September 16, 2024 • 25 mins
In this conversation, Karol interviews Rob Long, a writer and producer, about his career in screenwriting and his current endeavors. They discuss topics such as the impact of COVID-19, the changing landscape of the entertainment industry, the pursuit of success, and the importance of faith and spirituality. Rob shares his insights on the need for continuous learning and the dangers of credentialism. The Karol Markowicz Show is part of the Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Podcast Network - new episodes debut every Monday & Thursday.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Marco Wood Show
on iHeartRadio. My guest today is Rob Long.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Rob is a.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Writer and producer and co founder of Ricochet. He also
does a weekly podcast called Martini Shot.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Hi, Rob, so coort to have you on.
Speaker 4 (00:22):
Happy to be here. Are you in Florida right now?
I am beloved Florida.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
My beloved Florida. I am. It's so good. I you know, I.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Was thinking, we've only met once.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
I believe, and it was at a Reason party shortly
before I left for Florida.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
I pretty sure.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Yeah, And everybody got COVID after that party.
Speaker 5 (00:43):
It was like a super spreader event.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
It was a super spreader event.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
I didn't get it because I don't get COVID.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
I was born in Russia.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
We don't do that kind of thing.
Speaker 5 (00:51):
Yeah, I don't know what. I don't think.
Speaker 4 (00:53):
I mean, I did get it eventually, but I don't
think I got it there. Now does sound like a
very Reason event for all party in New York.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Right, which was like, you know, the time that everybody
was getting it was.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
It December twenty twenty. Oh, then forget I didn't get it.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
I got it in December twenty twenty we did was
that where I got it. I would just I would
just start sending nasty messages to Nick Leespie, who accused
me once of giving it to him, which oh.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Really, oh no, yeah, he definitely got it during that party. Yeah,
I remember that. I was very excited to meet you.
I had been a longtime fan. I'm actually, I would say,
even more of a fan.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Of yours now than I was previously.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
You're so I got What have I done? Yes?
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Yes, your sub stack is so good?
Speaker 5 (01:37):
Oh pa, thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I sign up for a lot of substacks kind of
because I like the people and to be nice. But
like I get them and they're like, hey, all right,
I guess I don't know, But yours, I like, I
look forward to it and there it's always super interesting
and hilarious and I just love them.
Speaker 5 (01:55):
My trick was just really not a trick.
Speaker 4 (01:58):
My trick is to use material I've already it's kind
of somewhat written, and then rewrite it and also make
sure I send it out early Saturday morning.
Speaker 5 (02:06):
My theory is on Saturday mornings.
Speaker 4 (02:07):
I mean, I mean, I'm not up at five fifty
or whenever I send it but it's enough time.
Speaker 5 (02:11):
People are like, oh, I'll read this, you know.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Oh, are you just like tricking me into reading it?
Is that what's going on here?
Speaker 5 (02:17):
No, I'm just I'm just telling you.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
I have a you have a whole thing.
Speaker 5 (02:22):
Right.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
If I didn't realize that it's every Saturday. If you
ask me, like, what day does Rob Long send his
you know, sub stack out, I wouldn't be like, oh, yeah, Saturdays.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
But I get it.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
You've totally hooked me on Saturday morning reading Rob Long.
Speaker 5 (02:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
You don't get many you don't get many emails anyway
on Saturdays. But it's AO and it's like, you know,
it's as oh, it's a three minute read.
Speaker 5 (02:42):
You're like, I got three minutes.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Yes, I do have three minutes.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
So how did you get into screenwriting?
Speaker 1 (02:50):
And I guess I should note you are well known
for being a writer on the hit show Cheers.
Speaker 4 (02:59):
Yeah, that was kind of my first big gig and
Pat harme my most famous gig. Depending on who you
are and how old you are you used to be.
I tell people I wrote for that show. They would say, oh,
that was my favorite show, or that is my favorite show.
That was my favorite show, And then it became the
well that was my we used to watch that. I
used to watch that with my family every Thursday night.
And then it was that's my parents' favorite show, and
(03:20):
that was that it's my my grandparents loved that show.
And then you know this, I think it's on two
B you know. So now, so I you know, I
started as like I'm old. So I started a long
time ago, and there were no I had no other
skills really like, I didn't. I couldn't do any kind
of math, so I couldn't be an investment.
Speaker 5 (03:38):
Banker like everybody else in my college class.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
And I knew I didn't want to be a lawyer,
although I did have the l SAT prep book in
my right by my bed as I was in LA
trying to break into show business.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
So who among us did not have being a lawyer
as a backup plan?
Speaker 4 (03:55):
Yeah, you know, it's like and I like to make
fun of lawyers, but the truth is that like the
you know, think, I think of all the people that
didn't become lawyers, and then you realize that the ones
who really became lawyers, of the like psychopaths, they're the
ones who like made it through. Yeah, So I so
I was in a writing class in college and the
guy teaching and said, oh, you should, you should go
(04:16):
to film school. Okay, I'll do that. I mean, I'm
glad you didn't say I should. You know, I should
go move to Romania or something.
Speaker 5 (04:24):
And I went to UH.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
I once went to UCLA Film School for screenwriting after college,
and I did that about a year and then I
figured it.
Speaker 5 (04:32):
The town out really and it was really a trade school.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
And once you figure out, okay, I need an agent
and here's what I got to do to get an agent,
then you're just you're on. And I think it does
not I should say to cautionary note to any young
people listening who may want to do this. It does
not work that way anymore. But back then it was
kind of a wide open town.
Speaker 5 (04:51):
It was really kind of fun.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
What's different now.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Uh, so many more people want to be so many
more people want to do that job, and they know
how to do that job now every every I mean
I think there's a I taught a class at NYU
one semester here in New York, and the freshmen in
my class, my writing class, we're smarter about the business
(05:14):
of show business than I think really I was for
ten years of being in it.
Speaker 5 (05:18):
When I was in it.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
Yeah, it's just and of course we have so much
media now, which is destroyed our country, but we have
tons of it. You know, everybody's got a TV show,
but there's nine thousand channels of stuff, and they all
need people to write it for now anyway, And it
seems to seem to people for a long time like
it's an incredibly fun job, which it really is.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
Yeah, but that time is really gone.
Speaker 4 (05:43):
Now it's over supply and nobody's working and everybody's cutting back,
and whatever I tell people, I can always tell I
can always what I would tell people that way way,
show business is right now. The people in the entertainment
industry always sort.
Speaker 5 (05:58):
Of nod, yeah, you know, it's really rough. People not
inn the entertainment industry always say yeah, crime me a river.
I don't care about you guys. And I kind of
like I'm on both sides of that.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Oversupply, cause let's econ one on one, you know, so
oversupply clauses that.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
That I ask all of my guests is do you
feel like you've made it?
Speaker 5 (06:15):
No?
Speaker 4 (06:16):
No, not, I mean no, But I also don't know
what that means anymore. I think as you get older,
I think if you're lucky, your definition of that changes.
When I was younger, I thought, oh, I know what
I want, you know, I want to just have a
fancy car, drive run away and be a big shot
and get a table into the restaurant. And then when
(06:37):
you get that, you think, well, okay, now it's like
that old Peggy Lee song.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
Is that all there is? You know? You think that
you know?
Speaker 4 (06:43):
And they've done studies sort of mid life studies or
mid to you know, you know, they always say that,
you know, your middle aged crisis or something breakdown, and
it usually comes from the two things that happen at
the same time, which is that you're old enough to
realize that you're.
Speaker 5 (07:02):
That you don't have unlimited time, right, and you're also
old enough to realize that the things that are really
important making it you haven't been paying attention to.
Speaker 4 (07:12):
I think that's and if you're lucky, you know, you
realize that and then you kind of like maybe make
some mid course corrections in your life or something.
Speaker 5 (07:21):
And if you're unlucky, you so double down.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
And now I definitely I really need car.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
I got the wrong spouse. I got to change out
this whole thing, you know, right.
Speaker 6 (07:32):
Which is wrong restaurants restaurants, Well, I think that happens,
like people think wherever they are, like, there's got to
be I mean, a friend of mine told me this
great story.
Speaker 5 (07:42):
He was like working as a young guy and he's
in the George H. W. Bush administration, right.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
Very very accomplished, a bunch of people running that administration
like a big deal, and he was called into the
Oval Office, right center of power in the world. All
of the most powerful people in the world are pretty
much right there, and he's like, you know, he's in
his twenties, early twenties, and he's got this book, and
(08:10):
he's got this briefing thing, and he's been told to
say this and this and this, and everything's highlighted.
Speaker 5 (08:13):
And he's there and comes in, he sits down.
Speaker 4 (08:15):
He comes in and he stands there and I Bush,
his Bush, the first president. Bush was incredibly, incredibly generous, elegant,
lovely man. He said, Dave, you gotta sit down and
sit down, you kidd you don't stand Hits got a
briefing book and they start talking. His boss starts talking,
and Bush starts raised his hand, and he says he
has a couple of questions before they are going, and
then the conversation.
Speaker 5 (08:35):
Just me andrews it's just these old.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Dudes, Yeah, just talking, yeah.
Speaker 5 (08:41):
And just shooting it.
Speaker 4 (08:42):
And then finally he realizes, oh my god, I thought
there was a room where things happen, and there isn't.
It's just a room a bunch of old dudes. Yes,
their afternoon away. So I kind of feel like, you know,
that's it's a great lesson to learn.
Speaker 5 (09:01):
You know this.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I always felt like that's what that's what was happening
at the White House.
Speaker 5 (09:06):
Yeah, I always.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Imagined it was old dudes blessing the night away.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
I'm surprised to learn there's more.
Speaker 5 (09:15):
Guess be true.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
Look at the world the way the world is. I
guess that's probably true anyway. So I can't feel you
ever make it. I think you just kind of you know,
you're once you're in a room, you realize, oh my god,
this is like if you ever met a really rich guy,
really want to make a really rich guy miserable, just
start talking about somebody who's a little bit.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
I like that.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
I'm gonna definitely try that the next time.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
I'm in a room with some rich guys.
Speaker 5 (09:38):
Oh yeah, they hate it. They hate it. They'll spend
a lot of time trying to explain to you why
that guy is not really that rich. I don't know,
he's pretty rich. It's pretty big. Try it. It's worth it.
It's worth it for those of us who are not
really rich. So are very few. We have very few benefits.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
That's why if you weren't a writer, what would have
been planned be for Rob Long?
Speaker 5 (09:58):
God, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
I don't know what I would have done. I think
I think I would have been some kind of like horrible.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
I would have been a lawyer, probably horribly bored now
furious lawyer. I don't think I would have been very happy.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
I'd have been one of those terrible lawyers, you know,
and like they're the lawyers and they have a mystery
novel somewhere they're writing, right, and they don't think they're
John Grisham and they're not.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
You know.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
That would have been Yeah, well, I'm glad you didn't
have to take the l SAT path that things worked out.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
I took the l SAT though.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
I was like, yeah, my husband was my best friend
at the time, and he was like, do not be
a lawyer.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
I don't know any happy lawyers don't do it.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
And so he really he really changed the course of
my life because I was like, yeah, you're right, I
shouldn't do this. Yeah, but I think about plan b's,
you know, like what what the other options out there
could be?
Speaker 3 (10:50):
Thankfully not not being a lawyer.
Speaker 4 (10:51):
But you know, so I feel like we sometimes have
an idea that like, Okay, you make this decision. I
don't know how old you are in your twenties or
this this is what you're going to be, so you're
that now yeah, forever.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
But kind of sometimes how it works, like it's you know.
Speaker 5 (11:08):
I think sometime how we choose to make it Yeah,
But I don't think it has to be that way.
You can, you know, you can.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
We have a lot of I think, a lot of
set you know, life, a lot of internally maintained and
directed objectives and rules that we think we need to follow.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
Yeah, and I don't think we do. I mean there's someone.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
I guess, Yeah, we probably don't, but it feels like
you do.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
I my first job out of college, I was a
pharmaceutical paralegal, and literally I did things like I would
have to like look at giant things of documents and
make sure that they were labeled numbered correctly, like one, two, three,
like monkey work totally. But then my second job, like
when I wanted to leave there, I was a pharmaceutical
paralegal and I couldn't become a different kind of paralegal
(11:52):
at like you know, age twenty one, it was like, no, no,
you are in this.
Speaker 5 (11:56):
Field and we need you.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yeah, we need to make make sure that the pages
are labeled correctly.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
In the pharmaceutical world.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
You can't go into that like finance world with your paralegaling.
Speaker 5 (12:09):
Okay, but you did though, because you know I did.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
But I but I have to say I made the
most expensive mistake of my life. I went to graduate
school because I thought to change my life, to change
my career, I needed more school. That's I mean again,
I'm an immigrant like that, that's that's sort of.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
What I want. The ideas that I was raised with.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
It's like, you know, keep going to school, you know,
if you want to do something, to go to school
for it.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Yeah, we're lied to.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
I don't know, well, I don't know know if it's
like I just I think it's maybe an unfortunate truth,
but we should probably all push.
Speaker 5 (12:41):
Back on it hard.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Yeah, the idea, I don't know. I think we had
this first of all, with there's too many credentials. We
all have too many credentials, and the credentials don't make
you happy anyway, so they just kind of like give
you the make it so that no one can sue you,
or you can't be fired or I don't know whatever,
people trust you somehow.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
Yeah, so I'm not quite. I mean that would be
a nice thing.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
That for us to a culture to get away from
Zeta had to be credential to do everything. Definitely, I mean,
my god, you have to, Like I'm going to get
this wrong, but I mean, you know, those women who
do eyebrow threading, they have to go to school for
something stupid. The stupidest thing ever, is it's easier to
be a you know, a daycare employee than it is
(13:24):
to be a barber, right, I mean.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
What's more important your haircut are the kids?
Speaker 3 (13:28):
You know?
Speaker 1 (13:30):
I'm unsure me too, Like, yeah, listen, my haircut is
actually really important.
Speaker 4 (13:35):
That's a reflection of you actually, So yeah, you're right.
Your kids can have to learn to fend from themselves anyway.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
It'll be fine, you know, it'll be fine.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Yeah, we're going to take a quick break and be
right back on the Carol Marcowitch Show. Do you have
things that you worry about culturally? Like, what would you
say is our largest cultural problem?
Speaker 5 (13:55):
Yeah? I mean I don't know what I don't worry
about because you get to be a certain point, you're like, boa,
what's that going to do?
Speaker 4 (14:02):
Be worrying about it? And also things tend to work out.
I mean, such a ridiculous thing. I don't think that
we I don't think that we are smart enough in America.
I think that we're getting dumb and we're letting ourselves
get dumb. Yeah, and I and I mean that in
a in a broad way. I just think that we're
not We don't know enough about science. We don't know
(14:27):
enough about statistics.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Well, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4 (14:30):
We don't know enough about the physical world. And I
don't mean we I mean me, I don't mean we
know we know. Depending on how old you are, you
can name the entire cast of Bewitched, including the two Darren's.
If you're my age, you know that is, and you
can probably you know, name this all of the tracks
in order of you know, Taylor Swift's You know.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
I can probably do that.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
My daughter is a big Swift Ye.
Speaker 5 (14:54):
Yeah, I mean like, which is fine.
Speaker 4 (14:56):
It's just that there's other stuff like I I you,
I'm sort of right wing myself, so I'm like, I surprised.
A friend of mine. Uh, this comes from a family
business here in on Long Island and they make Geiger
counters and nuclear stuff detectors.
Speaker 5 (15:13):
They've done for years.
Speaker 4 (15:14):
And he remembers as a kid being woken up at
like three in the morning by the state police and
they're like flights, flashing the house and knocking on the
door and they're trying it.
Speaker 5 (15:23):
They're waking up, waking up the family, waking up with
their dad because they needed him, wow, to go to
three Mile Island.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
I thought he was in trouble.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
No, well that's what he was. An emergency call, like
we need all of you when you open up your thing,
we need your factory, we need to get all this stuff.
We gotta go to the three Island because I just
have the three Round Island disaster, right, And I said, wow,
so amazing, and he goes, yeah, well here's what's even
more amazing. People forget there was no disaster. M there
(15:54):
there was no leak.
Speaker 5 (15:56):
There was there was.
Speaker 3 (15:58):
I thought was I don't know enough about it.
Speaker 5 (16:00):
Neither.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
They thought there was and checked it out, and it's like, no,
we're fine. Everything worked. And yet that moment managed to
change everything, the whole perception of nuclear power in America.
It ended the nuclear power initiatives everywhere. Yeah, and made
us more reliant on foreign oil. So if you connected
(16:22):
the dots, you could say, okay, so because we are
too dumb to understand the complicated stuff about it, which
is not even that complicate about nuclear power, we believe
this nonsense. And then we said, okay, well let's just
keep buying oil from the Saudis. And we kept buying
oil with Saudis, and eventually, okay, if you're really a
crackpot like me, you say, eventually nine to eleven, So congratulations.
Speaker 5 (16:41):
Yeah, but.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
You know, a standard view.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
I don't think that that's I mean, you know, there's
some fringe views now that have other ideas. I mean,
I think we once knew that, you know, nineteen terrorists,
a lot of them were Saudi's, blew planes into our buildings, and.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
That's how nine to eleven happened.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
But yeah, and I'm guilty of that.
Speaker 5 (17:04):
Like, Okay, I wish I should know that, like we should.
We should all. I think we have this idea that
as as civilization progresses and as things get, as we
move forward, things certain things should be easier. And I think, no,
there's more to know.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
You have to know more, right, Like a problem with
school these days is not hard enough because the kids
need to know.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
Agree, I so agree.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
There's you know, in New York where we lived, there
was this whole culture of gifted and talented education and
you had to really fight to get your kids into it.
And I was like, how don't necessarily think my kids
are gifted or talented. I just want them to work hard,
Like why does it have to be a test or whatever?
Why can't I just be like I opt into giving
them the hardest work you have available, and that'll be that.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
But you couldn't do that because you know obviously.
Speaker 5 (17:54):
Yeah, it is funny.
Speaker 4 (17:55):
I mean I'm actually going back to I mean I
should say, but I'm going back to school.
Speaker 5 (17:58):
I'm starting school again.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
Oh wow.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
Yeah, I am going to Princeton Theological Seminary. I'm going
to get an m div I want to be an
ordained episcopal minister if you can believe it. Wow, Because
like I said with my friends, like if you think
I'm insufferable, now, yeah, wait until I have a collar.
But you know, I go and look, it's a great place,
but it's a it's a it's school. Now I'm in
(18:22):
a school in decades and decades and there's just a
lot of support now and Princeton.
Speaker 5 (18:30):
Yeah, moving to Princeton in a week.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
Wow, that's amazing.
Speaker 5 (18:35):
Yeah, it's kind of crazy. Uh.
Speaker 4 (18:36):
And but the amount of what I've discovered at schools now,
Like I mean, I know this is a special kind
of school, but there's a lot of counseling available and
study help available, and there's like all this stuff available.
Speaker 3 (18:49):
It's very huggy.
Speaker 4 (18:50):
Now, yeah, I'm very huggy. There wasn't when I was
you know, I don't know what. I don't know what
it would happen if you were at a mental health
problem when I was in college. I think you just
they just assumed you did anyway, So hey, good luck
with that once you get more sleep, you know, that
would I think that would have been the solution.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
That's amazing.
Speaker 5 (19:07):
What made you do that, well, you know, it's like
the same whole thing.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
Like you get to a certain age of like, Okay,
let's I've been writing about stuff for a long time,
actually write about.
Speaker 5 (19:14):
Bigger stuff, think about bigger stuff. It's also kind of
maybe another problem I think with our culture is that
we have a very we we've isolated the big questions
like faith or lack of faith and put them off.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
Okay, on one day a week, I'll think about that stuff. Right,
just comes over here in this department of the bookstore,
and I'm not sure that's great. And I'm I'm in
a Episcopal Piscopalian, which is about the grooviest, you know,
most tolerant denomination out there, which is great. I'm one
(19:47):
hundred percent behind, and so part of me kind of
feels like, Okay, there's got to be a way to
sort of I don't think make this relevance the word,
but I think it's got to be a way to
like reintroduce all of this experience people have had for
at least two thousand years two thousand plus, depending on
what your faith is as part of the fabric of
(20:09):
your life, like right, not like or not, like you
have to wake up in the morning and think, Okay, here,
here are all the sins that I'm going to not commit.
But more about waking up every day and thinking, okay,
well what am I doing here?
Speaker 2 (20:22):
Right as? I don't know, you know, a little.
Speaker 4 (20:29):
Era Episcopalians, though we don't we don't even think we're like,
we actually redefine the word sin.
Speaker 5 (20:34):
Just so you know that's how good we are.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
I'm going to I'm going to use the word groovy,
just homage to you.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
I actually just remembered that at the COVID Libertarian Party
you were excuse me, you were with Andrew Claven. Oh yeah, well,
I feel like talks about this kind of stuff a
lot like faith in your everyday life.
Speaker 5 (20:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:53):
I mean, Drew is an old friend of mine, and
he is incredibly thoughtful. He wrote a wonderful book about
it about his conversion, and Drew is like, is the
first person to uh, you know, in the crew that
play the Crucible. You know, it'll be Drew who points
at me and screams, you know, blasphemer. You know he
(21:14):
will like that, he said, he will gladly light the
pyre under me when they stay for heresy.
Speaker 5 (21:20):
That's kind of sweet. Thing to do like only a
friend would, but he does. He believes that it's a
part of your fabric of what we're doing here. And
I think we look. I mean, people go around saying.
Speaker 4 (21:32):
Oh, I don't know, you know, I'm an atheist Dominique.
You know, maybe I think atheism is a form of faith,
by the way.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Agree, yeah, it's religion, religion.
Speaker 4 (21:40):
Yeah, yeah, And I think you know, people will been
to yoga class lately, like people are chanting and doing
stuff and drinking you know, special tea and lighting Palo Santo.
Speaker 5 (21:49):
And yeah, and you know there.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
Or meditating or doing all sorts of things that I mean,
there's a hunger, like you can't lose the human beings
are never going to involve past the awe of what it.
Speaker 5 (22:02):
Is to be a human being. It's like we can't
and if we do that, I think we're losing everything.
I mean, I was in.
Speaker 4 (22:11):
I was in Peru last week, of all places, and
there was a moment it was kind of cloudy. But
there's one moment we haven't a little Peru. It was
in the in the jungle in the Amazon Park and
the night sky clears and it's.
Speaker 5 (22:23):
And there's no moon so it's dark, but you see
all of the stars. We don't see them in the city. Really,
you got to go to a they called Dark Skies Parkers,
and we just see them all. When you see them
all you're like, oh, I get it, I get it.
I get why the Greeks wrote about all this stuff.
I get why they invented all these gods. I get it.
(22:44):
Like if you see this show every single night, every
single night, better than Cheers, Well, I don't know, that's
a good question.
Speaker 4 (22:54):
Well it's free or it's free, but that we just
were just because we have cities and yeah, that kind
of thing.
Speaker 5 (23:02):
We don't see that not that often. But when you
see it, you think, oh, okay.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Yeah, I think that those moments where you know, you
feel the whole world.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
It's been a year definitely of coming back to religion
for me, I know for a lot of other people.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
I can't wait to hear about your journey at Princeton.
I think that's like a really amazing thing to do.
Speaker 5 (23:24):
Well, I'm excited.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
I mean I'm excited and also weirdly terrified because it's
I mean, I just was looking I just putting my
schedule together and like I had to. You have to
register for classes right like on your little they have
apps now for that, and then and then it instantly
populates with the curriculum and like this, I have a
paper due. I'm already I'm already nervous about the paper
December twentieth. Yeah, I'm like, like, I hope they're don't
(23:48):
I think there's even exams or quizzes Like I I
may just not do great.
Speaker 5 (23:54):
I'm like too old.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
To see student's.
Speaker 5 (23:58):
Exactly what because.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
I'm like, I wait a minute, I'm a little too
old to be taking your stupid tests. Be the cranky
old man in every class.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I love it, Rob Long, You're so awesome. I've enjoyed
this conversation so much. And here with your best tip
for my listeners on how they can improve their lives.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
I'll tell you this.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
This is what I try to say to myself all
the time, and it is true, even though it feels
like it's not true.
Speaker 5 (24:30):
You should just remember that there is so much time.
Just remind yourself there is so much time left.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
I love that because I always feel like I'm running
out of time.
Speaker 5 (24:43):
It's over, It's over, It's totally over.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Yeah, Thank you so much, Rob Long, catch him everywhere.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
He's so amazing.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Definitely subscribe to his substack because I think that that's like.
Speaker 3 (24:54):
An underrated just piece of genius.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
Listen to his show Martini Shot, and catch him anywhere
that you find his writing.
Speaker 5 (25:02):
Thank you, Ray was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
It really was.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Thanks so much for joining us on the Carol Marco
which shows subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Marco Wood Show
on iHeartRadio. My guest today is Rob Long.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Rob is a.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Writer and producer and co founder of Ricochet. He also
does a weekly podcast called Martini Shot.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Hi, Rob, so coort to have you on.
Speaker 4 (00:22):
Happy to be here. Are you in Florida right now?
I am beloved Florida.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
My beloved Florida. I am. It's so good. I you know, I.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
Was thinking, we've only met once.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
I believe, and it was at a Reason party shortly
before I left for Florida.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
I pretty sure.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
Yeah, And everybody got COVID after that party.
Speaker 5 (00:43):
It was like a super spreader event.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
It was a super spreader event.
Speaker 3 (00:46):
I didn't get it because I don't get COVID.
Speaker 2 (00:48):
I was born in Russia.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
We don't do that kind of thing.
Speaker 5 (00:51):
Yeah, I don't know what. I don't think.
Speaker 4 (00:53):
I mean, I did get it eventually, but I don't
think I got it there. Now does sound like a
very Reason event for all party in New York.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Right, which was like, you know, the time that everybody
was getting it was.
Speaker 5 (01:04):
It December twenty twenty. Oh, then forget I didn't get it.
Speaker 4 (01:06):
I got it in December twenty twenty we did was
that where I got it. I would just I would
just start sending nasty messages to Nick Leespie, who accused
me once of giving it to him, which oh.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Really, oh no, yeah, he definitely got it during that party. Yeah,
I remember that. I was very excited to meet you.
I had been a longtime fan. I'm actually, I would say,
even more of a fan.
Speaker 3 (01:29):
Of yours now than I was previously.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
You're so I got What have I done? Yes?
Speaker 2 (01:35):
Yes, your sub stack is so good?
Speaker 5 (01:37):
Oh pa, thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (01:38):
I sign up for a lot of substacks kind of
because I like the people and to be nice. But
like I get them and they're like, hey, all right,
I guess I don't know, But yours, I like, I
look forward to it and there it's always super interesting
and hilarious and I just love them.
Speaker 5 (01:55):
My trick was just really not a trick.
Speaker 4 (01:58):
My trick is to use material I've already it's kind
of somewhat written, and then rewrite it and also make
sure I send it out early Saturday morning.
Speaker 5 (02:06):
My theory is on Saturday mornings.
Speaker 4 (02:07):
I mean, I mean, I'm not up at five fifty
or whenever I send it but it's enough time.
Speaker 5 (02:11):
People are like, oh, I'll read this, you know.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Oh, are you just like tricking me into reading it?
Is that what's going on here?
Speaker 5 (02:17):
No, I'm just I'm just telling you.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
I have a you have a whole thing.
Speaker 5 (02:22):
Right.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
If I didn't realize that it's every Saturday. If you
ask me, like, what day does Rob Long send his
you know, sub stack out, I wouldn't be like, oh, yeah, Saturdays.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
But I get it.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
You've totally hooked me on Saturday morning reading Rob Long.
Speaker 5 (02:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:36):
You don't get many you don't get many emails anyway
on Saturdays. But it's AO and it's like, you know,
it's as oh, it's a three minute read.
Speaker 5 (02:42):
You're like, I got three minutes.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Yes, I do have three minutes.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
So how did you get into screenwriting?
Speaker 1 (02:50):
And I guess I should note you are well known
for being a writer on the hit show Cheers.
Speaker 4 (02:59):
Yeah, that was kind of my first big gig and
Pat harme my most famous gig. Depending on who you
are and how old you are you used to be.
I tell people I wrote for that show. They would say, oh,
that was my favorite show, or that is my favorite show.
That was my favorite show, And then it became the
well that was my we used to watch that. I
used to watch that with my family every Thursday night.
And then it was that's my parents' favorite show, and
(03:20):
that was that it's my my grandparents loved that show.
And then you know this, I think it's on two
B you know. So now, so I you know, I
started as like I'm old. So I started a long
time ago, and there were no I had no other
skills really like, I didn't. I couldn't do any kind
of math, so I couldn't be an investment.
Speaker 5 (03:38):
Banker like everybody else in my college class.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
And I knew I didn't want to be a lawyer,
although I did have the l SAT prep book in
my right by my bed as I was in LA
trying to break into show business.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
So who among us did not have being a lawyer
as a backup plan?
Speaker 4 (03:55):
Yeah, you know, it's like and I like to make
fun of lawyers, but the truth is that like the
you know, think, I think of all the people that
didn't become lawyers, and then you realize that the ones
who really became lawyers, of the like psychopaths, they're the
ones who like made it through. Yeah, So I so
I was in a writing class in college and the
guy teaching and said, oh, you should, you should go
(04:16):
to film school. Okay, I'll do that. I mean, I'm
glad you didn't say I should. You know, I should
go move to Romania or something.
Speaker 5 (04:24):
And I went to UH.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
I once went to UCLA Film School for screenwriting after college,
and I did that about a year and then I
figured it.
Speaker 5 (04:32):
The town out really and it was really a trade school.
Speaker 4 (04:34):
And once you figure out, okay, I need an agent
and here's what I got to do to get an agent,
then you're just you're on. And I think it does
not I should say to cautionary note to any young
people listening who may want to do this. It does
not work that way anymore. But back then it was
kind of a wide open town.
Speaker 5 (04:51):
It was really kind of fun.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
What's different now.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Uh, so many more people want to be so many
more people want to do that job, and they know
how to do that job now every every I mean
I think there's a I taught a class at NYU
one semester here in New York, and the freshmen in
my class, my writing class, we're smarter about the business
(05:14):
of show business than I think really I was for
ten years of being in it.
Speaker 5 (05:18):
When I was in it.
Speaker 4 (05:19):
Yeah, it's just and of course we have so much
media now, which is destroyed our country, but we have
tons of it. You know, everybody's got a TV show,
but there's nine thousand channels of stuff, and they all
need people to write it for now anyway, And it
seems to seem to people for a long time like
it's an incredibly fun job, which it really is.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
Yeah, but that time is really gone.
Speaker 4 (05:43):
Now it's over supply and nobody's working and everybody's cutting back,
and whatever I tell people, I can always tell I
can always what I would tell people that way way,
show business is right now. The people in the entertainment
industry always sort.
Speaker 5 (05:58):
Of nod, yeah, you know, it's really rough. People not
inn the entertainment industry always say yeah, crime me a river.
I don't care about you guys. And I kind of
like I'm on both sides of that.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
Oversupply, cause let's econ one on one, you know, so
oversupply clauses that.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
That I ask all of my guests is do you
feel like you've made it?
Speaker 5 (06:15):
No?
Speaker 4 (06:16):
No, not, I mean no, But I also don't know
what that means anymore. I think as you get older,
I think if you're lucky, your definition of that changes.
When I was younger, I thought, oh, I know what
I want, you know, I want to just have a
fancy car, drive run away and be a big shot
and get a table into the restaurant. And then when
(06:37):
you get that, you think, well, okay, now it's like
that old Peggy Lee song.
Speaker 5 (06:40):
Is that all there is? You know? You think that
you know?
Speaker 4 (06:43):
And they've done studies sort of mid life studies or
mid to you know, you know, they always say that,
you know, your middle aged crisis or something breakdown, and
it usually comes from the two things that happen at
the same time, which is that you're old enough to
realize that you're.
Speaker 5 (07:02):
That you don't have unlimited time, right, and you're also
old enough to realize that the things that are really
important making it you haven't been paying attention to.
Speaker 4 (07:12):
I think that's and if you're lucky, you know, you
realize that and then you kind of like maybe make
some mid course corrections in your life or something.
Speaker 5 (07:21):
And if you're unlucky, you so double down.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
And now I definitely I really need car.
Speaker 5 (07:27):
I got the wrong spouse. I got to change out
this whole thing, you know, right.
Speaker 6 (07:32):
Which is wrong restaurants restaurants, Well, I think that happens,
like people think wherever they are, like, there's got to
be I mean, a friend of mine told me this
great story.
Speaker 5 (07:42):
He was like working as a young guy and he's
in the George H. W. Bush administration, right.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
Very very accomplished, a bunch of people running that administration
like a big deal, and he was called into the
Oval Office, right center of power in the world. All
of the most powerful people in the world are pretty
much right there, and he's like, you know, he's in
his twenties, early twenties, and he's got this book, and
(08:10):
he's got this briefing thing, and he's been told to
say this and this and this, and everything's highlighted.
Speaker 5 (08:13):
And he's there and comes in, he sits down.
Speaker 4 (08:15):
He comes in and he stands there and I Bush,
his Bush, the first president. Bush was incredibly, incredibly generous, elegant,
lovely man. He said, Dave, you gotta sit down and
sit down, you kidd you don't stand Hits got a
briefing book and they start talking. His boss starts talking,
and Bush starts raised his hand, and he says he
has a couple of questions before they are going, and
then the conversation.
Speaker 5 (08:35):
Just me andrews it's just these old.
Speaker 3 (08:37):
Dudes, Yeah, just talking, yeah.
Speaker 5 (08:41):
And just shooting it.
Speaker 4 (08:42):
And then finally he realizes, oh my god, I thought
there was a room where things happen, and there isn't.
It's just a room a bunch of old dudes. Yes,
their afternoon away. So I kind of feel like, you know,
that's it's a great lesson to learn.
Speaker 5 (09:01):
You know this.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I always felt like that's what that's what was happening
at the White House.
Speaker 5 (09:06):
Yeah, I always.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Imagined it was old dudes blessing the night away.
Speaker 2 (09:11):
I'm surprised to learn there's more.
Speaker 5 (09:15):
Guess be true.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
Look at the world the way the world is. I
guess that's probably true anyway. So I can't feel you
ever make it. I think you just kind of you know,
you're once you're in a room, you realize, oh my god,
this is like if you ever met a really rich guy,
really want to make a really rich guy miserable, just
start talking about somebody who's a little bit.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
I like that.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
I'm gonna definitely try that the next time.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
I'm in a room with some rich guys.
Speaker 5 (09:38):
Oh yeah, they hate it. They hate it. They'll spend
a lot of time trying to explain to you why
that guy is not really that rich. I don't know,
he's pretty rich. It's pretty big. Try it. It's worth it.
It's worth it for those of us who are not
really rich. So are very few. We have very few benefits.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
That's why if you weren't a writer, what would have
been planned be for Rob Long?
Speaker 5 (09:58):
God, I don't know.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
I don't know what I would have done. I think
I think I would have been some kind of like horrible.
Speaker 5 (10:05):
I would have been a lawyer, probably horribly bored now
furious lawyer. I don't think I would have been very happy.
Speaker 4 (10:11):
I'd have been one of those terrible lawyers, you know,
and like they're the lawyers and they have a mystery
novel somewhere they're writing, right, and they don't think they're
John Grisham and they're not.
Speaker 5 (10:19):
You know.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
That would have been Yeah, well, I'm glad you didn't
have to take the l SAT path that things worked out.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
I took the l SAT though.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
I was like, yeah, my husband was my best friend
at the time, and he was like, do not be
a lawyer.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
I don't know any happy lawyers don't do it.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
And so he really he really changed the course of
my life because I was like, yeah, you're right, I
shouldn't do this. Yeah, but I think about plan b's,
you know, like what what the other options out there
could be?
Speaker 3 (10:50):
Thankfully not not being a lawyer.
Speaker 4 (10:51):
But you know, so I feel like we sometimes have
an idea that like, Okay, you make this decision. I
don't know how old you are in your twenties or
this this is what you're going to be, so you're
that now yeah, forever.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
But kind of sometimes how it works, like it's you know.
Speaker 5 (11:08):
I think sometime how we choose to make it Yeah,
But I don't think it has to be that way.
You can, you know, you can.
Speaker 4 (11:13):
We have a lot of I think, a lot of
set you know, life, a lot of internally maintained and
directed objectives and rules that we think we need to follow.
Speaker 5 (11:22):
Yeah, and I don't think we do. I mean there's someone.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
I guess, Yeah, we probably don't, but it feels like
you do.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
I my first job out of college, I was a
pharmaceutical paralegal, and literally I did things like I would
have to like look at giant things of documents and
make sure that they were labeled numbered correctly, like one, two, three,
like monkey work totally. But then my second job, like
when I wanted to leave there, I was a pharmaceutical
paralegal and I couldn't become a different kind of paralegal
(11:52):
at like you know, age twenty one, it was like, no, no,
you are in this.
Speaker 5 (11:56):
Field and we need you.
Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yeah, we need to make make sure that the pages
are labeled correctly.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
In the pharmaceutical world.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
You can't go into that like finance world with your paralegaling.
Speaker 5 (12:09):
Okay, but you did though, because you know I did.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
But I but I have to say I made the
most expensive mistake of my life. I went to graduate
school because I thought to change my life, to change
my career, I needed more school. That's I mean again,
I'm an immigrant like that, that's that's sort of.
Speaker 2 (12:25):
What I want. The ideas that I was raised with.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
It's like, you know, keep going to school, you know,
if you want to do something, to go to school
for it.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Yeah, we're lied to.
Speaker 4 (12:33):
I don't know, well, I don't know know if it's
like I just I think it's maybe an unfortunate truth,
but we should probably all push.
Speaker 5 (12:41):
Back on it hard.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
Yeah, the idea, I don't know. I think we had
this first of all, with there's too many credentials. We
all have too many credentials, and the credentials don't make
you happy anyway, so they just kind of like give
you the make it so that no one can sue you,
or you can't be fired or I don't know whatever,
people trust you somehow.
Speaker 5 (12:59):
Yeah, so I'm not quite. I mean that would be
a nice thing.
Speaker 4 (13:02):
That for us to a culture to get away from
Zeta had to be credential to do everything. Definitely, I mean,
my god, you have to, Like I'm going to get
this wrong, but I mean, you know, those women who
do eyebrow threading, they have to go to school for
something stupid. The stupidest thing ever, is it's easier to
be a you know, a daycare employee than it is
(13:24):
to be a barber, right, I mean.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
What's more important your haircut are the kids?
Speaker 3 (13:28):
You know?
Speaker 1 (13:30):
I'm unsure me too, Like, yeah, listen, my haircut is
actually really important.
Speaker 4 (13:35):
That's a reflection of you actually, So yeah, you're right.
Your kids can have to learn to fend from themselves anyway.
Speaker 3 (13:40):
It'll be fine, you know, it'll be fine.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
Yeah, we're going to take a quick break and be
right back on the Carol Marcowitch Show. Do you have
things that you worry about culturally? Like, what would you
say is our largest cultural problem?
Speaker 5 (13:55):
Yeah? I mean I don't know what I don't worry
about because you get to be a certain point, you're like, boa,
what's that going to do?
Speaker 4 (14:02):
Be worrying about it? And also things tend to work out.
I mean, such a ridiculous thing. I don't think that
we I don't think that we are smart enough in America.
I think that we're getting dumb and we're letting ourselves
get dumb. Yeah, and I and I mean that in
a in a broad way. I just think that we're
not We don't know enough about science. We don't know
(14:27):
enough about statistics.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Well, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4 (14:30):
We don't know enough about the physical world. And I
don't mean we I mean me, I don't mean we
know we know. Depending on how old you are, you
can name the entire cast of Bewitched, including the two Darren's.
If you're my age, you know that is, and you
can probably you know, name this all of the tracks
in order of you know, Taylor Swift's You know.
Speaker 3 (14:51):
I can probably do that.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
My daughter is a big Swift Ye.
Speaker 5 (14:54):
Yeah, I mean like, which is fine.
Speaker 4 (14:56):
It's just that there's other stuff like I I you,
I'm sort of right wing myself, so I'm like, I surprised.
A friend of mine. Uh, this comes from a family
business here in on Long Island and they make Geiger
counters and nuclear stuff detectors.
Speaker 5 (15:13):
They've done for years.
Speaker 4 (15:14):
And he remembers as a kid being woken up at
like three in the morning by the state police and
they're like flights, flashing the house and knocking on the
door and they're trying it.
Speaker 5 (15:23):
They're waking up, waking up the family, waking up with
their dad because they needed him, wow, to go to
three Mile Island.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
I thought he was in trouble.
Speaker 4 (15:32):
No, well that's what he was. An emergency call, like
we need all of you when you open up your thing,
we need your factory, we need to get all this stuff.
We gotta go to the three Island because I just
have the three Round Island disaster, right, And I said, wow,
so amazing, and he goes, yeah, well here's what's even
more amazing. People forget there was no disaster. M there
(15:54):
there was no leak.
Speaker 5 (15:56):
There was there was.
Speaker 3 (15:58):
I thought was I don't know enough about it.
Speaker 5 (16:00):
Neither.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
They thought there was and checked it out, and it's like, no,
we're fine. Everything worked. And yet that moment managed to
change everything, the whole perception of nuclear power in America.
It ended the nuclear power initiatives everywhere. Yeah, and made
us more reliant on foreign oil. So if you connected
(16:22):
the dots, you could say, okay, so because we are
too dumb to understand the complicated stuff about it, which
is not even that complicate about nuclear power, we believe
this nonsense. And then we said, okay, well let's just
keep buying oil from the Saudis. And we kept buying
oil with Saudis, and eventually, okay, if you're really a
crackpot like me, you say, eventually nine to eleven, So congratulations.
Speaker 5 (16:41):
Yeah, but.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
You know, a standard view.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
I don't think that that's I mean, you know, there's
some fringe views now that have other ideas. I mean,
I think we once knew that, you know, nineteen terrorists,
a lot of them were Saudi's, blew planes into our buildings, and.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
That's how nine to eleven happened.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
But yeah, and I'm guilty of that.
Speaker 5 (17:04):
Like, Okay, I wish I should know that, like we should.
We should all. I think we have this idea that
as as civilization progresses and as things get, as we
move forward, things certain things should be easier. And I think, no,
there's more to know.
Speaker 4 (17:20):
You have to know more, right, Like a problem with
school these days is not hard enough because the kids
need to know.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
Agree, I so agree.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
There's you know, in New York where we lived, there
was this whole culture of gifted and talented education and
you had to really fight to get your kids into it.
And I was like, how don't necessarily think my kids
are gifted or talented. I just want them to work hard,
Like why does it have to be a test or whatever?
Why can't I just be like I opt into giving
them the hardest work you have available, and that'll be that.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
But you couldn't do that because you know obviously.
Speaker 5 (17:54):
Yeah, it is funny.
Speaker 4 (17:55):
I mean I'm actually going back to I mean I
should say, but I'm going back to school.
Speaker 5 (17:58):
I'm starting school again.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
Oh wow.
Speaker 4 (18:00):
Yeah, I am going to Princeton Theological Seminary. I'm going
to get an m div I want to be an
ordained episcopal minister if you can believe it. Wow, Because
like I said with my friends, like if you think
I'm insufferable, now, yeah, wait until I have a collar.
But you know, I go and look, it's a great place,
but it's a it's a it's school. Now I'm in
(18:22):
a school in decades and decades and there's just a
lot of support now and Princeton.
Speaker 5 (18:30):
Yeah, moving to Princeton in a week.
Speaker 2 (18:33):
Wow, that's amazing.
Speaker 5 (18:35):
Yeah, it's kind of crazy. Uh.
Speaker 4 (18:36):
And but the amount of what I've discovered at schools now,
Like I mean, I know this is a special kind
of school, but there's a lot of counseling available and
study help available, and there's like all this stuff available.
Speaker 3 (18:49):
It's very huggy.
Speaker 4 (18:50):
Now, yeah, I'm very huggy. There wasn't when I was
you know, I don't know what. I don't know what
it would happen if you were at a mental health
problem when I was in college. I think you just
they just assumed you did anyway, So hey, good luck
with that once you get more sleep, you know, that
would I think that would have been the solution.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
That's amazing.
Speaker 5 (19:07):
What made you do that, well, you know, it's like
the same whole thing.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
Like you get to a certain age of like, Okay,
let's I've been writing about stuff for a long time,
actually write about.
Speaker 5 (19:14):
Bigger stuff, think about bigger stuff. It's also kind of
maybe another problem I think with our culture is that
we have a very we we've isolated the big questions
like faith or lack of faith and put them off.
Speaker 4 (19:26):
Okay, on one day a week, I'll think about that stuff. Right,
just comes over here in this department of the bookstore,
and I'm not sure that's great. And I'm I'm in
a Episcopal Piscopalian, which is about the grooviest, you know,
most tolerant denomination out there, which is great. I'm one
(19:47):
hundred percent behind, and so part of me kind of
feels like, Okay, there's got to be a way to
sort of I don't think make this relevance the word,
but I think it's got to be a way to
like reintroduce all of this experience people have had for
at least two thousand years two thousand plus, depending on
what your faith is as part of the fabric of
(20:09):
your life, like right, not like or not, like you
have to wake up in the morning and think, Okay, here,
here are all the sins that I'm going to not commit.
But more about waking up every day and thinking, okay,
well what am I doing here?
Speaker 2 (20:22):
Right as? I don't know, you know, a little.
Speaker 4 (20:29):
Era Episcopalians, though we don't we don't even think we're like,
we actually redefine the word sin.
Speaker 5 (20:34):
Just so you know that's how good we are.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
I'm going to I'm going to use the word groovy,
just homage to you.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
I actually just remembered that at the COVID Libertarian Party
you were excuse me, you were with Andrew Claven. Oh yeah, well,
I feel like talks about this kind of stuff a
lot like faith in your everyday life.
Speaker 5 (20:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:53):
I mean, Drew is an old friend of mine, and
he is incredibly thoughtful. He wrote a wonderful book about
it about his conversion, and Drew is like, is the
first person to uh, you know, in the crew that
play the Crucible. You know, it'll be Drew who points
at me and screams, you know, blasphemer. You know he
(21:14):
will like that, he said, he will gladly light the
pyre under me when they stay for heresy.
Speaker 5 (21:20):
That's kind of sweet. Thing to do like only a
friend would, but he does. He believes that it's a
part of your fabric of what we're doing here. And
I think we look. I mean, people go around saying.
Speaker 4 (21:32):
Oh, I don't know, you know, I'm an atheist Dominique.
You know, maybe I think atheism is a form of faith,
by the way.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
Agree, yeah, it's religion, religion.
Speaker 4 (21:40):
Yeah, yeah, And I think you know, people will been
to yoga class lately, like people are chanting and doing
stuff and drinking you know, special tea and lighting Palo Santo.
Speaker 5 (21:49):
And yeah, and you know there.
Speaker 4 (21:52):
Or meditating or doing all sorts of things that I mean,
there's a hunger, like you can't lose the human beings
are never going to involve past the awe of what it.
Speaker 5 (22:02):
Is to be a human being. It's like we can't
and if we do that, I think we're losing everything.
I mean, I was in.
Speaker 4 (22:11):
I was in Peru last week, of all places, and
there was a moment it was kind of cloudy. But
there's one moment we haven't a little Peru. It was
in the in the jungle in the Amazon Park and
the night sky clears and it's.
Speaker 5 (22:23):
And there's no moon so it's dark, but you see
all of the stars. We don't see them in the city. Really,
you got to go to a they called Dark Skies Parkers,
and we just see them all. When you see them
all you're like, oh, I get it, I get it.
I get why the Greeks wrote about all this stuff.
I get why they invented all these gods. I get it.
(22:44):
Like if you see this show every single night, every
single night, better than Cheers, Well, I don't know, that's
a good question.
Speaker 4 (22:54):
Well it's free or it's free, but that we just
were just because we have cities and yeah, that kind
of thing.
Speaker 5 (23:02):
We don't see that not that often. But when you
see it, you think, oh, okay.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Yeah, I think that those moments where you know, you
feel the whole world.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
It's been a year definitely of coming back to religion
for me, I know for a lot of other people.
Speaker 3 (23:18):
I can't wait to hear about your journey at Princeton.
I think that's like a really amazing thing to do.
Speaker 5 (23:24):
Well, I'm excited.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
I mean I'm excited and also weirdly terrified because it's
I mean, I just was looking I just putting my
schedule together and like I had to. You have to
register for classes right like on your little they have
apps now for that, and then and then it instantly
populates with the curriculum and like this, I have a
paper due. I'm already I'm already nervous about the paper
December twentieth. Yeah, I'm like, like, I hope they're don't
(23:48):
I think there's even exams or quizzes Like I I
may just not do great.
Speaker 5 (23:54):
I'm like too old.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
To see student's.
Speaker 5 (23:58):
Exactly what because.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
I'm like, I wait a minute, I'm a little too
old to be taking your stupid tests. Be the cranky
old man in every class.
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I love it, Rob Long, You're so awesome. I've enjoyed
this conversation so much. And here with your best tip
for my listeners on how they can improve their lives.
Speaker 5 (24:21):
I'll tell you this.
Speaker 4 (24:23):
This is what I try to say to myself all
the time, and it is true, even though it feels
like it's not true.
Speaker 5 (24:30):
You should just remember that there is so much time.
Just remind yourself there is so much time left.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
I love that because I always feel like I'm running
out of time.
Speaker 5 (24:43):
It's over, It's over, It's totally over.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
Yeah, Thank you so much, Rob Long, catch him everywhere.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
He's so amazing.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Definitely subscribe to his substack because I think that that's like.
Speaker 3 (24:54):
An underrated just piece of genius.
Speaker 1 (24:57):
Listen to his show Martini Shot, and catch him anywhere
that you find his writing.
Speaker 5 (25:02):
Thank you, Ray was a lot of fun.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
It really was.
Speaker 1 (25:04):
Thanks so much for joining us on the Carol Marco
which shows subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
Host
Karol Markowicz
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