Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, welcome episode number thirty five of The Hunting Collective.
Speaker 1: And of course I'm Ben O'Brien, and this week we
Speaker 1: are in Bozeman, Montana on a Saturday afternoon in the
Speaker 1: Mediator Offices, the lovely brand new Mediator Offices full of
Speaker 1: plastic tables and no office furniture, and I'm hanging out
Speaker 1: with our new associate editor, Morgan Mason. And Morgan came
Speaker 1: to this company from gear Junkie and moreover from Wakefield,
Speaker 1: Kansas as a small town farm kid who's got a
Speaker 1: pretty badass story to tell us about joining the army,
Speaker 1: headed to Iraq, coming back and spending time outside and
Speaker 1: then finally, after many years, find his way to this
Speaker 1: company and it will be creating some content alongside this
Speaker 1: podcast and others for all of you, so hopefully you
Speaker 1: enjoy that. So, without further ado basin Morgan, Yes, sir,
Speaker 1: what's going on man? Not too much, just packing up,
Speaker 1: getting ready to hit the road. That's right, that's right.
Speaker 1: I'd like to start podcasts off with people you like,
Speaker 1: describe your surroundings. Normally the surroundings are way more exciting
Speaker 1: than their current surroundings. But still, I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people are interested in where we are learning about
Speaker 1: it to give your best pros describing where we are.
Speaker 1: We are in the Canary District in Bozeman, Montana. In
Speaker 1: our offices. Don't give out any addresses because people want
Speaker 1: to come in and there all the women are gonna
Speaker 1: want to come especially with these dogs laying around like
Speaker 1: continue anyways down here in our office in our corner
Speaker 1: that they stuffed us in the editorial team, you know,
Speaker 1: and just hanging out at our fancy tables. Yeah, there
Speaker 1: are plastic tables and they came probably from Target and
Speaker 1: they probably cost about yep. When you're a startup, that's
Speaker 1: kind of how it goes. That's life. Yeah, that's startup life,
Speaker 1: and that's what we are. Um. But we have two
Speaker 1: dogs laying sleeping under these plastic tables. Puppies by the
Speaker 1: name of Arlow and by the name Opinion Opinion, being
Speaker 1: the office dog. He's claimed it. Tell us about tell
Speaker 1: us about Opinion. So the Opinion is a wire hair
Speaker 1: pointing grayfawn that I picked up in June and he
Speaker 1: is my little bird dog, amigo. So he just got
Speaker 1: him trained up and we're gonna hit the road here
Speaker 1: pretty soon. And head back to my home state of
Speaker 1: Kansas and go chase birds around. And I've got his brother,
Speaker 1: Arlow from the same litter that I'm dropping off with
Speaker 1: my brother, So we're gonna go take these little hooligans
Speaker 1: out and chase quail around out there. Dude, these wire
Speaker 1: hairs are just like they come in here and they
Speaker 1: just sleep. And if if a fucking quail wandered into
Speaker 1: this office, ship would erupt, it would erupt. And I
Speaker 1: wish if we were in a situation where a quail
Speaker 1: would wander in to our office. I watched Opinion down
Speaker 1: at the front windows looking at a little tweet bird
Speaker 1: and almost getting ready to blast through. That's a good dog.
Speaker 1: I imagine we should talk about because you know, you
Speaker 1: and I both work for this company, right, so, but
Speaker 1: it's early on, so we have an opportunity to shape
Speaker 1: some things, primarily in this case what the office looks like,
Speaker 1: but also what's in it. Yeah, I have a pretty
Speaker 1: gnarly case of a d D when it comes to work,
Speaker 1: Like I don't have a d D in any other
Speaker 1: person in my life, and then when I'm working, I
Speaker 1: always want to be doing something else. So I have
Speaker 1: a d D. We currently have a putting green. If
Speaker 1: you go to my Instagram you'll see a photo of it.
Speaker 1: It's very popular. Mr Stephen Ronella, founder of this whole venture.
Speaker 1: He's always anti I golf, but me, I'm terrible black golf.
Speaker 1: But my brain needs a distraction. MM. So what do
Speaker 1: you feel like we should like? What kind of things
Speaker 1: should we build around the office to keep our minds
Speaker 1: off work? Um, we definitely need to get the kitchen
Speaker 1: up and running so we can tinker around with recipes, right, yep,
Speaker 1: tune into the tune into the meat eater platform. At
Speaker 1: some point we'll just cook ship at random times of
Speaker 1: the day and everybody should love that. It will be
Speaker 1: like on fire. Just set the little switch and go
Speaker 1: live and show that a bottle that's going on drunken
Speaker 1: mess that it will hopefully be anything else any like
Speaker 1: other awesome things. And I don't know like a new
Speaker 1: startup office should have, especially this one. We should have
Speaker 1: boatloads of taxidermy everywhere, and we should probably have bows
Speaker 1: and arrows, with the arrows having little belcrow tips that
Speaker 1: we can shoot at the taxidermy for the kill shots.
Speaker 1: That's a good point. Maybe at each other. Is that unsafe. No,
Speaker 1: I think that's fine. Okay, we can do that well. Also,
Speaker 1: we were talking about having a kegurator. Yep, I feel
Speaker 1: like that would be good. Um, pretty much anything we
Speaker 1: want at this point are lords of this tiny little
Speaker 1: domain in which we sit. Yeah, that's that's the Media
Speaker 1: Incorporate office is. Hopefully, Uh we'll soon have podcast studios
Speaker 1: and video areas where we can go live and show
Speaker 1: you what we're doing over here, and hopefully that ship
Speaker 1: is interesting. So you out there, that's that's our job.
Speaker 1: You're out there on the internet world. Uh, we would
Speaker 1: want to read it or learn about it. So tell
Speaker 1: us about your position here at Meat Eater Incorporated. So
Speaker 1: I was brought on as an assistant editor and constent creator.
Speaker 1: So my job is to work with some of the
Speaker 1: individuals that we're working with in the meters, so like
Speaker 1: April Ooki and others that are writing in and slip
Speaker 1: and bringing in pieces and going through and editing those,
Speaker 1: getting ready for the web and all of that, and
Speaker 1: then also looking for interesting stories and putting things together,
Speaker 1: whether it's out twos or recipes or what have you,
Speaker 1: and whip those up for the company and just drive
Speaker 1: that website traffic and just keep looking for interesting things
Speaker 1: going on. Yeah. See, this is at some level I think,
Speaker 1: live in the dream. Yeah, because some of the things
Speaker 1: you listed aren't like dream like scenarios. But the dream
Speaker 1: like scenario was very much that we can kind of
Speaker 1: like wake up in the morning, like I'd like to
Speaker 1: write about that, and then you dear audience out there
Speaker 1: listening can then decide whether we're good at our jobs
Speaker 1: or completely terrible at them, and that we should be
Speaker 1: We should go away and stop bothering you with this
Speaker 1: content and put all those hate comments on the on
Speaker 1: the internet. Yeah, you can do whatever you want on
Speaker 1: you as a free country. But hopefully you like the
Speaker 1: things that we come up with, the crazy ideas that
Speaker 1: we spawn in this room or room similar to it,
Speaker 1: and uh, we keep our jobs and you guys, you're entertained.
Speaker 1: I think that's an easy one. But for me as
Speaker 1: a journalist, that's pretty pretty much a dream scenario. Yeah,
Speaker 1: just wake up and research find interesting things, or take
Speaker 1: off for Kansas and go round up a bunch of
Speaker 1: interesting things there. Yeah, which is yeah, so you're leaving
Speaker 1: here tomorrow to go back to your home place or
Speaker 1: a m pushing off Oh man, you're that's hard. That's
Speaker 1: hardly gonna have to have more coffee than booze in
Speaker 1: the cop in the morning. It's a party. That's a
Speaker 1: hardy trip right there. How long a drive is that? Um,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna stop three quarters of the way down in
Speaker 1: Nebraska and do some pheasant hunting there with a buddy,
Speaker 1: and so that should only be like ten and a
Speaker 1: half hours, but with the puppy stops, that might turn
Speaker 1: into about a twelve hour situation. Hang out there for
Speaker 1: about forty eight hours and then drop down another four
Speaker 1: hours down to the little quarter section family farm and
Speaker 1: chase birds with my brother. Yeah that's pretty cool, man, Yeah,
Speaker 1: pretty cool that. See, if you can round up some
Speaker 1: white tails and spend the month, they're just kind of
Speaker 1: whipping up content. Yeah, well, I think it'd be are
Speaker 1: gonna be reading your content that we did. They need
Speaker 1: to know what the hell you know? You came from Kansas.
Speaker 1: We learned that part. You have awesome dogs. We know
Speaker 1: that we work here. We also know that, Um tell
Speaker 1: us about your upbringing. So I grew up out in
Speaker 1: northeastern Kansas on the edge of the Smoky Hills and
Speaker 1: the Flint Hills on the side bordering the Flint Hills.
Speaker 1: And I grew up on a quarter section farm hundred
Speaker 1: sixty six acres that was passed down from my great uncle.
Speaker 1: UM and Dad brought us up out there, bought my
Speaker 1: brother and I up working behind bird dogs, bucking hay bales. UM,
Speaker 1: just kind of living the little country homestead dream out there,
Speaker 1: working cattle and and doing that. So did that. Grew
Speaker 1: up through high school and played ball in high school,
Speaker 1: and then shipped off for the Army. UM shortly after
Speaker 1: signed in between my junior and senior year, and spent
Speaker 1: that time just kind of working through the reserve unit
Speaker 1: that I signed up for. And then let's not go
Speaker 1: too quick. Let's go back to when you were working
Speaker 1: on the farm. UM. I grew up in the suburbs
Speaker 1: where there was no farms. I mean there were farms,
Speaker 1: but I just hunted on them. I didn't work on them.
Speaker 1: Do you feel like you learned anything growing up on
Speaker 1: a farm, or like you have a little bit of
Speaker 1: grit you might have not had otherwise. Absolutely, part of
Speaker 1: it from the farm and part of it from my dad.
Speaker 1: He's a kind of guy that doesn't say a whole
Speaker 1: lot but when he does, it's very strong points. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Um pe he deals with people all day. He works
Speaker 1: at this little gas station mechanics shop in town, and
Speaker 1: so there's people coming in and coming out all the time,
Speaker 1: and he's just learned a way to effectively use his
Speaker 1: words to tell you to get the hell out. Um.
Speaker 1: That's usually a good dad, a good version of a dad,
Speaker 1: kind of like that old school dad. Yeah, very much so.
Speaker 1: But he's a good guy. He's got a soft heart. Um.
Speaker 1: But yeah, he's a good dude. And just one brother. Ye,
Speaker 1: one brother, Joel. You guys close, Yeah we are. We
Speaker 1: weren't so close growing up. I was kind of that
Speaker 1: an asshole older brother. Yeah. Yeah, I had one of those. Yeah.
Speaker 1: How what's the age of difference, uh six years? Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: well I was a year and a half my brother. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we weren't really friends until we got old enough to
Speaker 1: like not be assholes to each other. Yeah. I think
Speaker 1: he's got some emotional scars from when I like pinned
Speaker 1: him down and put baby mice down a shirt. Everybody listen.
Speaker 1: He's probably better off for that. Yeah. No, my brother
Speaker 1: used to go online and back when there was like
Speaker 1: a O L and semester and I show up high
Speaker 1: like my freshman year of high school, and he was
Speaker 1: a junior, maybe your sophomore, and I'd be going to
Speaker 1: class and some young lady would approach that I had
Speaker 1: no interest in dating and be like, I can't believe
Speaker 1: here dating, I can't believe we're growing out, Like what?
Speaker 1: And it turns out my brother had hacked my well
Speaker 1: screen name and made girlfriends for me at various times.
Speaker 1: Good for him, Yeah, he's a nice I love, lovely fellow.
Speaker 1: I admire him now. But yeah, I mean that's just
Speaker 1: growing up man. Yeah, you're either doing the beating or
Speaker 1: or or seeing it. Yeah. Yeah, it's been awesome just
Speaker 1: developing that relationship with Joel and coming back to it
Speaker 1: is like at the very core of our relationship and
Speaker 1: and our father's relationship with us is hunting. It's like
Speaker 1: he barely had any time to do anything because he
Speaker 1: was hustling his ass off at the gas station and
Speaker 1: then coming home and work in the fields until like
Speaker 1: ten o'clock at night, and so we didn't see him
Speaker 1: a whole lot. But when we did, it was on
Speaker 1: Sundays and we would be walking the fields or we'd
Speaker 1: be driving around country roads with binoculars and hands and
Speaker 1: looking for deer at first and last light. And that
Speaker 1: was just how we were brought up an ingrained and
Speaker 1: so it's it's been a really cool situation. Uh, once
Speaker 1: Joel and I have gotten past all that other bullshit
Speaker 1: to share this, and I'm exceptionally excited excited to come
Speaker 1: home and have these two bird dogs and for us
Speaker 1: to walk the fields together. It would be really cool. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a good part of life. Man. You're in a
Speaker 1: good part of life for sure, where you can kind
Speaker 1: to return to the place where you know, having fond
Speaker 1: memories is important. Not everybody's homes gather up fond memories,
Speaker 1: but a lot of us, my mind does. I'm sure
Speaker 1: you're years does too, and um returning to those places,
Speaker 1: especially around hunting. Like I have a strong hunting bond
Speaker 1: with my dad. My brother never took it up, like
Speaker 1: just never. I think he just he was out partying
Speaker 1: and running around when I was up on Saturday mornings
Speaker 1: chasing deer. He was out chasing, yeah, chasing different kinds
Speaker 1: of tale, which is never. He never really took to
Speaker 1: it and to this day really doesn't have much interest
Speaker 1: in it. I even guess some interest in it because
Speaker 1: I do it. Like he is aware that it is something,
Speaker 1: but he's also not all fully on board with the
Speaker 1: situation and like questions things all the time like why
Speaker 1: would you shoot that fox? Or why would you do this?
Speaker 1: And um, I've come to value that part of our
Speaker 1: relationship because I spend so much time in a bubble.
Speaker 1: Sure you do as well around him. You shround yourself
Speaker 1: with people that like to do the ship you like
Speaker 1: to do. And uh, it's nice. Everyone's a while for
Speaker 1: me at least to go back and have that. But
Speaker 1: you have to get those checks and balances. So so, uh,
Speaker 1: you're in high school, you play ball, football, baseball, all
Speaker 1: all balls, pretty much everything. It was small town Kansas.
Speaker 1: We had eight hundred people in the town and so
Speaker 1: it's just like you want to play something here, you
Speaker 1: go go sign up. And then army. So that's a
Speaker 1: big stage of your life. Was it the army? Correct? Yes,
Speaker 1: Army reserves. Army reserves. So tell me about why and
Speaker 1: how on that one. Oh, there's a lot of why
Speaker 1: in that one. There's a lot of family history. It's
Speaker 1: just very rich in military. Um, so there was a big,
Speaker 1: big element of like my upbringing of looking back to
Speaker 1: my grandfather and my great grandfather, UM, and just all
Speaker 1: over in our our family tree, there's history of the military,
Speaker 1: and so that's always something that had been on my mind.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I was also looking for
Speaker 1: opportunities because it was very much small town Kansas, not
Speaker 1: a lot of opportunities to to get out to go
Speaker 1: to college. UM didn't come from a wealthy family, and
Speaker 1: tuition was not spoken for. It was figure this out,
Speaker 1: find your way. So between all of that, the just
Speaker 1: the feeling of wanting to serve and and do something
Speaker 1: with my life that was meaningful, and also just creating
Speaker 1: that that opportunity to break out into the world and
Speaker 1: and see what I can do to give it a go. Yeah. No,
Speaker 1: that's that's an impressive thing. I mean I never had
Speaker 1: inklings of that, and I don't think I would have
Speaker 1: listened somebody told me to stand in line. I think
Speaker 1: I probably would have been kicked out pretty early on.
Speaker 1: It was it was difficult. There's a lot of teeth
Speaker 1: written in there. Yeah, particularly what was hard is for
Speaker 1: you mm hmm, Yeah, just breaking because I was just
Speaker 1: like running around like a wild child in Kansas. Just
Speaker 1: running around, mashing the accelerator down on my little pickup
Speaker 1: truck everywhere I went, and just kinda running around without
Speaker 1: cause and and then jumping in and getting that discipline.
Speaker 1: It was. It was good for me. Yeah. So what
Speaker 1: happens during your your army tenure? Did you go fight?
Speaker 1: Did you give me the full full experience? Yeah? So,
Speaker 1: like I had mentioned, I joined in between my junior
Speaker 1: senior year, so I got to have a little bit
Speaker 1: of a half step in where I went to drills
Speaker 1: and kind of learned the lay of the land before
Speaker 1: jumping on full throttle. And then after I graduated, shipped
Speaker 1: off to Fort leonard Wood, Missouri and ran through basic
Speaker 1: training there. Did that, went down to a i T
Speaker 1: which is Advanced Individual Training UM, and I was in
Speaker 1: ninety six Bravo, which was an intelligence analyst, And so
Speaker 1: did that training down in Arizona and finished up with
Speaker 1: that and then went back to Kansas to jump in
Speaker 1: a school into college and really had no fucking clue
Speaker 1: what I wanted to do with my life. I was
Speaker 1: still like fresh off the farm, having a clue, still
Speaker 1: super green, and I just did that and just kind
Speaker 1: of puttered around in school didn't do much. And then
Speaker 1: one day I was litting or laying around in my
Speaker 1: room and on my little thirteen inch TV screen I
Speaker 1: watched news clips of the planes in the towers and
Speaker 1: I was just like, oh shit, my life has just changed.
Speaker 1: And like I just got goose bumps right now thinking
Speaker 1: about it. UM, just knowing that something was going to
Speaker 1: happen at that point in time, my life was going
Speaker 1: to be different. And sure enough, two years later, our unit,
Speaker 1: which was a FOTE Movement Control battalion out of Manhattan, Kansas,
Speaker 1: we got deployed and we were in. We went basically
Speaker 1: like right behind the Marines UM, coming in from Quait
Speaker 1: into Iraq. So I spent fourteen months over there on undemployment.
Speaker 1: And I went from a small town Kansas boy with
Speaker 1: no clue about the world too rude awakening of life
Speaker 1: and politics and third World country dynamics UM and just
Speaker 1: running around the desert with a machine gun on my
Speaker 1: hip and learning this all in. Wow, how old were
Speaker 1: you then? I was twenty? So I had my twenty
Speaker 1: first birthday Jesus interact, Oh boy. And this was in
Speaker 1: this was during the Shock and all the initial invasion.
Speaker 1: So we were in Fort Riley, Kansas when the shock
Speaker 1: and all went down, But we were shipped out like
Speaker 1: very soon after that. So we were like in our
Speaker 1: deployment stages as that, like as the blasts we're going off,
Speaker 1: and then when when give me the moment prior to
Speaker 1: any you know, firefights or any Browns going off that
Speaker 1: you realized ship was about to be different, Like you
Speaker 1: was it when you got on the plane to go
Speaker 1: over or did you land and look around or what? Like?
Speaker 1: What was the realization moment? And maybe in the military
Speaker 1: training you have to be prepared with that prior. You know,
Speaker 1: we definitely were a little bit prepared for that, um
Speaker 1: but I think it was when we were on the
Speaker 1: plane and I think I think we're on a Sea
Speaker 1: one thirty flying over. I can't remember exactly, but it
Speaker 1: was a pretty eizable plane and as we were sitting there,
Speaker 1: we were loaded in wearing full battle rattle, so we
Speaker 1: had kevlar helmets on, we had our flak jackets on,
Speaker 1: We're holding our sixteens, and we were all sitting shoulder
Speaker 1: to shoulder on this little like twelve to fourteen inch
Speaker 1: cargo strap that was on the side of the plane
Speaker 1: like running down and we sat there and it was
Speaker 1: just like a complete bear airplane on the inside, and
Speaker 1: all of our gear was piled up in the middle.
Speaker 1: There's a couple of humbies in the back of the middle,
Speaker 1: and we're just sitting there for I don't even know
Speaker 1: how many, like fourteen hours or something, just looking at
Speaker 1: each other and like the freezing cold as we flew over,
Speaker 1: and I'm just like, huh, this is life uncomfortable. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: so yeah that And then so when we dropped in,
Speaker 1: we dropped into Kuwait, which things weren't too crazy there.
Speaker 1: It was a very westernized base. Um, it was very
Speaker 1: safe and secure within the base that we were staging
Speaker 1: at for deployment. But then as soon as we got
Speaker 1: the call and we're just like we're heading boys, get
Speaker 1: your stuff, get get everything ready to go. It was
Speaker 1: jumping the humbies. And as we approached the border, that
Speaker 1: was like that was the moment. And we approached and
Speaker 1: there like the border was this big burn that was
Speaker 1: going down the line and they were just in one
Speaker 1: Abram tanks all pointed, dozens of them pointed into a rack,
Speaker 1: and at that point in time, I was just like,
Speaker 1: holy fucking shit, like what are we what are we
Speaker 1: getting into right now? Um? And yeah, that was wild.
Speaker 1: And then I was in the convoy at the very
Speaker 1: rear and my job was as a saw gunner as
Speaker 1: well to pull rear security on the convoy. So we
Speaker 1: had a lot of reports that there were attacks coming
Speaker 1: up from the rear, and it was my job to
Speaker 1: make sure that nobody came up and got after us.
Speaker 1: So I had a saw in him two four nine
Speaker 1: hanging out the back of the humby and just pointed
Speaker 1: backwards down the road making sure we didn't get hit.
Speaker 1: So I chewed on a lot of dust that day. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you did. And do you feel how long from
Speaker 1: when you crossed the border to when you fire the
Speaker 1: first round? You know? Actually when I went over there,
Speaker 1: I never squeezed off my trigger. Really great. Yeah, So
Speaker 1: I'm I'm thankful for that, But I'm also thankful for
Speaker 1: the guys that that had to and had to do
Speaker 1: what they had to do and came back, and you know,
Speaker 1: always thinking of the guys that didn't come back and
Speaker 1: the gals that didn't come back. But I'm I'm very
Speaker 1: much blessed of the fact that I don't have that
Speaker 1: hanging over me. Um, that I'm not dealing with that.
Speaker 1: So you have friends that did or folks that's tough. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I think from somebody like me or a lot
Speaker 1: of people listening, just you can't comprehend that, Like there's
Speaker 1: no comprehension of of that kind of stress and that
Speaker 1: environment and what that does to your perspective, let alone
Speaker 1: in your mind. Yeah, it was. There was definitely a
Speaker 1: lot of emotions to to filter through coming back after
Speaker 1: that one. Yeah, So you spent how much time in combat?
Speaker 1: I was in? Our deployment was fourteen months, so we
Speaker 1: had orders for six months and then as soon as
Speaker 1: we got over there, before we jumped in, they're just
Speaker 1: like up by the way orders changed were three six
Speaker 1: boots on ground. So wow. And so two thousand three
Speaker 1: to two thousand four we were there the entire time. Um.
Speaker 1: And so at some point you come back home, yeah,
Speaker 1: and tell us about you know, you cycled through, You've
Speaker 1: done your time, You've done your fourteen months, and then
Speaker 1: it's time to come home. What's that like? That? That
Speaker 1: was wild. That was a lot to digest and filter
Speaker 1: through and marinate on. And just all the things that
Speaker 1: I saw over there, all the things that I felt
Speaker 1: over there. Um, it was wild. It took me a
Speaker 1: long time to to get through all of that, and
Speaker 1: I basically came home to Kansas, went back to Manhattan, UM,
Speaker 1: and was just really wasn't sure what to do with
Speaker 1: my life at that point, really didn't have any direction.
Speaker 1: I was just knowing that I needed to go through
Speaker 1: everything that i'd i'd felt and saw and all of
Speaker 1: that and somehow figure it out out. And so I
Speaker 1: was there, and then about three months down the line,
Speaker 1: I had a buddy came back that had moved to Colorado,
Speaker 1: and he's just like, what the hell are you still
Speaker 1: doing in Kansas? Like, let's go. So a week later
Speaker 1: I packed up my car and I moved outside of
Speaker 1: Breckon Ridge. And for the next jo i'd say like
Speaker 1: thirteen years, I spent my time bouncing in between Colorado
Speaker 1: and Mexico and just just try to enjoy life, just
Speaker 1: get back to happiness and and getting back to a
Speaker 1: better person and and figuring that out. But it was
Speaker 1: it was definitely a long journey along the way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: are there any um stories you want to tell from
Speaker 1: being over there? You feel like would inform folks about
Speaker 1: what it was like? Like some you know, you don't
Speaker 1: have to tell something if you don't want to, but
Speaker 1: there might be something that I always wondered if it's
Speaker 1: even worth telling what actually happened, other than you know,
Speaker 1: folks understand the fall before and they understand you know,
Speaker 1: violence and those types of things. But there's was there
Speaker 1: any seminal moments for it over there that you know,
Speaker 1: give you some positive look on it or just an
Speaker 1: overly negative look back on it. I'd say, like the
Speaker 1: one thing that stands out in my mind that like
Speaker 1: when I think back to memories over there, that like
Speaker 1: it comes like first and foremost for me is we
Speaker 1: were out on a convoy and we had to go
Speaker 1: into Baghdad for this deal and we had to go
Speaker 1: through this section called I. E. D Alley. It was
Speaker 1: just like notorious, and like my job in the unit
Speaker 1: was an intel analyst, and so I was in charge
Speaker 1: of tracking all the attacks that happened on the highways,
Speaker 1: figuring out who was doing it, why they were doing it,
Speaker 1: and briefing that to our commanders. So I was very
Speaker 1: involved in like what was going on. So we were
Speaker 1: going through the section called I. D Alley, and I
Speaker 1: very much knew like the ship that went down there.
Speaker 1: It's just people were getting blown up right and left,
Speaker 1: and so we rolled through and pushed through, and we
Speaker 1: like had guns hanging out the window, just waiting for
Speaker 1: something to pop off. Never did um. And then about
Speaker 1: thirty minut it's later, we had swung around, finished what
Speaker 1: we needed to do, and we're coming back down the
Speaker 1: other side and there was a Humby sitting there smoldering
Speaker 1: that had just been blown up, so meaning that we
Speaker 1: had driven over an I E. D. And they chose
Speaker 1: not to press the trigger at that moment. And seeing
Speaker 1: like the black smoke rolling and knowing that there was
Speaker 1: people inside, soldiers inside, and like that was just that
Speaker 1: shook me down to the core. Yeah, but it did. Yeah.
Speaker 1: We had a gentleman by the name of Omar A Villa.
Speaker 1: He was a sergeant in the army. On probably maybe
Speaker 1: ten episodes ago seven episodes to go to the podcast,
Speaker 1: he spoke about the same thing. He was blown up
Speaker 1: in an I D attack and he lost, you know,
Speaker 1: and maybe in the same spot you're talking about, because
Speaker 1: he spoke about it in that same terminology like I
Speaker 1: D Alley. Look, this is the place where he knew
Speaker 1: that there was a lot of that going on, and
Speaker 1: he was blown up, and Um had third degree burns
Speaker 1: the most of his body and lost a leg and
Speaker 1: Um lost most of most of the fingers on both
Speaker 1: his hands and went through his gun and still going
Speaker 1: through hundreds of surgeries. Now today, you know and like
Speaker 1: that that story and even yours, you know, from an
Speaker 1: outside perspective, not having been lucky enough not to go
Speaker 1: through that, but being so close to it is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like you feel this overwhelming amount of like thankfulness that
Speaker 1: you didn't just get blown up. But then you look
Speaker 1: and you're just like, holy sh it, somebody else did.
Speaker 1: And then you just like have this weight of guilt
Speaker 1: laying on you. And it's it's, I don't know, it's
Speaker 1: it's tough to to describe, like the that feeling. It's random, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the randomness of life. Yeah. Yeah. I heard somebody try
Speaker 1: and describe that on a sports regarding like a baseball
Speaker 1: game the other day, and I thought, how shallow was Like,
Speaker 1: just at the moment I heard it, I thought, well,
Speaker 1: anything could happen at any time, and and one little
Speaker 1: thing is different and we win the game. I thought, Uh,
Speaker 1: all right, that's that's life. But in those situations, those
Speaker 1: those things way that's circumstantial, the consequences way heavier. No,
Speaker 1: even the circumstantial occurrences like that, like you drive over
Speaker 1: I D and the guy doesn't hit the button or
Speaker 1: isn't sitting by it's sitting by the button. Then the
Speaker 1: next guy doesn't he and it does and it changes
Speaker 1: in that that those things changed just not your life,
Speaker 1: but many many, many lives just in those small decisions.
Speaker 1: So I'm glad they didn't blow you up. Yeah, me too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what it sucked for everybody. Um so you're back. You
Speaker 1: go back, and you're doing Colorado in Mexico. Um, you
Speaker 1: spent a lot of time outside, I imagine. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: So when I came back, I had kind of like
Speaker 1: bounced around a little bit trying to figure out what
Speaker 1: I was gonna do. And then one New Year's Eve,
Speaker 1: I just made a little pack to myself to follow
Speaker 1: happiness and jumped into that. And then when I first
Speaker 1: came over it first came back, I was a white
Speaker 1: water raft guy down in Buena Vista and Brown's Canyon,
Speaker 1: and I had a hell of a time and then
Speaker 1: I left that. Because we're basically surviving off of PB
Speaker 1: are peanut butter. I was like, I gotta do something else.
Speaker 1: Every other kid that age yep, sleeping out of my
Speaker 1: car down on some ranchers land out there. It was
Speaker 1: an amazing time. Um. But I went back and got
Speaker 1: involved in the white water industry and was like kayaking
Speaker 1: and paddle boarding and surfing river waves and just having
Speaker 1: an absolute blast doing that. And so I chased that
Speaker 1: around for a while and ended up learning how to surf,
Speaker 1: and then going down and ended up going down to
Speaker 1: Mexico a couple of times. Once lived down in San
Speaker 1: Jose Docabo and ran a paddle board and surf shop
Speaker 1: down there and got to go out and surf for
Speaker 1: lunch and after work, and that was amazing. Um. And
Speaker 1: then came back up, kicked around Colorado for a while.
Speaker 1: I went back down there a second time, was amazing.
Speaker 1: I took my brother that time. I bought a camper
Speaker 1: van and the dog that I had before bomb or
Speaker 1: this black lab and we just road tripped the whole
Speaker 1: way down on this white Cambra van. So it's like
Speaker 1: the dream, Yeah, it's like, but it was funny. In
Speaker 1: the little Ford Econo line one fifty or whatever, and
Speaker 1: there's like me, I'm six ft about one ninety my
Speaker 1: brother six four two twenty and then a black lab
Speaker 1: and we had no room in this and we were
Speaker 1: like sleeping in there and there's black dog hair everywhere.
Speaker 1: Every meal, we're like pulling dog hair out of Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's almost like a Patagonian commercial, like a modern The
Speaker 1: funny thing about this is is I watched a hundred
Speaker 1: eighty degree South, so that and not just like screw
Speaker 1: Colorado for a while, I'm going to Mexico. Well, I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, the benefit of going through, you know, some
Speaker 1: pretty scarring events in battle, I think maybe help you
Speaker 1: find a little bit of what you were, you know,
Speaker 1: like just go like there was some live in the moment,
Speaker 1: because you certainly get to realize in those situations at
Speaker 1: moments that don't always laugh like every moment is precious. Yep.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of that, and there's just like a
Speaker 1: lot of confidence of the things you can do us
Speaker 1: you go through so much that tests you mentally and physically.
Speaker 1: You're like, I'm gonna go live in a van in
Speaker 1: Baja for four months and just wing it and I
Speaker 1: don't know, like a lick of Spanish, I know, I
Speaker 1: e d s down there. Nope. Now, I'm pretty big
Speaker 1: on perspective for sure, and I think, um, everybody's perspective
Speaker 1: is different, of course, based on their experiences, but there
Speaker 1: are certain experiences in your life that provide the ultimate perspective.
Speaker 1: And there's not a lot of people that have what
Speaker 1: you know, that the perspective you have and then came
Speaker 1: out of it clean at least physically came out of
Speaker 1: it clean. And and is that perspective something you still
Speaker 1: use today daily basis? Yeah, absolutely, I'm always trying to
Speaker 1: pursue passion and work to fulfilling like a just living
Speaker 1: a really good life, um, you know, and just just
Speaker 1: trying to live the best life I can um and
Speaker 1: staying within the realms of passion and not that's brought
Speaker 1: me pretty much to where I am here today. It's
Speaker 1: just kind of falling exactly like what my heart and
Speaker 1: what my gut tells me to do, and and keep
Speaker 1: investing in myself and investing in little bearded bird. Dugs
Speaker 1: thrown around with, Yeah. No, So then you know, after
Speaker 1: that time in your life you decided to move to
Speaker 1: Montana and then he told me just basically because you
Speaker 1: thought there was some opportunity here, and you thought the
Speaker 1: hunting and fishing world was where you wanted to stake
Speaker 1: your claim and kind of worked out where he didn't it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I did, you know. I had left Colorado and bounced
Speaker 1: to Utah for a little bit to some fly fish guiding,
Speaker 1: and then came back and did a little white tail
Speaker 1: hunting with my brother. And it was just kind of
Speaker 1: this this deal of figuring out hunting again because I
Speaker 1: took a lot of time off after coming back from war.
Speaker 1: Just like the whole thought and idea of killing just
Speaker 1: wasn't I wasn't in the and mentally in the place
Speaker 1: to to get after that. So I spent a little
Speaker 1: bit of time away from it to the tune of
Speaker 1: about ten years, and just really did some soul searching
Speaker 1: of what that meant for me before I got back
Speaker 1: into it. And I'm really glad that I did that
Speaker 1: and took my time, and it's thankful that I had
Speaker 1: that core of going around in the fields with my
Speaker 1: dad and my brother and Jason birds and yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, was it was that the aversion to hunting
Speaker 1: during that time? Was that a visual thing or was
Speaker 1: it a just a philosophical like I've seen death and
Speaker 1: I don't want to participate or what. Do you have
Speaker 1: a take on what that really was for you? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was, Yeah, it was the aspect of taking life
Speaker 1: that I just I wasn't comfortable with. Um just like well,
Speaker 1: it was just like the whole thought of killing, Like
Speaker 1: as soon as I thought of like killing it, like
Speaker 1: you know, like the crisp bodies that I saw that
Speaker 1: were like blackened and tarred up and all of that.
Speaker 1: It's just like that's what killing brought into my head,
Speaker 1: Like no matter if it was hunting or any sort
Speaker 1: of deal, and shows this mental imagery that came into it.
Speaker 1: And it took a little bit a while to like
Speaker 1: filter through that and figure out what everything meant to me.
Speaker 1: And and now I'm in a really good place in it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that takes some time to get through. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not a small thing. I've I've heard a lot
Speaker 1: of veterans talk of bounce. Well, there's two things. One
Speaker 1: is what you're talking about, right. The killing becomes you know,
Speaker 1: less palatable for lack of a better term, or killing
Speaker 1: becomes this um, you know, this negative force in your
Speaker 1: life and you don't want to you know, you want
Speaker 1: to eliminate that negative force or or those things with
Speaker 1: The second thing I've heard is that that like time
Speaker 1: spent outside, the solitude of mountains, the what wildered, the
Speaker 1: focus and the intensity of being in the wilderness. Like
Speaker 1: those types of things, the bonds that you are similar
Speaker 1: from from those of you know, your your combat, your
Speaker 1: patriots and combat are similar to those that you go
Speaker 1: outside and have adventures with. Like did you was going
Speaker 1: outside still something that heals you while you were getting
Speaker 1: to the point where killing was then get okay for you? Yeah? Absolutely,
Speaker 1: That's That's what Colorado was for me, getting out there
Speaker 1: and just exploring the mountains and exploring some of my
Speaker 1: family roots in western Colorado and chasing adventure out there.
Speaker 1: It was. It was very healing for me, and it's
Speaker 1: it did me a lot of a lot of good
Speaker 1: to get out there and just be free and be
Speaker 1: in the mountains and and have that solace. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: I've always struggled with that personally as just conceptually or
Speaker 1: just as a you know, kind of as an ideology
Speaker 1: of you know, taking veterans outside to kill things as
Speaker 1: a way to either it's not a reward, but as
Speaker 1: a way to um, you know, distract them or to
Speaker 1: take a you know, to give them something to draw
Speaker 1: all away from their negative experiences. I think it's something
Speaker 1: to focus in on. It's like it's a mission for them.
Speaker 1: And like I was very much the same way. I
Speaker 1: always needed like something I could just dive wholeheartedly into
Speaker 1: and just engulf myself in. And that's that's what hunting
Speaker 1: was when I was growing up. That's what the action
Speaker 1: sports that I was working on in Colorado. Um. I mean,
Speaker 1: when you're like class four, class five kayaking, you've got
Speaker 1: to be in the moment. And that was a blast
Speaker 1: doing that. And then you know, coming back here and
Speaker 1: now I'm in this place where I'm like creeping around
Speaker 1: in the woods and calling bulls and chasing ran animals
Speaker 1: with a stick and a bow and there's just a
Speaker 1: bow and arrow, and that's very much the same way.
Speaker 1: It's just it's been a great journey getting to there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that's uh, you're you know, if if we're
Speaker 1: all lucky, we're not that far away through a lot
Speaker 1: of years left. But it sounds to me like those
Speaker 1: those years may have been tough, but those were important
Speaker 1: years of your life. UM. And I think the last
Speaker 1: podcast or one of the previous ones, we talked Adam
Speaker 1: green Tree, and Adam had similar or not. You know,
Speaker 1: he never had your experiences, but he had some traumatic
Speaker 1: experiences growing up and talked a lot about those traumatic
Speaker 1: experiences being um. What drives him, like what allows him
Speaker 1: not to um, not to be lazy? What provides you know,
Speaker 1: the drive to get things done and his his inner voice.
Speaker 1: It's like that we're just not gonna quit on this
Speaker 1: because we're just not going to there's no option to quit.
Speaker 1: You got that perspective of what it looks like back there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's like I don't want to go back there. I
Speaker 1: don't have any desire to go back there. I'm not
Speaker 1: going back there. And while I'm here, in the place
Speaker 1: that's better than there, I'm going to succeed and I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna accept no for any answer. Yeah. Absolutely. So
Speaker 1: that's an important perspect and I think there's it's lost
Speaker 1: in a lot of people in our society today. And
Speaker 1: you got it in probably not a a desirable way,
Speaker 1: but you got it nonetheless, you know, I found it
Speaker 1: one way or another thing. Yeah, I mean, I think
Speaker 1: sometimes it's very trivial that I would I come on
Speaker 1: this podcast and talk about you know, I went hunting
Speaker 1: and I learned all these things, and now I'm a
Speaker 1: better person and I have perspective that I was playing
Speaker 1: like it's playing these are this is playground. Sometimes you
Speaker 1: go outside, um, not that it doesn't allow, you know,
Speaker 1: when I went to Nepal or when I've gone to
Speaker 1: New Zealand and spend time outside doing very hard things.
Speaker 1: That's perspective of gaming. But I'm still playing. Yeah, still playing.
Speaker 1: But it's as long as you're getting out there and
Speaker 1: you're looking for the lessons to be like that's that's
Speaker 1: the big thing, instead of just taking it all for
Speaker 1: granted and just running around doing your thing. Man, No,
Speaker 1: you're right about that too. And now but yeah, I
Speaker 1: think I always and talking to guys like you and
Speaker 1: you know, folks like Omara Vila and and even if
Speaker 1: you you know, in a very different way, Adam green Tree,
Speaker 1: that struggle, real struggle, you know, inescapable struggle, like non
Speaker 1: voluntary involuntary struggle. Yeah, it's coming whether you wanted, it's telling,
Speaker 1: whether you wonder or not. It's in your face. It's
Speaker 1: just a different you know if if humans were mold,
Speaker 1: it was just it's just a different you're cut out
Speaker 1: of a different mold. You're you're shaped from a different thing.
Speaker 1: And um, and you had you know, you had a choice,
Speaker 1: but once you're there, you had no choice. Once you
Speaker 1: were in it, you had no choice. And so, um,
Speaker 1: I just I would just say that, I it's something
Speaker 1: that I respect and something that you know, I'm not.
Speaker 1: I don't wish that I had that, but I know,
Speaker 1: oh that there's still a lot of good that comes
Speaker 1: from it. Yeah, even though that it even though that
Speaker 1: it's can be a you know, negative force to think about.
Speaker 1: And you know, as you look back on it, but
Speaker 1: you're here today, I mean, you don't incorporated after all
Speaker 1: that ship. Yeah, living a pretty good life right now. Yeah. Um,
Speaker 1: so a couple of podcasts ago, I'd say, well, it's
Speaker 1: only just ninely a month ago now. Um. We when
Speaker 1: we launched the company, we talked about our Y and
Speaker 1: I think we've probably covered a lot of your Y already.
Speaker 1: We've kind of gotten to the Y. But I think
Speaker 1: every employee of this company has especially when something's new,
Speaker 1: you have the opportunity to really, you know, you rightly
Speaker 1: give it what ninth employee, tenth employee or something like
Speaker 1: that like that. Yeah, pretty small team right now. Um,
Speaker 1: we just added two dogs. We have ten plus two. Um,
Speaker 1: but we have the opportunity to really get up in
Speaker 1: the morning and say why am I doing this? Because
Speaker 1: we're not We're not cogs in a wheel. We're not
Speaker 1: you know, button pushers or leverpoolers, were not going to
Speaker 1: the factory and working on the line. We are in
Speaker 1: positions where we can chart our course in whatever way
Speaker 1: that it makes sense for us. So what's you know?
Speaker 1: What is your why today after going through what you've
Speaker 1: been through and coming out on the other end. Good question. Um, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't let you off of the bullshit podcast talk.
Speaker 1: We're going deep color. We're going deep here on the
Speaker 1: hunting collective. We always do. I would say, looking back
Speaker 1: with hunting, looking at hunting as far as I can
Speaker 1: a lifestyle and industry to dive into, um and to
Speaker 1: pursue it's with hunting itself. It's become this connection based
Speaker 1: thing for me. Where so thankful that I have the
Speaker 1: upbringing that I did and being able to understand the
Speaker 1: connection to the dirt and the animals and the chemical
Speaker 1: composition of everything and like being so grounded, like going
Speaker 1: out and killing these animals but then eating them and
Speaker 1: becoming like not to sound to Granola, but like becoming
Speaker 1: one with the land and like filling that absolute connection.
Speaker 1: It's this primal thing that is it's so hard to describe,
Speaker 1: but it's I'm so thankful for of of feeling that
Speaker 1: and seeing that, and and knowing that I've got that
Speaker 1: connection to the earth and how that makes me feel mentally,
Speaker 1: and like how fulfilled I become with that, and and
Speaker 1: it's just this, man, it's not like a loss for
Speaker 1: words of how to describe it. But that's probably a
Speaker 1: good thing. It's probably the best way to describe at
Speaker 1: the loss of verbs. But yeah, I mean it's yeah,
Speaker 1: it's just going out there and it's it's fulfillment. Is
Speaker 1: is an incredible way to describe it that I can
Speaker 1: see and just becoming it's like it's been kicked around
Speaker 1: the office here, but it's it's true. It's becoming a
Speaker 1: better person because of it, and that's what I'm looking
Speaker 1: for in life. And sitting around last winter with my
Speaker 1: brother while we're chasing white tails and just kicking back
Speaker 1: on the sofa, and watching Meat Eater and just like
Speaker 1: having conversations about what Steve's talking about and know they're
Speaker 1: like I'm pushing forward in this realm. And then having
Speaker 1: it all come like circle to being here in the
Speaker 1: office and working with you and Steve and and being
Speaker 1: a part of these conversations. Is that's just I'm so
Speaker 1: happy to be here. Yeah, and we're happy to have
Speaker 1: you know. I think that's important. And there's a big
Speaker 1: part of me that's like, I'm it's just a regular dude,
Speaker 1: And there's this big part of me that it's wonders
Speaker 1: why I can't just get on the podcast and talk
Speaker 1: about calibers and talk about let's talk about seven mill
Speaker 1: or six man. I'm a Jack O'Connor fan there, six baby. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I think there's part of me the wonders
Speaker 1: why that. And there's a part of me that that
Speaker 1: is honestly and openly wondering whether trying to balance like
Speaker 1: the virtue signaling that can go on, like just saying
Speaker 1: the right thing because that gets the best reaction, but
Speaker 1: then really truly believing what I'm saying or what I'm writing.
Speaker 1: And so I think that's in this day and it's
Speaker 1: essentially the struggle that we all have to go through
Speaker 1: to make sure we're openly and honestly delivering our message
Speaker 1: in a way that the best way that we can.
Speaker 1: Not everybody's gonna like it. You can't. You really can't
Speaker 1: change your wife for someone else, but really make sure
Speaker 1: your why is true and honest and not just some
Speaker 1: semblance of talking points that the advertisers are paying for. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that or this company came up with even you know
Speaker 1: or or like you said, it's something that you post
Speaker 1: on social media, everybody really likes. That can't then become
Speaker 1: your thing. You have to say down and decide what
Speaker 1: you want to do and then go and do it
Speaker 1: and hope it works for everyone else. And in the
Speaker 1: case of you know, editors at a company like this one,
Speaker 1: I really hope everybody takes to it, doesn't think you're
Speaker 1: full of it, that you're an idiot, um you're and
Speaker 1: and some folks, you know, Steve's really great at just
Speaker 1: being Steve Man and not let anybody else into that
Speaker 1: would wreck that. And and that's a huge piece of
Speaker 1: why I was so eager to jump on board is
Speaker 1: because of the truth and like not chasing bullshit of
Speaker 1: what needs to be said for this or that. It's
Speaker 1: just it's truth and story and character and yeah, just
Speaker 1: like the whole psychology of it all. Yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: hell of an opportunity to to get get down to
Speaker 1: communicate with everybody that likes to do what we like
Speaker 1: to do and make them better. They make us better,
Speaker 1: and that's what really, that's what really like content should
Speaker 1: be about. I think I'm pretty sure we're going to
Speaker 1: try it anyway, betting on it. I'm betting that it's true.
Speaker 1: I'm betting that you know, you and I could sit
Speaker 1: in this little room here with these dogs and shoot
Speaker 1: the ship and talk about you know, sometimes talk about
Speaker 1: what calibers are the best, but a lot of times
Speaker 1: talk about like how we can you know, take other
Speaker 1: folks that are in this company that are creating content
Speaker 1: to shape them in a way that makes sense right
Speaker 1: and tell them, hey, look this is let's make sure
Speaker 1: we go back to our why every once in a
Speaker 1: while and then then re examine what what we're doing
Speaker 1: this for and why we're doing the creating content and yeah, man,
Speaker 1: we've gotta make money, but we're not here to sell widgets,
Speaker 1: sail or snake oil or here to to inform and
Speaker 1: educate and entertain people and do it in a way
Speaker 1: that's honest, and and do those things in you know,
Speaker 1: in the public forum where we're putting our ship out
Speaker 1: there and hoping that people like to, you know, click
Speaker 1: on it. So please, everybody, we're begging you. We need
Speaker 1: to feed the puppies. The puppies are hungry. They're not
Speaker 1: sleeping right now. Yep, they've been sleeping through this whole podcast.
Speaker 1: They don't even care. I love them. Do they come
Speaker 1: in here? Opinion comes in here and just rolls right
Speaker 1: on the concrete and as he goes to sleep, and
Speaker 1: then all the ladies of the office make cooing noises
Speaker 1: and pet him. And he loves that ship too, as
Speaker 1: all dogs do. He's got to dial in. Man. He's
Speaker 1: got the life. He's with six months old right, just
Speaker 1: about six and a half months old, half well, and
Speaker 1: every office needs a dog like that. I'm glad we
Speaker 1: have one. So what are you looking forward to meeting? Or?
Speaker 1: Inc wise, now that I'm glad, everybody that listens to
Speaker 1: this podcast hopefully can get to, you know, introduced to
Speaker 1: you and who you are and what you're about. And
Speaker 1: start to read your stuff and experience the content you're
Speaker 1: gonna be able to create. But like, what's what's the
Speaker 1: thing do you look forward to? The thing that I
Speaker 1: like chasing are the characters, like the folks that are
Speaker 1: out there, the the unknown stories of just some very
Speaker 1: eccentric individual and their life and what that looks like
Speaker 1: and a deeper look into it and into their why.
Speaker 1: And that's that's always been something that I've been fascinated
Speaker 1: with and have done a little bit here and there,
Speaker 1: and definitely hoping that I can jump into that here. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, we're part of the same generation.
Speaker 1: And I would say, are we what generation? Are we
Speaker 1: generation X y Z. We're millennials, dude, Yeah, we're at
Speaker 1: the very beginning stage. We're like early on millennials. Um.
Speaker 1: I think our millennial generation that we're a part of
Speaker 1: is a lot about a lot about themselves, like a
Speaker 1: lot about me, not even a selfish me, but just
Speaker 1: that's kind of the content you see on social media.
Speaker 1: It's like turning that came around the point towards you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the deal, right, That's what people do. So that's
Speaker 1: why I agree with you, and I'm not doubting anybody
Speaker 1: who likes to turn the camera on themselves. That's totally fine,
Speaker 1: awesome and many and many aspects of freaking awesome. But
Speaker 1: I'm with you man, my journalistic um tendencies and in
Speaker 1: the that part of my mind is excited to explore,
Speaker 1: you know, with a platform, with a bigger platform that
Speaker 1: we can all share explore some those people, you know,
Speaker 1: I've been able to, even through the short time of
Speaker 1: this podcast, talked to like rabbit hunters from Maryland and
Speaker 1: the kyote hunters from Texas and Cody Act bear guides
Speaker 1: and freaking famous Australian dudes and just all I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, Steve Ronella, CEOs of huge corporations, like all
Speaker 1: kinds of stuff. And that's not it's not that it's
Speaker 1: not that they're all one type of guests, but they're
Speaker 1: just interesting people with their own stories to tell, and
Speaker 1: all those stories kind of are grounded at hunting and
Speaker 1: what hunting is about for all these people and hopefully
Speaker 1: you learn something along the way with that. So happy
Speaker 1: to add you into that group of people. Yeah. Absolutely, Oh,
Speaker 1: I don't think, um, you know, I don't think it's
Speaker 1: important that when you start creating concept for the come
Speaker 1: been and you had out the Kansas that people know
Speaker 1: everything about your life, but it's good for them to
Speaker 1: have some background on who you are, little idea, a
Speaker 1: little idea of what's going on, what's rattling around your
Speaker 1: old brain? There? Good Kansas. Um, you're gonna kill a
Speaker 1: big white tail. You guys got any like trail cam
Speaker 1: images of giant bucks? Um, we don't have any trail
Speaker 1: cam images. I've got my brothers down there. He lives there, um,
Speaker 1: and he's had eyes where has been told from a
Speaker 1: family friend of a decent one sixty class it's running around.
Speaker 1: Then we're gonna try and get after. That's nice. You
Speaker 1: guys hunting field edges? What's the what's the situation there? Um?
Speaker 1: A little bit more timber, yeah, Um, I mean everything
Speaker 1: is kind of field edges there. There's just strips of
Speaker 1: tember running through a little creek bottoms and and that stuff.
Speaker 1: But it's definitely borderlined with with agg everywhere. I gotta
Speaker 1: tell you, I'm how many white tail tangs are I
Speaker 1: eating in Kansas? Or like five of them or something
Speaker 1: like that. I've never killed a white tail in Kansas
Speaker 1: that I can remember. Over Oklahoma. Sure, Texas great the
Speaker 1: words gotten out on Kansas. Those white tails are getting pressured, yeah, man,
Speaker 1: for sure, and they know how to become ghosts. I
Speaker 1: feel like I've hund it all around that state, and
Speaker 1: I've never had any luck with white tails for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: I don't know why. Yeah, my brother got a really
Speaker 1: nice from last year, a thick body. I mean he
Speaker 1: shot a horse of a white tail. Uh. A white
Speaker 1: tail is still my favorite thing, man. I don't know.
Speaker 1: It's something about but we leave in Montana. This place
Speaker 1: is a paradise for growing outside. I mean a freaking paradise.
Speaker 1: There's always something going on. People who live here so
Speaker 1: fucking spoiled. It's a good place to be. That's very
Speaker 1: much part of why I wanted to be here too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it's just it's a gluttony of outside things
Speaker 1: to do. But for whatever reason, sitting in the timber
Speaker 1: and here in that and knowing it's coming up, nine
Speaker 1: times out of ten it's a squirrel walking up. I
Speaker 1: hate squirrels for that reason. Um, you had or a
Speaker 1: raccoon or some or a dough anything, what what you're
Speaker 1: actually there to shoot? But yeah, you can visually see
Speaker 1: your chest pocket like balancing out of your chest because
Speaker 1: your heart rates going up. Yeah. And I've killed lots
Speaker 1: of deer in that scenario and still to this day,
Speaker 1: that's the moment. I last year hunt in Iowa and
Speaker 1: Illinois and killed a buck in Illinois and Iowa with
Speaker 1: John Dudley, and I'd spent most of the year hunting
Speaker 1: in all these crazy places. But he filmed me. And
Speaker 1: when I shot this deer or it wasn't like some
Speaker 1: two buck. I mean, it's barely one fifty. I look like,
Speaker 1: you know, all the stand pots when he used to
Speaker 1: shoot his white tails, want eye fishing, one eye cut
Speaker 1: in bait, That's what I look like. I was looking
Speaker 1: up at other holy should away showy yet and it
Speaker 1: was just an archery buck that I shot him. And
Speaker 1: it wasn't you know, I just said, it wasn't any
Speaker 1: giant that anybody would have overly impressed by. But what
Speaker 1: for whatever reason that experienced every time freaking makes me
Speaker 1: go nuts? Yeah I can. It's probably because how I
Speaker 1: grew up, so you get to go do it, you
Speaker 1: bast yep. Yeah, I And like the great part about
Speaker 1: where I grew up is is it's a little wildlife
Speaker 1: mecca down in Wakefield, Kansas. There's a little river that
Speaker 1: comes in called the Republican River. Tell everybody where it is.
Speaker 1: Everybody knows there's a huge lake there too. Um, and
Speaker 1: so we've got amazing waterfowl hunting there as well snowshine
Speaker 1: and bottoms by any means. But it's a it's a
Speaker 1: great little refuge. Yeah, I mean you've got there's a
Speaker 1: lot there. Yeah, there's that that culture, That Midwestern culture
Speaker 1: is one that I enjoy ship tone because it's really
Speaker 1: that just back forty buddies farm. You know, everybody gets together,
Speaker 1: communal type of life. I mean it's it's same here.
Speaker 1: It's just you gotta walk a lot further. Yeah, It's
Speaker 1: it's something special back there for me because I had
Speaker 1: two sets of great grandparents in that town growing up,
Speaker 1: and so our family just knew everybody is. It's a
Speaker 1: small town and so it's just you want to go
Speaker 1: hunt that field. You want to go hunt that field. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: What does your about your family say about your new
Speaker 1: new gig slash life in Montana? Because when I go home,
Speaker 1: I get like certain comments. I mean my dad is
Speaker 1: just like nice cool. Yeah, really that probably means like, yes,
Speaker 1: yeah he should. Well no, last year, he's just like,
Speaker 1: you're telling me you get to go hunt and fish
Speaker 1: for work, you son of a bitch. It's like, I'm
Speaker 1: your son. Does there many sense? My dad's my dad?
Speaker 1: My early my career, my dad did say ship like that.
Speaker 1: But now he's just like malaise. He's like, oh yeah
Speaker 1: they're hunt there. That's great for you. Congratulations. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: he's pretty pumped about it. Mom's happy for me, Like, dude,
Speaker 1: like ants and uncles be like, who's that Stephen Renowly
Speaker 1: tell me about him? He's on the Netflix. He's crazy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what I get. Like, my dad calls, well, now,
Speaker 1: my dad, I think corrected it. H Ronnelli is like Renelly,
Speaker 1: it's Renelly, Steve renow I'm surprised it's not like Scott Ronnelly.
Speaker 1: But yeah, my mom will say that it's Reelly. It's Ronnelli.
Speaker 1: There he in the office, the Renelly. Can you see
Speaker 1: him from the TV? Yes? Mom, I got a lot
Speaker 1: of buddies asking me what's he like, what's he like,
Speaker 1: what's he like off the camera? What's should just make
Speaker 1: stories up? Oh man rarely, if ever wears a shirt.
Speaker 1: He's got a one seven five a beam and he
Speaker 1: just walks around the tattoos, I mean full tattoos. You
Speaker 1: don't notice on the TV show Full Tattoos, they just
Speaker 1: put makeup over the face tattoos on Netflix. Well that's
Speaker 1: good man. I'm glad you're going home. Yeah, enjoy that. Uh,
Speaker 1: hopefully everybody can tune in or to or read or
Speaker 1: watch the content you're going to create for for our
Speaker 1: company doing a little bit of all of that for sure.
Speaker 1: Enjoy all of that and uh now and in the
Speaker 1: future too. So click on the old meat Eater dot
Speaker 1: com and there you'll find me and Morgan and Kenyan
Speaker 1: and Ronella and Folky and a whole bunch of other
Speaker 1: talented folks in the months hopefully years to come, great
Speaker 1: years years to come. So thanks for falling along as
Speaker 1: we build this and appreciate you sharing your story. Dude. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: thanks for having me. That's it. That's all episode number
Speaker 1: thirty five in the books. Thanks to Morgan, Thanks to
Speaker 1: our Low and Pinion two pups for hanging out for
Speaker 1: a great podcast on Austin day in the Meat Eator
Speaker 1: offices here in Bozeman, and so hopefully enjoyed that story.
Speaker 1: I know I did. Hopefully you can take your time
Speaker 1: to read Morgan's articles on the meat Eator dot com
Speaker 1: and follow along as his journeys he starts to create
Speaker 1: content for us, all his story and and give give
Speaker 1: all of you a little insight into his expertise and
Speaker 1: his life as a hunter, angler and a person who
Speaker 1: enjoys going outside. So until next time, please go to
Speaker 1: the meat Eater dot com as we said, and go
Speaker 1: to the listen tap, and there you'll find this podcast
Speaker 1: all its episodes. You'll find all of the Meat Eater episodes,
Speaker 1: of course goes without saying, but you'll also find Mark
Speaker 1: Kenyan Wired to Hunt. You will find anchored with April Folkey,
Speaker 1: and you'll find a ship ton of articles to read
Speaker 1: about wild foods, about conservation, and about hunting and fishing
Speaker 1: and how to be better at all of it. And
Speaker 1: so if that's not enough, if you still need more
Speaker 1: stuff to do, go and sign up for the newsletter.
Speaker 1: The Meat Eater newsletter comes out every Wednesday morning and
Speaker 1: it is all things meat Eater related. So for now,
Speaker 1: that's all I have, but that should keep you busy
Speaker 1: until next two to day when we'll be back with
Speaker 1: another episode of This Year podcast, so thank you for joining.
Speaker 1: We'll see you then. Bye, m hm hm