Someone Stop This Train

Here's your transcript broken into paragraphs:

Hello. I am recording this, and it's kind of weird, because I'm already getting birthday wishes from people on the other side of the planet where it's already my birthday. According to my clock, I got about another 15 minutes. But, uh, here's the thing, I am turning 60. That's weird to even say out loud, I am now 60. It just doesn't sound right. And I don't know why 59 sounded better, but 60 sounds really funky.

And what's weird about this is, in my head, I am 23 when I was five. In my brain, I was 23. I think I've told you the story probably multiple times. When I was five, sometime that week, my mom would take me up to my future elementary school where I was going to be going to kindergarten, which is a block and a half from my house. And so the time came to go to school, and I went to the back door and opened it up, and my mom said, "Hey, like, don't you want me to walk you to school?" And I was like, "Why? Like, it's right there." And she was like, "Oh, okay," and offered a little man win. And she always thought that was kind of like, you know, little independent guy. But I, the reason I wasn't worried is because I was 23 in my head, it's like, "Mom, what are you talking about?"

And it's weird because I feel like... I don't know if it's a train. John Mayer has a great song called "Stop This Train," where he talks about getting old. But I feel like I'm either walking into a room because I'm like, there's all right, you have your first part of your life, your childhood, then you have your teens and your 20s, and then you got your 30s and your 40s. Now you got your 50s and your 60s, and then you got 60 to 80 or whatever, right? Anything past that, you're on, you know, bonus.

But I can't help but feel that it's a weird little game, and you walk into a room, and it's like a squid game, maybe without all the drama. I just watched... I'm still watching "Beast Games" on Amazon, where you just know, you start off with X amount of people, and by the last episode, you're down to six, and you just find out, yep, guess what, yeah, you've been eliminated. And so there's part of that curiosity that's just like, going, "Well, what's gonna get me? Is it a car wreck? Am I gonna fall and not catch up? You know, is it gonna be a stroke, a heart attack? What's the deal?"

It makes you wonder, and you're just trying not to obsess over that, but you just know, kind of like being served jury duty papers, right? The one day, you just open up an envelope, and you're like, "Ah, crap, jury duty," right? So, like, just one day, I'm just gonna be like, "Ah, crap, cancer, Ah, crap, you know, whatever." And it's hard not to just think about it.

But it's also kind of weird that as I record this, Joe Biden just got out of being a president, and one of his sayings was, "Hey, no joke," to which I always wanted to go, "Did you? Did you just say a joke? Because I didn't, I didn't hear one, but okay, thanks for clarifying, Joe."

But I was probably so far in, uh, 2025, I think I've had Dairy Queen, you know, maybe two times, maybe three, because I had one, like, four days ago, and ice cream is a nemesis for me. And when they built one within literally walking distance of my house, when I already had one, and it was one of those things where, like, well, it's summer, you got to go to Strickland's Custard. Because, you know, that's what you do when you live here.

And there's a part of my voice that's like, "Yeah, that's not a joke anymore." And in the same way that you can't drink beer till you're 18, you can't drink liquor till you're 21, maybe 60 is the cutoff where you go, "Yeah, we think we're done with the Dairy Queen." You know? And there's a part of my brain that goes, "Oh, come on, peanut Buster parfait." But there's another little voice in my head that goes, "No, seriously, we're not, we're not kidding about this. Like, that's, that's really..."

And I've been watching, there's so many videos on YouTube. There's this one thing called "She's the Food Babe," I think it is. And there is stuff going on, and this is where I just want to get on my soapbox and explain how horrible the US government is. Bobby Kennedy, I'm hoping that somebody let that guy loose, because seriously, like Kellogg's, I think in Texas, they signed a thing to remove Kellogg's cereal and such from the schools. And here's why.

If you look at the stuff in, like, Fruit Loops, you know, good old Toucan Sam, not marketed to kids at all, of course, in the US, and then you look at the version in the UK, they're way different, because the FDA lets them put in a bunch of chemicals that are, I don't know, how do you say it again? Oh, that's right, poison, like they're really bad for us. You know, all this fructose stuff that makes us think we're not hungry or we are hungry when we're not, so we just eat more. "Feed me, yeah?" And I'm like, "Well, yeah, maybe that is the last peanut Buster parfait. Enjoy it. Maybe eat this one a little slower."

You know, I gave up Mountain Dew again for, like, the 800th time. Drinking a lot of water. I was happy. Today, I put on my Apple Watch, and it said, "Hey, you're walking more than you used to." And I'm like, "Yeah, I got a treadmill in the living room now. Sold my exercise bike so I can put the treadmill there while I'm watching TV." But I can't believe I'm 60. I'm not happy about it.

And what was interesting because I have a cousin that I used to hang out with all the time. When we were little, I would go to my Aunt Mary's house and hang out with my cousin Lee, and he was a month older or a month younger. I was, you know, I came in February, he came in March. And so I went up to my aunt, who was 97 and has every single one of her marbles, and said, "How does it feel to have your baby turning 60 next month?" And she said, "I got one that's really messing with my head." And she, I said, "What's that?" And she goes, "My oldest child is turning 70." And she's like, "I have a child that is 70." And I said, "Oh." She goes, "Yeah, she goes. And what's weird?" She goes, "Look, I'm 97," which was interesting because I thought she was 96, but that kind of proves the point. She goes, "You know, you hear these sayings like, 'Time flies,' and she goes, 'It's because it does.'" She goes, "It only gets faster," and she goes, "I know you're probably thinking, 'Well...'" And she's like, "No." She goes, "I'm here to tell you, I feel like I was 80 last week, and I'm 97, and I hope I get her genes. That's my mom's side of the family."

But I think I'm going to stop here because otherwise, I'll just ramble on. But I'm just, for the record, let the record state, 50 was no big deal. 55, okay, you know, we all sing Sammy Hagar, and but I'm not, I'm not crazy about turning 60. And I'm just, it is kind of one of those things where I have that... this isn't a joke, this is not a drill, and I got to start taking better care of my body. And I've already cut way down on carbs and drinking gallons of water every day, because it turns out everything I eat is bad for you. And I mean everything, and I have cupboards full of this stuff, so I'm kind of trying to eat it, like, maybe lunch will be bad today. Dinner will be great. Breakfast will be good, and then eventually, I'll get rid of all this stuff.

But everything was just, you know, and it sounded good, you know, Chobani pineapple yogurt with fruit on the bottom. Well, okay, and it's so yummy. Well, yeah, the reason why it was so yummy is it's filled with a bunch of chemicals that make your brain go, "Give me more yogurt." So I'm not sure what the answer is. Besides, get more sleep, drink more water, exercise more, and if it didn't come out of the ground, or, you know, something, maybe pass. I just pass on all, you know, when I look at things like candy bars and, you know, all that stuff, it's, uh, it didn't come out of the ground, and it went through quite a few processes.

So we shall see. I renewed my driver's license today, and that's always odd when you see the old one. And the cool thing was, as I'm down five pounds from four years ago, so that's a good sign. And something new, at least in Ohio, you can renew your license. They still need a sticker every year, but your actual driver's license you can renew for eight years, and where it used to be four. And I was like, "Oh, sign me up for eight if I don't have to go through this again," which is interesting, because I don't know if I have when I get a sticker. I don't think I... like today, I had to take an eye exam, then I passed with my glasses on, but it's gonna be weird.

But then I thought about it, I might... as I walked out, I'm like, "I'm going to walk back in here when I'm 68 to get a new driver's license." And that kind of sounds like a ways off, but I also know it's going to be here pretty quick. And what am I going to do in the next eight years? Because they're going to fly. And so for the record, if you go, "Man, that sounds scary." It is. I'm on a treadmill, right? I'm on that train, in the words of John Mayer, "Would someone please stop this train?"

And, you know, I don't want jury duty and I don't want cancer. We can avoid those two things. I'll be fine if I eat better. Well, things should get better. So if you're freaking out, if you're white-knuckling it, hang in there. It's gonna get better.

Let me know if you need any further adjustments!