Dad Interviews His Teenage Daughter (Dad Jokes Included)

0:33

Hi everyone. And welcome to today's podcast. We're here with my favorite baby girl. Oh, okay. Anastasia, Anastasia. She's my youngest, but she's my baby Anastasia. Hi. Why? How are you doing mami? I'm tired. Why? Because I had coffee. So I'm coming down from my crash. She had coffee the last couple of days and she was a little weird, but she was hyped. She was ready to run through a wall the last couple days. And then she crashed. Sometime a little later. Welcome to the podcast for the world. Obviously talk about you a lot. I talk about her a lot and her older sister, I write, I share a lot of stories and it occurred to me. And I actually thought of this before about bringing them on. She's older, she's got opinion. She's got ideas. She's about to take on the world. And, what better way to actually share what we have going on in our lives and share some of our stories than actually include her. I would like to think that she'll be coming on more regularly. And as I wrote on social media to share that she was coming on to spill the tea, to spill the beans or whatever it, you, kids spill these days spill it, spill it. You used to tell me not to spill things. Not anymore. We spill things, apparently. It's the end of the summer. I wanted to share what our summer was like, some of the things we did. And if you follow me on social media, I've shared some of those stories, but this will be the first time actually sharing them with her voice actually being included. And just so you know, the older one isn't here because she's moved on, she's got jobs, she's got life. I got my own room. She has her own room. Which kind of brings me to one of the main topics that I did want to touch on which. How is it? How has it been this summer being here alone every other year before this year, we I've had the both of them for, and just for context, as well for me this summer is the last summer in which she's legally obligated. To be with me from here on out. If she chooses to come and hang out with dad will be because she chooses to. And I really . I really hope you choose You're putting me on the spot. Yeah, I know. Like don't let the internet down and break your dad's heart in front of everyone. Cause I'll see it on a podcast. Recommended it to me on my YouTube channel. Yes, you will be. It will be recommended, but to go back a little bit. What, what has been, what have you gone through, how has it felt to be alone in the house without big sister or. I don't know, because like, it's been like this on my mom's as well. Oh. So it's been like this for a little bit of while, but it is strange cuz normally I'm like, yeah, we're arguing or she's pushing me off of her side of bed. We take, turn doing dishes, but now it's just me doing dishes. I'm sorry. I have tried to help. About the dishes. So in the past there was this basic understanding that we had worked out that they would, well, they actually, they worked it out, but after we eat dinner or after we eat anything, they we'd have to wash and we had to clean up and they worked it out between themselves. But although there would still be arguments about who washed the dishes last, they would debate that for a little bit and then they'd wash 'em and it'd be done, but there was two of them. So there was a break. Right. But now it's pretty much all the time. I did volunteer a couple times during the month, like, all right, let's trade off. You can take care of the other responsibilities. So. You know I felt you. I like man, she's her hands must be dry. All wrinkly, all wrinkly. I don't want her to be an old woman. She's too young for that. So let me help her out. Got the cats already. Got the cats already. Yeah, I definitely get more sleep because we're not up all night giggling. Personally, I miss that used to miss after I put you out, be ID, be like. Hihihi! That's not where, how funny is no, we can't stop talking. There'd be a good on good nights of 30, 45 minutes of then just, Hi hi hi hi Hi hi hi. It was the cutest thing. When they were young, I used to actually like, "shut up, go to bed". But I started really appreciating it, cuz that means you're having a good time or you're having a good conversation and you're enjoying yourself. So you feel uncomfortable enough to just blah to who knows it's summer be kids. So, I do miss that. I do miss that. It's unfortunate. Now when I see her, we laugh a lot more. Yeah. So that's a good point. What is that like now when you see each after not seeing each other. Scarcity, We never argue. It's great. If we, if there's any attention, we're like, I'll tell you later. When we hang out, we actually go places. I mean, we can sit in the living room and still chat. It's nice. But we actually go places, go out to eat. She usually pays. Oh yeah. Cause she's got a paycheck now. She must make her feel good too. Like not to worry about it. So yeah. It's like she's taking care of baby sister. I wanted to take it back for a second. Did you have enough thought? No. Okay. Wanted to rewind to the first week before you got here. Oh, share with the world, with the internet, with the people. What did you do that week? What did I do that week? Well I went to a summer camp called camp RYLA, for the eight, 10, I think if you really wanted to be specific. It's a leadership camp where I'm there for six days, no phones. And there's like a hundred, I wanna say 180. There's a lot of us. And it's, we're all 17 year olds. We're all going into our senior year and it's just meant to te teach us how to work with others. And I mean, it's a, it's advertised as a leadership camp, but I like to say it's a mental health camp. because we got through a lot of that. There's a lot of breaking barriers and stepping out of our comfort zone, but we make some really good friends because, you know, we spend so long together, very little sleep, a lot of go, go, go wake up at six, go to bed at like two or three on a good day. But we create some good bonds and very tiresome. So I did take a long nap when I got home. The first day I picked her up, she, I think we had dinner. She went to sleep early and then she slept the rest the next day to like noon or so. No regerts. What does regerts mean? Regrets. Oh, I'm like, yeah, just go told. It was a thing we said there, at least my cabin, there was cabins, you know, that type of camp. And those are saying go, not regerts. No regrets. Okay. Okay. New word to add to the vocabulary. I'll educate you. You, you and your sister have definitely helped me over the years. Maintain, touch, stay in touch with the vernacular, the lingo, the slang. And that made me always happy becauseI felt in touch. I wasn't outta touch now. I don't know what I'm gonna do after y'all I felt hip to the game. Do people say that? I don't know. No. At any rate, what were some of your biggest takeaways? I know you have, if you, and I don't want to set you up, but I do wanna set you up because you, you, the, when she came back, she was talking for probably an hour or two straight about everything they did. I'm just like. Feel like I'm mean blitz, but I've made me so happy that you had such a great time. So share some of that. The takeaway. I don't know. Or some of your best memories. I, I was gonna go for my best memory. Yeah. There was a talent night and I do poetry if he definitely definitely said something about that. And I hadn't performed in a very long time and I was peer pressured by my group. A good kind of peer pressure at least to do some spoken word. So I got like 10 poems. I didn't read 'em all. I had like 10 poems and I read 'em to my counselor. And then she was like, ah, do these three. So I did them three. I was like the last to go because there were some technical difficulties. So like they said the best for last second or last. Okay. But he, he was good too. And I got three standing ovations. Yeah. It was like a room of at least 200 people because that includes the counselors. And there was alumni there, actual rotary club sponsors because there, it was basically our first scholarship. They paid for this whole summer camp for all of us. So there are a whole bunch of people there. And I did it. And that audience was the best audience I could have ever performed in front of to get back into the game. They were the best. I mean, even if I made a mistake, they would've clapped, but since I didn't, it wasn't even louder clap. And it was, it was so good. Oh man. I, I still can't fully remember what it looked like because one, the lights were really blinding and then two. I just went blank and then it was really cool. Cause I had like a whole little standup comedian set up. I had a little stool with my water. I should have had a rag to, I brought the sweat, but it was really neat to perform in front of them and to feel the love afterwards, it was like a day and a half left, a camp after I performed and strangers would walk up to me saying, Hey, I loved your pieces or Hey, I felt seen by your pieces. That's gotta be a great feeling. It was a great feeling. Yeah. What were some of the relationships that came out of it? You, you keep, there seems to be a strong group that came out of it. I don't know what other cabins look like, but I'm definitely not biased. When I say I, the best cabin. We have best connections. No bias. One of them, his name's Clarence, he's my poetry buddy now. We're gonna write a piece together. We're working on a piece with a artist to, for his, an album that he's making. We're just supportive. He, he shared some of his poetry. I shared some of mine and then other than him, I got a whole bunch of other friends where we're already meeting up for birthdays just to hang out because, well, we're all kind of really funny, so it's good audience to have around. It's good. People definitely bring some, some of your people together. And I think that's one of the things you said to me that resonated and it stuck is that you found your group or your people. I believe that's what you said. They're my people. Yeah. They are my people. It's neat to have found a good group like that at such a young age. I mean, we all volunteered to be there for six days. No phones. No phones. They were taken away, right? Yeah. Yeah. Not handed to you until the end. So they literally had to, had to spend time with each other, immerse themselves in the activities and connect. We cry together. Yeah. Nothing bonds. We were up to like three or four crying. It was crazy. Nothing bonds, you like crying together, opening up, being vulnerable and crying together. That was when you tell me all these stories, it obviously made me super happy because you got to share your gift. And that's something I definitely want to talk about because it was a theme throughout the month. It seemed like the easiest thing is not easiest, but so much more so convenient opportunities that I had to create events revolved around poetry. Right. We had a show we went to by Lemon Anderson. And it's an individual who I've been following a poet, a spoken word poet that I've been following since Deaf Poetry Jam. I wanna say 2007 back in the day, same time I found Joaquin Zihuatanejo on the same Deaf Poetry Jam Show. Yes. He's one of our people. But we, there was an opportunity here a couple a week or so ago. We just, oh, we're gonna talk about Mexico in a second. We just got back from Mexico and literally the day I got here, we we're unpacking and I got a face, sorry. Oh, got from Mexico. I got a tan. Oh, I thought you was talking about, maybe I spit on you. I'm sorry. I wouldn't cut you. So we just got back from Mexico, we're unpacking, and I'm on Facebook kind of catching up, with all the messages and whatnot. And there was an ad shout, south Kara Mia and the founder and everybody who's running their social media, an ad for Lemon Anderson, doing a reading of his new act,, I suppose. And I didn't even completely know what it was about, but I've always enjoyed his poetry, his rawness. I knew, I knew enough about him, that he, after death poetry, he started to create a brand. And just a new practice around doing stage shows like one man shows. So the ad popped up. I didn't know all about it. I, it was kind of me up putting it on here is local company that does plays and amazing work, Signed, bought the passes, told them shouted, Hey, we're going to a play on Friday. I said a play. I didn't know. They're like what? I said, don't worry about it. We're going to a play. They had no idea what they were walking into. Friday we show up, they still had no idea. I did show him something from him. From that time and long time, it was a long time ago. We show up, they see the pamphlet they're like, that's not the same guy. And he's grown. Obviously we always, I don't look the same way. I look in 2007, 2010, even. So obviously we look different. It was basically a rough run through of a piece of work that they're working on. Some pieces, some works. Lemon is doing different characters When aliens fall from the sky when aliens. Thank you. Thank you. I don't love you for that. When Aliens fall from the Sky is the name of the actual, piece, artwork. Composition. Thank you. And it was fantastic. What was your impression of it? It was really, I was, I was blown away cuz he puts on so many different characters. Yes. And he switches like that. And it was really personal and he gets into it. He does a little jiggy and it's hard to tell what's real. And like what's the character and what was him? Mm-hmm. All the character, but very real stories. Very, so one of the core concepts is that he's writing a piece and changing scenes, characters, and he's writing it from a different Latino, a different culture from that language, from that era. And he does it so well. And this is just a rough, by the way. So obvious afterwards, they're asking for feedback and we're like, I don't know. It just sounded fantastic to us. But there was some great feedback given and it was just, it was, it was powerful. And I love that. I was able to introduce her to that because poetry has been something that I feel has become a part of your identity. Since I was eight. Since you were eight and since lettuce , which I'll make sure to share a link in the show notes where. She performs the lettuce. It's her first poem that she performed in public. She's been writing and performing since she was a child. That brings us back to the president where she was performing that day. She was willing to perform three pieces that were really vulnerable and vulnerability being a core piece of this, because, because of that vulnerability and because of you openly sharing it, what happened? I made so many friends, so many people came up to me like, wow, like one kid, he did a poem that day, first poem we ever wrote. He wrote it there at the camp, performed it. And then I went, of course later and afterwards he came up to me and he was like, you were such an inspiration. I gonna keep writing. So I can be like, he was like, wow, I'm that person now? Yes. Yes. It's it. you're gonna inspire people to, to do things. And just as you've been inspired, go ahead, go ahead. Big one. So this one counselor, I really love her. I loved her from the first day she looked so cool. I never spoke to her until after I performed. She said that she performed poetry, cuz she was a previous camper there from like 2019 or something. And she performed poetry on the talent night. So she was, she was crying. She was in tears. She was happy that someone, someone else was able to have a similar experience and that now I follow her on Instagram. Like her poetry page. She, it was inactive for a couple of years, but afterwards, after the camp, she starts posting again, saying that she was inspired. And to know that I was part of that, it's like, whoa, it's funny how you, I had a lot of people in tears. It's funny how inspiration works. It doesn't matter. It could be a movie, it could be a book. It could be your child. It could be someone that you're counseling, I suppose it doesn't matter. And to, to know that you're inspiring adults, and younger people or your peers actually not younger, but I love that. Obviously, we've seen Joaquin. We have a couple chances to see Joaquin who's the Dallas poet Laureate shouts out to Joaquin. You're probably gonna be watching or listening to this here soon. Thank you for your role, in helping make sure that she was here and that she had inspiration. You provided that. I also wanted to make sure to mention. Carly. Okay. Carly? Yes. Yeah. Carly. Yes. We're together. Carly, cuz she posted something recently where she shared a photo of you writing. Haven't seen it. Oh, you haven't seen it. I must have showed to the older one. She shared an old, shared, an old photo of y'all writing cuz they both took coaching classes, poetry coaching classes from her. She says, she thinks about you often. Excuse me. And that y'all inspired her. You like it's, it's just a beautiful thing. So poetry, I mean, and I, I, I talk about this a lot. So let's wrap up this segment with what has been for you what's poetry meant for you spoken word poetry, writing. Poetry, just an outlet. Most of my poetry is not the happiest of things. I'm not very good at writing the happy stuff, but it's fine cuz it's my, it's my place to put all my sad stuff to put into words. If I couldn't before. It's therapy before the actual therapy session. Mm, definitely is. And it's therapy for others, cuz it, when you share it, it's like, oh, she feels that too. I'm not the only one. I think for me, one of the biggest ahas as I was getting older. Cause I didn't have these tools was wait, I'm not the only one that feels this? I thought I was just a weirdo cuz you can't talk to people. You couldn't talk to people about these things you couldn't share, especially guys, you can't, Hey man, are you going through this thing? You'd be, you'd be the weird one and lame. So you just keep it to yourself, but to hear people share that. All right, next I definitely wanna talk about another thing that you were, you picked up this summer, which was Journaling. You're journal journaling. That's gonna make you proud. Yeah. That's gonna make you proud. Very proud because it's something that I've been doing consistently with some relative consistency for several years and you decided to pick it up. Did you wanna share it? It's over there. Go get it. If you're enjoying this podcast, if you're enjoying this conversation, please let me know, drop a review, drop a comment. Let me know if you would like to hear more from her and her sister moving forward. Because I think I personally would love these types of conversations with parents and their children. Especially as they're older to maybe get some advice and some tidbits that I could use. Cuz now I'm oh, I'm transitioning to a different place in my life, which is they're not children anymore. So I no longer will be parenting actively. Like don't I don't know what draw the wall. Don't yeah. I never said that though. Oh, don't touch the hot stove or yeah. That's still the same point is I won't be parenting with that mindset more so be counseling, coaching, mentoring about real world adult kind of things. I did a lot of that. We talked about that some other time to make sure to prepare them for this, but it's just gonna be a new world and I'm, I'm a little lost. So pardon me while I figured that out baby. In the meantime. Yes. Back to our regularly scheduled program. Here's my journal. We have a cat there and we have more cats here. Just thought, I'd get that over with favorite color is green, if you didn't. And so I saw this and I was like, oh, I really like that. So then I took it and I tried journaling, this is bullet journaling in particular. And I saw somebody call it BuJo BuJo yeah. Bullet journal, like, oh, I love BuJo. I'm like. It's just an easier way to type instead of having to keep typing bullet journal, took me a minute. Yeah. I tried forever ago going into 2020 actually. And I took like an hour making this really cute page and never touched it again. I didn't wanna ruin it, but then I was like, okay, I'll ease my way into it. I didn't even think about bullet journaling, just journaling, not journaling using like a planner because very unorganized then. And one of my favorite videos that I watched, it was just a snippet of, it was. It's better to have a messy planner than an empty one. Whoa. So my planner, I stopped trying to make it pretty and I just wrote whatever I needed. And then I took that into this and I watched a video on bullet journaling. It was like they said, you'll become more comfortable with mistakes, which is definitely true. There was so much wide out in here, even though it's an Offwhite color page, doesn't look right. It works. So anyways, I use it for cute little drawing purposes also for using as a planner to calendar, to journal about my day to track my moods and whatnot. To me, one of the biggest things is like, this thing looks printed. That's so interesting though. It's not the nice handwriting, but still being kind. He's being kind. Here's ju see it. I gotta little Ko fish. Cause I don't know what to do. Let me ask you what motivated you to actually do this. And, and, and so far stuck with it. I had a friend, I, I barely made her made. We barely became friends this last year. She's like, I didn't know. She went to the school this whole time. Turns out she was there all along. Anyways. She, we, me and my other friend, I admire her for how organized she is. And she's always on top of things. And towards the end of the school, you're like, how the heck do you do it? And then she said that she keeps a planner, 2, 1for her personal and one for school. And I was like, oh, that makes sense. And then she showed us her planner and it wasn't anything crazy like this. It was just simple, straightforward check, keeping track of everything in an organized way. And I was like, I like that. So this summer I was like, Hmm, if I'm gonna do that next year, do I really wanna start two of them at the same time? So I decided to ease my way into it and it makes it more fun and pleasing to do because you look at it and seeing the pages fill up because you're consistent with it. It's a win-win yeah, aesthetically and for productivity. It, it made me really happy to see her do it. So much is going on. that I wish so much was going on when I was a childhood world. We're all kids. I wish I had kept a little bit of a, more of a journal to keep up with some of the stories. One of the things that I've learned in life is that you forget things. And if you don't document at least on paper, on digitally, some type of journal, you will forget almost everything you do. Like, if you just try to remember what you did last Wednesday. She asked me yesterday, what did we do Monday? I was like, uh, let me go see. Yeah. So she had some moments jotted down. Even if I, I read a book, I forgot the name of it. Yeah. I have a lot of books, but on, on storytelling in this individual, I can't think of his name. He's a fantastic writer and a fantastic storyteller, but he says that he, he has this thing, this idea called Homework For Life, which I've been doing for about a year now, where he jots down at least one moment from the previous day. One story, one lesson one. Aha. To recall something big that happened that day or something, not necessarily big, but just a moment, a story, cuz that's what he does. He's in the, his job is to tell stories and that idea stuck with me because every day something happens. So if you just take a moment to jot that down, you have some, you'll have some recollection about it. We have so many memories that are buried and so many memories have been lost in my childhood. I there's, I don't remember much of anything. Sometimes I think I was high. I wasn't it's true though. Cuz this is like, I don't remember much of anything. I have to ask my family and friends. Like why was I point is she will have this and I hope you stick with it. I do too. Because you're gonna remember things. You remember where you were like when you're in 10 years when you're struggling with something and you, you look back to your journal in 2022, you're gonna be like, oh my God, I've grown so much. And that's the biggest. For me, one of the biggest benefits and it, it doesn't even really matter is just for the sake of journaling, but to look back and like, what was I complaining about? You know, it's fantastic and I'm glad you're doing it. And to think that I had any influence on that. Well, No, this is a totally unique idea. No inspiration from anyone in my life whatsoever, whatever would be a lie. I would tell it is. Thank you. Thank you. Um, anything else you'd like to share as it relates to the journal? Um, um, um, um, um, gimme a few more ums. It's just fun. It's just, that's good. It's fun. And I'm doing things I've never done before. Like I saw a lot of inspiration from Pinterest. Not sponsoring. It just seems to be really inspirational. I undervalue for the longest. So did I and then wow, I'm on it like crazy. Yes. Didn't think that was possible. But I saw this someone else's and they did a, they did it a bucket list and I was like, Hmm. I've never made a bucket list. I was like, okay, I'll make one. But I only put a couple things on it. No, it's a full list of things. , it's a full list. It's a beautiful list of cool things that she plans on doing. Nothing crazy. Like go climb mountain. No, it's simple things I can do this summer, so yeah. So you should be able to knock it out. Yeah. Good for you. Bucket list. 2022 Summer. Summer 2022. I got two months. BAM! Which brings me to my next big topic. We took a trip to, to Mexico. No, I was like, we didn't SKRRT, SKRRT.. We took a trip to Mexico, second week of June 2nd week into ninth. Yes. That was an entire journey and a half. To make that happen. I definitely wanna mention my fantastic, beautiful, amazing, beautiful. Did I say beautiful already? Talented girlfriend, and partner for helping make that happen? Cuz without her, we it doesn't happen. We come up, we thought about it came up with the idea of a fantastic friend in Mexico who has an Airbnb. She has a spot and she told me that she would be glad to have me down there like, oh cool. And then finally, and always have to get down there. Yeah. Now we have to get down there. And so there's a matter of passports. My girlfriend made it, her mission, her life's mission to make that happen and push it through, schedule it, get photos, get everything done. And she did, we got it expedited. I went ahead and bought the passes before we had the passports. I even bought instrument just in case things didn't go through or COVID started ramping up and going crazy. But it, it worked out that the passports got here. We flew out there and had a fun time. Had a fantastic. And this is a story that I have that I wanna write more about, but the basic premise is this. And the basic take for me was one of the biggest takeaways. I really have. I'm born in Mexico. I'm Mexican. If you CA in case you didn't know that. Born in Mexico, raised in the US US citizen now. But I haven't really been to Mexico since I was maybe 14 or 15 was the last time. And it wasn't very memorable. It was a bad experience because of some things that happened, accidents or car breaking down or something like that. So my memory wasn't that great. And and remember, I forgot a lot. I remember very little anyways. So as a Mexican, essentially, it was my first time really being in my motherland, speaking my mother tongue primarily. And it was as if I had, cuz I hadn't been there basically since I was a child, even when I returned it was just as a tourist essentially, but it wasn't a great experience. So I don't have anything to really say, Hey, this is the Mexican experience. This definitely meant a lot to me, it impacted me greatly. And I felt like my roots got deeper into the me, my Mexican culture. I'm very proud of where I came from. And I was, I'm a little ashamed that I'm not more immersed in it, but partly because I was raised here in many senses, I am American, but I got to take my children. I got to take my daughters and they got to experience it. So if he felt like that, we were way more American than it. Right. But, but we passed, they thought I was Mexican. They cooked Spanish to me. So it works. Yeah. Tell that story real quick. We were getting ice cream and my older sister and him were inside the shop and me, and Carla, do they know her name? Carla, let's introduce her. She's my girlfriend. They got us, the passports. Me and her were just sitting on the bench and these guys walk by advertising a show. They speak to us too. They say it in Spanish and they hand us a business card and there's tourists next to us and they speak to English. And had a business card and they walked around. I was like, oh my gosh. They thought they thought we were from here. They thought we spoke Spanish and I kind of do, but didn't think I'd pass for it. Right. So they got the seal of approval source. Like you look the part sorta, you might have at least casted down. So they defer to Spanish. Yeah. I love that. What other stories or moments stand out to you or observations that you may have made? It's not that horribly miserable country. You think it is? Mm. I mean, that's all, that's all we said. That's all we're told. Don't go to Mexico. It's so dangerous. And, but it's dangerous everywhere you go. There are extra risks in certain places, but nothing unique. Yeah, definitely. For me, I definitely was. My head was on a swivel of sorts. Poverty is an interesting concept and an interesting reality rather. Because with poverty with hunger, people would do some crazy things. If I was hungry, I'd probably do some crazy things as well. So there is that reality and I'm not, it's not, I'm not oblivious to it, so I'm definitely watching out for it. But there's, there's, it's a beautiful country. It's beautiful people. Lot of like they're working, they're hustling for me. That was my biggest takeaway. Especially on the beach, watching so many people come up to us. They're not so much watching, but also having them come up to us and sell us, like try to sell us something every 30 seconds to a minute, knowing that we're gonna say no, they know it like conditioning themselves. Like to not even take it personally is something that was a bit mesmerizing. But it also kind of made me realize that they're just trying to eat. They're just trying to sell a couple of them to maybe eat for the day. So it's not lost upon me how privileged we are and how we have it easy in a lot of ways. Obviously I work and what not. They are literally working to eat that given day. Many of them are. So it definitely gives you the context or the realization that there are a lot of people that are trying to do their best to just survive while we are just here giving away money on some senses. Having said that every chance I got, I try to tip well. I try to tip really good because that's how a lot of them eat once again. And the service is fantastic. They definitely do care. And some people just were so passionate about helping. They clearly love what they do, or they knew that they had to work hard. They try to give us a good experience throughout, which reminds me, I guess, is a good segue into one of our best experiences with the boat we took. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Can you tell them about that? We got on a boat, that's it? No. It was pretty early. It was like a six, seven hour experience. We got 'em there. They gave us, they fed us breakfast and then they took us. It was, it was a very slow boat. That's something that really stuck out to you. Yes. So once we arrived, which was fine in the beginning, cuz we were eating. Okay. We never sped up. I want it, whatever. At least 70, 80 people on the boat. So like a double-decker just for context, you know, it's like not a, a speedboat or anything like that. It was definitely not a speed boat. Yeah. It's okay. I shouldn't know. We have expectations. It's fine, but I didn't set expectations properly that day. But it was, it was okay. It was still beautiful. And then they took us to this Las, Los Arcas Los Arcos. Shoot. I don't know. I don't know. It's a big rocks. It was a bunch of arches and it was beautiful, but we got to our specific spot and we snorkel. Okay. It took us snorkeling. There was a lot of people. So it was definitely a lot of being splashed. We saw a little baby jelly fish, but they were the same, the same people who were serving us breakfast were now leading a snorkeling little trip. So then they get back on the boat and they take us to a beach. Nice beach, very nice. Very small beach, but some nice. Very beautiful water. And they, we, they fed us lunch, dinner, lunch, lunch, lunch, lunch. And now those same people who were. What is it called? Leading the snorkeling are now waiters. So they're serving us, they're helping the restaurant. And then we go, we go playing on the beach. Absolutely. Beautiful. Take some great pictures, guys. That's the best beach experience. Some of those waves really took me out though. Yeah, that was crazy. And they got back on the boat. And they were helping us get on the speed boat that takes us back to the big old boat because you know. It's yeah, no, I think. And then on the way back since there's no stops and there's no food, people are gonna be impatient and hungry. So they entertained us with some music. There was dancing, there was fun.. And now the previous, what were they before? They were, they were bus boys. They were, or no, they waiters. Yeah. They were snorkeling people. Oh my gosh. They're both people. Yeah. The staff now, all of a sudden they're they're entertainment. they're entertaining us to the dance. They are full on dancers. Like they were getting me, they gotta be Zumba instructors. Yes, absolutely. I I'm. Carla thinks they might have been stripers because I, I wasn't gonna say that They didn't do anything scandalous, mind you, but man, they could all move. I think I heard of Carla laughing back there, but they could move. They were leading all the line dances and they, their energy level was through the roof. They were cleaning, they were bartending, it was crazy. They did everything and it was such a good experience. It was a fantastic experience. And I think this boat in particular, everyone pretty much spoke Spanish. So it felt less of tourists, more of people who were home, at least in the country. And it was really neat just to sit there, dancing with them not being. And since we had him, especially he was speaking Spanish, we, I didn't feel like a little tourist to there. Like, oh, what'd you mean by that? It was really, really cool. One of the things that also impressed me about the whole thing, and it was my small mindedness, not knowing until this trip is as tourists, we obviously. or an English being the predominant language you can tell. I mean, the people that were really successful are doing better are individuals that learned and grasp the English language in such a way that they speak it almost as if they were native as if they were American. So the guy that was leading the event, we became, he was talking to me in a more man-to-man human, to human, kind of it's Bruno Mars. Yeah, that's right. She called him the, the Mexican Brun Mars. No, he called him actually. He called himself the Mexican Bruno Mars. And we went along with it. Yes. We, I think we may have taken a picture. The guy was fantastic. Um, spoke perfect English Manny, Manny. Thank you, Manny. If you're watching this love you, man. But he was talking to me. He's like, man, this is so exhausting, but I love it. And it's just hard sometimes cuz he, he has to manage so many personalities, obviously his crew and probably at least 70 to 80 people trying to get everybody happy and motivated just to be floating on the boat for another 30, 40 minutes slow. But the time zapped and flew because of the fun that we were having. He knew exactly this is, they do this every day. He says I'm so tired, but they do it. He literally told me that. They do it every day because it is their livelihood. If they don't bring the energy, then they will be boring. It will be like, oh my God, we still got, we actually said that, oh, it's gonna be a long trip. Homey told me like, wait, wait, you ain't even got started yet. So I like something's happening. I don't know what's happening. It became a fantastic time. So at the end of it, they asked for tips, but I think he called it something else. He says he doesn't like to call it propina I believe that's what the word is. He doesn't like to call it tips so much as some type compensation for the entertainment that they provided. And because they just gave us all this fun because, they performed because, they had us just laughing and enjoying ourselves. I saw the little cup filled, so it was in their best interest to give it to us, to give us that energy. And for me, that was my big takeaway from the whole thing. All those hours. Dude, it was a full day. They literally did the best they could to make sure that we were all having a good time. And it was mind boggling to watch it and to think that they do this every single day. Good for them. And I'm glad that they have something that allows them to like practice and train and get better at all these cuz it's gonna benefit them forever. Right. But it was the best part of the trip for sure. Anything else that stands out. Cause I know we had a handful of things. Oh wait. She journaled it. I see what she has. If she can have one that just comes to mind. Oh look. Where's it at? There's so many. Like 9, 10, 11. I think we came back on the 16th. Oh, one of my favorite things. I don't know. It was just, it was just so much fun. We had our little beach photo shoot. Hey, Hey. Not too far. Oh, cause you realized it. Oh no. You were still in the picture. You're just a little poor. We had our beach photo shoot, which oh yeah. Yeah. Second year in a world. We barely missed the rain. Every single time it happens. But then we're waiting in line for this taco place that, that was recommended to us. It was a very long line for like there we're gonna wait. They gotta be good for. It's the place to be apparently the place to get tacos. And started raining that a little sprinkle. We can wait, we'll just sit over under the canopy. Yes, we would just there and then it really started pouring very hard rain. We're like, Ooh, we can't wait it forever. We realized there was a side clone out in the sea. So the rain wasn't gonna stop. It was gonna keep coming. Dude. It came down hard. It was crazy. A lot of those phases of it though. So then we decided we're gonna make a run for it and find somewhere else to eat. So we're just running in the rain, not sure where we're going. We're in our dresses. And I had heels? Sandals. Was not rain running in the rain material. So it was very funny though. And then we ended up at this restaurant where they had huge Teddy bears for some reason. And I took pictures with them. Yep. And it was great. Food. Wasn't that good. Food was good. I have tacos. Did you? To me. They were empty. Meanwhile, the restaurant down the street with tacos was like lines down the damn corner. Different. So it was interesting. Like what are they doing that this place isn't doing? Oh, she got it. Oh, and I got my rings. Oh oh no, no, no. I wanna talk about the place you went out for the boat. Those are some of the best. Really fancy place. We were not dressed for the occasion. Oh, that was our last day. That's right. It was the last restaurant Porfirio's I believe it's called. We weren't dressed for the occasion. As we were walking in, we like, oh my God, I don't. This is too fancy. They let us sit. Fantastic experience had some of the best Mexican food, but I feel like they fancy up the like, I had a torta and they brought it out in a, what is it? A food truck. Food truck, like a mini food truck. And it's on top. So they definitely make, made everything experience. They made it really delicious. You can tell they probably use some source, some of the best services. One, my favorite one, my favorite things was me and my sister share this big old play to meat to make tacos, but they would, they would only bring up four tortillas at a time in the little container, because they would like to replace him to keep 'em fresh. But then at some point we kept asking for tortilla or they just kept bringing them without us asking to the point we had too many, but yeah, they were always fresh and they were so good. And. Wow. I wanna go back. It was just for that place. It was really, really good. I was blown away. I had for like four people to run. I thought I was doing something wrong. Cause I had various waiters surrounding me. I'm like, why, why is everyone around me? But apparently it's just, I guess what they do, they have multiple people helping you. But that was really neat. It was a little intimidating. Very. But after getting over that, it was definitely a fantastic experience and we loved it and um, it was a good way to end the. I think it was our last place we ate before we left. We had the breakfast. Ah, yeah, we had already been there. So it was. That was a good place too, because they had sweet bread though, the second time they were out because we went later in the day and it was father's day, but the first time it was so good. It was a good place. The Sweet's there. Oh, we enjoyed it. So just so you know, we went to Puerto Vallarta. We haven't spoken about, oh, we spoke about this whole time. Didn't mention Puerto Vallarta. It's a very touristy town in a lot of ways, but it still has maintained an, I feel like a good chunk of its essence. I enjoyed it. I loved it. And thank you to Suzanne. If you're watching this video, I appreciate you. Thank you for letting us stay in your place. And I look forward to seeing you soon. Moving on to our next big thing which was one of the big things that you've been working on this entire summer daughter. Driving SKRRT. SKRRRT. Once again, I bring my significant other, my partner, my loving, beautiful, amazing partner into the story because she has led this adventure of making sure that she's ready to start driving. After this, I'm gonna go drive on the highway. First time driving on the highway, we're gonna hit the road. She's been driving, she's been pushing for this to go out, to get her on the road to get her prepared for it. Leading us to this summer, we have been work well. She worked with her last year a little bit. And then like for the previous two years, maybe three, we've been here for a while. I started to get her in the car and get her comfortable with the thing so that with the knobs and whatnot, let her go and stop in the parking lot here. But then Carla took over last year and gave her a little bit more. And this year she's like, Nope, she's 17. This is it. You're going to learn how to drive. You're gonna be comfortable. And. how is that? Oh, okay. I was like, well, thanks. It's been great. Especially these last two weeks, we've been really making sure we're on it. Our goal was to drive at least once every day days that we didn't, we had to make up for it another day with a double day and every day, these past couple of days we've been, wow. I've said days so many times. , It's funny when that happens. Right. Sometimes I do videos where I'm talking about a certain topic and I say a certain where like a hundred times, they're like, oh my God, I just said it again. There's no other synonym to replace it, but whatever. We would go to the neighborhood where my mom lives in my school, so we can practice that route so I can get ready for that. And then we'll practice parking. And for this, this last, this past year, all the time is when I do come over and she takes me to practice. We've been in the parking lot, huge parking lot. Just learning how to turn. You know, whatnot, not have learning how to not crash into cars. That's a good idea. I support not crashing into cars. And then first time I remember the first time I went on the streets. Oh, I was terrified. We live in front of a police department. I was freaking out. And then a police car drove by me because I was too scared to turn onto a very busy street. And she wrote on her window was asking if I'm okay. I didn't know the routine. So I was just smiling, giving her a thumbs up, but she was waiting for me to talk to her back to her, but she kept going. But then I couldn't see. And then this guy honked me, but anyways, guys honk at me now because, well, I'm not gonna risk it. Not even for a biscuit and they're honking This ain't worth it. Just for the record. They were honking. I'm like, no, you're crazy. I'm not gonna go. You're crazy. And then I went or whatever, and I'm great at parking now. Now she's very patient with me. She's an incredibly patient human being. And this was literally all of her doing. I mean, you're great. Don't get me wrong. I know. You taught me, you told me which one's the break, which one's the gas. But I got you the second. No, you took me on the field. Okay guys. So I took her on the field. I'll take credit for that. Okay. She got you around the basis. Yeah. She got you knowledgeable aware. She's fine. Okay. You're not hurting my feelings, so it's fine. No she did a lot and it's been great. Yep. So look out. She's about to hit the road guys. Oh, definitely look out by herself soon, but it's definitely something that I've enjoyed. I'm usually working and she'll take off with her. She comes back. She's like, I've been SKKRRRRTTTING. It's been amazing. I know how to do this. I know how to do that. The confidence that she comes like three or four days ago, she came in a little defeated. It wasn't a bad run. Just like, boom. There was no accident. Thank God. So there's that. So that is a win, but there, I did sense that then the next three, last three days consecutively, she comes in with a little more confidence, and a little more confidence. And right now you're like sky high obvious. But it's those reps it's about just getting 'em in and being comfortable, like working through the weird stuff and awareness around what you need to be paying attention to. I'm so happy that she's been there for you. And so happy that you're allowing yourself out there and not like refusing to drive cause others there's sometimes people don't want to do it. I was tempted to, I always, my line was, I don't even learn how to drive. I'm gonna get so rich. I can just pay for Ubers, but it looks like I have learn. In the meantime. Yeah. In the meantime until you become that wealthy let's just make sure that you can drive. Hey, fantastic. What do we got next? So you are a senior. Oh, right. Yeah. You're about to, you are a senior, essentially. What are you looking forward to? Marching season. So if you don't know. What's your position with your marching people? I am head drum major. You see how little she doesn't look this little, but she's a little petite thing. Yeah, I have this picture. This, they took me on this big old monster. Oh, sorry. That's what we call it. Big old podium. We call it the monster. And I'm like this tiny on this huge platform. It's crazy. It's really funny to see. Yeah. We're not gonna lie. It's pretty funny. So as soon as you get back, cause she, she leaves today's her last full day with me. We've already, well, I think I know where you're heading with this, but we already have had one. As soon as I get back, you have something with band, right? Yeah. Tomorrow I go back to my mom's, but first I have a little drum major session with the other three. That's what. And we've already had one this month and it's been so cool. Cause all my I'm like working on little cheat sheets to memorize how to conduct like warmups in the show. And I'm putting videos in Google drive and it's been really cool. And like, we had a tie dye session because that's a tradition we do, but I'm creating a new tradition that we're gonna do. And it's been great. It's been so much fun. And these are my other group of people. These are also my people. I have a lot of people. She has a lot of circles of friends and you're loved it's growing. Yeah, absolutely. I love to see that. But, what else are you looking forward to in this senior year? What things happen that or events that are coming up that you, you can't wait for or? What are you excited? I did that earlier with my glasses, but contact you. Okay. Okay. An eyelash or hair or something. Okay. I was jacked up my contact a second ago in the video was gonna be like, I'm here, you're talking. I'm like over here. Right? like, oh no, this is about to get. I resolved it much, much quicker than I usually do. Okay, good. Um, why am I looking for, to, uh... Are you excited? For your senior year? Oh yeah. No, I'm definitely very excited for my senior year. This is crazy. The ... Is coming. It's like, whoa, where the camera's gonna come out and be like, haha. You don't grow up. You're still seven. Yeah. No (seven)teen. That's crazy. Sometimes it feels very unreal, but we're getting through that and I am looking forward to it. It's gonna be a lot of fun because there's me too. It's okay. Whole senior hold. Okay. Crazy. I know. For you. Yeah. For me, you know this story, but I'll share it with them or reversions of this story. When, when I divorced, when we were living at grandma's at abuellta's, I didn't know how I was gonna get here. I didn't know how I was gonna pay for this or for that, or for a car or for your supplies or for college or for anything. But I had in my heart, I was, I was fairly certain that I'd figure it out. We'd get it together. I'd get it together. You missed my nap time. Oh, baby. You need more coffee. It was really tough. It was a tough time. So you're here, we're here now. We're doing well. And you're about to go to college and we'll get that figured out. Mm-hmm. And it just makes emotional because you're a grownup. A little bit. You're basically a grownup. You'll be 18 in a few months. Oh, I miss the elections by a week. You'll be 18 in a few months. And by this time, next year, you'll be planning or you'll be planning on going something might be there. Yeah. You might already be there. So. Wow. Yeah. What happened? I was talking to a mom yesterday about to be mom she's oh, my barber. She. Oh, I was like, what, what do you mean? Mom's About to be a mom, she's pregnant. And she's telling me about her child. I'm like, Dude, you have no idea. I don't know how I got this old and got this gray hair. My kids all grown. Like, I don't know what to do with this. Like, so I, I can't imagine for you. What that experience is like to see your life. I mean, shoot, COVID. It cut off my freshman year and all of a sudden I'm gonna be a senior. I feel like we just got quarantined. I feel like I just finished my freshman year. And now I'm graduating at the end of this year. Yeah. What? What happened? This is. This is. Someone hit three times speed on the matrix simulation. Wow. That was something I was gonna say. And I just wouldn't blank. I already ready my school supply list though. Oh yeah. Share with them. You're a little perfect backpacker. What was it? My ideal school bag. I was struggling to come up with a school supply list. So I was like, no better way to figure out what to get, than to draw it out. She loves diagram. She loves illustrating. And she's good at it. Yeah, it's been great. Because I realized I gotta get a smaller bag or else I'm gonna fill all the pockets that I have. At least with a smaller bag, I can fill it. This is her older self talking when she was younger, she was determined to have the big bag with all her books and all her pens and markers. I have back pain. I know now she does, but she was little she's like, no, I need it. Oh, I need every pencil. Bigger than me. Yes. They're like, oh baby. You're. But like now I know myself, some whew, but it's all organized. It's gonna be great. And since I have an iPad, thank you. Mm-hmm I don't need any papers. It's gonna be nice. So I don't need some binder. I have a binder for a band and that's it. So it's pretty great. Everything's slowly becoming more minimal. I've been more of a minimalist. So maybe that's a little bit of the influence. You only need so much. Still analog. Yes. And that's actually kind of, I'm gonna say I butted heads with her, like, baby, you don't need that. Just do it digitally. That way. It's everywhere. No, I want, I wanna write it, but baby. And she's like, and then I. Teevee? This is maybe the way she prefers to do it. It took me about 30 seconds or 45 seconds of me, like trying to persuade her to just go digital. And I realized like, wait, she's different. She's built different. I had to let that go. I mean, I still have my Google calendar to remind me of the important things, but this is way more fun. Absolutely. I love that you have your thing and I can appreciate it though. Paint on paper is still very important. Baby, thank you for joining me. You're welcome. On this podcast. Would you like to come on more often? Depends. Depends on? What's the pay like? Hey, Hey sucks. I do this for the fun. Come have fun with me. I'll think about. Don't think to hard. I'll have to schedule it. That is true though, you do have to schedule it. Cuz yeah. It's about to get crazy. Oh, you like the smile? It's why it get better. Oh snap. We haven't shared that with anyone. Why is it about to get better? I'm getting invisalign. Yeah. Cause those who have Invisalign together, love each other. Or stay together? Yeah. Even Carla. Yeah. Carla. My girlfriend, has Invisalign as well. So she came to me a couple weeks ago and she says, You used to tell the story actually. I was thinking about it for a while and then one time, like forever ago, I said forever ago I was like maybe two, three months ago. I told him... Oh S#!t! What? It's gonna be a straight podcast. What do you mean? I didn't hit record. OMG! I just realized I did not hit record. We're recording podcast. So we're gonna, it's gonna be a straight podcast. What is, does that mean? Just audio? No, I've been so funny. I know. Hit record now. You are evil. How do you. I've been so funny. You're still funny. It comes through. Like I've done so many facial reactions. No, all my hard work. My eyebrows hurt. Okay guys. Here's my school supply list. Oh man. Here's my journal. Cat. That's not a cat cat cat. She's the youngest cat lady you will ever meet June. Here's the Polaroid picture. Yes. There. It's not like you do this. I don't, I don't do this a lot. Not enough. At any rate. I've been, been so good at looking at the camera. I'm like, wait. oh, snap. You keep looking over there to keep making sure it doesn't go to sleep. Yes. BUt I didn't see that till right now. Luckily we're recording. This is so funny though. So funny. Hey. Yeah. I'm just kidding. I'm kidding. Love you Carla. I don't even know what we're saying. I'm getting invisilign. Let's do it. Let's do it with the same energy. So, I went to him and I, and I said, I don't, we were just walking by something and I said something and I was like, oh, I was like something about like, I wanted to invisillign I was like, really? I never knew that. And I, I never acted on it. Like I never followed up, but this time I did. I told him I put it on my, I put it on my planner. So you can see now I put it in here. I was like, have, I don't know, like dentist talk or teeth talk. And we're pulling into Barnes and noble. And then I said, So I wanna get Invisalign. He' like, oh, okay. Actually I think you led, you gave me like an interesting lead into like, Can I ask you something? Just so you know what's gonna hit you. Yeah, of course. And I appreciate that. And it wasn't overly dramatic, so I didn't think it was something off the wall that I was gonna lose my shit. Okay. Anyways, I pulled in. I wanted, I said I wanted to visualize, I said, okay. And instead of just sitting with the, okay. I said, okay, what's the next step we have to do? She did. I trained her well. So we go, he says, when we go inside, he's gonna message my godmother because she works at the dentist where he gets his stuff done and where I would now get my stuff done. Shout out to Ericson Dental. Oh, dang it. They just got a plug. You can say it again. No, I was gonna say it wrong. I was gonna say like, Dentist Ericson. Close enough. Ericson Dental. Fantastic. If you're in the DFW area, go check 'em out. So he says, whenever I'm done getting my books to make sure that he did that. And I did exactly that. I got my books and I was pretty speedy quick too. And I said, So what'd she say? And she hadn't responded. So I waited till the next day. I was like, What's she say? So then he called her and then it was either having an appointment the next day after that fall, that day or like fall that day, or like July 5th, which I wouldn't even be in town. So I went in the bay the next day. So I asked him one day, two days later, I went in the dentist. Once again, my girlfriend was, Johnny on the spot. She was like, because it wasn't gonna work the next day. Because he had like a call or a meeting at the time that I would have to go to the, my appointment. But she had an appointment there at 7 AM. So we got up early and got there. And then with her, because she happened to have an appointment, because she was around, I was able to get in. And because I went with her at seven in the morning, they had a cancellation at eight. So instead of going in at 11, I got in two, three hours earlier and it was great. It all worked out. I love how the universe works. So within 48 hours of her telling me, yeah, two to two days, 48 hours of her telling me that she's interested, we got her in. And I'm the perfect candidate for Invisalign. I have beautiful, healthy teeth. And I'm a great patient. Perfect patient. Can you tell? So it was needless to say, it's been paid for, and she should get 'em in a couple weeks. When she gets back from her trip. She has another trip. She's gonna get better. Yeah. She has a beautiful smile already. Wait for it. We're about to have the prettiest smiles everywhere. Sound effect. Hey editor, make sure to hit a sound effect here. Good thing to keep recording. Oh, so with that, What's the fun is I can't see my facial reaction. You could just be, you could have just been me talking through like an audio distorted thing where you sound like me, because maybe they're gonna use that against you. They're gonna be like, wow, You don't, you don't really have a daughter. As it is somebody on YouTube said to me, I don't believe this dude is even a father. Cuz kids be doing crazy ish that parents never do. Anyways. People already doubt that I am truly am a Dad. Oh,, why can't, why is the one podcast? You record no camera? Were daughter's there? Oh, she's obviously not real. You're faking her this whole time. Because you didn't hit record. Damn you old man. I love you though. I love you too. Oh my goodness. Well with that dramatic ending. I bid farewell. We bid farewell to you. Thank you for joining us I'll be seeing you another time. Yes, you will. She'd be coming on just to talk. 'Cause the idea is just to have conversations. What's going on in your life. Something you wanna share. It's our matured summer wrap-up video. Yes. Oh, so yeah, I'll end it there. This is basically the last of the summer wrap up videos for 10 years or so. I've been, at the end of every summer vacation that they come with me, because they come with me for, they would come with me in June. They'd be here through father's day as well. So it was cool. They'd be with me on father's day. And then, at the end, I started this little thing where I record a summer wrap up video. So we share what we did and I'll actually include a link to a couple of those videos in the show notes. And you get to see her growth, our growth, just being comfortable on camera talking, sharing. I used to be like this the whole time. She was the cutest little thing. Cause I think the first one, she must have been seven or eight. So she's yeah. She's just making sure that her hair was just wrapped. Oh, so my hair's frizzy, you know, you told me I, I it's. So this is the matured adult version of that wrap up. Unfortunately, in this wrap up, we only have one kid, nonetheless. That's how mature and aged it is. Yeah, we're growing up. Eventually. It might just. Next time it's gonna be all gray. It's pretty much all gray kid. Don't my nose hair. Wonder why maybe not enough sun. Anyway, thank you for joining us. I really appreciate you. If you really want to hear this entire episode, you have to listen to the podcast because there's only, there's only a few minutes of video. I appreciate you. Make sure to subscribe the channel. Follow us. Wherever you listen to your podcast, iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, whatever I'm on all these platforms. I love you guys. Thank you for tuning in. We'll talk again soon. Oh, I'm stuttering. Buh-bye. Bye. Finish here. Hmm. Finish here. And, oh, you are so evil. staying in it. Cause we recording. Oh,