The Office's Ed Helm On His Secret Passion (History, Acting, Storytelling & MORE)

Here's where I get I go dark. Okay. An infinite number of monkeys. One of them will eventually write Hamlet. Like somebody's gonna set off nuclear holocaust. It's gonna happen. I've been seeing more like sculptural book decor. Huh. I there's a my my buddy has a a bookstore or he he he has a general store in Massachusetts that also has a book corner. Really? And he he Built this um he's an author actually. Uh um he wrote a beautiful book called The History of Sound. Oh, it's a book of short stories. Yeah. U Ben Shadic is

his name. Uh married to Jenny Slate also wrote some fabulous books. and Marcel the Shell, of course, which we're huge fans of in our house. So, Ben built this um this little entry to the booknook of the store by by making like a rebar arch. Yes. And then drilling holes in like a couple hundred books and Threading them on the arch. And it's this it's this like little story book. I had that exact same idea that it works. Did you have you been next door? No. I walk. So, we have a bookstore next door. Okay,

great. But the chimney is this. Yeah. From and the ceiling's maybe like 23 feet tall. So, it's like this giant thing. But I like that because have you been to the last bookstore in downtown LA? No. It's great bookstore in one of these big old buildings. Okay. And you Walk up the stairs and they they did that arch, but it's over like the top of the stairs. So, it looks like you're coming through like a book tunnel. Yeah. And so that's that that was one of the ideas I was going to steal, but I This

is from uh there's this company called Books by the Foot, and they sell them for like things like this or movie sets or rich people's houses that want to pretend that they Yeah. And you can also buy them by color. Yes. For like Interior designers who are like, I want a rainbow bookshelf. It just But doesn't that sort of break your heart a little bit? It's like it's very Great Gatsby. It's like it has nothing to do with the book itself. Oh, that's a very good reference. Yes. Right. Like he never What did he say?

The pages are all uncut in his library because no one's ever read a book in The Great Gatsby's library. Yes. Because he thought book smart people have books had books, Right? Yes. And that's what he reduced them to decoration, which is in a way what books by the foot does. But you know what? I It's It's a good aesthetic. Well, yes. I think if you're buying it to impress people, that's a problem. for buying it because I'm not going to destroy my books. This like none of these come out. These are all glued and nailed

in there. So So like I'm not going to destroy books that I like people go, "How do you get them Out?" And I was like, "I don't these are not my books. These are this is just for But that's funny. It reminds of the office is their uh it's the it's the date night or date mic one." And she goes, "Have you read Lee Aoka's biography?" And he goes, "Read it? I own it." Like that's like that's the more important statement. Not like I've read it, but yeah, that scene in the Gatsby Library is hilarious.

It's the guy with the glasses, right? I think. And he walks in there and he's just Oh, man. And I think that's, you know, you ever see like a decal edge book? Have you heard that? That's like that's I think when it's rough because the pages are cut. That's supposed to look like that's what that's mimicking. Right. Right. I should have done Snafu and Deal Edge. I have asked about that before. You Know, you can get you you can get anything you want in a book. They'll just be like, you know, it comes out of

your royalties. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You're like, I want all color photos on every page like this. And they're like, we can get that for you. But you understand we don't do that for Do you want any remuneration for this product? You know, this book will be $90. Uh yeah that's that's that's you're so Right. I mean this is my first book but it but going through the kind of like reduction of options. Yeah. And it's like oh yeah we want like like threecolor illustrations and and like uh oh it's that that changes the calculus

that much then then forget it. Let's do it's just like you're just sort of reducing more and more. But actually, I'm super proud of where we wound up because the the the visuals and you have a advanced so you don't you don't have The final visuals in there, but um but it's just some really cool uh and kind of cheeky uh like collage art in there. Well, the hard part about doing your first book is usually you're someone who loves books. So, you have a lot of like you you are bringing to this book everything

you've ever liked about any book you've ever read and then you're like, I'd like all this. They're like, let's pick a few of those. It's why it's why often times Firsttime directors movies are overkill. Yeah. The little much. Yes. Like there's too many camera moves, the lighting's too dramatic. It's like uh it's just cuz it's everything you always wanted to do. Yes. Well, there's a book over there that I see like sometimes I I c they catch my eye there, but Seth Goden wrote this book called Meatball Sunday and that's what he's describing. The idea

of like uh you have this ice cream sundae like you you add too many things onto Something and it at some point it becomes disgusting. I don't know. Meatball sundae. It does sound kind of like a Ben & Jerry's flavor. I can get behind that. Well, I thought the book was fascinating and it brings up something that I think about all the time, which is that like history is [ __ ] terrifying. Yeah. I think pe uh like uh and the more you read history, like it doesn't calm you Down. Often you go, "How are

any of us alive?" Interesting. I that this is I tried to head that off in the introduction. Yeah. Uh because I think of history in particular the sort of like study of disasters or or just like human folly. Um it's weirdly there there's this there's this kind of uplifting aftertaste to it which is the one thing they all have in common is that we got Through them. Yes. like we're still here and we it's to me that's a nice meditation during during difficult times. It's but that's like the parable of the turkey. Do you know

that? No, I don't. It's like it's good until one day is Thanksgiving. Like it's like hey if today was fine, today was fine. Like at some point that's such a basic parable. It's the parable of the turkey. It's good until it's the day that everybody eats you. Yeah. And then it's not good. Yes. It's just not good. Um, I I uh I still think that I mean I bring it to this moment. I feel like in where we're in what feels like this moment of unprecedented division and ranker and you know outrage and um people

are saying oh the look at how unprofessional the White House is is being managed right now. You know there's just so much outrage in both directions from all sides. And you don't have to look back very far in in especially in world history, but even in American history to be like, "Oh yeah, this is it's very precedent. This is uh part for the course. This is how we do it. This is what we do. We move through these like really difficult moments." And um and it always it always feels insurmountable. Sure. And that's where I

think the reassurance kicks in where it's like every everyone in some of these situations I mean this The book has has snafoos of all different scales but uh but even the big ones like the existential ones or or in my in the podcast snafu the first uh the first season it's like it's about nuclear holocaust. Yeah. And I don't know, there's just something like we're No, I think we get through it. You study history and it it both it calms you down because you're like we've been through things things like this before and then it

also makes me Terrified because you're like we've been through things like this before. Like we keep doing this. Well, no. I just mean like you realize like how bad it can like when people mess with certain things, how bad it can get very quickly. Do you know what I mean? like like um when you have you go like um like when people when when you when you play with certain human forces or you don't take care of certain things, you can descend into chaos very quickly. And there's like there's real consequences for incompetence and malice

and yes, secrecy and corruption. Like it it it's not like it has real consequences for real people. So I think when you study history you go okay if history's basically always been awful snafu is happening. That's what's so funny about that situation normal uh you know like the the premise is that it's always [ __ ] up. Yeah. And so that that's what gives you perspective. But Then it also reminds you of the stakes which is that like when when people do something they shouldn't do or a president does this or world leaders do that

or a company does this like people die or you know like you're measuring the consequences of the mistakes usually in human life and then the the fact about history repeating becomes kind of sad and tragic in that sense. I'm trying to I'm trying to put some positive top spin on this. You're Dragging me down. Come on. Right. No, but I uh I still cling to and and maybe it's a sort of desperation on my part, but I I genuinely uh I find it uh sort of therapeutic to to uh to visit these moments um kind

of revel in the all of the the just hubris and folly and idiocy that caused them. Yeah. Comedic. I mean, a lot of these things, you know, the the curation of this book, the choices that that I made like about what goes in here, it's Largely it's not things that are um it's it's things that with distance we can smile about and that I can give a sort of cheeky treatment to. It's just like we just persevere. There's something human about that. Um and and well history is not optim there's something optimistic about that. Yeah.

I think history was it history is not fun to live through necessarily right like it and so it's kind of always been thus and there's like those people's lives Are okay you know like it I I I I think I don't think it's mutually exclusive. I think that that's kind of the premise like I've said this before but like people forget Churchill was a historian. That's like how he made his living is he wrote books about history. And there's this letter he writes to his publisher right as World War II is breaking out and he's

like I'm just going to put a thousand years between me and this m like he's just he's like I'm going to go To my books and chill out for a minute. And that's that didn't make World War II less bad. Like I think that's what I mean. I'm sure he had this this sense of like hey I'm going to escape and look at the history for a second and then it's this is also going to give me a sense of foroding of how bad things can get. So, I think I just think there are kind

of this I I think that's to me what the study of history gives you is both comic relief and perspective, but then also Like uh let's try to get this right because if we get it wrong, it's real bad for people. Yeah. Yeah. And and you're right. I mean, the the scale of human suffering throughout history is so overwhelming that it that that that can be uh that that can be a spiral of despair. But that's where stoicism kicks in and that's where there's so many of your of your lessons to be uh applied here.

Well, one of my favorite ones is like the Soviets didn't believe in Evolution. So like they their crops couldn't get any better because they like refused to accept the premise that like you could genetically modify and selectively breed for things. Interesting. And so like that's like insane and silly, but then also like millions of people die because of famines and stuff as a result of it. Good god. So okay, like if you don't those don't seem like mutually exclusive ideas Necessarily. Oh, the evolution. Yeah. Well, that you can that you can sort of like make

immediate adaptations that on it's different from a scale of evolution. Yeah. But they're they're just rejecting the the premise of like sort of even I think like it's like this to me the the metaphor is that when you have an ideology or a doctrine that blinds you to a set of obvious facts in front of you which is like one of the themes of history. It's just are The the triumph of like preconceived notions over one overwhelming piece of evidence over overwhelming piece of evidence. Yeah. Yeah. But we bring uh Yeah. Yeah. Boy, history is

full of that. There's uh there I I don't know if there there are certain are there any episodes that jumped out at you? Well, the Carter one I find fascinating because I he's like one of my favorite presidents and the idea like he has this reputation of being this kind of like Adult or loser or weirdo and it's like he's a nuclear physicist who also like single-handedly like in a moment of great heroism like saved potentially a lot of people from from a nuclear disaster and then we're just like, "Oh, he looks so dumb in

those sweaters or whatever." Like he said he had lust in his heart. Like the things that we like that's the other thing about history is our our our almost impressive ability to learn the wrong thing or to focus on the Wrong narrative from a thing or reduce it to something completely irrelevant and ridiculous. Yeah. Just so listeners know, this this the episode you're talking about uh or the story from the chapter you're talking about is is when Jimmy Carter was, I think, 28 years old and was uh worked on in the in the Navy nuclear

sub uh I forget his title, but he had he was high ranking in in nuclear subs and and he was called upon to address a meltdown happening in in Ottawa that was the first nuclear uh power plant melt. meltdown. Yeah. In history. And he had to train they they they had they couldn't be at the core of this meltdown for more than 90 seconds at a time. So some Mission Impossible. Yeah. Totally. So they built this duplicate of the core which they they then trained all of the the you know specific actions that they had

to do and so they could jump in and do this thing for 90 seconds and then Jump out and then just keep going and keep going until this reactor was fixed. Yeah. And it is uh it's insanely heroic. Like the the danger the the the pressure of something like that is is crazy. And you're right, it is so just completely diametrically opposed to all of our popular perceptions of Jimmy Carter as just this like goober. Yeah. Like he's literally like from the peanut state. That's my home state. And I love Jimmy Carter because he's like

a Georgia boy. He's also one of the greatest human beings that ever, you know, like just a a decent human being. Yeah, you're right. And and but now but you read this, you're like, "Oh, he that man was he had grit." Yes, that that man was courageous and leadership. Yes. Too, which I think a lot of people fault his president. That's where people are like he was just kind of a like dinky president like he didn't have that that strong hand. But he man you look back It's in there. I would say among the stories

of the book that is one of the few that gives me what you were saying which is like the hope like we got through this like he didn't he was not responsible for the [ __ ] in any way. He was he was the one that helped save it. Yeah. Right. And uh usually we don't get such a nice clear like and that's one of the ones we know about we don't know about it because it didn't end badly. Yeah. Like it it No, you're Right. So we're not like that that doesn't keep anyone up

at night because it was a near miss. Yeah. That's actually a wild that's a that's an incredibly important point that you're making. There's so many things that when you just start to scratch the surface of history and and and dig deeper, we have forgotten about, you know, I mean, about so many things. A I think a lot of things in this book will be new to people. Um the podcast we go into uh one Of the most insane events of the 80s uh which was this NATO military exercise AEL Archer in 1983 and nobody nobody

that was actually classified until just a few years ago. So that's that's why nobody knows about it. But it it does it's so full of uh of uh like incredibly potent lessons for us right now, especially with all this there's like suddenly nuclear saber rattling again. Yes. And um but yeah, just if if people don't know that that Story, Abel Archer was a military exercise in 1983 that where NATO was moving troops and and doing this massive exercise as as militaries do in order to sort of practice what you know, actual warfare. This particular year,

the Cold War tensions were so hot. This was right in the wake of the evil empire speech Reagan's and uh and the Korean that Korean airliner plane had been shot down by the Soviets and tensions were just so hot that the Soviets began perceiving this NATO military exercise as potentially real. Yeah. Oh, we think they're actually staging an invasion. Yeah. and uh and and the Soviets at the time were had had set up this uh this system of collecting evidence that was so prone to bias of just like perceiving threat. Yeah. And so of course

they got in insanely antsy and they're trying to deliver results to their higherups like look look what we found. Look at all This scary stuff. And so Abel Archer uh becomes perceived as this grand like massive scale staging for an invasion. Soviet Union ramps up their nuclear posture. We of course clock all of that with our sort of intelligence and we ramp up our nuclear posture. They clock that and it's just this standoff that becomes it unfathomably close Yeah. to like button pushing, right? And nuclear holocaust. Uh it's what's really wild About that story is

to look back um knowing now that that that that narrative was playing out and then but to overlay sort of the arc of Reagan's tone towards Kruef and towards the the Soviet Union and and George Schultz, the Secretary of State, like what what they were sort of saying at different times. Now knowing when you put this timeline underneath it, you're like, "Oh, there there was a tone shift right here." Yeah. because they were suddenly aware Of how close they realize they're playing with fire. Yeah. And that it was real and and then and then you

go and that was a that was a media environment and a global communications environment that is like in retrospect hilariously quaint and slow. Yes. Like Cruchep during the missile crisis is like sending this like long teletype memo to Kennedy's like waiting for it to type out and then he's like well I'll respond in the morning. Now it's like the the Constraints on Twitter are determining it. Who said this? Is this a real person? Just it's terrifying to think. I mean that's one of the lessons I think from your book but also for setting history which

is like no one should have nuclear weapons. It's just bad for every like we should not be entrusted. No one should be trusted with a thing that can destroy everyone because we're idiots. Somebody I guess somebody has to be trusted with it because we invented it. Yes. I'm just saying if it was not. Yes, of course. I think that's what's fascinating about your thing is is how far back it goes. Like it's not like just recently we got stupid. Like we've always been prone to disasters and anytime you organize people into groups there's miscommunications and

there's screw-ups and there's all this stuff. And it's it's that's all of human history up until 1945. And then suddenly humans possess The ability to destroy all other humans in an instant. Yeah. And that's you're suddenly in new territory. Like there's not a lot of moments in human history where everything does fundamentally become different. And that is the first time that's possible, right? And it feels like we're on the cusp of that again. Yeah. With generative AI. But uh here's where I get I go dark. Okay. I just I feel like, you know, if an

infinite number of monkeys can one of Them will eventually write Hamlet, like somebody's going to set off nuclear holocaust. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Like we're it's going to happen. Mhm. It's a matter of time and and every near miss in a way increases the chances that at some point in the future it will h it's not like the fact that it hasn't happened doesn't make it less likely to happen in the future. I think it makes it more likely to happen in the future. Yeah. But it does I guess we're holding On to just the idea

that it's so it's so uh unfathomably catastrophic that even someone who wants to be that person who ends the world deeper down doesn't want to be that person. Maybe my friend gave this TED talk and it's it's about like it's about sort of the psychology of say like mass shooters, right? They're they're these dark twisted individuals who basically want to not be alive and they want to Hurt as many people on their way to unaling themselves, right? And so his point is like, okay, obviously for most of human history, it was impossible to get a

weapon that allowed you to do that at any kind of scale. Like even just the technology of a handgun is infinitely more dangerous and makes us more vulnerable than what you're like loading an old school musket, right? And so his point is like, okay, um, so what percentage of people want to do Something like that? Very, very, very small percentage of people, but a lot of people, you know, you're going to get a certain number of people that do that. And so he's like, okay, well, what how many like airline pilots are there? How many

people work in infectious diseases? How many people work in nuclear weapons? Does at some point statistically do you not get somebody who is of that mentality or gets to that breaking point, but instead of doing a school Shooting or something, they have a thing that can unleash unfathomable harm on an enormous amount of people. And that that yeah you can you can think yourself into uh a point of almost existential doom very quickly like oh [ __ ] that right how many airline pilots have there ever been how many infectious how many people have access

to bioweapons etc and you're like oh it comes down to like one crazy person could change the balance of humanity. Yeah. I mean thankfully thankfully or not I guess the uh the barrier to entry for those other um mechanisms being an airline pilot or a high level infectious disease Yeah person like there there are so many hurdles. Yeah. And of course there are virtually no hurdles to gun acquisition. I know it's strange. Um but uh but I take your point. It's a there there's a this one game this one game theorist has this idea that

to to Decrease the risk of nuclear holocaust. It's that um the nucle you know there's the nuclear football that they carry around with the president and his argument was that actually um we should pick a person and then we should put those codes in their chest cavity. So we should send them. Have you heard this? Yeah, I read that. Yeah. It's it's it makes so much sense. Obviously, it's a thought exercise, but the idea that um it's abstracted is the problem. Like You're pressing a button and then over there lots of harm is happening to

pe faceless people. The idea that the president would have to kill someone with their bare hands like hack them open and fully like like get the nuclear code out of their chest cavity. Uh that's a much it's a it's a it's a very I think reasonable thought exercise to explore because you're right it just makes the act of launching but personifies it in one act of violence Instead of endless face you have to go call Steve the guy with the you know like just follow it's like three people turning keys or whatever and then but

uh but boy is that that person the patriot whoever that is right. Right. Like agrees to that. It's like the ancients how they're like this person's like a vestal virgin or like it's like some hereditary position or whatever and and so far it's none of them have it's none of them have ever had to do it. So it Seems like a it's the parable of the turkey also. It's seems like a great job until some future day. So venerated and honorable and just like the turkey gets trotted out for the in the White House and

well actually that guy gets pardoned. So I guess a bunch of people in a row make it all the way to retirement. It's great gig until one guy it's like three days under the job. It's horrible. Oh my god. So have you always been into History? Were you always a history nerd? Yeah, I think uh it it just it it it's where I sort of gravitate to with uh with reading and research. And I'm I'm very much uh like I'm very ADHD quite literally, you know, officially or whatever that means diagnosed. But but I I

chase rabbits all the time and I uh and I'm just always like Wikipedia like I don't let things go if something pops up and it's like what? Like on the way here we're in Bastrop, Texas. Yeah. And I'm like I got to know about Bastrop Texas. Like what's this? What is this place? Yeah. And uh and I'm reading about some history and uh and I and I just love it. It becomes their stories. And you know what I do for a living is is storytelling. As an actor, as a comedian, as uh uh as as

a creator of media, it's all it's all storytelling. And there's it's like when you see this Is a true story at the beginning of a movie or or TV show like it just has that added yes little like giddy factor and I I love I just get that little tinge every time I'm digging into something or reading about something new. Um, unfortunately my ADHD brain is also very much a civ and and so I I take in tons of like I have a very fine like small fixed amount of data that my brain can hold

and I'm constantly pouring in New stuff which is super fun but a lot of it uh it just kind of falls out the back. Bashup is a weird place. Yeah. like it's named after this guy who pretended to be a baron but wasn't like in the way that people would come here from Europe and be like I'm count so and so and they'd be like sure. Yeah. So he call he was Baron de Bastrop or something and it's just to a financial criminal basically but you know Germany was a long way away or wherever he

was Claiming to be from like the uh those the what are they the characters in Huck Finn the um uh what do they I'm blanking on the count and the But have you read James? Have you read the book James? No, I haven't. Okay. So, uh, Pival Ever wrote this book that's I'm well aware of it. Yeah. So, it's it's the perspective of Jim, but he's James. He's actually really smart and super well read. But one of the fascinating parts of the book Is from Tom from Huff Finn's perspective in the Twain version, they're kind

of these like colorful weird characters, but in James' in in James, they're well, they're criminals and they're they would sell him down the river literally in so like they're going from town to town, you know, swindling people out of, you know, a few dollars to attend made up play or whatever, but you imagine they they chance upon a Human being worth a thousand dollars in their like Yeah. So, so in James, what's fascinating is the menace that the characters take on, right? And it kind of reminds you of like what great like whenever someone reimagines

something or you see a an actor make a really different choice, you're like, "Oh, I never even considered that they're that." And it it totally ch so much of the book changes your perspective. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that that I that's That's actually quite poignant, too. And yeah, I got to get It's really good. I I that's one that's on the list. Um but in in general, I think history is just also a a bit of an escape for me. like I um I kind of it's easier to read about other people's problems than to focus

on or try to solve your own sometimes. So, so in some ways it can be a bit of a maybe um not not the most healthy bit of escapism, but but I do I also try to like take lessons from These things and take ideas uh into my life, you know, as I was so excited when you invited me on this on your show and I I it got me thinking like where are some of the stoic ideas that emerge from these stories? Yeah. And I kept thinking about well Abel Archer in particular being a

military exercise is sort of the uh the ultimate premeditio mealora. Sure, right? Yes. And and there's another one in the book. I know exactly what you're going to say. Yeah. The uh the millennium challenger. That's the opposite of a premeditio. Oh, okay. Explain. Well, I'm just say like so uh premeditum is this idea that you practice you premeditate on the things that go wrong. And there's this famous war game and it starts going poorly. So they basically change the rules. Yeah. So they could w they're the win the war game instead of learning the lesson

which is like, "Oh [ __ ] we're terribly unprepared for something like this." They go, "No, no, no. How can we shuffle the paperwork around so we don't have to make any changes?" Yeah. So, Millennium Challenge was a uh another war game in 2002 where uh the the the US military divided divided its team into two teams, red and and blue. Of course, blue was the United States and red was sort of this samorphous Middle Eastern foe. And uh and and Red uh this this this Marine lieutenant was in charge of the red team and

he just Got really creative. Yes. And he was going way kind of like out of bounds with with his ideas and Oh, I'm going to send messages via motorcycle messenger. Yeah. To to the battlefield. I'm not going to turn on my radar so I can't be uh found. Uh, I'm gonna signal I'm gonna go back to like like mid-century tactics and I'm gonna signal my ships with lights instead of like radio transmissions. And uh he even did this incredible thing where he was Researching uh animal herd behavior uh in how to how maybe he could

maneuver smaller boats to overtake larger boats. And it worked. And so the red team is just crushing the blue team. And the blue team is like, "Well, this doesn't validate all of our preconceived ideas about you're cheating. You're cheating at war." They accused him of cheating. And uh and yeah, like you said, they just they just wound up constraining the red team. Yeah. They actually lost on The first day. Yeah. And then they said uh let's uh let's do it again. Yeah. Because we still have 13 days designated for this exercise. So there's more lessons

to be learned. Let's do it again. But now we're going to start sort of constraining you a little bit. And then they constrained him so much that that general retired or just uh uh he quit. Yeah. He was like, "Guys, I'm out. This is ridiculous. This is embarrassing." Right. And of course, no Lessons learned. Uh it wasn't long after that that that some of those tactics were seen on the on the battlefield, which was the whole point of the point of the exercise, not for one person to win or another person to lose. It's to

learn something and to to be test to stress test these different things. Exactly. But if you're if you're your goal is to look good or make someone else look good or not look bad, that's the whole problem. I interviewed um Arnold Schwarzenegger last year and I was talking to his chief of staff and he was telling me this story that when Schwarzenegger was governor, they were supposed to do some like disaster FEMA uh uh mock thing like, "Hey, this is a earthquake, you know, whatever." And so everyone's practicing. and it was supposed to start at

like uh 5:00 a.m. and they were like, "We'll wake up, we'll start, you know, and um Arnold woke up at like 3:30 and he called it And he just started it early and everyone's like, "What are you doing? We're not ready. We're not ready." And it's like that his point was like the whole point is you're never going to be ready. What do you do when you're not ready? How the the point is how quickly can you get ready when you're not ready? And I can imagine like certainly somebody looked at the math when Putin

was like what would happen if we invade Ukraine. Someone was like it could not Go well. Like it could go really bad. And then they were like you can't tell him that, right? Like you definitely don't tell him that. There's actually a famous story about the emperor Hrien. He has this um he has this uh this favorite philosopher and they're like talking and um they get in some argument. It was something small, not like a disaster or whatever. They get in an argument small, something small. And the guy's right. And Hrien is insisting that he's

right. And finally the the guy goes, "You know what? Actually, you're right." And then he leaves and and the the philosopher's friends say, "Uh, why would you? You're correct. Why would you?" And he's like, "I think you you've made a mistake. Uh, the person who commands 30 legions is always correct." And that's the reality of power. It has this distortive effect. Yeah. where people tell you what they think you want to hear instead of what's true. And that's probably responsible For like 50% of the snafuss in the book or in history. It's just not truth

not getting to the person who desperately needs or that person being unable to to process truth for one way or another. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Truth. truth not making it because they are not receptive to it. Yeah. Or it's been caught before they could be receptive. Yeah. And in the case of the the Millennium Challenge, like they they were truth was so evident. Yes. It was just falling in Their laps and they were just like, "No, no, no, no, no, no. We don't like it." Yeah. We don't like that, right? We're gonna we're going to change

that. Yeah. That that's um that screws up the exercise, right? as opposed to tells us exactly what the exercise was intended to surface. Like if it's just a thought exercise and not an a thing where there's unpredictability, why are you even doing it? Yeah. You know, I saw this Um Instagram reel recently that kind of blew my mind that's sort of in speaks to this which is uh it's basically the power of our own confirmation bias. What's interesting is to me is like sometimes our confirmation bias is just sort of sorting information. Yeah. As it

comes into us. But then you have a situation like that like that where the confirmation bias takes on proactive adjustment of reality. And it's like no no no this is not working For my confirmation bias. I need to actually change the rules of the game here. But this uh this clip that I saw, it just said when you as you listen to this sound, think um think the phrase aliens have landed or some anything. Yeah. And you listen to this like very strange audio sort of gurgle, but you can hear aliens are landing in it.

Yeah. Right. Then they say, "Now listen to the same sound, uh, but this time you'll hear, uh, it's a it's a cold day today Or something." Yeah. And you listen to it again. It's the exact same sound. And suddenly you can hear your your brain is sort of piecing those sounds together. And it's a it's just a demonstration of what you what the expectation that you bring to something. Yeah. how it defines your perception of the thing. Totally. And that I'm still reeling from that honestly because it's like how much do we just dictate Yeah.

What we're perceiving to ourselves? Yeah. And and and and like what is how do you see things for what they are? Yeah. Yeah. How can we like diminish our our filters as much as possible or diminish our expectations for the way things should be or the way things should look or feel? And I mean we all can I think like that that's a very uh sort of like enclosed encapsulated experiment with this sound gurgle. But we all know Of moments when we have walked into a situation and and manifested its outcome oftentimes in a bad

like in a frustrating way. The frustrating way ones are the ones we remember and we can point to where it's like, "Oh, I walked into that so insecure or I was already hot or whatever." Yeah. Yeah. I was already mad. Yeah. Exactly. And it went wrong or I embarrassed myself. Um that's a form of that. That's a form of sort of manifesting something. And I um I'm just Fascinated by that uh and and sort of desperate to like well the idea that your perceptions are not your mind is not your friend and your perceptions are

constantly [ __ ] with your perception is really kind of trippy and that like part of philosophy going back thousands of years is the ability to go like why do I think this or is that true or where am I you know and the to have the sort of self-discipline to go you know here's here's a script I have So, is this Following that script or here's a bias I have? And the ability to sort of have some skepticism about your own thoughts and impulses is like a real superpower. You're never going to be perfect

at it, but just to be slightly more aware than the average person. Well, it's funny. I would I would call it a superpower for like uh for being a whole person that experiences the world. Well, it is I think it that kind of humility that that sort of Like social emotional humility Yeah. and intellectual humility uh is uh a liability in the sort of like what we're seeing in the sort of public leadership space. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Apparently, I mean, that's what we're learning right now is that apparently th those that kind of humility

can be uh can backfire, but but that's not what we're talking about. I I I agree like the and and the the this uh the the stoic uh notion um amore Fati. Yes. Yeah. That is a superpower because if you can love your fate, if you can love whatever you're walking into, um that uh just that positive sure energy that you bring into any any situation or especially unknown situations with like very unknown outcomes that would normally sort of trigger a fear. If that can actually if you can bring love to that or or a

sense of benevolent like Acceptance to it then um then the outcome is so much more likely to reflect that. If you're like I can work with that. Yeah. Yeah. And and I don't I don't know the first thing about Navy Seals. Uh and I don't think I would make a very good Navy Seal, but what's his name? The um Joo. Jaco Willing. Good. Good. Yeah. So, have you interviewed him? I have. Yeah. Okay. I love that. I I saw one of this is good. I saw that that clip and I just was like That's awesome

because uh and I try I've tried using it on my kids. They're not on board yet. But it but it's but it is like we're gonna there's something good going to come out of this. Yes. And usually it's like in the examples he gave that I saw it was like someone worried about a c an upcoming circumstance and that's where if you can be like okay good well good then well the the superpower of the artist is that everything can be good For the artist because you can use it for your thing right that's I

think that is the the ultimate redemptive for all the [ __ ] you have to put up with for the problems for how hard it is to make it and all the stuff that's tough about it. The the ultimate compensation is that you can use anything that happens to you in your form of expression. In fact, you're that's what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to take what life gives you and transform it into a Painting or a poem or a performance. Like that like when when you're like, I'm tired. I'm frustrated. It's hot. You

know, you're like, how could I how can this be part of the character? or like I'm thinking like, hey, how how can I this was expensive and stupid and I'm so angry about it. But if I can work this into the next book in some way, I can tell myself that it was actually good that it happened because the book was better for it happening. And that to me Is like that that is that's the that's the superpower of an artist is you get to use all the stuff in a way that I mean it's

I think it's also true as a parent. It's true as a school principal. whatever you do, you want to use your things. But in in the way that a comedian can take this thing and be like, there's a funny bit here. Maybe that's harder to see as a nurse, but like it is true. We can take our experiences and use them in some way. That's a beautiful uh reflection on on artistic pursuit. I I hadn't thought of it in that way, and I love that. It's a it's a it's a it's a processing. What's interesting

is I think a lot of artists don't even know that they're doing that. Yes. Right. So you take like uh a death metal person who's like a very tortured like they're and maybe living a tortured life and um but expressing them like like they're a conduit for these things that become This art form that's like death metal which is not for everybody but it but it is it's an artistic expression and and then and it and for a lot of people that's a that's something that they can take in they can take that toxic experience

of that person's life that artist and feel something good. Well, I saw a clip of you. You were talking about how the the Andy Bernard sort of catch, it's not a phrase, it's like a sound, was something you heard from a Bully growing up. And so like you're telling it on a TV show and everyone's laughing and you're laughing. But I'm sure it wasn't fun hearing it from the bully during the bullying, but all these years later it finds an outlet or a thing and it's not just uh hey, this is where I got that

from, but it's like a thing that brings people joy and happiness and it makes you better at your job. There's no way you're going to sense that in the moment. I'm recording this. But that's what an artist does is an artist sees a thing that I think an ordinary person would see as only bad or just immediately forget. An artist locks on to it and goes there's something here. Subconsciously they think this and then it comes back all these years later. Oh, this is this is the place for that. That's really a funny example and

it brings to mind another another sort of surprising example from from my my Career which was uh when we were shooting Hangover 2 in Bangkok and I got the worst food poisoning of of my life and possibly anyone's life and my body just exploded out of every uh possible opening and uh Sorry for that, but um yeah, tell us more. Could you describe it? Let me break it down. Um well, no, the the best Well, there was one point where obviously if both ends are operating simultaneously, you have To kind of spin around in a

bathroom and the toilet was in a closet in this in my hotel room and I spun around so fast that I bashed my head on the door jam. So now I'm like bleeding and it's all happening. It was I I I got so dark. I remember that night like I'm gonna die. I thought I was gonna die like thousands of miles from anyone I love. Just a horrible way to die. Despair. Yes. And I called our first AD who's the first AD on a film production is kind of the boss Like the foreman if you

will. And I was like I don't know what's happening. I'm just like I I I can't I'm [ __ ] myself to death. I think I might. This is like and he just goes, "You're so your pickup is at 6:30. We'll see you then." Yeah. And I was like, "Oh, yeah. Right. This is uh this is how this works." Yeah. They're not going to stop a thing of 300 people because Yes. So, what happens is I go to set and uh and it happens to be we're shooting these Scenes where our characters, as is the

sort of hangover motif, are tortured and beat to [ __ ] and like feeling horrible. Uh, and I'm able to actually kind of rally. I'm I'm literally curled up in field position between takes, but I'm rallying in those moments and like feeling sick, but feeling the the narrative kind of like fused or or channeled through that. Also, the other thing that's happening is this beautiful uh I I just I'm Receiving this beautiful kind of safety net from Zach and Bradley. there when I'm curled up and we're shooting in Soy Cowboy which is the red light

district of Bangkok and it's very like it's just grimy like it's a and and that we're in the sidewalk and then sit like I'm on a blanket on the sidewalk and Zach and Bradley are just sitting next to me with like a hand on my back or on my leg and just like brea I'm getting misty thinking about it like giving me Sprite. Sure. And that connection is also what's coming through the movie is like weirdly these guys who are just constantly like at each other's throats are also there's this like kind of subconscious like

deep bond of like they're there for each other and and that was also hap both of those things were happening and they're probably inseparable from each other they're connected to each other because they see what you're putting in or what it's taking out of you and it's bringing Everyone together I heard did an interview with Kate Winslett once. I actually added it into the the 10 year anniversary of the obstacles away. I didn't add that much stuff to it, but she was talking about how her acting philosophy is she gets there and she says to

herself, "What can I get for free?" Like not like what stuff can I steal from set, but like uh like what like what am I feeling? Like I'm tired, so like how does my how does Me being tired give something to my character that I now don't have to act so hard on? And so if you're grimy and disgusting and hung over and your your life is escape, you know, whatever the the because your character is particularly tortured throughout the whole things, that's the comic relief of it. And now you are comically relieved in that

way in real life. you're probably able to tap into a to to act that level would require a level of uh Effort and skill that maybe is not attainable on a normal day because how could you fake something so profoundly painful, you know? I love that idea that that some of these these uh it's it's a spin on good. Yes. Right. Totally. It's like I feel sick or tired today. Good. Yes. Like use it. Yes. And that's that's an old kind of like apherism in in acting is like use it use whatever you have but

or or like use your your tortured childhood. You use your your Painful memories for for this or that. Um it goes back to just your initial kind of expression of this uh this idea of of artists. Yeah. being a um I I forget how you phrase it exactly, but the way I'm interpreting it is a kind of uh a a channel um for yeah, just a a way to take experiences and uh and weirdly make them digestible. Yeah. To others. And well my mentor Robert Green he told he said um You know you just got

to remember it's all material just like everything is material and then you're like oh okay so yeah this it's not saying the divorce is fun or the broken leg is fun or the food poisoning is fun or the global pandemic is fun or the political dysfunction is fun but it is material in the sense that it inform it it either becomes material or it informs the material and that's sort of the job is to take these these things and to turn it into something. Um, and that's it's not a it it doesn't redeem it in

the sense that you would you would choose it, but you didn't get a choice. That's the whole point is that like here it is. The only saving grace is that you made something of it. H how how much discipline does it take to to to to say good every time? Well, it's easy when you live like a as the office would say a nerf life, you know, like it it it's I think I sometimes struggle with that with the books Because people like I was just talking to someone and he's like, "Hey, I'm rereading your

book because I just found out I have throat cancer." And I'm like, "What holds up?" you know, like like because I was I was writing it about how you say good to, you know, like traffic or like I was writing about from my experiences which are not nothing but they're not that. Yeah. And so that is kind of one of the hard that is one of the this the trippy parts about art is That you know you make it from your experience and it can often end up speaking to people in far more serious or

you can't control who and how it speaks to other people. And so sometimes there's a heaviness where like Sure. Yeah. I'm say like what we're saying good to dayto day is nothing compared to someone who's like you know I just buried a child and and and you know like someone someone just asked me to sign some books and they were like telling me This story about like what had happened to them and I was like well I'm definitely not writing a morphy to this person because that is would be so preposterously insensitive and I'm like

I really have to think about how I can say something that isn't flippant. Yep. Because you know, Jaco can say good because he's the commanding officer of these people he's telling this thing to, but he can't say good to someone who just, you know, lost everything or a kid Who got beat up on the playground. Totally. That's it's like choose your moments. Yes. Or maybe I mean if but again it's something that that it's like uh it be it can become a kind of muscle memory if you if you work on it and sort of

meditate on it and and uh um and imagine premeditio meorum. You imagine being in those situations um like Uh when it's like it is good. You could turn this into something but you would not want and you you have to be sensitive what you say to people of course like telling other people that for sure but I but I just in terms of like how training yourself to respond to something. It's weird. I haven't thought about this in a long time but um I'm reminded of the comedian Tom Green. So this is like in 2000

or 2001 or something. He was diagnosed with Testicular cancer. Yeah. And I saw an interview with him and I don't know Tom Green. I um I was a big fan of his when when I was younger and uh and I I remember this interview that was like kind of grave like it was it was like kind of serious. and he said uh that his friend he and his friend had had um and I'm probably butchering this somewhat, but what I took from it was this idea that when something goes terribly wrong, they flip it. There's

another way of say It's another way of saying a lot of what we've been saying. You flip it flip it over. Yeah. And like you make it good. You make it something Sure. Um there are situations where that feels impossible. You would think a testicular cancer diagnosis is one of those situations. He flips it into a documentary about his case. Yeah. about his what his experience and um and he becomes a uh a sort of vessel for positive Uh you know a a positive way to maneuver a situation like that can probably normalize the thing

that people have a lot of shame about and don't talk about like it probably helps the overall conversation about like hey this is a thing that can happen to healthy younger people. Yeah. And and that is about as grave, you know, when mortality is at stake like there that's about as grave a circumstance as as it gets. And fortunately, as I understand it, his uh Operations all were successful and recovery was successful. Um and and you even have to wonder there there's so much uh in in in medical science now about sort of the ethos

that you bring to a medical experience whatever it is and how that affects your outcome. And if you're um you know if you feel like this is the end. Yeah. And and uh and and look there's no these are some of the most impossible feelings to control or adjust or or try To steer in any way. So there's I don't say there's any judgment for how anyone may be feeling but um but that trying to bring a a mind a mindset of uh of of recovery and of like next steps positive steps actually can affect

start to affect your physiology in ways. Certainly not going to hurt. Yeah. You know what I mean? where I could see like giving up or not caring or not trying that probably has its own impact on the your physiological self also. Sure. Yeah. I just read a New York Time there was a big New York Times profile about him. He like has a ranch in Canada or something. Oh, cool. Oh, I got to check that out. Yeah, it was it was because he like basically invented podcasting also, but didn't you know, he was the Joe

Rogan went on Tom Green's podcast and was like, I should do this really. He's been very Yeah, it's And you're just like sometimes the person that invents the thing does not get the thing. And So, yeah, but it it was a lot of the piece was sort of about him kind of coming to peace like even he he was even talking about like he also invented like what Jackass became also. Sure. And so he was like, "Multiple times I've like predicted the next big thing and then the next big thing went to someone else. Everyone's

gonna move to ranches in Ottawa." Yeah. Apparently that's the next the next big thing. That doesn't sound bad. I'll be honest. So what's the Next You're doing another season of the show, right? Yeah. So season 3 is actually I I don't know when this will air, but uh it it may be it's coming out in a week. Okay. Which so it'll probably be out. Um and uh each season of the podcast, so the podcast and the book are are a little bit different in that each season of the podcast is a deep dive into one

thing. Yeah. Yeah. And uh so it's eight, you know, half 354 minute episodes. Uh highly produced, very Heavily researched. It's kind of produced as a as a sound collage story. I'm the host narrator, but we have we work in lots of archival audio and interviews with experts and in many cases people involved with uh the incident itself. Yeah. Some of it's not that long ago. Yeah. Yeah. The the the season two uh was was 71. Ael Archer was 83. Um so that's uh that's sort of how the podcast works. Season three of the podcast is

coming Out. It's it's 1920s, so we don't have any we don't have any people from from then, sadly, but uh um but it's it's a really wild story of kind of deep within prohibition. I I'm well aware most people have prohibition kind of in their in their brain as just sort of the furniture back there. We kind of know that it's when, you know, the Volstead Act and the alcohol was made illegal. bunch of gangsters shot everybody with Tommy guns and uh organized crime exploded and then we just realized this is a terrible idea and

we made alcohol legal again. Uh that kind of amazing that you used to be able to have constitutional amendments and then if it didn't go well you could just pass a different constitutional amendment getting rid of it. Yeah. That like in one way prohibition is government not working but it's also not that long ago the system worked. Yes. like they used To change things and try things and we don't do that. You're right. You're 100% right. It's in that way prohibition is like functional government. Yes, it's the constitution working. Yeah. But there's a there's a

sort of underbelly of the of the prohibition that I didn't know about until we started researching this. Um and it's that uh the so the industrial alcohol supply uh it was well known that a lot of this was getting sort of pirated into the Bootlegged alcohol for for human consumption. Um and so that's where the process of denaturing emerged. And denaturing alcohol is when you basically add chemicals to it to make it incredibly undesirable. And usually that's in the form of taste. So like it it's just like so horrific to consume that you don't want

it. Yeah. And so it's safe in a in a warehouse because nobody wants it. Yeah. And then you can use it for its industrial purposes. Um It started to become a thing where they also were adding poisons to denatured alcohol uh and the industrial alcohol supply. And they started adding more and more uh awful poisons knowing that this was going to get channeled into the bootleg alcohol supply and that many people would be consuming this and thousands of people died because of this and this was the government. This wasn't like this was a tactic to

this is the Depersonalization abstraction thing we were talking about like we know we're putting poison in the thing that people will drink but let's not think about what's going to happen when people drink it. Let's just let's just hope like maybe like people will catch on real quick and then and then stop drinking and and prohision will work. So, uh, prohibition enforcement is is its own like just massive snafu and it's so endlessly fascinating. There's so many Like weird, cool, interesting characters um throughout. But this story and then uh that this story of the poisoning

Yeah. of thousands of Americans by the American government, yeah, is like largely unremembered. Uh, which is wild. And the heroes of that story are these the the first uh medical examiners of New York City, Alexander Gler. Um and uh oh my god. Oh my god. I don't think you need to remember thousands of hours on that. Anyway, Charles Norris, Charles Norris and Alexander Gler, first medical examiners, and they're the ones actually they they're pioneering all these methods to discover what chemicals are in dead bodies. and they start to realize like there's patterns here. Right. Right.

Right. And uh and it just and it blows they they blow the story and it's it's just it's so cool and it's also a um it's such a cool time. I interviewed Terrence Winter for the Podcast. Boardwalk Empire. Yeah. So he created Boardwalk Empire and he's he's just not only is he a just an encyclopedia of of Prohibition era knowledge. Yeah. Um, he's also just the most fascinating, hilarious guy. So, he's in there. He's sort of woven throughout. How good is Steve Bushi in that show? Unreal. Insane. Unreal. And so unexpectedly Yeah. good, right? Yeah.

Totally. Like he I Oh, the guy with the Face. Yeah. It's a It's such a cool show. And Terrence Winter is is such an awesome interview. So much so that he's he's he's sort of laced throughout the season. Um but he also gets his own bonus episode. It's just entirely me and interview just me and Terence Winter. And uh it was so so fun. But that's season three that's coming out. Then of course the book is coming out. Awesome. The book is the opposite of deep dives. It's just sort of very consumable Chapters. So your

book's about history's biggest screw-ups or crazy stories. So, I thought I'd pick some books that I thought went well with it. So, I don't know if you've read Have you read Library Book? No. Okay. This is about the library fire at the downtown Los Angeles public library. It burned to the ground in 1986. Just almost every book. And they don't know if it was arson or not, but it's this Susan Rolene is amazing. If you've ever seen adaptation, That's based on her book, The Orchet Thief. Yes, of course. But, uh, this book is crazy. Uh,

super good. Uh, and then just like how they were not prepared for the fire at all, then how bad the science on tracking down the arsonist. I thought this one was really good. Uh, Night of the Grizzlies. Okay, so what uh Glacier National Park, there had never been a grizzly attack in like the hundred years the park had existed. One night in 1967, two different Grizzlies attack two different groups of people and kill them. and they find out it's happening because at one of the cabins in the park, you know, like Yellowstone has a Sure.

Um, they would put on nightly shows where they would feed the bears garbage and then the bears became deeper. And like I when I think of snafuss, I think of like human stupidity. Our relationship with animals is like at the top of the list. There are a few in the book. Yes. Yeah. Oh, You mean you can't just kill every one of these species and it somehow replenishes? But the idea that they're feeding grizzlies trash every night. Yeah. Next to a campsite that humans sleep in tents and then they're not like, "How's this going to

go?" It's amazing. And so, so the night that they just cancel the show or that they don't feed the bear, the bears are like, "Where's our [ __ ] food, guys?" I think Yes. I think they started to to Clamp down on the thing and now you have these and like also grizzly bears are much smaller now than they were like in our parents' generation because they don't eat so much trash. like they would the the the bears actually have shrunk in the parks because they're not hundreds of pounds of garbage every day. It's a

crazy book. Then uh after Theodore Roosevelt is president, he goes on this hunting trip in Africa where he kills like thousands of animals. Again, The animal thing. And then he goes and he explores this river in South America, like the longest river in South America, which had not ever been charted by like a white explorer. No, it's called the River of Doubt. Okay. Um and uh he promptly nearly dies and so does everyone in the thing. Like there's a reason it hadn't been charted. It was a very difficult river. And so you just have the

ex-president again thing of Carter. Just have this he's like dying Of malaria and this swamp. At one point he's like leave me like go on. And they're like we can't leave the president. It's an amazing book. Like I think what I narrative non-fiction is like my favorite genre where it's like a true they are telling an insane true story almost as if it's a novel. That's my favorite kind of book. Do you know what I'm talking about? I'm very excited. Yeah. Um, that one's amazing. Do you know about the Johntown flood? Yes. Yes. Amazing. I

I only knew about it from the Springsteen song. Okay. Uh, but uh, yeah. this this these rich people just have a lake above the town of Johntown and there's no like I think about what's happening now where it's like yeah it feels like the government doesn't do anything but they decide like what you can put in a dam or not or what the state you know they just had an earthen dam like several miles above an Industrial city that thousands of people lived in and I mean they were not engineers they didn't and then the

dam bursts and then it's the story of the dam bursting McCulla is like an amazing biography. I love that one. Uh, Titanic, obviously, one of the great snafoos of human history. This is like the book that invents the genre of narrative non-fiction. He writes this in like he writes this in 1955. So, a bunch of people are still Alive. Oh, wow. Cool. And we just didn't know like the it the Titanic has become more famous in retrospect. So, that one's amazing. Another flood one. Flood of 1927. So this is this full of interviews? Yeah, it's

like like real quotes from people who are on he that's the definitive story of what happened that pretty much everything we know is based on that his story. Well, uh Leonardo DiCaprio, it's true. That that's not that's right. Yes. Like That's all that's exactly how that all happened. All right. Anyway, so good. Uh flood of 1927, similar one. uh they huge crazy flood and then the rich people blow the dams uh blow some of the levies above New Orleans so it doesn't flood their houses and properties but does flood oh my god the people who

don't have any political power that's what I think is interesting about a lot of the snafuss it's about it's about who has power and Gets to make the decision and then who gets stuck with the consequences of those decisions the Mars Bluff story do you remember that one in the book that that it it this uh bomber from uh takes off from Alabama, I think, in the in this is in the 50s. It's going on a training run and uh it's it's over Mars Bluff, South Carolina, and they accidentally drop a nuclear bomb on Mars

Bluff. Now, thankfully the the file core is is actually out of the bomb, but There's still t many tons of TNT in it. Yeah. And it lands in on this guy's property and just it leaves a hu 75 foot crater. Yeah. And uh and damages his property and there's a few injuries. Nobody's killed, thank God. Um and he just gets he's like a World War II veteran. Yeah. And so he's like, "You know what? I get it. This is cool. we'll figure this out. This is crazy [ __ ] He's actually has a a good

attitude until the The government lawy law bureaucracy kicks in and they're kind of like, "Yeah, here's a couple of dollars." Yeah. And then then he gets pissed. But it's another example of like a powerless guy just getting boned by this. Well, that's epic. You know, this the the woman who spills McDonald's coffee on herself and she's McDonald's and we we take that as like legalism run a muck. And it's like, no, actually, it was like incredibly egregious. And all she wanted Was her the coffee was like 300° or something. And then all she wanted was

like her legal bills and which were like $17,000. But it's the jury was horrified and was like, "No, you get a lot of this." Like the McDonald's treated her so shitty. Yeah. And Yeah. It's sometimes it's it's the cover up afterwards that's the awful part. Um, this is about the Lucatania Deadwig. Another shipwreck. I have a lot of famous favorite shipwreck books, but This one's very good. Uh, like they knew that there they they knew there were boats. They knew there or torpedoes or sorry, submarines. They knew they were shooting them. And it just like

dies like it chills like to me like a shipping deadline. They're like, "Well, let's chill here in the water for a couple days." And and part of it is like um you know, it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world if something could precipitate a war. And then also like Throughout the book, the Woodro Wilson is like he he's like just he's he's like single as president and he's just fallen in love with someone and so he's pretty preoccupied with like courting this woman who could not be less interested in him. Oh my god.

And you're just like, okay, even at that level, the president can be distracted by like random [ __ ] Oh my god. So good. And then this one, I don't know if you read Empire of the Summer Moon, which is an incredible Book, SCU. one of Texas's great writers, but this is about Zeppelin's. When I read your book, it was immediately what I thought of because as I when I interviewed him, I it's these are the triumph of hope over experience. Like it's the dumbest idea you could possibly imagine. Like let's have a highly flammable

like element. We'll put it in an enormous Yeah. ship reservoir that we run with gas powered engines. By the way, combustion. Yeah. Yeah. Right. So, We'll just have fire next to it. It has a [ __ ] smoking room in the zeppelin. All of them did because everyone smoked. So, they're like, "No, no, we'll put walls around this room and you can smoke in here." As if it's not also filled with the gas. Amazing. So, this is not Hindenber. No, not about the Hindenburg. It's a bigger worse one. And all of them doesn't have as

cool a name. They just all of them crashed one after and it was and it was just like just a profoundly Stupid idea. I mean, they didn't they I guess I I didn't know what they were made of, but I wouldn't have guessed animal intestines. That's what the outside It's not like they had really highly advanced materials. Materials. So like Yeah. They just used like what sausages are made out of. That's what it's a sausage because it has to be very light. Yeah. because the engine is all the weight and it's just like it's just

dumb idea after I mean think about how They would like the the idea was the Empire State Building had a landing I was going to bring I was going to bring that up that was a a derigible dock right and it's like but it's a needle it's a balloon like that's what I mean it's just so it's almost unbelievably dumb like it but it made it not like the it's not like some of the snafoos where it's like Oh, it'll work out. Like the guy who was in charge of the program was on the ship.

Like it was so so it made So much sense that it didn't seem stupid, but it was just profoundly stupid. So good. It's amazing. I love it. Thank you so much so so much. Yes, of course. I got some homework for next time. Future future snafoos. Well, this was awesome, man. Thank you. So so fun. Thank you.