Welcome to the Struggle Bubble I'm Chad Kutting And I am Craig Surgey. We took last week off, Craig, so I apologize to everybody that was looking for a Struggle Bubble episode, but you know, life happens. life happens. mean, you know, Austin Stefani was not happy. He didn't have anything to listen to. Chris Mullen was unhappy. We've also got these reports about not having all of our episodes on YouTube. think, slackers, slackers.com. We didn't think we were reaching the world, but now look at us. People are calling us. Where are you? We need you in our lives on a Wednesday morning. It was a wellness check. Everyone's checking in to see where the Struggle Bubble is. Well, worry not everybody. We're still here. And we're bringing you the season one finale today. 30th episode. yeah, where's my clap audio? I'm dropping the ball. You take a week off and look what happens. But we thought today we would go and just recap everything that we've done over the past 30 episodes and just get everybody caught up on what's going on in our Struggle Bubble with the amount of volunteer hours that we're putting in, businesses being started. There's a lot going on, Craig. I am on severe burnout mode, it's fantastic. What is good is you literally close your eyes at night and you fall asleep. There is no counting sheep. It's pass out till that alarm hits. So that's nice. you're up at like three o'clock in the morning walking a dog. Yeah, if people aren't following me on Strava, then you need to get me because it's hilarious when I'm waking everybody up when I close my walk with the dog and everyone's like, God damn it, he's already burnt 500 calories and I'm asleep. And then if you don't do that, we're checking in on you, make sure that Echo's getting his proper doggy care. Yeah, no, because it's shit if I'm dead. Just make sure that Echo's got you walking. I mean, the dog's way more adorable than you are. I got a really sad story about that, we can start with sad. I was walking in this morning. Yeah, no, it's fine. It was 6.15, 6.10, something like that. And the guy stops me and it's pretty dark at that time of the morning. He rolls down his window and he's like, hey, I'm like, yeah, what's going on? And he said, hey, enjoy every walk with your dog. I had to put my dog down last night. I'm like, I don't know if that's like inspirational. Enjoy, throw the ball one extra time for your dog or super sad for 6.10 on a Wednesday morning, but either way. words for you because when we were out on our weekly meeting, our preparation meeting on Monday, you were telling him you were just gonna let him go and jump in the lake with the ducks and you weren't gonna save him. Such a dumbass. Bless him. Well, as we know, chases, yep, I mean, he chases bears, he chases ducks, he chases geese. I do want to get him employed at Fisher Middle School so we can clear that field every morning, but they're not willing. No, they're not willing right now. But yeah, so the week off has been, I kind of missed it. Missed the bullshit hour. Yeah, is there anything that you want to get off your chest that you missed on the last couple of weeks? You had a few soccer matches? lot, a lot. Yeah, we had a few soccer matches. High school soccer started or tryouts. Yeah. don't you volunteer for, Craig? That's a great question. Yeah, I'm an idiot basically. No, the high school... Yeah, I've not completed that one. I've got some technical stuff in there we can roll into. So, soccer's winding down, so I'll give you a quick recap. 2016 girls, if we win our remaining matches, we may come second in the league by one or two points. So, if things go our way... We could clinch it. We're talking about seven and eight year old soccer. you know, let's make sure we pop the apple cider if we do win it. But yeah, those girls are pretty excited and growing at a rapid pace, which is fantastic. And then the high school. get promoted into the next platinum division? Already in it. There's nowhere to go except to year up. Wow, you're, that's incredible. And it's all because of the coach. It's definitely not because of the coach. I just build the environment. Just build the environment. No, but the high school, let's talk on that, because that one's coming in. We beat Scotts Valley 3-0 on Monday. We play Branham on Friday if it's not rained out. These are just preseason friendlies, so that don't mean a lot yet, but it is a pretty decent bomb squad of players. We've got one Stanford commit already. Three that I think will get picked up the minute they hit, four, no, three I think will get picked up the minute they hit junior year, which is next year for them. So we have a solid spine, four or five. And then we've got a few more that I think will potentially be a D2 level team or players. it's, high school's looking pretty strong this year, but we'll see, you never know. do you mentally go from 2016s, so you got eight year olds, I mean some that haven't turned eight yet, they got another month, and then to 15, 16, 17, 18 year olds? It's a switch for sure. My language isn't different between the two. No, I'm joking. Yeah, no, it's a switch. But you know what's funny? There's so many similarities though. Just stupid shit. I just received the ball with the correct part of the foot or the right foot, you know, instead of whatever it is. So there's some things that are very similar. And then there's some things that you're like, all right, like I shouldn't tell you to work hard. Like that's an issue and I can ball out a 15, 16, 17 year old on like being a lazy ass. Say it's a difference, but it's the same. Like the seven year olds don't know when they're tired. So you have to monitor them and pull them out when they look tired. 15, 16, 17. And at the end of the day, high school, you're there to win as well. So equal playing time, those things are out the window. You're there to try and win a CCS title. it's pretty much, and the way we've built it, I'm the assistant coach, right? Jess is the head coach. But the way she's built the program is we're really not too worried if you're a freshman all the way up to senior, like the best players will start in that position. So it's a thrive environment. And if someone's ahead of you, prove to us that you should get that spot, which I enjoy, right? It's a lot more where that higher level comes in as high level as you can get at high school. But it's a great mix. It's a great mix. We talked a lot about, know, at a younger age, the positions don't really matter. Just go be an athlete, expose them to everything. And then as you get towards the high school age, more competitively, there are skill sets for each one of those positions. Is there a, like in football, there's a, like a general athlete. You could put a player into a few different positions. It doesn't matter just where you need. Is it similar in soccer? Do you see a specialization where you have a defender, you have midfield, you have your strikers that are really talented and stay in that role? you have a couple you can switch around, but generally there's no like kind of Swiss army knife in there. You got to, and that's again how we built the team. Like you are going to try and you've got to try and get that player out of that position if you want it. Simple as that. Now it does change formation wise, right? Depends if you play 4-3-3 or we play 4-4-2 or whatever we're thinking and seeing at the time. That can change a few things. but generally you set your team out to go and win naturally and then say ad hoc on the fly if you need to bring in a more defensive player if we're getting over ran or move to four in the middle or whatever the scenario is. So yeah, it's gonna be a fun season. say the littles are winding down. have a end of, Team Two has an end of season tournament, 14th, 15th of December. And then we've got some pre-season stuff coming up. So that'll be fun. Pre-GA, which. Lexi 15s will be participating in. Some of my 16s will be pulled into the 15s for that, because you're go 9v9. So that'd be fun. And then, say we've done a lot of work in the club actually, the last 24 hours has been really good. We're definitely building in the injury mitigation program. So I sat, we drew last night for a while about training the girls from 11 years older about those things and just getting the girls simple things, running in a straight line and then calling left or right and they go through those gates to strengthen that explosive. Just the amount of ACLs and MCLs that are getting blown out on the girls side is just horrific. So we're starting to build that in the program, hopefully from ages 11 and 12. So I mean, I'm looking forward to that because I think it's a huge part to the women's game that we're missing at the youth level. So yeah, it's... It's gonna be fun. It's gonna be a good off season for the club, good in season for high school, and I'm really tired. But we'll get... And cold. God damn it's cold out there when the sun goes down. night and we were making a joke. have every one of you as coaches have that giant winter park on looking like you're going to Mount Everest. It's not that cold. was 60 degrees last night. It was definitely not 60 degrees when the sun's down. Try 47. Try playing back in Ohio, everyone would be out in shorts and t-shirts running around. I had the best quote the other day. I was having coffee with Larry and a guy that he knows from Stupid Gym, CrossFit. And he's in shorts and t-shirts. I'm like, dude, I'm freezing. And he's from Canada or the East Coast or somewhere. He's like, yeah, you know, when we were kids, you wear t-shirts and you just lift your shoulders high to stay warm. I'm like, that's brilliant. Cause that's exactly what you do. You shrug your shoulders higher. to try and stay warm. Craig, let's, we talked a lot about in all of these episodes, the balance, right? Work-life balance, all that stuff. You're in with all of these teams. We don't talk about at home, like how you're able to do all of that, right? Are you getting any feedback from your kids or from your wife? Hey, Britt, on how many hours you're putting in? It's just, it's literally at times. Who's got dinner? When will you be home? Done. And remember, right, our house is chaos. Mondays the girls don't finish dance until eight. They leave school at, you know, two-four to quick snack. They're back in the studio at 3.30 slash four and they're dancing till eight. So it's constant chaos movement and it's really alignment to that. We're all in the house and then out the house at the same time, generally for. either dance or me coaching and then we're all within 30 minutes to an hour back in the house. The hard part as you know is the girls will do whatever, they've got stretch class today and then it's the juggling act of can Beth pick them up, do we take the Jacksons, whatever it is, that's when it gets the chaos kicks in. But you're fine, it seems like you're finding a balance there. You're just exhausted at the end of the day. yeah, you just got nothing. The hard part, honestly, is that, I know we talk to a lot of people about their kids on this, but that's the hard part is dialing in, stop fighting me at fucking nine o'clock, go to bed. Like I'm done. So that's one part. Chloe gets the 30 minute window, she gets 9.30 because she doesn't get up till 7.30, as you know. Little side story, guys. Jackie and Chloe used to walk to school together. The Cuddins brought Jackie every morning, was it 10 past eight, quarter past eight, whatever it was. just knows before that she got there on 750 because that's when I would leave to take the kids to Dave's Avenue, to the elementary school. And then I'm like, why is Jackie not coming any more close? She's like, I don't know. I'm like, okay. And then I speak to Chad, to all the listeners. Like, yeah, Jackie's too nice of a human being to say to Chloe, I want to get to school early and hang out, which is totally cool. And I don't want upset Chloe's feelings. And my reaction obviously is, tell her, because she's a lazy arse. She doesn't wake up till 7.30. Then I'm driving her to school. Today was 8.20 and we got there at 8.28. To be fair, the traffic at 8.18, 8.20. No, no, no, it's gone. It's all gone high school at that point for us. So I can get her there in a few minutes, but that was the reason why. So Lazy Ass gets 30 minutes more before she has to hit bed. So the hard part for us is we all collide. between 6.30 and 7, back in the house for dinner, homework, showers, et cetera. So we have this small kind of two hour window of eat, homework, read, shower, bed, and that's when the hasso card starts to fall down. it's just crazy because there must be something evolution-wise where the kids, they don't want to go to bed. They want to maximize as much time as possible. And then in the mornings, you can't rouse them because they're not looking forward to the thing that they're going to do. On the weekends, totally different. They're up before seven o'clock. But we have a window where the kids don't wake up until... Like we're pulling them out of bed, physically pulling them out of bed about 7.25. And then if we don't leave the house by 7.50, it'll take double the time to get to school. So today, Jackie, you know, doesn't have to be there till 8.30. Alexa wants to be there right at eight o'clock. As soon as the gates open for school, she wants to be the first one in that door. So you have some competition there where Jackie's like, well, I don't, I don't really care. You're trying to pull everybody together. So it's, it's a lot of energy in the morning. We missed the window today. Jackie wasn't ready just in time. We missed the window. So they're getting out of the car about 8 or 9, but then Jackie learned a very important lesson because we take her right after. If we don't hit that eight o'clock window, she doesn't get that time before school. So she didn't get dropped off because there's so much traffic. And now that it's colder, not as many people riding bikes, not as many people walking. So we get hit in one elementary school traffic and then the the junior high traffic, it's all a mess. But everybody got to school okay. Fully stressed out, but they got there okay. two of your three children then that want to be on time or early. What about the third one in this pile? Do you ever hear the phrase DGAF? No, what's that? DGaff? You don't know about DGaff? Don't give a fuck. That's Theo's mentality. On time, late, to, from, doesn't matter. The kid just, doesn't, it's almost a type of abuse from his sisters because they, like Alexa is like a second mom to him. Yelling at him, telling him what to do, what not to do, which is why they're in two different classrooms. Then he, I mean, he and Jackie get along so well. Like she's a nice big sister and then all of a sudden, screw you, Theo, you're out. So. Poor little boy. That's why we need some guy time. He's too much girl stuff going on in our house. It's welcome to wow, I wish I could show you this room for fuck's sake Well, let's talk a little bit about for I know some people listen, but for everybody watching the video, we've got Craig in studio number two, not the main room. So we're underneath a bunk bed. He's got snowflakes, which I think are from Target. Is that the 2024 Target collection of snowflakes hanging underneath? a Lilo and Stitch life-size plushy decorated as an elf. You've got a script Chloe behind you and we had to turn that light off because it was too bright. and then a Grinch stuffy too. You're gonna need another storage unit, Craig. there's more. I don't know what I'm looking at. okay. Okay. Candy cane PJs. we're not finished yet. A Grinch sweatshirt from Old Navy. yeah, my daughter has a Grinch obsession right now and that's a little terrifying as well. a credit card, so how are these things finding their way into your house? Well, I mean, obviously, right? She's a shithead. she, she's actually a good shithead. way too many names. You need to apologize and rebuild and repair that relationship. No, it's bilateral, like it comes back. She's like, dad, I need new sneakers. I gotta run the mile. I'm like, well, number one, you don't run the mile, you walk, you lazy ass. So let's start. can we, can we display her time? Is it under nine minutes? no. It was like nine minutes. Let's just pause on this for just a second Craig because Jackie and I had a conversation on this. So she had to run the mile. She missed the mile two weeks ago because her leg hurt from soccer. So she had to go in and run the following week. And then now two weeks later, she had to run it again. But I guess there's a bit of a game because you just have to improve your time every single time. So there's a bit of sandbagging going on. And I'm hearing some kids doing this in 12 minutes and I'm like, I can walk with you. it. Yeah, I can walk it. Yeah, for sure, for sure. So let me go to the shoe store and then I'll give her her supporting angle here. So she's like, need new shoes. I'm like, all right, whatever. Like blah, blah. And she's like, I don't think I'm this size anymore. I'm like, dude, we just got you those pandas. We didn't just like six months, whatever. So I take it to the Nike store. They're like, yeah, she's size, size six. I'm like, well, fuck that, four and a half. That's an issue. Okay, you were right. But also I'm like, you need to tell us, not just kind of say, I need new shoes. Like you've actually grown out of them. So Scarlett was late because she's like, just inherited 15 pairs of shoes. It didn't fit Chloe. Like. that she's worn three times. So she was happy. So we go and she's like, I gotta do the mile. I'm like, great, let's go. Look, she's like, I want those Air Force 1s. I'm like, well, they're not running shoes. I'm like, so yeah, I'm not gonna run it. Yeah. She's like, I'm not gonna run it. I'm like, all right, like I'm not gonna get into it. It's not like you're an unfit human being. angle of the mile, a school required event to get new Air Force Ones? That's smart. came into the conversation. But then when we're there, she's like, let's just walk around dad. I'm like, all right, like so the Nike store next to Nike is the Old Navy. She goes in, she sees all this Grinch stuff and she's like, hey. And she's like, it's the Old Navy, dad. It's not like we're talking hundreds of dollars. I'm like, well, okay, well, here's a sucker for me. But, thought we had a conversation of we start with no. We did start with no And then I was like, you know what? We went we start with no And then it was just me and her you're such a dick and then it was I was like to be fair. You got all your grades to a so all right and you rationalized it. I love it. I love it. Just a dad with his daughter soaking in these days before she doesn't want anything to do with you. Yeah, a while, so a funny story with us. So let me go back to the mild and I'll go to the next funny story. Is, I'm like, dude, nine minutes, like, come on. Like, I can literally go on a fast walk and do it in nine minutes. And then she told me this, fixing stuff that the kids are doing. So then I get to soccer and my players are like, coach, six minute mile. I'm like, damn girls, like, good job. Like, six minute miles at 11, 12, you guys are... You guys are really pacing it. I was like, yeah, you're better than my daughter. She's like, they're like, well, hold on. Coach, Chloe's a dancer. Like, she doesn't need the enjoyment we need. I'm like, don't protect her. I'm like, hold on here. I'm like, okay, you guys are soccer players, but- that's what I had told Jackie as well because she's been running around all season, couple soccer teams now. But she had gotten in with her cousin. Her cousin is in seventh grade and told her all about the tips and tricks. And he let her know early on that you gotta set a slow time and then work and be fast at the end. That's not the way it works, you lazy bastards. Yes, it is. I think in the work world, that's exactly what it is. I talked to Austin or any of these sales leaders that we had, there's sandbagging going on all the time. You know this just as well. Hey Craig, what are you gonna hit in Q4? Maybe a mill comes in at three million. Yeah, maybe father and your kid, nothing's piped. So then talking about being a father-daughter moment, I pull up behind Miss McHenry yesterday and she's got a little crush, that, and I'm like, so I pull up and she gets out and normally she'll let me give, still give her a little kiss on the cheek before she goes, nothing, right? So she exits. you're mixing pronouns here. You're not kissing Miss McHenry. You're talking about your daughter. Okay? Let's go back a second and make sure we know the she and her that we're talking about. Correct, so Chloe normally lets me still give her little peck on the cheek before she exits the car. But then, you know, there's a little Finns just standing out there and she doesn't, she just kind of gets... She, she gets out. That's fine. And, so I wind down the window, I'm like, love you, bye, love, hey, Chloe! I like your little shit. we're on the same page because we had this, and just think about that evolution, right? Time is very precious. You drop them off at preschool, they're clinging to your leg. They don't want you to leave. Dad, I love you, please don't. And then they get comfortable, they have all their friends. And now we play music every morning. We listen to new music, old music, it's fantastic. And then as soon as we get into the drop-off line, dad shut the music off. Okay, no problem. You don't want to have everybody listening to, you know, Alanis Morissette. No problem, I get it. And then it's, I love you, and a year ago, love you too. Now, silence. They don't say a word. So then I start rolling down the window. If I don't get an I love you when I drop off, I'm like, hey, Theo Lexa Cutting, I'm your dad, I love you. Well, Jackie has secondhand embarrassment now. So she's in the front seat. She goes like as scrunched as possible. She doesn't want anybody to see her. I go, you're embarrassed by that too? Well, let's see what you do when I drop you off at junior high. Go to drop her off at junior high, she turns to me, don't you dare. I will make your life miserable. And normally it's Alexa with the threats, I'm like, okay, I get it, no more I love yous, not even a bye, just a, hmm, a lot of grunting going, eh, slams the door and she's off. Yeah, we got a- I think we got a few years of this shitshow. A few years. I mean, I think we get the same thing from our wives. Yeah, I don't even know if she's spoken to me this morning except get the kids to school. So I made coffee. Yeah, good husband made coffee. It's all ready for when she wakes up. Just gotta pour it in your cup. Take the kids to school. Okay. Now we're talking about the real Struggle Bubble. On that token, you had mentioned your coffee routine. Are you making an espresso? you just hitting a button? Tell us about the coffee preparation you're doing for your wife. dude, so as you know, we've got, was looking at machines the other day, we were in espresso and then I liked the bean and then we bought the granulated pre, I'm like, you know what, we've got the grinder at home, so I and bought a big bag of beans and grind and then fresh pot every morning. That's where I'm at right now. But I do like your machine where it's beans at the top and then I can. decide if I'm doing espresso, whatever. So, but we got too many stupid coffee machines and pots and all kinds of shit, so I just standardized. That's where I'm at. All right. Let's do a little bit of a look back, Craig. Look, look how far we've come. Started off a few episodes, just you and I talking about coaching, getting into the fall season and all that fun stuff, being a dad. And then we had, I think just an incredible list of guests that came on. I want to thank everybody again, but you think about the early days where we had Robert Hata, Thomas Eagren. So somebody that's moved from Ohio to California, and then somebody now that has gone through sports and baseball with Thomas and coaching at the highest level. A lot of fun just to start that ball rolling and get connected. I think we've gotten a little bit of feedback from each of those episodes that we still carry with us. And it's interesting, we run into people on the street saying, hey, this guest had said this thing and I use that. We had a friend the other day talking with Cali with the glass ball and rubber ball. And first shout out to you and I for not laughing or breaking stride one bit when she's talking about juggling balls and glass balls and rubber balls and balls balls balls. We held it together. I was definitely gonna ask where's Austin's balls in this? Poor Austin. Our number one supporter and he gets a shout out and a dig every episode. Yeah, bless him. But the friend had said, yeah, use this at work, right? Go to somebody and say, is this gonna shatter if we drop it or is it gonna bounce back? We'll be able to catch it again. And it's interesting that we're not affecting millions and millions of people, but there's little pieces of feedback that can get picked up here and there as we have these conversations with shit that we're all going through. Absolutely, I think there's a few things like, I'm seeing as people post on their own personal social media, the comments I'm seeing as people are reconnecting as well. So maybe we're not affecting millions just by us talking, but when it goes out into that kind of ecosystem, it's amazing how many people that from their past reconnect through. Either, you know, reposting the podcast or, you making a comment, whatever. That's pretty, that's pretty wild as well. That kind of took me back a little bit. I think Austin is still the highest ranking. Am I right? He is, and we asked him the other day how many times he's listened to his own episode and he says, just once. Which is one more time than Callie's listened to her episode. Good, I'm glad we called her out. Yeah, that was interesting. So some of the guests, just going back to that, just some really, I always love getting into, and especially when I listen to podcasts, where people came from and where they are now and how they got through that journey. I think... as you're growing up, you think it's just a lateral, I do this, I get a promotion and blah, blah, blah, blah. And then you actually talk to these people and it's like, my God, it's ebbs and flows and turns and twists. All the way back to like YK, Yusuf got fired, just went down basically as Rolodex called 50 people, gone into in San Francisco, jumped on a plane and went from there. It's kind of wild how everybody, and then, The names evading me right now, the US rower, your friend from Ohio. Mike, like his road to where he is is insane at the same time of just decided to pick up rowing. okay. That's a bit like you trying to do workouts. we'll talk about that in a second. There is no one path. That's the biggest thread that came through all of this is you think about growing up, we've talked about this before, high school, college, get the diploma, get the internship, get the job, do the job, keep the job. And people have gone all over the place. I think it's a lot with the technology that we have in the remote world and all the internet. The years that we've gone through the technology that we've had allows us to bounce around and find things that we're passionate about and just go that direction and then have the network and take the chance. And everybody that we've talked to has an element of that of maybe just a happening, right? Me running into and selling season tickets to the VP of global sales at Facebook was just a chance occurrence. It was my turn on the phone and that led to a career in technology and where we are today. starting a company and taking that chance. Mike, you mentioned of just, hey, I'm gonna try rowing. I've tried these other sports, I'm gonna try it. I really love it. The rowing leads to relationships, relationships leads to jobs. It's just an incredible, everybody is taking advantage of the opportunity. you said it on Monday. We had a, you know, we had a walking meeting on Monday, which I love, right? You just kind of walking and talking. which I'm pretty sure everybody in Los Gatos believes that we are in a relationship with our dog. So we're just walking our dog in the morning. that's just Chad and Craig, hey. Although it did start off in the parking lot when we parked our cars, we had a friend ask if we were recording a mobile Struggle Bubble, which was great to be recognized. You take it on the road. start, I was gonna say start seeing us walking around town with selfie sticks. Greg, can I pause for just a second and can you hear any of the yelling that's going on upstairs? Okay, so if anybody picks that up, if we're not able to find it in the audio and I leave it in on the edit, Lauren is screaming, knock it off. Now, there are no children in the house. I'm downstairs. It's the cat. It's the cat. We have an asshole cat. Dun dun dun- Does the cat have red eyes? no, the cat does not have red eyes, but it, it should, it should. So we, we adopted a kitten. It's been about a month and a half now. he was nine weeks old when we adopted him. I historically have not been a cat person, although when I met Lauren, she had two cats and I sacrificed my allergies and for the relationship I was committed. this cat is. He's aggressive. He's like a tiger. We got a laser pointer the other day so that we can get him some energy burn. Chases the dot all day and then passes out. So in the mornings, perfect little angel. In the evenings, angel. During the day, he just goes up to Lauren and he wants to play. And now she's screaming at him. So the good deed of me saying, all right, let's get a cat. The girls have wanted a pet. Lauren loves cats. Let's go. Thought I'd be a hero. Backfire, Craig. Yeah, I'm not a cat. I would have a cat if we had a... Yeah, I'm not a cat. If we had a farm, I would have cats to live outside. We don't live on a farm, so there's no fucking chance we're getting a cat. No, well, Echo would probably eat the cat. I know, I could probably just like give it a good kick in the face. We got out of line a little bit. I don't know if you would dare. Yeah, you did. you, so you mentioned it, yeah, you mentioned it on the walk on Monday of chances, right? And our first interaction, I don't know if we've said this story before, was, hey, we're going to a first birthday party. I met this mom at the West Valley Gymnastics and it's in Santa Cruz. And you're like, fuck my life. I've got twins, I've got to carry these two, the carriers out the car, like I've got to drive over the hill, I don't want to do this, we're going to Santa Cruz, I don't know the people, like this is bullshit. And now look at us, 10 years later. there's something you should know about me is I don't like people. I have my trust tree, right? I have my people. And then if you're outside of that, just, don't, I'm not that extrovert that has time. So there's many people that I'm friends with now. Dan Barris, similarly, you know, we first met, kids love soccer. And he starts talking to me about the Golden State Warriors who at the time were playing the Cavs. I'm from Cleveland. I'm just like, who's this asshole? I won't talk to him. And then you become great friends, right? You break through and I feel like it's a good filter, but sometimes I have that resting bitch face that I don't have the time. So for you, when Lauren comes up to me and says, hey, guess what? I have a friend that I've been hanging out with at gymnastics while our girls tumble or do whatever the hell they do at gymnastics. Let's go to their first birthday party. And the first birthday party was not down the street. We drove over the hill, 30 minutes away. like, my gosh, this is going to be awful. We have the twins, so we're not sleeping. And you're right, carry both strollers or carriers in there, pop them off the stroller and we had a great time. We had a great time. You broke through the filter. Congratulations, Craig. You made it. You're welcome. Yeah, but it's just, again, you go down those history paths of how people got there, what they're doing now, those kinds of things. And I think also as people listen in, it's like, there's no element or time on change. Like if you don't want to do something, just change. And you know, Hatt's has said it, right? He just, he was done, took a year out, traveled the world and... There you go. Right now we're onto something new and adventurous and whatever else. We have that same feedback right now, right? Starting a business, right? I have not stepped foot in a corporate office since November 5th of 2023 and took some time off, took sabbatical, was part of layoffs last year and... year. took it off, yeah, 2024, took it an opportunity to start a company and go and we have people come up and say, my God, how do you do that? It seems scary. You're not taking a paycheck, you're not doing this. And you just do it, right? It's something that has been on the list. You just find a way to get it done and do it and it can be inspirational for other people thinking about it. Yeah, and I think we can talk because, not to give us ageism or whatever here, but it's like, if it all goes to shit, you've got enough experience to fall back on. When you're young, you should do it because you have no responsibilities. We've gone through that middle section of life of... Kids now I need like really good health insurance because they're definitely going to get sick and I need this and I need that and all the shit that life throws at you for those probably 10 years of one to 10 when your kids are one to eight, whatever of kind of figuring out responsibilities to a certain degree, right? The kids need more or whatever. And now we're at that back end of that of like they actually need less. They need more money from us, but less time from us. So now it's us when the world's collide again. were talking to a friend about that the other day. I'm like, you still got a three year old dude, just patience is the key here. Like just get through these next five years or so. Then you look back and go, shit, what happened to those 10 years? And I'm like, yeah, I'm telling you right now, my friend just got severance in the UK and he's got a two year old, or gonna be two. And I'm like, dude, just you got a decent severance package, take the whole of December and January off, spend time with him. Then, you know, move forward with that. So, just experience patience. just that has been ringing in my head of, take, strike while the iron's hot. Tomorrow is not a given. And if you're not gonna do it now, when are you going to do it? And that's from the littlest things in life. It's the dishes in the sink at the end of the day. I'm gonna need to do them eventually. Why not do them now? And then seeing it through as a parent with your kids, right? You're asking them to do things in the moment. and not wait and then you reflect back on yourself of when is this going to happen? load. Yeah, we've talked about this as shit load, right? Actions lead to consequences and consequences lead to actions, right? So you either take action now and the consequences, I can watch TV or you don't do it now and now the action is shit, I'm running around, I got to finish my homework at 9 p.m. at night. Like you just, and then that leads into habits, right? Good habits slash bad habits, then it's consistency. Right, if you can start dialing all that shit in. Then you're gonna be fine, right? It's just the same trying to encourage that into the kids and you know, there's just to flip it back to the sporting world Again, my kids juggling the soccer ball. They know if they don't can't juggle over a certain amount the consequences They may not be on this team next year So what are you gonna do? I'm gonna put the time energy and effort and if I want it enough well One of the hardest things to teach though, because the immediate, especially in the society we're at today, you have immediate gratification. You have a phone in your pocket, you can get the dopamine hit, you can get the information you need, you can get that right away. A week from now, a season from now, a year from now, 50 years from now, it's really difficult to start to optimize, but finding little nuggets where you can teach that. This morning was a great example. Hey, Jackie, we left. five minutes later than we should have, why did we leave five minutes later than we should have? because we didn't have this thing in our backpack. Why didn't we have this thing in our backpack? Well, because I said I would do it tomorrow. All of that flows and you're to, and talking to a 12 year old is really difficult because you say the words and it hits a brick wall, but you have to believe there's some information staying in there that they're not gonna give you the satisfaction of saying, you're right, dad. But the next time that the situation arises, they figure it out. And we're still working on it, man. I'm a procrastinator. I'm put the pro in procrastination. My mom and dad's go to this walking club and it's great right and it's it's consists every two times two times a week they go and whatever it doesn't matter but it's like even they're still learned like they've got to get consistent with it they got you know and when they are it's gonna make them feel better right we all know that from working out and exercising which would take us into you trying to do muscle-ups It's not muscle ups. I'm not going to pull an Austin Stefani. And and I am anticipating some Austin Stefani injuries, some muscle up tryouts, starting to drink Celsius, creatine and protein shakes. Maybe buying larger t-shirts if we start putting muscle mass on. All right, all right. Wait, let me finish. Are we gonna go chicken legs and forget leg days? Okay. All right, walk me through it. It's fake news. I coached the freshman football team, right? I did the running backs and linebackers. It was a great season. And one thing I noticed is my nephew, who's on the JV team, has grown, right? six inches taller than me at this point. He's putting on a ton of weight on the barbell and I got under and tried to do a bench. Tried to just do like one of what he was doing and I got it but it really did not feel good. And I, you know, I lifted when I played in college and played baseball, played football but I haven't really lifted weights in a long time. Since Jackie's been born, 12 years. What was the wait? I'm not gonna say that, that's private information. But I said to myself, I'm 41 years old now, let's start a little bit more of that muscle training because I have seen what it looks like when you don't keep up with that. When you lose flexibility, you lose strength. And I think it would feel good for me looking at the team photo next year not to be a scrawny little dude. I wanna put on some muscle, put on some tone a little bit. So I said, I said the same thing to Nick, my brother-in-law who's an assistant coach as well. But he's a big time weightlifter. He was in the strongest man type competitions. He was throwing Atlas stones, throwing kegs over his head. I don't want to do that type of stuff. But I also, if I've learned a lesson training with Nick is from my mountain bike days, my second day on a mountain bike, we went and did a ridiculous workout. We went on El Sereno. I wasn't cut out for it, but I had some pride and I wanted to get there. So instead of jumping into one of his workouts, I wanted to do it the right way, build a foundation and then jump in with him. So I asked the strength and conditioning coach at Los Gatos High, shout out to Coach Stinson, to put together a program for me as a 40 something year old man to not hurt myself. And she did, there's a three week kind of break in program, which I'm in week three right now. and then next week dips into the big stuff, right? The cleans, the bench press, the squats, all the stuff that I'll need to go to a gym for. But I'm excited, it's been fun. So yes, I have started doing some protein shakes. Yes, I've gotten now into the creatine stuff. I'm doing some research on how to retain some muscle mass and build it out. And I wanna see your scrawny soccer ass next week try and throw some weights around. Let's go. Let's Put a challenge. Yeah. Yep, we don't lift, we don't do much arms, but it's basically shoulders down. All right, all right, let's see it. We'll see it next week, we'll keep everybody, we'll do some measurements. We'll come back in season two after the first of the year and we'll see who's building. But you're just gonna jump into a cold turkey. I don't think that's the right thing to do. Right, definitely not the right thing to do but yeah, whenever I ever... Yeah, whenever I ever f- and Romanian deadlifts the past couple of weeks than I care to talk about, Yeah, I'm not excited for lunges and squats just gets you like so tired, but we'll see let's go of legs versus arms, there's been a lot of lower body. And then the upper body is just kind of mixed in there, but at the end of the workout, you're feeling good. Yeah, full body workout. Yeah, well, as you know, when I jump on the pallet on, just try and go hell for leather and rip my lungs apart and. know. back on Craig and it's been really difficult. So I went through the training of there's power zones, which is really about keeping your output in a certain range and then building off of that, which is a way to measure instead of just going for a ride. And there's three different versions. There's an introduction, there's a stabilize, and there's a grow or peak your power zones. And over the summer, when we actually started this podcast, I was going through methodically and improving and improving and improving. and my FTP scores, functional threshold power scores were improving. And then I started coaching and just didn't have the time, which is on me, right? When you're spending three hours out there on the field and starting a company and taking care of the kids and all that, there just wasn't enough time. That's an excuse. But I lost it all. So I'm on the bike now with that improved FTP score that I've not had the, I've had too much pride to lower it. And it's beaten me to hell. Yeah, I started to ride with Kevin in the mornings, just real quick, half mountain, coffee ride. But the good thing about riding is you can get back into shape real quick. It's to get started in riding is hard. It takes a lot. It just changes from running. It's just a different cardio, obviously. But when you've got it core built, you can get back into shape pretty, pretty quickly. I was reading some of my times from when we were at COVID when we started riding. I'm so far off, which is fine. I'll get back to it. think I'm going to go back to... at this point though, Craig. We're talking about that, right? It's five years, so we were five years younger, right? In our mid-30s at that point. And then nothing else to do. We're riding every other day. And now, know, middle of a ride, and it's a pain. yeah, no it definitely changes and I'm not trying to I'm not trying to be a superhuman at this point, right? It's just keeping the weight off and keeping the muscle mass as best we can Rather than chasing times, but I think I'm gonna go back to clipless I'm gonna get some clips in the Black Friday sales and kind of get back into it big time But again, it goes to show you there are no excuses. It's just you want to do it or you don't want to do it. You need to time manage and put it on there. Just like today. I'm very sore and you got to put on the schedule. I'm gonna go back into right. I'm gonna fucking start working out with you. So that's gonna can my riding real quick although Bubble muscle shirts. We can rip them off. Yeah. Well talking about that. Let's say I know like we're kind of getting to the top of the hour or past the hour Let's get a quick shout out to thank x2o studio as well for our first sponsorship absolutely huge to step in and support us and we're super, super thankful. And on top of that, Craig, mean, thankful for everybody that joins, right? We started this podcast with just you and I just messing around once a week and it turned into a pretty rewarding and fun experience to have, let's count them up, two, four, six, eight, 10, 12, 14, 15 guests. So half of our episodes had a guest associated with it. I mean, 16 because Ricky and Leslie joined us. have professional soccer players. We have professional sports franchises. We have family friends. We have VCs. We have a wife in there. Lauren joined us to talk about, know, Toad Savvy. People that we met through soccer. Rob Ludeman, you met through soccer. I met through baseball. And now we're watching this kid play in the CCS playoffs in football. Yep. A professional career coach with Lisa, close friends, Nate, Austin, Callie, Ben, Julia, Thomas. Yeah, Jenna on. Yeah, child therapist, family therapist. So if you're hanging with us, please go back and take a look at one of those episodes. We're not going to name favorites because our friends or wife will kill us, but there are moments in each of those episodes that really resonate and build on to what we're trying to build with the Struggle Bubble because We're all in this together and we're struggling on a daily basis to keep all those balls in the air. Shout out to Callie with the glass and rubber balls and figuring out what the hell we're doing and where we're going next. But thankful for everybody that followed us. We're gonna try and get more of these episodes up on YouTube on video. We've heard the feedback that seeing our faces, which I question their decision making. told you you gotta face for radio. I do, I do. I should go back to radio. That'd be fun. But the plan for us is we're gonna enjoy the holidays with our family. So this will be the last episode of 2024 of our first season. We're gonna enjoy the time here over Thanksgiving, do some traveling with family for Christmas holiday and come back towards, sometimes January, February. We haven't really locked it in yet. Once we get our guest schedule in our own schedule. Craig's coaching soccer throughout that period. I'm done with football, but the kids then start and then we have a whole, we've already kicked off the little league locally. We have registration open. We're doing a wiffle ball classic on Saturday. We're raising money for some special charities. And really I've announced that this is going to be my last year as Los Gatos little league president. Five years is a good run and see how this last season shapes up. Let's go, maybe we'll do a Christmas special between Christmas and New Years. Just to put us on. We'll see. Yeah, exactly. Maybe we'll open the gifts and see how disappointed the kids are. That'd be awesome. Yeah. What's this piece of coal? We're gonna have a fire. I warned you, I warned you. All right, everybody, appreciate it. If you aren't already, please follow us on social media. We are at the Struggle Bubble Pod on Instagram and also on TikTok. I haven't posted as much over there because we just don't have the time, so. reels, otherwise we're gonna get shouted at. Yeah, we'll get reels, we'll get everything up and going and looking forward to seeing everybody in the new year Have a safe and enjoyable holiday season and appreciate your support here on the Struggle Bubble. Adios!