Bigfoot, right?

Yeah. If I ever saw it, I'd certainly want to go find it more. I don't necessarily think Bigfoot exists, but if I saw one, I'd certainly want to go find it.

This one's really trippy because it sleeps on the ground like a gorilla, you know? Yes. Yeah. They nest on the ground and they they caught one eating a leopard. They don't know if it killed the leopard or if it was just eating a leopard that was already dead. But you can imagine how strong a chimp is now. Imagine how strong a 200 I mean, not two hundred six, six foot tall, probably more than two hundred three or four hundred with the muscle mass known to man the fuck out of the jungle.

The crazy thing is they have a camera trap, photos of one walking upright.

Oh, no. Yeah. Walking to see if you find that the guy's Karl with a K arm Armaan.

He's this wildlife photographer. They got obsessed with this animal because they were, you know, a lot of people were claiming bullshit for the longest time on this, that there's photos of one that someone had shot from the 1920s and they were trying to figure out if it was a hybrid, it was a gorilla chimp hybrid, if that's possible. So that's the one that's the camera shop on the far left. See see it walking that that fucker was walking on its hind legs.

It's huge. And they'll go back to where you see that one right beside it on the left. That's the dead one. Up, up top. Up top. Yeah, right there. That's the one that they shot at a landing strip. They shot near an airport. Look at the size of his hog.

Good Lord. Good Lord. Or at least the size of that fucker. I mean, you don't know how big the men are behind it, but, you know, I mean, even if they're five seven, that's that's a six foot enormous chimpanzee. And then the one in the middle, the black and white one. Jamie over there. Yeah, that one that is the original photo from really, really early on. I think that was the early 1980s.

People were trying to figure out what the fuck that was. That was like it's really big for a chimp because these guys are trying to hold it up and, you know, its legs are still dragging on the ground. So if it was standing up on its hind legs, it probably is tall. Good Lord. Yeah, crazy, so it is an actual there's another one to that one right next to a chimney above right above where your cursor is down into the right, that one.

I mean, this is a fucking enormous animal, man. Oh, yeah, that's like the Bigfoot of the jungle. I mean, imagine a 400 pound chimp, six foot tall, 400 pound shit like, what the fuck? So this guy, Carl Armande AMAA and has been photographing these things for years and set up these camera traps. They have two different types of chimps. They call them tree beaters and lion killers. The tree breeders are the ones looking at one in the middle at standing up.

Fuck you do the thing. God damn, that's crazy.

If you could watch what a normal chimp does physically, that's be pretty impressive what that thing can do. Yeah.

I mean, they throw themselves through the air with their arms, literally just throw themselves and catch a tree. That's why they hang from it. So this is a so that's why that Congo movie was so weird. Like it's kind of sort of loosely based on an actual real chimp. Yeah.

And they get real gray looking, too, which is also true, just like his book.

Yeah. I and stay in the movie. They had the gray. Yeah. Those get, they get real gray when they get big sort of like gorillas. They also have a crest on their head like gorillas that this see this chimp, this fake chimps call that he made. This is a normal chimp skull. But the ones that they found, that's why they got so confused.

These bonobo apes, they actually have a crest like they have this big, thick partition of the top of their head and the skull that usually like with bears, that's an age when they get that butt crack in their foreheads, big, thick muscles that they can crush moose bones with.

Yeah, it's crazy. It is pretty wild watching what some of the like the like. I got hit by a black bear once running. Just clip me. He was running scared but he hit me and I was like, oh that that was definitely a reality check of running like jogging.

Oh fuck no.

I was on the trail and he ran by me and clipped me. Oh. And it wasn't like this crazy.

I mean, he just ran you over accidentally. Fuck man. He hit me. And that was that was a reality check of where I stand out in the food chain. I thought I hit by a fucking 600 pound linebacker.

I mean, it blew me back any he clipped me on the side, but it happened so fast. Right. And literally, it took me a second to like Jesus Christ. When he hit me, he was running scared. Right. It was just a happenstance thing.

But s got attacked by one when he was young. South cops. Yeah. When he was young. But it really shows you like well I have a matrix target.

You like those that fucking bear at my house pushed the center octagon out. He doesn't have opposable thumbs. He didn't release the ratchet straps and he has managed to push the middle portion of my priced peanut butter on my hand.

And I was pulling arrow and he smelled it. Yeah. And he was able to push that center octagon out. Now it's 180 pound little black bear.

So imagine what a, you know, 500 pound black bear could do to you when you see him run up trees just just use their claws and just run up the tree and full clip like you would run on the ground but faster. And they go up a tree that way.

Oh, yeah, we're so weak. I yeah, it is. It's pretty crazy that that one I got one that charged me two years ago. Geissman That thing was like I hit it two times coming at me here and here and.

Oh shit. My NICUs. Right.

I mean the first time I hit it I was like, oh like running backwards. And I wasn't I was pooping my pants. Right. And then it took off and it started stomp on the ground. So I huffed at it again and came in again. And I was not ready the second go around either. And I hit it here and then it ran off broadside and I anyway, I ended up killing it.

But it was hilarious because my my buddy was like, hey, did you get a shot because he couldn't see in the timber? And I'm like, dude, I'm, I'm out of arrows. And he said, what happened?

And I don't think he believed me. We got up there. I'm like, dude, it's a big bear. And I said, Did you hear it? And he said, I could hear it stomping. And I was like, Did you hear it? Fucking try to eat me? And he was like, Did it really?

I'm like, No, I didn't try to eat me. I was like, but Jesus. And he, you know, look, there's guys react, you know, reenacting, telling him what happened. It was a trip, man. But those I was weren't black.

I might have thought that you were a bear. So when that snow melts, the, you know, king. King of the apes. Right. The biggest bears guard the plushest grass.

Right. And so when I stocked in, I actually pull my camo off and I put on black fleece because it was in a field and I was on my hands and knees and he'd feed and I'd get closer and he'd feed and I got to 35 yards. And he wheeled out right when I shot and he went into the timber and I was like, God damn it. And then I could hear him in there popping his teeth. And I'm like, Oh, he wants some.

So I loaded, narrow and just dove into the timber and I started huffing at him. And that's a dominance thing.

You find what you did that to get him riled up. Why would you do that?

Well, it seemed like a good idea at the time, right. Look, we just caught up in the moment.

Well, I could be honest with you. I've never had one it come at me that fast. Usually they'll just stand up there.

And I thought you were going to bluff him and then he would be there for a shot. Yeah. And it didn't quite turn out like I had planned it. And he came straight at me and I so I started like, oh, that's fucking bad idea.

And I started running backwards and I shot. But it was I go from here, the TV.

And I hit it well, I thought, OK, that should slow him down, I'll get it. Well, fuck it just pissed him off. So he ran out there 20 yards and started stomping the ground. So at this point in time, I was a bit caught in the moment. And I'm not trying to make this sound any more than me being a dumb fuck. So I started huffin at it again and he came straight at me one more time and I hit him on the other side.

Well, what was funny is, is Gary, you know, it's like, hey, you know, you get a shot. And I was like, Yeah, dude, you would not believe this. And you could tell he was like, yeah, whatever we get in there.

And this thing's got one arrow sticking out of here, one here and one through the lungs. And it was fucking crazy. Seven foot four.

It's a weird animal to eat to. You know, the rivets taught me how delicious they can be. John and John Revett really know how to cook them and especially on a trigger. They'll smoke cook. That's what we cook a ham. It's unbelievable why it's so good.

I get a kick out of the hate mail I get about predators. Right, because we we eat them like mountain. Unbelievable. It's not as good as Accies deer, but it's pretty damn good.

And it's like just because it's weird that you get less hate mail from a deer than you do something.

I know, because it seems like if you're killing an animal like a mountain lion, you're doing it because you want to be a badass. Yeah, that's what it is. So but if you kill an animal like a deer, like that's normal. People are accustomed to people killing deer for food. I had people like, oh, those are endangered.

Calculate giant mountain lion. And I've killed a bunch of bears like they're endangered. And it's like now there's actually kind of a problem, right? Because in California, they're not endangered at all.

It's you hear that talk all the time. There's at the Horn Ranch, they have one particular camera trap where they cut sixteen different mountain lions on a pond.

They're a problem. And they they'll eat, you know, they'll eat two and a half days a week pretty easily. And so a mountain lion. But, you know, you think like people think you can't eat and there's some predators you price shouldn't eat.

But again, in the big picture, which I, I do not understand how people think they eat everything else.

And so to be truly not the hashtag conservation, but if you're worried about other animals, you have to keep everything in relative check.

Yeah, there's a weird thing that people have, though, when it comes to predators, like there was a woman who ran an alpaca farm in Malibu and she had this one particular mountain lion that had found her farm irresistable and slaughtered a bunch of them and killed a couple of goats, too. And she got a depredation permit to kill this thing. And the amount of death threats that she got when they found out that she was going to kill this mountain lion or was told that she got a permit where she could hire someone to take this mountain lion out.

And so she eventually wound up not doing it just out of fear. She was just scared. But meanwhile, they don't have any problem with this thing, really thrill killing.

It was just thrill. It can't help itself. Yeah. Once they found out that they could get into that pen where the alpacas were, it just was slaughtering them.

Yeah, the the the U.S.. Well, not just us here. It's kind of weird. So put things into perspective. Things don't think about this.

If you shoot an animal and you don't pack it all out, you get a ticket for wanton waste. Right.

And and honestly, I mean, what do they do about, like, rib meat? Do they call them on rib meat is every state's different.

So in Colorado, you have to take four quarters and neck meat someplace. You don't have to take red meat. Some places you do, you think about it. How much food do you think it was wasted in California yesterday? Beef, how much was thrown away? The people didn't finish their meals. Their steak was cooked medium rare. That animal was alive once and they throw it away. Yes. You heard how people look at that.

That is weird. But it's like the thing of you going out and doing it yourself. And what I think they're really worried about someone shooting a deer and just taking the antlers, which is. No, no.

I guess that portion of it I don't get the other portion. Like, I get like, well, I got like 500 pounds of meat a year. Right. It's it's a big deal for me. What's crazy to me is this some dude that just let his kid throw his entire steak away because it didn't taste good is going to give me crap for shooting a deer that I won't eat.

Old thing. Wow. That's human, though. You know, humans are real complicated animals, so we're real bizarre. And what we can justify and not justify, you know, that's it's one of the things you're seeing. You know, someone's walking around without a mask. You know, on the street. People yell at them, tell them you're putting me in danger, but you will see a massive protest and it gets nothing but positive response from the news.

And the media like this is amazing. People are unified and it is amazing. But it's also amazing. The two weeks later, there's a giant spike in covid and no one wants something. I've read, though, that there is a big spike in covid, but there's not a corresponding death spike. Yeah, I read the same thing. Yeah, see, that's true. That's true. Because they said that covid is spiking, but deaths aren't, which is really interesting because that must mean that they're better treating it.

Or maybe people have a better understanding of how to survive it. Or maybe the. People that are getting it are younger because a lot of them are getting it specifically from the protests, which they're kind of denying, it seems hilarious, which is weird, the whole thing.

I'm trying not to get depressed people on top of each other. I'm 100 percent support of the protests, 100 percent. But people on top of each other, you tell me if they're sick, they're not going to give it to each other. That seems highly unlikely.

Yeah, I'm not a doctor, but there's just a lot of con contradicting. Yeah. Views of that. Like, you can't protest certain things, but you can protest other things. And then when covid first kicked off six feet, wear a mask or whatever, and then I see these things where, you know, there's this six foot thing, but we do we don't mind if you protest.

And it was exactly everything was strange to me.

And, well, there's something gay pride protest this or celebration this weekend in Chicago. Same thing. Everybody on top of everybody. And everybody's like, this is wonderful unity, OK?

But, you know, in two weeks when the restaurants in the bar shut down again, we're going to question our decisions.

Yeah, it's. You ever watch like Zombieland who's funny is Fatty's are first to go right up all the time.

Think about how bad would it be to rewind 80 years? Like what would happen, like how how soft we are as a as a culture now.

It's pretty amazing. And then, like, you know, you think about some of the different plagues. You know, I read list. Well, I already shit. I listen to a lot of audiobooks. Me too.

I like to say I read though it sounds better. It does for me too. But the reality is I don't read shit. I look at pictures, but I read magazines.

I even read articles online. I read articles.

I'll read some articles, especially on my phone. I'll pull them up. But yeah, but I've rarely read books.

I fall asleep when I read them, which I probably should read more.

But I, you know, when I, when I look at all of the different everything that's going on nowadays, like if there was any major, actual, real major crisis, like how fucked we would be as a society is pretty amazing.

Well, it's like we were talking about our dietary choices, the fact that 70 percent of Americans are overweight. And it's so crazy that so this is such a weird time in terms of how easy life is without, you know, pre covid. Yeah. And that people had gotten accustomed to this soft way of living. Yeah. So when someone does something like what you do and what you prefer to do, that's what makes it so extraordinary. When someone uses that ridiculous farmers walk farmer's carry machine.

And here it is.

As you see, coronavirus coronavirus cases spike country will be seeing more deaths.

Dr. Fauci says that guy that will be going up is what I understand that Dr. Fauci is a medical expert and a good man, but I am annoyed at him.

For what he said about the masks, because he literally said that we told people not to wear masks so that they wouldn't buy them so that health care experts can get them.

You can't do that. You can't do that because then we know you're lying at one point in time. You can't lie. You can say, please don't buy masks because health care workers need them. Instead, get a bandana. Instead, take an old t shirt, convert it into a bandana. Please say that, please. In the future, don't lie to us, because when you lie, then we think you're lying, no matter what ability.

Exactly. Especially when it's about something like that. Like, I understand they were probably compelled him to do that. But man, that confuses the fuck out of everybody because there's this video that you know him talking about. You don't have to wear a mask. And then a couple of weeks later, they're like, actually, you have to it's mandatory.

Yeah. The whole covid thing is a different it's different very well.

And I think you sent me a text or something like that, man. This is blown out of proportion.

And I think you said definitely for people like like like with me and one of the you know, one of I if everybody was like you, it would be a bad cold.

Yeah. I hope you don't get it. But if you do take a lot of vitamin C, drink a lot of liquids, get a lot of rest. But the problem is, you know, obese people, diabetics, older folks.

And I don't want to beat a dead horse to death, but I really, really would like, you know, not to sound too what's the word liberal tree hugger?

It's like I really wish bottled water as we're drinking it. I'd like to see more options for filling up a Nalgene. I would like to see more options for people for health like. Right. God forbid we spend all this money on stuff like it wouldn't be horrible for the government to spend money and get some free dietitians out.

And I mean, I don't have a plan for this, but knowing is a converted fat kid like, fuck, I wish I had some help when I was younger.

I remember when Trump had that lady that was telling everybody not to touch their face and then she licked her finger and then turned the page.

Yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah, exactly. That's but that's when, you know, when we're talking about health experts and things along those lines, that's the kind of shit that you see sometimes. And it just makes you go, God, people are so weird. Just human beings are so we're so weird what we concentrate on and what's important to us. So strange.

Yeah.

Well, where you're from New York originally I was born in New Jersey, but most of my from thirteen on I grew up in Boston not to turn to reverse the roles here, but what made you get into hunting?

Well, I see I had seen a bunch of those PETA videos and I was like, I'm going to do one of two things.

Either I'm going to become a vegetarian or I'm going to become a hunter. Yeah.

And then Rinella took me hunting on a show and I dropped a mule deer. The moment the deer dropped. I was like, OK, I'm doing this from now on. And then the moment we ate it by campfire, I'm like, this is the best meal I probably ever have in my life. And it just made me realize, like we cooked it, we left some of it and we hung it up in a tree because it was pretty late.

When we shot it, we took the organs and then we fried up some liver and onions and we fly fried up some heart and by the by the campfire. And I remember thinking while I was eating that like this is the most satisfying meal I've ever had in my life. This is how I'm going to live from now on.

So take that and multiply it by a hundred. That's how I feel with a recurve. I don't know how else to explain it.

I mean, I get it. It's just I mean, something about watching that arrow fly through the air after all that hard work. Now, you may want to snap that fucker in half, several times on the way to finally hitting an animal. Right. But being a guy, I'm driven. I'm goal oriented.

You know, I really like the challenge. I like to practice. I like all that. I get it.

I totally get it. I would imagine that the connection is so much more intense than even with a compound bow because you're dealing with all the cams and the well, engineering and all the noise.

Right. Getting closer, like two different things you have to do.

It is hard for me to explain to you I have a little bit different perspective because I've come from that the compound side being able to, you know, shot my Cariboo 127 Yards. I've got bashed for that. Right. And I'm like, here's a crazy shot.

But if you trying to shoot a Cariboo, like, a lot of times you can't get very close.

Yeah, we just we couldn't get close. But I, you know, without me getting bashed too much about shooting long distance now, I really I mean, getting sub ten yards from an animal is pretty freaking cool. I can imagine it is.

And you know, when people thinking about trying it out, like give it a try.

Right when one thing good you can do with your kids, do you ever get to a point where you are going to make my own arrowheads block? No, not yet.

I'm going to cut my own sticks and whittle my own arrows like I don't really full on Comanche.

I've had a lot of people messaged me about that in an right now I can tell you that I like I am very accurate that well, we just shut that tournament with, you know, Luke in the group and. A compatriot, Luke was like, so happy because at the end he asked a bunch of compound guys what their scores were so he could give them shit because mine was higher, because everybody was giving him shit about how do you let her and beat you with a stick bow.

And he's like, you know, screw you guys. You come do it because I've taken a bunch of money from them. I like that accuracy. Even though it's not where I was at the compound.

I don't know that I'll never build my own bow, but I would say the chances are highly unlikely. I'm pretty happy where I'm at right now. Building a bow.

By yourself, you mean cutting wood and actually constructing a bow out of the wood?

Yeah, and probably the best guy that Clay Hayes is a real traditional dude. He's so not even a recurve.

He's using like a regular self-love to cut it out of his front yard. Jesus, what kind of wood would you use for that? Well, they're both art trees, which is actually I don't know what the real Osage maybe is.

What about our trees? Anyway, I'm not an expert at this shit and I don't plan on being I mean, I got aluminum razor right now, so what am I talking about?

But the thing that seems crazy. Well, when you use a traditional bow, but it's made out of aluminum like. I know, right? Yeah.

I was just going to say I get hate mail all the time for it.

Do you really. Oh, you you always say I get hate mail all the time for you. And I always say, why are you reading that shit? You're right.

And I will say you have been a good influence because I probably in the last. Five years, I have really gotten to a point where it takes a lot for me to get any engagement or any rise out of it, I just read them and laugh because I'm like, wow, whatever. That's your opinion. But the problem is with me, you're not problem. I answer so many tech questions. I try to be super involved with our customers.

Was one of those guys that need help. So you have to read some emails and some in some of my district messages.

But I will say like like that stupid trad. when I came up with it's not stupid, I thought that would be good for the community.

But no, like I got I don't know what you're talking about. It's just it's a vein you can shoot out of a I mean, the feathers for people and all the feathers for the arrow.

So feathers are for generally traditional archers shoot feathers.

And they do that because it has to contact the riser and flattens out, flattens out. So it's more accurate.

Yes, exactly.

Because you don't get to bounce off the shrine like you would with a plastic vein like you do with a compound bow because it hits the shelves and bounce drops.

You get contact bounces off. So I had that goat hunt. I got a hold of the guys today and I was like, hey, let's get this. I don't care if you sell them, I just want them. Well, I thought that would have been this is how weird the traditional archery community is for me. I thought that would be a positive for guys to do backpack hunts.

And and it was for a lot of guys.

I got I made the mistake of reading a few online traditional archery forums about myself. And that was a bad idea because I was like the devil, because those veins come and they want them to be feathers.

Yeah, I'm like the Antichrist or something that they wanted to be feathers because traditional. Traditional. Yeah.

And even though the wood is made from ACNC machine, their eyes are in their limbs have carbon in them.

Now people are weird, people are weird with when and especially when people get into tradition, traditional things they get very strange. Yeah.

And I don't mean like with me, I don't care if you hunt pink underwear and whatever the hell, David Goliath, whatever the both you do, whatever that makes you happy. I just want people to get outdoors and get off the couch. But, you know, everybody has different opinions and perspectives and whatever else. But for for me, that was just a tool that increased my opportunity while I was out there.

But it was definitely frowned upon by some. Yeah. So fuck them. Don't don't you think that this would be a really good time for some sort of hunting education, like a like a program that people can enter where they could be taught like adult onset hunting, like people who are adults learn how to do it. Someone take you out? I mean, I know there's a few people that do similar things out there, but, man, it would be real nice, especially when, you know, uncovered happened.

And people realize, like, hey, this food supply chain is a little sketchy. Like we don't we don't really have any toilet paper here. And, you know, I went my buddy went to the grocery store. So there was one package of ground meat that was all that was there. Yeah. And I was like, yeah, man, that's that could go sideways.

It was pretty crazy.

Some of my neighbors that were not keen on me taking my own animals and all the food I had in the deep freezer that all of a sudden wanted to come there were not keen on it.

Like, did they tell you they weren't keen on it? Yeah, you could see they're pretty down on it.

You know, they say something to you, you know, other than like, yeah, I'm not into hunting like that kind of underlying, you know, go fuck yourself. You shot an animal, right. And but they ate meat, you know, so whatever. However you want to look at it.

And then when weirdest covid hit because I do, I eat four or five hundred pounds a year. Pretty easy to meat, maybe more than that. Plus, you know, I give my daughter and whatever anyway I eat. Some of them had come over and were like, hey, can we try some of that. Like yeah I don't you know, I'm always going to encourage people to try it. And then now it's obviously worked out because they're addicted to it.

They love it. It's the cleanest. Yeah.

It's so good for you too. It just feels better when you eat it. You like you eat a real nice elk steak like you get like energy.

It's weird. It's hard to describe to people.

It is. And I mean, you also have like for me, the the fact that I you know, the way I feel, the way I got it, it just adds to the whole experience, which is hard to explain.

But I think that as a whole, like land navigation, you know how to break down an animal. You know, animal behavior. Yeah, that'd be a hell of a class that I think would be a horrible time.

Yeah, I think it would be great for people. I mean, I wouldn't say do it with archery. I would say do it with a rifle, you know, especially people that don't have any experience in it. But I think that would be incredibly rewarding.

It's not something that everybody can do. Well, people always say that when you talk about hunting as being a method of acquiring your meat, like, hey, we don't have to factory farm hunting is still a possibility. People go, well, you know, you can't feed everyone with hunting and they're right. You really can't. But guess what? Everyone's not going to do it. Yeah, it's like everything else. It's like, you know, the whole world can't go to jujitsu class.

It would be too packed. Yeah, that's good, because most people are not going to do it anyway. It's too hard. The same thing with lifting weights, the same thing with yoga. It's the same thing with anything that's difficult. Difficult things do not attract people. They attract some people. Yeah. They attract people that are. Stood challenges, yeah, and I I would say the only thing if you did that, you'd probably want the shooting of the weapon to be the last portion because a lot of people would want to just do that and then.

Right. You know, you'd have to earn your way to that and you have to have a curriculum, right? Oh, yeah.

Well, and I talk about that easy button that people hit all the time. One of the things that I'm most thankful for is I came up with a time with no rangefinder. I had to learn to range. Right.

And how did you range with no rangefinder? Did you learn how to like like recognize actual distance of things by thinking of it in terms of like body sizes? Like what?

First it was a tape we measure and you know what I mean. You'd roll it out and we would have different courses or whatever.

And when I say we didn't have range finders. Right, when I started, there was like a Bushnell 500, the thing was the size of this freaking notebook, it was giant, it was a mano, an ocular. And that was like the first one.

And then they had some other ones that were probably available to people that a lot of money.

But you would peson it out my step as a yard. And so I measured out or we were at a range and I'd make sure how far everything what you know, I would pace it out. So I would guess the yardage and I would pace it, guess the artist and I would pace it.

I've heard of archery competitions where they don't let you use a range finder.

So here's the thing with that. And so we talked about Leevi before.

You know, Leevi Morgan has shot higher scores at times on unknown 3D courses where the known 3D course had a shot, a lower score, and those guys had range finders. That's how good that dude is.

So when you say unknown, you mean three courses where you can't use a range finder. So you're shooting at targets and you have to guesstimate.

Yep. And he guesses the yardage and there's another class shoots from the same stakes and they get range finders. Levi has beaten them with no range once.

And so that's how fucking good that guy is.

So say when people talk about because you get guys like I would say me and Cam, not a tournament guy, can shoot 160 yard shots. I mean, great shot or even Dudley Dudly, amazing shot. But then you look at a Leevi Morgan, if you dig in to him, 13 Assaye World Championships in a row, that that guy was pretty good and he's still shooting today.

And then you think he's hitting fuckin quarters not knowing the distance out of 50 yards.

He is crazy that someone could win something that competitive thirteen years in a row. I mean, it's hard to believe.

Well, I mean, about the time, like, my wife is making my head too big. I'll pull up YouTube and have her watch NASA with like a Gillingham and Levi or Dan McCarthy. And I'm like, these guys are good, honey. I'm just OK. Like, these guys are fucking unbelievable.

It's an obsession, right? Archery is a weird Zen obsession, like the field. I try to explain to people like if I never hunted again for the rest of my life, if I never, never even eat meat for the rest of my life, I would definitely shoot bows and arrows.

Yeah, definitely practice archery, because there's something that happens when you concentrate on that target and the shot process in the shot breaks and then arrow sinks right into where you're looking at. It's amazing. It's a it's a beautiful feeling that's extremely rewarding.

I don't think it would be hard for me. I mean, what happened with me when I did that switch, right.

When I was, you know, it I found a new love for archery that I had lost because the newness ran away.

And I'm not saying I was, you know, perfect at it, but you can pick up a compound and, you know, shoot it and skip a week and still be pretty damn good with it. Right. You don't stick, but you got to shoot it all the time. So I got to a point where fifteen years ago I would take work off and call in sick to set up my new beau like I was always been addicted to archery.

And then later on down the line, that newness wore off wear now. Well, I'm the boss, so I don't call in sick. I am so I mean, literally a kid at a Christmas waiting for shit to come in with that recurve.

So it rejuvenated that love for for archery and it kicks the shit out of you. And so that challenge, you know, when I say you that challenge of practicing, it's pretty addictive.

I was actually surprised you haven't tried it more yet, but you traditional bow.

Yeah, I some of the time I know what it is. It's I know that it's going to take X amount of hours every single day and I'm scared.

It's like the same reason why I won't play golf. Yeah. Like I know me. I'm not doing that. I'm not walking around for eight hours a day because then I would be doing it every day and everything else would suffer.

That's why I don't do cross fit. To be honest with you. I'm super competitive. Fuck, I fucking hate.

I just watched that documentary. There's a cross fit documentary. I forget what it's called. It's the fittest or something like that. It shows the competition's so fucking bonkers. Matt did.

We did. We had Matt Chan on the other day. He took second in 2012 and now Crosthwaite games. I'm not across Twitter so I don't know all the different shit, but I mean, that's for sure. But I, I've told Frank, I'm like, dude, I'm not good at not giving everything I have. And one, I'll fuck myself up physically, you know, trying too hard. But to the time to put into that with everything else I've got going on my workout programs, fine.

You know, so I'm like, dude, I got enough irons in the fire. I don't want to dive into the cross foot arena and get consumed by that as well as many other things.

Even photography takes time and all that shit, all your hobbies take time to finish the crossword.

Think do I know too many people that have hurt themselves yet they get to push too hard and they hurt them.

I was just reading an article about a guy who was a vitrine who got Raamdeo Rhabdomyolysis. Oh no. Shia Cross Veterinary Science, Microfit instructor and I got Robideau from a cross at work out. But you just, you know, you're pushing yourself so hard with all those reps and you're doing it trying to keep up with all the people that are in the class with you. I get it's great for you, but for morons like me, probably not the best move I'm going to.

Agree with you and that moron category, am I in a moron like me, like literally like Franken, our competitive, you know, are not competitive.

You know, we both want to do good.

If I go into a crossfire, Jim and Frank beats me. So, like, I'm going to go home back. Oh, shucks, I lost my mother and I'm going to go, you know, go apeshit.

So it is again, I get, you know, guys get pissed or whatever about, you know, me. I'm not talking shit about Crosthwaite. I'm saying I do not. I would probably slack on form because of whatever the Lord or whatever it's called for the day.

I probably quinson form and fuck myself up.

Look, I know you can fuck yourself up doing everything and I fucked myself up doing jujitsu multiple times. I'm not saying you should do it, but, you know, I've talked to people that are real, like legit trainers like Steve Maxwell, who said he doesn't like it because it's lifting weights as a sport. He goes lifting weights should be something you do that enhances sport. He goes particularly when you do an Olympic movements. He's like Olympic movement shouldn't be done to maximum repetition.

He's like they should be done controlled and they should be done, you know, a low number of reps and you're just trying to build strength. But everyone's got their own thought process. And when you look at those guys in those competitions and the girls, the girls scare the fuck out of me. There's some of those girls are fucking guerrilla's. Like, that's crazy.

I don't know if that's good girls, but I don't know who's into that. But the guys are obviously insanely fit. So saying that it's not good for you seems silly. It's obviously very good for them. You know, some of those fucking dudes are so impressive.

But I just worry about shoulder injuries exactly like the kickboxing eatings.

What are the Keber is a hip hop schnaps body. Get muscle ups. Know those things look like a recipe for me to fuck myself up. Yeah, there are less recipe for a labrum tear.

But guys, a bunch of guys gave me shit when I set up my own gym there. It looks like a cross fit gym and I'm like, yeah, I'm not doing any up so like making jokes, but I think it looks like a functional strength gym.

You know, I do the most I do. You know, as far as like I'll do one arm dumbbell snatches, I do some straight leg deadlifts, but I do everything in moderation. And where I used to lift super heavy for power like crazy but used to be a big motherfucker.

Right. 70 pounds bigger than I am now.

Yeah. Big. Well I got to I benched.

My goal was to bench over five hundred. Now I want to get dickheads email me. I cheated. Right. I used steroids and I don't know what the fuck I was doing so but I tell you what, when your wiener breaks from taking that, that will make you stop doing anything.

That's what happened. I didn't fuck I was doing, but I got to where I could lift pretty much anything I wanted. I couldn't walk for me to Jamie and back without getting winded.

And so do you, Mike. I mean, I'll just get a list what I took and then.

Sure. So it's taken 250 milligrams or one milliliter of ananth, eight every three days.

So basically it's taken three shots a week of Ananth eight.

I don't know what that is. That hard core stuff. No, it's just testosterone, 250 milligrams.

So I take one shot of that a week now for being on testosterone replacement, testosterone replacement.

But I was also taken equipoise. That's for horses. Yes, it is. I was taken equipoise. I was taking.

That makes you super purple, Decha. I took Treinta for a while, but I could not handle trendy like fuck.

I hung a guy out of a building like Trin is not good. It's superhuman strength, aggressive sex drive but superhuman dickhead who like you. It's just not for me. So I only took that for a little bit and I didn't take it for that long.

The one thing I found out is one, there's a reason that you're not supposed to be on that shit. And I'm not a religious guy, so I'm not going to say God didn't mean you to be that way, but somebody didn't mean me to fucking be that way.

You're monkeying with your your structure. You know, you have a chemical and biological and hormonal structure of your body and you're monkeying with that. You know, you're adding massive amounts of muscle to your body. You're adding superhuman levels of hormones to your body.

Well, and, you know, I'm I'm in like the first time I took equipoise. It's a horse decongestant, so I wouldn't get no decongestant. Yes. It's cleans out the airways or opens up to bronchial dilator some and shit up.

I'm like, what am I getting sick? What's because I you know, there's horses and pigs on the fucking container, you idiot.

Right. A people ask me about it, I'm like, don't do it.

Eat healthier, you know, workout hard. Like I lost everything anyway.

But the problem was, is in the middle of that they have Decha and they call Decha Dick. Right. It makes you like like no sex drive.

And I wasn't taking anything to because I watched Hidalgo right in the Hawesville in the pit with my daughter and I started crying. I was the dog.

Is the movie right. OK, anyway, horse falls in the pit and the horse gets like a spear in its leg. Oh, I'm crying. I'm like, what the fuck is wrong with me?

Well, you're emotional. She's my estrogen levels were like through the roof.

So I looked and like an idiot. I was taking I had 200 mg per milliliter Decha.

And then I had another bottle that was like 400 or something, and I got all mixed up, so I was doubling up on deck some of the damage.

She did this for maybe a year and a half. Did you get yourself checked out after it was over? Oh, yeah.

When I was OK. Well, when I first got off, I wish I had a photo. I don't feel pulling up how big I get. I look like that rock on Fantastic Four.

It's fucking weird looking dude. I had Ronnie Coleman in here. Oh my God. Weeks ago. First of all, what a great guy. So nice. Yeah. So friendly and so so happy. Even though he's basically broken. Yeah. He's had. How many back surgeries did he say he had. Something crazy. Yeah, like more than 10 back surgeries, I read an article, it's at 13, but and that was probably his entire back is basically fused.

Yeah, but when you look at him when he was Mr. Olympia, you know, when he was winning.

Yeah. Jesus. Yeah. Jesus. I mean that a human being can get that big.

Oh it's it's insane. And I mean, I only scratch like I didn't put the you know, he he's done it his whole life. Right. Those guys are freaks. Phil Heath lives by us and Denver. You'll see him every now and then. You used to and he's a new kind of one guy like Ronnie.

The thing is, though, it's like you go to a gym and grab two 200 pound dumbbells and you start doing incline bench with no spotter that, you know, grabbing some looks but genetically was not built to lift that heavy.

Right. That that's there's some help involved in that.

But I got to a point where I was super emotional and not like I don't believe really in the roid rage thing because I never got that.

When you talking about you just tell me you're hanging the guy on the side of a building. That's all the rage.

Yeah, well, let me finish. Good point. But I think if you just take an increased amount of like testosterone and anabolic in general, if you're a happy guy, you're happy.

If you're a sad guy, you're sad. And if you're a dickhead, you're more of a dickhead.

The thing with, well, trend, that's why I got off it.

That was one thing for me that definitely I just I was changing psychologically when I got off. It was the problem. Like emotionally I was a wreck.

Like, that's the closest. I'm not like a suicidal guy. That's the closest where my brain just didn't function. Right.

And then I got off cold turkey and whatever I did, that is a big issue with kids, young kids, their endocrine system crashes. And just like we were talking about, with soldiers that have been blown up a bunch or football players or fighters, your body's not producing testosterone correctly.

After you get off that shit, you get really, really depressed for some people, bigger rexy as what they were telling me, because I was afraid to go to the gym because I was shrinking. All right. So, you know, what I did is I joined Planet Fitness. You can hide in there and be little and fit right in.

You can't even make noise now. I know. I kid you out. Lunch alarm that alarm. Have you ever seen alarm go off?

Yeah. So there was a couple of muscle heads that went in there, I think to prove it in one of the gyms that I went to and they were grunting and deadlifting and they kicked them out.

They pull your membership. That's so crazy. You can't try hard. I know if you're lifting heavy, you're going to like if you do that, like, hey, it was you're trying too hard. We don't want that here.

It was weird for me. I'm not a weight dropper, but definitely if you're doing a deadlift, there's something in it's heavy.

Something's going to come out of you. Right? You're going to you're going to do some grunt. I'm a grunt or pro.

And so I, I don't I'm not the guy that makes a crazy amount of noise in the gym. But there's times where last couple, you know. Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. You're it's frowned upon. So I went there for like six months, which I will say was the smartest thing I could have done. There was no Tim Taylor's took two year olds in a fucking basket at the front of it. Right. There is no really.

Oh, yeah, they are Tootsie Rolls pizza. They serve pizza. Oh, it's the weirdest shit I've ever seen at that place in space in my life. It was what I needed because I had no temptation.

I just think it's amazing that they would set up a place where they're encouraging you to not try too hard.

And they do. Well, I'm sure I was. That's how people like it. I was laughing.

They laughing like for me, once I got out of it, you know, I was like, that is the strangest shit I've ever seen. There's a gym that wants you to be fat.

That's strange because they do there's pizza Tuesdays or whatever.

Is it do they want you to be fat or do they just encourage you to not intimidate the other people with your performance?

Is that what it is? Probably because that was I was definitely the oddball at the one I went to.

And so, like, I would do catchphrases and I would put 240 fives on each side on the ground, and then I would put 445 on the like a Smith machine. And I'm just doing calf drops, right? Oh, that got shit canned immediately. I was like, I told you not to do it.

Yeah, well, one, they said I was taking all the weights up and two, they said that's not they didn't kick me off totally. They said that is frowned upon here.

And I was like, well that is frowned upon here.

Catchphrases because I how I was doing it when I was like, this is strange, but I can't again, it was good for me at that time to get off because that was the hardest thing mentally that I had to do.

That is everything I hate about America. Yeah. Like that whole. Just the idea behind that. Don't try too hard. Just like. No, no, no, not here, here, here. We're going to use 45 percent exertion.

Did I get in trouble a lot. I get called a dick for being the guy that's rubbed some dirt in your crotch and get the fuck up and go like that, rub some dirt on your crotch.

Is that real good advice? Yeah, it gets the point across. Right. Well, when guys will ask me certain pieces of advice that they need, like a they need someone like maybe you or me or Rinella or whoever to give them a oh man, that's OK. I'm not that fucking guy. Don't send me a message where you think you're going to get some kind of. Oh, it's OK that you suck, you know, keep going like I try to circle myself with people that tell me I start to try harder.

That makes sense. Yeah. And I get messages and I'm like, dude, no, that's not OK.

I'm like, you're fucking weak. Just push harder. That's that's the key. Keep trying.

Well, the only problem with that kind of advice is some people start off with a terrible bass. Right? If you're if you're a person, it doesn't have any athletic background, no exercise at all. You really do have to start off light. And I tell people all the time, like, if you're just starting exercise, if you work in an office, you're in a cubicle, you're completely sedentary. All you have to do is just start walking to start with walks, then start with do some push ups to do a few things.

Don't do anything crazy. That's great advice.

That's what advice I'm giving, though, is that type of advice, like when they're they send me their diet plan and it's the diet plan of a Greek God. And I'm like, yeah, you're fucking lying. Like you're not doing that shit.

Like, that's what I'm talking about. I totally agree with what you're saying. But think about it. If I message you and said, hey, man, I need eighty grams of carbs a day, I'm walking four miles, no soda. I'm still 260 pounds at five nine. I think something's wrong. And it's like, yeah, you're fucking lying to yourself is what's wrong. Or maybe someone's really wrong.

You need to go to the doctor. I've said that to you. I have. I've met a lot of people with thyroid problems.

Yeah, definitely that. But you can get checked out. And so I am probably not the best for advice because literally, if you're the guy that's gotten checked out and you're just making excuses, I'm like, dude, you quit fucking lying to yourself and push for it is kind of crazy how many people lie about how often they work out what they do.

Yeah, it's really sad.

Yeah. Well, and again, I probably sound jaded but come in as a recovering fat kid myself. Right. Like, like I wake up and eat peanut butter. My wife has to hide this shit. Right. I got problems so I know where they're coming from.

You say that. But I've never seen you fat years. I've known you. You've always been fat. But I always say I'm fat, so I don't get that exactly. But that's the mentality. That's the right mentality versus the mentality that lies about how often you work out and what you eat.

Well, in, you know, again, I call myself fat and I always will because I never want to be fat again. When I get I got up to 260 when I got to the army.

Did you ever get to a point where you were making your own meals for the back country? Like, do you ever use a dehydrator? I do that now. Do you do that now? Yeah. What do you cook like? What kind of stuff do you make?

So rewind the cheapest meal I can get if I'm in a hurry and I can't make it as I get brown rice, top ramen and olive oil tuna for people listening, that is a cheap way to do it.

But so tuna and olive oil. Brown brown rice. Top Ramen. Yep. What is brown rice. Top rice. It's just a healthier top ramen.

OK, and then I make my own seasoning so it's not loaded with sodium. OK, but when I make a meal and there's multiple ways to do that, the like super easiest is just take elk steak, elk, a roast cooked a roast like you normally would.

And then in that roast I'll cut up sweet potatoes and I'll put in veggies. And they are just basically make kind of a stew and then and that that I and I put up.

So when I do that, do I put a ton of olive oil in it because of the fat?

And then I have trays on the dehydrator and they're the the trays where it's like a Frisbee so it can't go through. So I've got like sweet potatoes, olive oil. I usually put in like broccoli shit like that. And the sweet potatoes I cut up relatively small, dehydrated. It's that simple.

Do you have to when you make a meal like that with a dehydrated, you have to add extra seasoning so that it tastes good when you rehydrate it.

There's two ways to do it. What I encourage people to do is not add as much seasoning when you cook it because it will be hard to get it right, meaning everyone might if you're if you've got a buddy or depending upon what the meal is. Some meals are more flavorful than others. Some are more bland.

I added after, oh, OK. So when you're in, it's like you pour boiling water into it and then you add the seasoning on top of that.

So what I do is I depending you can do it in a Ziploc bag, but the easiest thing is those just cheap plastic containers or you can put in a titanium one. It doesn't matter. But once I, you know, kick it off, boil it, get it rehydrated, get the boiling water in there. I just put a lid on it, let it sit for ten minutes, not very long, or boil it until it is if I have extra fuel and then it's ready to go just like that.

Just like a mountain house.

Same principle to nothing. Makes me fart harder than mountain houses. Yeah. And it turns your poop funny colors like Amory's is an orange and a mountain house is a green. I've never poop green.

I did and I didn't look at it. But the smells that were coming out of my body last time I ate mountain houses just like rice. The shit cannot be good for you.

It's got a lot of sodium and most people are like, why does it matter? It's like 150 times a year. It fucking matters. Like I have got to I can't eat those things all the time. So there's a few new companies off. It's pretty healthy that I use.

But when I make my own, like I will take Idaho and potatoes and then at home I make for shepherd's pie and then what I've made in. Put in the dehydrator, I just mix it with Idahoan potato, so I make my own shepherd's, so you dehydrate it and then do you vacuum seal it and we'll packet's. It depends if I'm a lot of times. No, I actually just put it in a Ziploc bag because the vacuum seal thing, it helps.

But if I'm making it per trip or per month, you know, you're not trying to get it to stay forever. Yeah, yeah. I'm not worried about it.

So, yeah, that's one of the things. But there's other ways to cheat the you know, I say cheat the system, but there is other ways that you can save money, eat healthier, you know, when you're out there in a lot of guys, if you're only going for seven days, it's not that big of a deal. But long term, you know, you really got to think ahead.

I would also imagine that it gives you an extra sense of satisfaction that you're doing something like you're creating your own meals while you're eating, that, you know, this is a meal that from an animal that you shot yourself. You put the meal together yourself, you're dehydrated it now you're rehydrating it that extra sense of satisfaction that you're doing something. It is.

And actually, I've done it so much now that satisfaction is almost kind of a diggin desensitise. We're talking twenty years.

It's normal. It's normal. What's weird is what's not normal is when people look at me like I'm weird that I do it. That is weird for me. Like I'm like. What it's not like you cook burger, don't you, like really people come over and my wife's real estate agent, she gives a package to to the people that want a wild game is like the smartest thing she ever thought of because I don't you know what I've never bought.

OK, but I guess it's fucking expensive if you go target. Yeah. So she'll do like a package wild game as a thank you. If she says the House they'll call and she has all kinds of recipes or whatever. So when people come over and I'm like, what are we eating?

And I'm like, oh that's Mountain Goat and that's Moose there. And then we have like jalapeño cheeseburger and we'll mix it with our dad because that's kind of a weird flavor.

What is our dad taste like? Is everybody varied on that? Some people say it's terrible. Some people say it's delicious.

I would say the taste is good. It's tough stuff, too. So it's good like like a braise it and cook it slow cook it.

So I don't think you can fuck up anything. You slow cook. That's the thing. When people are I'm like, how do you fuck up a roast. But if you like, I took a backstrap or a tenderloin and cooked it. It was pretty tough. So we make everything into burger salami, you know, pepperoni sticks or whatever out of the your dad. Now, is it my first choice? No, but I tell you, the burgers pretty flavorful.

So we make almost everything out of in the breakfast sausage and burger.

Does it depend on what time of year, like if it's in the rut? I would say the right part has a huge part to do with it.

But if you make it into how a cheeseburger, I give a fuck. If you put that into a turd, that is going to taste good. Right. It doesn't matter.

And so the last one, that big, big one I shot, we made almost that whole thing into. Well, we did. We made the whole thing into burger broths, breakfast, sausage. But it tastes pretty good. It's not bad.

I mean, I think our people take care of the part of the problem and how they cook it.

Yeah. So we let them we drip them, you know, we drain them totally. And when I say aget not aging, well, let it hang for a couple days, we let it age as far as let it drain out, it makes it more tender.

So I, I hate when people see say things taste bad when it's just your dumb shit.

Bad preparation. Yeah. It's bad perhaps because I haven't tasted much wild game.

That wasn't great dude. We just did three hours believe it or not. Good God time flies in this room.

I know I'm pedia and that's a fucking miracle. I know you drank to kill and a bottle of water.

Yeah. Listen man, I tell everybody your podcast, Cafaro Casse, you can get if you're interested more in hunting and backpacking. Cuffaro Casse. It's available everywhere. And what is the Cafaro International's part of the website.

So Kafar ok if a are you dot net is the website and Cafaro cast is the the podcast and best fucking backpack's in the game.

Yeah I appreciate it man. Thanks for having me on. Great for being here brother. It was awesome. Was really fun to talk to you.

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