Welcome to the Struggle Bubble. I'm Chad Kutting. and I am Craig Surgey. We are joined today by a good friend, Rob Ludeman. Rob, thank you for joining us. It is pleasure. am excited, gentlemen, to be here. I've been listening to some of the episodes and I love what you're working on. So it is pleasure to be here. That's awesome. Rob and I go a few years back through the little league, but I think Craig, you and Rob go back even further. Yeah, we go back to the good old soccer days. It's a lifetime ago for probably Rob and Matt, but this seems like yesterday for me. Still out there getting old knees. Still one of Matt's favorite coaches. I will compliment you and that's not just me. Or the episode that's still one of Matt's favorite coaches because of your style, because you didn't focus on the winning and the losing and the goal scoring, but on developing skills. And that's very relevant to where he is with his athletic pursuits right now. convinced it's not about Craig's talent, it's about the accent. They don't know, the players don't know when they're mad, when he's mad at them. Don't blame me. It's not like you're running up and down the sideline yelling rubbish. you know, that was a coach that I had when I was nine or 10 playing comp, Scottish guy going, rubbish, Eric, rubbish. Yeah, the new one, have translated to garbage. That's a garbage pass. It's a garbage ball. The kids know that, they know, they know. But I'm so stoked that he's not in soccer anymore, obviously. it doesn't matter what the score is. The learning lessons of like he's taken in the, hey, the winning, the losing, the game will be the game. We know that. But the actual learning curve that he's taken in football and baseball is still, you know, I've still got to. Keep working at it, right? It's 17, 18, you're still grinding away and still trying to find the next thing. Well, something clicked in one or two years ago. So Matt is 17. He's a senior at Los Gatos. He plays football. He plays baseball. And he's had a private coach for baseball whose focus is really around fitness and practicing on your own and reps. And it really is a contrast to the travel ball and all. But something clicked in with Matt a couple of years ago where he just became very self-motivated, right? He just goes to the training facility on his own now for two or three hours at a time. He hits, he lifts weights, he throws, he invites a friend. And I love seeing that because at a younger age, we're always dragging our kids to the practice and trying to get them out to do things. And at some point, I tell you folks that are listening with younger kids, it's going to click in and they're going to become self -motivated. And that's really exciting as a parent when you see that happen, when you see that moment. And that's one of the reasons why we are excited to have you on Rob, because we've, we have experience with younger, our younger children, right? Under the age of 12, that's who we're coaching, that's who's in the family. Now you've seen it progress from Matty being a little kid, you know, just kicking a soccer ball around, you know, not knowing what's going on. And then all the way at a very high level, right? The Los Gatos football team going deep runs into the playoffs, the Los Gatos baseball team making deep runs into the playoffs. There's a high competitive angle. When did you see that? switch over to him where it wasn't, you know, because I have to go to baseball because dad is telling me to go to baseball. It's because I want to be there and I want to put in the effort to get better. probably 13 or 14 right it was it was just a little bit after he finished majors and football was different right that came later that's a whole nother story that was something we never even expected just that he was gonna be a really good football player and he would come to me and say hey can we go out and throw you know I need to pitch can you throw me batting practice And I think it partially is age and maturity and partially maybe it's just the situation, right? You and I did the little league thing a lot, Chad. And there is a lot of that that's schedule oriented, it's routine oriented and you have to go to practice and you have to go to the games. And then once Matt hit 13 or 14, there was more freedom, but he wanted to play. He wanted to get out there and he wanted to practice. Craig, Matt never made it to 10 juggles. So I know. ha ha ha. I know that's something that you're big ups to your player who did 96 when I listened to the Labor Day episode. I don't think Matt ever got to 10. And that's why he's not playing soccer anymore. Also, all the kids got really fast compared to him. And I guess that's why he's a lineman now. Well, it's funny you say that. two things I got straight off the bat here is, do you think unstructured play is part of or majority of where he got to today? And do you think at the age of 13 and 14 was that decision -making in his own head that I'm better at baseball? I know you said football came later, but then other sports. So now I'm doubling down. What do you think that click was? Why was that click? And is it all kind of merged into one really? think it's maturity mainly and just looking ahead at what he needed to do to get better. We still don't... have the same opportunities or avenues for unstructured play that I think the three of us had growing up. I grew up in Saratoga. Every weekend I would get buddies together. We'd go play wiffle ball. We'd meet up at the field. We'd meet up and play pickup basketball, probably not as much soccer, football, street football. It just doesn't exist. And so I can't say around 13 or 14 that he had more unstructured opportunities, but there was something in him where he started realizing seeing the older kids play, that he wanted to do that. He wanted to play in high school and he wanted to have an opportunity to potentially play at the next level, which is something we're working on every day right now with his college applications and recruiting. Yeah, so self -guided then. He realized that that's his goal and that's where he's going to put the time, energy and effort to get to. Which is pretty early, 13, 14, everyone's got a dream, right? To go to major leagues or whatever sport you're doing, but to then actually work it backwards and figure out strengths, weaknesses. How did you deal with that? Like how, from a parenting standpoint, more than a coaching standpoint of, okay, we're going to support you obviously and what you want to do, but... You know, there's obviously days where I'm sure he woke up and was like, I don't know if it's gonna work out for me or, you know, I need to work on, is he self -motivated on seeing his weaknesses and working on them or is it more of a Tiger Woods mentality that I'm really good at this and I'm gonna be exceptional at this. It's a cop out, it's both, right? So he's definitely aware of where he needs to improve, but he's also a really darn good baseball player, right? And so there's that, if you've ever gone through 360 training, Chad, you probably have in corporate world when you do 360 and they tell you about your strengths. And what's interesting is when you go through the strengths, you're... your tendency is to look at the weaknesses and say, I need to improve and bring up these weaknesses. And one of those 360 reviews I did, the HR counselor said, actually, you really should focus on the strengths, right? Those are the areas that people see you as a great leader. And so for Matt, I think he saw his strengths. And so it was to... maintain his level of strength and to make those areas better, but also work on some of the weakness types of areas. And I think to put a pin in that, Craig, I think the thing that helped him the most was we lined him up with a private coach. And I know not everybody has resources for that, but his private coach in baseball was part of the reason that I think he became very self -motivated. That was a reason to get out and we supported him with that financially and with time. That's one of the reasons why he's in a position now where maybe he's going to get to go play Division I college baseball. There's a chance. Yeah, I kind of classify that as unstructured now as well. I think one -on -one training, it's unstructured in the format that it's not the whole team, I'm gonna go soccer term here, but it's not the whole team. I don't see you in the game every single week, so I don't know really is your position in a weakness, things like that, but I can hyper expose the technical abilities in a single instance. So I can work on striking, I can work on. receiving, can, so I kind of call that now as an unstructured session, right? Unstructured to us is going out with our buddies, getting our asses kicked by someone that's five years older than us, et cetera, and that's what kind of built us into the players we were, but now these kids, it definitely, for me anyway, is down to unstructured means of private coach going in and working on technical aspects of the game. So it's really interesting, that's, it's good feedback as well for anyone that's listening, like, know, resources are resources. At the same time, if the kid is that driven, go in the backyard and juggle the ball. Bye. Rob, what I didn't know about you, we're doing a little research in this episode. So Duke University, you go all the way to the East Coast. You grew up in Saratoga and then also decided to play baseball at Duke. And club team, but what was important to you about getting out there and maintaining that sports part when you're, I'm sure, have all the studies in the world that need to get done? I I played hardball until I was 35, right? So was something that I just loved doing, but you reach that point when you're in high school and you're looking at the trade -off between academics and athletics. And certainly there are kids that are both smart and amazing athletes. And I was just pretty good, right? So Chad, I was getting letters from D3 schools, right? Come to somewhere. Yeah, come to somewhere in Ohio, in Ohio or Iowa that I'd never heard of from California, or I had an opportunity to go to a really great university. And so that was the trade -off. But club sports. was a way that I could keep playing but not have to sacrifice as much time. So I actually had a really fun college life. I had fun. I was able to manage my studies and I got to play baseball and it wasn't club intramurals. We were traveling to Chapel Hill and playing UNC. We were playing NC State. We were playing UNC Greensboro. Liberty, schools in the region, Virginia Military Institute. We were playing their club programs and it was highly competitive. We had officials. it was great. that actually my best friends now that I still have 30 years later, my friend group that goes to Vegas every year that has a text thread that we do fantasy sports with, it's all those club baseball guys. Like that was the best part about it was those teammates became friends for life. And so I encourage again, kids or parents of kids who are struggling with the college athletics, you don't have to go play. Division I, II, or III sports, pick an education and go pick out club sports. And club sports are so much better and well organized compared to when I was in school in the early 90s where they were just getting started. It's a great way to stay competitive and really get the juices continuing to flow around playing a sport. That's so true. I'm the exact same way. The friends playing football, playing baseball in college still talk to you. Talk to two of them this week, three of them this week. The bonds are there. I'm curious on the baseball side. It's important to you, you played hardball in three or 35, which was just a couple years ago, Rob. Was there ever a doubt that your son was gonna play baseball? We wanted to expose him to any sports he was interested in, right? So we certainly weren't going to force him to do anything, but like most families in this country, your kid is in T -ball at five and you get exposed to it. Certainly I wanted him to play on a personal level because it was something that I enjoyed and mattered to me. But if he came home one day when he was 10 and said, I don't want to play anymore, go, okay, great. What else is there? something, right? Go do dance, go do cheerleading, play an instrument. I don't care, but you have to have a hobby or something separately than just going to school and hanging out with your friends. Fortunately for us, he took to the baseball, right? You can tell right away in T -ball, those kids that they're pretty good. And we got him into soccer eventually later flag football. basketball not until much later but only for a year or two just because it was something fun to do. But yeah, of course I love because I played that he played and I think he was 13 or 14 when he was already better than I was as a senior. I he was throwing faster at 14 or 15 than I threw when I was a senior in high school. So there's some special talent there that he has which is really great. just want to take a second to let everybody know the type of person that you are and your family. When I came onto Los Gatos Little League, Matty was on his way out. Your son was out of his way out of Little League. You were our umpire in chief and decided to stay on the board for multiple years when Matt wasn't even part of the league anymore. So that's one piece that I want you to talk about in a second. The other is, in that same year, you and Matt volunteered to coach a tee ball team. You did not have a five or six year old on that team. You had no family relation anywhere close to that team for that grasshopper season. Is that a grasshopper's polo you have on? Yeah, it would also suffice as a grasshopper's polo. It would work. But you gave you gave back to the committee. just it just said so much about you and Matt and then seeing both of you on the field together that bond that you had before he was going into the big high school years, the independence years was just so great to watch. Talk a little bit about why it was meaningful for you to do that both on the league level to stay on with us and also coach with Matty. I had great examples in my parents, both of whom volunteered in the community. so part of that was a reflection of what I saw growing up and what it meant for them to give back. My dad ran umpires in Saratoga Little League. So the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. My dad also did storage marketing, which I do now. you know, cats in the cradle and all that stuff, right? But it... Yes, Matt had moved on, but the opportunity to do something fun like coaching a tee ball team with him and probably even more so, Chad, you've seen this out on the field. When I get to go umpire with my son and I'm doing plate and he's out in the field, we have the greatest time. It's an hour and 45 minutes and we're mentally connected in a way that just a father and son or a parent and child can be. And it was super fun. And it's something I love doing. I think I did it for three years after he finished Little League. It was fun to be on the board and it was an easy and enjoyable way to stay involved in the community and to give back. And then what happens is high school gets too busy and you just need to back out and be there to support and go to the games that your kids in and help with homework and all that. But I think it was a great experience just for the three or four years beyond when he finished. And I don't look back on it with any regrets at all. It was great. It's a message I really want to get out there and have resonate. I'm the same way. So my dad still involved in umpiring, officiating basketball, volleyball, to be able to go out on the field and know that you're there, you're on the same page, you're hanging out, you're actually learning how to represent yourself in the community. You're umpiring as a kid, as 12, 13, 14 year old, you have the safety net of your dad out there. But also you're talking to grownups, you're in charge of a game, you're in charge of the flow. A ton of lessons from my childhood came out of being out on that diamond and hanging out with my dad. No, the lessons are fantastic. And for parents that I talked to about doing the umpire and you know, this chat is. dealing with adults, learning at a young age, 12, 13, how to comport yourself with adults, making decisions and standing behind them and being definitive about them. That's a great skill. And you need that all throughout life, whether you're in business or whatever your vocation is, they're just, you know, umpiring or officiating in general and putting yourself out there. There is risk that comes with it. You are going to make a mistake and you're going to have to learn how to fail and how to recover from that failure, but continue to stay focused on the job. There's just so many great learnings that come from officiating. Do you have any like, arsehole parents like we have in soccer? At baseball? 18 minutes. 18 minutes. have set a record, Craig. Congratulations. You did not curse for the first 18 minutes. And then I think you said arse, arsehole. Is that cursing? Sorry, I interrupted the question, please. And anatomy is not cursing. Yeah, is there any like bad parents in like, cause I mean, you've seen it Rob, like there's some real. You can say assholes again.- Opinionated parents? I'm trying not because I've got games this weekend. Opinionated parents. One, I play the sports world no more than you. Like, fuck you. That's not gonna work for me. Then, there's parents that are just so intense in the game. overprotective of their kids. Is it the same as soccer as it is in baseball for the umpires? Because I - Like, I stand with the refs and I'm like They asked me other time, it's not just hands in the air. None of my lost cows parents get into any of these conversations. Cause they know I'll snap it real quick. So I support the referees in like, Hey, dude, you want to cancel the game? Cause the opponents are being this way. That's fine with me. Like I'm not, I'm going to support you in that, right? This is the same in baseball. The reason I'm asking this question, I feel like it's probably going to be worse because soccer's not really an American sport, I mean it is but it's not. Baseball and football, people think they could have made it when they absolutely could never have made it. So their opinions are so high on what's right and what's wrong. What bothers me most about soccer parents is parents yelling at their kids to do things on the field, right? You made the comment in the last episode, which you used to remind us of when Matt was playing on the team, is you're paying a lot. Let the coach do the coaching. Just say, job, clap, cheer, be disappointed. There's a subset of parents that are going to be problematic and challenging in any sport. at every level. mean, even in the high school ranks, and this is something we're going to all need to watch out for, there's an official shortage. have football, Matt's football game against Mountain View in two weeks was moved from Friday to a Thursday night solely for the reason that there are not enough officials in the Bay Area, in the South Bay to do the high school games. Why? Because they get yelled at, they get shouted at, and they don't want to put up with that. They don't pay them enough to have to put up with that. So yes. soccer, baseball, basketball, isn't great. I wish people could just mellow out and just enjoy the game. And that's one of the nicer things about having a kid in high school is you just show up and you just watch. don't need to yell anything, right? There's tons of coaches there and they're gonna handle it. They'll do the yelling and they do. But it's everywhere and it will continue to be a problem. Officials and official shortages are still gonna continue to happen and I think get worse just because of that dynamic. That sucks. It really does. It sucks for the game, sucks for the... For all of it, honestly. The kids as well. Part of the reason I get into this hard is what example are you showing your kids? If it didn't go your way, then you can scream and shout and, know, shout bloody murder. Like, no, dude, it just didn't go your way today. It's okay. It wasn't anybody's fault. Sad. It's really sad. The overall mentality, you're of combining all that, Matty is coming up and starts to enjoy the game. He's umpiring with you. I think the way that you've represented yourself and the transparency that you have helps offset some of the attitudes that you get. Like for me, when I'm out there with you or with any of the other kids, I think being there as an umpire or as an official for the right reasons. and also the parents being there for the right reasons. When those two worlds come together, it's a great experience. Everybody's out there to have fun. Nobody is out there to miss a call or to miss a play, or to miss a route. We're all trying our best. And I think that's that empathy that we're missing a bit that we'd love to bring back to the game. that's the word you and I always discussed when we were working together on the board and doing the umpire. It's empathy. It's putting yourself in the position of that official who, by the way, is trying to do their best. They are not going out there intentionally missing calls. or not paying attention, they are out there trying to do a job. And for the adults, when you criticize us, we are out there primarily volunteering, at least at the Little League level. We are not getting paid. Soccer, other sports, different, but regardless of whether they're getting paid or not, they're trying their best. And it's not like everybody, the game is not gonna matter so much that everybody's gonna get a scholarship or win a trophy. And even if it's that, just be quiet, watch the game, enjoy it. There's Craig and I have talked about this a little bit and it may be too heavy for this episode, but there's almost a feeling where people enjoy other people's failure. Where if you make a bad call, they're trying to get on you right away, say, you made a bad call and there's an enjoyment and they want to see other people fail, which is just a scary place to be. Because as we've talked about, you're there for the right reasons, I'm going to miss a call. I'm going to miss a ground ball. I'm going to miss a shot. I'm going to miss a pass. It's going to happen. Harping on that isn't really fixing anything. All the games are made for mistakes. That's the whole point of the game, right? You're trying to... Yep. Yep. well, and take that forward because you've hit this topic a number of times is take that forward to our kids post game. And that's one of the biggest things I've had to learn and change about myself. And it probably started around that same time we were talking about earlier, where Matt was 13 or 14, where when the game finishes, I learned to not talk about how he played or how he performed. Just the easiest thing you can say as a parent or a spectator or a friend of the kid is, I loved watching you play today. I really enjoyed watching you play. Give it some time or pick out something cool that happened. Even if Matt maybe has a bad day or bad outing, go, I really love that pitch you made against that third batter with three, two to come back. That was super cool. And it's a positive thing. and that's full circle, Rob, right? As you said, with the private coaching, concentrating on the positives, not the weakness, right? So you should be representing that as a parent after as well. Again, the game's the game. The cards are gonna flop the way they flop. So let's concentrate on what you did really well and accelerate at that. The thing you did wrong is probably just a mistake and you don't actually need to fix it, because it won't happen again or it'll be less continuous. That will naturally clean itself, so let's accelerate on the positives. That's right. Rob, one thing we haven't touched on yet, and I was going to do this at the beginning of the show. When people see the name Ludemann on this episode, are they going to think about you first or are they going to think about your more famous significant other? Actually, if you think about it, I'm probably the third most popular in the community right now. Yeah, so relative to Mrs. Ludeman, first grade teacher at Dave's in her 29th year, God bless her, and how long she's been doing that. And people really have no idea behind the scenes how much time she actually dedicates and spends every night for two to three hours. correcting papers, doing work at home, going in on the weekend. So think about your elementary school, your middle school and your high school teachers a little bit differently if you didn't realize that, that there is a lot of time they put in beyond just 830 to 230 in the classroom. So yes, I am Mr. Ludeman in the community. I'm no longer really known as the umpire guy because all those kids have aged and moved on. And now I'm really the third most popular, you know, if there's a scale it's like, like Julie, Matt, and then right here at the bottom of the screen is Rob, because Matt's known pretty well as a nice guy in the community. Is it Rob though, or is it Matt's dad, Julie's husband? for sure, for sure. Yeah, it's Mr. Ludeman, it's Matt's dad. Yeah. And I mean, there's a small set of people that actually call Julie the mayor. now that seems like a great next step for Julie. They call her the mayor because it's really difficult for us to, and we actually don't go out in town very much because it's really difficult to go out in town in Los Gatos because she is recognized when you have, I don't know how many kids over 29 years times 20, what 500, 600 students that she's taught in close to 30 years. She knows tons of kids, lots of families. We're now going through weddings. of former students. think former students are having children. I was just about to ask that if she'd done the full circle yet where an ex -student's kid is now in the school. not we're close, right? So we're really close on that. She has taught multiple offspring of former classmates of people that she grew up because other people may not know as well. Matt is a third generation Los Gatos high school student. So Julie went there in the late 80s, was a cheerleader and Julie's mom, Carolyn, went there. 20 or 25 years prior. So he's a third generation. So there's a lot of community ties, which is a cool thing. Yeah, it's really cool. Really cool. that the next step of being a mayor, actually Rob, I wanted to ask you, we ran into you and Julie at the football game down at Soquel last week. And it was at a distance. So Craig, we were walking out with Lauren's dad and Rob and Julie are walking in. And at first, I didn't yell for Rob, we yelled for Julie because she's the more popular one and the kids really love seeing her. But the first reaction and tell me if I'm wrong is I just want to go in and get the football game. I don't want to talk to a parent or one of my students. And then you saw it was us and it was okay. But is that what you're talking about going out in public of like, I just want to I want to go somewhere. I'm going to get in trouble if she listens, we do have a certain code when we're shopping at Trader Joe's or in stores where she'll give me a certain look and then disappear down an aisle and around the corner. Not so much that she doesn't want to engage, but it's usually when she's in sweats and the hair isn't tied. it's wanting to avoid that connection. So it's not that she doesn't want to be friendly, but there are certain times and places where she prefers to stay a little bit more anonymous. I mean, Judy must have seen so much in 29 years. All at Dave's, all at the school, or different schools. Wow. No way. Yeah, she attended Dave's for part of her elementary school and started there when several of her teachers were still teachers. And she had to learn to not call them Mrs. and Mr., right? In the break room, they're like, no, no, you don't call me Mrs. Herd, I'm Tony, right? okay. Right? She was 23 and still seeing them as teachers. So yeah, long legacy there. She must have seen a lot. Must have seen a lot of, what grades? She gone through all of them? she's always taught first and she has seen a lot, but the things Craig that fundamentally don't change is she inherits 24, 25 kids that are kindergartners who don't really know how to do much of anything. And she has them for seven or eight months. And at the end of seven or eight months, they can read, they can write, they can do more than basic math. and they are ready to go on to second grade. And I think that's what keeps her inspired in doing it. I think that's the part that she loves is teaching six -year -olds foundational skills that will benefit them the rest of their life. I love that in on the struggle bubble, we thank every single teacher we know, Julie and everybody at the local schools and everybody around the country, because we saw firsthand what it takes to educate children when COVID hit. When we had COVID kindergarten, and we're trying to get anybody to pay attention and you're at your wits end, I cannot do what the teachers do. Everything that they're doing for our kids day in and day out, and I'm sure on days where they don't. want to be there sometimes, they're they're tired, but they show up and they get the job done is a lot of kudos that need to be sent. about umpiring, Chad, right? There were times during games when I just want to take off the gear and give it to the person harassing me and say, here, why don't you come out and you come out and do this. Everybody had about 15 months where they got to attempt to teach their kids stuck at home and realized, this stuff is, this is hard. What it goes by to something I say a lot in the sporting world is I personally think some of your best coaches should be at the foundation phase. Like I know everybody wants the best, you know, the best kids at this level and win a national championship, whatever. If you don't get that foundation level right, that 18, 17, whatever national level isn't ever gonna come. because you gotta get that foundation and development phase dialed in early and strong and those morals set before you can scroll up, right? So I think, it's a great, I love that she's just first grade. Like, I know my job, I can knock it out the pot, these kids are gonna come into the world absolutely solid, and I'm sure, as you just said, going to weddings and stuff, they still remember all of this from six years old, that that was the foundation to where they are now. So I think that's... That's massive and it's really cool that she stays in that age group and knows her strengths, honestly, and the school as well. Good for them keeping her, you know, happy, because it's not fun every day, I'm sure, as Chad said, but where she's really at her strongest points. That's awesome. I didn't expect a full, I kind of did a full tangent to focus on your incredible wife, but you both have done an incredible job with establishing yourselves in the community, giving back. Matt's incredible athlete student says hi to me every single time comes up shakes my hand, which is it says a lot that he's able to represent you and the family really well. What are some of the, I'll say milestone struggles and milestone strategies that you've seen that have had to change? over time from the elementary to the middle school to the high school that you can help our listeners out with. think I'll start with, and I thought about this when we were talking leading up to the episode, I will tell people that there is light at the end of the tunnel. Right? So while you may feel that you are struggling, and certainly Julie and I went through it as well, there are game changers that happen. Matt started to drive a year and a half ago. That's an amazing game changer. Like, what do do with an hour? on average back in your day, every day because you're not hauling off to the practice or dropping off at school or dropping off at a friend's house. So that is certainly huge. But we went through the same thing that everybody that you've had on has talked about, right? Trying to focus on your career, your vocation. I had a period for 10 to 12 years where I was traveling 120 ,000, 150 ,000 miles a year. Matt was born and I was in Hong Kong. three weeks later and I still hear about it 17 years later from Julie if she really crossed with me about something she can dig that up and bring that up. So keep plugging everyone. There is light at the end of the tunnel, but know that the sacrifices you're making and the time that you're making are valuable. I made it to every possible game, school recital. school concert, everything that Maddie was doing, and I have zero regrets. None. Absolutely, absolutely zero regrets. And sometimes that was leaving work at 2 .30 to go to a three o 'clock game. The time invested was well worth it. So while there may be less time for you to do the things that you want, we have the kids, we have the families. That's what we signed up for. and it's all worthwhile. We're less than a year away. He's gonna go off somewhere and I'm gonna miss it. We already talk about weekly, what are we gonna do with all the time when we're empty nesters? How are we gonna spend that? Some of it sounds fun just to whip off somewhere for a weekend, but I know we'll miss the noise, we'll miss his coming and going, we'll miss being able to go watch games. So my advice is optimistically. there's gonna come a time when you're in high school and it's gonna feel really good again to have that kind of that more breathing room, that more time where you're not just driving around everywhere on the weekend. Going down, that was hell, Chad, when you talked about Morgan Hill for, I assume it was down in the complex off of Tenet or what, I can't stand that place. That place is an absolute nightmare, but it brought back memories of some really fun tournaments that, you know, he scored four goals in a game down there one time. I still... I remember him holding up his four fingers with his, you know, fourth goal, which was just some goofy kick top of the box that he looped over the goalie. We had some fun times there and I made the time and the effort to go there and it was all worth it. So parents, I know it's hard. Keep listening. I think you're gonna get a lot of great perspectives in this program from people, but as one of the more experienced guests that you've had already, which means I'm old, which means I'm over 50 and just, you know. Rob. You're just a few years removed from that 35th birthday. I had my first lower extremity inspection two days ago. So, you know, there's that meme that floats around, if you know what a cassette tape or a fax machine is, go schedule your colonoscopy. I just had one of those. So no, I certainly have the age, but I know what everybody's going through. And it's great you have this resource to help people commiserate and learn techniques from others. Just one more question on that, because you brought up professionally, Rob. There's certain videos and things going around social media about the negative impact to capitalism of this softer parenting style that we're talking about, softer in quotes, where people are dodging out of work early. They're not burning the midnight oil. The Starbucks CEO got feedback of, why are you prioritizing your kids over your multi-billion dollar corporation? You've reiterated this, we've said this, there's no regrets. I just want you to, there's no regrets on either side. You've progressed in your career at some large companies, Sun, Oracle, now Pure. Talk a little bit about that dedication to your craft at work, the dedication to the family and the synergy that you've had to not have those regrets. The mantra is really family first and I've led teams of seven people, 15 people, 25 people as a manager, as a leader. And I sincerely believed that as a leader as well. I never told somebody no if they had some type of family obligation. If you don't have that strong foundation of somebody feeling like they can prioritize their family, it's really difficult to expect them to excel and be committed to their craft. I mean, look, we're... If it was 30 or 40 years ago with the office culture of show up at eight and leave at five, my dad worked at IBM for 37 years and that's every day he left at seven, he got home at six and that was just the way things are. We are blessed to have the flexibility. The work takes care of itself in the time that you need. I make breakfast for Matt every morning and at 7 .15 I sit down and I start doing work at the breakfast table. I do emails, I hang out, I drive in at nine when traffic has gone away. Sometimes I blow out at 3 .30 or four, but at night I'm doing emails. So the beauty of technology that we have now is we can do the work how and when we need to do the work. And hopefully you're in a situation where you have a management or a company culture that is flexible enough and understands that. And it's not about your butt in the seat. It's about getting your work done. And granted, there will be times you have priorities, have deadlines, and those will get in the way of family. But if it happens too much, then you really probably should seriously question the role you're in, the company you're in, and allowing you the freedom to choose how and when you get to prioritize family. Absolutely. Well, we have thoroughly appreciated you coming on Rob for accepting the invitation and talking through us. think another side of the struggle bubble, right? You're on the outer skirts of the struggle bubble. You've made it work and wish you, Julie, Mattie, all the best. And for everybody looking or watching the video, there's a Mark Price starting lineup figurine in the background here. When Rob and I first met, learned I was a Cleveland guy and we're an Ohio State, Ohio guy. Mark Price is my hero. Shows up at my doorstep, drops off a, I think it was, was it eBay that you found it, Rob? I got an eBay Mark Price and as the backdrop, my favorite player growing up was Ron Harper, Miami of Ohio guy, Cleveland Cavalier, then a Clipper, then a Laker, but for whatever reason, he was my favorite player. So I followed the Cavs and so I got plenty of Mark Price and I know all about it. Well, certainly yes. Yeah, I try not to watch that highlight. Yeah. They shoved it in our face. Rob, really appreciate it. For everybody listening, please follow us on Instagram. A lot of great content coming up. We'll keep you posted on all the guests that we have. That's the struggle bubble pod on Instagram. And recommend this to a friend. Send it over. Anybody that is experiencing that struggle bubble, what we hear. And Craig, there was a conversation last night with one of the soccer dads. he conveyed to us that, hey, there are people going through the same things that we are. We're not alone in this struggle. We're all having very similar conversations with our kids, with our wives, significant others, with our friends. Let's be all in this together. Join the struggle bubble and we'll get through this together as best we can. me caveat that really quick. He said when I was listening to it, I text my wife and said, see, everyone's going through the same thing. You need to listen to this podcast. So I appreciate that, shouting from the rooftops. Don't want to get anybody in trouble. All right, until next week everybody, appreciate it. Adios, thank you. Cheers all.