Half Hour Intern: Recent Episodes

Blake Fletcher

A podcast that explores the interesting paths people take in life, and why and how they take them. From cuddle therapists to financial advisors. New episodes every Tuesday.

Do you ever feel a bit off? You can’t really put your finger on why, but you’re not quite yourself. Have you ever considered that maybe your internal energy isn’t flowing very well, or that negative energy in your surroundings is bringing you down? Today’s guest Terje Kuusk is a Reiki master practitioner (heals and fixes energy flows in the body) and practices real estate energy clearing and upgrading as well. We’ll discuss Terje’s connection to energy and how we can tap into and clear the energy around us.

How do you feel about the things that you own? Does your enjoyment for them usually peak right when you purchase them and then slowly fade from there? There’s certainly science to back that up, which is one of the reasons that they say it’s better to spend your money on experiences as opposed to things. But what about things that we own that grow and change, whose ownership becomes a sort of experience in itself? A couple years ago I learned about raw denim and and decided to purchase a pair for myself. Unlike most of my clothes, I was looking forward to what they would look like in a year or two, and every day I wore them brought me more satisfaction that my new jeans were truly becoming MY jeans. The experience that I’ve had with my jeans is something that today’s guest, David Shuck, knows an awful lot about. He is the managing editor of heddels.com, the foremost website for all things raw denim. We’ll discuss denim and the philosophy behind owning things that need to be broken in.

Time. A true currency if there ever was one. Yet, rarely do we consider as diligently as we should if we are spending it wisely. We may shop for good deals on a regular basis, some may even call us frugal, but when it comes to spending our time we give it away to the first thing that comes our way. Today’s guest, Garland Coulson, is a time management consultant and it’s his job to change that relationship. He wants us to be frugal WITH time, and regularly consider how we are spending it. In this interview he’ll give us plenty of tips to help us better manage our most valuable resource.

Most of us live our lives looking forward to things. This is fortunate. This is the privileged position that we are in. It also means that we often neglect the present and miss out on the magic of the mundane. We look forward to getting off work, so we don’t have as productive of a day. We look forward to the weekend, so our week seems less fulfilling. We look forward to getting to our destination, so we overlook the beauty in the journey. Being present in the here and now is a popular philosophy, but few of us truly embrace it the way that today’s guest has. Reed is a tour cyclist. He rides his bike 100’s (sometimes 1000’s) of miles on vacation. He has ridden similarly freakishly long distances to work and back, day after day. Reed has taken what for many of us is the thing that stands between us and being where we want to be, and embraced it as the place that he does want to be.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. You know what’s really worth a lot? Both. Science tells us that if we both see and hear a concept our retention and comprehension go through the roof. It was this fact that today’s guest, William Warren, unknowingly channeled when he sketched concepts out during meetings at his former company. His drawings were so great that he became known for them in the office, and ultimately left to start a company dedicated to them and the art of visual communication.

Like just about everything else under the sun these days, we seem to be putting a lot more scrutiny and focus on the workplace. And why not? It’s where we spend the majority of our day. There’s the ‘work is work’ camp who believe that work was never meant to be fun, they pay you for it after all. There’s the ‘work should be fun and rewarding’ camp who believe that each of us should be able to have a role we enjoy. Luckily for us, more and more companies are coming around to the latter camp. Happier bees make more honey. Today’s guest, Gianna Biscontini, is a certified behavior analyst and founder of W3RKWELL. She created W3RKWELL to help other companies understand how to keep employees happy and healthy for the long run.

We're on vacation for 2 weeks. Enjoy some of our favorite episodes from the vault while we're out. New episodes start 6/26!

We're on vacation for 2 weeks. Enjoy some of our favorite episodes from the vault while we're out.

We're on vacation for 2 weeks. Enjoy some of our favorite episodes from the vault while we're out.

What is your brand? Are you the funny one that also has a soft side? Are you the quiet one that opens up to close friends? It can be so hard to nail down because people are so complex, and we’re constantly changing. The same can be said of most businesses. This is why businesses are turning to outside experts, like today’s guests from Blow Branding, to help them define their brand. Is it what you do? Why you do it? How you make people feel? We’ll learn all about the recipe in today’s episode.

I’m going to give anyone reading this a peek behind the curtain. When I’m writing these blurbs for the episodes I try to come up with a thesis around which I will write. Now, sometimes when I come up with a thesis I try to tap into the collective zeitgeist and think of a stat or a fact that we all agree with that is going to support my thesis. Like, ‘we all like puppies’. After I think of the stat or fact, I then go to good old google and search for it, to add some level of integrity to what I’m saying. Cut to this weeks episode.  I think to myself, the most wanted superpower has to be flight. This is gonna tie in perfectly to this week’s episode on zip-lining and why people like my guest, Mike Seper, love it. So I go to google, see if a large scale survey has ever been done on what super powers people want, and low and behold one has been done. Cool, just gotta make sure everyone wants to fly like Mike and I and then we can get this show on the road. And…4th?! 4th place! Flying is not first, nor second, nor third. 4th. The number one power people want is invisibility, which in addition to ruining my blurb about flying, really throws a monkey wrench in my idea that the vast majority of humanity is good. Something tells me that these people don’t want invisibility so that they can anonymously help more people. Anyway, to all my fellow flyers at heart, today we learn about a way we can get close to the real thing.

Picture the person that you think has the perfect job? Who are they? If I had to guess I would say that the person you are imagining has a job that they love. Perhaps a trade that they’re really good at. I’m always so envious of the chef’s I see on Chef’s Table. These people have a singular focus. One that they love and one that they’re great at. Doesn’t that make for the perfect job? ‘Find something you love and you’ll never have to work a day in your life’ sort of stuff. Well, what if you’re like today’s guest, Khalif El-Amin, and you don’t want to find just one thing? What if you want to do a lot of different things? And help other people do a lot of different things? Now that can give a restless soul like me some hope.

What do you think ‘The American Dream’ is? This was one of that hardest questions I was ever given in a small class in college. Every student was put on the spot and had to answer in front of everyone else. It was one of those times where you know the person asking has the ‘correct’ answer in their heads, and they just want to see what you’ll say, but you have no idea what they want you to say. I don’t remember what my answer was, or what the correct answer was, but I often ponder the question. What is The American Dream? And does it change over time?

The most concrete and simple answer I can give to this is to be a property owner. The single act of owning property is a statement that you live in a free and democratic society, and you are not going to be reliant on other people for your welfare. It allows you to spend your greatest lifetime allocation of money on yourself. It does…a lot. And what’s more American than owning a piece of America. Today I speak with Brandon Pfannenstiel. He’s come up with an awesome business idea to help turn renters into owners, and put people on the path to the American Dream.

Some things speak to our minds. These are the most common of things that we regularly encounter every day. Other things speak to our hearts. These are less common, but still encountered with regularity. Rarely, oh so rarely, does something speak directly to our soul. A good way to categorize these things is to realize that we, in turn, cannot really speak about them. We don’t know how to describe something that speaks to our soul. Think about a soul-mate, or love at first sight. We can throw a lot of adjectives around about why we like that person, but those are just the words that speak to our hearts and minds, and probably apply to plenty of other people that we have met. The thing that makes this one person so special cannot be spoken. There is just a deep seated knowing in the soul.

Amazingly, there are things that seem to speak to all of our souls, belying the notion that we are not connected. Fire is the perfect example of this. Anyone who has ever gone camping and stared into a fire can attest to the feeling that you get. My best words to describe it would be a peaceful reverence, but again, words don’t really work here. Today’s guest, Victoria Zajac, knows all about the soul affirming power of fire. Rather than just be a cautious observer, Victoria decided to get up close and get to know fire even better. Spinning, swallowing, dancing, breathing, you name it, Victoria does it.

Over the course of the next few months we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the eighth (and likely final) of these, Prosthetist. Kevin is a truly amazing man. He makes custom prosthetic limbs for amputees, and if that's not enough, he donates his time to make prosthetic flippers and fins for dolphins and turtles that get caught in fishing nets. Enjoy!

Over the course of the next few months we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the seventh of these, Street Artist. I knew going into this interview that Cameron was a successful street artist from San Francisco. I did not know that Cameron is also an awesome human and a wonderful interviewee. Enjoy!

Over the course of the next few weeks we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the sixth of these, Creative Marketing Prodigy. I went into this interview thinking, 'How interesting can marketing really be?' I came out of this interview feeling like an idiot. Enjoy!

They say that you shouldn’t judge a book by it’s cover. I’d say that’s pretty good advice, and today’s guest is the living embodiment of why. Jamie went from Broadway actor to being recognized as one of the foremost experts on baby gear in the world. Jamie is a single male with no kids and no plans for having them. Someone whom you would not look at and think, there is a guy that knows all about babies. Yet, life is a strange and beautiful thing that takes us down paths we would never imagine.

Over the course of the next few weeks we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the fifth of these, Medicolegal Death Investigator. I mean...who deep down doesn't want to be a murder detective. Enjoy!

Ups and downs are part of life. The ups can feel great, the downs…not so much. Luckily for us there are people out there like today’s guest, Laurel Harlan, to help us survive and thrive in the valleys of the human experience. Laurel will explain the differences between clinical social work and other mental health roles. She’ll also give us some advice for coping with depression and anxiety in our own lives.

Over the course of the next few weeks we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the fourth of these, Ultra Marathon Runner. This was one of the more mind boggling hobbies that I've learned about on the show and really gives you a glimpse at the amazing things the human body is capable of. Enjoy!

As many of you know, our sound engineer is currently out because he and his wife just had their first baby. Today we honor him and parents everywhere with an episode all about babies and the interesting ways we can have them. Many prospective parents face difficulties when trying to get pregnant. Today’s guest, Katie Cline, will explain the various options available today to have a child. We’ll take a deeper dive into Katie’s forte, embryo adoption, and how this relatively new procedure is helping struggling couples have children of their own.

Interview Contents: 2:00 - What is embryo adoption? 3:20 - The number of embryos made during IVF. 5:00 - Embryo adoption vs. IVF. 6:50 - Giving birth to your adopted baby. 7:50 - Frozen embryos and getting them in the mother to be. 10:30 - Having trouble getting pregnant vs. carrying a baby. 15:20 - The process for donating embryos. 18:20 - Benefits for the donor. 22:30 - The process for the adopter. 25:00 - Differences between embryo adoption and traditional adoption. 29:00 - Donors and Adopters getting to know each-other. 31:00 - Common questions Katie gets from donors and adopters. 33:00 - Negative pushback that Katie gets. 39:30 - The start of NRFA. 44:00 - Advice.

Over the course of the next few weeks we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the third of these, Flight Attendant. This was one of the jobs that I was most excited to hear what a day in the life was really like, and Carin could not have been a better representative for the show. Enjoy!

Many of us dream of a life that is simple. A life that is different from the one we live. We think about separating ourselves from the chaos of the modern world, and moving out into nature. Maybe we move to a farm and start our own little business working with animals. That’s exactly what today’s guest felt like, and decided to do something about. Erin will tell us what it’s really like to live the dream, and the path that she took to get there.

Over the course of the next few weeks we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the second of these, Actor & Musician. Tyler has some of the most amazing stories I have ever heard on the show or anywhere else. Enjoy!

Have you ever wondered about how that pair of shoes you’ve been wanting shows up in an ad for you online? Just how much data is being collected on you and how is it being used for marketing? Enter the world of programmatic advertising. Chris Cox will tell us all about the present and future of the marketing and advertising world.

Over the course of the next few weeks we will be alternating between new episodes and some old favorites from the vault. This is the first of these, Cosplay. I had such a fun time interviewing Roxanna and feel like she really represents the spirit behind cosplay. Enjoy!

Professional sports are such a unique and incredible thing. Unlike many other professions where there can be prerequisites, necessary degrees, and boxes to check to be afforded an opportunity for employment, sports asks only one thing of you. Are you one of the best people in the entire world that does this? If the answer is no, well then you better work even harder until you are or move along and find yourself another profession. It is the truest form of Darwinism that we have in modern society. Today’s guest, Sean Lawton, is a professional Lacrosse player for the Boston Cannons. He’ll tell us all about the trials and tribulations of becoming a professional athlete and distill the lessons he’s learned from the process. Also, we’ll get a brief course in Lacrosse 101.

Applications and technology have really changed the look and feel of the world in the last decade. Transportation, finances, dating, you name it, it’s all been changed and it all feels very different than it did just 10 years ago. One area that might not seem very different is how we make physical goods. Manufacturing mass quantities of goods that we use has remained fairly the same, but that doesn’t mean that nothing has changed. Recently, mainstream adoption and advancements in 3D printing have paved the way for a whole new type of manufacturing, and with it, entirely new possibilities about the products we can make.

Merry Christmas!!!

First of all I want to say that my thoughts are with everyone in California that is currently displaced because of the fires. I also want to send out a huge thank you to all of the amazing men and women that fight fires like this when they arise. If you would like to come on the show and tell your story, we would love to have you.

In today’s episode I speak with Tyler Cross who is a prescribed burn crew member for a nature conservation company. It seems counter intuitive when it damages homes and encroaches on urban areas, but fire can be a really good and natural thing. Tyler will tell us why prescribed burns can be a good thing, and how certain pockets of nature thrive with regular fire.

If there’s one thing I know for sure, it’s that all of us are going to be old someday. Yet, we don’t seem to give the elderly the amount of respect or attention that we would most likely want for our future selves. The is unfortunate socially, but can become a real predicament when it comes to looking at and tackling the problems that face senior citizens today. Trying to raise money for educating children in a third world country? Here’s my credit card. Trying to raise money for the elderly? Doesn’t quite have the same ring to it. This is the uphill battle that today’s guest, Meg Barhite, has to face in her career. She loves the elderly and will explain what her company does to help.

Reading is something that, like most people, I didn’t really take to until I got older. When I was growing up, even through high school and college, I had way too much stuff on my plate to concern myself with reading. Which friends house am I gonna go over to? How can I cover up the fact that I didn’t do my homework today? Does Madison like me or is she just being really nice? So many questions and concerns running around my head, and reading definitely wasn’t one of them. In the past few years though, things have really slowed down for me in the chronic existential crisis mode that is youth, and alas I have found books. Luckily for our species there are some that are more mature than I was. The impressive few that enjoy learning and reading at a young age. Today we speak to Kara McCabe who liked reading so much she decided she wanted to be a high school English teacher. Now, as an English teacher in the U.S. and as a volunteer teacher to girls in Afghanistan, she helps recruit the next generation of young readers.

Interview Contents: 3:00 - What made Kara interested in becoming an English teacher? 5:00 - The curriculum, and what you want to teach vs. what you have to teach. 8:00 - Teaching grammar. 11:00 - Getting kids to read. 17:00 - Trying to make things more exciting for the kids. 18:30 - The types of kids that like to read. 23:30 - Difficult concepts for the kids to learn. 25:45 - Trying to get kids interested in things like Shakespeare. 31:30 - Getting involved in your students’ lives. 36:45 - Volunteering time teaching girls in Afghanistan. 42:45 - Kara’s favorite part about being an English teacher. 43:30 - Advice for volunteering.

A couple days ago we celebrated Thanksgiving. It’s a wonderful holiday where we spend time with people that we love and think about the things in our lives that we are grateful for. With that in mind I wanted to put out an episode that could touch on that note of gratitude, and what better episode could there be than an interview on organ donation. It is the biggest and most important gift that you can give someone! There were people this past Thursday that were sitting with their families, that would not have been sitting with their families had someone not given them the ultimate gift. Today we learn about how the process works, and what we can do to make sure we are in a position to help.

As humans we are on a never ending quest to relate to each other. It’s one of our best universal qualities. Sympathy. Empathy. Walk a mile in their shoes. We have words for all of it. It is this unyielding empathy that makes literature, and the characters in the stories that we tell, so important. When we relate to a character on the page, we may open up more to characters like that in our lives. We may even open up more to parts of ourselves that we previously shied away from. It is with this idea in mind that today’s guest, Maura Lee Bee, writes. Her characters are often atypical, which is exactly why we should take the time to get to know them.

Imagine the one thing that truly captivates you. The thing that you love doing, thinking about, and learning about. Now imagine that you get the opportunity to do that thing for a living, and then imagine that you’re surrounded by other amazing people, from all over the world, who love that thing just as much as you do. Today’s guest, Tom Perry, is a brilliant particle physicist working at the mecca of particle physics CERN. He and thousands of other physicists work daily at the Large Hadron Collider to make some of the great scientific discoveries of our time. In part one of our interview we’ll learn about life at CERN, the LHC, and what happens when you smash two protons together at close to the speed of light.

Imagine the one thing that truly captivates you. The thing that you love doing, thinking about, and learning about. Now imagine that you get the opportunity to do that thing for a living, and then imagine that you’re surrounded by other amazing people, from all over the world, who love that thing just as much as you do. Today’s guest, Tom Perry, is a brilliant particle physicist working at the mecca of particle physics CERN. He and thousands of other physicists work daily at the Large Hadron Collider to make some of the great scientific discoveries of our time. In part one of our interview we’ll learn about life at CERN, the LHC, and what happens when you smash two protons together at close to the speed of light.

“You can find magic wherever you look. Sit back and relax, all you need is a book.” - Dr. Seuss It’s been a while since I felt the magic and wonder in my life that I felt regularly as a child. Luckily for me, in my adult years, I’ve learned that Dr. Seuss is right. All you need to suddenly be in a place where magic and mystery are still alive and well is a book. Luckily for them, many children realize that you don’t have to wait until you’re a boring old adult to have this epiphany. Today we speak with the children’s librarian for the Boston Public Library, Maggie Levine. She’ll tell us about what the heck librarians do all day, and explain why being a librarian for children is so much more fun than working with adults.

Humans are some pretty complicated organisms. We have a body, mind, and spirit all wrapped into one package. Each needs it’s own nurturing and care, and the health of each will influence the other two. Yet even knowing this, we are often “too busy” to really care for ourselves the way we know we should. We may go to the gym and see how the time that we give to our bodies also helps pacify our minds, but how often do we try to work the other way around? Today’s guest, Stephanie Kato, is a pioneer of the concept of Metaphysical Cleansing. She is a firm believer in healing the physical body through work with the emotional and spiritual bodies. Today she’ll teach us about the metaphysical path to holistic health.

Have you ever been sick before? How did you ultimately get better? If it was anything more than a common cold, it probably involved taking some drugs. The miraculous little pills that help us get back on our feet more quickly, or in the case of something more serious, get back on our feet at all.Today we learn about the drugs we take and the people that make them. Emma has the incredibly important job of helping to create molecules that treat cancer, with the goal of one day eradicating it all together.

What goes into your mouth usually matters quite a bit more than what comes out. Food allergies, Celiac, IBS, cancer, Alzheimer's, depression; things that impact us physically, mentally, and emotionally all seem to be on the rise. And yet do a quick google search and you can find someone that has fought every one of these things with changes to their diet. With stakes like these, and general energy and happiness levels in play for all of us, it’s a wonder that more of us don’t track our diet and lifestyle. What sorts of inputs are we giving our bodies, and how does changing those inputs change our bodies output? Today’s guest has struggled with Celiac Disease and IBS, but has been living pain and symptom free for a while now. Laura will share her story, tips, and techniques with us, and go over the wonderful food and lifestyle diary she made in the process.

Language is unquestionably the most important revelation that occurred throughout human history. An easy way to explain a complicated idea to someone. A quick way to let someone know how you feel. A means to prevent conflict and allow us to settle our differences in a more civilized manner. Despite it’s importance, we don’t really pay it much attention from day to day. We just walk around, using our language of choice, not considering how that language came to be. Today we learn about one of the most important languages in the history of the Western world, Latin. We’ll learn how it evolved and its massive influence over the languages many of us speak today.

I want you to think about the difficult decisions you’ve made in your life. More specifically, I want you to think about the tough conversations you’ve had to have about these decisions. Maybe telling your parents that you’re moving out? Dropping out of school to pursue your dream? How about telling your significant other, “You know that large amount of student debt I accumulated to become a lawyer? Well, I decided I’m going to stop practicing law and start baking pies for a living instead.” I know, pretty specific, but it’s also exactly what today’s guest did. Now, only a few years later, her pie shop has almost doubled it’s business, she’s in the works to get their dough sold at Walmart, and her #WorldPieDomination blog has over 1,000 readers a day.

Food. We all love to eat it, and a lot of us even love to make it. Maybe that’s why so many people dream of one day opening up their own restaurant. Making food for strangers who would one day become your friends. Getting the know the community around you through the worlds greatest (family friendly) pastime. It really seems like a great existence. Today we learn about the ups and downs of the restaurant life from brothers and successful restaurateurs, Aaron and Jared Pool.

What is yoga? Is the answer a simple one about exercise or is it a complex one about philosophy and awareness? After today’s interview I have a feeling that if you asked 10 different people you may get 10 different answers. Christie Rafanan is an amazing yoga teacher in San Francisco, and a good friend of mine. We’ll dive into that many layered question trying to define yoga and hear about how it transformed Christie’s life.

What do you think of when you think of the word therapy? Therapist? Most of us think of traditional psychotherapy, talking through your life and problems with someone. Using your head to fix your head. However, many people and cultures throughout history have placed an equal, if not greater, focus on the body as a means to mental health. Surrounding yourself with nature, exercising, playing, these are all things that can have a massive impact on your mental state. In fact, it’s so important that an entire school of therapy is devoted to it. Today’s guest, Andrew Hermansen, will teach us all about it.

Do you ever have daydreams about leaving the world behind? Leaving the stresses and anxieties of the modern world and moving to a rural piece of land where you’re surrounded by the people that you love and some animals. Today’s guest is working towards that goal. Kevin is a part-time cattle rancher, working towards living the cattle ranching life all year round. Kevin is a true inspiration to me as he embodies setting your own goal and then patiently, diligently, working towards it. He’ll tell us all about the farm life, and the day to day of being a cattle rancher.

TLDR: Show will be going to one day a week for a little while. New episodes every Monday. Recommended past episodes to check out in the meantime: Actor and Musician Bar Owner Cosplay Creative Marketing Prodigy Cuddle Therapy YouTube Gaming Celebrity Medicolegal Death Investigator Director and Author Sensory Deprivation Floating Influencer Marketing Paranormal Psychic Mastectomy Tattoo Artist Ultra Marathon Runner Pastor Flight Attendant

Do you believe in ghosts? Like religion, your belief in the paranormal can really be swayed by the culture you belong to. For some reason in America we don’t really embrace the idea of ghosts, and yet over 80 percent of our population believes in the afterlife. Today’s guest, Craig Owens, is a talented photographer and, like many people, used to be ghost-agnositc. Then, one day Craig was doing a vintage photo shoot at a supposedly haunted hotel, and he experienced paranormal phenomena first hand while doing the shoot. This planted the seeds for an amazing passion project called Haunted by History. Craig uses actors to recreate scenes at haunted hotels and takes truly unique photos that teleport the viewer back in time.

How we feel as we enter a space is a pretty complex thing. Smells, sounds, spacing, art, furniture, plants, lighting - it all melds together in our minds to make us feel a certain way. Do we feel relaxed, energized, uneasy? The interesting thing is, most of us won’t even know why we feel a certain way in a home or building, we’ll just feel that way. Today’s guest is a trained interior designer, which means that it’s her job to create a space that not only looks appealing, but one that makes you feel a certain way. Want to feel relaxed and care free when you’re at home? Mackenzie can do that for you. Want to feel energized every morning when you look around your bedroom? She’s got you covered. Today we explore the intricate ins and outs of the interior design world.

Growing up and making your way in the world can be hard. That’s kind of what this show is about, see what people choose to do as they forge their path in this world. Most of us, and nearly every person I’ve had on this show, choose a path that has been walked by someone before us. That doesn’t change the fact that we need to be brave to do it, might have to leave something behind to pursue it, and need to give a lot of ourselves to succeed. It just means that we got the idea to walk down said path because someone else walked down that path before us. Today’s episode is with a truly unique person that had no such blueprint for his career. For that reason it’s hard to even explain what Michael Cirino does. Art, marketing, logistics, and one-of-a-kind experiences are all in a days work when you create your own blueprint.

When most of us think of getting audited we think of the IRS and our taxes, and a big not fun process. When most of us think of accounting we simply thinking of numbers, boring repetitive numbers. Today we will hear from an auditor that works for a major accounting firm, and his job has nothing to do with taxes, or numbers for that matter. Tim is an IT auditor, which means that when it comes down to it, he’s using his accounting degree to work in the tech world. He’ll explain IT auditing to us and why it’s so important as companies grow in size.

The landscape of marijuana in the United States (and many other areas of the world) is changing. Thanks to that changing landscape it is not only not as taboo as it used to be, it’s also a possibly serious, legal business venture to get started with. Despite the shift it’s still a great place to make a lot of money depending on where you live. Today’s guest, Alex, manages a full scale weed growing operation in Los Angeles. He’ll tell us all about the legal ways to make money working with and growing weed in California.

The landscape of marijuana in the United States (and many other areas of the world) is changing. Thanks to that changing landscape it is not only not as taboo as it used to be, it’s also a possibly serious, legal business venture to get started with. Despite the shift it’s still a great place to make a lot of money depending on where you live. Today’s guest, Alex, manages a full scale weed growing operation in Los Angeles. He’ll tell us all about the legal ways to make money working with and growing weed in California.

Lucky for people like me there are smart people in the world like today's guest, Matt Templin. He has one of those rare skills that impacts pretty much every other job on the entire planet. Matt messes with the chemical chemical makeup of things to make them better, and he'll tell us all about it.

Ahhhh beer, how I love thee. Is there anything more refreshing than a Mexican beer with a lime on a hot day? Is there anything more satisfying than a dunkelweizen in the fall? Anything more perfect than a complex IPA or red ale? The answer to all of these questions is of course, no. If only we could be surrounded by beer all the time. Most beer aficionados have considered how amazing it would be to open up a brewery and make beer for a living. Few people have actually done it. Today’s guest, Drew Pool, followed through on the dream and opened up Wren House Brewing Company in Phoenix, AZ.

Life, more specifically modern life in the modern world, puts a lot of stress on our minds and bodies. For 99% of human existence on this planet people did and didn’t do things quite differently from how they do or don’t do them now. They did have long portions of every day where they got to be quiet, and just listen to nature. They did follow the natural cycles of the sun and the moon. They did not eat processed or made in a lab food. They did not sit at a desk using their brains at max capacity for the majority of their day. They did not put strange man-made chemicals on their skin to make themselves smell better or look more attractive. Some of these things have really only started to change in the last 50-100 years. While last century we thought we were making everything ‘better by science’, this century we seem to be seeing more and more people that are sick and tired with no concrete answer as to why. I would venture to say that there is more than just a correlation there. Today’s guest noticed the same correlation for herself, while suffering a slew of health complications in her 20s, and decided to do something about it.

The younger generations of today are unfairly saddled with a myriad of judgements and prejudices. They’re obsessed with technology. And yet they're the ones who brought back vinyl, film, and are still interested in print. They’re self absorbed. And yet they’re the ones who above all else just want to have a job with a purpose that helps the world. They’re too busy with their technology to pay attention to what’s around them. And yet they’re the ones that look at life through an artistic lens and see the things that most of us miss. Today I interview two young women who showcase all of these points. They created a beautiful magazine called Slope & Swell. They’ll explain their inspiration for the magazine and their desire to not just make another blog.

There are a lot of things in this world that I don’t understand. I guess that’s why I started this podcast. You'd think that I would usually be awed and baffled by new technology, but it’s typically stuff that wasn’t made in this millennia that has me looking like that super cute thinking emoji. Fax machines? Get outta here. Radio broadcasting? Basically witchcraft. Commercial flight? You can talk about drag and lift until you’re blue in the face, but I still can’t wrap my head around a 500 passenger plane when I look at one. And then there are things much, MUCH further back that I still can’t grasp. Today we learn about a really amazing one of those things, acupuncture. Acupuncturist Joyce Kawalchuk will educate us about the 2,000-3,000 year old art.

Starting your own business can be quite the undertaking. You have to learn about SO much in order to get your business off the ground. One of those things that is increasingly taking up entrepreneurs’ time is simply trying to look good. Nice design, tight branding…things that give the appearance that you actually know what you’re doing. Things that show the world that you belong here. The problem is that most entrepreneurs have no idea how to make great design or great branding, so they either spend a lot of money to hire someone to do it for them or they spend time and frustration trial and erroring their way to something decent. Today’s guest, Jenn Murray, is here to put an end to that.

Let’s play a game. I want you to imagine that you are confronted by a nefarious magical being and said NMB says to you, “I am going to take one of your five major senses, but you may keep the other four”. So first you try to remember what your five senses are, and you remember that you have sight, hearing, taste, touch, and smell. Next you go down the line and think of how each one has been a part of your life in recent and distant memory, trying to asses which would be the most live-withoutable. Which do you land on? Which is the sense that you are okay with leaving behind? I have a pretty good feeling that today's guest just might change your answer to that question. Dawn is an olfactive expert and helps develop scents for companies all over the world. And not just scents to make you think, “oh that smells nice”, but scents to make you have a particular experience. She’ll explain just how impactful scent is in your life, and the hidden ways it’s probably impacting you right now.

‘A penny for your thoughts?’ An interesting question, isn’t it? It sure doesn't place a whole lot of value on your thoughts. Our thoughts, feelings, experiences, people just don’t care that much about them. Everyone’s got their own problems and they definitely don't want to hear mine. Yet somehow, some people are paid for their thoughts, more than a penny in fact, and it’s not just famous people. Thanks to the internet regular people just like you and me are sharing their lives and finding that people value what they have to share. Today’s guest, Geraldine DeRuiter of The Everywhereist, shares her award-winning-blog-book-deal-getting journey with us.

Have you ever considered how difficult it must be to be a live stage performer? You have to brave getting up on a stage, bright lights abound, all eyes focused on you. You have to remember your lines, so many lines. Life for the actor or actress can be pretty scary. And if you’re an opera performer like today’s guest thats only the start of it. The lines that Chelsea needs to memorize are typically in a foreign language that she doesn’t know. Then, when she gets on stage, she has to sing her lines in perfect pitch, and in such a booming way that without amplification it fills the entire theatre. It takes a lot of training to be able to do what Chelsea does, and she’ll tell us all about it.

I consider myself a pretty fit guy. I like to eat relatively healthy. Go to the gym from time to time. Go for daily walks with my dog and even the occasional run. Yet every time I go to the gym I am quickly reminded that there are people that are in a whole different stratosphere of fitness than I am. They are the 1%. They can be described by the same sentences I wrote above about myself, but with far less adverbs and qualifiers. They are fit, eat healthy, and go to the gym. All in all, they are really awesome, disciplined people. Today’s guest is the 1% of the 1%. She is currently the USA Weightlifting National Champion in the 63kg category. She’ll tell us all about the sport of weightlifting and explain what it takes to get to the top of the mountain.

This week on Half Hour Intern we explore the mind, our thoughts, and how our emotions impact both. Today we learn about a severe and traumatizing form of anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder. We're usually only shown images of the classic 'clean freak' OCD person on television. Dr. Z will tell us all about OCDs many other forms and how she helps patients cope with the disorder.

Have you ever been cut off in traffic and felt that you now had a personal vendetta against the person in the other vehicle? Have you ever gotten in an disagreement with a family member and proceeded to think about how angry they make you for the rest of the day? Have you ever had a bad day and taken it out on someone that had nothing to do with it? It sounds like you could use some practice in emotional regulation. Today’s guest, Dr. Patricia Zurita Ona or "Dr. Z", explains how most of us could use a little work at regulating our emotional state. She’ll give us tips and advice for recognizing our emotions as they enter a heightened state, and altering them to for our benefit.

Being just fine, in perfectly normal health, is such an incredible blessing that we all too frequently take for granted. It is only when we go through aches and pains, viruses and diseases that we really really consider how lucky we usually are. Yet, even with aches and pains there is one area of our health that is still taken for granted, and that is our mental health. Many of us have the fortune of going through our lives and dealing with a little bit of anxiety here, some depression there, but all in all our brains are wired for normal mental health. Today’s guest, Will Jiang, is not so lucky. While going to college he suffered a psychotic break that later got him diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. Will will tell us all about what it is like inside the mind of someone with schizophrenia, and how he was eventually able to to thrive in spite of his condition.

SEO. Search. Engine. Optimization. Not exactly the three sexiest words in the English language. In fact, I’d be willing to bet that if you checked your own internal ‘search engine’ those words are barely registering as something that you want to learn about. However, you might be, like me, saying to yourself, “It is a really big part of the world though, so maybe I should at least learn about it, as boring as that will be.” All I can say is, you’ve taken the first right step, and you are in AMAZING hands with today’s guest, Britney Muller. I can assure that what Britney has to say is far from boring, and it might even have you messing with the internet by the end of the episode. It’s time we take SEO from geek to chic.

Buildings (and all sorts of other structures) can be pretty darn cool. The Eiffel Tower, the Taj Mahal, The Sydney Opera House, the list of incredible buildings goes on and on. Usually we praise these buildings for their aesthetics, like a bunch of shallow people whose moms never told them that beauty is on the inside. Today’s guest is here to remind us that without the inside, there would be no outside. She makes sure that the value of a building is more than skin deep, and helps save plenty of lives in the process.

I don’t know about you, but I sure do love animated movies. The worlds that the artists and directors create are so full of wonder and magic. Animation is also the modern day home of the allegorical tale. Many live-action movies have forgone having a moral or some deeper story to tell, in favor of just being a straight shot of ‘action’ or ‘romance’. Somehow, movies for “children” have become the best place for complex, deep stories that are deeply profound no matter your age. Today’s guest, Leo Matsuda, is a director of one such very deep and profound Disney short, Inner Workings. He has also worked as a story artist on many other big name films. We’ll discuss the animation industry, the magic of Disney, and the philosophical messages in Inner Workings.

I don’t know about you, but I sure want to have a job that I love. Isn’t that a pretty universal goal in life? To be one of those lucky people who says, “It doesn’t even feel like work to me”. Until you get that job you just pretty much hate people like that, but you really, really want to be one of them. Today’s guest thought she found that job. It’s an amazing job, and you’ll hear all about it. You might even decide that it’s your dream job. For her it turned out to be fool’s gold. She’ll explain why and how she went about fixing it…and she’ll tell us some pretty good celebrity stories too.

Most of us do not achieve all the things that we want to in life. We see this as a given, that’s life. But if we sit down and really analyze the things we fall short on, we might start to understand more about ourselves and what it is that is holding us back from what we want. How do we talk to ourselves about losing weight? How do we see ourselves when we have achieved the success we are going after? How do we feel when we think about our life being completely different than it is right now? Neuro-linguistic Programming is an approach to communication, personal development, and psychotherapy that aims to know these things. Unlike many forms of therapy, NLP doesn’t need to know WHY you have problems with your mother, NLP just wants to know HOW you think about your mother and will help you reshape that thought. For this reason it has made quite a splash in the personal development / self help scene. Today we speak with a true expert on the topic, founder of iNLP, Mike Bundrant.

We’ve gotten to a point as a species where we are pretty damn wasteful. Gone are the harmonious days of us living and working in conjunction with nature. Today we get massive portions of food and then throw away our leftovers. We fill landfills with packaging and the byproducts of manufacturing. There is no circle of life, there is simply waste. Luckily, some amazing new companies have been created that aim to tackle this problem. Today’s guest repurposes used beer grain from urban breweries to make delicious and nutritious grain bars. As they say, one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.

Today’s business landscape is a lot different than the one our parents grew up with. It’s seems more and more business are launching online and having a physical space is simply not needed. Why spend the time and effort of opening your own store when you could just put everything online and not have to worry about the same overhead? I’ll tell you why. It’s romantic. It’s a way to connect with where you live. And for lack of a bigger vocabulary, it’s really awesome. Picture waking up in the morning, making yourself a cup of coffee and then diving to your shop, the shop that you own. You put the keys in the door, and walk in. It’s quiet and peaceful, but you know that in a few hours people will be coming and going and you will meet a lot of them. You look around your beautiful little store and think, I belong here. Sometimes owning the largest liquor distributor online is cool. Sometimes owning the little bar from Cheers, where everyone knows your name, is even cooler. Today’s guest, Lauren Danuser, explains the trails, tribulations, and wonderfulness of owning your own brick and mortar store.

When most of us think about the military we think of guns, combat, and camo. There are, however, many different branches of the military. While all are fully trained for combat, some are a far cry from the default image that we conjure up in our heads. Today’s guest spent a good portion of his life with the Seabees, a smaller group of an already small group of naval divers. The Seabees, a heterograph of C.B., are members of the naval construction battalion, and they help to ensure that fixed underwater structures are kept in working condition. They also get to blow stuff up.

I have been a fan of podcasts for close to ten years now. I’ve always loved their ability to open my mind and teach me something new. Two years ago I decided to start my own. Having my own podcast has taught me even more than listening to podcasts, and has been such an incredibly fun journey. I get a lot of questions from listeners thinking about starting their own podcasts and I always recommend that they do. Today I bring on a couple that have a wonderful podcast that features small businesses in Arizona. It’s a great idea for a show that any one of you could try to replicate in your local area. We’ll discuss the ins and outs, and ups and downs of podcasting. I’ll be placing links to all of the recording equipment we use in the show notes on halfhourintern.com. So, if you are one of the many people that have thought about starting your own podcast, listen to today’s episode and get inspired!

Living a healthy life can be hard. It can be really hard. It’s the whole lifestyle part that gets in the way. It’s easy enough to eat healthy when you’re quarantined at home and surrounded by healthy food that you bought, no alcohol, and lots of motivation, but it can be really hard the moment we step out our front door. It’s not so easy to be healthy and fit when we sit at a desk for 9 hours a day. It’s also not so easy to be healthy and fit when it seems like we are surrounded by over-processed, high sugar, high carbohydrate food. When you’re on the go, what are you supposed to do? Today’s guest, Siphiwe Baleka, learned just how intense this issue could be when he decided to become a truck driver. Out on the road with no schedule, clean food, or gym nearby Siphiwe gained over 10% of his body weight in his very first 2 months. Rather than resign himself to the fact that that was just going to be his new life, Siphiwe decided to do something about it. Over time, he developed a plan to make himself the fittest trucker in America, and now he helps truckers across the country follow in his footsteps.

They say that with age comes wisdom, and while I’m not sure if that’s true, I have definitely picked up on a few things over the course of my time on this Earth. One thing I’ve noticed is that many cliché sayings are far more than just cliché. They are as true as true can get. They are wisdom in a tiny, bite-sized morsel. A great example of this is, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know”. Every one of us has benefitted in some way from knowing someone at some time in our lives. Maybe it was as small as getting a discount at a local business. Maybe it was as large as getting an interview for a job that ended up cascading into your lifelong career. Maybe it was someone introducing you to the love of your life. No amount of interview prep or reading ‘Men Are From Mars Women Are From Venus’ could get you in front of the right people at the right time. This begs the question, why do we not focus more time on trying to get out there and meet more people? Why do we not build our networks to allow more of these wonderful things to happen in our lives? Today’s guest is a networking natural and decided to start a matchmaking/networking business. Emily helps people build their networks with likeminded, amazing people that just might be able to help move the needle in their lives.

Money. It’s one of those things that most of us spend a little too much time thinking about and could probably use a little more of. Today’s guest, Mark Podolsky, was very much like the rest of us until one day a friend introduced him to the concept of land investing. Rather than flipping real estate, just buying raw land and turning around and selling it for a quick profit. A massive, quick profit. Mark thought his friend was making it sound too good to be true, but sure enough, his first piece of land he sold for close to 10x what he bought it for. Now, many years later, Mark has built a 7 figure business buying and selling land, and he now educates people on how they can do the same. Over three episodes Mark will explain the basics of the process to us and defend his claim that land investing is the best passive income model around.

This is part 3 where we discuss how to go about selling the land after you have acquired it.

Money. It’s one of those things that most of us spend a little too much time thinking about and could probably use a little more of. Today’s guest, Mark Podolsky, was very much like the rest of us until one day a friend introduced him to the concept of land investing. Rather than flipping real estate, just buying raw land and turning around and selling it for a quick profit. A massive, quick profit. Mark thought his friend was making it sound too good to be true, but sure enough, his first piece of land he sold for close to 10x what he bought it for. Now, many years later, Mark has built a 7 figure business buying and selling land, and he now educates people on how they can do the same. Here, in part 2, Mark gives an overview of the land buying process.

Money. It’s one of those things that most of us spend a little too much time thinking about and could probably use a little more of. Today’s guest, Mark Podolsky, was very much like the rest of us until one day a friend introduced him to the concept of land investing. Rather than flipping real estate, just buying raw land and turning around and selling it for a quick profit. A massive, quick profit. Mark thought his friend was making it sound too good to be true, but sure enough, his first piece of land he sold for close to 10x what he bought it for. Now, many years later, Mark has built a 7 figure business buying and selling land, and he now educates people on how they can do the same. Over three episodes Mark will explain the basics of the process to us and defend his claim that land investing is the best passive income model around.

Cancer. It’s probably the scariest, most feared word in the English language. It’s a word that none of us ever want to hear and yet, surprisingly, about 40-50% of us will be diagnosed with cancer in our lifetime. That means that it’s a near guarantee that you or someone you are very close to will get cancer. Today’s guest, Dr. Sarah Boston, is one of the leading veterinary cancer surgeons in the world. A few years ago her professional and personal life merged when she found a lump on her neck that she had a bad feeling about. Sarah then became her own advocate on the long journey to diagnosis, treatment, and recovery.

Most of us, at some point in our lives, have a pet that is one of our best friends. I, for one, am a dog person. I absolutely love it whenever I’m out and about and I get to meet a new dog. I also own two dogs who, next to my wife, make me laugh and smile and fill me up with good emotions more than anybody else in my life. They call dogs ‘Man’s best friend’, and to me that sounds about right, but I definitely believe that any pet can fill that best friend role. It makes sense then that we would treat our pets with the same level of love and care that we treat anyone else when they get sick. Today’s guest, Dr. Sarah Boston, is one of 50 fellowship trained surgical vet oncologists in the world. If your dog or cat gets cancer, she is the amazing person you would want to treat them.

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way.” For the majority of human history these words were a great motivator, but probably not very realistic. There was a whole lot that just plain and simple could not be done. Then, with the advent of computers, that statement seemed a bit more true. Those with enough time and money could tackle all sorts of problems. More recently, with the proliferation of the internet and smartphones, it would seem that statement is darn near fact. Apple realized this fact back in 2010 and coined the phrase “There’s an app for that”. Today there are tools online that can help just about anybody program an app to do just about anything. Matt is one such anybody and in just a few short months he learned how to program apps that solved his problems.

include (Half Hour Intern)

include (Handsome, Intelligent)

include (Justin Washington)

void func(basic); void do_something(Interesting, Awesome);

int main() { std::string str = "Test"; int x = 5;

std::thread t{func, str, std::ref(x)};

do_something(Enjoy);

t.join(); }

What do you believe in? Do you only believe in what you can see and touch? Do people say that you’re the most gullible person in the world and you’ll believe anything? Are you religious, or is science your only deity? Where do you stand on the occult and mysterious? In the past people that chose to balk at religion and consider themselves married to science and logic could sleep soundly only believing in the physical world that science explained. Then came quantum physics, and with it a bunch of unnerving and miraculous observations without explanation. Suddenly being ‘logical’ and ‘scientific’ didn’t look so different from being a believer. Things in the world of mystery and science fiction were now sounding more possible and plausible in the world of actual science. Of particular interest to me, and the focus of today’s episode, is tarot. Ask a question, pick some cards, and they will help guide your future. Sound like BS? It also sounds an awful lot like the law of attraction mixed with some quantum mechanics helping to guide your life.

The amount of things we take for granted in any given moment are astronomical. Right now, you can read this, for instance. In a moment you’re about to listen to this episode. That means that someone created language. It was passed down to you. You didn’t have any inherent learning disabilities that kept you from assimilating the language or learning how to read. Someone taught that language to you. The list goes on and on. At the very top of that list, and yet somehow often overlooked, are our senses. You can read this because you were born with the ability to see, and you still have that ability today. You can listen to this podcast and all of the beautiful, wonderful noises in the world because you have the ability to hear. What would you do if that ability started slipping away, or went away completely? Or if you had a child that was not born with hearing the way that you were? You would go and see an intelligent, caring audiologist like today’s guest, Lauren Keller.

NEW CONTEST! CHECK OUT TODAY'S EPISODE FOR DETAILS. When most of us are in school we don’t know exactly what we want to be when we grow up. Yet, we know that we’re going to work for someone. We put a lot of effort into learning as much as possible, grooming ourselves to be good employees for our future employers. Then, we go through the rigors of career fairs, mock interviews, and finally the real thing. Somehow, it never occurs to us, most of us, that we could spend this time and effort trying to find a way to work for ourselves. Trying to do our own thing. Today’s guests had this epiphany during their senior year of college in the midst of their own get-a-job hunt. At the end of the year they were both offered jobs, which they later rethought and rejected, due to a budding fashion accessory company they launched. A year later and they’re doing just fine having never worked a day for anyone but themselves.

Cities. Suburbs. Rural country. These are three very different and distinct areas that we often categorize, subcategorize, and most importantly separate. But what if aspects of each could move and fit into each other? What if the most important and vital aspect of one could be moved into the others? Farming and growing a sustainable, real people feeding amount of agriculture is often thought of as something that can only be done out in rural land. However, people like today’s guests are using a little bit of technology and creativity to help bring agriculture to an urban setting, and from the sound of it things are going very well.

There are not many foods that are irrevocably linked to days or events in our lives. Turkey, for instance, for people in the U.S. on Thanksgiving. There are fewer foods still that share their tie with events throughout the world, across cultures. Go to a birthday party in Japan and you will find a birthday cake. Go to a wedding in Switzerland and you will certainly enjoy some wedding cake. When you really think about it, cake is in some pretty rarified air. It makes since then that some people get really into the art and craft of making truly amazing cakes. Today’s guest, Corrie Rasmussen, explains the hobby and career of cake decorating.

“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!” These are the words of the Statue of Liberty. Back when the statue was placed in New York, and even more true before it was ever erected, these were not hollow words. Many people you ask in America can trace back their lineage to a poor family in another part of the world that was looking for a new start. Men and women looking for a chance to give their children, and their children’s children, a better life. However, since the statue was placed in New York in 1886, the U.S. and world population have increased 6 fold and 7 fold, respectively. A lot has changed since America was a young country, and it unfortunately does not look like we can lift quite as bright a lamp beside our golden door as we did for our ancestors when they made the journey. Today we speak with an immigration attorney to learn about the what life looks like for immigrants that want to come to America, and how that picture becomes murkier with the governance of the new administration.

When I was a kid my sister and I used to play video games together while listening to music. The games weren’t too particularly complicated back then, so it was perfect to turn the sound to the game on and turn some music on instead. Since we were kids we didn’t have too many games, or too big of a music selection, so to this day I can still remember every single album tied to every single game we would play it with. Some games I don’t even remember the title, but I sure do know what we listened to with it. Samurai Showdown and TLC’s Crazy Sexy Cool. Some cartoony Mario Cart-esque snowboarding game and The Wedding Singer soundtrack. I have countless memories like this from my life where I can remember exactly what song was playing with what memory. Music is a pretty powerful thing! Today’s guest knows all about the power the music and its tie to emotion and memory. Chris is a composer and specifically he regularly composes music for movies. Some pieces that are out in the forefront, and some pieces that stay back and subtly influence a scene. He’ll tell us all about both and the music writing process.

Wine? Check. Travel? Check. Why do we need to complicate our lives with much more than that? Today’s guest Brent realized that he sure as hell didn’t. He left his prestigious job as an Engineer to travel the world and make (and drink) wine, and he’ll tell you how you can do the same.

I have a confession to make. I am a long time milk-aholic. In my youth I drank it straight, in high-school and college I would go through a gallon a week absolutely drowning bowls of cereal multiple times a day, and now that I’ve given up straight dairy and things like cereal, I’ve replaced liquid milk with it’s solid butter and cheese cousins. Who doesn’t love a salty gruyere or a creamy brie? Who doesn’t love butter on…everything? Yep all of my life I’ve owed a huge debt to our good friend, the dairy cow. Today we learn about how our amazing friends are fed and what impacts the finished product that we love.

Do you consider yourself a pretty discerning customer? Do you like having cool stuff instead of having lame stuff? Well, the whole reason that people like us are even allowed to be discerning and have nice things is thanks to people like today’s guest, Jimmy Huynh. Jimmy is an industrial designer which means it’s his job to make products look nice and function well. Apple would be the primary example of a company that has considered industrial design a top priority. Jimmy will break down the fun and difficulties of working in the industrial design world.

F-R-A-N-K, is there a more beautiful combination of 5 letters in the Latin alphabet? Frank and I have been friends since we were 8 years old. He is, and always has been, one of the most genuine and giving people that I know. When I had the idea for my podcast 2 years ago I called Frank and told him all about it and asked it I could have his help with editing the audio of the show. Frank, you see, is an audio engineer for a living. Since I had just quit my job to start the podcast I had nothing to offer Frank other than digital high-fives and my thanks, and yet, Frank being Frank said that he would love to help in any way he could. He proceeded to chop together an awesome intro for me that made the show feel ‘real’ and to this day edits the audio on every episode of the show. Today we get to take a look at the man behind the curtain, Frank.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that you have had some not fun times with customer support in your life. Perhaps even reading the words customer support makes you have flashbacks of one such time that really takes the cake? Deep down we know that we should be happy that companies even have customer support, and yet you’d be hard pressed to find someone that has a favorable opinion of their time spent on the phone trying to solve a problem. Today’s guest, João (Joe), is the manager of a customer support team for an international travel website. He’ll give us the inside scoop on what it’s like to deal with all the haters and live life on the other side of the telephone.

Do you ever wonder where your food came from? What sorts of approvals and checks and balances it had to pass before making its way to you? As we recently learned in the ‘Organic Farmer’ episode, getting produce on your table is not as simple as you might think. For better or for worse, if you live in the Western world your food will endure quite a bit of scrutiny before it ever makes it to you. Today we learn about another side of this food chain. Natalie was recently employed as a North Pacific Groundfish Observer for the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Fisheries Monitoring and Analysis Division (FMA)…quite a mouthfull. Natalie’s long title meant that she lived on fishing boats off the coast of Alaska and made sure that everyone was following the rules. Thanks to people like Natalie sustainable fishing that makes minimal impact on the overall ecosystem is a reality in the majority of the United States.

I have a question for you. What is the one thing that permeates EVERY aspect of consumer interaction with a company? If you looked at the title of this episode you can probably guess that the answer is the brand. Think about it. When Chipotle decides to add a new menu item the number one question they need to ask themselves, even more important than ‘Does this taste good?’, is ‘Does this new item fit in with our brand?’. When Apple decides to appoint a new employee as a speaker at an event, ‘Does this person represent our brand?’. When Target decides to update the lighting inside their stores, ‘Does these lights feel cohesive with our brand?’. It’s pretty crazy when you really think about it. The bigger and more successful the company, the smaller and more mundane the change that needs to pass the brand test. Today we learn all about this test and how we can better cultivate our own brands.

Food. It’s pretty important, ya know? There’s the whole entire ‘don’t eat it and you’ll die’ thing, but for most of us food is so much more than just death prevention. It’s our means to feeling good physically. It’s our means to feeling comforted mentally. The invention of agriculture was our main reason for coming together in large scale societies. Pretty important stuff. It’s no surprise then that we’re always trying to think of ways to make it better. Currently, better means organic. Today we speak to a large scale organic farm manager, Doug Kaba, to get his perspective on what better means, and learn more about the farm side of the farm to table movement.

Here is part 2 of our interview with Amy Baldwin, owner of Pure Pleasure sex shop in Santa Cruz, CA, and certified sex educator. Different from a typical HHI interview, I put out a call to listeners to send in your sex related questions. In part one we mostly covered questions sent in by women. Today, in part two, we cover the questions sent in by men. Enjoy.

I know, I know, we just recently had two episodes about sex…but something those episodes taught me is that sex is a giant topic with so many ins and outs and little intricacies that it can never really be fully explored. It also taught me that we all have our own relationship with sex, our own knowledge of it, and our own lack of knowledge of it. It is with those lessons that I decided to invite this week’s guest on the show and do another sex filled two part interview. Amy Baldwin is the owner of Pure Pleasure sex shop in Santa Cruz, CA, and is also a certified sex educator. Different from a typical HHI interview, I put out a call to listeners to send in your sex related questions. In part one we mostly cover questions sent in by women, in part two, men. Enjoy.

Part 3, the final installment, of the 2016 Half Hour Intern Awards is here! In today's episode we cover the awards for "Best Story" "Best Advice" and "Favorite Episode".

Your Nominees Are...

Best Story

Spearfishing - Shark attack (Levi Brown) Flight Attendant - Losing cabin pressure (Carin Ryan)

Best Advice

Street Artist (Cameron Moberg) Cuddle Therapy (Travis Sigley) Author (Michael Goorjian)

Ho ho ho, Merry Christmas! In this special Christmas day episode of Half Hour Intern we speak with a Mall Santa and learn all about the life of Mr. Claus.

Part 2 of the 2016 Half Hour Intern Awards is here! In today's episode we cover the awards for "Career I'd Most Like To Do" and "Hobby I'd Most Like To Try".

Your Nominees Are...

Career I'd Most Like To Do: Medicolegal Death Investigator (Dannine Lorenzo) Moveable Feast Retreats (Laura and Tim Sullivan) Travel Blogger (Collette and Scott Stohler) Wine Maker (Sterling Kragten)

Hobby I'd Most Like To Try: Spearfishing (Issac Daly & Levi Brown) Home Brewing (Emma Christensen) Flow Arts (Nicky Evers) Glass Blowing (Josh Simpson)

Sports is generally not known for having high caliber reporting. In fact, most of the time when I’m watching I’m amazed at how boring the questions seem that are being asked on the sidelines. But despite this perceived laid back nature there is a ton of work that goes into sports reporting. I’m talking stats. I’m talking about demanding an interview from someone that doesn’t want to talk to you right now. I’m talking about trying to say something intelligent while not overwhelming the interviewee, and trying to keep everything under 30 seconds. There’s a whole lot that goes into it, and that’s just the sideline reporting side of things. Today we speak with Angela Lauren who has been there and done that with just about every job in the sports reporter field.

Here we are somehow, magically, one year since the last Half Hour Intern awards. 2016 was the first full year of Half Hour Intern and it was full of ups and downs (many more ups) that I will never forget. Among other things the show was featured on iTunes, NPR, & CBC, listeners started supporting the show on Patreon, we got over 100 iTunes reviews, and starting this month the show is partnered with Virgin Airlines and will be on every flight in North America for the next six months. Perhaps more importantly, I’ve made over 100 new relationships and learned countless lessons from the last year of the show. And, as I said last year, none of these people are famous or doing what they are doing for any other reason than that is just the bad-ass type of person they are. It is the perfect reminder of the greatness we can achieve and the amazingness that exists in the world around us at all times. Knowing that Pascale Vermont (grief counselor) is volunteering her time with people that are dying is such a beautiful thing. Knowing that Dr. Noah Kaufman is a rock climbing American Ninja Warrior in addition to being a great father and a full time Emergency Room physician is the true definition of humbling. Knowing that Carin Ryan left her career and went out on a limb to become a flight attendant in her late 30’s (and she is loving it!) is truly inspirational.

I am so profoundly honored that you all have continued to listen and give me a reason to continue this. I promise that I will continue to learn and grow and make the show better and better with each passing episode.

In today's episode we go over: Guest That Makes The Biggest Difference Most Inspirational Most Unique Career Most Unique Hobby

Sex. It pretty much makes the world go round. They say that nearly every major invention ever can be traced back to a desire to impress someone that you are sexually attracted to. Moreover, adoption of new media and tech over the past 50 years has been heavily influenced by sex and the porn industry. One of the major reasons VHS won over the Betamax format was VHS was the main format for porn. By the late 1970s, erotic film accounted for over half of all VHS sales in the United States. On the internet 13% of all searches are for erotic content, somewhere between 4-30% of all traffic is for porn, and at any second 30,000,000 unique people are viewing porn online. Online payment was invented to collect money on porn sites. Makes you wonder what the future will hold with virtual reality and artificial intelligence…actually it doesn’t, it’s going to be a lot of porn and sex. Something this all encompassing takes a lot of time to talk about, and this will be the first of many of those talks. Today’s guest, Maxine Holloway, is a porn actress and director, live show actress and director, an escort, a sex activist, and a college level sex educator that has her masters in public health. As you can imagine, we had a lot to talk about. This is part 2 of our conversation.

Sex. It pretty much makes the world go round. They say that nearly every major invention ever can be traced back to a desire to impress someone that you are sexually attracted to. Moreover, adoption of new media and tech over the past 50 years has been heavily influenced by sex and the porn industry. One of the major reasons VHS won over the Betamax format was VHS was the main format for porn. By the late 1970s, erotic film accounted for over half of all VHS sales in the United States. On the internet 13% of all searches are for erotic content, somewhere between 4-30% of all traffic is for porn, and at any second 30,000,000 unique people are viewing porn online. Online payment was invented to collect money on porn sites. Makes you wonder what the future will hold with virtual reality and artificial intelligence…actually it doesn’t, it’s going to be a lot of porn and sex. Something this all encompassing takes a lot of time to talk about, and this will be the first of many of those talks. Today’s guest, Maxine Holloway, is a porn actress and director, live show actress and director, an escort, a sex activist, and a college level sex educator that has her masters in public health. As you can imagine, we had a lot to talk about.

We are only one week away from the 2016 Half Hour Intern Awards! Here are your nominees for this year's awards. Go to Halfhourintern.com to submit your votes for who should win.

Social media is such a pervasive fixture of modern society. You may love it, you may hate it, you may think it’s a waste of time…but there it is. Seemingly not concerned with peoples’ varying and ever-changing opinions of it, it remains, stronger than ever. Today we interview a social media manger for a major fitness brand, Beach Body. Jake will tell us about the ins and outs of trying to manage something as amorphous and massive as social media, and he’ll make us all feel a bit better about the social media hustle.

Do you like to exercise and consider yourself pretty fit? Let’s take a little test. Do you like swimming? How about swimming for two hours straight, nonstop? Do you like riding your bike? How about riding your bike for 112 miles, roughly the distance from Los Angeles to San Diego? Or maybe you’re more of a runner. How about running a full length marathon? I feel like I like fitness as much as the next guy, but I’m not lining up to do any of that stuff! Now, think about doing all 3 of those things, swimming for 2 hours, biking for 112 miles, and running a marathon BACK to BACK to BACK, with no stopping in between. Seems pretty inhuman. Well, it’s what today’s guest, and thousands of other people in the world do. Today we’ll learn all about the Iron Man triathlon and the crazy people that do them.

Most of us have the luxury of being able to speak our primary language every minute of every day. If we choose to speak in a language other than our native tongue, it’s usually that, a choice. We may learn to say things like “Where is the restroom?” or “Nice to meet you”, but rarely are these phrases necessary. They’re usually learned to make conversations on vacation more easy, not with any real sense of urgency. However, children all over the world are immigrating to countries where they simply do not know the language. For economic or other reasons kids and teens find themselves in a new land, with no ability to speak the language. In these instances they MUST learn the language, and there is a very real sense of urgency. Today’s guest is an ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher in Phoenix, AZ. Holly teaches teens that are brand new to America, with no prior experience in speaking English. She’ll tell us about what it is like to try and teach students like this and how the classroom dynamics play out.

It is an interesting time to be a member of law enforcement in America. There have been many events in the past two years that have drawn the ire and suspicion of the greater public regarding the people that are hired to serve and protect them. This is on the one hand good, as we should question everything all the time, and audit our government employees to make sure they are serving the purpose for which they were hired. This is on the other hand bad, as public sentiment and backlash fracture the country further. Worse, it can cause good law enforcement officers, who risk their lives to help make our cities safer, to feel ostracized and looked down upon. Today I interview one such officer, Matthew Barton, a sheriff from Yavapai county in Arizona. We’ll discuss what it’s like being a sheriff in today’s world.

Think about how different the world is from how it was 100 years ago. A century ago we barely had cars, paved roads, or phones. The world wasn’t connected by air travel, television, computers, or the internet. Revolutionary advancements make the modern world unrecognizable from the not so distant past. Yet there are certain places you can go where the impact of progress is less felt. If you were to enroll in a university and go to class a century ago things would flow in a very similar way to how they do today. The clothes and culture would stand out far more than the format of classes and education as a whole. Today’s guest, and the university he works for, is aiming to change that. Laurence works for Minerva University where the progress is the norm, the world is your classroom, and skill mastery is on the agenda. It’s time for revolutionary advancement to come to the world of education.

Raise your hand if you like to travel. Everyone? I see. Now, raise your hand if you like to spend time with your boo thang. Everyone that has a boo thang (sans those who just got in an argument right before reading this)? Just as I suspected. We’ve interviewed for a lot of fun and desirable jobs on Half Hour Intern, but how about getting paid to travel with your boo? That’s gotta be the best job in the world…tied at the very least. Getting flown around, wined and dined, free stay here, free tour there, not too shabby. We all know that travel blogs exist and we’ve probably all wondered, “who the hell are these lucky people and why not me?!” Today we meet the lucky travel blogging couple of Roamaroo. They’ll explain how they got so lucky and what life is like on the other side of the rainbow.

Nothing brings people together quite like a good meal. This makes today’s guest somewhat of an important person. You could say that Emma is a food writer and that she comes up with amazing recipes for a living. You could, in a more indirect way, say that Emma is a happiness dealer that knocks over the first domino en route to good times and lasting memories. I mean, without people like Emma over the years we’d all probably just be eating the same damn thing every day, and there’d be nothing happy about that. Today she tells us how she comes up with her wonderful recipes and gives us a behind the scenes look at the food writing world.

A short post U.S. election message and an inspirational episode about helping people in the Peace Corps.

They say that what you own owns you. If that’s the case then I sure do hope that whatever owns me comes from the 167 year old Hammacher Schlemmer catalog. Consider being owned by a batman golf cart that shoots flames out the back…I’d be okay with that. Or how about a personal submarine, that’s also a sports car? Not too shabby. Yep, thanks to people like today’s guest, Sarah Plovanich, Hammacher Schlemmer, 167 years after it’s creation, is still a hub for high quality, very unique gifts. Sarah is a buyer for the catalog where she does everything from evaluate invention submissions to travel the world in search of the next great products. She’ll tell us all about what it’s like to have the coolest job ever.

Life is a journey best spent with your whole heart and mind invested. Hold nothing back. Love fully. Travel far and wide, and learn and experience with an open mind. Eat great meals with people that make you smile. Experience deeply. Through all of this, live with a light heart that is focused on the present. These beliefs were the foundations of a wonderful idea and are now the blood and bone of a wonderful company, Moveable Feast Retreats. Uber amazing couple Laura and Tim Sullivan come on the show to share their grand vision for the ultimate vacation, and tell stories from the recent inaugural retreat.

Nothing beats a good book. A great fictional story can sweep us up in a make-believe world, blurring the lines of reality and the extraordinary. A great nonfiction book can disseminate wonderful ideas that we can logically digest and grow from. But why limit our lessons to the work of nonfiction? Perhaps the best of all book genres is the highly under appreciated philosophical fiction. Sewing seeds of growth while wearing the disguise of entertainment. When we are wrapped up emotionally in a narrative both sides of our brain can interpret a lesson, and a level of deep growth can occur that is difficult with nonfiction alone. Today’s guest understands this concept well and has written an amazing piece of philosophical fiction that speaks to the collective struggle of our time. He’ll discuss why philosophical fiction is such a great medium for distilling down complex topics, and explain what the whole book writing biz is all about too.

They say that home is where the heart is, but what about when you rent a home on vacation? Suddenly your heart becomes more vulnerable. You want a home that treats your heart like the love of your life…but even better. Dare I say, like how your grandma would treat you. Anticipating your every need, and always having more in store than you could ask for. Homes like this are what today’s gust specializes in. Ryan saw the need for a home rental company that went the extra mile for both home owners, and guests on vacation alike. He pairs up amazing properties with people looking for a “grandma home” (damn I’m good at marketing). He’ll explain the ins and outs of the luxury rental business and tell us about his decision to quit the corporate life and pursue his own business.

For most of us having a properly running car is a necessity. If our car isn’t functioning correctly, our lives can’t function correctly. We’d be late to just about everything…if we even had any chance of making it at all. Luckily for us there are wonderful people like today’s guest. Car not starting? Engine overheating? Bizarre clicking noise that you’re afraid might be animal living in your undercarriage? Steven has you covered for all of this and more. He’ll find out what the problem is and have you back on the road in no time.

Ahhhh beer, how I love thee. Is there anything more refreshing than a Mexican beer with a lime on a hot day? Is there anything more satisfying than a dunkelweizen in the fall? Anything more perfect than a complex IPA or red ale? The answer to all of these questions is of course, no. Beer is such a wonderful beverage with so much depth to explore. Most of us undertake this exploration by heading down to our local market or bar, getting something that sounds interesting, and then imbibing. This exploration can be taken a step further however by inserting ourselves into the process earlier, and making the beer ourselves. Today’s guest, Emma Christensen (author of Brew Better Beer and True Brews) gives us a lesson on home brewing and explains how making beer can deepen our appreciation for this wonderful beverage.

If we ever get hurt, or our body has some sort of hiccup in proper function, it’s likely to take a whole team of specialized individuals to get us back on our feet. Physicians, physicians’ assistants, nurses, and the often unheralded medical device rep to name a few. If you have ever needed a procedure done to improve your body’s health or performance, there was likely a medical device rep involved somewhere down the food chain. Reps, like my friend Sam, make sure that the products and devices being used in a procedure are being used in the best ways possible. They can also help troubleshoot problems that could arise during or after use. As they say, it takes a village, and we should all be glad that people like Sam are part of that village.

There sure are a lot of animals out there that get a lot of recognition for their greatness. Dogs are a man’s best friend. Chicken’s are coveted for their delicious, healthy eggs, and their equally delicious and dynamic meat. Cows stand at the apex of the red meat world, and are also the standard for dairy products everywhere. But what about animals that are just as awesome and somehow fly under the radar of acclaim. What about the goat? Or should I say G.O.A.T? Their dairy…very low in lactose and S1 casein (another often inflammatory component of cow milk). Their meat? Gyros. Their size? Cute. Their temperament? Did you know that goats wag their tails when they’re happy? Yep, they’re pretty darn great. Today’s guest knows all about the greatness of goats and how great their dairy can be. PJ is the owner of Goat Milk Stuff which is an amazing, family run, goat milk business. They started with soap and now make just about everything you can think of. PJ is nice enough to offer a free bar of her REALLY good soap to Half Hour Intern listeners. Just visit http://www.goatmilkstuff.com/InternSoap to find out what all the hype is about.

Today’s episode is different from the traditional job or hobby exploration. This is a replay of the Half Hour Intern Awards episode 1 from 2015. It’s a great look back at some of the shows best moments from 2015. If you would like to submit an idea for an award category for the upcoming 2016 awards please tweet your idea to @halfhourintern or email blake@halfhourintern.com.

They say that diamonds are a girl’s best friend. I’m more of a pet rock guy myself…but today’s guest has me considering expanding my horizons. Hannah Powers is a gemologist which is a person that looks at gems all day and, among other things, grades them on their value. She’ll tell us all about what makes a gem a gem, what makes said gem valuable, and why diamonds are in fact pretty darn cool.

Last year I was traveling with my wife and I said, “It’s just such a bummer that you can’t visit places for longer. A travel visa only allows you to stay somewhere for a few months. Think of what the experience would be like if you could stay longer than that.” Cut to a month ago when I get an e-mail from a listener of the show in China, Yue. Yue went on to tell me a story about this amazing program she had just been a part of called a ‘working holiday’. It is a visa that you get from the government of a country, similar to a travel visa, only it allows you to stay there for one to three years! Forget just saving up tons of money and going to some place for a few months, with a working holiday visa you can go to a country and get a job and live there. Truly immerse yourself in the culture. And no, you do not need to be sponsored by a company, or even have a job lined up for when you arrive. If this has piqued your interest at all, listen to the interview with Yue to learn more about the program and hear about her year long experience living in New Zealand.

Most forms of art are meant to be admired from afar. We look, we interpret. We consider how beautiful it is or how it makes us feel. However, there are entire schools of craftwork that open up art to a much greater definition. Art for practical use. Art that we can literally feel. Art meant to not just be looked at, but to be touched, and more importantly, used. Today’s guest, Josh Simpson, is one of the best in the world at one of the oldest crafts in existence, glass blowing. Josh will teach us all about the basics of glassblowing and explain the difficulties of working with such a unique medium.

Did you hear, studies say two cups of coffee a day will give you a healthier heart?! I hear you, you can only drink coffee in the morning though. Never fear, didn’t you know that studies show that two glasses of red wine a night are proven to make you live longer?! I know, it’s the perfect one two punch! If only there was a study that supported my love of unhealthy food, like, oh, I don’t know, that eating grilled cheese sandwiches will make you more likely to have sex. This new world of studies is so great! Just start the Blake Fletcher patented ‘Coffee, wine, grilled cheese’ diet and you’ll be banging your way to a longer life in no time! (Please don’t actually do that or you’ll probably get an arrhythmia, alcoholism, and clogged arteries) It seems like studies are coming out every day that say…whatever the heck they want to say, and that new ones are always contradicting old ones. What does it all mean? Can we even trust studies and data at all anymore? Dr. John Johnson, data analyst extraordinaire and co-author of the new book Everydata, is here to help us sort through everything.

Have you ever had the dream that you invented the next big thing? That you made the next ‘must have’ product that people all over the world wanted. That you were finally the person that made something that made everyone say “Why didn’t I think of that?!” Today’s guest, Brett Miller, is one of those people. About a year and a half ago he created Brik Book, and after being featured in everything from Gizmodo to Oprah magazine, he is now in the middle of living that dream. Brett will tell us all about Brik Book’s launch and the lessons he has learned on the road to success.

Us men are a pretty basic breed. Many of us don’t fuss too much over how we look. We’re in and out of the shower, grab some (hopefully) clean clothes, take about one minute with our hair (if we have any), and that’s about it. But as most women will tell you, it can be fun to dress up. It can be fun to add something to your style that complements your outfit in some way. For women, there is a whole range of things that accomplish this. For men, we pretty much just got watches, and what a great thing to have. They can be so many things to so many people. Need a little something to pull together your outfit? Watches got you covered. Need a statement piece that lets people know how much money or how in debt you are? Some watches cost as much as houses. Need something to tell you what time it is without having to take your phone out of your pocket? Watches. It’s no wonder that so many men, and women, get really into watches. Today we talk with the two founders of Worn and Wound, one of the most popular watch blogs on the internet, about all things watches.

Culture is a difficult thing to define. It’s an even more difficult thing to influence and legislate. What makes one culture thrive and another flounder? What makes one artistic and another scientific? In the workplace, what do we even really mean when we say workplace culture? And once we get that defined, how do we try to influence that? Does hiring pretty much take care of everything, or does it go much further than that? Thankfully I don’t have to answer any of these questions. Today’s guest, Tom Freeman, is the Culture Manger for the wonderful meditation app company, Headspace. He’ll tell us about everything being a culture manager entails, and how he strives to keep a great culture through rapid growth.

Each of us has something to give this world, and we often plan how we are going to do this. Ironically, while we try to follow this path we often find that there is another, completely different plan waiting for us to set it in motion. Oftentimes, this path that finds us is a far truer calling than the one that we set out on. If we allow ourselves to change course and give this new plan some momentum, it often unfolds in ways we never could have conceived or anticipated. We grow, we learn, we develop. Only inflexibility, stagnation, and fear of growth can prevent this cycle. This may sound like an easy choice to make, but fear and inflexibility are very real forces. Both of these forces are deeply rooted to our ego, and therefore carry far more weight than they should. As today’s guest, Australian Special Forces Vet Tim Thomas, speaks to during the interview, it is only when he made the decision to “take the ego out” that his true path opened up before him. From that moment Tim’s life in the Special Forces got better, the lives of Tim’s fellow troops got better, and they even became better soldiers for it. Tim maintained this approach after leaving the Special Forces and now lives a life of servanthood developing a safe space for veterans to heal and feel normal again.

Luckily, for the majority of us, there are very few jobs that carry with it an assumption of who you are. Values, ethics, personality type, all there wrapped up neatly with your job title. Can you imagine if every time you mentioned what you did for a living people made an immediate judgement about you? Not too fun. Today’s guest, Eric Hobbs, carries around one such title with him. Eric is a lawyer, and he is well aware of the snap judgements people like us make about “people like him”. In Eric’s email to me detailing what he does for a living he even went so far as to say “Wait! Wait! Hear me out; yes, lawyers kind of suck (I’ll be the first to admit that), but I’m not one of those sucky lawyers”. First of all, that is really funny and shows what an honest and humorous perspective Eric has. Second, what is this non-sucky type of lawyer that Eric is referring to? Why a corporate lawyer that is, working for a company that makes outdoor recreation equipment, a huge passion of Eric’s. He’ll tell us all about what it is like to work in an industry that is related to your hobby, and what sorts of crazy things people try to sue his company for.

I know I know. I’ve started several of these out by saying something like “fill-in-the-blank, isn’t it great” or “fill-in-the-blank, is there anything more loved”. But please, bare with with me one more time. Today, finally, we have an episode dedicated to the topic of boobs. If there is anything more loved than boobs…I’m not too sure what it is. Women love em’, men love em’, babies LOVE em’. They’re a real catch all. A great reminder to not see ourselves as so separate and divided all the time, and that at the end of the day we really are all one. One great big boob-loving family. In the interview I speak with Elyse Kaye who developed a sports bra specifically for the underserved and growing demographic of well-endowed women.

Sleep is a such an incredibly important part of life. We all know that. Strangely, it may also be the most universally taken for granted part of life that we all share. When we are sleeping good and able to fall asleep easily we hardly give sleep a second thought. It’s just…something you do. When we can’t sleep, our bed can become a source of anxiety, our mind a prison, and our life a nightmare. It’s the number one foundational cornerstone to both physical and mental health. Today’s guest, Drew Ackerman, is very familiar with the pains of not being able to fall asleep. He has struggled with insomnia since childhood. Four years ago he decided to do something radical, and incredibly interesting, to help people like himself. He created a podcast where he tells bedtime stories for people struggling to fall asleep. Not too exciting, sometimes downright boring, the exact type of thing you would naturally fall asleep to. Drew’s podcast has since exploded and he helps hundreds of thousands of people fall asleep every month.

Kids these days. All they care about is themselves and their Snapchats. Too busy staring at their cellphones to even acknowledge anyone else. I mean, where will the world be headed with this next generation at the helm? Am I right?! Psych! (that’s what the kids say these days) This week’s episodes showcase how off base and misguided statements like that can be. In todays episode I speak with college student, and much smarter than me human being, Flavio Pacheco. Flavio is a true testament to where having your head on straight at a young age, in a country like America, can get you. After being born in America, Flavio spent the rest of his childhood growing up in Brazil. He moved back to America by himself at the ripe age of 17 and started attending junior college with scholarships he attained. Flavio proceeded to learn how to fluently speak English in only 2 years, graduated Summa Cum Laude from said junior college (while trying to learn to speak English), and is now on his way to a full ride scholarship at an Ivy League University. He also locked down an internship as a lab research assistant to ultimately help people with high cholesterol…at a lab that, up until Flavio persisted them into submission, did not allow anyone less than a PhD student to be a lab assistant. Again, all from a guy that didn’t even know how to speak English a couple years ago. Grab some popcorn and prepare to feel bad about yourself, but hopeful for the future.

Kids these days. All they care about is themselves and their Snapchats. Too busy staring at their cellphones to even acknowledge anyone else. I mean, where will the world be headed with this next generation at the helm? Am I right?! Psych! (that’s what the kids say these days) This week’s episodes showcase how off base and misguided statements like that can be. In this episode I speak with a 16-year-old high school student that raised and saved money for a year so that he could participate in a volunteer program that helps children in Ghana. Jack then flew to Ghana and spent three weeks teaching at a school, made bricks to help rebuild said school, and connected with formerly trafficked orphans in the community. Again, Jack is 16. Enjoy his positive mindset and let him assuage your fears about our youth.

Most people in the world don’t get enough exercise. It’s just…so…hard. It’s like work. And we already have to work for a living. Who wants even more work to do when we get done with work? Many of us that do exercise tolerate it for the benefits, and we manage to maintain discipline long enough to get us to the gym or out the door for a run. Others constantly look for more ways to spice up exercise to make it more than tolerable, more than just work. Something, dare I say, closer to fun. Today’s guest is a group fitness instructor and his whole goal is to help you have a good time while achieving your fitness goals.

If I had a dollar for every time I wished I had a dollar, I’d be the Bill Gates of dollars. Is money really where it’s at though? John Lennon and The Beatles sure didn’t think so. Mark Zuckerberg recently decided to begin the process of giving 99% of his Facebook shares toward learning, curing disease, connecting people and building strong communities. That is A LOT of dollars! It seems for many people that make it to the top financially there’s still a longing to do more, to give back. One of the best ways to give back is to find a great non-profit that you believe in, and support it. Today’s guest, Bri McKoy, just so happens to work for a great non-profit that you can believe in. She’ll tell us all about it, and the way her incredibly unique job helps support its goal.

Sports. Love em! Next to politics, there’s noting quite like sports for bringing people together and simultaneously tearing people apart. Sports allow us all a bit of escapism and show us the best physical feats that our species is capable of. It also lets us feel like were part of a team, part of something bigger than ourselves. You would think it is due to these reasons that professional sports have absolutely exploded in the past 30 years, but you would think wrong. The real reason for sports current dominance is people like today’s guest, Andrew Weber, who give us instant access to the biggest and best moments…only moments after they happen in real life. For what good is being a sports fan if you don’t get to see the action? Welcome to the world of sports photography.

Breakfast sure gets a lot of love. Thanks to an almost 100 year old article in Good Health, most of us were brought up to believe that it is the most important meal of the day. It’s the most appropriate meal of the day to have our daily coffee or tea. It sets the tone for our day, which means it basically sets the tone for our lives. People like breakfast so much that they had to create brunch, just to keep the breakfast train rollin. Most of us, however, would not write into a podcast to ask if we could discuss the hobby of being a breakfast enthusiast. Most of us are not today’s guest, Anya.

City life, it’s a wonderful thing. So much to do, so much to see, great transit to get you there. OR it can be the worst thing. A never-ending congestion of cars and people, a cacophony of man made noise, and the smell…that terrible terrible smell. Unlike what we may think, a lot of this is not left up to the eye of the beholder, or what day you decide to visit. Rather, it’s almost completely up to people like today’s guest. Lior is an urban planner for one of the most forward thinking, awesome, bicycle and pedestrian friendly cities in the whole world. He explains just how important urban planning is for making city (and suburb) life livable, wonderful, or downright terrible.

Human’s are at the top of the food chain, and in fact, most of us are completely removed from the food chain all together. We understand that our fruits and vegetables grown on farms, but we go to supermarkets to get them. We try to suppress the idea of where our meat comes from, or spend copious amounts of money to get it from a relatively humane source, but no matter what we do we just get it from somebody else that does any of the heavy lifting for us. Today’s guest, Stephen, likes to hunt and eats the animals that he himself kills. Some might consider hunting cruel, but Stephen explains why getting back into the food chain changes your perspective and appreciation for your food.

If you’re reading this right now, statistically speaking, there’s a very good chance that you’re in the top 1% of earners on Earth. I know you may be thinking “it sure doesn’t feel like I’m in the top 1%”, but I can assure you your situation is quite different than the other 99%. If we spent some time in their shoes, we would undoubtedly want to support the other 99% of world occupants in some way. Well, good news! If you’re reading this right now there is also a very good chance that your government is giving millions (or billions) of dollars per year to help people in developing countries. And if you’re a tax paying citizen that means that you ARE helping the other 99% of world inhabitants right now. Some of the money you’re paying goes towards people like today’s guest, a foreign aid advisor. If you’ve ever wondered about the current state of foreign aid, and whether or not it’s working, this should be an interesting listen.

Video games are pretty darn popular. Americans spend about as much on games as they do on going to the movies and buying music, combined. It makes sense then that game companies are constantly trying to figure out what the next hot game will be, and how to make it (enter Pokémon Go, episode 116). However, for every great success, there are more great failures, and even more games that even got to see the light of day. Today’s guest, Joe Martin, is a gaming journalist that like to research this lonely area of gaming, the history of games that were never released. As they say, those that don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. So what has Joe learned?

If all goes according to plan I should live to be about 180 years old, in peak health, and then one day die of cardiac arrest while reading a book by myself on my front porch. But just as life is crazy and throws unexpected things your way, death can do the same. I may walk out side right now and get attacked by a swarm of bees ala My Girl. For all of the not so straightforward and ideal deaths out there, today’s guest comes to the rescue. Dr. Thirakul is a forensic pathologist and it’s her job to find out how people died.

Growth takes time. Just ask an 8 year old boy who is smaller than everyone else in his class. And success, well, success doesn’t happen overnight. Just ask the founder of nearly every company imaginable. But sometimes, very rarely, very very rarely, all the stars and planets align. Sometimes you make a product that you hope people will like, and it turns out to be the product that seemingly everyone was waiting for their whole lives. Sometimes you come to the realization that people just gotta catch em’ all.

Flora, how we love thee. Think of how boring our surroundings would be without the vibrant colors of flowers, the varied shapes of bushes, and the sheer majesty of trees. We’re so lucky to have nature around us all the time. Many of us even have yards right outside out house that we can go and enjoy any time we want. Nature is wild though, and sometimes that means having a crazy, unmanageable yard that doesn’t inspire very much love. It can be hard to tame nature into something both usable and beautiful. Luckily for us there are people like Linda that specialize in making this dichotomy come together.

What’s the most important job that you can think of? Thanks to my skills in the clairvoyant arts I know there’s a decent chance that a doctor is what just popped into your head. Did you know that there are almost 5 nurses per doctor at hospitals across America though? Behind every great doctor, there are about 5 great nurses doing their job to keep us healthy and alive. Like physicians, nurses have to choose what they want to specialize in and who they want to help. So as important as the job is, monotony can certainly start to creep in. That is, unless you choose the route of today’s guest and become a float nurse. Sefora has the opportunity to help anyone and everyone in the hospital, and has one of the most diverse jobs medicine has to offer.

Michelangelo. Leonardo. Raphael. Donatello. What do these names have in common? They’re the four most famous turtles of all time. There’s a lot more to being a turtle than being a famous never-aging-teenager ninja though. Most turtles prefer a more simple life. Some turtles like to swim in the sea. Some turtles are really small and like to live in bogs, like little turtle gnomes. Today’s guest will help us learn about the wonderful and diverse turtle landscape, and also give us a peek at what the life of a field biologist is like.

Comic books have seen quite a change in perception in the past decade. Hollywood, and then everyone, took notice. Blockbuster films were made. Award winning shows were made. Comic cons got more and more popular. Cosplay became a word in the common vernacular, and suddenly, comics weren’t just for nerds anymore. Still, everything seems to center around the big names, the Platinum Hits. As you would imagine, like music, movies and other art forms, this is only a piece of the pie. Hardcore comic book fans get into the underground stuff. The independent and self produced stuff. Today, independent comic book creator Napoleon Doom comes on the show to tell us about the world of independent comics and the creative process.

The internet is a pretty crazy place. You can buy anything from shamwow towels to assault weapons, watch anything from adorable cat videos to genre defying porn (these account for 97% of the internet’s overall use), and have video conversations with people across the globe. One of the less touted feats of the internet is that it allows us to be anyone we want to be. Today’s guest was one of the first people to really tap into this concept and use it on social media. Andrew created a parody twitter account called Annoying Actor Friend that assumed the role of, well, your annoying actor friend. It completely stuck a nerve with the Broadway community and suddenly Andrew became the Bruce Wayne to his Twitter account’s Batman.

Most things in life we don’t want standardized. Skin color, personal opinions, sexual preferences, our landscape and geography, variety is the spice of life. There are a few things though that definitely need to be standardized, and probably not many higher up on the list than what a physician is going to do when they give you a prostate exam or how they are going to act if you suddenly pass out while in the room with them. Physicians, like professional sports referees, are a great group of people to have standardized. We definitely don’t want one doctor seeing a foul, and another doctor saying to play on. It could quite literally be a matter of life and death. Today’s guest is a standardized patient. Standardized patients act out various scenarios with physicians and nurses in medical school to make sure they get it right when they’re out in the real world.

Is there anything more badass than being a ninja? They’re stealthy, they wear all black, they’re the strong silent type. However, to my amazement, there is something more badass. Today’s guest is an emergency room physician AND he’s an American Ninja Warrior. He’ll explain what it’s like to pull off the incredible feats of being a ninja warrior and tell us about his path for getting there. There is quite possibly no better role model for children and adults of all ages. If you’re growing weary of seeing advice posts on social media from people whose commitment to said advice is tenuous at best, Noah should be a nice breath of fresh air for you.

Clothes, can’t live without em’. They keep us warm, hide our bodies from the unsuspecting public, and make our pets look really ridiculous. Since we all need to wear them, that means that lots of people need to make them too. What kind of an undertaking is that though? If you want to start a jewelry company you can buy some jewels and stick em’ in some precious metals, next step profit. If you want to start a clothing company you buy some cotton and…then…next step profit? Luckily we have Jim Snediker, Co-owner of Stock Manufacturing Co., to explain all them steps of starting a clothing company to us.

What did you want to be when you were a kid? I would be willing to stake my life on the fact that at least 90% of kids at some point in their childhood would all say the same thing, and it’s not Fire Truck Driver. I am of course referring to being an astronaut. Is there anything more great than space? Anything more captivating and awe inspiring? Today’s guest himself is an aspiring astronaut, but for now he has to settle with just being a particle physics trained electrical engineer with a PhD working on some of the most complex problems that mankind ever has at Langley Research Center for NASA. If Astronauts are going to get to space and survive there, they have to rely on a lot of smart people like Michael. Time to learn about the people that have helped inspired the imaginations of every child ever.

Not everyone is created the same, and that is a great thing. We live in a world with boundless diversity that is truly beautiful. However, with some diversity there comes challenges. Those with special needs and disabilities can have a tough road in life as society often doesn’t cater to their needs. Luckily we have wonderful people, like today’s guest, that dedicate their lives to helping those who are created differently, but are absolutely equal to the rest of us.

There are some technologies that are indispensable once discovered. Like a combination of a weed and a redwood, these technologies grow their roots so fast and so deep, that in just a short time removing them would undo the entire foundation of civilization. For me the big three would be farming, electricity, and the Internet. One allowed civilizations to exist, one allowed them to thrive, and the last allowed the whole world to connect into one big civilization…and perhaps more importantly it allowed you to read this sentence and listen to this podcast. Time to figure out what allows us to have the internet and enjoy life as we know it today.

There's so much that goes on behinds the scenes in the world. So many people that make it so we can just live our day to day lives without much interruption. One such major role is that of product tester. Nothing makes it into our world without somebody messing around with it out first. Did you put some oatmeal in the microwave this morning? Best believe that microwave was tested…and probably the oatmeal too. Some product testers take on much more bold jobs than oatmeal, and today’s guest is one of them. Shawn is an experimental test pilot. Planes and helicopters need testing just like anything else, and Shawn is the man to do it.

Most of us like to think that we’re pretty self sufficient, but the reality is that we need a lot of help from people around us to enable our success. Support roles are invaluable at keeping the world spinning round and keeping quality products at our fingertips. Perhaps no one knows this more than a book editor. For one, they help writers sound good. They make sure there is balance and consistency throughout a novel, and give it an overall sense of polish it would not otherwise have. The more unknown side of book editing though is to read through countless potential books and decide which are going to make the cut, which are worth our time and money. Today’s guest tells us all about the rewards, challenges and pressures of deciding what we get to read, and how we get to read it.

Today’s episode will open you up to how you can get a job at a national park. Rather than try to come up with some witty thing to say about it, I will leave you with some quotes from one of the greatest men in American history, John Muir. “The mountains are calling and I must go.” “The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness.” “In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks.” “Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” “I only went out for a walk and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.” “Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.” “When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.” “When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe.” “Between every two pines is a doorway to a new world.”

Two words. Murder. Mystery. Who doesn’t love a good one? We have a seemingly endless number of television shows based on them, some really popular movies, and an entire genre of books dedicated to finding out whodunnit and how. AND one of the bestselling boardgames of all time. AND the most popular podcast of all time that helped put podcasting on the map. Basically, we all collectively love to try and solve the case. The thing is, there are real people out there who actually have to help solve those cases for a living. Today’s guest is one of them.

Well, here we are. 100 episodes in. I debated for a long time on what topic to tackle for the 100th episode. Then I remembered, the most common question I get is why/how I started the show. So here it is. An interview with me as the subject, questions written in by listeners, hosted by my lovely wife, Asta. Thank you all for your support. It means everything to me.

Art is everywhere, and according to most definitions, can be pretty much anything. Yet somehow when art is put indoors, into a formal setting, it somehow can become pretty intimidating. Like somehow just putting it in a frame and on a wall makes us second guess if we really ‘get’ it, or if we’re even capable of getting it. Our overly self conscious hang-ups aside, today’s guest argues that we can all appreciate art. Ann Hazel’s is a wonderful, down to earth gallery owner that just wants you to have a great experience with art.

The American justice system is quite a paradox. It’s a beacon of hope and justice for anyone accused of crime in America. On the other hand, it can be a big and complex world that swallows the accused up without much thought to reformation and rehabilitation. No one knows more about this dichotomy than defense attorneys, and perhaps no defense attorney knows this more than a parent defense attorney. Parent attorneys are charged with the difficult task of defending parents accused of abuse and neglect, and helping them get their children back. As you might imagine, many people find these parents to be indefensible, guilty before proven innocent. Today’s guest Diana explains why they do indeed deserve defense, and how the justice system is reforming to put families first.

For many of us, our animals are like our children. We dote on them, share pictures with anyone willing to look, and tell stories about how great they are. Thinking about my life without my dog is…unthinkable. Yet if our animals manage to run away from home, or get lost, whom are we supposed to call? Today’s guest, that’s who! Sarah is a lost pet specialist/pet detective, and when animals in Los Angeles lose their way Sarah knows all the tricks to help track them down.

We live in a fast paced world. On the move, internally and externally, no time to focus on the little things around us that piece together our lives. Sometimes, in rare moments of clarity, peace, or fatigue, we slow enough to appreciate some of what’s around us. We fear that this slowing down will get in the way of our fast paced productivity, but I’ve found the exact opposite to be true. It increases productivity as our true, more capable, selves often come out in the process. Today’s guest knows all about slowing down and appreciating the little things every day. He is a self confessed pen addict. Brad will explain why pens are pretty neat, and how slowing down to write things by hand has helped him cope with the increasing pace of the world around him.

Knives (and other blades) are so essential to our lives. Like, top of the life pyramid essential. Yet, they’re so commonplace and fundamental that we completely take their existence for granted. Want to not eat a whole cow all at once? Knives. Want to not grow your beard…forever? Knives. Want to get rid of that rogue tree growing in the middle of your driveway? Knives. Perhaps it’s because so many of us use cheap knives and blades stamped by machines that we don’t seem to notice them very much. There are however some amazing people that don’t take their existence for granted, and they make knives the good old fashioned way. Today’s guest Jimmy will tell us all about the process of making your own knife (or sword) and give us plenty of other info about these indispensable tools.

Most of us live in a world where we, above all other things, value happiness. Some people, like Buddhists, live in a world of non-attachment to good or bad. Today’s guest, Pascale Vermont, has devoted her life to the opposite of all of this, getting up close and personal with the whole range of human emotions that fuel grief. Sadness, anger, guilt, and anxiety are just some of the things that are a part of her daily life. She’ll tell us why grief doesn’t have to have be something we avoid, and how we can navigate its treacherous waters.

Have you ever been in a state of flow? Complete and effortless focus in a single task, a merging of mind and body, all while not even thinking about it? Flow states are a pretty buzzed about topic right now, and many people are trying to crack the code for educing a state of flow. Which to me sounds kind of like forcing someone to fall in love with you. There are however certain activities that really lend themselves well to bringing on a state of flow. Competitive sports and ultra-marathon running for example. But what about something for the non blue ribbon presidential fitness award winners of us out there? Today’s guest explains the world of flow arts. A super fun, deep, flow state stimulating world for all.

Fictional storytelling is such a gift. It allows our minds to run wild and transports us away to another world where absolutely anything could be possible. It also helps us digest complex topics in a more palatable and easy to comprehend way. Perhaps for this reason, while the number of adults that reads falls, the number of adults reading to their children, and children reading in general, holds steady. While we may feel too busy to read, we know how valuable it is for a small child to have a fun conduit to learn, grow, and explore. Today’s guest is mother, and a writer of children’s books and teen fiction. We’ll discuss why writing a children’s book isn’t as easy as it looks, and what writing with a teen voice is like.

I don’t know about you, but I sure am good at over-thinking things. I think it’s a trait that humans developed when we realized we were capable of abstract thought. We just started abstract thinking the hell out of everything! Then, as part of a solution to our over thinking and various other struggles, we came up with psychotherapy. Using the mind to help heal the mind, what a natural fit. Today’s guest is a psychotherapist, but believes in stepping outside of the usual psychology role, and incorporating your body and other experiences into the therapeutic sphere. I say anything that gets me thinking a bit less sounds good to me.

According to the great Ron Swanson, "Clear alcohols are for rich women on diets". This entire week of half hour intern would make Ron proud as it's all about the #1 non-clear alcohol in the world, whiskey. Whiskey is such a great liquor to learn about as it is incredibly steeped in history, tradition, and lore. Today's guest is the perfect instructor as he has surrounded himself with the stuff in both his personal and professional life, and knows whiskey better than most people could hope to in a lifetime. This is part 2 where Josh takes me through a tasting of 4 whiskeys that he brought over.

According to the great Ron Swanson, "Clear alcohols are for rich women on diets". This entire week of half hour intern would make Ron proud as it's all about the #1 non-clear alcohol in the world, whiskey. Whiskey is such a great liquor to learn about as it is incredibly steeped in history, tradition, and lore. Today's guest is the perfect instructor as he has surrounded himself with the stuff in both his personal and professional life, and knows whiskey better than most people could hope to in a lifetime. This is part 1 where Josh answers all kinds of questions and gives us a foundation of knowledge about whiskey.

The world of art is about as deep as any there is. There are so many different mediums, so many different styles, and so many different makers and admirers that an endless number of creations can be made. Today’s guest thought he wanted to go one direction in the world of art, but was then introduced to metal. This introduction completely shaped the rest of his life, and the way he thought about art. He still uses metal to make traditional fine art, but he’ll also make you a fence for your back yard. Who’s to say what can and can’t be art anyways?

Oh sweet irony. Here I sit, on a plane, writing this sentence. I’m on my way to Japan for my honeymoon, and so far my flight attendants have been the most important part of my journey. They brought me these amazing rice cracker snacks that I wish every flight had, they gave me water to take my melatonin with, and they brought me coffee 4 hour later, seemingly just in time to bring me out of my melatonin induced coma. Yep, things are going pretty well for me up here thanks to my flight attendant crew. But is it as cool as them as it is for me? According to today’s guest, in fact, it is.

Any fan of Half Hour Intern knows we love our adult drinks around here. Social lubricating, tension easing, great tasting drinks; what’s not to love? I’m typically a beer and wine man myself, and as such I’ve already done a couple of interviews with people that get to drink wine for a living (I still can’t believe jobs like that exist!), but today we finally speak to one of the wonderful people behind the juice. Get ready for a lesson in the delicate balance of art and chemistry.

There are very few things that can happen to you that will forever change your life; very few events that change the way that you think about and interact with the world. I think that it’s safe to say that losing a limb would fall into this category. Up until modern times losing a limb would’ve very likely also meant death. Thanks to people like today’s amazing guest, losing a limb is no longer a death sentence, and they are working hard to make it less and less of a life changing event. Whether you are veteran that lost a leg, a dolphin that lost it’s tail, or a turtle that lost a fin, today’s guest is here to help.

We humans are a fickle breed. There’s part of us that loves to be told what to do, what to wear, and what to spend our money on. Yet there seems to be an even bigger part of us that hates all of those things. I think a big part of it is that while we’re being told what to do, we don’t want it to seem like we’re being told what to do. What a predicament we’ve put the world of marketing in. Tell us what we should like, but don’t tell us directly lest we feel like we’re being given some corporate line. Enter the world of influencer marketing. No more direct company messaging, no more fickle consumers.

Ghosts and ghouls and goblins, oh my! Do you believe in ghosts? Like religion, your belief in the paranormal can really be swayed by the culture you belong to. For some reason in America we don’t really embrace the idea of ghosts, and yet over 80 percent of our population believes in the afterlife. Today’s guest explains that if an afterlife exists, those that are a part of it would likely want to come back from time to time to check in on us. I say the more the merrier and stop hiding from me already! Let the haunting begin.

Forms of art can be like fuel for the soul. Music, paining, sculpture, photography, and countless other art forms have a way of cutting to our core. Forget your prefrontal cortex, that music is gonna get that toe tappin and that painting is gonna head straight for your pleasure center. As a city dweller, one of my favorite forms of art is kick ass street art. Big, bold, bright murals that enhance an otherwise bland, and sometimes even run down, building. Not only is it great in sheer aesthetics, but the way you happen upon it is just the best. No tickets to a museum. No art gallery needed. No planning at all. You’re just walking down the street and BAM, awesome thing in your face! It’d be like going for a walk and all of the sudden this amazing band was just playing on the street corner. The combination of beauty and surprise is one that I have absolutely no problem with. Today’s guest is one of the best at making these awesome surprises a reality as he takes the otherwise mundane and turns it into art.

Often times in nature bigger is considered better, more beautiful. The ocean, the stars, the redwoods of Yosemite. Likewise, smaller things can be considered cute, and fun. Puppies, kittens, even baby corn. The world of bonsai perfectly blends the two, taking what would be a full size majestic tree, and shrinking it down to pot size sensibility. Today we learn about having the best of both worlds with Bonsai.

Music is the freakin’ best. They say that you can’t stay upset or depressed if you put a smile on your face. I say you can’t stay upset or depressed if you just put on some music. Music is like a shot of pure serotonin that bypasses your brain and hits your right in the soul. In order to have this wonderful drug we have to have people that make music, and in order to have that we need to have those that teach and inspire. Today’s guest is a Jr. High school band director that inspires kids to connect with music and create it for themselves.

Close Pastor (with David Massey) Part 1

ReleasedMar 07, 2016

Atheism and agnosticism may have growing numbers in the Western world, but they still pale in comparison to that of Christians. As a self described, ‘I don’t know what I believe in’, it’s hard for me to understand how anyone has 100% faith in anything. Be it Christianity, atheism, the current model of space and time, I don’t really know if we have any of it right…or wrong…or whatever. I mean, I’m only human. Today’s guest is also only human, but he does have 100% faith that we’ve been shown the way to faith, spirituality, and eternal life through Jesus Christ. David is a super awesome, super kind pastor that sat down with me for over two hours to discuss our differing belief (or disbelief) systems. This is part one where we also discuss just what the heck a pastor does all day.

Atheism and agnosticism may have growing numbers in the Western world, but they still pale in comparison to that of Christians. As a self described, ‘I don’t know what I believe in’, it’s hard for me to understand how anyone has 100% faith in anything. Be it Christianity, atheism, the current model of space and time, I don’t really know if we have any of it right…or wrong…or whatever. I mean, I’m only human. Today’s guest is also only human, but he does have 100% faith that we’ve been shown the way to faith, spirituality, and eternal life through Jesus Christ. David is a super awesome, super kind pastor that sat down with me for over two hours to discuss our differing belief (or disbelief) systems. This is part one where we also discuss just what the heck a pastor does all day.

Is technology always a good thing? I don’t just mean electronic gadgetry; I mean any form of scientific advancement. This past century has been such an interesting one where we’ve come SO far with science and medicine, only to realize that moving forward is not always progress. We can grow more crops than ever thanks to pesticides and genetically modified seeds, only to realize that our food doesn’t carry the same nutritional value, and our fruits and vegetables don’t look and taste the same as they once did. We can double the size of our pigs so that we can have bacon on just about everything, but the super-sized pigs are so fragile that they can’t even go outdoors or they’ll die from disease or infection. We have a plethora of antibiotics to kill off pathogens, and we now have a growing list of antibiotic resistant bacteria. Perhaps it is due to this that more than ever people are skeptical of the ‘better by science’ approach and are trying old school methods for health and well being. One of the more popular and interesting approaches is Ayurveda. The ancient Indian science/study/philosophy of health and well being is REALLY old school, but as you’ll hear, many of it’s ideas and principles seem to be popping up all over lately.

Going out for the night (or the day) can be great. Sometimes you just need to get out of the house and explore. As I get older though I realize that there is a time and a season for everything. Just as nature has summer and winter, I believe we have our own internal summer and winter that can shift week to week, or day to day. So what of winter? What are we supposed to do when it’s time to wear sweatpants and stay in for the night? Are we destined for Netflix and pizza? Are we doomed to the slow and comfortable death of watching others’ lives play out in front of us while we eat cookies on the sofa? Must we spend our winters in isolation? Today’s guest, Wes Tomlin of Never Bored Gaming, reminds us of an often forgotten alternative, the surprisingly deep and vast world of modern board games. Whether you’re in your own personal winter or summer; whether you’re feeling like a caterpillar in a cocoon or a social butterfly, there will always be a game for you.

Predator and prey, the circle of life. Who needs that when I’ve got Whole Foods? We may have used our brain power to remove ourselves from the food chain long ago, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t recreate the predator and prey roles for fun. Is that ethical though? Is there something sick and twisted about shooting a spear through a fish for your own enjoyment and meal? After speaking with today’s guests I say absolutely not. The roles of predator and prey naturally give the predator a respect for its prey. A respect that the rest of us living outside the food chain may try to empathize with and imagine, but can’t truly appreciate. In a bizarre twist the rest of us are left with a respect for money, our source for food on the table. Let’s hear from a couple of would be predators about the virtues (and fun!) of picking up the hobby of spearfishing.

The world sure has become a fast moving place. Everything is ever-changing, and trying to gain a handle on it all feels more and more impossible. Just when I start to feel like I really understand a current technology or app, another ‘must have’ is just around the corner or already taking its place. There are some amazing people though, that seem to thrive in this setting. Those special few that stake their claim in a field and proclaim that they will be at the forefront, they will be the ones seeing and making change. They do not get left behind as they do not wait for any playbook, and boldly venture out into unknown frontier to swiftly meet whatever success or failure lies ahead. Today’s guest is one of these people in the field of marketing, and his company’s ideas will expand and/or blow your mind.

I want you to think for a moment about the top 5 things that you hate doing. My made up survey says that the top answer on that list would be cleaning. Ugh. I don’t even like writing the word! You know something is no good when everyone can easily do it, and yet TONS of individuals pay other people to do it for them. Today we hear finally hear about the not so bad side of cleaning…and the weird side; it’s really a good, bad, ugly sort of situation. We’ll learn about what it’s like to be on the other side of the mop, getting paid for it.

Documentary film is a truly amazing form of art and storytelling, and thanks to the rise in popularity of streaming services like Netflix, we seem to be living in the golden age of the documentary. From gripping crime stories, to heart-opening human connections, to downright eye-opening, world-view-changing film, documentaries don’t just entertain, they educate. And as Sea World can tell you post Blackfish, that education has a lot of power. So what is it like to wield that sort of power? What is it like to have your audience demand that you both entertain them, and give them some food for thought?

Have you ever collected anything? Sportscards, stamps, rocks; there are a nearly limitless number of things to amass. Collecting can be such a great way to really appreciate something on a deeper level. It usually requires lots of research and time on the part of the collector, and they become everyday experts on the field of their passion. Today’s guests really prove that you can collect almost anything you put your mind to. Kevin and Dan are obscure record collectors, focusing on the strange, kitsch, and swept under the rug records of the past. They’ll explain why the obscure can often be so much more fun than the usual rare records people pine after.

Is there a better unifier of people than sports? For that matter, is there a better divider of people than sports? What a unique thing to completely bring groups of strangers together out of a shared love for their team, and tear others apart out of their geographical patronage. That sure is some intense emotion that sports stirs up! I, for one, love sports and its unadulterated expression of hard work and teamwork ultimately paying off. I also just love being able to watch people who are the best at their craft do their thing. Seeing Steph Curry hit three after three really is a beautiful thing. Today’s guest, Scott Lynn, has spent his life watching and commenting on sports. As you would imagine, he feels like a very blessed man, and has a lot to say about a life spent with the greats.

Close Actor (with Michael Goorjian)

ReleasedFeb 01, 2016

Isn’t it interesting how long storytelling has been a part of human culture? It has always been there as this integral piece of society and culture, and was even around before there was any concept of society or culture. We can use acting and storytelling to entertain; it can take us on a journey and bring out all of our emotions. In it’s more deep form it can also make us think and help us grow as people. It develops our empathy and can help us tackle ideas in an abstract way that we may be too unprepared to face head on. For all these reasons and more, today’s guest, Michael Goorjian, has made storytelling his life’s work. From acting, to directing, to writing, Michael has done it all and done it well.

Isn’t it interesting how long storytelling has been a part of human culture? It has always been there as this integral piece of society and culture, and was even around before there was any concept of society or culture. We can use acting and storytelling to entertain; it can take us on a journey and bring out all of our emotions. In it’s more deep form it can also make us think and help us grow as people. It develops our empathy and can help us tackle ideas in an abstract way that we may be too unprepared to face head on. For all these reasons and more, today’s guest, Michael Goorjian, has made storytelling his life’s work. From acting, to directing, to writing, Michael has done it all and done it well.

If I had a dollar for every time I wished I had a dollar, I’d be the Bill Gates of dollars. Is money really where it’s at though? John Lennon and The Beatles sure didn’t think so. Mark Zuckerberg recently decided to begin the process of giving 99% of his Facebook shares toward learning, curing disease, connecting people and building strong communities. That is A LOT of dollars! It seems for many people that make it to the top financially there’s still a longing to do more, to give back. One of the best ways to give back is to find a great non-profit that you believe in, and support it. Today’s guest, Amanda Brock, found a non-profit that she loved and started donating her time and money. After a time that wasn’t enough and she left her job to work full time at the non-profit. She’ll let us know all about the switch and the non-profit life.

This episode is a slight departure from the usual format. In it I interview a very intelligent, very ambitious friend of mine, Dave Irwin. Dave is going to be leaving in May to live on a glacier in Greenland where he will test out a product that he designed to replace the typical home foundation in flood prone areas. He’s trying to change the world and help millions of people, and during the interview he’ll tell us all about how and why.

Diet. It’s all around us. An ever-present member of our lives. Whether we want to lose weight, gain weight, get more energy, or have more focus, tweaking the diet is always the first and best place to start. For most of us, this is something that we started to do as adults. I, for one, am pretty focused on my diet, but it’s not something I gave even a second thought to until about 5 years ago. Prior to that it was fast food and mac and cheese if that’s what I was in the mood for. Today’s guest, Sanjay Raja, argues that that shift in focus needs to happen earlier, as early as baby food. Let’s find out why and get some tips for raising a healthier generation.

Human touch. Is there anything better? Anything that connects us more to other people? Anything that connects us more to ourselves? When was the last time that you were really in the moment, not thinking about anything else? Odds are human touch was involved in some way. Cuddling, hugging, sex, massage, even bumbling around as a teenager, they all have a way of clearing the noise and bringing you into your skin. Well, a couple of weeks ago we talked about cuddling, so onto the merits of massage! Today’s guest, Kelly Spellman, is a practitioner of the very specialized Esalen massage. Almost more of a philosophy behind the massage than a set standardized way to practice; Esalen focuses on a holistic, whole body and spirit, approach to massage. Sound pretty avant-garde. Sounds pretty awesome!

The human body does so much for us and asks for so little in return. It’s like the big, silent buddy to our soul. All we gotta do is feed it and give it sleep, and it’ll do pretty much anything we ask of it. It makes sense then that some people decide to give their big, silent buddy a gift. A work of art. A tattoo. Today’s guest, Amy Black, helps people give this gift. She also is an amazing human being who gives a much larger gift to breast cancer survivors. Through her post-mastectomy tattoos, she helps women (and men) look in the mirror again. She helps bring their lives back to a sense of normalcy, and helps those who need feel a sense of closure.

I don’t know how you feel, but I love weddings. I’m not a big fan of the traditions and black-tie-ness of most nuptials, but I am a HUGE fan of gatherings based on love, friendship, and family. Add to that an incredibly memorable day for at least two of the attendees, a verbal profession of love, and a hot dance floor where teens, grandma, and everyone in between can be seen, and I’d say we got a pretty magnificent event on our hands. So, what’s it like to have a wedding related job? Moreover, what’s it like to be entrusted to capture the heightened emotion of the day on film? Time to find out.

Cuddle therapy sounds pretty crazy right? Like some guy’s strange attempt to get close to women only to make a move when things get comfortable. But after talking to today’s guest, Travis Sigley, I don’t think it’s crazy at all. Come to think of it, why should it sound so out of place? Everyone has people around them that they CAN talk to, and yet some people don’t feel comfortable enough and seek out a therapist. Maybe they grew up in a family where they didn’t really talk about their feelings so they only feel comfortable with a therapist. Maybe 1 of 1,000 other reasons, but none of them do we question. Well, what if you grew up in a family where displays of affection were taboo? Growing up with handshakes from dad, pats on the back from mom, then jump straight into having a sex life that lacks any sort of intimacy. Perhaps then, a trustable, open person like Travis offering intimate touch, without the awkwardness of family or the transactional prospect of sex is exactly what the doctor ordered. As smarter people than me say, sometimes you can think and talk all you want, but what you really need to do is act. Welcome to the action form of therapy. Welcome to the cuddle puddle.

Tea. Is there anything more revered, historical, fabled, sought after, in the entire history of humanity? Some might argue wine, but there’s something special about a non-alcoholic beverage that can command so much respect and reverence. It tries to tell us a story in its very composition. Containing both caffeine to stimulate and theanine to calm the mind, it promotes the yin-yang balance in life that is so important and so valued in Eastern culture. Today’s guest, Travis Sigley, knows all about this balance and tries to cultivate the calmer, more connected side of tea drinking that is almost absent from Western culture. He tries to bring this knowledge and presence to the guests of his own teahouse and the campers at the adult summer camp, Camp Grounded. Today he’ll tell us about both.

It's the First Annual Half Hour Intern Awards! This will be a 3 part series done over the final 3 weeks of 2015. In the third installment: Most passionate about their career and most passionate about their hobby.

The ocean contains 71% of the Earth’s surface…it makes up 99% of the living space on the planet! And yet how much do we know about it? How much do we try to help its inhabitants? Me…Unfortunately, not so much. Today’s guest, Dr. Juli, has spent her entire adult life trying to help these creatures, trying to find out more about the 99%. Today it’s time to find out more about that world. Time to find out more about these neighbors that call our planet home.

It's the First Annual Half Hour Intern Awards! This will be a 3 part series done over the final 3 weeks of 2015. In the second installment: Most unique career and most unique hobby.

Who are we? Where do we come from? Just what the hell is going on out there?! That is what today’s guest, Adam Bradley, and his cohorts are trying to find out. Adam is an experimental particle physicist. Due to that lengthy title, it is Adam’s job to help us better understand the universe and our place in it. Dark matter, dark energy, and theoretical particles are part of his every day. If we hope to make it to the promised land as a species, it’s going to be thanks to smart people like Adam leading the way. Does all that knowledge weigh heavy on his mind, or is he able to live a normal life like the rest of us?

It's the First Annual Half Hour Intern Awards! This will be a 3 part series done over the final 3 weeks of 2015. In the first installment: Best Voice, Best Laugh, Best Story, and Best Advice.

Have you ever thought about how much we take flying for granted? For one, the fact that we can even get off the ground is borderline miraculous. Something about thrust and lift, but it might as well be witchcraft as far as I’m concerned. Second is the fact that we manage to do so safely. Have you ever been in a plane crash? Do you know anyone that has ever been in a plane crash? Now replace the word plane with car and think of how many stories you can come up with. Would you ever take a long distance vacation if plane crashes were that common? The safety of air travel is pretty amazing, but not an accident or a fluke. It’s due to people like today’s guest, Gabe Koa. Gabe is an air traffic controller and he’ll give us a rundown on what a day in the life is like for one of the most important jobs in existence.

Man vs. nature. It’s a tale as old as time. Man is full of hubris and tries to conquer nature, nature slaps man down and says, ‘come on dude, I’m nature.’ Then there are those like today’s guest, Andy Pathuis, who try to work with nature to do wonderful things. Andy works in concert with massive rock structures, and uses the tiniest of nooks, crannies, and ledges to scale them. Is it scary? Maybe. Can you die? Definitely. Is it worth it? Andy sure thinks so.

We live in a downright crazy and absolutely amazing time to be alive. Limitless information at our fingertips, gluten free pastries, and snuggies are all a part of our reality. Perhaps more important than any of those innovations (except for the snuggie) is the change of the business and socioeconomic landscape that has happened over the past decade. We now live in a time where there are almost zero barriers to entry to jump headfirst into your own world-facing business. Success is certainly not guaranteed, but the fact that you can even try is a wonderful gift. I, for instance, have a podcast. Do I have a degree in journalism? No. Do I have any idea how to produce a real radio show? I don’t think so. Did I have any idea how to make my own website or podcast all of six months ago? Absolutely not. And yet here I am. Today’s guest has used this new business landscape and in just over two years completely changed his life. Stefan, a.k.a. Datto, went from being a guy that liked playing videogames in his free time to a guy that has a half million YouTube subscribers to his relatively new Datto Does Destiny gaming channel. Stefan now makes a healthy income playing videogames all day, not working for anyone else. So, how did all this work out for him, what lessons has he learned, and what is it really like to live the dream?

Want to know a secret? Of course you do! Right now, in your city or town, there are dozens…perhaps hundreds of hidden treasures just waiting to be found. Did you go to a park last week? There may have been one under the bench by that one tree that looks like the pope. Go for a walk yesterday? You probably passed by two, but you were just a muggle so you passed by none the wiser. Have no fear! Be a muggle no more! In today’s episode Geocaching.com employee Jon Stanley will give us the lowdown on the wonderful world of geocaching. He’ll explain to us what geocaches are, why it’s no good to be a muggle, and how you can get started ASAP. It’s time to take your walks, your hikes…your life to the next level.

Good ol’ architecture. Without it, we’d all be living in caves right now! No pyramids, no Machu Picchu, no Eiffel Tower. Thank god for us, people like Shayan exist to bring us out of the Stone Age and into the future. Using a dash of practicality, a pinch of creativity, and a heap of total badassness, Shayan helps people build their dream homes and by extension, their dreams. Let’s learn more about this awesome career that impacts how every one of us lives.

Do you have an idea of a job that you want to do, but the job doesn’t really exist yet? Do you have several unrelated passions that you don’t see how you could possibly tie together into a career for yourself? Well so did today’s guest, Kelly Robinson, but now she’s combined architecture, design, travel, yoga, meditation, and psychology into one of the coolest jobs I could possibly imagine. We’ll learn what the heck being a vibe manager is all about and how Kelly turned a fairy tale job into a reality. Get ready for some inspiration!

Remember how cool being in a band seemed when you were a kid? Remember how cool that still seems right now?! Whatever happened to those aspirations of playing in front of thousands of screaming fans? Today's guest, Rocky Votolato, never gave up on the dream. It has paid off as a long and fruitful career as both a band member and, more notably, a solo singer songwriter. We'll hear from Rocky about how being a musician has changed his life, what touring is like as you get older, and much much more.

Baking is so awesome. It’s fun and messy. For most people it reminds them of childhood. And you’re left with the greatest of treats when all is said and done. Just writing that series of sentence fragments makes me want to grab some eggs and sugar! Today’s guest was on the path to lawyerdom, and then looked around and said, ‘Forget this, it’s time to start baking!’ Now, years later, she has her own successful baking company whose goods can be found all over the bay area. How’d she do it? What lessons did she learn along the way? Just click play already!

Bees basically make the world go round. I mean, if we were to award an Earth MVP to only one species, it would probably have to be bees. And yet, how much do you know about them? They fertilize our plants, make us delicious honey, sting us from time to time, and yet most of us don’t really know much about them. Time to change that and possibly pick up a new hobby at the same time! Today’s trio of guests will tell us about all different facets of beekeeping. Whether you live in the city, the countryside, or anywhere in between, our guests have you covered for how to start forming an alliance with our fuzzy friends today.

Bees basically make the world go round. I mean, if we were to award an Earth MVP to only one species, it would probably have to be bees. And yet, how much do you know about them? They fertilize our plants, make us delicious honey, sting us from time to time, and yet most of us don’t really know much about them. Time to change that and possibly pick up a new hobby at the same time! Today’s trio of guests will tell us about all different facets of beekeeping. Whether you live in the city, the countryside, or anywhere in between, our guests have you covered for how to start forming an alliance with our fuzzy friends today.

Bees basically make the world go round. I mean, if we were to award an Earth MVP to only one species, it would probably have to be bees. And yet, how much do you know about them? They fertilize our plants, make us delicious honey, sting us from time to time, and yet most of us don’t really know much about them. Time to change that and possibly pick up a new hobby at the same time! Today’s trio of guests will tell us about all different facets of beekeeping. Whether you live in the city, the countryside, or anywhere in between, our guests have you covered for how to start forming an alliance with our fuzzy friends today.

Think you know about bird watching? Think again! In this interview I get the low down from bird watcher extraordinaire, Lisa Myers. We’ll discuss whether or not bird watching is the most boring hobby you can have (hint: it’s not.) and whether or not bird watching is just for old fogies (hint: it’s not). In fact, I’d now have to say that bird watching sounds downright awesome! Time to dust off those binoculars…

Why have one scoop of ice cream when you can have two? Why have one favorite singer (Rick Astley) when you can have two (William Hung)? Why have one super awesome once in a lifetime job when you can have two? KC Badger knows all about how foolish limiting yourself is, and in today’s episode he shares that divine wisdom with us. The real life most interesting man in the world explains how he made the transition from professional BMX rider to professional fly fisherman, and why if he can double dip on life, you can too.

Exercise is an amazing thing. It releases endorphins, raises your metabolism, boosts hormone production, and it can help reshape the very body you walk around in. Some people use exercise to accomplish even more remarkable feats, like pushing the boundaries of the re-sculpting process the body is capable of. Today’s guest, Alex Olson, is one of these people. She is a body building fitness competitor, and she totally kicks ass. She’ll tell us how she used diet, exercise, hard work, and discipline to reach a lofty goal, and how it completely changed her self-confidence in the process.

Have you ever stared into cat’s eyes and wondered what’s going on in that head of theirs? I sure have! I’ve wondered things like “What are you so smug about?” “Why do you keep judging me?” and “Why am I putting all of my emotional baggage on this animal?”. Has all of that wondering still not stopped your cat from being a furry psychopath? Well today’s guest is here to help! Daniel "DQ" Quagliozzi is a cat behavior consultant. Seriously. And he’s here to tell us what’s wrong with our cats, what’s wrong with us, and if it’s really possible for us to coexist.

James Beard said, “Food is our common ground, a universal experience”. No matter your station in life, or where in the world you live, food is the driving force for bringing people together to share stories and laughter. At most weddings the meal outshines the ceremony and becomes the main event. Every day, business deals go down over the dinner table where people both literally and figuratively break bread to find a common ground. And we just passed the American holiday of Thanksgiving, which does away with ambiguity and completely centers around the idea of coming together for a home cooked meal. Today’s guest, Simi Hansen, is one of the wonderful people enabling us to have our universal experience. Simi started her own successful catering business and brings amazing cuisine to where it is needed. She’ll tell us all about her strange path to becoming a chef and how changing other peoples experiences has changed her life.

If you were stuck on a desert island and you could only eat one food, what would it be? Trick question! The answer is obviously cheese. Not only is it the best tasting thing in the world, it also has protein, fat, and carbohydrates, making it the perfect shipwrecked meal. Today we’ll learn all about this superfood from Sophie Mosgrove, a certified cheesemonger. Sophie spends every workday thinking about and tasting cheese. She’ll let us know what it’s like to have this dream job, and give us all kinds of interesting facts and advice to help us pick out a winner the next time we’re at the grocery store.

What would you say if I asked you to get up in front of a crowded room and give a speech? Statistics say that you would probably not be too happy about it. Public speaking is the #1 fear in America; more than bugs (which is mind blowing to me), more than heights, clowns, you name it. Now multiply that fear times the fear of trying to make a room full of people laugh and having them just sit there, wondering when you’re going to be done so they can get their night back on track. If only the fear study had asked people about doing stand up comedy, surely it would be in a class all to itself. Today’s guest, Quincy Johnson II, knows all about that fear, the horror of not having people laugh at your jokes, and the amazing feeling of completely killing it onstage and bringing a whole room together. So what are those highs and lows like, and would it be worth trying out?

Halloween is my favorite holiday. Always has been, always will be. There is something so great about getting to put on a costume and go around as someone else for the day (or week). You can get really into it and try to completely personify your character, but even if you don’t its just such a refreshing change from the norm. The most important thing about Halloween though, the reason it is the inarguable best holiday, is that it really brings people together. Christmas, Chanukah, Thanksgiving, nah, that just gets you and your family together. Halloween gets EVERYONE together. Friends, colleagues, neighbors, complete strangers, it’s all good! Everyone seems to be on an equal footing and in a mood to talk when you have the ultimate ice breaker, you’re not really you! So why limit yourself to Halloween? Today’s guest, Roxanna Meta, ain’t no fool and knows all about dressing up other times of year. She’s been doing Cosplay for the past 7 years and it’s completely changed her life for the better. Time to hear about the awesome segment of people making dressing up a full time hobby.

I like to go to the gym. It helps me clear my head and get my life in order. Yet, as much as I like going to the gym and appreciate its benefits, I definitely wouldn’t consider myself an evangelist for it. CrossFit on the other hand has a reputation for evangelical followers. Do you exercise? I CrossFit. Do you go to the gym? I go to a CrossFit box. Do you like to work out? I like to do CrossFit. So, why all the territorial hype? What makes CrossFit so special? Let’s find out. Today’s guest, Fat Tony, gives us the details on all things CrossFit. He’ll explain why he thinks it has the cult following it has and why that has led to a mixed reputation. Note: All opinions expressed are Fat Tony and Blake Fletcher’s neither of which has any formal ties to the CrossFit brand and company.

Do you like nod your head to the beat? Shake your butt? Pop and lock? Too far? Well for today’s interviewee it’s not far enough! Keon Saghari started dancing in classes at age 3 and never looked back. There have been ups and downs over the years, but she is now a core member of Axis Dance Company in Oakland, CA. She’ll tell us about what it took to get there and what her days are like now that she is living the dream.

Is there a more unforgiving sport than golf? A more isolating, soul sucking, stare at the devil in the face experience than trying to hit a ball out of the sand only to hit the ball one foot forward, even deeper into the trap? If it exists I sure haven’t found it. Yet somehow, disc golf, a sport that shares the same name, rules, and terminology, has none of the same estranging experiences and steep learning curve that make golf so exclusive and bittersweet. Disc golf is a sport that truly anybody can pick up and play, and on their very first outing have a really fun time. A sport that, like a good board game, doesn’t have a correlation between skill and fun factor. Today’s guest, Paul Ulibarri, fell in love with the simple yet sophisticated sport and three months after picking it up took home 4th place in the amateur world championships. Paul has since turned pro and now makes a living as a professional touring disc golf player. Yes, Paul is a prodigy, and you probably won’t have the same life changing experience with the sport that he did, but he’ll explain why just about everyone could and should pick disc golf and give it a try.

When was the last time you lived in the moment? Like, really, really, just lived in the moment. Did it by any chance happen the last time you were on a dance floor? It sure did for me! There’s something about listening to great music and pretending you’re starring in Soul Train that makes you forget about everything else. No cares, no worries. It’s just you, the music, and the dance floor. As far as I’m concerned, that pretty much makes the DJ some sort of transcendental Zen Sherpa. In today’s episode, Ben Anderson (aka Swookie Monster), tells us all about what it’s like to be a purveyor of presence, and gives us advice for how we can get started DJing as well. So long Eckhart Tolle, hello funky bass line.

What does it mean to be a nerd? Really into Sci-Fi? Star Wars is the most popular movie franchise of all time. Love fantasy? Game of Thrones is the number one rated show on television. Breathe too loud and have a bizarrely close relationship with your Mom? Now we’re talking! In today’s episode we examine the in-between, the Godfather of all things nerd culture, Dungeons and Dragons. In a sci-fi, parallel dimension twist, we’ll find out about the game from none other than a super badass girl, Lisa Gross. Lisa will teach us how to play D&D and more importantly, reevaluate what it means to be a nerd.

Do you like dogs? Of course you do! Dogs are so much better than people, and just about anything else on the planet. First of all, they can be trained to do all sorts of amazing things. Second, they are fiercely loyal and love their owners. Most importantly, they always show you that love and what a good time they’re having with those great wagging tails of theirs. Dogs just seem like nature’s optimists. They’re a constant reminder to not take our lives too seriously, and to be happy with what we have. So what’s it like to forego the traditional 9-5 path and just surround yourself with playing dogs all day? Today’s guest, Miyuki Bierlein, will answer just that question.

Music makes the world go round. It can make you happy when you’re sad, it can make you feel sadness when you’re happy, and, well, just about any emotional shift in between. In no form is music more awesome and appreciated than when being played live. Live music brings masses of people together to feel the energy of a band that just can’t be realized in any other way. But who makes that go around? Who is the man or woman behind the curtain pulling all the strings to make sure that we can see a live act? Who are the people pushing and pulling all of the levers to make sure the crazy festival we went to this past summer actually worked? It’s time to meet Dawson Ludwig, a modern day Oz for the Northern California music scene. We’ll learn all about what happens before we ever hear the first note of the first song.

Money makes the world go round. Well, gravity too, but mostly money. And yet it’s somehow considered this taboo topic not to be talked about. And it’s partially due to this taboo that millions of people including myself make poor or uniformed financial choices every day. Well, time to talk about it! Today’s guest, Peter Dunn (aka Pete the Planner), devotes his life to helping people make better financial decisions. He uses just about every media format available to answer questions about money, and help people on the path to financial wellness. So let’s have him answer some of our finance questions and learn about the awesome path that Peter has chosen in life.

Bicycle gears and brakes, huh, good god y’all, what are they good for, absolutely nothin’! Wait…what? According to today’s interviewee, Sean Martin, riding a bicycle sans multiple gears and brakes is the only way to go! Well, the best way at least. Sound a little unsafe? Well, time to quit being such a wuss and listen to the joys and virtues of fixed gear bicycle riding!

Ahhhhhh. Who doesn’t like a little peace and quiet from time to time? Some time to unwind, give the brain a chance to relax, and connect more with ones self. What if I told you that there was a way to put that whole process in overdrive…unwind faster, relax more, connect deeper. Welcome to the world of sensory deprivation floating! Today’s guest, Mike Garrett was so transformed by floating that he decided to move and open up his own float spa business. Mike will explain what all the hype is about, his crazy path to get here, and some tips and tricks should you decide to take the plunge.

Finally, time for some good old-fashioned horseplay! Today’s guest, Janelle Swanson, started riding horses at the mature age of 7 years old. Over the years Janelle has owned horses, rented horses, ridden in competitions, ridden for fun, and even stopped horseback riding to pursue other interests…only to pick it back up again. She’ll tell us about the special connection between man and horse that make this a truly unique hobby. We’ll also hear about the costs and options for getting started, no matter where you live. Time to get back in the saddle.

Do you consider yourself an extrovert? Do you thrive off of the energy you get from meeting new people? Have you ever considered starting a hostel right out of your house? I’m gonna go ahead and assume no. But after hearing today’s guest, it might not sound like such a crazy idea. Duncan started a hostel right out of his house, that he still lives in, and in the last 8 months he’s had over 500 people from all over the world stay with him. He’ll tell us all about the effect it has had on his life, and how he turned a home that he is renting into and amazing business and life venture.

Do you like to watch movies? How about filming yourself and your friends, or your family vacation? Snapchat? How about making a feature length independent film and submitting in to film festivals? Today’s guests are in the process of doing that right now! Mike Delaney and Ed Gonzales have been making short films together since they were in high school, and last year decided to take all of their experience and connections and roll them up into a full-length indie film. We’ll learn about what it took to get them here and how you can get started with your vision for the silver screen.

Remember how terrible arts and crafts time seemed as a little kid? Who in their right mind would rather be gluing puff balls on construction paper as opposed to being outside playing kickball?! Have you tried any sorts of crafty activities since? In today’s episode I interview Mike Steinberger on the hobby of leatherworking. Mike likes working with his hands, and about a year ago came across a friend that worked with leather, so he decided to give it a shot. Now, several nice wallets, purses, and a happy girlfriend later, Mike is loving it!

Ever wondered what it takes to be a life coach? What does that term even mean? Do you remind people to brush their teeth twice a day and change their oil every 3k miles? I mean, how do you coach about something as complex as life?! Today’s guest, Sariah Sizemore takes us through the fascinating world of life coaching. She’ll tell us about how she got the confidence to help others through their struggles, what it takes to be a life coach…and just what it is exactly that they do.

We are a society, for better or for worse, obsessed with stardom. Completely captivated by the bright and shining light. The ensemble cast is all fine and good, but give me a name for god’s sake! Although, what about that ensemble cast? What about the people in the background actually making the play…movie…music come alive? Today’s guest, Lucy Graves, is going to fill us in on what it’s like to live in the background, eschewing recognition in favor of some good old-fashioned life experience. Lucy is the keyboardist for one of the better-known people in the music industry today, CeeLo Green. She is also the keyboardist, backup singer, and co-song writer for Grammy winner Printz Board. What is it like to be so close to stardom, but not a start yet yourself?

Parenting. Holy crap. I want no part of it. I mean, who needs that sort of responsibility? I can barely take care of myself on a day-to-day basis. Put another human being under my care…that’s just downright negligent. But I do hold out hope that one day I’ll mature thanks to today’s guest, my wonderful sister Brittany. Brittany is the most awesome, selfless parent you will ever meet, and currently she is a stay at home mom. Watching her has done a pretty good job at swaying me into thinking that maybe, one day, a million years from now, being a parent might actually not be that bad. Today she’ll tell us about what it’s like to go partly crazy from hearing Mickey Mouse songs all day, contemplating running away from home, and definitely not trading any of it for the world.

How much do you love your hood? On a scale of Snoop Dogg to heartbroken teen whose one true love just moved away because their stupid dad got a stupid new job? Today’s guest, Todd Lappin, is most definitely on the Snoop/Dre end of the scale. His love, admiration, and fascination with his neighborhood caused him to start a blog about it in 2009. In the 6 years since, the news, happenings, and interesting residents have kept him going strong, and his connection to his home and neighbors has grown even deeper. So tell me, how much do you love your hood?

Have you ever dreamt about leaving your whole life behind and starting a new one somewhere else? Do you ever consider ditching your path to personal gain to go and help the less fortunate? Have you ever been watching a documentary about living in a 3rd world country and almost dropped everything right then and there to join the Peace Corps? I can’t be the only one! Today’s guest, Jeff Palmer, knew from a very young age that he wanted to help people, and while still in high school made up his mind that he would join the Peace Corps. What he didn’t know was how difficult and long the process would be to get there, and what life would be like once he began.

We’ve all been there before. Staring deeply into a bowl of salsa thinking about how much better it would be if it were just a bit hotter…saltier…cilantroier. Just a bit more lime and this would be almost perfect! Today’s interviewee, Tim Willhite, knows the feeling intimately well, and decided to do something about it. Tim decided to start making his own salsa, and it was so darn good it started winning competitions. Lots of ‘em! Tim knew he was on to something and years later his salsa can be found in national grocery chains. So how did that all happen?

Ever wondered what it would be like to fall towards the earth at terminal velocity? I for one have, and then imagined what it would be like to pee my pants and terminal velocity…but now I’m thinking maybe I should give it a whirl anyways! In today’s episode I interview Ross Reichenbach about the hobbies of sky diving and BASE jumping. We’ll talk about some of his death defying experiences and how his life has changed since he picked up the hobby. If you’re afraid of heights like I am, you should definitely give this one a listen.

Wine. The drink of the Gods. The blood or Christ. The Greeks and Romans each had a God dedicated to it and it was the focal point of Jesus’s first miracle and last supper. That’s quite a history for a beverage! So what is it that makes wine so awesome? So revered by man? And how does that reverie translate to today? We’ll speak with Sommelier Sam Bogue to learn all about what makes wine worth obsessing over.

What if I asked you to start a nearly Billion dollar tech business? “Sorry, I think you got the wrong guy/gal” or “That kind of stuff is made for people cut from a different cloth than I am” might be thoughts that would come to mind. They certainly did for me! In today’s episode I interview Taulia founder Maex Ament, and we get to see just how different that cloth is. We’ll learn about how he mustered up the courage to start his first and second companies, how he feels about the success now, and what advice he would give to anybody with a crazy idea in their head or heart.

The ocean is amazing. Utterly and completely amazing. Studies have shown that just living near the ocean is good for your health. But why stop there? Ancient Polynesians sure didn’t, and neither did today’s guest Rory Parker. Rory has been surfing nearly his entire life. And he even managed to land a job writing for an awesome surfing blog for a living. So why was Rory so drawn to surfing? And what recommendations would he have for newbies looking to try it out?

The human mind is capable of amazing things. Coming up with the computer I’m typing on, writing MLK’s famous ‘I have a dream’ speech, moving the brush to form van Gogh’s ‘Starry Night’, developing every vaccine and medical breakthrough ever. The mind is there, front and center for everything. It is THE cause in the cause and effect relationship. And yet, we have almost no idea what is going on in there. Chemicals this, hormones that, add a dash of heredity and we’re starting to brew a cocktail that no one can help to understand. Yet, some people still try. One such masochist is today’s guest Emily Anhalt. She is currently a psychotherapist and psychological assistant, and is at the very end of a long road to becoming a psychologist where she will continue to better help people understand their relationships to the man (or woman) in the mirror. What does she think about mind? What does she think about thinking? What does she think about thinking about your thinking?

Disclaimer: Emily Anhalt is a psychotherapist and psychological assistant working under the license of a supervisor. Her interview is not about trying to garner patients or offer advice, she wanted to talk about and make more accessible to people, what it is that happens in psychoanalytic psychotherapy

Do you like to travel? Who the hell doesn’t?! Let’s hear from somebody who gets paid to travel for a living. In this episode I interview Soki, a tour manager for a travel company for young adults. Soki leads groups of people through southeast Asia for 1-4 week long trips. He regularly gets to see temples, jungles, white sand beaches, and even gets to go out at night and have a good time with his tour group. Sounds like the best job ever…Is it?

The world is a pretty neat place. The Grand Canyon, the giant sequoia trees of the Sierra Nevadas, the gysers of Yellowstone, Niagra Falls, Crater Lake, the rock formations in Moab. The list goes on and on…and that’s just the US! Kinda makes you wish you could just get paid to travel around and see it all like today’s guest Darrell Hartman and his younger brother Oliver. They are the founders of the incredibly unique and much talked about “travel blog” Jungles in Paris. Jungles in Paris uses a mix of breathtaking photography, videography, and well written articles to really explore the spirit of some of the most beautiful areas, people, animals, and phenomena on the planet. So, how did they make it to the promised land and start living the dream?

Do you remember your first bar experience? I sure don’t remember mine (I’ve heard stories), but my second was truly great! I remember heading into it thinking, ‘why would I pay extra money for drinks just so I can sit at a place less comfortable than my house?’ But I did it anyways, and thus began the multitude of friendships formed and memories made at bars in my life. Today’s guest, Josh Harris, is co-owner of one of the best bars in San Francisco. He and his business partner, Scott, set out to make some of the best drinks and best bar food in the world (nailed it), all to help as many people as possible come together and make their own memories (nailed it). So how do you make alcohol part of your job and open one of the most successful young bars in the world?

Why do we always seem to limit ourselves? ‘A job that awesome just isn’t going to happen for me.’ ‘That kind of success isn’t meant for me.’ ‘A relationship that great just isn’t in the cards for me.’ How do we know? Who said that we could read the future like that? You never know when something wonderful can be just around the corner. Today’s guest Tyler Hilton followed his heart and never limited himself, and has been paid back in return. He decided to not settle for having one awesome job and by the age of 21 had two. He’ll tell us all about what it’s like to live two awesome lives at once, and explain why you should never assume what tomorrow holds in store for you because it might be more amazing than you could ever imagine.

Running, for reasons I personally can’t begin to imagine, is the most common and most popular sport in the world. I suppose the barrier to entry is pretty low as everyone is born with the requisite materials to be a runner. But have you ever tried running? Do you have any idea how hard it is?! If you haven’t run in a while, try running a mile this week. There’s a 50/50 chance you’ll just collapse into an asthmatic blob after about 1,000 feet. Yet somehow, every year, millions of people line up at starting lines all over the world to run marathons. Forget 1,000 feet, we’re talking 138,336. On purpose! Even more impressive is the small population of ultra runners across the world. They look at a marathon as a warm up, and start their races at 50k. And the races go all the way up to, well, straight up Forest Gump style action. Perhaps even crazier is that many of these ultra runners, like today’s guest Ryan Ghelfi, run all over rugged mountains and uneven terrain while doing this. Some call it ultra running, some call it trail running, I call it totally insane, brave, and awesome.

Do you get stressed out when your boss yells at you? Get a bad grade on a test? The waitress comes over to the table and you weren’t quite ready to order? Today’s guest, Dr. Raymond Shaheen, may be able to help put some of that in perspective for you. Dr. Shaheen is a vascular surgeon who very regularly has to make life or death decisions to help save the lives’ and limbs’ of patients. We’ll learn what it is like to carry that sort of mental burden, we’ll hear some of the memorable stories from Dr. Shaheen’s career, and most importantly we’ll find out just what the heck a vascular surgeon does.

Do you like to eat? Everything? All the time? I know I sure do! But there’s something I’ve learned in life, and that’s that you can’t always have it all. Want to eat some tasty sugary pastries and bliss out from the dopamine hit they give you? Sounds good, but be prepared to not feel motivated to go to the gym…or do much else after. Want to have loads of energy every day, have amazing looking skin, and a feel balanced emotionally? It’s probably gonna take some sort of sacrifice in your diet. In an almost literal sense, you can’t have your cake and eat it too. Today we’ll talk to Darlene Adamusik who has one of the more extreme and restrictive diets out there (though that’s not how she thinks about it). She is a vegan. She is loving it. And she is going to tell us why.

Have you ever been on a website before? Has it ever occurred to you that almost every website you go to was designed by a web designer? That fact reminds me a lot of the architecture episode. It’s almost hard to believe that EVERY building we walk by was conceived by an architect, and even harder to believe that EVERY website we visit was conceived in much the same way. Time to take a look into that career and see what this ubiquitous field is all about.

The Greek philosopher Heraclitus said, ‘The only constant is change.’ Boy was he ever right. Times they are a changing. Some things for the good, others for the not as good, but that’s all a matter of perspective. From my perspective, one of the better changes to come about in the last decade or so is bringing an element of casualness to once very formal and very serious institutions. Showing that just because something looks more relaxed from the outside doesn’t mean that all of the emotion and substance that makes it special is not still on the inside. On the contrary, it can make it even more special as it becomes approachable and inviting to a larger group a people. One example of this is modern ‘fine dining’ institutions. Most of the famous young chefs in the world work at restaurants that you can feel at home in. No tuxedo necessary, just come in and enjoy the warm, unique atmosphere and amazing food. This similar change has come around to the institution of weddings. Gone are the days of 90% of people getting married in churches and country clubs, here are the days of my wife and I getting married outdoors in Yosemite. Today’s guest, Maggie Lord, sensed the writing on the wall and created a Rustic Wedding (and Rustic Baby) empire. She is the founder of one of the most popular wedding blogs, RusticWeddingChic.com, and proves that you don’t have to be precious and formal to be beautiful, memorable, and filled with emotion.

Just stop right there. I know what you’re thinking. ANOTHER episode about alcohol…that…is…AWESOME! And you’re right, it is awesome. Do you know how many treaties were signed over a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon? All of them. Do you know how many businesses were founded over a carafe of Zinfandel? All of them. Do you know how many statistics I’ve made up while drinking a glass of Sangiovese? None of them, because that would be totally irresponsible. Today’s guest, Madeline Puckette, is the ultimate Renaissance woman. She’s the graphic designer responsible for some of the greatest wine infographcs that have ever been made. She was voted Wine Blogger of the Year at the International Wine and Spirits Competition for her site, Wine Folly. And now, she’s responsible for the #1 selling wine book on Amazon of the same name…and as of my writing this it hasn’t even come out yet! So how, in just a few short years, do you completely take the wine world by storm?