Mentally Oddcast Transcript: Author and Filmmaker Ryan Lieske
Find an audio version of this episode here.
Find more from this week's guest here.
00:00:01.82
Wednesday Lee Friday
You are listening to the Mentally Oddcast. My name is Wednesday, Lee Friday, and this week we are... You know what? Actually, no, I'm going to try that again because I do want to definitely mention fundraising in the beginning.
00:00:14.20
Ryan Lieske
Okay, yeah.
00:00:15.67
Wednesday Lee Friday
Cough, cough.
00:00:17.73
Ryan Lieske
Coffee.
00:00:18.01
Wednesday Lee Friday
You are listening to...
00:00:20.39
Ryan Lieske
Sorry.
00:00:20.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
You are listening to the Mentally Oddcast. My name is Wednesday, leave Friday. Do visit us on Ko-Fi. That's K-O-F-I to support everything we do.
00:00:31.35
Wednesday Lee Friday
This week, our guest is Ryan Leeski, who was born December 1973. And he's been bothered by that ever since. His early creative endeavors include staging plays at his parents' basement, building haunted houses in neighbors' garages for trick-or-treaters, making comic books, and recording fake radio shows.
00:00:52.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
In junior high, a friend loaned him a Charles L. Grant paperback, and while reading that, Ryan decided writing would be his life, and he set about writing his first novel.
00:01:03.61
Wednesday Lee Friday
Welcome, Ryan.
00:01:08.12
Wednesday Lee Friday
things were progressing well until college when issues with mental health entered stage left and that's where the real story begins welcome ryan
00:01:17.50
Ryan Lieske
thank you so much wednesday i'm delighted to be here actually um
00:01:22.46
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, I am glad you could be here. This is this was a long time in coming. We had ah an array of scheduling and technical problems that were keeping us apart, but we managed to overcome.
00:01:31.26
Ryan Lieske
yes
00:01:33.21
Wednesday Lee Friday
So that is delightful. Now, ah we always start by asking our guests to tell us the story of the first horror movie that you remember seeing. So let's have it.
00:01:44.54
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, okay, so i for years I sort of lived under the, what do they call that, the Mandela effect, because i had I was convinced that the first horror film I ever saw was Creepshow, the George A.
00:02:01.72
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right,
00:02:02.20
Ryan Lieske
Romero, Stephen King, EC Comics homage classic, and I thought that was it. And then it dawned on me one day that when I saw that movie, which was over at a friend's house in the early eighties, he was one of the few people in our small little town that had cable.
00:02:23.51
Wednesday Lee Friday
right. right
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Ryan Lieske
And so I remember all of a sudden remembered right after creep show, we watched poltergeist and I had already seen poltergeist and he hadn't.
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Ryan Lieske
And I was telling him about the, so then I realized the first horror film I saw
00:02:37.24
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
00:02:44.12
Ryan Lieske
had to have been poltergeist um and obviously growing up when i did in the 80s i was a big steven spielberg nut and so obviously i probably begged and pleaded to see poltergeist because his name was attached to it and that pretty much i Yeah, I don't know what to say.
00:03:06.16
Ryan Lieske
like And it's weird, too, because horror was not my first love as a kid. like That was an anomaly for me, that and Creepshow.
00:03:14.26
Wednesday Lee Friday
Really?
00:03:14.53
Ryan Lieske
Those just were not... No, I mean, starting out, I was a science fiction fanatic, ah probably because of the triple threat of Star Wars, Star Trek.
00:03:21.73
Wednesday Lee Friday
OK.
00:03:27.98
Ryan Lieske
And um there was this anime that ran on on TV back in the late 70s, early 80s called Star Blazers. um
00:03:36.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
OK. Yep.
00:03:38.42
Ryan Lieske
addicted to that and I loved Battlestar Galactica, Buck Rogers, all that stuff.
00:03:42.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
Uh-huh.
00:03:42.86
Ryan Lieske
Like, that was my life. And then shortly after that, I started to get into the sort of fantasy and action adventure stuff after I saw Raiders the Lost Ark.
00:03:53.88
Ryan Lieske
um So up until about junior high, horror was not really a big thing for me, which is weird because it kind of took over my life.
00:04:06.39
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, I mean, I very much think of you as a horror person.
00:04:06.55
Ryan Lieske
But...
00:04:09.85
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:04:10.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
um but But no, it sounds like not. Now, I do have to clarify, though. Surely you would have seen Jaws before Poltergeist.
00:04:18.52
Ryan Lieske
No, nope.
00:04:19.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
Really?
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Ryan Lieske
I actually.
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Wednesday Lee Friday
Because, I mean, people...
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Ryan Lieske
go ahead.
00:04:23.48
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, people do disagree on whether or not Jaws is a horror movie. But I think if a child is eaten alive in front of you, that that just counts, regardless of how much action is in it.
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Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:04:33.72
Wednesday Lee Friday
So...
00:04:34.14
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, no, Jaws, I definitely think it's a horror movie. And on a side note, I recently took my nephew to see Jaws in the theater for the 50th anniversary.
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Ryan Lieske
And my roommate came with me who had never seen the movie before.
00:04:45.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
Nice.
00:04:50.30
Ryan Lieske
And yeah, neither of them had.
00:04:50.32
Wednesday Lee Friday
Wow.
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Ryan Lieske
so And I've seen it, what... a hundred gajillion times. So it was really neat to see their reactions to it.
00:04:56.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep, yep.
00:05:00.18
Ryan Lieske
And afterwards I asked them, I said, now, do you guys consider that a horror film? Cause part of me thinks it's more of just like an adventure movie or a thriller even, but they both were like, Oh no, that's a horror movie.
00:05:09.37
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
00:05:14.81
Ryan Lieske
That scared me. Like they were 50 years later this 12 year old kid in late 30 year old,
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Ryan Lieske
friend of mine, we're still intensely nervous and frightened while watching it. So yeah, it's a horror movie.
00:05:31.51
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, well,
00:05:34.84
Wednesday Lee Friday
I don't think people ever stop being afraid of being eaten alive.
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Ryan Lieske
Sure, sure.
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Wednesday Lee Friday
um
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Ryan Lieske
This is true.
00:05:41.53
Wednesday Lee Friday
Which I would say actually brings me to my next point, which is that you and I met because of zombies.
00:05:47.45
Ryan Lieske
Do we? Yeah.
00:05:47.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
um not Not because zombies occurred, but because we had some zombies.
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Ryan Lieske
I wish i wish
00:05:54.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
Now, we can't really talk in detail about the project, but
00:05:58.90
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:05:59.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
I was aware of a project that you had done that I was very impressed with, and we had we had some dealings with regard to that.
00:06:03.44
Ryan Lieske
Oh, thank you. Yeah. Yeah.
00:06:06.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
um Now, zombies, in a way, are almost their own genre it is separate from horror, because so much has been done. and the I mean, there's zombie romance now.
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Ryan Lieske
yeah
00:06:19.37
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'm not saying I'm in favor of it, but I am aware that it exists.
00:06:19.74
Ryan Lieske
yeah
00:06:22.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know, there's zombie comedy. There's, I don't know if you know, Stefan Petruca. He's been on the show and he wrote The Dead Man Walking, which is a zombie detective.
00:06:33.03
Ryan Lieske
Nice.
00:06:33.11
Wednesday Lee Friday
And, oh, it's fantastic. You got to read. There's audio books, too. And there's at least two, but I think he's working on another one.
00:06:37.11
Ryan Lieske
Oh, okay.
00:06:40.29
Wednesday Lee Friday
um But yeah, that's that's good stuff.
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Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:06:43.09
Wednesday Lee Friday
Good stuff right there.
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Ryan Lieske
Now, don't don't forget the Zomromcom.
00:06:47.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
Of course. What is that? Warm bodies or something?
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Ryan Lieske
Warm Bodies.
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Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
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Ryan Lieske
I even think they consider Zombieland a Zomromcom. Shaun of the Dead.
00:06:55.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, wow.
00:06:56.54
Ryan Lieske
I think Shaun of the Dead probably... kind of kickstarted that because it does have that whole dealings with him and his girlfriend in it. So maybe that's the culprit, whatever.
00:07:06.63
Wednesday Lee Friday
Great. Well, Shaun of the Dead is such a bromance, though. i just I love that aspect of it so much because it shows like dudes that get on each other's nerves and yet somehow not talking about it is what works for men.
00:07:11.61
Ryan Lieske
Oh, it's totally.
00:07:23.64
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:07:23.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
And as ah as a lady, that's that's not generally how we do things.
00:07:24.44
Ryan Lieske
Yep.
00:07:30.14
Ryan Lieske
So I've heard.
00:07:30.52
Wednesday Lee Friday
But I would be
00:07:30.90
Ryan Lieske
So I've heard. But actually, speaking of which, again, i actually had the privilege, I would say, of showing Shaun of the Dead to my nephew.
00:07:43.03
Ryan Lieske
Same nephew, aforementioned nephew. We watched it last night. He'd never seen it. And he he thought it was fantastic.
00:07:48.25
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, wow.
00:07:51.43
Ryan Lieske
So...
00:07:52.22
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, yeah.
00:07:52.73
Ryan Lieske
um Yeah, I mean, I think it's a near perfect film in general, but one of the best, easily in the top five of perfect horror comedies.
00:08:03.71
Ryan Lieske
Like, it just is.
00:08:04.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
00:08:05.31
Ryan Lieske
It's so good.
00:08:05.43
Wednesday Lee Friday
I agree. You know what? Now I think we need to parse what the top five horror comedies are. Because that certainly is one of them.
00:08:11.67
Ryan Lieske
Oh. Agreed,
00:08:13.36
Wednesday Lee Friday
Tucker and Dale vs. Evil has to be up there.
00:08:15.77
Ryan Lieske
ah grade agreed.
00:08:16.09
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah
00:08:16.47
Ryan Lieske
Agreed.
00:08:17.76
Wednesday Lee Friday
Honestly, Creepshow belongs up there. if If you want to go so far as to call Creepshow horror comedy, not everyone does because there's a lot of of straight horror in it.
00:08:27.48
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:08:27.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
But...
00:08:29.11
Ryan Lieske
Well, the Stephen King segment is hilarious. I mean, it which is strange because it ends on such a bleak note. But it's I mean, maybe it's just Stephen King playing a hick is just funny.
00:08:36.63
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well...
00:08:40.94
Ryan Lieske
But, you know, yeah, no, there's it's actually it's got aspects of horror comedy to it. So sure. Yeah, I guess.
00:08:48.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
I think that was a movie, that was like the movie where I learned that you can't just quote things in movies in front of grandma.
00:08:57.75
Ryan Lieske
right
00:08:58.01
Wednesday Lee Friday
because the the phrase wearing your balls for earrings is not something you should say to your brother in front of grandma and believe me when i tell you i found that out the hard way
00:09:07.74
Ryan Lieske
yeah i Yeah, I imagine I would have suffered the same fate had I ever made that mistake. So, yeah.
00:09:14.46
Wednesday Lee Friday
okay all right so that's three so let's let's say two more hmm
00:09:16.41
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. um Honestly, i kind of Well, there is Abbott and Costello, Me, Frankenstein, which I think most people... It wasn't the first horror-comedy hybrid, but a lot of people cite that as a sterling example that even movies today are trying to duplicate, you know...
00:09:35.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
See, I would have to watch it again and see if I can separate the nostalgia from it Because I certainly loved it as a kid, but I also watched ww WWF wrestling as a kid. And that's not something I would do now unless John Cena is doing something really cool.
00:09:45.02
Ryan Lieske
yeah
00:09:50.17
Wednesday Lee Friday
But um and let me see.
00:09:50.42
Ryan Lieske
Right, right, right.
00:09:52.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
Now, some people talk about the Addams Family movies as if they're horror comedies, but I would put those in an entirely separate category then than actual horror.
00:10:00.09
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. They're adjacent for sure, but i usually lump those in as like fantasy comedies because there's ah obviously a fantastical element to some of it. Well, maybe not even with Adam's family, now that I think of it. There's there's no magic in those, right?
00:10:17.25
Ryan Lieske
They're just weird.
00:10:17.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
I well I mean thing is whatever he's got going on yeah
00:10:19.15
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:10:22.51
Ryan Lieske
That's true. He is a reanimated severed hand. So, okay.
00:10:25.53
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah I mean it it seems like Wednesday would be better at killing Pugsley if she really wanted to do it so maybe there is some sort of protective amulet happening there that we've never seen
00:10:32.98
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:10:38.08
Ryan Lieske
True. Yeah.
00:10:38.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
00:10:40.09
Ryan Lieske
Or she's just into the edging aspects of it. um
00:10:43.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well. h
00:10:45.17
Ryan Lieske
Not in that way, but you know, Hey, I'm going to get you right close to the end.
00:10:47.64
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, certainly not.
00:10:49.71
Ryan Lieske
And no, you're still alive.
00:10:50.84
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
00:10:53.46
Ryan Lieske
Sounds like me and my brother growing up, so whatever.
00:10:54.01
Wednesday Lee Friday
you ah
00:10:58.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
Wow, you know what? I'm like blanking on all the horror comedies I like now. Maybe we should just leave it at three.
00:11:04.22
Ryan Lieske
would What would you would would you think? Maybe Scream?
00:11:09.05
Ryan Lieske
I mean, i know it's...
00:11:09.39
Wednesday Lee Friday
I think so. Like, that's that's more wry than laugh-out-loud funny, but but yeah, I mean, that's certainly a contender.
00:11:14.76
Ryan Lieske
That's true.
00:11:17.46
Ryan Lieske
I mean, the one I would throw in for sure is Ghostbusters.
00:11:21.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
00:11:21.91
Ryan Lieske
I mean...
00:11:22.03
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, in Scary Movie, there's the the original Scary Movie is a fine, fine horror comedy.
00:11:28.50
Ryan Lieske
it's been I saw that in the theater opening night, and I have not seen it since. I remember laughing a lot, but I was drunk.
00:11:33.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
00:11:34.30
Ryan Lieske
Okay, okay.
00:11:35.16
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, H and I saw it together, and I think that I was one of maybe three white people in the theater, and that place was raucous, man.
00:11:44.31
Ryan Lieske
agree. Okay. okay
00:11:44.84
Wednesday Lee Friday
And that I think that really helps when you have a super engaged, raucous crowd for a movie like that. It's just such a better time than if you got a bunch of somber people or people on their fucking phones.
00:11:53.53
Ryan Lieske
i agree
00:11:56.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
like I can't stand that.
00:11:58.52
Ryan Lieske
No, are you kidding me? i
00:12:00.18
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, go home! You're not that important.
00:12:01.69
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:12:02.46
Wednesday Lee Friday
You don't need to be reached at all times.
00:12:03.00
Ryan Lieske
No.
00:12:05.50
Ryan Lieske
i go I go slightly ballistic, if I see it. I try to ignore everybody when I'm in a theater, but...
00:12:09.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh.
00:12:12.28
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know, I'm looking around my apartment for clues as to horror comedies that I want to make sure and mention, and I don't know how I could forget the cocaine bear.
00:12:22.04
Ryan Lieske
Oh, yeah, I think that one that one needs to marinate with me a little bit more, but I i was amused.
00:12:23.20
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well,
00:12:28.48
Ryan Lieske
I was amused.
00:12:29.91
Wednesday Lee Friday
See, that's the thing.
00:12:30.26
Ryan Lieske
So...
00:12:30.63
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, with B-movies, there's so many B-movies that end up being funny, and you're not always sure if they meant it. Like, Velocipastor, they mean it.
00:12:37.08
Ryan Lieske
Exactly.
00:12:38.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
Velocipastor means it.
00:12:39.13
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:12:40.51
Wednesday Lee Friday
Inhuman Witch, definitely self-aware and delightful. Have you seen Inhuman Witch yet?
00:12:44.95
Ryan Lieske
I have not seen Inhuman, which I didn't... I've never even heard of it so...
00:12:47.71
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, you gotta. Oh my god, dude. Dude, I will honestly say I think it is the... One of the the greatest just in terms of sitting down and watching it and seeing how much heart it has.
00:13:01.50
Wednesday Lee Friday
Low budget films of all time.
00:13:02.01
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:13:03.80
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like you can tell how much. they I mean, but the thing is, like like there are sets that are literally like poster board with a drawing of a of a control board on it that Like I would bet you this movie was made for about seventy five dollars, but I just love it.
00:13:20.60
Ryan Lieske
Okay. I'm looking it up now. i want to add it to my, uh, um, oh my God, that poster. Okay.
00:13:26.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
he
00:13:26.87
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. All right. Yeah, I'm adding it to my Letterboxd watch list. So, verdict TBA.
00:13:35.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
it's one of those things that I haven't actually bought it yet because it was on YouTube for a long time and then I was like, oh, it's not free. And then I said, wait a minute. If anybody deserves my $12.99 for this movie, it is these people.
00:13:48.95
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:13:49.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
you know Because it's right up there with ah you know Santa Jaws, which I love.
00:13:50.26
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:13:53.91
Wednesday Lee Friday
I thought Llamageddon was really good. um
00:13:56.96
Ryan Lieske
Lavalangella.
00:13:58.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, yeah, both of those are great. Like, hey, i wonder what the Police Academy cast is doing doing now.
00:14:04.25
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:14:04.33
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, nothing? Great, get them in here.
00:14:05.53
Ryan Lieske
No.
00:14:08.47
Ryan Lieske
That's great. No, I'm going to have to i definitely have to look into this.
00:14:09.32
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep, yep.
00:14:14.55
Ryan Lieske
i um I recently downloaded or not. I shouldn't have said that. Can you edit that out? um I recently came across a film called Nano Shark.
00:14:22.50
Wednesday Lee Friday
Where was
00:14:29.69
Ryan Lieske
It's like inner space, but with they go into somebody's bloodstream to fight a shark. this A nano? i I mean, nano shark. What else do you need to know?
00:14:38.71
Wednesday Lee Friday
That's fantastic.
00:14:40.28
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, I'm going to watch that shit. thank you
00:14:42.55
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, because there have been so many great, bad shark movies lately. um there And they'll shock you. Like, Ghost Shark 2 is surprisingly well written. It's like someone dared somebody to make that movie good.
00:14:57.02
Ryan Lieske
Really?
00:14:57.37
Wednesday Lee Friday
And they were like, yeah.
00:14:57.42
Ryan Lieske
Ghost shark 2?
00:14:59.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, because, you know, the first one has Richard Mole in it, R.I.P.
00:15:00.28
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:15:04.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
And, you know, and and it's OK.
00:15:05.30
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:15:07.81
Wednesday Lee Friday
It's what you think it's going to be. And the cool thing about Ghost Shark is that it'll show up like in a water cooler or a slip and slide, like any place where there's any water at all.
00:15:17.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
The Ghost Shark can appear.
00:15:19.71
Ryan Lieske
Oh, wow.
00:15:20.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
So it's it's very versatile. Yeah, but then two, because the first one is pretty zany.
00:15:22.14
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:15:25.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
And then the sequel is, ah I'm like, wait, this this is Ghost Shark 2, right? i'm I'm looking at the right thing, because it was surprisingly like, why are you all trying this hard?
00:15:36.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
I mean, thanks, but I'm shocked.
00:15:37.94
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:15:39.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I thought that Ouija Shark is another good one.
00:15:40.15
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:15:43.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
And that one has one actor in particular, a child actor, who is like the Millie Bobby Brown of this movie. Like, what in the world is that child doing in this movie?
00:15:51.77
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:15:54.88
Wednesday Lee Friday
He's so talented.
00:15:56.12
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:15:57.50
Wednesday Lee Friday
So, yeah, I mean...
00:15:57.62
Ryan Lieske
Well, everybody gets to start somewhere. I mean, like in right now they could, if they offered me a paycheck,
00:16:01.24
Wednesday Lee Friday
Indeed. indeed
00:16:07.06
Ryan Lieske
and I cashed said paycheck and it actually went through, they could get me to write 10 ghost shark movies. I would do it because I'm in the sellout mode or sellout phase of my life right now.
00:16:13.57
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, totally.
00:16:19.48
Ryan Lieske
Um, so, and I am not ashamed of it whatsoever. Right.
00:16:24.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, I mean, you're allowed to write things that you're not passionate about. i used to When I started writing like for money, I was writing SEO. i was writing advertisements and describing wallpaper and shit because I wanted to get paid for writing.
00:16:34.62
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:16:37.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
And that made me feel like a writer.
00:16:39.38
Ryan Lieske
Exactly.
00:16:40.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
So, you know...
00:16:40.86
Ryan Lieske
So, Ghost Shark 3, if you guys want to make it, call me.
00:16:43.67
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
00:16:47.66
Wednesday Lee Friday
Dude, you know who you should call?
00:16:47.77
Ryan Lieske
I haven't even seen him yet, but I'll do it.
00:16:50.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
Dude, you know who's actually writing super serious now? It's Thunder Levin, who wrote the first four Sharknadoes.
00:16:56.82
Ryan Lieske
Are you serious?
00:16:57.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
ye Yeah, yeah.
00:16:58.62
Ryan Lieske
He's finally... Well, good for you.
00:17:01.50
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, he used to be on Twitter. i used to be on Twitter, so I was aware of him being on Twitter. But um yeah, and last I heard, he was throwing down on a serious screenplay.
00:17:11.52
Ryan Lieske
Nice. Okay. Well, yeah, I'm not on Twitter anymore either. So, um, probably we're really,
00:17:17.66
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, he was mad that I asked him if it was his real name. His name's Thunder Levin. Like, yeah, I realize that's kind of an iffy question coming from me, but that that doesn't make Thunder Levin any more believable.
00:17:29.68
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'm just saying.
00:17:29.85
Ryan Lieske
right.
00:17:31.42
Wednesday Lee Friday
But, you know, sometimes people have amazing names and they just come naturally. Wolfgang Van Halen.
00:17:35.97
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Wolf gang. Where'd you get that name? know, I sometimes wonder that too, because it's like how, I mean, just it's a simple sounding name, but Stephen King, like you were blessed with that name.
00:17:51.65
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. Yeah. Yep.
00:17:53.61
Ryan Lieske
Like that just Clive Barker.
00:17:54.33
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
00:17:56.05
Ryan Lieske
Those are just great author names. good on your parents for calling you like we could all, I mean, you've got a, you've got a great unique name.
00:18:00.41
Wednesday Lee Friday
yep
00:18:06.50
Ryan Lieske
I, I hate my name. I'm always struggling with, should I use it or come up with a cool pseudonym? But yet, eh, why not? Like, I just don't think my name ever sounds like a writer name, which is silly.
00:18:18.68
Ryan Lieske
I know, but I'm always like, ah, the, the Liskey trips people up and, and it just doesn't have a ring to it. I don't know, but you know, first world problems, I guess it's,
00:18:27.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah Well, but that's the thing is it it becomes a writer name because it's synonymous with writing.
00:18:34.58
Ryan Lieske
Sure, sure.
00:18:34.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
Now, there's ah there's a writer who's been on my show and when and we went to undergrad together. So a lot of people, when they hear the name Scott Sigler, they think of a very specific genre and some very specific books, you know, horror and sports together, a lot of science-y stuff. You know, it's got...
00:18:55.19
Wednesday Lee Friday
but But when I say Scott Sigler, I mean, it's the guy that is in the house next door and I'm going to see when the party starts. Like, that's, you know, like, what what is a writer name to some people is ah that guy name to me.
00:19:02.20
Ryan Lieske
Right. yeah
00:19:08.12
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, no, you got a good point.
00:19:08.15
Wednesday Lee Friday
So.
00:19:09.44
Ryan Lieske
You got a good point. um But that's just me. Yeah. You know, we all have that stuff about ourselves we don't like.
00:19:15.25
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, no, I hear it. I hear it.
00:19:18.55
Ryan Lieske
So.
00:19:20.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
I want to get back to zombie fans on that note because, in my experience, a lot of zombie fans and horror fans in general, they're people dealing with ah mental health issues, emotional health issues, trauma, ah anxiety, PTSD, a lot of that.
00:19:20.70
Ryan Lieske
But. Yes.
00:19:38.48
Wednesday Lee Friday
What would you like to say about that?
00:19:41.33
Ryan Lieske
um Wow. Yeah, this is um this is actually something I've thought about for most of my adult life. um Because as someone who was very undiagnosed for a long time, and also someone obsessed with consuming and creating horror stories um in various mediums,
00:20:09.21
Ryan Lieske
I, you know, it's something I've always wondered about. And I've um not, ah not just in terms of myself, but in terms of everybody that's kind of in the community like that, um you know, and I've read a lot of stuff where, you know, interviews with famous horror filmmakers or um writers and stuff who, I mean, I think it was Stephen King who, and I'll paraphrase because I don't remember the exact quote, but I remember reading an interview where he said,
00:20:39.00
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, I'm I'm pretty mentally unstable and a lot of people have told me I should see a therapist. But instead, I write down all my fears and anxieties and you pay me for them.
00:20:53.89
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
00:20:54.71
Ryan Lieske
And I was like, when I read that as a young lad, i was like, that's genius.
00:20:55.99
Wednesday Lee Friday
anyone
00:21:00.10
Ryan Lieske
That's, that was what I was like, because I'm, I'm, I wanted to do that. Like, I wanted to put all my, yeah i didn't even know how to explain it back when I was a tween or a teenager, you know, it was a few years you know And obviously discussions of anxiety disorder and depression aren't as weren't as on the table out in the open as they were as they are now.
00:21:24.54
Ryan Lieske
Because grew up in the 80s.
00:21:24.57
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
00:21:26.05
Ryan Lieske
I was in high school until the early 90s. And we knew about it. i mean, everybody knew what those things were. But nobody really like talked about it. um at least you know Or you just make jokes. um And then once I got...
00:21:41.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
particularly particularly for men. I think that even now, but even more so back then, men were less encouraged and more judged, I think, for saying that they needed mental help, which is, you know...
00:21:53.50
Ryan Lieske
Oh, sure. Yeah. i Well, and it's one of the things that kept me for a while from even doing anything about it was because I, you know, was indoctrinated or whatever to think, yeah, that's a weakness.
00:22:07.96
Ryan Lieske
And um so I guess for me, the reason I was somewhat drawn to horror and decided I had a
00:22:08.61
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep.
00:22:20.54
Ryan Lieske
ah not only a fondness for writing it, but a knack for it, um, was because I i think I, uh, what would you say? Uh, subconsciously knew that I was channeling something, um, whether it was for me or something,
00:22:38.62
Ryan Lieske
you know, i that I saw happen to a family member or a friend and just didn't know how to process it. In my mind, i you know, this is even before I ever put pen to paper or ever picked up a video camera, I made up movies and books in my head.
00:22:55.93
Ryan Lieske
Um, like, and I wish I still had these, but I would fill notebooks with hand-drawn made up posters for made up movies.
00:22:56.49
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
00:23:05.31
Ryan Lieske
And I even had made up actors that would star in those movies and they often start in other ones. And I had made up directors and, um, yeah.
00:23:16.31
Ryan Lieske
I would just, if, if I saw something, I didn't quite, you know, I, I'd go home and draw a little movie poster and say, this is the blah, blah, blah, blah. And it stars Ryan Liskey and all his friend, Nathan. And, and we were the actors in them. And and I would just, you know, and then that's what I said in the intro, you know, and sometimes I'd turn them into little comic books and, um,
00:23:41.88
Ryan Lieske
ah So yeah, I guess what i I... So having all that in my... You know, that I was already doing throughout my whole life that when I finally found horror, I just felt a kinship in it because there was... It was this sort of like... I don't know what you want to call it, but it was like a box in my head got opened where it was like, oh, there's other people that are scared of this stuff too. And they don't know what to make of it either.
00:24:11.42
Ryan Lieske
And I think what they're doing is making up imaginary worlds to deal with that stuff. And i just wanted to be a part of that. So um I think when it comes down to it, I think it's a you know, and it's the old cliche, it's the vicarious roller coaster where you get to experience death and violence and all these horrible things, but it's over in two two hours and you get to go safely back to bed. And just because it's a cliche doesn't mean it's not true.
00:24:44.82
Ryan Lieske
um So, yeah, I think, I'm probably in line with a lot of other horror people that would say the same thing that it's, uh, what do they say that, um, good, uh, art should comfort the, um,
00:25:02.40
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, yeah, it should comfort the afflicted and discomfort the privileged or something like that.
00:25:09.02
Ryan Lieske
Something. Yeah. Yeah. That I think that's what it is, is I was one of those people that it comforted me years and years before I even knew what was wrong with me.
00:25:21.21
Ryan Lieske
And.
00:25:22.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah Yeah, you hit on something that I really want to, like, tap with a hammer because as a kid, you weren't a horror guy.
00:25:22.61
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:25:30.46
Wednesday Lee Friday
You liked action and and sci-fi, um which, like, I find that that there's a strong correlation between kids with certain kinds of autism and sci-fi because sci-fi can be so...
00:25:30.81
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:25:45.08
Wednesday Lee Friday
like knowledge-based and intricate and there's so many especially something like star trek you know if you're one of those people that knows about star trek and can tell you like the specs of six or seven different enterprises it's like you know like you need something to do with your mind so you're doing that and i wholly approve of that but but the other part of that is that
00:25:50.65
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:25:56.18
Ryan Lieske
yeah Yeah.
00:26:04.22
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:26:07.26
Wednesday Lee Friday
once you started ah realizing and making discoveries about your own mental and emotional health, that's when the horror started really appealing to you.
00:26:17.34
Ryan Lieske
yeah
00:26:17.72
Wednesday Lee Friday
And i I love that. Well, I always think of ah Tom Savini was the first person that I had ever heard of who I was aware used horror as a ah coping mechanism because he was in, I guess it would have been Vietnam.
00:26:31.70
Ryan Lieske
Vietnam. Yeah.
00:26:32.92
Wednesday Lee Friday
And and yeah, and he saw horrible things. And when he came home, he channeled that into art. And, you know, some people would say that it's not art or whatever, but those people are just straight up wrong, you know?
00:26:39.48
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:26:45.72
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. Pish posh. Pish posh all over that.
00:26:47.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, yeah. I mean, like like they say in the Larry Flint ah trial, like you're describing a matter of taste as opposed to a matter of, you know, what something actually is, like the reality.
00:26:54.04
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:26:59.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like you don't have to like Dawn of the Dead, but you don't get to say that it's not art because the people who made it made art. You know, if you ask them, hey, what are you doing?
00:27:07.99
Ryan Lieske
Exactly.
00:27:10.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'm making some art. And that's, you know, that that's why AI shouldn't be making movies because it's not art.
00:27:16.98
Ryan Lieske
Exactly.
00:27:18.16
Wednesday Lee Friday
That's something we talk about here a lot is the the the difference between art and and product.
00:27:18.71
Ryan Lieske
know. I agree.
00:27:23.32
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know, because they're they're called the humanities for a very specific reason.
00:27:23.51
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:27:28.25
Ryan Lieske
Right. Yeah. No, I, I, I'm with you. I, um, I have very mixed feelings about AI. Um, Obviously, I think like any tool or any technology, it can be used as a tool to a certain degree.
00:27:45.72
Wednesday Lee Friday
Sure, sure.
00:27:45.75
Ryan Lieske
um i've you I've used it a couple times on some videos, some really stupid videos I made for my YouTube channel. And...
00:27:56.60
Ryan Lieske
I used it to make it look purposely bad. Like I wanted to make really bad looking AI art. So I just said, well, why not just use the AI to do that?
00:28:08.41
Ryan Lieske
um And everything was mine. I simply used it to ani to animate the lips of the people talking because I don't know how to do that.
00:28:18.81
Ryan Lieske
Um, and I had to make my cat talk. So it was like, you know, I'm just going to do that. And I think it turned out funny, like, but it's not something I would do all the time, but you know, I'm like, well, why not? Let's just see what this can do.
00:28:34.07
Ryan Lieske
And, but would I ever do it to make a whole movie or write a whole book? Hell no. Because, I know that what I put into it was my stuff. It just sort of gave me, it just helped me pull that off.
00:28:50.97
Ryan Lieske
Um, rather than me feeding a bunch of prompts into it, I specifically tailored it to do something to meet my specs. If that makes sense. Um,
00:29:01.57
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, absolutely. And, you know, i think that's a really important distinction is the distinction between generative AI, where you say, hey, AI, make me something versus I need to use this very specific tool. Sometimes like I have I'm what do they call it? Aud HD. So I'm kind of autistic, but also I'm just a scatterbrain.
00:29:23.77
Ryan Lieske
but Okay.
00:29:23.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
And so if you ask people, say, say, chat GPT, for example, to organize information on different cultures as it pertains to a specific religion and how that might interface with specific kinds of characters.
00:29:39.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, I can't even get my head around that.
00:29:40.12
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:29:42.78
Ryan Lieske
Right, right.
00:29:43.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
But But if I get, it's it's kind of like Wikipedia. Like, I know this isn't a real research source necessarily because it's, cause you know, it's it's not, it's it's a lot of different people saying things and it's hard to know for sure what's right.
00:29:59.00
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:30:01.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
But you can, you you know you have to double check it. So it's, it's i see, I actually consider that safer if I get something and I'm like, okay, this probably isn't all right.
00:30:06.33
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:30:11.99
Wednesday Lee Friday
This is more for ideas than anything else.
00:30:14.84
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. No, I agree. I completely agree. So, because I do that sometimes with my my other podcasts.
00:30:18.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
I think...
00:30:22.23
Ryan Lieske
If, like, I'm in a real hurry, I'm like, okay, could you... just take this movie that we're reviewing and give me a real quick rundown on the main cast and crew and any awards they might've won any controversies in their lives. Any, can you just put it all together, like in a one page synopsis for me? Because I just don't have the time to do all that. So then I just basically have a cheat sheet that I can read from. And if there's something that strike, you know, me,
00:30:54.97
Ryan Lieske
what do you call it? um Meets my eye. Is that a saying?
00:30:59.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
I think so.
00:31:00.35
Ryan Lieske
If I find something that, yeah, if I find something that catches my eye and I'm like, Oh, I want to elaborate on that. Then I'll go and do it myself. But to me, it's just like, it's to me, that's no different than like looking at IMDB and saying, okay, this guy did this and that. Except in this case, I've got it all on one sheet.
00:31:20.41
Ryan Lieske
So ah you know, again, it's not generating anything other than what's already out there. Um, so yeah, I don't know. I guess that's why I'm saying I have a love hate relationship with it because of I, if I was given the opportunity to flick a switch, I would turn it all off and stop it from ever happening.
00:31:39.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, well, and the the environmental impact is another thing.
00:31:39.42
Ryan Lieske
But yeah.
00:31:43.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
I mean, it uses so much energy, so much water, and that's another thing that poor communities are going to pay for.
00:31:43.19
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:31:49.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
And to me, that's the best reason to use it sparingly, if at all.
00:31:50.23
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:31:54.55
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, agreed.
00:31:57.11
Wednesday Lee Friday
But honestly, I had to leave a job ah last year because the boss wanted us to use AI for everything.
00:32:05.94
Ryan Lieske
Oh.
00:32:06.81
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I didn't want to use it at all, but he wanted little movies. And so he got this program. I think it's Google Gemini, but it's like a paid version of it.
00:32:15.32
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:32:16.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
And you just tell it a prompt and it will make a little movie that's like 10 seconds long. And I think you get like five a day or something on the plan we were on. And in all honesty, like three of those five would be pretty entertaining.
00:32:26.93
Ryan Lieske
Oh, Lord.
00:32:32.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
They'd be ah like, I mean, maybe I'm just really good at prompting. I don't know. Some people think it's a skill, but But I learned a bunch of things about it. Like it AI ah visuals, they don't understand 3D.
00:32:47.38
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:32:47.61
Wednesday Lee Friday
So I was trying to get a spider to jump through a flaming hoop, but it doesn't understand through. It can only have it jump into a hoop.
00:32:56.44
Ryan Lieske
Ah, okay.
00:32:57.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because everything is two-dimensional. So I found that interesting even as I'm like, yeah, this is interesting.
00:32:59.70
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:33:05.42
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like i like when when kids cut open a ah you know fruit or whatever to explore the insides. It's only interesting because it's like new to me, even though I know it's bad.
00:33:18.87
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. No, I, yeah, same here.
00:33:20.60
Wednesday Lee Friday
But, you know...
00:33:22.26
Ryan Lieske
I get it. Like, it's it's so fascinating, especially as a kid that loved science fiction. You know, this is this is those aspects of, you know, when you were a kid, you're like, I wonder what things are going to be like in the future.
00:33:37.18
Ryan Lieske
Well, that's that's this, you know.
00:33:39.96
Wednesday Lee Friday
Welcome to the world of tomorrow.
00:33:40.22
Ryan Lieske
We've got... Yeah, we've got phones in our hands that have more computing power than early NASA spacecraft.
00:33:43.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
dick
00:33:47.61
Ryan Lieske
So it's like, okay, we are kind of there now, but it's in its infancy.
00:33:48.33
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. Yep.
00:33:54.78
Ryan Lieske
And obviously the genie's out of the bottle. It's not going back in. I'm realistic enough about that. um But it still bugs me.
00:34:05.85
Ryan Lieske
and Then again, i was the most ah I was so appalled in the early 90s when CGI started working into movies. As much as I thought Jurassic Park looked cool when Toy Story got announced, I was like, no, absolutely not.
00:34:16.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah. h Well, Jurassic park juressic Park used a lot of modeling, though.
00:34:21.82
Ryan Lieske
No computer generator.
00:34:26.53
Wednesday Lee Friday
A lot of that stuff was was much more old school.
00:34:26.97
Ryan Lieske
They did. Yeah, and and that's kind of why it didn't bother me. but But then I went and saw Toy Story, and I was like, oh, my God, that was brilliant.
00:34:37.26
Ryan Lieske
Damn it. Damn it.
00:34:38.52
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep.
00:34:38.97
Ryan Lieske
You made it good.
00:34:39.26
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. Yep.
00:34:39.85
Ryan Lieske
You had to make it good, didn't you? And now I'm like, okay, whatever. It's a CGI cartoon. I don't care. Like, so are we going to get that flipping about AI in, like, 20 years?
00:34:51.77
Ryan Lieske
Probably. um Not that that's a good thing, but we probably will. So,
00:34:56.63
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, the the issue that I'm having, i mean, the thing about AI for me is that like it's fascinating and it's bad for me.
00:35:04.92
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:35:04.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, I love drugs, so that's not going to be a good argument. That won't keep me away from it because when things are fascinating and also bad for me, i just want them more. So it's it's it's honestly difficult for me to resist AI.
00:35:15.00
Ryan Lieske
Exactly.
00:35:19.42
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like I have to because it's bad. Basically for the same reason I'm not drinking a Mountain Dew Code Red right right now because it's so bad that like I don't, i would I would be embarrassed to tell people that I was using a ton of ai
00:35:26.20
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:35:29.24
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:35:34.71
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. No, I mean, it's.
00:35:36.28
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, because I know it's bad.
00:35:39.32
Ryan Lieske
I'm with you like I love drugs. I love I'm on. Well, I'm on a lot of prescriptions, but I love edibles. I used to be a you know, I was never an alcoholic, but I was definitely a drunk.
00:35:54.62
Ryan Lieske
And I don't I haven't. I pretty much had maybe a teaspoon of alcohol in the last five years. Um, and
00:36:04.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, if you can get all the THC you want, I really don't see the point of alcohol.
00:36:09.56
Ryan Lieske
no, I'm so glad I don't do it anymore, but it's like, There was a time when it's like, I know this is so bad for me and I'm going act stupid, but in red but in a weird detached way, I'm fascinated by the fact that I do get stupid when I drink it.
00:36:27.45
Ryan Lieske
So I'm going to do it it's because like you said, it's just like, I know it's bad for me.
00:36:28.23
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
00:36:32.33
Ryan Lieske
i know it's wrong, but I'm so fascinated by it. I have to, I have to play with it. I have to,
00:36:38.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, and as creatives, we're always in danger of wanting to make sure that we're interesting.
00:36:45.40
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. Well, yeah. Yeah.
00:36:48.73
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know? I mean, would you rather be in ah in an asylum or be boring? it's It's a tough call for a lot of people.
00:36:54.44
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:36:56.59
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, well, which asylum? Is it one of the nice ones?
00:36:58.74
Ryan Lieske
yeah
00:37:00.48
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because if they have art therapy and good food, yeah, I'll take a couple weeks. You know? Yeah.
00:37:06.52
Ryan Lieske
To quote the immortal poet poet and sage Billy Joel, I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints.
00:37:14.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep, yep.
00:37:15.29
Ryan Lieske
yeah
00:37:16.09
Wednesday Lee Friday
There you go.
00:37:17.11
Ryan Lieske
Is he problematic now?
00:37:17.50
Wednesday Lee Friday
There you go.
00:37:18.35
Ryan Lieske
Sorry if he is. Yeah,
00:37:20.09
Wednesday Lee Friday
i don't i don't see how he could be.
00:37:23.16
Ryan Lieske
yeah I don't know. I know he had an alcohol problem, but yeah, exactly.
00:37:24.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
i hope not. Well, psh, psh, psh, no actually i think i think i would probably know if billy jewell were problematic because i follow billy martin and he loves billie jewell so i
00:37:29.20
Ryan Lieske
Exactly.
00:37:37.40
Ryan Lieske
Oh, does he? Okay. Did not know.
00:37:38.68
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah so
00:37:39.80
Ryan Lieske
But yeah.
00:37:39.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
so i'm sure that i would know
00:37:42.12
Ryan Lieske
Okay. Good. Good. Good job, Billy, for staying out of trouble.
00:37:44.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right?
00:37:48.18
Wednesday Lee Friday
So I want to talk about your diagnosis, your mental health diagnosis.
00:37:52.66
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:37:53.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
um How old were you?
00:37:55.93
Ryan Lieske
oh Let me think. Gosh, um I want to say this was in 95. It was definitely mid ninety s um And it was a very, very, very hard to break out of ah breakdown. That was a terrible way of describing it. It was a pretty intense breakdown that was in the wake of three other.
00:38:22.54
Ryan Lieske
breakdowns that slowly built in intensity until this one in the mid nineties. I'm pretty sure it was around 95. This was the one that kind of broke me.
00:38:33.37
Ryan Lieske
Um, I've had a few cents that were even worse, but at that time, um, so I must've been 22, maybe 20, somewhere around 22, 23.
00:38:45.37
Ryan Lieske
um So it's all fog now, man. But it was around then I, that was the, at that time had been the worst, uh, breakdown in my, in my short up to that point life.
00:39:00.38
Ryan Lieske
And this was the one where my mom had to pull me out of bed to get me to do anything. Friends were coming over, trying to get me out of bed, like laying in a dark room in my bed, 24 hours a day.
00:39:15.90
Ryan Lieske
um For various reasons, it would take I could do like a whole seven seasons worth of podcasts on what it was like in my head at that point and what was had led to the breakdown. But that was the point where my mom actually came down, forced me out of bed, forced a phone into my hand, and made me call a therapist.
00:39:38.26
Ryan Lieske
And I did, i went in they diagnosed me as, um you know, depression, uh, generalized anxiety disorder, um, which I don't even know what it means, but, um, and they recommended I get on, uh, Paxil or whatever it was at the time, probably Paxil.
00:40:00.15
Ryan Lieske
Um, and I was like, I, at that point had heard nothing but horror stories about,
00:40:00.44
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
00:40:08.08
Ryan Lieske
psych meds and everybody, you know, Hey, you can get in a car accident and you'll have all your limbs severed and you'll just be laughing.
00:40:09.50
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah Yeah, yeah.
00:40:15.91
Ryan Lieske
That's how much it takes away the feeling and your personality. Um, so I don't know, probably pot, which is, yeah.
00:40:20.82
Wednesday Lee Friday
What were these people on? My god. Like, are you all on Thorazine? Because you shouldn't be.
00:40:30.10
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. I'm like, whatever you guys were on, just tell me because one one Okay, anyway, long I'm getting ahead of myself. But yeah, i pretty much flat out refused to take the meds.
00:40:43.03
Ryan Lieske
And to this day, that is one of my biggest regrets.
00:40:43.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh no.
00:40:46.79
Ryan Lieske
My life would have been so much simpler and a lot easier if I had just done it. But I was afraid. I thought I thought i would start taking them.
00:40:57.07
Ryan Lieske
And my mind was in such a Part of it was, and this is going to, it's hard to describe these things to people because as someone who has heard other people talk about their mental illness or whatever they've got going on in their brain. And then I hear it and go, well, that's not, that's not that big a deal. Why are you worried about that? You know, that kind of thing.
00:41:21.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
00:41:22.07
Ryan Lieske
you know Take your own advice, Ryan, because mine was i had gotten to a point where I convinced myself that if I even thought of the word death, I would die. like I thought I was going to mentally um think myself to death. like I was going to will myself dead. It would make my body shut down. Like I was convinced of this and I would sit in my room all day until I got exhausted and fell asleep. Just repeating the word life, life, life, life life in my head over and over hours upon hours.
00:41:58.39
Ryan Lieske
Um, I couldn't work. I couldn't drive a car. I, because I, if I even let my mind slip once, in thinking the word death, I started to get tingly.
00:42:09.85
Ryan Lieske
I felt my limbs seize up. Um, my head would just start getting just like electric crackles and I would, my, I'd get tunnel vision um,
00:42:23.48
Ryan Lieske
I was horrified. Like I was like, I don't know what to do. I can't live the rest of my life like this. I'm only 22 or 23. I don't want to die, but this is the end. This is it.
00:42:33.94
Ryan Lieske
Like, what do I do now? I've somehow cracked some code humans weren't supposed to know. And I'm going to be the one that wills them themselves to death. And it was horrible.
00:42:46.14
Ryan Lieske
And, i don't To this day, I don't know why i didn't take the medicine, but I think in being that that was the state of my mind at the time, I thought the medicine would unhook my mind even more.
00:43:01.37
Ryan Lieske
like I would become even more more detached from my own brain if I took the medicine. And then... So I just didn't. But then after about three months of this, I just basically sat up one day and said, fine, fuck it, die.
00:43:19.96
Ryan Lieske
And I didn't. And obviously I'm sitting here talking to you or am i but yeah, i didn't die.
00:43:28.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
00:43:30.97
Ryan Lieske
So I was like, okay, I broke it. And because I did that, I got it in my head that i don't need help because I broke that.
00:43:44.38
Ryan Lieske
So anytime something bad happens, I just have to train my mind and be strong and, you know, fight it. Um, and then long story short, few years later, another breakdown occurred this time I did get on the meds and damn it.
00:44:02.94
Ryan Lieske
I wish I'd done it sooner. Like it changed my life completely.
00:44:05.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, well, sure, sure.
00:44:08.12
Ryan Lieske
Um, so that's that.
00:44:09.88
Wednesday Lee Friday
what And that that is a really common um conundrum that people get into when they first realize they have ah an official mental health diagnosis because...
00:44:25.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
I mean, I can tell you from my own experience that, yes, the wrong medication will fuck you up. I was, you know, I have bipolar 1, which is a lot.
00:44:31.64
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:44:34.49
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:44:36.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
So, and and I was misdiagnosed because... On the day that I went to see the doctor, I was depressed. So he diagnosed me with depression.
00:44:46.49
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:44:48.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
And so he gave me Welbutrin, which is one of the worst things that you can give to someone with bipolar disorder because it makes them manic.
00:44:56.63
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:44:56.73
Wednesday Lee Friday
and ah And it was bad. and Because the thing about depression depression, as you know, it keeps you from getting things done. You you don't function. Mania will blow your life up because mania is where you want to tell everyone what you really think of them because they need to know.
00:45:13.82
Wednesday Lee Friday
And you have a great idea for a project. And if you could just get a few thousand dollars together, you're all going to be rich. Plus, you know what? I think I'd like to move. And I don't know how I actually feel about my partner anymore.
00:45:24.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
Maybe we should talk it out. Or maybe I should have an affair first. I don't even know. So I'm like, that's what mania is.
00:45:28.60
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:45:31.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mania is a whole bunch of bullshit that seems really reasonable suddenly for some reason.
00:45:31.42
Ryan Lieske
ah yeah
00:45:38.04
Wednesday Lee Friday
And, you know, it it took me a few tries to get on the right medication. They gave me something. I don't even remember what it was, but I woke up one day and thought it was five years earlier and started getting go getting dressed to go to a job that I didn't have anymore.
00:45:52.98
Ryan Lieske
Oh, wow.
00:45:54.20
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, yeah.
00:45:54.87
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:45:54.96
Wednesday Lee Friday
And that happened in front of H. I was already with H at that time, and he found that very scary.
00:46:00.28
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, that is...
00:46:00.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
and like well And he reminded me of where I worked and what I needed to do when I got there. and i I showed up to work and was there for like an hour, and they were like, you should go home.
00:46:13.79
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'm like, I can't.
00:46:14.53
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:46:15.22
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'm the store manager. And they're like, no, you're the shift manager. You can go home. Like, oh, sweet.
00:46:20.33
Ryan Lieske
Oh, wow. Wow.
00:46:22.97
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I remember that I went home and I sent a pizza to my work. And they were like, did you mean to send us a pizza? And I was like, yeah, because I went home. Like, by that time, I had kind of regrounded myself again.
00:46:35.59
Wednesday Lee Friday
And they're just like, look, you wackadoo, we don't know what's happening, but thanks for the pizza.
00:46:35.93
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:46:40.82
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. Well, luckily you had a nice coworkers or whatever, because I imagine in some cases that could have gotten you fired on the spot or just not necessarily fired, but like, uh, um, should we call somebody for you?
00:46:47.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
00:46:50.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, totally.
00:46:54.68
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
00:46:57.75
Ryan Lieske
Like, yeah.
00:46:58.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
right well i mean but that's the thing if it was an unscrupulous team they could have cleaned out the safe i mean anything could have happened when you have like no nobody like running things but but no no good team um so did you feel like
00:46:59.22
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:47:10.22
Ryan Lieske
That's true. Yeah.
00:47:17.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
I mean, it sounds like you certainly wish you'd you'd taken the med sooner, but what other kind of coping tools did did you have at your disposal?
00:47:27.38
Ryan Lieske
Well, unfortunately it was very shortly after that, that I, uh, got into drinking because I did not even touch alcohol until I was about 23 or 24.
00:47:44.60
Ryan Lieske
um I never got into drugs in high school, never got into alcohol. I smoked cigarettes and that was about the extent of my rebellion um as far as you know illegal substances because I started smoking before I was 18.
00:48:00.25
Ryan Lieske
Well, for those of you that don't know, 18 is the legal limit in Michigan for cigarettes.
00:48:00.63
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
00:48:05.69
Ryan Lieske
Is that the way it is all over the U.S.? I didn't know if I...
00:48:07.80
Wednesday Lee Friday
i have i would I would guess so, but when I was a kid, they sold cigarettes and machines, so it was not not rigidly enforced, I think.
00:48:09.43
Ryan Lieske
i Okay.
00:48:13.18
Ryan Lieske
Oh, yeah, same here. Where do you think I got them all?
00:48:18.11
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
00:48:19.03
Ryan Lieske
Oh, you know that bowling alley down the street?
00:48:20.76
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
00:48:20.95
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, there's a cigarette machine in the lobby.
00:48:21.72
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
00:48:23.07
Ryan Lieske
they don't Nobody's standing there. Just go buy a couple packs.
00:48:26.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
you
00:48:26.79
Ryan Lieske
All righty. um So, yeah.
00:48:29.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, and back when you could buy them with a change in your pocket, too.
00:48:29.46
Ryan Lieske
i mean
00:48:32.22
Ryan Lieske
Right. They were like $2.50. So, yeah, i yeah I just, I don't know. For some reason, it's just something in my head as a teenager warned me that you don't want to touch that stuff.
00:48:48.15
Ryan Lieske
Um, and when people described it, it never sounded fun to me.
00:48:48.88
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
00:48:52.06
Ryan Lieske
It sounded scary. Like, like to this day, i mean, I've, I've experimented a little bit since then. Um, but I've never touched anything harder than marijuana. Like I, people are ah I've actually had inveterate acid dropping people. What do you call those people? Acid droppers?
00:49:13.66
Ryan Lieske
What do the kids call them?
00:49:15.32
Wednesday Lee Friday
I don't know, they just call me Wetness.
00:49:15.70
Ryan Lieske
Uh,
00:49:16.76
Wednesday Lee Friday
i Nobody really, i didn't know there was a name for that.
00:49:18.96
Ryan Lieske
Okay. Yeah. Anyway, I mean, I've had people that have done acid a lot who have told me point blank, Ryan, do not try acid because they know me so well. They're like, no, you will you will probably die because you will go so dark dark and deep into your own whatever abyss you have in the center of your mind and you will not come back. I know you well enough to know it will ruin you. Don't do it.
00:49:45.50
Ryan Lieske
ah So I don't do it.
00:49:45.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, sounds like that's certainly a possibility.
00:49:48.70
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, and I don't want to do it.
00:49:49.27
Wednesday Lee Friday
Wow.
00:49:51.38
Ryan Lieske
like i I have never wanted to do it. I never wanted to touch cocaine or heroin or anything like that. like I saw a train spotting, and I didn't think the first half hour looked fun.
00:50:02.83
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:50:03.51
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah
00:50:04.02
Ryan Lieske
I was like, no, no, because I know where this is going. And yeah, it looks like they're having a good time, but no, I'm good. Like I wasn't that guy that was like, oh, but didn't it look so much fun?
00:50:17.71
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. So did Scarface. And then he ends up, you know, bullet riddled in a pile of cocaine. Like, I'm not stupid.
00:50:24.41
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah ah
00:50:25.02
Ryan Lieske
I know how these movies end. yeah.
00:50:27.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah but see all the weed movies end just fine
00:50:30.84
Ryan Lieske
Exactly. That's why I'm now, i wasn't, big and I don't like smoking marijuana. I just don't. It it hits me too quickly. Edibles are amazing. um once Once I finally discovered edibles, and I'm holding some in my hand right now, i was like, where have you been all my life?
00:50:52.15
Ryan Lieske
These are perfect. you you
00:50:54.11
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. Yep.
00:50:55.13
Ryan Lieske
If you time them right, whoo,
00:50:59.40
Wednesday Lee Friday
Nice.
00:51:00.12
Ryan Lieske
I say this as like my most perfect timing was seeing Oppenheimer in the on the big screen. Because there was a moment where the music kicked in and my edible kicked in at that exact moment.
00:51:09.16
Wednesday Lee Friday
Nice.
00:51:14.52
Ryan Lieske
And I turned to my friend and I went, holy shit, dude. I love this movie. I timed that perfectly. And he was like, me too. And we were just like so into that movie all of a sudden.
00:51:25.24
Ryan Lieske
Like, I don't even remember the scene, but it was something with the look on an actor's face, the way the music hit. And then they cut to this wide shot of them assembling the, the town.
00:51:37.75
Ryan Lieske
And I was just like, Oh boy, I'm in. Let's do this. Christopher Nolan. Like, I love it.
00:51:42.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
wow
00:51:44.31
Ryan Lieske
I love edibles. So I'm not high right now.
00:51:46.07
Wednesday Lee Friday
that actually reminds me it reminds me of the time I saw natural born killers on acid because there's
00:51:51.80
Ryan Lieske
Oh Jesus. Yeah.
00:51:53.18
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, because, you know, I was like, I don't know, 22 or some stupid thing watching this movie. And just as they got to the desert, I was like, oh, my God, I think we're in the desert.
00:52:05.22
Wednesday Lee Friday
Are there snakes in here? I hear snakes. I'm aware of the snakes, you know, but.
00:52:09.21
Ryan Lieske
Ah, yeah, you're a braver braver person than I.
00:52:11.68
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
00:52:12.61
Ryan Lieske
I wouldn't do that.
00:52:15.18
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'll tell you what, man, LSD led me to some life-changing decisions, and I don't know that I...
00:52:15.42
Ryan Lieske
a
00:52:20.89
Ryan Lieske
but Okay. Right.
00:52:22.73
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, it's very weird, because like after college, I didn't have any money, and I'm kind of fucked up, and so I had to go move back in with my mother, who is my abuser, and her husband, and you know all that shit there.
00:52:31.26
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:52:33.53
Wednesday Lee Friday
So... it was terrible it was terrible and i would get out of town whenever i could and so one time i was not very far like my parents are in royal oak i was in saline so you know was that like an hour um and uh and we had done acid the whole night me and my buddy finster and um the next day i was like wait a minute i didn't think about any of that the whole time i was there
00:52:47.16
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:53:04.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
It only matters because I think it matters. Oh my god. So if I stop thinking that that matters, it doesn't matter. And I don't have to go back. And that's when I went no contact with my family.
00:53:17.96
Wednesday Lee Friday
So.
00:53:18.52
Ryan Lieske
that's That's great. See, that is awesome. And i in yeah, I've heard a lot of stories of people that psychedelics you know help them.
00:53:29.46
Ryan Lieske
and i And if I knew I could come back from it, I would totally try it.
00:53:29.88
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh yeah. Well, shrooms, man.
00:53:35.70
Ryan Lieske
But I'm terrified. like Actually, that's not true. I mean, i have I'm imagining in the next couple of years, I probably will eventually try mushrooms because I've got a couple of people that are really good I don't know what you call them, but they they guide people.
00:53:50.15
Ryan Lieske
And okay.
00:53:50.52
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep, well, that's what they're called. It's a i mean a type of doula, I suppose. But yeah, yeah definitely a guide.
00:53:55.32
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. You're.
00:53:57.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because psilocybin is is much less intense. It's like a softer high. But you still want to be very careful when it's your mind.
00:54:04.28
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:54:07.04
Wednesday Lee Friday
Now, I actually want to touch on something else that you said.
00:54:07.48
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:54:10.48
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because I think it it speaks to a common problem that we have in the mental health community.
00:54:10.58
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
00:54:17.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
And that is you didn't want to take medication at first because you had heard a lot of misinformation.
00:54:22.83
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:54:25.69
Ryan Lieske
yeah
00:54:25.82
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I'm curious to know, like, ah obviously a doctor can't force someone to take medication, but I really wonder what kind of steps they're taking and what could be done that is more effective in terms of helping people understand like what the legitimate risks are because of course there are legitimate risks to medication but also like ah a benefits analysis to see like yeah yeah this might give you a runny nose and make you less sexually and make make your sex less intense but also you won't be suicidal okay You know, you've got to like risk risk benefit analysis that.
00:55:00.79
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:55:04.12
Wednesday Lee Friday
So ah do you have any thoughts on that?
00:55:04.34
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:55:05.92
Wednesday Lee Friday
On like what we could be doing differently, what doctors could be doing differently?
00:55:10.10
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. I don't, I don't know that I do because it wasn't really my doctor that, the that I had a problem with, with that. It was more, um was more other cultural input I was getting plus friends um who, who,
00:55:29.18
Ryan Lieske
i pray am I don't know if it was because I was impressionable or if it was just... I think what it was was I was looking for an excuse not to take it. So rather than listen to my doctor who i or the therapist, who I actually quite liked and did trust, i it was that whole like...
00:55:49.14
Ryan Lieske
One person will tell you the truth, but nine people will tell you the lie. And you're going to go with the nine people ah for some reason.
00:55:59.37
Ryan Lieske
i don't know if that makes sense, but I listen.
00:56:02.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, it does. I just think that um I would assert and I don't want to like dictate your experience to you, but I would assert that it's your doctor's job to help you understand the realities of of that.
00:56:09.34
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:56:15.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
and And to, you know, and and yeah, people are hard to convince and we trust our buddies more than we trust people we pay.
00:56:16.47
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
00:56:22.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like all of that makes sense. But I mean, at the core of mental health, if if what you're getting out of therapy, whether it's a prescription or a coping tool or some sort of relaxation technique, whatever, if it's not actionable, if if it's not actually going to take place, then, you know, that kind of blows up the whole thing.
00:56:44.89
Ryan Lieske
Right.
00:56:45.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
So...
00:56:46.42
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, that's a very good question. And I guess it's been so long for me that I don't quite remember. i i know it happened and I know the general reason why I didn't take it. But there's so many nuances to that, to to where I was as a person back then, that i could just as easily say i I caught an episode of Saturday Night Live that made me laugh.
00:57:10.87
Ryan Lieske
And I decided i was okay. You know what I mean? Like i was so young and um in in impressionable and, um, not impressionable, but just so i wasn't a very world, weirdly world, worldly kid.
00:57:15.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. yep
00:57:25.63
Ryan Lieske
I grew up in a very small town in Grand Rapids or near Grand Rapids, Michigan. It's a lot bigger now, but, um, yeah. you know i I grew up in kind of a... i mean, I went to a secular school and I certainly had friends that lived in bigger towns that I would visit. So it's not like I had this entirely closed off life. But i would say at least up until I was 18, it was a pretty insular experience. like We didn't travel a lot to places other than
00:58:01.24
Ryan Lieske
really you know, Mackinac and stuff like, I mean, I wasn't traveling to New York or overseas or anything.
00:58:07.22
Wednesday Lee Friday
fair Sure, sure.
00:58:10.25
Ryan Lieske
It was just, and I, my parents were very conservative and they, you know, didn't put much stock in a lot of things that I, you know what?
00:58:20.58
Ryan Lieske
And I can't even come up with examples for that, but because it's, it's so hard to explain why I was the way I was at the time, but,
00:58:32.63
Ryan Lieske
I don't know. I guess once I just got into college and me and my friends started, we were more on our own then. Because, you know, you you can wake up on your first day of college and be like, nah, I'm not going to go.
00:58:45.38
Ryan Lieske
And it's you know what?
00:58:47.05
Wednesday Lee Friday
you
00:58:47.35
Ryan Lieske
You can do that. Like, no one's going to stop you. and And so it was more like, you know what? Let's not go today. Let's drive to fucking Detroit. Why? i don't know. Let's just do it. Okay. And so we started, you know, just us little hit kids from Caledonia just started experiencing the world a bit more.
00:59:08.06
Ryan Lieske
And that's, I don't know. So I guess it's just, I just for so many years growing up in such a small, somewhat contained conservative little world that I believed that the boogeyman's, you know, pills are bad.
00:59:30.14
Ryan Lieske
This is bad. Psychiatry is bad. And, um,
00:59:32.79
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, you know, gotta I was raised by what sounds like a a similar um political leading. You know, both of my parents that I lived with were conservative, a little bit racist, but not not overt about it, but, you know, Northern Michigan racist.
00:59:50.73
Ryan Lieske
yeah. Oh yeah. I know all about it.
00:59:53.37
Wednesday Lee Friday
So, right. And, you know, sort of the appearance of Christianity, but not so you'd notice. Just to be like, yes, look how normal we are.
01:00:04.15
Wednesday Lee Friday
You're all Christians and we're Christians too. That sort of thing.
01:00:06.93
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:00:07.15
Wednesday Lee Friday
But but no, like, sincere, like, we're all going to do this because we're Christians and that's what we do. Like, there was that was not part of our our ethos at all. And then, so so I learned a lot of things that...
01:00:23.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
I think there's an underlying attitude to conservative theory that if you don't believe what they believe, you're stupid and naive. Whereas I think on the liberal side, that a liberal is more likely to say, if you don't believe what we believe, it's because you're selfish and callous and you lack empathy.
01:00:33.40
Ryan Lieske
yeah
01:00:42.23
Wednesday Lee Friday
um those Those are kind of the two sides.
01:00:42.26
Ryan Lieske
Right.
01:00:44.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
So if you're on the conservative side and you're afraid of being a sucker or an idiot or falling for it, That means that all of your misfortune, you're bringing it on yourself.
01:00:57.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
Anything that's bad that happens to you, it's because you didn't listen and you trusted somebody you shouldn't have trusted. And you wore a face diaper just because Fauci told you to.
01:01:03.99
Ryan Lieske
yeah
01:01:06.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
And, you know... And that's that's what it turns into. It turns into... i mean, will you knew you have eyes. You know what we're living with. It's like the people that are still MAGA at this late date, they are so angry.
01:01:16.63
Ryan Lieske
Oh yeah.
01:01:22.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
And they are just clinging so hard to things that are obviously false. And then because they didn't have that experience where you get the hell out of your town for a little while and you meet people that grew up thinking things that your parents made fun of.
01:01:37.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know?
01:01:37.64
Ryan Lieske
Right. Right.
01:01:39.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
And so, and that's why conservatives think that college is indoctrination, because we're not, nobody's making us change our mind. We're realizing that y'all were full of shit.
01:01:50.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
You told us a bunch of fearful garbage that, you know, to like be xenophobic and racist and homophobic.
01:01:50.87
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:01:57.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
And when it turns out that like Rick Santorum was lying the whole time, and gee, trans people weren't the real groomers all along, then
01:02:03.03
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:02:07.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, kids are going to feel betrayed by that.
01:02:11.06
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:02:11.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know, it's like Santa Claus times a million.
01:02:12.12
Ryan Lieske
Oh, yeah, absolutely.
01:02:13.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, why did you lie to me like that?
01:02:14.36
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:02:16.89
Ryan Lieske
I remember like... I think the first time as a teenager, I really had my mind blown. um Now keep in mind, i was, you know, I was reading a lot at this point, a lot of sci-fi and horror, and I was being exposed to a lot of strange things through the fiction I was reading.
01:02:37.02
Ryan Lieske
I mean, come on, Clive Barker. um You know, yeah when you're 16 and start reading Clive Barker, it's,
01:02:39.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
01:02:43.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah Yeah, it is.
01:02:44.02
Ryan Lieske
Kind of mind blowing because you're like, holy shit. he He doesn't just have gay sex. ah There's things in this book having sex that he can't even describe. And he can't even describe the way they are having sex.
01:02:53.82
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
01:02:56.03
Ryan Lieske
And I love it. This is awesome. Like, i want more of this. You're kind of like, holy shit. what, what? what were they telling me in Sunday school? That doesn't make any sense.
01:03:07.03
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
01:03:07.11
Ryan Lieske
Like, and so now, but I remember my first girlfriend, her parents were, I guess what back then we called new age, um you know, plate of crystals in the living room.
01:03:16.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
01:03:19.16
Ryan Lieske
ah They literally, yeah, literally introduced me to Inya.
01:03:20.52
Wednesday Lee Friday
Alighting your chakras and whatnot. Thanks.
01:03:25.66
Ryan Lieske
Like, I'm not kidding.
01:03:26.46
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay. ha
01:03:28.86
Ryan Lieske
She called me on the phone one day and said, have you ever heard Inya?
01:03:29.21
Wednesday Lee Friday
thanks
01:03:33.34
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. like So yeah, that's how new age, early nineties, her parents were. And her and I were driving home from a date one night and we used to out by my, on the highway by where my parents lived, there was this big, huge billboard that said, Jesus Christ is coming soon.
01:03:39.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
okay
01:03:52.92
Ryan Lieske
And to me, that was just normal. That was like, yeah, yeah, he's coming soon.
01:03:55.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
01:03:57.92
Ryan Lieske
I get it. We all know that.
01:03:59.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
01:03:59.20
Ryan Lieske
Right. So I'm driving past this with her and she just looks at this billboard and goes, I fucking hate things like that. And I look, What?
01:04:09.98
Ryan Lieske
What did you just say you hated something that had the words Jesus Christ on it? And that's when she explained to me, like, she's like, yeah, I've never, my parents don't believe in any of this. I don't either. We don't, I've never been to a church.
01:04:26.26
Ryan Lieske
Little old Ryan.
01:04:29.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
01:04:29.48
Ryan Lieske
Bam. i was like, Oh wow. So there are people out there that really, you know, and that was kind of mind blowing to me as silly as it sounds.
01:04:40.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
01:04:42.74
Ryan Lieske
Now, that was one of those moments I'll never forget because something broke then. Like it took a, cut it took a few more years to fully crumble to pieces, but something cracked in the, in the facade that was my world at that time.
01:05:01.34
Ryan Lieske
And, you know, reading about it in a book is one thing. But then when you meet somebody in the flesh that's like, no, I don't. I think all of that's garbage. You're just like,
01:05:12.89
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah normal they're not some kind of baby eating satanic drug doing you know goat rider or whatever um
01:05:16.66
Ryan Lieske
yeah.
01:05:19.77
Ryan Lieske
No, this was just some girl that I took to a movie and we had dinner at McDonald's. Like this wasn't a weird thing. it was just, meh.
01:05:30.42
Ryan Lieske
You know, and yeah, I got into Enya for a while.
01:05:31.55
Wednesday Lee Friday
yep
01:05:33.14
Ryan Lieske
So what do you want?
01:05:34.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah Well, I won't blame you for the Enya. I have to say, my experience with all of that, with religion as a kid, was different, I think, because it wasn't instilled in me in any sort of...
01:05:47.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
way that would stick because i remember i had a bible i had an old old king james that had my name on the front of it in gold which you know symbolism please um but when i was a kid like i really really wanted to believe that there was a god in the sky that loved everybody and was looking down and had a grand plan but i knew it wasn't true
01:05:58.42
Ryan Lieske
yeah Same here. Okay.
01:06:12.44
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like I couldn't make myself believe it.
01:06:12.95
Ryan Lieske
okay
01:06:15.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
And man, I tried. I was so jealous of people that because I mean, to hear the hype on it, it was a great way to live. You had community because like I got pitched by that all the time. There were a bunch of Baptists on my street.
01:06:30.46
Wednesday Lee Friday
And they were so like, we'll send a bus to your house and pick you up, but you can go to church. And I'm like, okay. And then my mom was like, oh, no, you're you're not doing that. so And I didn't know why. But like the thing is that like I very much felt like my mom was doing it for mean reasons because she didn't want me to go around being with people that were nice to me.
01:06:51.32
Wednesday Lee Friday
Which was that was accurate to a point, I'm sure, but also very legitimate reasons to not send a young girl to church with a bunch of people that you don't know by herself.
01:06:51.35
Ryan Lieske
Sure, sure.
01:07:00.28
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:07:02.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
And and I didn't know that then, but but I know it now, so...
01:07:05.75
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, absolutely. No, that's.
01:07:07.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
But I will say, one bit of childhood ah hype that I did fall for as a kid was that drugs are bad, and only bad people do them.
01:07:17.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because only knew people that drank.
01:07:18.59
Ryan Lieske
Oh, yeah. Yeah.
01:07:20.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
Everybody in my family drank. um And I wasn't aware of anyone doing drugs until I was quite a bit older. And I distinctly remember being 10 or 11 and finding out that the Beatles did a lot of drugs.
01:07:36.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
And if you, well, but the thing is, if you believe that anyone that touches any drugs will end up a bum in an alley penniless and hated within weeks, you know, that that's what happens when people do drugs.
01:07:37.18
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:07:52.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
And then you hear that the famousest, most beloved band in the history of music did tons of drugs.
01:07:52.38
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:08:00.19
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, oh, so that was all a lie then.
01:08:00.57
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:08:05.21
Wednesday Lee Friday
So all drugs are probably fine and I shouldn't listen to anything any of you say about drugs.
01:08:05.24
Ryan Lieske
yeah
01:08:11.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
which Which also was not the the best message to take in.
01:08:14.94
Ryan Lieske
No, but, you know, you fit you get the balance later.
01:08:15.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
but
01:08:19.25
Ryan Lieske
you did
01:08:20.28
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, yeah, that's the thing.
01:08:20.70
Ryan Lieske
You know.
01:08:21.16
Wednesday Lee Friday
I had to figure all that out by myself.
01:08:23.19
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:08:23.24
Wednesday Lee Friday
And, you know, basically my takeaway from all of that is that it's really sad that we can't get opium anymore like we could in the 90s. That's my takeaway. It's like those jackasses must be making it all into heroin or some shit. No, bring back the black stuff. Yeah.
01:08:41.81
Ryan Lieske
I get it.
01:08:42.81
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, dude, I convince myself every so often that I would be the new Edgar Allan Poe without the cousin thing if I could get my hands on opium on a regular basis.
01:08:53.18
Ryan Lieske
I, I,
01:08:53.43
Wednesday Lee Friday
But no now I worry that I'm too old for it because my heart is bad.
01:08:56.85
Ryan Lieske
right. Well, it does get to that. i mean, even I now I'm like, yeah, there's certain things I just don't want to get into because of my age.
01:09:04.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right, right.
01:09:04.75
Ryan Lieske
Like I kind of wish I'd, you know, been maybe more of an absinthe drinker at one point, but why?
01:09:11.05
Wednesday Lee Friday
Ooh.
01:09:11.12
Ryan Lieske
I don't know. Cause it was sounded cool at the time. And, um, but yeah.
01:09:16.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'll tell you what, i when I finally had a glass of absinthe and I did it up with the sugar cube and the fancy slotted spoon and everything, man, I took three sips and I had to go to bed.
01:09:17.27
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:09:25.18
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:09:27.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
It knocked me on my ass. I couldn't even tell you what the high was like.
01:09:30.01
Ryan Lieske
Absolutely. Yep.
01:09:32.28
Wednesday Lee Friday
The high was like, I'm sorry, you guys, I'm going to bed.
01:09:33.03
Ryan Lieske
Yep.
01:09:35.16
Wednesday Lee Friday
That's that's what the high was like. So I don't even know if if that is a high.
01:09:37.25
Ryan Lieske
Yep. I had the same i Yeah, I had a very similar experience because we we tracked down a bottle of it.
01:09:40.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
it's ah It's a low. Yeah.
01:09:47.10
Ryan Lieske
And I had a friend who's like, oh, man, I lived in Amsterdam for a year. Let me help you do this. And so we did it all by his book. And I remember giggling a lot for about 20 minutes and then being like, God, I'm tired. And...
01:10:03.83
Ryan Lieske
The only other thing I remember is I didn't wake up with a hangover, but I didn't see green fairies. I didn't sing Moulin Rouge. I didn't, I didn't write.
01:10:15.58
Ryan Lieske
um I don't know. I was trying to think of a writer that was on opium, but all I could think about was Johnny Depp and from hell. So, and he, he wasn't a writer.
01:10:23.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
01:10:26.45
Ryan Lieske
um So, you know what I mean?
01:10:27.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah what's the trying to think what's the play where the guy is yelling at his mother that he's been going to opium dens because she asks him why she's oh it's the glass menagerie like i've been going to opium dens mother it's like no you haven't
01:10:38.91
Ryan Lieske
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. um i Can I pee really quick or are we...
01:10:49.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah i can pause yeah
01:10:50.97
Ryan Lieske
You sure?
01:10:54.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right.
01:10:55.24
Ryan Lieske
I'll talk slower now.
01:10:55.37
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, so, so actually,
01:10:57.72
Ryan Lieske
My bladder's empty. Sorry. Sorry.
01:11:01.53
Wednesday Lee Friday
i want to get back on the subject of depression and how that impacts your productivity.
01:11:07.22
Ryan Lieske
Oh, God. Yeah, this is this is where it gets rough. um Yeah, ah like I said earlier, that um why getting on to the Paxil or whatever back in the 90s by not getting on it was my one of my biggest regrets. Because um if if my if my mental illness has done anything to me...
01:11:32.89
Ryan Lieske
um It has been robbed my levels of productivity. I, I, to this day, I like to say that I'm about 10 years behind because when I got, finally got on the meds was about 10 years after I'd first been, you know,
01:11:51.32
Ryan Lieske
i prescribe them. So that's why I think that mentally, emotionally, and everything, I'm i'm still about 10 years behind from where I should be because I lost so much time
01:11:53.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
01:12:06.42
Ryan Lieske
Um, like if you had seen me in high school, I was literally writing five short stories a week. I'd already written a complete novel by that point. Uh, was writing screenplays for me and my friends to perform.
01:12:20.79
Ryan Lieske
Um, Books of poetry, which we'll never see the light of day. um Because they're god-awful. But I was so prolific. And even in the first year of college, I was just on fire. like I was ready to go out there, get published, start making movies, doing all this stuff.
01:12:43.19
Ryan Lieske
And immediately, or not immediately, but the summer after high school... Bam, it hit and it derailed me for at least a decade is in terms of productivity. And so um once I finally did get diagnosed again, or once I finally did take the meds,
01:13:06.42
Ryan Lieske
I noticed over the course of maybe two or three years, my productivity got a lot better. And, um you know, it's not that I didn't write. It's not that I didn't do stuff.
01:13:17.76
Ryan Lieske
It just was not nearly as prolific as it was. And, you know, and believe me, I'm not saying every one of those five stories I wrote a week in high school were worth anything, but it's just the fact that I did it and had the energy to do it and the the mental stamina to do it and the mental clarity.
01:13:30.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
01:13:36.47
Ryan Lieske
um So yeah, that that has been a big thing in my life that I would say that mental health my mental health issues have robbed me of the most would be my productivity vis-a-vis the time that also stole because if you're going to be productive, you need time.
01:13:57.17
Ryan Lieske
And if you wasted all that time, not being productive, you don't get that time back. And so when you do become more productive, you have less time, you know, so
01:14:02.28
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep, yep.
01:14:06.36
Wednesday Lee Friday
And it fucking stresses you out, which could throw you off your game, too. That is so relatable.
01:14:11.29
Ryan Lieske
yeah, it's, it's, whole I mean, it's, I, I, I don't, I'm not saying I would get teary eyed over it, but if I really wanted to get, You know some tears going I could just sit there and think about how many Years of my life I wasted um Because I didn't I don't know if it's wasted is a good term because Once I realized it was an illness I realized it wasn't my fault Necessarily um So I'm not going to sit there and say oh I was because I was lazy Even though that's what I felt like At the time but You know
01:14:38.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
01:14:43.19
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, man, but I think that, ah well, yeah, see, ladies that are in Gen X, we never got diagnosed with autism or ADHD. So we went through our entire childhoods, 20s and often 30s as well, thinking that we were lazy and slow and just not trying hard enough.
01:15:04.31
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:15:04.31
Wednesday Lee Friday
and and And I think that that's given me the kind of of anger that that you described.
01:15:04.52
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:15:11.22
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, to well, goddammit, that's not fair. You know, because your whole life you're compared to people...
01:15:15.89
Ryan Lieske
yeah yeah
01:15:19.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
from functional families with true beliefs and mental health. And if they don't have, you know, if they, even if they have mental health issues, they get taken to a doctor and people that know about those issues suggest strategies, medications, and like you get the things that you need eventually.
01:15:37.72
Wednesday Lee Friday
And if for whatever reason, you're not able to get those things, then yeah, it absolutely feels like lost time.
01:15:38.23
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:15:45.18
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:15:46.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
It's like, wait a minute, you you were not taking me to the doctor and then you were complaining that I read too much? You know, like, oh, those you're wasting your life with books. Like, yeah, the books are helping me not want to kill myself, but thanks for asking.
01:15:58.55
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, exactly.
01:15:59.80
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah ah But but you ah you also have OCD, is that correct?
01:16:04.50
Ryan Lieske
Well, I'm going to be honest. i my I've never been officially diagnosed with that. And i've never I'm not one of those self-diagnosis people because I know that's BS.
01:16:16.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay. Ooh.
01:16:19.51
Ryan Lieske
Um...
01:16:20.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
I wouldn't go that far.
01:16:20.73
Ryan Lieske
Well, ah okay. Yeah. Sorry. I didn't really quite mean it that way. I meant more like, um, I'm not going to just read the description of something and go, Oh, I do that too.
01:16:34.62
Ryan Lieske
I must be this. Like, I, I'm not saying that it's wrong. I'm saying that if I, I would be the type to want to make sure i was that before I ever said I was that, um,
01:16:47.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
01:16:48.34
Ryan Lieske
if that makes any sense. So I apologize if, if I, if I misspoke there at the beginning, but, um,
01:16:54.20
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, no, i get it. i get it.
01:16:56.95
Ryan Lieske
i But I definitely have had a lot of people with OCD tell me that, like, dude, you should get checked for that because you – and like, no. i what No, I'm just i'm just disciplined.
01:17:09.10
Ryan Lieske
you know And they're like, no, you're kind of fucked up. like you should and and And I've actually had medical professor professionals say that, you know, if you did that, I wouldn't be surprised if you had that.
01:17:20.84
Ryan Lieske
So I'm going to do it. Like I do want to get tested for it. And I honestly thought, do it.
01:17:27.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
I'm gonna blow your mind. I'm gonna blow your mind. did you know Did you know that fucked up is not actually a medical term? It's not even in the DSM-IV.
01:17:35.01
Ryan Lieske
It's not.
01:17:36.47
Wednesday Lee Friday
I know, and like, most of the people I know have it. Everybody has fucked up, but it's not in there.
01:17:41.27
Ryan Lieske
I didn't know that.
01:17:43.35
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah You'd think...
01:17:43.77
Ryan Lieske
Oh, man. haven't lied to my whole life.
01:17:48.31
Wednesday Lee Friday
right it's it's distressing um right this kid's fucked up
01:17:51.29
Ryan Lieske
That was the first thing the doctor said to my mom when he pulled me out. He's like, your boy's got a serious case of the fucked up. And then he hit me and I cried. it was terrible.
01:18:01.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah they do that it's abuse man um so you are a youtube creator what what do we need to know about that
01:18:01.56
Ryan Lieske
It's trauma, man.
01:18:07.67
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:18:10.26
Ryan Lieske
guy No, i um this is something that's kind of been new. I've been doing podcasting for a while, and um I just hadn't you know hadn't really ever thought of doing anything on YouTube, even though, like as you read in my intro, growing up, i um you know I staged plays. I did haunted houses. We shot home movies. we I used to make fake radio shows. I've been on...
01:18:40.12
Ryan Lieske
local independent radio. I had a, I produced and starred in a public access television show in the early 2000s. So one day I was sitting there going, why And I was saying this to a friend.
01:18:52.62
Ryan Lieske
I'm like, I know we're doing the podcast, but why are we not doing stuff on YouTube? Like if this had been there when we were in high school, we would have owned this platform. Like this is what we were doing.
01:19:03.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right. Right.
01:19:04.86
Ryan Lieske
We just didn't have any place to show it other than public access or at friends' parties, you know? And so I said, you know what I'm going to do is I'm just going to start fucking around and making stupid videos.
01:19:12.41
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep.
01:19:19.13
Ryan Lieske
um And I say stupid as a very, very... sincere term of endearment because I love stupid.
01:19:26.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
Sure.
01:19:27.30
Ryan Lieske
I love idiocy. I love absurdity and silliness. So I basically started making these silly guessing games. Like I'll show you 100 movie or 100 shots from movies featuring people standing in front of bridges.
01:19:43.53
Ryan Lieske
And you have six seconds to guess the name of the movie. And cause there's like thousands of those out there. And I'm like, well, I could make these.
01:19:51.53
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
01:19:52.47
Ryan Lieske
You know, why not? And so I started making those. I started making me and my nephew do videos um where, you know, because I'm introducing him to all these movies with his parents' permission, of course. And we do little videos. And I've got this other podcast coming out I'm doing. And um I'm just like, I just need to start making stuff, even if it doesn't serve any purpose.
01:20:20.31
Ryan Lieske
other than occupy my time and make me happy, then I don't care. um but it seems to be catching on. Um, I've only been at it for a couple months, but every day my subscriber count is growing.
01:20:35.57
Ryan Lieske
So, um, I'm just going to keep making shit.
01:20:36.73
Wednesday Lee Friday
nice nice
01:20:38.96
Ryan Lieske
Like I've got a little short film. I just shot with my cat fighting a wind up zombie toy. And, um, yeah, Yeah, it's just fun for me to do because I'm ah i'm working on another book right now. I do have ah a day a couple of day jobs and I'm also just was like, screw it, I'm going to be a content creator. In fact, it's you who got me over my aversion to that word. Yeah.
01:21:05.24
Ryan Lieske
because you one day made a post about, you know what? I do create content. And I was like, God damn it. Wednesday's right. I need to stop being so elitist about this term. um So, and I think one of your short story collections is like content created by Wednesday.
01:21:21.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. Yep.
01:21:23.86
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. I've got that.
01:21:24.89
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep.
01:21:24.95
Ryan Lieske
I can't see it from here, but I, I do have that. um
01:21:28.06
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah That's... Yeah, that's my first collection, actually. Creepy, stabby, and mentally odd.
01:21:32.15
Ryan Lieske
Yes. Stabby.
01:21:33.53
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because...
01:21:33.59
Ryan Lieske
I love that word. Yeah.
01:21:34.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, because ah the phrase mentally odd is something that I actually thought of way back. I talked about it on LiveJournal, so probably 20 years ago, if not more.
01:21:43.11
Ryan Lieske
Oh, wow.
01:21:44.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I said, I'm going to tuck that phrase away and do something with it later. and then I put it on that book and people commented on it.
01:21:55.36
Wednesday Lee Friday
I started using it in my, eyes I said mentally odd in some of my social media profiles.
01:22:00.57
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:22:01.05
Wednesday Lee Friday
and And Maga Boys really zeroed in on it as a thing to insult me about. And I was just like, you you think you're insulting me by repeating the thing I said about myself?
01:22:11.65
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, what?
01:22:12.09
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, what I do not get that mentality.
01:22:12.41
Wednesday Lee Friday
I don't...
01:22:15.01
Ryan Lieske
It's like, no, I put that there as a warning to not say that to me.
01:22:19.83
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, please don't point out that I'm fat. I'll be so upset if I don't think I'm a size 8.
01:22:22.87
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:22:24.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, what?
01:22:25.75
Ryan Lieske
Like, yeah, and I had somebody one time, like, I'm not trying to compare myself to anybody else who's been bullied, but one time somebody was like, yeah, well, dude, you have cats.
01:22:26.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
No.
01:22:35.89
Ryan Lieske
And I was like, brilliant deduction i only have 90 pictures of them on my facebook page and i'm yeah it's like willie that's all you got is that i have cats like well i think what it was was because i was bitching about trump um spoiler alert i don't like him um i
01:22:48.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, what kind of fucking sociopath thinks that's an insult?
01:22:59.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
What?
01:23:01.18
Ryan Lieske
I know fucked up. Um, so i was bitching about Trump and this guy was going on about, well, my kids and this and that, and I got to protect the children. And I was like, yeah, but look, you're doing this or that, you know, this isn't going to help your kid. He's like, well, yeah, well you only have cats or something like that. And I was like,
01:23:21.53
Ryan Lieske
What? like I know.
01:23:23.27
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, I mean...
01:23:24.75
Ryan Lieske
i'm not saying I'm a parent. I'm saying that what you're saying has nothing to do with parenting. And and it was just, it was stupid. And that's why i don't get involved in political discourse anymore online.
01:23:36.77
Ryan Lieske
But, um...
01:23:37.18
Wednesday Lee Friday
But, you know, that's a MAGA thing that they say. that The assumption is that if it doesn't... relate to you personally then you must not care because that's what a maga boy would do they would say that doesn't impact me or anyone that i am directly related to so i don't care and that's also why they don't like cats because cats don't kiss your ass they only want things they can control so they want a dog that they're mean to not a not a cat who is independent and and will scratch the fuck out of you if they don't like you
01:23:48.63
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. Yeah.
01:23:55.42
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. No, that's just...
01:24:00.50
Ryan Lieske
Right. Yeah.
01:24:07.61
Ryan Lieske
Exactly. That's why I'm... ji Yep.
01:24:11.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
is Because a cat does not a cat does not want your approval is the thing about that.
01:24:12.27
Ryan Lieske
That's why i love them.
01:24:16.98
Ryan Lieske
It does not need it
01:24:17.18
Wednesday Lee Friday
Your attention maybe, but not your approval. Exactly.
01:24:19.61
Ryan Lieske
Right.
01:24:19.61
Wednesday Lee Friday
Exactly.
01:24:20.92
Ryan Lieske
I said, I was joking the other day to somebody that, because was recording an episode of my podcast with somebody. And I said, i said, yeah, I'm, that's me.
01:24:31.64
Ryan Lieske
I'm a childless cat daddy. I'm the second most hated person by JD or the second most hated demographic by JD Vance.
01:24:34.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
so
01:24:40.70
Ryan Lieske
And I said, the only thing that make would make me make him hate me more as if I had tits because, or no, a uterus, I don't remember, but we were making fun of JD Vance is what I'm getting at. And I'm like, yeah, I realized how much he hates childless cat women.
01:24:55.99
Ryan Lieske
What must he think of us childless cat guys? Like, God, we're so not, we're not manly enough.
01:25:00.47
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
01:25:03.04
Ryan Lieske
And we, we, we we haven't put our sperm to good use, I guess. Sorry. i don't want them.
01:25:11.06
Wednesday Lee Friday
Sounds like you and I should split a bottle of blue hair dye just to make sure we're extra, extra offensive.
01:25:14.87
Ryan Lieske
yeah
01:25:17.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
So your new pod, your new podcast is the, where you watch, it's a movie recommendation. And then you discuss the movie with the person that suggested it to you.
01:25:29.82
Ryan Lieske
Yes.
01:25:31.32
Wednesday Lee Friday
So how's that going?
01:25:31.93
Ryan Lieske
did i write Did I write that in the thing I sent you?
01:25:35.64
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, that's how I found out.
01:25:36.66
Ryan Lieske
Oh, okay. Because I was also going to actually ask you at some point to be on that show. um So I didn't know.
01:25:43.67
Wednesday Lee Friday
Dope.
01:25:43.86
Ryan Lieske
I was like, shit, did I already see that?
01:25:44.12
Wednesday Lee Friday
I recommend...
01:25:46.73
Ryan Lieske
Hmm.
01:25:47.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, you gotta fucking watch Inhuman Witch, dude. We gotta talk about Inhuman Witch.
01:25:50.10
Ryan Lieske
Well, that, yeah, well, we'll get to that in a second. But yeah, um so I have been doing a podcast with my friend Rick called The Unidentified Flying Podcast.
01:25:54.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
if
01:26:02.68
Ryan Lieske
ah We've been doing that for a couple years. We're slowly, very slowly, ah much too slowly for my liking, working our way our way through the science fiction films of the 1950s, year by year, title by title.
01:26:14.81
Wednesday Lee Friday
nice
01:26:17.21
Ryan Lieske
ah We do occasionally lump some of them together for double features because a lot of them are, if not repetitive as hell, are very short.
01:26:24.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
but
01:26:25.05
Ryan Lieske
um But we're so far, we're we're about halfway through 1952, and we've got more episodes of that coming on. But me being the...
01:26:32.59
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, isn't them 1952? Okay. Okay.
01:26:35.77
Ryan Lieske
No, them is 54, I believe. Next year, 1953 is the year where the decade really kicks off.
01:26:39.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
okay
01:26:44.71
Ryan Lieske
Like that's the one pretty much every movie, barring a couple that are now considered classics of that that era.
01:26:45.21
Wednesday Lee Friday
okay
01:26:53.03
Ryan Lieske
53 is when it really kicks in. You got a couple before that, but 53, it's like, oh boy, We're going. 52 kind of sucks, but we're getting there. We're getting there. um But I was, I being this person that just wants to constantly be creating stuff, decided to do my own podcast called thrill me.
01:27:18.74
Ryan Lieske
And yeah, like you said, I, I reach out to people of all different walks of life and, or people of all different types. It's a sort of star Trek, uh,
01:27:30.04
Ryan Lieske
infinite diversity, infinite combinations thing that I'm really into.
01:27:32.79
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right, right.
01:27:36.54
Ryan Lieske
And i they have the only prerequisite is it has you know has to be a movie I haven't seen. I'm not going to critique something I've already seen. So um pe i right now I'm in the process of editing the episodes. I wanted to have about three in the can.
01:27:56.34
Ryan Lieske
For my day one launch.
01:27:56.37
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm.
01:27:58.30
Ryan Lieske
And then. ah There'll be some more following that. And we're also doing a side. Sort of side quest. On that one. With the occasional special episode. But more on that to come. Because I haven't quite finalized the details. But yeah. that'll be called That's called Thrill Me. And I'm hoping to launch it. The first week of March.
01:28:19.54
Ryan Lieske
um
01:28:19.70
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay. Yep. Yep.
01:28:20.63
Ryan Lieske
And that'll be produced. Through my Cinema Milkshake. uh, label, or I don't know what you call it. Cinema milkshake studio. I don't know what I have. Um, but that's, it's, it's basically just, uh, you know, it's a podcast.
01:28:36.64
Ryan Lieske
It's more about the guests than it is about me. And it's, it's sort of an experiment in seeing how movies are a great way to teach empathy to people because,
01:28:48.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
yep yep
01:28:49.40
Ryan Lieske
you're not only seeing... It's not just the movie itself that can teach you empathy, but listening to what that movie makes someone else feel or think can take can be a good source of... Or a good teaching tool for empathy. And that's why I wanted...
01:29:07.54
Ryan Lieske
these people to kind of come in and not so much defend the movie to me, but sell it to me, tell me what it is you, or even if it's a movie you hate that you wanted me to watch so that we could hate it together, or it's a movie you're not quite sure of and you wanted somebody else to see it and that might help you decide what you think about it.
01:29:19.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
Bye.
01:29:30.13
Ryan Lieske
That's the whole concept is I want to know why you liked it, why you hated it, or why you weren't sure about it. And what, what can a conversation about that bring to both of us? And I've actually had it where movies that I was a little lukewarm on by the end of the interview, I had warmed up to a lot more because they sort of convinced me that like, okay, seeing it through your eyes,
01:30:00.98
Ryan Lieske
I actually think this is better than I thought it was then. So, and in some cases it's the opposite.
01:30:04.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. Yep.
01:30:07.48
Ryan Lieske
I'm like, no, I kind of think this movie sucks more now, but I'm, but it's also like you, it's not a gotcha podcast.
01:30:07.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
boom
01:30:10.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
01:30:14.98
Ryan Lieske
It's not, I'm not there to make fun of anybody. It, I definitely, I want people to love what they love unabashedly. yeah, I want to have fun with it. So it isn't, you know, ah a show where you're going to come on and I'm going to take pot shots at you and your taste in movies. It's because I'm no one to talk.
01:30:37.40
Ryan Lieske
um
01:30:38.49
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, I love a whole bunch of trash. I think we covered that at the beginning of the episode.
01:30:40.82
Ryan Lieske
and I love trash period. Yeah.
01:30:43.24
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep.
01:30:44.06
Ryan Lieske
Caligula is one of my favorite movies of all time. And I'm not saying that ironically, i
01:30:49.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, I will fight anybody who talks trash about any Malcolm McDowell movie. I don't care if it's Island of the Dead.
01:30:53.40
Ryan Lieske
yeah
01:30:54.42
Wednesday Lee Friday
I will throw down for Malcolm McDowell.
01:30:55.80
Ryan Lieske
yeah Yeah. i Okay. No, I agree.
01:31:00.11
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh,
01:31:01.27
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. No, Caligula, it's a trash masterpiece. I don't care what anybody says.
01:31:04.59
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah.
01:31:07.03
Wednesday Lee Friday
Now I wanna talk a little bit about your book, which is called Fiction.
01:31:11.42
Ryan Lieske
Yes.
01:31:11.45
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I first wanna point out how ballsy it is to give a book that title. Why not just call it book?
01:31:19.32
Ryan Lieske
Well, yeah i've been I've been asked that a lot, and I've actually had a few reviewers that, even though they liked it, they did poke fun of that title. But um that is actually that book came from a screenplay I wrote in my late 20s that was turned into a movie, but the movie never got finished.
01:31:40.60
Ryan Lieske
Um, it was all shot. It's just never been finished and it never will be. And that's a whole nother story. But several years later, I decided to turn it into a novel and I went back to the original source, you know, IE my, my untouched draft of the script.
01:31:59.42
Ryan Lieske
Uh, I did not want to use any of the movie we shot cause I didn't want to use anybody else's ad libs or anything that wasn't mine. I didn't, which happens on a movie.
01:32:10.15
Ryan Lieske
Um, I didn't want any of that in the book.
01:32:10.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
Mm-hmm. h
01:32:13.15
Ryan Lieske
This had to go back to me, um, because I didn't want to steal anybody else's stuff. Cause I had actors who were brilliant ad livers and, you know, every day the cast and crew would come up with something, some cooler idea than I had.
01:32:26.65
Ryan Lieske
And I didn't want to steal anybody else's stuff. So I went back to my original and I, um, Anyway, the reason I call it fiction, I don't want to spoil it, but I have had a number of people that by the time that they get to the end of the book, they're like, oh, I know why you called it that.
01:32:48.66
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
01:32:48.92
Ryan Lieske
There is a reason why it's called that.
01:32:48.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right
01:32:51.56
Ryan Lieske
And some people don't see it right away, but most people that have read it have said, okay, yeah, no, that's a perfect title for that. So while it does seem generic,
01:33:00.11
Wednesday Lee Friday
right.
01:33:03.20
Ryan Lieske
it's 100% intentional. And so unfortunately that book is out of print and I am in the process of, i was trying to find another publisher for a while, but nobody will touch reprints.
01:33:05.65
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay.
01:33:17.43
Ryan Lieske
um
01:33:18.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, dude, I just signed my first three books with Barnstormer Publishing.
01:33:22.90
Ryan Lieske
Really?
01:33:23.64
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, they're all reprint. Yeah, because I wanted new paperback editions, so we'll we'll talk about that afterwards.
01:33:30.17
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:33:30.35
Wednesday Lee Friday
I got you.
01:33:30.73
Ryan Lieske
Okay. Okay.
01:33:31.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
I got you.
01:33:32.95
Ryan Lieske
I didn't know that because I was going to just start. Okay. Yeah. All right. Yeah. I want to talk to you about that.
01:33:39.32
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, definitely.
01:33:40.09
Ryan Lieske
But because, yeah, I wanted I wanted to get back out there. And um I'm definitely proud of it. ah I sometimes go back and read passages from it. I'm like, who wrote this? Like, even though was only a few years ago, I'm like.
01:33:56.89
Ryan Lieske
wow, how did I do this? ah You know what I mean? You get that feeling like, how did I sit down and write this? But i don't know.
01:34:05.43
Wednesday Lee Friday
ah Especially, i mean, yeah, um I feel that because in between writing of my first couple of long-form books, I found out that I have autism and ADHD. So I felt much more comfortable giving myself permission to write short stories instead.
01:34:22.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
And now the idea of writing a whole-ass novel is super daunting.
01:34:23.03
Ryan Lieske
Okay. Okay.
01:34:27.06
Wednesday Lee Friday
I can't even finish my Savior trilogy. You know, my third book... Don Jr. went to all the trouble of becoming the President's son again. And I cannot manage to finish my book about the President's son trilogy.
01:34:40.11
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because the first two are, you know, done and out and everything. But yeah, because the that's...
01:34:43.29
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. I read them and enjoyed them.
01:34:46.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, I mean, I think the the first book is is just wonderful. It's so sincere. Saved the President's Son is just like i I thought about it for years and kept talking myself out of writing it.
01:35:00.18
Wednesday Lee Friday
And so I really wanted to explain why I felt the way that I did, because I really have always genuinely liked Don Jr. until... until
01:35:09.34
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
01:35:10.57
Wednesday Lee Friday
MAGA, but when it started, you know, I was sure it was fake. Well, you read it. I was sure it was fake. i had It had to be fake. How good it how how could it not be? um
01:35:18.04
Ryan Lieske
Right.
01:35:18.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
And so I explained to the world why I thought he was really a decent guy and that it was kind of a secret now because of, you know, blah, blah, blah with the family. And I i felt really good about it. And I published it and it. came out and I was proud of it. And I told everyone. And two months later, he fucking led a seditious attack on the Capitol.
01:35:38.84
Ryan Lieske
Right. I remember you posting about that.
01:35:40.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, well, don't don't I feel silly.
01:35:42.34
Ryan Lieske
So yeah, I, i
01:35:44.49
Wednesday Lee Friday
And then I had to write another book, but then it was like 2022. And that was when I got sick. That was, I got COVID and it knocked my heart off its rhythm. So I was sick, like in bed sick basically for like six or eight months.
01:35:57.51
Wednesday Lee Friday
And so I was working on that book.
01:35:57.94
Ryan Lieske
yeah.
01:36:00.47
Wednesday Lee Friday
It was like the only thing I could do. But then after a while, I couldn't even sit up straight. And I totally just thought I was like dying or whatever. So I didn't really do anything about it. Plus, you know, we're poor. You can't just go to the hospital just because you think you might be dying.
01:36:13.19
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because you never take yourself out of that financially.
01:36:13.75
Ryan Lieske
Right.
01:36:16.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
My God, look at what just happened to James Van Der Beek. So...
01:36:19.54
Ryan Lieske
Right. Yeah, no, it's a nightmare.
01:36:21.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
so So, yeah. So, I didn't really do anything about it. and So, I thought that I was, like, consumed with sadness and hatred. But, in fact, I was not angry.
01:36:32.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
I was unhealthy. Like, I was sick physically.
01:36:35.96
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:36:36.43
Wednesday Lee Friday
So, so that the second book is... It's real, real mad. It's it's a very angry book. But it has some great characters in it, like the ladies.
01:36:44.48
Ryan Lieske
Oh,
01:36:46.44
Wednesday Lee Friday
I don't know if if you know this, but, you know, Fishnets and Scones are two chicks I went to undergrad with, and they are wonderful people, and they're in the third book. So...
01:36:57.18
Ryan Lieske
okay. Okay.
01:36:57.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
and Yeah. So, so yeah, so I am really trying to finish the third book, but every time I start writing about politics, the actual politics gets so crazy.
01:37:09.22
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I'm like thinking and thinking like, how do I outdo this?
01:37:09.88
Ryan Lieske
Oh, I know. Okay.
01:37:12.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
How do I spoof this? How do I parody it? And finally I said, you know what? I'm just going to put aliens in this book. And as long as aliens do not come to earth and take over, I won't have to change the book again. And I will be God damned if I did not wake up that Saturday to president Trump telling people that he saw aliens and that they see them to shoot them out of the sky.
01:37:35.00
Ryan Lieske
oh Oh, okay. Wait a minute. I missed this. Wait, he said that?
01:37:38.39
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, this was a while ago. Yeah, it was some, somebody saw lights or something and Trump was like, well, you guys, you better shoot them out of the sky. And all these MAGA boys were like, okay, getting their guns and going out. It was ridiculous.
01:37:50.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
And then they figured out that it wasn't actually aliens and, you know, something, something Epstein files.
01:37:54.36
Ryan Lieske
Right. I can't. I mean...
01:37:57.81
Wednesday Lee Friday
I don't know. But...
01:37:58.94
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, I didn't know. Wow. Like, I don't... I i think i posted about this the other day on my Facebook because I used to be quite a bit more outspoken about this stuff. But um I decided for my own... Mostly for my own personal sanity to really scale that back um this year.
01:38:19.61
Ryan Lieske
And actually, last year was when I started to scale it back. But...
01:38:23.96
Wednesday Lee Friday
Best thing for you, really.
01:38:24.22
Ryan Lieske
so Yeah, but I mean, I still keep tabs on the news, but, you know yeah you know, and that's what I posted about was that, you know, my head's not in the sand, but I swear to God, I had no idea he told people to shoot UFOs.
01:38:40.18
Ryan Lieske
I missed that completely. And that's the one headline I wanted, I would have wanted to have seen.
01:38:45.57
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right? Right.
01:38:46.60
Ryan Lieske
Like, what?
01:38:47.22
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
01:38:48.09
Ryan Lieske
Like, are you kidding me? Holy, like,
01:38:50.90
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know, it's it's funny. I think Colin Jost, and this would have been probably 10 years ago at this point when he was doing an Update. Trump had just been like subtly implying that someone's death, not Epstein, but someone else, that their death was like foul play.
01:39:08.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
And he was like, you know, normally president accuses man of murder would be like a big headline, but now it's just kind of this, oh, wacky Trump saying things.
01:39:21.62
Ryan Lieske
yeah
01:39:22.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
What a what a troll.
01:39:22.46
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:39:23.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
LOL. You know, like,
01:39:26.01
Ryan Lieske
I know. It's so, it's so bizarre.
01:39:28.44
Wednesday Lee Friday
it is It is surreal. It is positively surreal.
01:39:31.77
Ryan Lieske
I can't get over it half the time.
01:39:33.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
I mean, the director of health and human services just explained to us that he doesn't fear germs because he used to do cocaine off toilet seats.
01:39:33.65
Ryan Lieske
Like,
01:39:42.26
Ryan Lieske
I know, which if normally if somebody said that to me, I would be like, okay, that's cool, man. Cool.
01:39:48.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
but that's But that's the same guy who says that people who buy soda and chips don't deserve healthcare because they're making unhealthy life choices.
01:39:49.22
Ryan Lieske
look
01:39:55.16
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. Like I'm saying, if this is some dude I ran into at the bar or that I worked with said that I'd be like,
01:39:57.56
Wednesday Lee Friday
So...
01:40:00.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right, exactly.
01:40:04.38
Ryan Lieske
Right on, man. but Not the guy that's in church. Oh, Jesus Christ.
01:40:09.95
Wednesday Lee Friday
yep
01:40:10.10
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, it's it's so fucking surreal. I don't... Me and my brother... Because my brother's got two kids and we're often talking about like, how the hell are you going explain all this to him when he gets older? like Because they're doing a pretty good job of shielding him from the worst of it.
01:40:26.94
Ryan Lieske
um
01:40:26.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, as long as you can tell them that you were on the right side, you know, that you did the right thing.
01:40:30.84
Ryan Lieske
Oh, for sure. Yeah.
01:40:34.68
Ryan Lieske
I mean, I already told him that if I ever catch him even whispering the name Andrew Tate, that I will disown him as my uncle.
01:40:34.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because, I mean...
01:40:40.12
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, my God. ah
01:40:42.94
Ryan Lieske
And his father then goes, yeah, and I will no longer be your father. because you're like and He's like, no, I'm like, no, no Manosphere.
01:40:47.61
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right. Right.
01:40:52.50
Ryan Lieske
None of it.
01:40:52.79
Wednesday Lee Friday
Ugh.
01:40:54.36
Ryan Lieske
um We raised you better, even though I didn't raise him.
01:40:57.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
so
01:40:57.45
Ryan Lieske
But God damn it, I have some stake in it. I'm making him watch Friday the 13th movies in order.
01:41:00.12
Wednesday Lee Friday
chair Sure, sure.
01:41:02.71
Ryan Lieske
So...
01:41:02.81
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, you do sound like the fun uncle for sure.
01:41:05.24
Ryan Lieske
Oh, i yeah, they called me up. um This was about a year ago. And my brother was like, so Killian's asking about horror movies. And we figure you might be the best person.
01:41:18.86
Ryan Lieske
to So do you want to start coming over and showing him some horror movies? And I'm like, I've been waiting for this phone call for so long.
01:41:26.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right?
01:41:26.73
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:41:27.19
Wednesday Lee Friday
right
01:41:27.93
Ryan Lieske
ah
01:41:28.73
Wednesday Lee Friday
like that friend from college. Yeah, I have like every once in a while I'll hear from somebody and and that's that's basically the conversation. My kid is such and such an age. What's safe to show them?
01:41:38.33
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:41:38.52
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know? Like they really liked Coraline and, you know, Frankenweenie. What do I show them next? Like, ooh.
01:41:46.17
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:41:47.19
Wednesday Lee Friday
Sit down, my friend, and I shall tell you a tale.
01:41:47.55
Ryan Lieske
Paranorman.
01:41:49.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh my god, Paranorman is so great.
01:41:50.23
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. I love Paranorman.
01:41:53.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
Um... And it's it's so fun now because tv like movies for kids are so much better than they were. like We had Disney movies, which were like, you know, they're pretty good, but not not great messages, particularly for girls.
01:42:06.39
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:42:09.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because in the majority of Disney stories back in the day, the girl stories end with a wedding.
01:42:10.58
Ryan Lieske
Sure.
01:42:15.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
And the boy stories, except Pinocchio, they they generally end up king. So...
01:42:20.60
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:42:22.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
that did That is not a great message.
01:42:22.17
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. No, I agree.
01:42:25.25
Wednesday Lee Friday
But we are actually getting toward the end of our time. So I want to make sure that that we covered everything that you want to cover.
01:42:30.20
Ryan Lieske
Word.
01:42:32.65
Wednesday Lee Friday
Did we miss anything that you want to tell people about?
01:42:35.86
Ryan Lieske
um I mean... Not really. I mean, I'm more concerned that if... you Did you get to everything you wanted to do? Because...
01:42:43.56
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, totes. Yeah, I think...
01:42:45.23
Ryan Lieske
I'm not used to being a guest on these. I'm usually hosting. So I think I talk too much because I'm the one who's used to having to fill in all the gaps, but, um, yeah, i want to make sure you got everything, but if not, then, um yeah, I basically, um I'm out there.
01:42:54.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh.
01:43:03.61
Ryan Lieske
um I, you know, semi-private, but i also enjoy entertaining people. So I don't mind making new friends and acquaintances and, um,
01:43:14.55
Ryan Lieske
If you want to find me, I'm pretty easy to find ah in terms of my work. um And that's just to Cinema Milkshake. And you can find, if you just type that into Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Spotify, Blue Sky, and Letterboxd, you can find me on there.
01:43:36.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, you have a LinkedIn, right? Or a link tree?
01:43:39.86
Ryan Lieske
I don't, but ah but I'm going to because you suggested it in the email you sent me to prepare for this podcast.
01:43:45.21
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah. Yeah.
01:43:47.36
Ryan Lieske
So I will have one of those.
01:43:47.48
Wednesday Lee Friday
Uh-huh.
01:43:48.84
Ryan Lieske
And I am more, I just, oh, I'm sorry.
01:43:49.56
Wednesday Lee Friday
Cool. so We'll, we'll sock that in the description.
01:43:52.98
Ryan Lieske
Okay, yeah.
01:43:53.60
Wednesday Lee Friday
No.
01:43:53.82
Ryan Lieske
And I did just, um... I just bought my domain. So i will I am in the process of working on an actual fancy website.
01:43:59.96
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh, nices nice. Nice.
01:44:04.62
Ryan Lieske
and But any of those places, you should be able to go and find links to my podcasts, my video my YouTube channel, and eventually when my book comes out again.
01:44:16.49
Ryan Lieske
And some of the short stories in the novella I'm working on right now – um all that nonsense. um So I guess if you are interested in any of my silliness, um I can promise it's entertaining.
01:44:33.72
Ryan Lieske
Promise not guaranteed.
01:44:33.88
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, well, and you actually left something out, the podcast that you do with your partner. um He's sexy. i I think that's that's something people people deserve to know. um So, yeah, just throwing that out there.
01:44:46.04
Ryan Lieske
My what what partner?
01:44:49.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
Rick.
01:44:50.33
Ryan Lieske
Oh, Rick. Yeah. Sexy. He's, he's a hottie.
01:44:55.13
Wednesday Lee Friday
you You didn't have to agree with me. i was just pointing it out because you you neglected to mention it.
01:44:57.62
Ryan Lieske
I don't.
01:45:00.17
Wednesday Lee Friday
So, you know.
01:45:00.76
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, you're right. But, but the reason I didn't mention it is because it's through cinema milkshake now.
01:45:02.39
Wednesday Lee Friday
oh
01:45:07.20
Ryan Lieske
So, um, but yeah, if you want to listen to, if you're a fifties science fiction fan or just someone who's into classic era films in general, um,
01:45:20.38
Ryan Lieske
I can't promise that it's as academic as TCM, but we'll, we'll do our best to make you laugh. Um, it's called the unidentified flying podcast. And that is also available on blue. or You can find that on blue sky letterboxd. And, uh, what's the other one I said earlier, uh, Instagram.
01:45:43.83
Ryan Lieske
So yeah, all that stuff's out there.
01:45:44.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right.
01:45:45.88
Ryan Lieske
Um, and come join me as i do my best to, um, assuage some of the darkness in our lives with absolute frivolous entertainment and guessing games and assorted kitty cat nonsense.
01:46:04.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, then, that we also like to give guests a chance to ask me a question if they have one.
01:46:05.98
Ryan Lieske
Word.
01:46:10.90
Ryan Lieske
Oh,
01:46:11.10
Wednesday Lee Friday
So if you do, now is the time.
01:46:13.78
Ryan Lieske
Okay. ah um God damn it.
01:46:18.29
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
01:46:19.83
Ryan Lieske
I came on, I was like, I'm so used to being, ah to hosting these and asking the questions that I was like, you know, ah this is fun. I can just not think and just answer.
01:46:30.17
Wednesday Lee Friday
right
01:46:30.90
Ryan Lieske
But now I've got to think of a question. um
01:46:34.46
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, no, you don't have to. i mean, i'm not I'm not that interesting, you know.
01:46:36.25
Ryan Lieske
But I want to. No, I think you're pretty interesting. But it see, all the questions... Because you years ago, you did an interview for me for my now defunct blog where I was doing interviews with people about their reading habits.
01:46:50.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep, yep.
01:46:51.10
Ryan Lieske
And i feel like all the interesting stuff we talked about on there... um Tell me what you really think about the made-for-TV film Bates Motel.
01:47:02.42
Ryan Lieske
That's what I really want to know because I know you're a big Psycho fan. um Is that canon?
01:47:09.69
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, no, no, it is not, Cam.
01:47:11.06
Ryan Lieske
okay
01:47:12.34
Wednesday Lee Friday
um
01:47:13.51
Ryan Lieske
I'm serious, though. I did want to know this, but... um
01:47:16.12
Wednesday Lee Friday
No, um because it's ah it's an 80s movie, Bates Motel, ah well you know with the Bud Court and Lori Petty, RIP Bud Court, miss you, buddy.
01:47:20.85
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:47:25.69
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, I know.
01:47:26.06
Wednesday Lee Friday
um But ah no, because it starts at at the open, Norman is is dead. And what is canon, what is canon is Psycho 4, the McGarris movie that was made for Showtime.
01:47:35.01
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:47:40.47
Wednesday Lee Friday
And Norman is very much alive in that.
01:47:40.89
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:47:42.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
so So, no, it is not canon.
01:47:43.45
Ryan Lieske
Okay, so.
01:47:45.51
Wednesday Lee Friday
But that said, I am in favor of those who respectfully want to add to the Psycho mythos. Um...
01:47:55.10
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
01:47:55.96
Wednesday Lee Friday
I did not feel that that's what was happening in this case. I felt like someone owned the rights to the property and wanted to make a series of it, so they stitched some shit together and got some good actors.
01:47:59.74
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
01:48:07.68
Wednesday Lee Friday
And, you know, the pilot did not work. It did not become a series. um
01:48:12.31
Ryan Lieske
Oh, it was a pilot. I did not know that.
01:48:13.72
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah. Yeah.
01:48:14.99
Ryan Lieske
I've seen it. I saw, I watched it the night it debuted. My parents, I was so excited and my parents let me watch it. And I remember being so bored. Like, I mean, I was a kid, mind you, but I remember being like, where's Norman Bates? Where are the stabby people? Where, where's anything happening?
01:48:34.39
Ryan Lieske
And I haven't seen it since. So that's why I was interested. Cause, um, I didn't know it was a pilot. Wow. Okay.
01:48:42.04
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, there's actually a single DVD that has all of the sequels. It's 2, 3, 4, and that pilot. And the premise, that the really the thing that's that's the most wrong with it is that it introduced supernatural elements.
01:48:58.55
Wednesday Lee Friday
Because the focus of it was supposed to be that different people were going to come to the hotel and some would end up in the house for some reason.
01:48:58.78
Ryan Lieske
oh
01:49:06.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
And all these crazy supernatural things were going to happen. And even as a kid, I was like, I'm not allowed to say this is bullshit. But this is very good and I don't like it.
01:49:17.58
Wednesday Lee Friday
So. ah
01:49:19.77
Ryan Lieske
No, I get it. I get it. I remember having a similar reaction to that Friday the 13th show. Like, I'm like, wait a minute.
01:49:25.69
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep. Yep.
01:49:29.20
Ryan Lieske
Where's Jason? he's Does he work at this antique store?
01:49:30.87
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
01:49:32.72
Ryan Lieske
like is he Does Jason sell them the the evil lamps?
01:49:33.14
Wednesday Lee Friday
Right.
01:49:37.66
Wednesday Lee Friday
And I'll tell you what, the thing about that show being such a crashing disappointment is that when HBO started Tales from the Crypt not long after, we were so thirsty for it.
01:49:37.84
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:49:49.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
You know?
01:49:49.11
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:49:49.50
Wednesday Lee Friday
And it just hit that spot so well. Because Tales and from the Crypt, like, I'm mad that it's not on HBO streaming.
01:49:52.79
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:49:56.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, that that is bullshit. That you can't stream it.
01:49:58.94
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:50:00.76
Wednesday Lee Friday
cause And I'm sure it's just like a rights nightmare, but there are so many episodes that are just... like they're They're classic television in and of themselves as individual episodes.
01:50:10.07
Ryan Lieske
Oh, absolutely.
01:50:11.03
Wednesday Lee Friday
So, I mean, we could do a whole episode just talking about Tales from the Crypt episodes, no question.
01:50:15.62
Ryan Lieske
Let's do it. No, I'm just kidding.
01:50:16.73
Wednesday Lee Friday
Alright, well, we can't, though, because it's time for the Mad Lib.
01:50:18.30
Ryan Lieske
Um.
01:50:22.00
Ryan Lieske
Boop, boop, boop. Okay.
01:50:24.69
Wednesday Lee Friday
Alright, so, you know what? We're gonna start...
01:50:26.60
Ryan Lieske
God, I haven't done one of these in decades. All right.
01:50:28.92
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, get ready for it. Let's see. One, two, three, four, five, six. Looks like seven nouns. And those are going to be singular nouns.
01:50:39.64
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
01:50:42.66
Ryan Lieske
I've got to come up with seven nouns.
01:50:44.15
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, you do. And you got to tell them to me so I could write them down in the Madlib book.
01:50:45.11
Ryan Lieske
Oh.
01:50:48.18
Ryan Lieske
Pliers. It's my first one.
01:50:51.80
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay. Okay.
01:50:53.53
Ryan Lieske
Um... oh it's an Oh, this counts. Sour cream.
01:51:00.44
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
01:51:00.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right. Yep. Yep.
01:51:02.33
Ryan Lieske
um Acorn.
01:51:07.40
Wednesday Lee Friday
Uh-huh.
01:51:07.58
Ryan Lieske
This is fun because I'm just looking around my desk.
01:51:07.99
Wednesday Lee Friday
Go right ahead. Yeah, that's what happens.
01:51:10.14
Ryan Lieske
um um um Toilet paper. I ran out of Kleenex.
01:51:18.62
Wednesday Lee Friday
That's none of my business. I need one, two, three, four more.
01:51:22.65
Ryan Lieske
Four more.
01:51:22.71
Wednesday Lee Friday
Maybe I miscounted.
01:51:23.41
Ryan Lieske
You're...
01:51:23.75
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah.
01:51:24.76
Ryan Lieske
No, I've got four here too.
01:51:24.82
Wednesday Lee Friday
I think I did. Okay. Well, let's have it.
01:51:26.78
Ryan Lieske
um
01:51:29.75
Ryan Lieske
Vaseline. But I promise you it's ah it's a um chapstick.
01:51:35.27
Wednesday Lee Friday
It's a song.
01:51:37.10
Ryan Lieske
Vaseline.
01:51:37.98
Wednesday Lee Friday
yeah
01:51:39.93
Ryan Lieske
Flaming lips, man. um Let me see here. Cat, I would say sleeping cat, but you probably just want the cat.
01:51:47.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
Nope. No adjectives. Noun. Two more nouns.
01:51:50.10
Ryan Lieske
no Oh yeah, you did say no adjectives. um A copy of Let's Go Play at the Adamses? No. um Gosh, this is...
01:52:00.28
Wednesday Lee Friday
One word jump. Come on, you know what a noun is.
01:52:03.03
Ryan Lieske
yeah I do, hard drive. And you need one more?
01:52:06.39
Wednesday Lee Friday
And one more. Yep.
01:52:08.47
Ryan Lieske
You're going to get a word that is... Skull.
01:52:17.05
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right.
01:52:17.39
Ryan Lieske
Skull.
01:52:17.43
Wednesday Lee Friday
i actually need one, two plural nouns.
01:52:22.44
Ryan Lieske
Plural nouns. Didn't I? gave you one.
01:52:25.66
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, I need two more.
01:52:26.01
Ryan Lieske
oh no. Pliers is a. OK, you need two more. So you need edibles. That's a plural. And you need. um Damn it. Socks.
01:52:39.74
Ryan Lieske
Socks.
01:52:41.69
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right, I need an adjective.
01:52:44.70
Ryan Lieske
An adjective. You're going to get... um Jesus, I had a good one and it just slipped my mind. um Cozy.
01:52:58.05
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right, I actually need two more adjectives.
01:53:00.86
Ryan Lieske
Two more adjectives. Damn. Okay.
01:53:02.30
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yep.
01:53:02.98
Ryan Lieske
um ah yeah Blurry.
01:53:10.17
Ryan Lieske
And...
01:53:15.63
Ryan Lieske
That's not an adjective. Shit. um Fiery.
01:53:22.63
Wednesday Lee Friday
All right, I need a verb.
01:53:24.50
Ryan Lieske
Holy shit. um Jog.
01:53:29.66
Wednesday Lee Friday
And a place. Actually, two places.
01:53:32.73
Ryan Lieske
Two places.
01:53:33.66
Wednesday Lee Friday
Give me the first place.
01:53:35.75
Ryan Lieske
Shower. is that or do you want like a proper, like a city place?
01:53:39.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
Any place.
01:53:41.14
Ryan Lieske
Any place. Okay, shower. And then, um street corner.
01:53:50.84
Wednesday Lee Friday
And finally, I need a last name. Now, usually that's the guest, but I'm not going to hold you to that.
01:53:57.72
Ryan Lieske
No, do it. Okay.
01:53:59.00
Wednesday Lee Friday
Okay. Here we go. So this is called a League of Their Own, and we are on the sporty section of the Madlib book.
01:54:08.82
Ryan Lieske
okay
01:54:08.82
Wednesday Lee Friday
So here we go. Did you know that there used to be a professional baseball pliers for women? It was called the All-Cozy Girls Baseball League.
01:54:20.38
Wednesday Lee Friday
When America entered Sour Cream War most of the men went off to jog. in order yes In order to keep professional baseball blurry, some team owners decided to make an acorn for women.
01:54:28.60
Ryan Lieske
Which we would.
01:54:38.94
Wednesday Lee Friday
some Some team names were the Shower Daisies, the Street Corner Bells, and the Rockford Edibles. These toilet paper breaking women inspired a movie called Vaseline of their own, which, stop which starred Tom Leesky and won two golden cat awards.
01:54:49.43
Ryan Lieske
Okay.
01:55:04.09
Wednesday Lee Friday
The fiery players were all inducted into the baseball hard drive of fame and have become an inspiration to socks everywhere. It goes to show you that you can accomplish anything if you set your skull to it.
01:55:20.44
Ryan Lieske
Now that I like. That should be on a bumper sticker.
01:55:23.93
Wednesday Lee Friday
Yeah, you can't do that with AI.
01:55:24.22
Ryan Lieske
But...
01:55:25.41
Wednesday Lee Friday
Well, you can, but you shouldn't.
01:55:27.10
Ryan Lieske
Yeah. But oh my god, how did my ad lib have end up having so much sexual innuendo?
01:55:33.78
Wednesday Lee Friday
Oh my god, dude.
01:55:34.50
Ryan Lieske
Oh.
01:55:34.74
Wednesday Lee Friday
We used to do these these at parties. These were like the quintessential Wednesday party thing. And my god, they were so foul. And every once in a while, a kid would come over and be like, oh, Mad Libs, can I look?
01:55:45.02
Wednesday Lee Friday
Like, no, no, no, no.
01:55:45.56
Ryan Lieske
Yeah.
01:55:45.86
Wednesday Lee Friday
no Every conceivable drug, violent, and sexual activity is within the those Mad Lib pages.
01:55:47.06
Ryan Lieske
We used to... ah
01:55:53.48
Wednesday Lee Friday
Don't go near it.
01:55:54.65
Ryan Lieske
Yeah, we we did something similar. um We had a little, ah this was when I was in 10th grade, and me and my friends had like this, you know, like a stand by me where they've got that, i think it's a tree house, but ours was more on the ground. But we had an an ah issue of penthouse letters stashed away, and we would do Mad Libs using words found in penthouse letters.
01:56:17.14
Ryan Lieske
And we would, so whatever we thought were the best sentences from each we wrote in black marker on the walls of the tree house. It was, oh, good times, man.
01:56:25.40
Wednesday Lee Friday
oh my gosh
01:56:28.47
Ryan Lieske
But seriously, an inspiration to socks. Oh, do you know what guys do with socks?
01:56:33.54
Wednesday Lee Friday
we'll do yes yes i do i had brothers um
01:56:35.90
Ryan Lieske
oh
01:56:40.12
Wednesday Lee Friday
I had brothers and I did laundry.
01:56:40.34
Ryan Lieske
Oh, shit.
01:56:41.84
Wednesday Lee Friday
So yes, I am aware of these things. um Dude, I am so glad you could be here.
01:56:47.80
Ryan Lieske
Oh, me too.
01:56:47.85
Wednesday Lee Friday
was wonderful having you. And this was a great conversation. So I hope people got a lot out of it. um I know I did.
01:56:54.90
Ryan Lieske
i I did too.
01:56:55.03
Wednesday Lee Friday
So we, are yeah, I don't know if you heard, we shut down the magazine. So we are no longer sponsored by Sometimes Hilarious Horror. So if if you want to support the podcast, the best way to do that is on Ko-fi.
01:57:08.57
Wednesday Lee Friday
And yeah, that's where we are. We'll have links in the description. And we will also see everybody next week. So thanks, everyone.
01:57:18.58
Ryan Lieske
Word.
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