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Show notes: Spooky season is almost upon us and we cannot wait! In this episode, we have books for wherever you fall on the spooky spectrum: from fall vibes and witchy tales to outright scary and nightmare-inducing stories and everything in between. There's something for every spooky soul and we can't wait to hear which ones you add to your TBR. Let's get spooky!   Click here to join us on Patreon to get an exclusive bookish goodie every single Friday. With fun bonus episode series like: Monthly Overflow Books, Backlist Book Club, The New Books in Our Lives plus a private community for RTL Book Nerds only, you're going to love being a part of our Patreon. Not only that, but you're helping to support our show by saying I LOVE WHAT YOU DO.    Find the time stamped show notes below with links to all of the fun things we mentioned.   Something Bookish: [03:15] S: Substack: Feeling My Shelf by Alex Reliford [4:29] M: Video: Most Anticipated Books for the Rest of the Year   Spooky Books We've Already Read and Loved: [9:06] M: Anita Blake Vampire Hunter series by Laurell K. Hamilton [9:54] S: Hidden Pictures by Jason Rekulak [10:47] M: Strange Weather by Joe Hill [11:23] S: The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna [11:57] M: The Devil Takes You Home by Gabino Iglesias [12:38] S: Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern [13:10] M: Mothered by Zoje Stage [13:43] S: The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean [14:42] M: River Woman, River Demon by Jennifer Givhan [15:10] S: The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston   Books We're Planning to Read This Spooky Season: [16:04] S: Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth [17:53] M: In My Dreams I Hold a Knife by Ashley Winstead [18:47] S: Assistant to the Villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer [20:02] M: There's Someone Inside Your House by Stephanie Perkins [20:52] S: Weyward by Emilia Hart  [22:10] M: Survive the Night by Riley Sager [23:08] S: Beasts and Beauty by Soman Chainani  [24:40] M: Our Share of Night by Mariana Enríquez [25:34] S: A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik [27:07] M: Cursed Bunny: Stories by Bora Chung [28:05] S: The Witches of New York by Ami McKay [29:47] M: Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster by Jonathan Auxier Follow RTL on Instagram: @readingthroughlifepod Follow Sarah on Instagram: @sarahhartleyco  Follow Mia on Instagram: @fastlifeinslowlane + @miamanagementco    * The books noted above contain affiliate links. This means that we may get a small kickback if you purchase through our links, at no additional cost to you.  

Asketic co-Founder Miķelis Baštiks talking with Inese Ozola from "Amoralle" and "Amoralle Level Up" about how to build and work with the audience and how to create new ways of building business by listening to your audience.M: Speaking of fundamental values, which we discussed while creating the website. You have identified them, but how do they impact the practical side of things? Secondly, we once touched upon this in our Instagram conversation, how you didn't create Level Up out of thin air, but instead created something for your existing audience or community that's completely different from your core business, which is to sew clothing. When you had SockBox, you probably never imagined you would have digital products, masterclasses, but when you understand your person, you can make anything for them, gather help for Ukraine, film videos and sew clothing. Those are different activities, but they are for the same person. I find it very interesting – building around the audience, because 9 out of 10 times it's the other way around. Someone decides to make or sell something and then looks for people who need it. You're the rare case, where you already had an audience and then you keep expanding it.I: If someone first decides to become a fashion designer, and there are a lot of people who feel such drive in them, and then this person very purposefully works toward what they believe in, then eventually they will find their audience. In these cases, the authenticity of such people is always totally clear, you know they are looking straight ahead towards their goal, it's their opinion. You may like it, so you follow that, or you may not like it – so you don't. The downside is that this usually is a very firm, inflexible, very straight path. While the other story, which is my story, is a relationship with the brand or with your dream.M: The difference is that in the first case the brand is created around the personality, but in the second case – around the audience. Seth Godin, a grand-master of marketing, has compared business creation to a dance – you called it a relationship – where you constantly do your best to not step on each other's foot and understand where you are going next, and that's the other path.I: I actually think that today's brands are about this relationship.M: As much as I was able to witness your team in action, it felt very good, and also, I could sense a system underneath. There was no bureaucracy, which was nice to observe. Have you intentionally applied that or is there a structure, the invisible carcass?I: You can't teach that, you can create that, it's a living organism, and it works because everyone is in their place. One of our unwritten rules is that every person who exits our premises, whether it's a cooperation partner, client or delivery person, has to feel happier than when they entered. To sell something at the store is not as important as making the lady happy as she leaves.M: That's one of the cornerstones of the brand, and then you seek how you can achieve that with music, interior design, relationships, specific staff dress code. And these are the small points of contact, which together create the sense of the brand or associations with Amoralle.I: Of course, I'm glad to hear praise, thank you for that, but I find critique to be of the highest value. That allows me to analyse the situation, and any critique is always followed by a small adjustment to the system going forward. For example, an individual order – a lady wants to make a dress. We have agreed on the design, the price, but something goes wrong, there's a lack of satisfaction. I dissect this whole situation, and going forward we introduce a payment of deposit with the order. If we don't pay the first instalment or pay before the service, then we don't feel involved in the process. Whereas, after we pay the first instalment we feel as a partner in the process towards the common goal. Also, a clear understanding of what each element costs and why. We get this question quite often. Why does this silk peignoir costs 1000 euros?M: How do you explain this value in practice? Do you explain during the meeting, is it explained on video or at the website? In your experience, what is the best way to convey the value of this end-product or piece of art?I: To date, a detailed video story has worked the best, where you see the beginning, the fabric being sewn by people and then the product, which is now on the catwalk at a fashion show. Then an unwritten rule is to have a sample, namely, the bicycle has been invented and you need to see what are the people, who already have reached the destination of our path, doing now.M: Okay, in every aspect of your operation?I: Yes, name it, in every aspect there's a sample, because when you see it visually, you understand what resonates with you and what is it you would like to change to convey the message to your clients. The sample has allowed me to save a lot of money and time. I've learned it over time in cases of failure, and by analysing them I realise that from now on we shall implement a sample. Failures are the ones that help you take bigger steps toward your goal; they help you save money and time in the future.M: How do you find the balance between being present with your team, doing all these things that you mentioned, and stepping away from all that quite a lot, letting the team work remotely or independently?I: I'm present as much as I can, I trust my colleagues and that's the only way I want to work. I pay a lot of attention to having the strongest, sharpest, most powerful and efficient colleagues on the team.M: How does it work in practice with there being multiple locations? Are you some days in one place and some days in other? Or do you all meet up or have a conference call or you work individually? How does that happen in reality?I: I spend a certain time in each place, but I do spend more time where the toughest stage is being tackled. For example, during the creation of Level Up, I spent more time at Level Up.M: How did you realise that during the Covid pandemic you could create a new business branch, which is Amoralle Level Up and has no direct relation to clothing, but is more like a community for women who relate to this brand, but you offer completely different products, namely, online masterclasses, digital products, various events on your premises?I: In this field of information and specialists, to be able to select the best, the most powerful ones and to transfer this knowledge to your clients, to be together with them and together realise how we as a brand can help them. And we can help, because we are the ones who created this femininity brand cult in Latvia. If you had to name a Latvian femininity brand, you would definitely mention Amoralle. That's what we created, this story of lace, the victory walks of lace. We have been the pioneers. It makes us responsible to these women to give them what they need today. And one day, if I as the director or we as the brand feel that they need a new direction, I will follow it.M: What you did in respect of Ukraine, when you momentarily, in a few days' time created a new centre, where you could bring the necessary things and supplies to help, it was not just an Instagram post of support, but a practical platform, which allowed the people who relate to your brand to get involved and help out.I: This story has more to it. When the war in Ukraine began, when Russia invaded Ukraine, we were having the pre-launch campaign for our new collection, we had planned to start selling the new collection. We had invested money in the collection and the marketing campaign, ads etc. At that moment it was clear to us that our women, the ones who love the brand Amoralle – none of them would want such dress, nobody would want to see it. That's not possible. We stopped everything instantly, and together with them we dived into helping as one big team.M: Once my friend told me that he had went into this shop on Brivibas Street called SockBox to buy socks for his girlfriend and that's the first time I heard of it. Later you became what you are now. How did it even begin? How did you get the idea to create something like this?I: I created the shop after my son had just been born, it was opened when he turned 9 months old. I basically created it at home with the computer, while feeding the baby. The initial idea was to offer socks from various manufacturers to women and men. Less than a year later I was working at the shop daily. I was the cleaner, the accountant, the director, I was everything. While working there every day, I realised that no one is producing the things that women would like to buy. I even went to China to see if somebody there produces what I think they would want to buy. Then my mom mentioned that we could sew it ourselves. She knows how to sew, but she had just joined sewing courses to improve her skills. I said “okay” and so we bought a sewing machine and hired Natālija who still works with us.M: The rebranding stage when SockBox became Amoralle. Why did that happen and how do you feel about that now?I: I wanted to create a fashion sock brand. In order to have a fashion sock brand you have to participate in a fashion show. When I got the permission to join a fashion show, only then I realised that you can't send a naked model with only socks on. That's how the first bodies were created. To create a “wow” moment for the final look, we made a flowy cape. That's how we started producing silk peignoirs. I can clearly remember the first client who bought a silk peignoir for 700 euros in the small SockBox shop. I almost fainted from happiness. That inspired me more and more. It still was called SockBox, we made silk peignoirs, sold them. We were contacted by a gentleman of Arab descent, who wanted us to open a shop in the Middle East. And we needed a name. At that time, we were already selling in the Middle East, and my clients were saying that it's pretty hard to make a connection between the name SockBox and silk peignoirs with this branding. When thinking about export, I realised that it's a problem and that we need a rebranding, and I made this decision, since the brand was still small enough to make a quick rebranding without much hassle.M: Does this name resonate with people in Saudi Arabia? People there are even more traditional than here.I: People are very traditional, you can't show any photo with a body. You can only show the clothes with no body. There are certain market conditions. But the risqué, sensual clothing itself, they like it very much. It's not much spoken about, and it must be marketed in other visual ways.M: There can be no photos of people?I: No, you can't show such clothing on people in Saudi Arabia. When a woman goes shopping in this kind of shop, there have to be at least two shop-assistants present in the room; you can't be alone. The woman doesn't speak, she indicates with her eyes what she has chosen, and she never pays for it. She makes a choice and then her husband, brother or father comes in to pay.M: In one of our conversations you mentioned that the brand essence is “beautiful at home”.I: Yes.M: I really liked what you said. It provided even more clarity about what this brand is and who it's meant for, as well as the situation and context this product is to be used in.I: The sense of self, relationship with yourself begins at home. It mostly happens when no one is around, during your “me time”. The dialogue with yourself. Clothing is a source of inspiration for me. I put on beautiful loungewear when no one is around and that's when magic happens. That's the beginning in my experience. In the shop, also in exhibitions in Paris or New York, I often hear “I don't have a home that's adequate for wearing this kind of clothing”. I think it's an open discussion. What comes first? Beautiful clothes and then a beautiful home? Or a beautiful home first and then beautiful clothing? I will tell you how it happened. We have these silk slips. They're like dresses and look amazing when combined with your beloved one's suit jacket. I once went out like that, and he said “You wore that at home. Isn't it a nightdress?”. I replied “Yes, but it's very comfortable and looks really great”. It also makes you feel a bit mysterious. You feel very free, you do what makes you comfortable. That's a brand value. Value of a women's brand. We only have female employees, by the way. And I want them to do things only in a way that's comfortable for them. When a woman is inspired, everything happens swiftly. You must have noticed it in your wife too. She sometimes ticks off every task swiftly and easily. But sometimes things are dragging.M: Yeah.I: If we talk about the Amoralle story of 14 years, I vividly remember one turning point. I was traveling back from exhibition in New York. We did very well and I was thinking about what to do next. There's this book “The ONE Thing”. It talks about how important it is in business and in life to choose one thing and focus on it. Then your day will consist of anything that moves you closer to this one thing. There's this whole method for finding this one thing. I tried to apply it to Amoralle, and I realised that we were thinking about wholesale trade at that time, we were thinking about the development of local market, also we were considering expansion of production. We were spending our time focusing on various things. After I completed all of the tasks, I concluded that there is one essential thing, which still remains my one thing, which I do in order to expand the brand. And that's online. It's very essential, valuable and necessary for any business to understand internally that the tomorrow is only online. In the online realm you converse with your client in a completely different way. If you want to develop your business online, you have to think completely differently.M: Just like with the brand essence you mentioned, “beautiful at home”. It's one essence that is difficult to catch, but when you find it, it helps arrange everything else around it. The same goes for online. You're doing specific physical things, which is your shop in Riga, but it has to serve for this one thing.I: Nowadays physical shopping is on the downturn, but it still is necessary. We want this experience of being present, we want to feel the authenticity. But I believe that the whole tomorrow will be online. And being online, letters play an enormous role. The proportion. You see the message differently, if the letter is too large or too small, or written differently.M: That's the digital interior design.

Guest:Mark W. YuskoChief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer, Morgan Creek Capital Management & Managing Partner, Morgan Creek Digital AssetsMark Yusko is the Founder, CEO and Chief Investment Officer of Morgan Creek Capital Management. He is also the Managing Partner of Morgan Creek Digital Assets. Morgan Creek Capital Management was founded in 2004 and currently manages close to $2 billion in discretionary and non-discretionary assets. Prior to founding Morgan Creek, Mr. Yusko was CIO and Founder of UNC Management Company (UNCMC), the Endowment investment office for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Before that, he was Senior Investment Director for the University of Notre Dame Investment Office.Mr. Yusko has been at the forefront of institutional investing throughout his career. An early investor in alternative asset classes at Notre Dame, he brought the EndowmentModel of investing to UNC, which contributed to significant performance gains for theEndowment. The Endowment Model is the cornerstone philosophy of Morgan Creek, as is the mandate to Invest in Innovation. Mr. Yusko is again at the forefront of investing through Morgan Creek Digital Assets, which was formed in 2018. Morgan Creek Digital is an early stage investor in blockchain technology, digital currency and digital assets through the firm's Venture Capital and Digital Asset Index Fund.Mr. Yusko received a BA with Honors from the University of Notre Dame and an MBA in Accounting and Finance from the University of Chicago.Hosted By:Austin WillsonMichael O'ConnorBZ: welcome back to another episode of the long-run show. This is your host, Austin Willson, along with Mike OConnor. And today we are going to be having another guest on our show. We have Mark Yusko from Morgan Creek Capital. He's actually the founder and CIO of Morgan Creek capital and the chief managing partner of Morgan Creek digital.Hopefully I got that right, Mark. And we're going to be good. We're going to be talking about we're gonna be talking about a lot of different things today. Spanning many different aspects. Obviously, mark, you have a lot of experience investing money and allocating capital and also a lot of experience just with thinking about large long run issues which is the name of the show.M: One of the things that I really don't like is everything is focused on short term and social media. And that just the explosion of content has made it even shorter and shorter. And really, if you think about investing, the art of investing, it really is about the longterm. And it's nice. You're nice to say I have a lot of experience. That's just a very nice way of saying I'm old and I am and that's actually a good thing because it means you survived all the mistakes that you made when you were young. But importantly it goes to. My whole career has been around. Long-term thinking, I a series of happy accidents. I didn't plan to be an investment guy. I planned to be an architect. And then I tried pre-med and none of those things really fit. But I went to work for an insurance company out of business school and the guy who was doing investments retired. And so I was now the investment guy. And what I found is it was the perfect thing for me as a science guy. And science is all about format hypothesis, forming experiment, gathering data, testing the hypothesis, and then deciding if it's right or wrong. And that's exactly what you do in investing, right? You come up with this form an experiment.You, you make exposure and then you test it. You gather the data and the market tells you whether you're right or wrong. And part of the. my aha moment over my career was that time arbitrage. So long run thinking, right? The title of your show is the ultimate win in investing. If you have a long time preference, if you have the ability to think longer term than the average investor, you will make more money. And that's kinda cool. And you don't have to be right as often either. That's the nice thing is you don't have to always be right or prove that you're right. Which is very dangerous and investing. Yeah. So quick. Went to school. I said to be an architect or a doctor then went to business.School, came out, went into investing. And my next happy accident was I went back to my Alma Mater. I went back to Notre Dame and I got into endowment management. And what I realized was I thought investing when I worked for the bond management part of the insurance company and then an equity firm. Was that It was just about picking stocks and bonds. That's what investing does. That's what the TV tells you. You should pick stocks IBM or GM or Ford. And what I realized is those were 15% of the longterm returns. 85% of returns comes from asset allocation. The big picture allocation of capital across stocks, bonds, currencies, commodities within stocks. Do I go international? Do I go domestic? Do I go technology? Do I go healthcare? And those big asset allocation decisions drove everything. So the endowment model of investing, which I learned at Notre Dame brought with me down here to university of North Carolina at chapel hill. Whereas the CIO there, that's what I learned. And all that endowment model means is you have a long time horizon. It's permanent capital. Therefore you have this ability to take advantage of time arbitrage. The second thing is you have to have an equity bias, because if you want to have a long term positive return, you need to outperform inflation and bonds just don't do that by very much. So you have to have an equity orientation, but equity doesn't mean stocks. You mean stocks? It means private equity. It means venture capital. It means commodity equity. There's all kinds of equities. And then the next stage was I left the university back actually now a long time ago, back in 2004, and I formed Morgan Creek Capital and more capital is just about bringing the endowment model to other investors, taking this idea of alternative, thinking about investments to the masses. Now everyone says what do you mean alternative thinking? I'm like I don't like the term alternative investments. People talk about it all the time. Hedge funds or private equity or venture capital. Those are alternative investments. alternative to what? you own stocks, you own bonds, you own currencies and you own commodities. How I own them in a mutual fund, in a hedge fund, in a private partnership, doesn't change the nature that I own. Stocks, bonds, and currencies and commodities. And the problem is whoever thought of the term alternatives, who was not a marketing guy or gal, they were not very smart. People don't like alternative stuff, alternative medicine, alternative music.They don't like alternative stuff. They're afraid of it. . And so what did he do? Tape put 5% in alternatives and 95% in tradition. That doesn't make any sense because if the traditional stuff isn't attractive, why would you want to own it? So fast forward Morgan Creek over the years has migrated from, this alternative thinking about investments to my big aha moment, which was investing in infrastructure around technological innovations. And it's a wave of about 14 year cycle is where the big wealth is created. on Twitter it's my pin tweet. The greatest wealth is created by investing in something that you believe in before others even understand. you will be mocked, you'll be ridiculed and it's worth it. And so back four years ago, we set up Morgan Creek digital subsidiary of Morgan Creek capital to focus on long-term investing in the digital asset ecosystem and having a blast. had more fun than I've ever had my career. And I love every stage of my career. But I'm having way more fun. Now I get to hang out with young smart people. I get to focus on this innovative technology. That's changing the world anyway.BZ: I love the term time arbitrage. That is just such a great term. And I find it so interesting because like you mentioned, using the that's so interesting, the endowment model, because that seems so foreign to wall street of the last couple of decades, or, having this model that you're actually considering long-term implications. You're not just looking for the next big short or something like that. What's been the reception from others in the field of that. Cause it seems like so much common sense to be able to look at the long-term, but it's pretty uncommon. What's been the reception ?M: We actually created a vehicle a number of years ago called the endowment fund and it took off, it was the most successful launch of a product in Merrill Lynch's history and everybody piled in and then something happened, gold financial crisis happened. We actually did well relatively well. We didn't do well. Absolutely. But we did less badly than everybody else. And, in investing the most important thing, right? There's three rules to investing rule. Number one, don't lose money rule number two, don't lose money rule number three, don't forget the first two rules and Roy Neuberger coined that phrase.And it's because of math. If I'm down 10, I got to be up 11. If I'm down 20, I gotta be up 25. I'm down 50. I gotta be up 100 to get even, God forbid you're like Russian market. I'm down 95 when it gets back to even which it will. Cause this has happened before. You'll be up 20 fold buying Russian equities. Great idea for the long-term not for the next week or the next month, but if you can buy spare bank at this price, you make 20 times your money, probably over a long-term period because you're down 95%. But that idea of avoiding the downside is what the endowment model is all about. And what happened though is after the gold financial crisis, the FED and other central banks around the world started pumping liquidity into the market. And that changed things. And what it did is it created this illusion that stocks, the S&P or going up every year. And so over the last 13 years has been pretty much a bull market in nominal terms, not in real terms, but in nominal terms. And maybe people not want to be value oriented. They want to be momentum players. They didn't want to take the long-term. They didn't want to make an investment today in a company that might take 10 years to harvest an S&P is up 15% every year. I'll just do that. So the endowment model kind of faded and can got out of favor and, necessity is the mother of invention that led us to say, all right, if nobody wants to think like long-term investors, then we'll find products that are, and the problem there was, we had an asset liability mismatch. We let people come out of the fund on any quarter, but we were making investments for long-term periods of time. And that doesn't work very well. It's like a bank. I give everybody, went to the bank to take their money. That's a problem. Cause there's not enough money for all the. Because they took $1 and lent it out 11 times and made lots of dollars. And there's nothing wrong with that. Fractional reserve banking is not in itself evil. It just, it operates on faith and custom where everybody doesn't run to the bank at the same time. And the same thing is true in long-term investments. If everybody wants their liquidity, they can't get it. So now we raise vehicles with longer-term lockups so we can focus on making those long-term investments.BZ: Interesting. Very interesting. So this kind of shifts and long-term cycle, or I guess midterm cycle, you were saying the 14 year investing in something that you're very convicted about, how did that fit into the endowment model or was that a kind of the next iteration for you?M: So it definitely fits into this endowment model of investing. But it was a discovery by being at the endowment actually. So I go back now and it's easy to tell the story because I grew up on the west coast. I grew up in Seattle and my dad sold and installed mainframe computers in hospitals. That's what he did cause they didn't have computers. And so if you go back to 1954, there was this innovation out in Boston, outside of route 128 around computing and suddenly companies could have computers. And 14 years later, there's an innovation out in Silicon valley on a microchip is suddenly computers can be smaller and companies like Intel and Cisco were formed and they did pretty well. Right then in 1982, 14 years later. And why it's always 14 years. I don't know exactly, but it's really because young people invent all the new stuff, because they don't know not to. And they don't know what they don't know. And so they just go ahead and do it. Marc Andreessen, 19 years old, he invented the browser. Larry and Sergei invented this company, Google, which I'll talk about in a second in their twenties. And so it's that young generation that gets innovation going. Cause the old guys are like, I'm fine. My flip phone is fine. I don't need a smart phone. And it's true. Confirmed myself that as I get older, but the key was I grew up in Seattle, many of my friends, they don't work anymore.They went to work for this little company called Microsoft. I was too stupid to do that. Now I defend myself saying if you've seen the picture of the original Microsoft 11, you wouldn't blame. Now there are multibillionaires. I'm not, I shouldn't make fun of them, but they looked pretty funny. We all looked bad in the seventies. Clothes were bad. Hair was bad. But look at the picture tonight, Google the original Microsoft 11, you go, oh my God, I wouldn't work for those guys either. So Steve bomber's mom said, honey, why would you work for that company? No one would ever want a computer in their house. He has 18 billion reasons. He was right. Mom was wrong. So 14 years later, I'm at my Alma Mater. I'm at Notre Dame and I'm working in the endowment office and we had the chance to make this investment in a company called Sequoia at the time. No one, not no one, but very few people knew who Sequoia was. It was not a famous venture capital fund. In fact, it was on the verge of failure because Don Valentine, the famous founder had hired this guy Michael Moritz, Michael was a wall street journal reporter. He had never done a deal before. The other partners like Don, what the hell? We're the future? Why are you hiring this kid? It turns out Michael turned out to be a pretty good investor, Yahoo, Google a few other things and maybe one of the greatest venture capitalists of all time, but we gave them 5 million bucks. They put half a million dollars in Google. And I actually remember. I remember saying guys, I don't get it. They're 20 search engines. There is web crawler and AltaVista and ask Jeeves, what do you need Google for? It's a stupid name. Now it's a verb, right? We totally reinvented search because Larry and Sergei young guys figured out that the way to do search is not to search the whole internet. There are 1.7 billion websites in the world. Half of them are owned by Google. What are you talking about, Mark? Think about it. When you start typing a question. They've set up a website for every question that has ever been asked. And as soon as you start asking the question, it directs you to a little tiny slice and they've already put all the information that you need to know. And sometimes maybe there's some bias, but that's how they do search and it revolutionized everything. And so we put in 500 K and we took out 200 million. So I now had this aha moment. This is a long story for an epiphany, but I had this epiphany that investing was about long-term investments in infrastructure companies around this cycle. And so 14 years later the mobile phone comes along and apple releases the smartphone The iPhone, their stock goes down 46. Think about this for a second. this iPhone and the stock goes down because people are never going to pay $500 for a phone.My flip phone is just fine. My Razor's awesome. Apple's now the biggest, most valuable company in the world. And I remember being back in Seattle at Craig macaws house, he was having an event for venture capital people. And Craig is a very famous pioneer in cellular telephony, the original flip phones. And I'm asked, as I asked his family office, guy said, do you think the mobile net will be as big as the internet? He's mark, you can me ask me if they want a computer? Yeah, whatever, ask them if they want a phone. Like I already have two, I don't need another one. So yeah, it's going to be a big deal. And what it did is it created the first network. 1 phone not valuable at all.2 phones, a little more valuable, 2 million phones, pretty valuable, 2 billion phones, really valuable. And the network effect is exponential and the people are bad at math. People suck at math, but that's just linear math. If I say what's two times two, both of you will say four. I say, all right guys, what's 17 times 23. I'll wait. That is the limit of human intelligence. The average person can not do 17 times 23 in their head. And so how are you at nonlinear? Exponential regression? Not very good. And so I do this challenge all the time. I say, take out a piece of paper, fold it in half, pull it in half again. I defy you to fold it seven times and it was a bag full of seven times. No problem. And they're like, whoa, okay. I can't fold it seven times. If you could fold it 20 times. It would be as high as your house. If you could fold it 30 times, it'd be the atmosphere. If you could get to 50, it'd be to the sun. And 100 is the known universe. So exponential growth is a really big deal. And so the network effect created these massive opportunities and the light bulb went off for me, just get in front of those waves. So buy things and you know how to find them, whatever the old people like me now say, will rot your brain or is a fad..anytime those two terms, come out, just buy it, tuck it in a drawer and go away.BZ: I love that guy that was going to be, yeah, that was going to be my follow-up ETF. And the 14 year pattern Have you seen that be very consistent? M: It's incredibly consistent and okay. What's amazing. So you went 1954 was the mainframe and they had four years, 1954 to 1958. We could make a fortune in deck and Wang and it's winching. Then you have a crash. Then 14 years later, 1968-1972 Intel Fairchild, et cetera. Then you have a crash then 1982 to 1986. Everything's great. Microsoft. Wintel. They have a crash then in 2010? No. Then in 1999, then in 1996, around the internet, 1996 to 2000, everything's awesome. Yahoo, eBay et cetera, Google, then you have a crash 2010 to 2014 to 2015. You have a little crash wasn't as big as the other crash, but there was a crash right now in 2024, which is the beginning of the blockchain era or the trust net as I call it. So the internet 1996, the mobile net 2010 and the trust net 2024. It's when everything in the world, everything in the world, everything of value, every stock, every bond, every currency, every commodity, every private piece of real estate, every piece of art, every collectible car, every private business, all $700 trillion of assets in the world will be tokenized. What does that mean? All a token is an entry on a block. It's an entry on a public ledger. That's all it is. It's not super crazy and exciting. It's really pretty simple, but it's code and we can trust code differently than we can trust people. And if you think about this, every technological evolution goes to making that trust in code better. When the internet first came out, people are like, I don't know what this thing isn't. It doesn't really work very well. And Netflix started a company and they're like, all right, we're going to use it. We're going to have video on demand. If demand is defined as four days, it took four days to download a movie. No one's going to wait four days to download a movie. So they almost went bankrupt and it wasn't until bandwidth was increased because South Korea innovated around broadband and suddenly you could deliver it in less than four days as a Netflix done pretty well. Pets.com. I'm going to deliver, pet food over the internet.Failed. It's the poster child of the failure of the internet, chewy.com. It's the same damn company, exactly the same, but we needed GPS tracking. We needed instantaneous access to information, to broadband. So it's these inflection points in technology and why they're 14 years. Again, it doesn't really matter, but it is very consistent. And so 2024, as great as it's been in blockchain and Bitcoin and all this other stuff, it hasn't even started. The players have entered the stadium, they're warming up. We haven't even played the National Anthem. And I was like, oh, it's the third ending? The eighth inning game. the game hasnt started.BZ:I think that's a phenomenal point because it's amazing how much we're already talking about Bitcoin and blockchain and web3. And it's The current figures are maybe 5% of the world has cryptocurrency. Like global adoption is still so early that it just seems like it's the next huge network effectM:If you overlay Mike, to that point, if you overlay the internet adoption and web three adoption or blockchain adoption, we're in 1997. Around the time when we invested in Google. And E-bay, I remember taking E-bay to our board at Notre Dame and they're like, let me get this straight. You want us to put money in a garage sale? Really? No. Think about this. So they were against it. The firm benchmark capital, some of the best investors on the planet they put in, they raised an $85 million fund, $85 million, not a lot of money. And they put a bunch of money into eBay, not all of it, but a decent amount. They took out $10 billion. The whole fund was a 96 X the whole fund. So she put it in a dollar, you got $96 back and on a garage sale company because people didn't get it or look at the market cap of PayPal today. And how many of the PayPal mafia are out there doing amazing things. humans are optimistic, right? If you weren't optimistic, you'd literally sit in your house in sheer shuttering because you wouldn't go outside. Cause you could get shot. He get eaten by a bear, all kinds of bad things could happen, but we're optimistic. And so we go on it's I always say, who was the third guy who went out to try to get a Mastodon with a spear? Cause the first two didn't come back. So who was the third guy who figured out, if he hit him right under the chin, you can kill the Mastodon. He was a hero, but, or who was the first person that tried surgery on without anesthetic before we figured that out. So we're optimistic and we try new stuff and that's good. And we have progress, but we're unable to imagine the unimaginable, right? We can't imagine. Right now we are talking to each other. We're actually, we're not talking to it. We're talking to a metal box, right? A metal and glass box. And it's coming in my glass metal and glass box into the airwaves, into a cell tower down through fiber optic cable out another cell tower into the airwaves, into your metal glass box and into your earphones in real time. Are you kidding me? I could imagine that 20 years ago, 30 years ago, no one. So it's really hard to invest for that long cycle opportunity set because you can't imagine. So who could imagine that money as we know it, which isn't money it's currency, the only money is gold because money is something exist in the absence of a liability dollars are not money they are currencies. But who could imagine that all of money will eventually be entries on a book? Not very many people. Yeah. It's amazing to me. And you spoke to this. The thing that we are the worst status imagining unimaginable, right? Cause we have a word for it that, that just goes to show you how big a bias it is.BZ: We have a word for it. It's unimaginable. And so I think the bias is to go, okay I can't do that. Or I guess the thought process is, I have this bias. I can't really know what's next because I can't see it. So therefore, I'm going to tighten my time horizon. I'm going to look for the short play I'm going to, and nothing against day-trading.I've seen it to be profitable, but I'm going to look for this short, interim intraday play or a week play or month play. At the expense of a longer term play, that may be an investment that may pay off 96X like, like the eBay story. And so it's a great, it's interesting that biting, there's nothing wrong with trading.M:There's nothing inherently bad about trading. It's hard. It's work and it goes to income and passive income and investing, we all work hard, right? We're doing what we do. We either create content or we manage somebody's assets or we make widgets, we all have this work that we do, but you think about it, the return on that, that work pales in comparison that if you can have something, take up a piece of real estate that you own, that someone else pays you rent and you make money while you're sleeping, it's actually a pretty cool or a Royalty. Think about Qualcomm that every time somebody builds an Android phone, they get paid. That's cool. And so they monetize their intellectual property and then you get into investing. Sure. If I can figure out if CEO, Adam tomorrow is going to wake up and do another great deal, like buying a gold mine, maybe I can get out ahead of AMC and it'll go up and I'll make some money, but what if he wakes up and he makes a bad investment, actually gold mines are usually are bad investments, but maybe this will be a good one, but what if it makes a bad investment? And it goes the other way. That's that? I don't have control of any of that, but if I can Intuit that, let's see. All right. Blockchain technology is really just an operating system for this injured, connected everything. Okay. That's interesting. So what makes money. When goods get traded marketplaces exchanges.So what if I just own a little piece of one of the exchanges like Coinbase, it doesn't matter if the price goes up, price goes down, people got to trade it. They take a cut. That sounds pretty good. If you look exchanges or there's the NASDAQ exchange with London stock exchange or the Brazilian , all of those have been great investments over the long term. Even the LME before they killed themselves the other day, by letting the Chinese billionaire say, "oh, I'm sorry. I know I lost money, but I'm not going to let you take it from me." And they screwed everybody else. Just mind numbing, how to destroy the capital of a business and one easy lesson, but there's time arbitrage. Right? There's short-term thinking I got this angry Chinese billionaire, right? Who's given us a lot of commissions saying he's not going to honor his margin call and I'll just cancel all the trades. That sounds good. Oh, shit. I just killed the golden goose because now no one will ever trust my exchange again, ever. Let's go to a different exchange. That's negative time arbitrage.BZ: So the way to, and I guess I, wasn't trying to position, day trading versus long-term investing because you're exactly right. They are very different. I guess my question that I was building to is with that bias in mind.How do we look at all of the trends that are out there, right? Because we could make an argument for metaverse right. that is the next 14 year cycle. Not withstanding there's crossover between the two, obviously, not withstanding that crossover. Okay. This is what I'm going to do. Or quantum computing, this is going to be the next large leap in computing technology. We're going to be able to calculate things we've never been able to before. So how do we think through these things that we might be seeing as trends or fads? And I like your rule earlier. Okay. "If some old fart says, oh, this is just a fad buddy, look into it." But how do we think through that? I tend to be more cynical. So I'm thinking, all right, great. We have all these trends. But how do we imagine the unimaginable? Sounds like a riddleM: it's the question that all of us should be spending at least a little time on, in fact, one of the best things to become a better investor is to spend some time every day or at least every few days just away. Not staring at your screen, take a hike, take a walk, meditate, whatever it is, and actually just think and try to cobble together these ideas because you're a hundred percent right. But the metaverse oh it's just Facebook. No, come on. Just think about that one for just one second. The metaverse is the decentralization of technology and the eraser of nation states and industrial conglomerates. That's clearly what the decentralized world is. So the idea of a centralized organization being the metaverse, it's an oxymoron it's jumbo shrimp, or military intelligence or whatever, and it just doesn't work. but the metaverse is big. Okay. So most, so maybe the metaverse is this next trend? And my 14 year cycle is all about computing power mainframes, microcomputers personal computers, internet mobile net trust net. And to your point, maybe the next is quantum net actually like that. I'm going to think about that a lot. Im going skiing next week with my son. So there are other cycles could be coincidence with the same 14 year cycle, or maybe they could be offset maybe within the 14 year cycle. There's a seven year offset for these other secondary or second order effects. Yeah, the metaverse is clearly something that, that is created out of this innovation around computing power. And so we do have to think, okay what does that mean? Does it mean I should invest in these centralized organizations that are renaming themselves? It's like when we were in long island ice tea named themselves long island blockchain stock went crazy for awhile, but what do you do? You don't do anything in blockchain. you make tea, but it's a great meme play, right? But they did it in 2000 and last bubble. I lived it and I, we invested in a company, true story called art technology group and what they did all this company. Did they help companies change their name to die? Because if you change your name to.com price went up. So these guys actually then listed as a public company. They were consulting company, long story short. We'd put some money in, through a firm called tutor ventures up in Boston. And our cost basis was 50 cents. The stock went public at a hundred dollars. Okay. So maybe 200 times our money. And I called the principal and I said, what should we do? He says, I'm an insider. I can't really talk. But I can tell you two things, revenue is 6 million market cap is 6 billion. And there was a silence. He's mark, did you hear me, Mike? Yeah. I heard you ı was like SELL, GET RID OF IT NOW! Here's the crazy part. It went to four. So it went down 96%. And I think about that at four, it was still an eight. Off our call list, but we sold at a hundred made 200 X. But the thing is that company didn't do anything. And these, so the third part of the question is, so you've got the main wave then how do you have then do you have these other opportunity waves, but then you got the scams that come into it that you want to avoid. So there's lots of crosscurrents and how you try to think about these big themes. But then the other thing is if you spend too much time thinking about it and not enough time acting on it, right yet, paralysis by analysis, you miss all the opportunities. And this is, to me, one of the things that's most, most important about investing is winning investors.Great investors lose more often than bad investors. They do win a lot, but they lose a lot. The reason losers, bad investors don't win or lose. They don't do anything. They're so afraid of losing that. They don't actually commit capital. So to your point, rather than try to figure out, do I, can I figure out which is the one I like to put bets and there are bets in a lot of different places. And then when things start to go double up, most people want to double down, right? When things go against them, they want to put more money in to prove that they're right in the market's wrong. The market is never wrong. The market is always right. You are wrong. And when we make mistakes, it's okay. As long as you Ralph. Okay. And we need to talk about this. Cause cause from Dean Smith and it's March madness and Tarell's play tonight, so recognize them. Not that hard. It's usually right in your face. Here's the hard part. Admit it. Yes. I made a mistake. there was a show on TV a hundred years ago called happy days. And there was this guy, Arthur Fonds rally, the cool guy. He said, Hey, and he couldn't say the word wrong. He couldn't say the word wrong. You got to say, you're wrong. Then you got to learn from it. Most important thing. And thinking investing is with every investment we get richer or wiser. Never both. We either learn something or we make money because when we're right, we don't actually analyze. We just say, oh, look how smart we are. Whoa, of course it was so good when you lose money and then you've got to forget it. And the forgetting is really important. And this goes to the other great coach who is still in the tournament as well. University of duke at Durham down the street, coach K has this great line. He says, you know what? Separates great. Players slash investors from the average? No, he says the greats focus on the next play. Watch the tournament game tonight and see how many times did you, so miss a shot go down and commit to a stupid foul. Cause they're thinking about the shot, a great player, doesn't even remember taking the shot, goes back, plays good, different defense steals A ball makes a layup.Bad investors they're constantly focused on, oh man, I'm a mistake. And I just can't believe it. It. Got to learn from it, but you got to erase it, forget it and go get the next up.BZ: Individual plays versus ETFs?M: You guys probably both play Fortnite. I watched my son play Fortnite. Does he take a shotgun or a sniper rifle? He takes both. Cause a shot is really good in some situations and the sniper is really good at another. So yes, the answer is yes. You definitely want a spray and pray and the whole spray and pray.I prefer spray and then water, the seeds that start growing. Okay. That's better to me and I pray a lot too, but hope is not an investment strategy. Hope is a four-letter word, particularly in investing, but the sniper rifle a hundred percent. And here's the thing. If you're willing to do the work, the sniper rifles really awesome, because if you actually will do the work that most people won't, then you get a better shot. And if you take that better shot, you can make a lot more concentrated portfolios, make you rich. Every great fortune in the world came from constant. Concentrated stock position, concentrated real estate position, contrary to business ownership, every fortune start with concentration. Now the joke is how do you create a small fortune start with a large fortune and stay concentrated, concentrated long enough competitors will come up and chip away and take all your wealth. So diversification keeps you rich. So if you are in the business of making money, which when we're young, we should be and ice. And I'm really good at talking because I sucked when I was young. I didn't do any of this stuff. I talk about. In fact, I sent a pre out to myself the other day, maybe a year ago, advice to my younger self, all the things that I did wrong, that I want people not to do wrong. And the key somebody asked me, how do you become a better investor in. Like all the time, a lot, like all the time and do the shotgun and do the sniper. And, but when it goes against you just move on, just sell and move on. And when things start going, don't pull your weeds. Don't pull your flowers, right? Peter Lynch has this great line. He says, investing is super simple. You pull your weeds and you water your flowers. But he says, the average investor does the opposite. They pull their flowers. Cause they're so afraid to loosen and they water their weeds because they want to prove they're right. Soros is not whether you're right or wrong. That has nothing to do with anything. It's how much money you make when you're winning, how much money you lose when you're wrong. And if you can constantly minimize your loss. First loss of the best loss and let your winners run and then do that work so that you think about a sniper. You guys have seen the movie sniper? .Does he just like randomly pull the thing out of his bag and then start shooting? No, he plans. He sets the stage. He gets where no one can see him. He's got the stuff, the cammo on. He lines up the shot, he waits and he makes the kill. So it's not like that's planning. And so if you do the work you set the stage, you do the plan, you get the cammo, you get the right rifle. You get the right ammunition. Yeah. You'll make some, you make some great investments. But that does mean an ETF is bad. Now the problem, the only thing on ETS, just make sure they actually do what they say they're gonna do in what you name the ETF. So you could have value ETFs that are filled with 30 times revenue. These is crap companies. Yeah. It's not value now, but the new value when it goes down 95%. But, and again, this personal experience. So when I, my first job, I had a 401k and, we had six options and one of them was the blue chip growth fund. And I had a thesis that the world was going to get lousy. This is back in 1991, 1992. Oh, we're going to have recession. I'm like, I'm going to put my money in the high quality blue chips. So I moved all my money there and we had the recession just like we thought, and this thing went down 40%. What the fuck? Probably shouldn't say that, but what the hell? And I go on, I look and it says in the footnotes though, "the blue chips of tomorrow" What the hell? This is my fault. I didn't read. I gotta pull that prospectus.BZ: It's interesting. I want to go back to what you said earlier, And I agree with everything you said, and I think it's actually one of, one of the episodes we recorded about two months ago. At this point we talked about just thinking about. How you invest in approach money and what are your biases and knowing yourself. And so for me, I know that I am very bad at acting quickly.I take, and I do the analysis paralysis. For me at certain points and this is one of them right now. I don't have the time to go and research and then implement and act quickly. Cause I know I won't. So I'm just going to buy a bow broad basket for now and hold it. And then like you said, in your answer, there's different ways to double down and concentrate, right? Whether that's your skills, whether that's, I'll say starting a business, right? So there are different ways to think about investing, especially as an individual. And so I, I'm interested to hear what you would say about the asset allocation portion that you said earlier, that's almost more important than picking the winners and losers because it seems like you can build a great portfolio that has a phenomenal asset allocation out of individual stocks, right? And individual positions. You can also do it with ETFs and it might be easier for the individual to do that. Factor in a lot of things. You've got to do your research on those ETFs. You can't be buying on the name of the tick thing, but it's that's the answer more than one or the other, right?M: Yup. No, you're a hundred percent right. Austin and the ETFs are an amazing tool because they give you big swaths of the canvas. So if you think of a canvas and it's got all the different colors all over and, international and emerging markets and developed markets and equities and fixed income and commodities and currencies and derivatives and leverage and all the things that you need to build a diversified portfolio. Using individual securities, you can do it. It's hard, like super hard because you got to decide, okay, I want autos, but do I want European autos or Japanese autos? Or, what about this Tesla thing? Is that really a car company? Oh, I thought it was a software company. It's a car. It sits out, it collects dust, just like every other car. And, oh, by the way, you're only in your car 3% to 4% of the time. Think about that. You're inside your car 3% to 4%. So I would say don't spend a lot of money on cars unless you're like really into cars. But the interesting thing about all of this is how you build that portfolio is important. So if you think about the four steps of investment asset allocation, manage your selection, portfolio construction and security selection. So the 85% is in those first three, that is the allocation piece. And then the security selection piece is the 15%. So it really doesn't matter over the term, whether you own Ford or GM, it actually doesn't. In short periods of time, it can matter a lot for sure. But over long periods of time, it's less important than knowing should I be in automobiles or should I be in flying cars or should I be in, whatever. So the big picture asset allocation, should I be in stocks or bonds? Credit or equity, should I be in currencies or commodities? Should I be long biased or should I be long short? Should I be fully hedged? Should I be in cash? Should I be in, in emerging markets or international? Where's the growth, all of those big pictures. It's those asset allocation decisions are really important. So that's where I always start. And I try to come up with five big themes 10-year trends that I think are going to drive investment and growth. And one of mine is the middle classification of the emerging markets, right? There's about 3.5 B that live at middle-class or below around the world. Most of them in Southeast Asia and. Most of them are going to move up. And it's just math got to move up. Now, China alone, China took 750 million people out of abject poverty and put them in the middle-class over the last 30 years. I don't know. Maybe those people that want to move up. They've seen Dallas. They want that life. So there's probably some opportunities in retail and consumer in China over the next. Give or take giving us the size of the U S and Europe put together. So that's a big thing. How do you play that theme? I could buy a and have bought this ETF called K web. Why? Because it owns technology companies that are making those middle-class lives better now marked I think is down 90% in the last year. Yup. So I bought it two weeks ago because anytime something's down that much, you gotta buy it. It doesn't matter what it is. If something's down 90%, you got to buy it. And so how else would you play the growth? The Asian consumer commodities is going to be more in demand. So I play it that way. Then you got to say how am I going to implement? That's the manager selection piece. So manager selection. I could do it myself. I, Mike and I could go decide, we're going to go rifle, shoot. We're going to sniper. And we're going to pick the stocks. SoI'm going to buy Alibaba. I'm going to buy jd.com. Totally fine. Totally acceptable. But what if we miss Mae Twan? What if we miss Pendo that K web is going to have them all. So that's outsourcing the manager to the group. That's doing that. Now the challenge with that is you got to pick between the managers and Howard marks has this great line. He says the problem with picking managers and picking people to manage your money is you have to decide between the good person who sounds good and the bad person who sounds good. They don't let the person who sounds bad, make the presentation. And it's so true. They all sound awesome. But then there's portfolio construct. This is, let's say I pick 10 things, either individual stocks or ETFs or hedge fund managers or mutual funds. I got 10, 10%, each 50% to one and 5% to the others that matters. It matters a lot actually. And there's capitalization waiting. There's equal waiting, there's rebalancing or not rebalancing. So all those portfolio construction things matter. Now the nice thing is most of us, we have lives. So it's like the cobbler's kids who have no shoes. We intend to manage our portfolio and we intend to rebalance and we intend to do all the work, if I look at my IRA, I have this little IRA from your way back when, and I look at that relative to the things that I do, or I just put it in my funds that are managed by people in my firm. It ain't close. You have all these great ideas. Why didn't you just put them in your IRA? Because I got busy and I didn't do it. And I wasn't smart like Peter teal to put in, private shares, which is what I really should have done, should put private shares at Morgan Creek. And then I should have written them down to the, basically zero in the global financial crisis like he did. And so then he gets this big basis and it created billions of dollars. Now I wouldn't have created billions of dollars, Peter is a genius. He's a mad genius, but anyway, so it's a long way of saying allocation first, spend your most time there because it's the most impactful. And particularly for younger investors, I have this thing that don't listen to anything I, or any other pundit on diversified portfolios and portfolio management. Under 60 years old, don't listen to that. Just concentrate on venture capital, equities tech. Like I believe it's not hyperbole. I believe it should be against the law for 25 to 65 year old people to own bonds. It is the waste of time and money. You don't need the volatility reduction because your volatility reduction comes from your future earnings. That is your fixed income.BZ: What are your emotions and feelings looking at blockchain now? Is this kind of is this really exciting?M:Oh, my God. It's the greatest look. It's the greatest wealth creation opportunity. I'll see in my lifetime and I'm gonna be around a long time. I got an 11 year old still. So I, I have this funny thing, we're a good Catholic family. I joke we had nine. We just skipped the middle six. So we have two older kids and a baby. And so we're going to be, I'm going to be around a long time. We'll be working for a long time. And so I'm not going here, but this is the greatest wealth creation opportunity I've ever seen because we're building on great tech. When you built the internet, you were building on shitty tech client server technology is really bad when you built the mobile net. You're building on pretty good tech. The internet was pretty good, but now you're building on top of an installed mobile net infrastructure. That is extraordinary and blockchain is a technological advance that is not linear, but exponential. So all these things are incredibly powerful. So I look, I got exposed to blockchain and Bitcoin in 2013. I didn't understand it. And so I was not a cryptography student and I missed it. I got blockchain, I got infrastructure my whole 14 year cycle thing and have done quite nicely. We've made good investments in infrastructure but I missed the opportunity of, a generation to really be early in, in behind joke that I got introduced to it the same month as the Winkle vie. And they're multibillionaires and I'm not. but there's a movie called the graduate and the graduate. There's a scene where he's asking his uncle for advice is one word plastics, go into plastics, which was good advice in the sixties. And today I said one word, "Jack blockchain go out to California. He wanted to live in San Francisco, said, go work at Coinbase." And he goes out and he interviewed and talks to people and it's I don't know, dad, maybe it's gonna be a big deal. I'm just going to KPMG safe. Gets me to San Francisco. " you're going to hate it whenever he did hate it. Quit after nine months" Coinbase goes public. Cause I find the right should have gone to Coinbase, but not as bad as you think you are. I might go, oh, do tell. I told you to go to quit, but you didn't lever up the house and put on Bitcoin. I'm like, "oh you a little shit." Okay. That's fair. No, one's crying for my son. Cause he works for snowflake and he's doing great, but, and I'm really proud of him, but I think it's interesting. It's a long winded way of saying I have never been more excited in my life. I've never had this much fun in my whole career and I loved my career. I loved every stage of my career. But my career has been in chapters, right? Chapter one, I work for not-for-profits. I was an allocator. I had fun. I loved it. I got second income working for the universities. Chapter two, I built a really nice asset management company, Morgan Creek, capital chapter three three years into a 20 year stint of tokenizing the world. And I really am having more fun. Now I get to hang out with young, smart, really creative people. I'm seeing technological innovation like the world has never seen. I now spend all my time doing venture capital, which has just so much fun backing founders and watching them build things. And it's, again, back to that long game, if you think that there are only four ways in the world that you can make money, all four require you to take risk. If you leave your money in cash, you get the risk free rate. Hence the name because you're not taking any risks. And unfortunately, if you do that, all your wealth is chewed up by inflation, right? Leave your money in the bank today, you get less than one. Inflation is eight, that sucks. So you gotta take risks. You can take credit risk, first risk.You can buy a bond. Now bonds are an actual claim. If you don't get paid, you can Sue pretty good deal. But you don't get paid a lot. You can take 2% above Risk-free rate not a very good deal. Look at bonds day, 2.4%. Woo big deal. And then you can take equity risk. Second risk equities are contingent claim. Meaning you only get paid if all the bond holders get paid. And so that's, that makes 7%above risk free rate. That's pretty good. So equity should be at the core of your portfolio. Then you can take illiquidity risk, private investments, private equity, private real estate, private equity, private debt, better get 5% more, 12% above risk-free. Awesome. 14, 15% compounded venture capital, even higher. And then you can use structure or leverage and leverage cuts both ways. Sometimes it's good. Sometimes it's bad, but illiquidity and venture capital and innovation as an asset class. And for all the ribbing she's taken, Cathy Wood is exactly right. Innovation is an asset class. It is where you want to invest for the longterm. And that's what I'm doing right now.BZ: That's amazing. Mark. It's been so good to have you on, I know we're running out of time here. But it's just been an absolute pleasure for both myself and Austin. Thank you so much for the time.M:I appreciate you guys having me on the show. I love this. That you guys are doing a show on the longterm, instead of all the day trading stuff again, nothing wrong. Day-trading totally fine. But sometimes you got to step back, take a hike, think big thoughts and really enjoyed the conversation to appreciate all your hard work, getting ready for it. And we'll talk again soon.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/the-long-run-show/donations

Asketic co Founder Miķelis Baštiks talking with Head of “Printful” Marketing Raitis Puriņš, about growing a marketing team, building and monetizing your audience.M: Much has already been said about the growth of Printful, but I find your growth as the Marketing Team Leader even more interesting. You started from a very small team of five, now you are more than 100. There are many things to unpack. How to lead a team of five and then switch to a much larger team is a conversation of its own. But how has the daily life changed for you personally? I don't know how much you have reflected upon it yourself, but it would be interesting to hear.R: Since day one my position was the Head of Marketing Unit at Printful, however, when you have a team of five, you're not really a manager. The whole office consisted of 30 or so employees, I was number 35. You're not a manager, you learn to become one afterwards. In the beginning you're thrown into unknown waters and you try to swim out. Along the way you learn to become a manager. The first and most difficult realization is the ability to delegate and trust others. When you really become a manager, you think, okay, this person can do this instead of me. He might do it slower at first or take a different approach, but he will catch on. At first, I always put 100% trust into a person when I give a task. It's not like I let them sink or swim, instead I become a beacon that provides help and checks in to see if he's on the right track. Afterwards he has to grow by himself and you witness the progress. Trust is something to be applied to your own colleagues. M: How does it look in daily life? Do you have daily, weekly check-ins? It's clear you have to trust and provide freedom, but there has to be some accountability. Where have you found the balance?R: We have a framework, at the company there's a presentation “How not to die at Printful”. The idea is that it's better to manage a team of fifty or a project, since the company is so big and one project encompasses a large amount of people. There are a few ways you can look at that. One framework provides that every person has its own goal that he has come here to do and he has to achieve in 3 months, 6 months. He knows what he has to complete. One step further, everyone has a number that drives him. The goal of my team could be revenue. You can influence any team, when you set them a number that they are responsible for. If it's the amount of new clients in Australia, then in becomes your drive and all your activities within the project are focused on that. You never come and talk randomly; you always focus on your goal. Managers don't have to keep everything on their mind - it's all written down, you just check in and see whether your team is on the right track.M: There are so many teams. If one team learns something or tests something, are there any systems for not making the same mistakes twice? Is there a way to transfer the know-how of one team to another when there are so many?R: We provide a blueprint or a framework of previous successful approaches, so you don't have to do your own trial and error; instead you have an outline for your new project. In a rapidly growing company, the only constant is change. You have to be okay with facing changes. Not just because you feel like it, but with purpose to be able to work better. You can't lead a team otherwise, whether those are 5 people or 100. Your manager can change or something else. I know that even I have to constantly keep learning. The rules keep changing, and marketing changes too. I actually like it, the discomfort of not knowing something. No one taught me at school how to lead a marketing team of 100 people. If someone knows such school, let me know. Otherwise you just do you best.M: Of course you learn a lot of things along the way, but can you identify a few things that have helped you on the journey from a single digit team to a three digit team. How did your life look before and how does it look now?R: The main thing that I also remind my project colleagues is that you have to ensure you're your partners share accountability for what you are working on. Another thing I remind my team is that there's no such thing as over-communication, especially internal over-communication. We previously had a situation when the IT team came to me and said that an e-mail should be sent out about an update. Okay, when are you going to launch it? Yesterday. So you were kept out of the loop, because it was assumed that you could do this very quickly anyways. It's important to ensure accountability so that you are aware about a project from day one and can contribute. We also have a huge client support team, more than 200 people globally. The company has to ensure constant internal communication about what you're going to do and what projects are happening, the communication is needed above all. The bigger the team gets, the more important it becomes.M: You once mentioned personal growth and how you sometimes write to marketing managers of big companies to ask something, and most of the time you actually receive answers. Is it something you would do in other areas? Meaning, proactively apply the example of a predecessor. And those times when you have received an answer, what have you learned from your predecessors in different companies, but in the same category or position?R: I have never studied marketing, I know almost no theory, and therefore all I've learned comes from other colleagues, also from my previous workplaces. I don't even remember who gave me the idea that you need a mentor. It's less about learning. When teams are of similar size, we switch charts. It was one of my challenges when my team reached 50 members. Okay, I need a structure for scaling or I will die and won't be able to manage it all. You find out what each team is doing, why it's so large, what works, what doesn't. Secondly, you switch agencies and tools. That allows you to adapt it to yourself. I've also joined several groups, there's a DGMG community for B2B marketing. You can ask your question to the crowd or just search for account based marketing, which isn't a well-known term in Latvia. I don't even know who I could ask that in Latvia. This allows you to gain more from real people who have done this, instead from a blog post, where you don't know if this information has been used in practice.M: What else has helped you to learn and grow along the way? This is a cool example of reaching out and learning from the experience of others. But is there anything else?R: Experiments, for example. Often we don't know if something would work and get good results. You just try and see whether it would work. You learn from mistakes. There are projects from last year where I have lost more than 100 000 dollars, without bringing any gain to the company. But I know I have spent several millions that have benefitted us.M: If you could go get coffee with three marketing people from around the world, who would they be?R: I'm more interested in branding right now. I would like to understand performance checks, I like to measure all technical things. If you're spending a lot of money for Super Bowl ads, you need a good justification for that and need to know how to do it correctly. From the branding point of view, my favourite is Coca-Cola. It's the reason why Santa Claus is wearing a red suit. Amazing! Also Apple. The product plays a big part of it, but they're also doing cool things with the brand.M: If you're more interested in branding now, could you unpack the topics that you're interested in?R: Many say that brand comes from the management. At Printful, the management is me. If I want to invest a bigger team, resources or money in this, then I need strong arguments for why we're going to do this. We'll see the results after three, four years, so why do we need to invest a large amount of money, since the market is huge. I still can't do this. It's not like we don't have a brand. The brand is everything that the company has done all these years. But I'm still missing something for us to scale and do it correctly. The right people, the right team? I don't know.M: You said there are 8 regions. Is the brand the same everywhere or do you build it differently for each region?R: We don't think about branding in each region that much, we like the framework “jobs to be done”. We try to find a person who we can help in achieving what he wants.M: Can you tell me more about the framework “jobs to be done”? How do you implement it in practice?R: First, you want to create an e-commerce shop, maybe you have an Instagram following you want to sell to or an existing business, or you want to create a merch line. Second, you want to order something for yourself. We enable you to do that easily, but you need to find answers to many questions. Who will you sell the shirt to? Do you have a design to print? How will you integrate it? For how much will you sell? Then you have to bring people to the website to buy something. A side-product from all this is that we educate clients. The marketing team is teaching others about marketing. All our resources are directed this way. It's much more beneficial to think about the person's dream than to think about benefitting from them driving a BWM. That's why we're very focused on this work. M: You have mentioned content marketing as one of the things you're doing. Do you still think it's working? When looking at the marketing landscape, do you see other things to focus on in the future? R: Content marketing is everywhere, including what we're doing. It's something you polish and put out. Content marketing can be measured in many different ways. The best effect is when any text that we publish in a blog or on website gets indexed on Google. That enables you to first find Printful in organic results just by searching. In content marketing you also create your image. I, by being in podcasts, am creating an image of being an expert on some topic, which makes people want to talk to me. It's similar for companies. If you create content about something, people will have an opinion about you, which goes along with branding. Okay, they know about this thing, probably I should work with them to ensure quality. You just have to create content, otherwise you won't understand what you have to do here. The idea of starting an e-commerce shop is great, but there a lot of ways to do it. The content helps us guide the creator through this tunnel towards a shop and making sales. M: What would be a go-to for potential clients who would like to create a new brand to be sold through Printful and create their content marketing?R: You have to build an audience. I don't have many examples nor experience, but many successful examples show that you can, for example, grow an Instagram account for dog-lovers and monetize it. You need a data base. You can also build hype by making an e-mail list, because you have to start somewhere, e-mail can't be your main channel. You can't send to some list, it has to be legal. The next channels are channels based on captured interest. From paid channels I can mention Google, which allows you to be found as an interesting author through searching. Then it's about whether the content on the website is enough. You create and all the elements mix together. It's hard to name one. Everything is organic game. It won't happen in one day. You'll see the results in the next few months. It's a long-term work.M: Printful grew very quickly, in just a couple of years. Was it a coincidence of showing up in the right time with the right product? Or was it the skill? I wonder if another company from a different category could duplicate what you did to grow five times or ten times quicker as they would otherwise?R: One mould that we have is “solve your problem”. Before Printful, there was Startup Vitamins, which still sells motivational posters. We needed them, because the offices of Draugiem.lv needed cool posters. Every cool office had those, so we needed them too. Didn't have them, so we designed some and started to sell. We did okay overall. We mostly printed posters, so we started to think about t-shirts and other things. I started searching for someone who could do it on demand, because we didn't know if they would sell. This niche turned out to be quite empty, so we decided to take it. Because again, what we're doing – we're solving our problem. The solution is so simple. In the end we printed our shirts, but it was planned out to be as fast and efficient as possible and with less costs.M: Do you feel a difference between the environments of Asia, Europe and North America when it comes to your clients?R: We haven't really delved into that. There might reasons why one is more successful and one isn't, but there aren't any cardinal differences. These reasons are mostly general. In japan, in order to switch your full-time job you need a special reason. In USA, side-hustling is very typical, you need to have an extra job to survive. You can drive an Uber or create an e-commerce shop. While in Germany and Scandinavia, you don't have such motivation. If you're happy with your job, you just have a beer and rest in your free time. You have other reasons for using Printful. In Germany, you need trust badges on your website for them to believe you're legit. There are some specifics, but it's not mainstream and isn't affecting much. We adapt.M: When you talked about brand development and marketing, one of the ways to grow a brand is word-of-mouth. One of your clients has successfully built his business. I think you mentioned that your tagline is “be your own boss”. This one successful person tells it to someone else, who also finds courage to try. For a company as big as yours, is such word-of-mouth still an important channel and tool?R: 100% yes! We might be big in Latvia, but the niche we can fill is still very small. How many e-commerce people in the world would sell printed goods and know about Printful? Not many. So this requires a constant drive. Social media stars rise every day nowadays, and they have an audience that can be reached more easily than ever, therefore it is important. The best approach is to be good at what you do. There's a guy who did a built-in kitchen for me. I have recommended him to at least 7 people, just because I'm satisfied with his job. If someone has a need, I will recommend him. And so it continues. It's the same for a company. It just happens in a bigger scale. When there's a chance to make a recommendation and someone has had good experience with you, he will recommend you, because it's something new he hasn't seen before. They become brand ambassadors. You don't pay them, you can only motivate them to do this more.M: This big trend of “creative economy” goes hand in hand with what you are doing with building an audience. MrBeast just launched his chocolate brand, which is super successful. He has built an enormous audience on YouTube, he launches one product after another. He has a chocolate or snack company. When you look at this category and also what you're doing with personalization and enabling people to be their own boss, do you see how this category develops and how big is the potential?R: That's one of the reasons why us too are developing and growing. Building an audience nowadays is much easier than it was twenty years ago. You can use the thing you have created – video, music, design –to captivate this person who wants to be associated with you, and, brutally speaking, you can monetize it. The ultimate goal is business. You create an audience and monetize it. One of my favourite examples recently are musicians. Musicians inspire passion in people. You follow them. If you like the music, you go to concerts and are ready to spend money. There are a lot of music bands, any one of them can start offering their merch.M: You've experienced an amazing and quick growth during the last five years. Do you have a vision for the following five years?R: We spend such a big part of life working. But in the end you work in order to be able to rest and live. The one thing on my plan is that I need more vacation days. If you work so much, you need time for resting, enjoy the fruits of your labour, spend time with family. There is still a lot of potential in Printful for development so you don't get bored. At some point I will address that too. M: What helped you to overcome the desire to do everything by yourself? I think that a lot of practical people are stuck in this bottleneck and are not ready to release the control.R: For example, if you have to send an e-mail, we agree on a period for doing it. Let's say, I will do it by Friday, but we agree that you will send me the contents by Thursday. If you are aware of the time period when it will happen and get this information, then you don't have to worry whether everything will be done on time. You just get a message that this is done. This has to be agreed upon. Then you can be sure that this person will check in with you that the text is ready, and on Friday you can confirm that everything is done. There have been occasions when I start writing e-mails and then have to edit this and that. When you start to delegate, the thing that you're afraid of is that something won't be done at all or in the quality you want. You just have to introduce these middle points. And any of these points can have a deadline. This way you can free your mind, because the computer will notify you at the right time. And you do the same thing with your team. You just write things down, you don't try to keep 10 things in mind. You say, this is our structure, these are the tasks, and this is the next step. By this time you have to do the following. If not, then you can start to micro-manage something else. That's where the trust comes from, just go through the game rules.M: Thank you.R: Cool, thank you.Raitis Puriņšhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/raitispurins/?originalSubdomain=lvhttps://www.printful.com/Subscribe to Asketic Podcast on:Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/73QSMYK46NHoHCytJYYmPZ?si=Mw4ZLISUSoueh9Es1pCLUgApple Podcast:https://podcasts.apple.com/lv/podcast/asketic-podcast/id1496922775YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQdekksSROS4PCxRV7aqT3QGoogle Podcasts:https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy50cmFuc2lzdG9yLmZtL2Fza2V0aWMtcG9kY2FzdA--Asketic design & branding:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/asketicstudio/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/asketic/WWW: http://asketic.com/

00:00 - Intro 04:00 - Evolution of a Coffee Drinker 07:15 - We Hope You're Hungry 09:40 - Jeff's Background 11:50 - How Jeff Started Woodworking 22:50 - College? Y or N 26:25 - The Value of Finance 28:50 - Full-time Business Owner 31:05 - Partner Conflicts + Dynamics 37:50 - Going Solo 40:00 - Making a Profit 42:30 - Not Being a “Yes Man” 55:00 - Build A Business To Sell 1:02:00 - Getting Out Sales 1:11:00 - Don't Focus On Sales Only 1:22:00 - How to Scale Quotable Moments “For our young listeners out there, take the opportunity and look for the experience you can get. If you're more focused on getting paid now, you're not going to get as good of pay later.” – K “I tell people all the time that you don't need an MBA to succeed in business. I also say, an MBA will not in any way remotely assure that you will succeed in business.” – M “There's 2 ways to be educated and they both happen through experience. You can either get the experience yourself or you can pay for someone else's experience to be passed down to you.” – K “Profit is not new cars – profit is inventory, new machines, and innovating.” – M “Your suppliers have no reluctance to tell you it just went up 15% and yet we, as the middleman between suppliers and their ultimate consumer, why are we reluctant?” – M “I'm building my company to sell it – I'm not sure whether I ever do it or not, but I want to get it to that position where it could be sold.” – J “Just because there's a language and a culture barrier there, it doesn't mean that there's a talent barrier.” – K Resources Martin's Forbes Article Jeff's Website Connect with Jeff on LinkedIn Email Jeff Check us out on Youtube Follow us on social media: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram Subscribe to our weekly newsletter, The Countdown Have questions? Email us! More from Martin theprofitproblem.com annealbc.com    martin@anealbc.com  LinkedIn Facebook Instagram More from Khalil benali.com  khalil@benali.com LinkedIn Facebook Instagram More from The Cashflow Contractor Ask Us A Question Sign Up For A Free Consultation thecashflowcontractor.com  info@thecashflowcontractor.com LinkedIn Facebook Instagram

Why is it so difficult? (2:30) Subjective reasons to fire. (3:50) What can you do? (5:20) The benefit of a solid team. (6:30) What's at stake. (9:00) Quotable Moments “It's pure agony. I suck my thumb. I do all other things before I finally carry it out.” – Warren Buffet “Hire for skill and fire for attitude.” – M “We may never eliminate all the feelings of empathy, doubt, and fairness, but we cannot let them keep us from terminating an employee once we know they have to go.” – M “Building the right team is arguably the most important duty for our businesses. It transforms your job into a business. They provide leverage to do more and learn more.” – M “Don't waffle.” – M “There's no faster way to ruin a good employee than to have them watch you tolerate a bad employee.” – M Resources Check us out on Youtube Follow us on social media: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram Subscribe to our newsletter, The Countdown Have questions? Email us! More from Martin theprofitproblem.com annealbc.com    martin@anealbc.com  LinkedIn Facebook Instagram More from Khalil benali.com  khalil@benali.com LinkedIn Facebook Instagram More from The Cashflow Contractor Ask Us A Question Sign Up For A Free Consultation thecashflowcontractor.com  info@thecashflowcontractor.com LinkedIn Facebook Instagram

This time our guest is Jānis Šipkēvics, we are talking about creative process, discipline, and how to create ideas and deliver them to the right audience. M: And the first question I wanted to ask is – do you see musical band or a musical brand as a business or art? How do you decide for yourself what that is? J: Music for me is my job, and it's the middle ground I have found between doing what I like and being able to support myself, so that I don't have to do another job in order to make music. That's the short version.M: One thing that is important is a certain discipline, when your hobby turns into your job or your occupation and you want to do it professionally. For thousand other people it's a hobby, many people like to sing, but for you it's a job. What's the difference that separates professionals in their creative expression from the ten thousand people who simply like to play music or create art?J: I think there's a perpetual weighing of both sides… turning the thing that you're doing into an utmost professional form is not always a victory. A lot of times when a person takes up a hobby and also finds the key to becoming useful and earning money with it, it is turned into a form that many years down the line is not even close to what it was at the beginning and is missing the reason for wanting to change the world, ideals or notions of what we can expect from music or design, or packaging, what it means to us and what message it carries. In creating music, when we talk about “Instrumenti”, which is my main place of work, we think about who we are addressing it to. That's one my dimensions, one of my research spheres of musical interests, but in this regard we think about the recipient, to whom we are sending this message.M: Yesterday I thought about the famous quote by designer Paul Rand: “Don't ty to be original. Just try to be good.”, namely, try to think more about the end-user of the design instead of putting your self-expression into the design work. It's similar to what you are saying. You in your work - the band “Instrumenti” - think about the audience, but you as a creative person of course have the desire for  an original self-expression. How do you find the boundary between what the audience and what you yourself need?J: Contrary to the notion of what is an original… at least me as a person who has thought about that, who has tried to break my inner spears, who has been looking for myself and denied myself, and gone in a different direction again and again, I have discovered that the more you are yourself, the more interesting is the possibility that it could mean more to somebody else than just a sound, a picture and a concert. The more you think about it and discover, the more you confirm it. And that is the biggest challenge, because each of us has doubts about ourselves, me as well, and great inner denial, and thoughts about the things we should have done better, about not doing something or being lazy. I experience that every day, but there are those good, blessed moments when you try to be friends with your inner self.M: Seeing what you all and you yourself are doing with music, I have the impression that you are able to put your authentic daily experiences aside and be professional on the stage, because when people come to the concert, they don't care that you are authentically tired or you've had a bad day. They expect to see the same quality that they have already seen three times for the fourth time.J: There are two phases to my work. The first one requires this authenticity and it can include tiredness or emptiness, or grief, or childish joy – and it all is necessary to be mixed together in order to create a new matter. And afterwards is the second phase, when this rock turns into a fixed thing, and then you have to start to deliver it, and afterwards it's just constant quality and it has to be exactly that. Something I've learned fairly recent is that I'm not allowed to diverge from what we can call in this office or recording studio a product, you have to give what you have promised to give, otherwise the game isn't fair. It might be fair, but it won't be long. I think it's very important to maintain this relationship and to be open and consistent.M: There are two saying often said to young people, one is to follow your heart, to do what you are passionate about and then you will succeed. And the other one, instead of following your heart, suggests to just take up one thing, do it, learn skills, and then the passion will come gradually and you will grow fond of your work.J: I think that in any line of work, the game becomes interesting when you reach a certain phase, and it's a fact. It takes patience to spend these iconic ten thousand or forty thousand hours thinking about and developing this skill. I think that each of us is capable of doing a lot of different things. We have the capability and potential inside of us to be surprising in many different forms. The question is what is able to create such excitement, passion and satisfaction in us for being there.M: The thing that always stands out in my mind, when I think about you and “Instrumenti”…  well, I used to think that musicians always hear music in their head, they write it down and then in two years' time they have collected these ten songs in order to release an album. Whereas with you I have noticed that you take two weeks during the summer to go to your retreat, lock in and do what you have to do, and then this material is ready for polishing. You are able to go somewhere and focus on your work. It's not like you feel like or are in the mood to do that, but there is a group of people, all of whom have to focus and give the best of themselves. The first question is how is that possible? How do you manage to all go there, to be on the same wave and to create so much material in such a short time period?J: At that moment everything, of course, doesn't start from zero. It's a moment when all three of us - me, Gatis and Reinis - dock together, and we all bring our own bag of ideas, which are put together, and then we see… one has found a book to read, other has five lines, another has a motive, one has a rhythm loop, one has an album that we all should listen to. There are conversations, the we go into the bath-house, then we swim, then we go for a run in the morning, and somehow it all… one hand washes the other, and then these hands meet and get to know each other much better, and then this hand is bold enough to write something down.M: In such a camp where there are many of you and you have to constantly voice ideas, and as you said, not all of them fit, how do you deal with criticism between each other… how do express that something is not a good idea? One is your inner criticism, but how do you deal with wider criticism?J: I think we have a quite good experience and we have overcome different waves and good through inner schooling. We have understood that.. And it took a while… It was especially hard when it was just me and Reinis. It would seem that two people working together is really easy, but, on the other hand, it's the biggest challenge, because there are two strong individuals, and if one says “I got it”, but the other says “listen, that's not it”, it turns into a frontal confrontation. It has a big potential to become personal - it's a “no” because I don't like it. In a collective everything is levelled out by this musical tripod, and in that sense everything came together much easily. Now Gatis helps us resolve things. I feel sure, when I hear it from a quorum. We take things much less personally in our inner collective, we have a lot of respect for still being together, we really cherish our alliance. Regarding the external criticism, over the years you develop a relationship with the external voice. There's a stage when you take it very personally and you think that each of these voices… many people don't have the time to delve into it and it's the first thought that is voice, and so be it. Every person has a right to their own opinion and I respect that, and I try not to get upset by that, but also listen, and often it has much of the truth in it.M: I have always enjoyed observing that everything you do is done on a very high professional level, whether it's a concert, your costumes, stage design and the music itself… and in such a creative process that's led by yourself, because you don't have a client who says he needs something for tomorrow. As a perfectionist and a perfectionist you can always keep polishing. I know you're currently reading a book called “Shipping Creative Work”. How do you know when to stop the creative work and ship it out and when to keep polishing it?J: It always seems that you could have kept polishing it. But there a lot of ideas that I have buried, that never saw the daylight, because I wasn't completely sure it's the right moment. Everything that hasn't happened in regards to my ideas that haven't seen the daylight  is just the result of my laziness. That's a significant factor and a whole new chapter in my life, which I look at with great respect and piety, and from which I learned discipline.M: What do you mean when you say discipline? What does it mean in daily practice?J: Chaos is not the most creative environment. I have understood that the less is on my worktable, the more I am able to say. The greater the order, the more surprising creativity is able to flourish in me. Maybe initially, at the age of ninety or twenty you are still able to absorb information, you're not yet confused by its amount… you don't yet realize that the world is so full of information, ideas and opinions. I have realized that I'll never be able to absorb everything, and if I do – I'd just go mad and feel crushed by that amount. So what I try to do is to say “No” to things. By listening to the ideas of Derek Sivers at your suggestion and not just that, I think there are many teachings that encourage you to understand that by saying “No”, you're saying “Yes” to something you really want. “No” weeds out the things that just come your way, and I for many years have been open to everything that knocks on my door, and with time you become more cautious and begin to treat your time with more respect.M: To continue this subject a bit… what about inspiration? Do you let it come to you constantly or do you turn it on and become inspired, and sometimes you're at home and don't want to hear anything? Or do you hear music all the time?J: No, no, it doesn't. I have understood that there are certain periods of input and output. There are moments when I'm completely empty, sometimes there's neither input nor output. I'm not able to say anything, I have no thoughts, and I don't even want to listen to anything. There's just complete emptiness, and it's good, I think you should let yourself rest. Just as there's inhale and exhale… you don't have to constantly keep inhaling and exhaling, there's a blissful moment when just inhale and realize what's going on. I think those are four different phases – inhale, pause, exhale, and pause. Those are like four sides of the sky, and each offers its own thing.M: When you exhale and create an output, how do you prepare yourself for work? Do you just sit down and start working or are there like three steps that you take?J: I feel the best creatively and mentally when I feel good physically as well. I'm very proud of myself when I run, go ice swimming, go to bed on time, not consume alcohol, eat less sweets, but it's a constant fight with windmills, but I know that I'm going in the right direction and I feel that these phases when I turn on this mode, they are wonderful moments of enlightenment.Jānis Šipkēvicshttps://twitter.com/shipseanet?lang=en--Subscribe to Asketic Podcast on:Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/73QSMYK46NHoHCytJYYmPZ?si=Mw4ZLISUSoueh9Es1pCLUgApple Podcast:https://podcasts.apple.com/lv/podcast/asketic-podcast/id1496922775YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQdekksSROS4PCxRV7aqT3QGoogle Podcasts:https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy50cmFuc2lzdG9yLmZtL2Fza2V0aWMtcG9kY2FzdA--Asketic design & branding:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/asketicstudio/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/asketic/WWW: http://asketic.com/

Applying this to contractors. 2:00) Calling people back. (3:00) How to not waste all your hard work in 5 minutes. (5:45) Quotable Moments “He worked for us for 4 months. Did good work, but missed a couple of punch list items. Didn't call us back. [For those reasons], he lost a referral source in us.” –M “He paid for advertising, he got a lead, he scheduled an appointment, he went out and he took measurements. He then designed the project and put together a bid and sent it but he made a critical error– he didn't call to follow-up.” –M “There are infinite ways that we're out there doing the 23 hours and 55 minutes worth of work and then we blow it on the last 5 minutes by not following through.” –M “Success is a few small disciplines practiced every day and they're always small things, like calling people back.” –Jim Rowan –M More from Martin theprofitproblem.com annealbc.com    martin@anealbc.com  LinkedIn Facebook Instagram More from Khalil benali.com  khalil@benali.com LinkedIn Facebook Instagram More from The Cashflow Contractor Ask Us A Question Sign Up For A Free Consultation thecashflowcontractor.com  info@thecashflowcontractor.com LinkedIn Facebook Instagram

Download MP3 今回は、２週間後のバレンタインデーにちなんだ会話をお届けします。 レストランで食事をしている親友の男女。バレンタインデーということで、周囲は人目をはばからずいちゃいちゃしているカップルだらけ。さてこの男女、どのようなロマンティックな会話になるのでしょうか…？ 今回の会話はアメリカの生きた口語表現が満載です。例えば上で使った「親友」や「人目をはばからずいちゃいちゃ」することを、英語でどう表現するのでしょうか。 (初級〜中級)*** It's a Good Expression *** （今回の重要表現） bitter 辛辣な (to) check out 見てみる (to) bother じゃまをする so as not to do ...しないように a good sport 付き合いのいい人、気のいい人 (to) handle 対処する gooey おセンチな cheesy 陳腐な、つまらない (to) show up 現れる most likely ほとんど、きっと (to) spite いらいらさせる significant others 大切な人 (to) insist on ...を主張する 〜's fault 〜の落ち度 lovey-dovey 恋にのぼせている the ever-supportive friend 親友 (to) share one's misery 悲しみを分かち合う PDA 公共の場でいちゃいちゃすること public display of affection (to) end up 〜 結局〜になってしまう There, there... まあまあ。 (to) get through 乗り切る (a) platter 大皿 I'm perfectly fine with my platter agreeing with me right here ここで自分の料理がご機嫌なら私はそれで十分よ。 while I'm at it 私がそれに精を出している間 *** Script *** Valentine's Day W: Hey, check out that couple over there. M: Why? W: Their faces are too close to each other. M: Irma, it's Valentine's Day! What do you expect? W: Oh, I don't know: a place where there won't be more couples to bother my eyesight? M: Come on. You forced me to go out with you so as not to lock yourself in your room again. I'm being a good sport right now. W: I knooooow. I don't get how you can handle all these gooey, cheesy humans around. They show up during this particular day, and hide the rest of the year, most likely just to spite people who don't have significant others. M: Well, that's why I proposed a movie night. But YOU insisted on dinner. W: Yeah, because I forgot what day it was. And I wanted to eat good food today. It just so happens that THEY thought of the same thing. M: Well, it's not their fault. Don't blame them for having feelings. W: Hey, I have feelings too! And I'm not afraid to show them… like, right this minute! What makes lovey-dovey couples so special that they have to have their own day? M: Um… You're just bitter that you only have me—the ever-supportive friend, to share your misery! W: Me, bitter? Of course not! It's just too much PDA going around. I'll end up blind by the end of the night! M: There, there… You'll get through this. At least food loves you back! There are a lot of different kinds of love, you know, not just the romantic kind! W: Tell THAT to the others, not me. I'm perfectly fine with my platter agreeing with me right here. Who needs a man when you've got steak! M: You see? Food cares. Just eat and forget you're surrounded by lovers. W: I think I should keep my eyes shut too while I'm at it! (Written by Bea Jianne Roque)

Download MP3 今回は、２週間後のバレンタインデーにちなんだ会話をお届けします。 レストランで食事をしている親友の男女。バレンタインデーということで、周囲は人目をはばからずいちゃいちゃしているカップルだらけ。さてこの男女、どのようなロマンティックな会話になるのでしょうか…？ 今回の会話はアメリカの生きた口語表現が満載です。例えば上で使った「親友」や「人目をはばからずいちゃいちゃ」することを、英語でどう表現するのでしょうか。 (初級〜中級)*** It's a Good Expression *** （今回の重要表現） bitter 辛辣な (to) check out 見てみる (to) bother じゃまをする so as not to do ...しないように a good sport 付き合いのいい人、気のいい人 (to) handle 対処する gooey おセンチな cheesy 陳腐な、つまらない (to) show up 現れる most likely ほとんど、きっと (to) spite いらいらさせる significant others 大切な人 (to) insist on ...を主張する 〜's fault 〜の落ち度 lovey-dovey 恋にのぼせている the ever-supportive friend 親友 (to) share one's misery 悲しみを分かち合う PDA 公共の場でいちゃいちゃすること public display of affection (to) end up 〜 結局〜になってしまう There, there... まあまあ。 (to) get through 乗り切る (a) platter 大皿 I'm perfectly fine with my platter agreeing with me right here ここで自分の料理がご機嫌なら私はそれで十分よ。 while I'm at it 私がそれに精を出している間 *** Script *** Valentine's Day W: Hey, check out that couple over there. M: Why? W: Their faces are too close to each other. M: Irma, it's Valentine's Day! What do you expect? W: Oh, I don't know: a place where there won't be more couples to bother my eyesight? M: Come on. You forced me to go out with you so as not to lock yourself in your room again. I'm being a good sport right now. W: I knooooow. I don't get how you can handle all these gooey, cheesy humans around. They show up during this particular day, and hide the rest of the year, most likely just to spite people who don't have significant others. M: Well, that's why I proposed a movie night. But YOU insisted on dinner. W: Yeah, because I forgot what day it was. And I wanted to eat good food today. It just so happens that THEY thought of the same thing. M: Well, it's not their fault. Don't blame them for having feelings. W: Hey, I have feelings too! And I'm not afraid to show them… like, right this minute! What makes lovey-dovey couples so special that they have to have their own day? M: Um… You're just bitter that you only have me—the ever-supportive friend, to share your misery! W: Me, bitter? Of course not! It's just too much PDA going around. I'll end up blind by the end of the night! M: There, there… You'll get through this. At least food loves you back! There are a lot of different kinds of love, you know, not just the romantic kind! W: Tell THAT to the others, not me. I'm perfectly fine with my platter agreeing with me right here. Who needs a man when you've got steak! M: You see? Food cares. Just eat and forget you're surrounded by lovers. W: I think I should keep my eyes shut too while I'm at it! (Written by Bea Jianne Roque)

リスナーの皆さん、Merry Christmas! 今年もクリスマスをテーマにした会話をお届けします。 クリスマスといえばプレゼント。毎年子どもたちが、サンタさんが来るのを楽しみに待っています。今回お届けするのは、息子のクリスマスプレゼントを買いにきた夫婦の会話です。息子はちょっと変わったものを欲しがっているようですが、それは何でしょうか。また、お父さんはこれについてどう思っているのでしょうか…。 　↓　↓　↓ Download MP3 （初級〜中級）*** It's a Good Expression *** （今回の重要表現） to be into ... ...にはまる、のめりこむ Moon-Boots, Sockem-Boppers ムーンブーツ、ソッケムボッパーズ（アメリカで販売されているおもちゃの名前） My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic 『マイリトルポニー〜トモダチは魔法〜』（アメリカの女の子向けアニメ。日本でも放送されていた） for starters まず第一に（to begin with） to be hard on ... ...につらくあたる *** Script *** Christmas Presents Situation: It's Christmas Eve, and Kiki and Lars are buying last-minute Christmas presents for their kids at a store, called Five Below. M: You know, I just don't understand the stuff kids are into these days. When I was a boy we had REAL toys, like Moon-Boots and Sockem-Boppers. W: Now Honey: times are changing and the toys the kids are into these days aren't any worse or weirder than when we were kids. It's just a different time. M: Kiki, Timmy said the only thing he wanted this year was My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic action figures. W: Oh, now don't be so hard on him. He's just a boy. Remember, you used to play with Barbie dolls when you were a boy for the longest time! M: There's a big difference, though. I was too young to know any better and my sisters made me. Timmy's completely different. W: What makes Timmy so different? M: Well, for starters... he's 34 years old! W: Hey, I thought we agreed we wouldn't argue about this in public. Besides, it's Christmas; let's just try to enjoy ourselves. This is the season of giving and joy. Let's try to act like it. M: Yeah, I'm sorry. You're right. W: Wait, I just got a text from Timmy. He said he also wants "a pink body suit" for... "his research". M: That's it! That boy is getting nothing! W: (sigh) You're being too hard on the boy. (Written by David Shaner)

リスナーの皆さん、Merry Christmas! 今年もクリスマスをテーマにした会話をお届けします。 クリスマスといえばプレゼント。毎年子どもたちが、サンタさんが来るのを楽しみに待っています。今回お届けするのは、息子のクリスマスプレゼントを買いにきた夫婦の会話です。息子はちょっと変わったものを欲しがっているようですが、それは何でしょうか。また、お父さんはこれについてどう思っているのでしょうか…。 　↓　↓　↓ Download MP3 （初級〜中級）*** It's a Good Expression *** （今回の重要表現） to be into ... ...にはまる、のめりこむ Moon-Boots, Sockem-Boppers ムーンブーツ、ソッケムボッパーズ（アメリカで販売されているおもちゃの名前） My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic 『マイリトルポニー〜トモダチは魔法〜』（アメリカの女の子向けアニメ。日本でも放送されていた） for starters まず第一に（to begin with） to be hard on ... ...につらくあたる *** Script *** Christmas Presents Situation: It's Christmas Eve, and Kiki and Lars are buying last-minute Christmas presents for their kids at a store, called Five Below. M: You know, I just don't understand the stuff kids are into these days. When I was a boy we had REAL toys, like Moon-Boots and Sockem-Boppers. W: Now Honey: times are changing and the toys the kids are into these days aren't any worse or weirder than when we were kids. It's just a different time. M: Kiki, Timmy said the only thing he wanted this year was My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic action figures. W: Oh, now don't be so hard on him. He's just a boy. Remember, you used to play with Barbie dolls when you were a boy for the longest time! M: There's a big difference, though. I was too young to know any better and my sisters made me. Timmy's completely different. W: What makes Timmy so different? M: Well, for starters... he's 34 years old! W: Hey, I thought we agreed we wouldn't argue about this in public. Besides, it's Christmas; let's just try to enjoy ourselves. This is the season of giving and joy. Let's try to act like it. M: Yeah, I'm sorry. You're right. W: Wait, I just got a text from Timmy. He said he also wants "a pink body suit" for... "his research". M: That's it! That boy is getting nothing! W: (sigh) You're being too hard on the boy. (Written by David Shaner)

Brad Post Michael D. Kenny, Attorney Brad Post: All right. Welcome to floridadefense.com podcast. We are speaking to Tampa burglary charges defense lawyer Mike Kenny, at the Bauer, Crider, and Parry, law firm in Tampa, Florida. Michael D. Kenny, Attorney: Morning. B: Mike, we’ve been speaking on theft crimes. Last edition we talked about robbery charges. Today, we’re going to be talking about burglary, which are two different areas. Correct? M: That’s right. It’s kind of funny, people use those terms, you hear people discuss them. I think lay folks might use the term robbery when they say, “My house was robbed.” But there’s specific terms, these are like “terms of art”, in the legal world. A burglary specifically means a theft from a particular location. And there's certain elements that have to be established in order for something to qualify as a burglary. Whereas robbery is like what we talked about before. Robbery means that the way the item was taken. Whether the person used some kind of force to take it, some threat of force, or that the victim at some point became aware during the course of the taking that an item is being stolen from them. They're all theft related, but a burglary specifically means the entering, or remaining, in a dwelling (which is basically a home), structure (which is something that is not a home, but like a business), or conveyance (which is an automobile or anything that basically transports folks) with the intent to commit an offense therein. Then there is an exception: unless the premises that are at the time open to the public, or the defendant is licensed, or invited to enter. So, that’s your basic burglary: a person enters a home, with the intent to commit a crime inside, and that essentially is a burglary. And it doesn't have to be that they have to steal something. In the vast majority of burglary crimes, that's what happens - a person breaks into a home and steal some items (a television, property, medicine) any one of those items. And depending upon what type of place of that they enter determines the severity of the crime. Generally speaking, a burglary of a conveyance, like a car, is a third degree burglary. A person walking down the street, they’re an opportunist, and they check the door handles to find out what cars will open in the middle of the night. And they find one that opens. Once they reach inside and take whatever items they can get, that’s a burglary of the third degree. That’s a burglary of a conveyance. A person goes to a home, enters the home, and walks out with a television set. That’s a burglary of the second degree. Punishable by up to 15 years in prison. A person who gets convicted for the first-time burglary, even if they have no prior criminal history, scores on the score sheets that we use in Florida, a minimum of 21 months in the Department of Corrections. So, almost 2 years, even with no prior criminal history, and that doesn't change unless there's some type of reduction to the charge, or some negotiation in a plea disposition. The judge really doesn't have any discretion. And then there's the third degree burglary that comes up businesses. A person breaks into a store that may be closed at night, and walks out with something. So, that's the basic definition of a burglary: that you enter with the intent to commit an offense therein. So why that matter, the intent to commit an offense therein? That’s pretty important because that's what separates a felony in a lot of cases from a misdemeanor. So say a person, which I’ve seen as a prosecutor, a lot of times you might have some homes that were abandoned for a while, and maybe there's some homeless individuals who ended up spending the night in the home. And after spending the night in the home, maybe they damaged some of the property. Well, in that case, probably most the time the person when they entered the home didn't have an intent to commit an offense therein. Just walking into a home and taking a nap, or going to sleep, is not really anything other than a trespass. Which is a misdemeanor. It doesn't carry any kind of prison sentence whatsoever. If the person enters the home, and end up stealing something, or enters the home and end up causing some type of criminal mischief or damage, courts have decided that you can use that the act that is committed to prove that that was the initial intent upon entering. There's another way to prove intent, and they say that you don’t have to prove intent to commit offense therein if the person is entering the home surreptitiously (meaning entering the home under cover of darkness, maybe disguised the middle of the night, sneaking in). If that's able to be established you don't have to prove what the person’s intent was. But in all burglary cases, a basic element the prosecutor has to prove to the jury, is that the time of the entry this person intended to commit a crime. I've have seen plenty cases, both as a prosecutor, as a defense lawyer, where you have individuals who are friends, or associates, or acquaintances who know each other. A person is invited into the home. At some point there's an argument, and maybe a battery happens, somebody hits somebody inside the home, or somebody breaks some items and maybe even walks out with something. None of those instances are burglaries, unless certain elements are established, because the person was invited into the home. So, you don't have the unlawful entry into the home. You have maybe a crime that happened inside, which would be no different really than if it happened outside. A battery, a theft, a criminal mischief. So, what a person can however, a homeowner can remove that person's invitation to enter. That has to be announced, “Hey, you’re no longer welcome here. You need to leave.” Then if a crime is committed, then potentially the state can establish a burglary charge. But burglaries can be pretty serious because they carry pretty stiff sentences. Like the robbery charges they elevate depending upon how the crime is committed, and whether or not a weapon is used. If, during the course of committing a burglary, a person is armed, well then you end up getting yourself in a situation where you have a life felony. And that is obviously the ultimate sentence you can get, aside from capital punishment of death cases, life imprisonment. So, if a person enters a home with a firearm, or with a deadly weapon like a knife, or a billy club, that is punishable by life. The other thing that makes it punishable by life is if someone breaks into a home, and at some point during that entry to the home there’s someone inside the house, and that person gets hit, or there's a threat to hurt that person that is punished much more severely. And that's punishable by life felony. So, once there's a person inside the home things kind of elevate a little bit especially if there's some threat to be made. Now, the unique that I have seen, as both a prosecutor and as a defense lawyer, what happens a lot, and what makes what seem like very insignificant crimes in the grand scheme of things very serious are these road rage type cases. These are the cases where somebody determines that somebody's driving wasn't courteous, or wasn't proper. At some point some guy gets out of his car, and walks over to the other person, and maybe punches him while he’s seated inside of his car. Well, that could be two things. That could be a battery – hitting somebody. That could be a trespass and a battery. Meaning once the hand crosses the threshold of the window the car. Or, that could be a punishable by life first degree burglary. Because it's a burglary of a conveyance, it’s the unauthorized entry into the car, and there's an intent to commit a crime inside. And that intent to commit a crime happens to be during the course of committing that, is an assault or battery. There have been a lot of cases with some famous folks who have been involved in situations like that. And it's one of those things that happens to a lot of people. It’s that one moment in life that somebody maybe loses composure. They end up doing what in all cases would be something punishable by probation. They end up committing a crime that's has a very severe punishment - a minimum amount of time in Department of Corrections- up to a maximum of life. B: You mentioned that there is a difference between home and also property or business. M: Correct. B: I was teenager once. I didn't do it, but a lot of people will go into the store, grab a case of beer, and run out. But you said that they had to prove that they had intent to do that I guess beforehand. M: There's more than that. Because one of the essential parts to prove a burglary is that the person entered unlawfully. So, when you enter a business, obviously everyone is invited to enter a business. So,   that's why when a person walks into a business during regular hours and steals a case of beer – that’s a theft. That’s not a burglary. B: Okay. That would be under the robbery sudden snatching? M: It wouldn’t even be under that. It’s a theft because unless the attendant is the person you're stealing from, or the person behind the counter. When you walk in you steal a beer from the cooler and you’re walking out, that person may see it and realize it but you're not taking it from that person. B: Okay. M: If you walked in and you took something that was on the attendant, like you picked his pocket, and he turned around and saw you, that might change things. So, the way you transition that, what we're just talking about, from a theft to a burglary, you have to break into the store in the middle of the night when the store’s closed, and not open it to the public. There is another scenario, where if you're in a place that’s open to the public, but you cross the threshold and go into an area that's closed off. For instance, where you see a door that says “Employees Only”, if you open that door, and the section of the store, the State might be able to establish the elements needed to prove that you entered somewhere unlawfully that you had no invitation to enter. And you took something from there, and that would be a burglary. B: This isn’t necessarily under burglary, but you know, how you see the people that walk in and they act like they have a gun in their pocket. M: That’s a robbery. B: Okay, and they don't necessarily have a gun, but that's with force or threat. Correct? M: Correct. That would be a second-degree robbery, unless they can prove, here's a unique thing about that, in the end that's going to be a jury question. I can tell you that if a guy walks in, and he has his hand in his pocket of his sweatshirt or something like that, and makes it look as if it's a firearm. If that person gets arrested later, let’s say a day later, the testimony is going to be, the attendant is going to say, “I thought I saw a gun.” And that's going to be the evidence. So, obviously a good defense lawyer is going to hone in on “Can they prove that this person was armed?” Because you've just taken a second degree felony and made it a punishable by life felony. But, the jury’s the one that’s going to decide whether the person was armed or not. Just because they don't find a weapon, doesn't mean a prosecutor might not try to convict that person of an armed robbery. B: Anything else on burglary charges Mike? M: That pretty much covers the general course of burglaries. There is this element of a burglary that involves, kind of a robbery. And that’s a home invasion robbery. That's when a person breaks into the house and ends up robbing someone using force or threat of force to take something from that person. That is kind of its own unique crime, and that kind of has the same levels if a person uses a firearm or other deadly weapon he can he commits a felony of the first degree punishable by life. If he commits a home invasion robbery, and carries a weapon, he commits a first-degree felony which is not punishable by life, but punishable by 30 years. With no weapon it’s simply a felony of the first degree, again punishable by 30 years in prison. B: We've got to two more podcasts that we’re going to be recording here, and that will be over property crimes and stolen cars. This is the Tampa burglary charges defense lawyer Mike Kenny at Bauer, Crider, and Parry. Join us for our next edition of floridadefense.com podcast.

Heyang:大家好！我是赫扬~欢迎来到这周RT英语词汇小百科。今天和马克我们要一起来聊一聊关于shower的那些事儿。Mark: Yes, and today we are going to be talking about a phenomenon of…either the weather or the bathroom. Right? HY: I guess so. Actually this word has a surprisingly wide range of different meanings. M: And the word is…HY: Shower!M: Yeah, we’re going to be talking about shower. So most of us are familiar in getting up in the morning and have a shower. Or actually many of my Chinese friends tell me that they have a shower last thing at night. There’s a cultural difference. Some people have a shower both at night and in the morning. HY: And that’s a waste of water. But anyway, I think that going to bed without a shower is dirtying the bed. M: Some people never have a shower. Isn’t it funny how you can always tell who those people are on the subway. HY: Yes, it’s pretty obvious. One thing that always interested me and at first got me a bit confused is, in English, there’s this phrase “baby shower.” At first, I thought it’s about giving a bath to a baby. And it turns out to be a completely different thing. M: This is an American thing actually. I don’t think it appears outside of America. But maybe it’s spreading through films and TV shows like Friends. I don’t know if there ever was a baby shower in Friends. But I’ll bet there was. Because it’s just the kind of thing that they would include in something like Friends, isn’t it? Baby shower, as far as I know not being an American citizen and my knowledge of this is limited, I think it is where friends of the new mother buy gifts and give the gifts to the mother and have a sort of party. Why not? And they would get thing that are quite useful like nappies or sometimes in America known as dippers, blankets, useful stuff. I think it’s a good new tradition really the baby shower. HY: Yeah, I think it’s the perfect occasion to celebrate the transformation of a woman into a mother. That’s something quite culturally unique, coz we don’t see that very much in China. But I do think it is an opportunity and occasion worth celebrating. M: Sometimes it’s the companies themselves that are behind these new traditions. Is ‘new tradition’ an oxymoron? I think it is, isn’t? It’s something where each word contradicts itself. Anyway, it could be that it’s the manufacturers of the baby products that are behind this. So what, people don’t have to do it. Actually they do, it’s become part of the baby tradition in America. That’s quite a good word to use for it. Coz they ‘shower’ the baby with gifts. We said that there’s two meanings to this word, but there aren’t really. Because there’s the shower you take in the morning, there’s the baby shower, or there’s a shower of rain which is light rain usually not lasting for very long. In fact, they all have the same meaning. Meaning something descending on you from above whether it be rain or water from the shower or presents. It’s pretty much the same meaning in all the uses of the word shower.HY: And what about that phrase called “April showers bring May flowers.” What does it mean? Is it a nursery rhythm?M: I’ve never heard of it. I don’t know where you’ve got it from. I’m always impressed when you find these ancient bits of English culture and literature. And I’ve never heard of any of them. But it makes sense, doesn’t it? Because April showers gets the ground moist in April. So that means the seeds will pop up in May as flowers I suppose that’s what it refers to. HY: It is a reminder that even the most unpleasant things, in this case the heavy rains of April, can bring about very enjoyable things indeed – in this case, an abundance of flowers in May. Many of life’s greatest things come only to those who wait, and by patiently and happily enduring the clouds and damp of April you can find yourself more easily able to take in the sights and smells of May. After all, it’s easier to love something if you begin with an optimistic outlook. I think it’s actually quite a nice phrase.M: There’s one more meaning of shower that does have a different meaning. Our listeners who like watching old English films starring people like Terry Thomas perhaps you’ve never heard of him but it’s worth watching some of his movies and it was used to describe a bunch of losers. He’d say something like ‘What an absolute shower!’ that’s how he’s pretty much spoke. I think that was quite a good impression of him. So that’s another use of it which is different to the other meanings. HY: That’s all the time we have for this week’s Word of The Week. We’ll see you next week!

1. W: Congratulations! I hear you are going to join the army. M: Thanks. But actually, it’s my twin brother who’s going to join the army. I am going to university. I wish to be a lawyer in the future. 2. W: Dad, can we go to the shop? I want to buy some sweets. M: There are so many other wonderful things that you can buy. Why not buy a book or some pencils? 3. W: Where’s Jane? It’s two fifteen. M: Yeah. We planned to meet here at two o’clock. Maybe she missed the train. W: I can wait for another fifteen minutes. But then, I have to leave. M: Okay, let’s wait until two thirty. 4. M: Hey, Jenny, you still play basketball? W: Sometimes. M: Well, we are playing basketball tonight at the park. Will you join us? W: Oh, I can’t. I am working tonight. I just got a job at a bookstore. 5. M: Good morning, may I help you? W: I’d like to rent a car, please. M: Okay. Full size, mid-size or small size, madam? W: Small size, please. What’s the rate? M: 78 dollars a day. 6-7 M: Hi, I’m Martin. Are you new here? I haven’t seen you around. W: Yes, I only started on Monday. M: Great! So what department are you in? W: Housekeeping. M: Oh, yeah. I work on reception. W: I see. Are you American? M: No. I’m from Sydney, Australia. How about you? W: I’m from Brazil. How long have you been here in Singapore? M: Nearly three years now. I like it here a lot. W: Me, too. 8-9 W: And finally the weather. Tonight we’ll be cool and cloudy in most parts of the country with some showers in the north. The temperature will be cool, around eleven degrees. The wind will get stronger overnight, bringing a fresh bright morning, clear skies and a hot sunny day all over. The temperature in the south will hit twenty-three degrees in the early afternoon, but lower in the north, around twenty degrees. The temperature will cool off in the early evening, dropping to around fifteen degrees, but still clear and warm. So a good day for an evening barbeque. That’s all for now. Good night. 10-12 W: John, just a few questions on your motivation. I know you developed your business with local people. What made you do that? M: Well, I’ve always tried to employ local people to help the local industry. But because we are not province of Spain with little unemployment, I have to use people from outside the area, too. W: What about management style? Are you a hard manager, John? M: No, I don’t think so. I’ve got strong character and as a manager, I am strong, but when I need to fire people, I give them five or… ten more chances. W: And what’s the future for you? What will keep you going? M: For business, well, a new vice president joined the company two weeks ago, so I can devote more time to customers and new products. And privately, I have decided to improve my quality of life. I am thinking of taking every Wednesday afternoon off. This means I can do some training courses, more relaxing activities. 13-15 M: Welcome to Sherwood Holiday Village. We hope you will enjoy your holiday with us. The sports complex is open from 6 a.m. from 9 p.m., and is available for tennis, badminton and bowling. You can hire equipment for just four pounds. Coaching is available at ten pounds per hour, but you must book in advance. If you enjoy competition, there will be a variety of games throughout the week. Please write your name on the notice board if you are interested. And if you need something to drink after a game, you can purchase fruit juice, mineral water and other drinks from the bar. Just to remind you that appropriate shoes must be worn in the sports complex. Next to the sports complex is a swimming pool. If you want to look your best in the pool, our sports shop has a wide range of designed swimming wear. For good meals, you can go to the Sherwood Restaurant. If you’d like to try the buffet, you can have a meal for just eight pounds. If you prefer to eat in, you can purchase food from the mini market. The bread, fresh fruit and vegetables are delivered to the mini market daily. For all inquiries, please come to the reception desk and we’ll be glad to assist. 16-20 W: Hello, Home & Office Supplies. Can I help you? M: Yes, it’s Thompson Electronics here. We have an account with you. W: Oh, yes. How can I help? M: We just have some printers delivered, but they are the wrong ones. W: Oh, dear. I do apologize for the mistake. M: I don’t know how you could have got it wrong. We order from you all the time. W: I know. But unfortunately, we’ve been having a problem with our computer system. M: Well, how can we sort this out? W: Could you bear with me a moment please? Ah, yes, I have the order here. You want 25 HW3C56 printers. Is that correct? M: Yes, that’s right. But you sent us 25 HW56 instead. W: I see. I’ll sort it out right away and we’ll post the order special delivery. M: Thanks. W: I’ll put a $300 credit on your account to make up the inconvenience as well. Is that all right? M: Oh, that’s very nice. Thanks.

Using imperatives to tell people to do something Hi and welcome to another great lesson from New English Academy. I’m Giles Parker and I’m your guide for this course. Today we’re going to look at some really useful phrasal verbs. Phrasal verbs are verbs that have two words to them, always a verb and either a preposition or a particle. You hear them all the time in spoken English so it is a good idea to start learning them. We’re also going look at how to tell people what to do. This is called the imperative form and it is very useful for giving instructions and giving directions or orders. Our comprehension text today is called ‘Pass the paint pot’ and features a dialogue between yours truly and a friend of mine, Marian, who helped me paint my house recently. He is just starting to learn English, so please forgive some of his pronunciation. I think he does very well. As ever, you can download the free transcript and the free guidebook with 25 different activities on how to improve your English using these podcasts from the website, www.newenglishacademy.com. Don’t forget to check out the catalogue of free online English courses too. This podcast is aimed at beginner level students but there is something useful here for everyone. Grammar explanation: Here in the Green Heart of Italy, I have made lots of new friends. Some friends are local people and other friends come from foreign countries to find work here. My friend Marian comes from Slovakia. He is a stone-mason, which means he knows how to build things with stone. Marian speaks pretty good Italian, but many of the people he works for don't come from Italy and they don't speak much Italian. So, he has to speak to them in English. Often, they want to help him do his job. This means Marian has to speak to them in a mixture of Italian and English. He has to give them instructions and directions and tell them what to do and how to do it. When Marian tells someone to do something, he uses a very useful bit of grammar - the imperative form of a verb. The imperative is the verb when you tell someone to do something, when you give directions or instructions or give an order. It's very easy to use. It is also very direct and straight so it is a good idea to be polite with it.  To tell someone to do something with the imperative just use the base form of the verb - that is, the verb without to. You don't have to change it or add anything to it.  So for example: Give me that nail gun. Start the compressor. If you want to tell someone not to do something, I mean, if you want to use the imperative in the negative, that is really easy too. Just add Do not before the verb. To make it friendlier, or politer add Please and make a contraction from Do not to Don't... So for example: Don't stand there. Please don't do that. Marian always tries to be polite so he doesn't always use imperatives. Instead, he makes them into requests. This means, he asks you to do something. It is very easy to take an imperative and change it into a request. All you need is a simple modal auxiliary, such as Can or could and make it into a question.  For example: Could you pass me that hammer, please? Can you put away the tools, please? When someone uses imperatives or requests, you can answer in a couple of ways. If you want to do it, you can say Sure! or OK! For example: · Put that hammer in the box there. Sure! · Don’t throw out that newspaper. OK. But…if you don't want to do it then you have to find a polite way to refuse. Refusing or saying no to anything in English is not as simple as just saying No! We’ll look at how to refuse things in more detail in another lesson. Lastly, a quick word about some of the verbs in today’s lesson. We’re going to look at phrasal verbs, or two-word verbs. This means they have a preposition or a particle after the verb.  They are very common and you’ll hear them all the time in spoken English.  And like everything in any language, there are some rules. Some phrasal verbs need an object. This means they need a something or someone to receive the action of the verb. For example: · You should put away the tools  – put away is the phrasal verb and tools is the object. You can put the object either after the verb and the particle OR between the verb and the particle. So, for example; · Don’t turn on the radio. · Don’t turn the radio on. Did you see where the object is? The object of both these sentences is the radio. In the first sentence it is after the phrasal verb, in the second it is between the verb and the particle. Lastly, one important rule: When the object is a pronoun, it has to go between the verb and the particle. So for example; · Turn the radio off. · Turn it off. Some phrasal verbs don’t take an object so there is no problem with where to put the pronoun. As I said, phrasal verbs are really common in spoken English. There is no easy way to learn them other than by reading and listening and remembering them. You can get a list of which phrasal verbs in the vocabulary lesson in the online course on imperatives and phrasal verbs on the website. Now for some reading and listening comprehension. With the right imperatives to tell his friends and helpers what to do, Marian can build and fix houses. Last week Marian and I worked together. He is the boss so he asked or told me to do lots of different things. While you listen to the dialog try to find all the imperatives. Then, listen again and find all the requests. You can check them on the transcript. Also, check what phrases we use to say yes! when we give an order or make a request. On the transcript, use a highlighter to show the imperative and the answer. Enjoy! That’s an imperative! Comprehension text A couple of weeks ago, Marian and I worked together to paint my house. It was a lot easier with two guys doing the work. I had painted houses before but Marian has more experience than me so he told me what to do sometimes. It all started when I asked him to help me. G: Marian, could you take a look at the paint in my house sometime soon? Some of it is old and needs fixing. M: Sure! When is a good time for you? G: How about tomorrow morning? M: OK. Phone me when you are ready. G: OK. Can you give me an estimate tomorrow too? M: Probably. Let me look at it and we'll see. I have to measure the walls. G: Oh, and could you let me know tomorrow what things we need? M: Sure. It depends on the house, you know? Do I have to prepare an invoice too? G: What? An invoice? So the next day I phoned him and he came over. Here is how it went. G: OK, this is the living room... M: Hmm... look at that damp patch in the corner. We will have to fix that. G: OK, what else? M: Could you help me move the sofa? Thanks. OK - come here a minute. G: What's up? M: There is something wrong with the skirting board here. G: OK, I see. Can you fix it too? M: Sure. No problems. I'll do it later. Now, pass me the ladder, will you? G: Here you go. M: OK, we need to put masking tape all around the doors and windows. G: Sure. Give me the tape and I'll get started over here. M: Pick up the tool box - I think the tape is under it. G: OK, I got it. M: Right. Let's get started. You finish putting up the tape; I'll take a look at the damp patch. G: OK... We worked together and put up the masking tape. The damp patch was difficult to fix, however.  M: OK we have a small problem here. Could you hand me that trowel? I want to dig out some of the old plaster here in this corner. G: Here you go. Can I do anything to help? M: Sure. Get the new plaster for me, please. Then put some of it on this float and pass it up to me when I'm ready. G: Right. Watch out for the old plaster here. Don't let it get in your eyes. It isn't good for you. M: No worries. Here we go. I finished. Now, could you hand me the float with the new plaster? Thanks. G: Sure. Be careful around the edges there. M: It's OK - I know what I'm doing. G: Great - that looks better already. What next? M: Well, we have to wait for it to dry before we can paint it. But we can tidy up the room and get ready for the first coat.... So we started tidying up the place and moving the furniture. M: OK, could you give me a hand with this cabinet? I want to put it into the middle of the room, under the light. It will be safer there. G: Got it. Gee, it's heavy - difficult to move... M: Don't worry - just use koshi mawashi... G: Ha ha, funny guy. What about the tools? They are everywhere... M: OK - put them away. The brushes, mixer and the float go in the bucket. Put the trowel and the tape back in the toolbox. Don’t throw out that paint thinner – it will be useful later. G: Sure. Anything else? M: Hmm... could you turn on the light and turn off the radio? I need perfect light and peace when I'm painting a room. G: OK, Picasso. Lights on, radio off. Right. Let's go have a coffee before we start painting. M: Good idea! After the coffee we mixed up the paint, climbed up the ladders and started painting. The first coat went on the ceiling and walls nice and smoothly and after a couple of hours we were ready to stop for the day and let the paint dry. M: OK, I think we can quit now. Let’s stop here, clean up, and start again tomorrow morning. G: Alright. I’ll wash the rollers and brushes. M: OK, but don’t wash them in hot water, just use cold water. And when you have finished, don’t let them stay wet. Dry them on the tree outside. G: Got it. How about pay? M: Don’t pay me today. Pay me tomorrow when we finish the job. G: Fine – see you tomorrow, then. M: Ciao.   G: Ciao.

We’ll do an eye pressure test next. 次は眼圧検査をします。 ◆眼科検査室で―眼底検査と眼圧検査 次は眼科の検査です。松本看護師（M）が眼底検査と眼圧検査を行います。※A：アンダーソンさん　 M：We need to do a fundus examination. It’s an examination of the back of the eye. Please sit down, rest your chin here, and put your forehead here. 眼底検査をします。目の裏側を調べる検査です。座って，顎をここに乗せて，額はここに付けてください。 A：OK. はい。 M：There will be a flash, but please keep your eyes open.   フラッシュの光が当たりますが，目を開いていてくださいね。 ―眼底検査が終わり，アンダーソンさんに眼圧測定機の前に移動してもらいます― M：We’ll do an eye pressure test next. 次は眼圧検査をします。 ―眼底検査と同じ姿勢をとってもらい― M：Keep looking at the red light in front of you. A small puff of air will blow onto your eye. Please try not to close your eyes. 目の前にある赤いライトを見ていてください。ちょっとひと吹き，目に空気を当てます。目を閉じないようにしてください。 【ワードチェック！】 fundus examination：眼底検査　rest：～に置く　chin：顎　forehead：額　flash：フラッシュ　eye pressure：眼圧　keep looking：見ている　puff：ひと吹き　air：空気　blow：吹く　 　 【ミニ解説】 fundus には「底」という意味がありますが，ここでは ocular fundus（眼底）という意味に使っています。眼底検査は funduscopy や ophthalmoscopy という医学用語もありますが,  患者さんには fundus examination と言って，さらに説明を加えたりするのがよいですね。眼圧は ocular pressure ですが，これもわかりやすく eye pressure などと言う工夫をしましょう。 a small puff of air のように空気を当てるときに「ちょっとひと吹き」のように言うことは大切です。ただ air だけだとどの程度の量かわからず不安になる人もいると思います。

７月と８月の第１週は「ドラマで英語を学ぼう」の新作「ニュージーランドの旅人（A Tourist in New Zealand）」をお届けしています。今回はその第２回目にして最終回です。 舞台はニュージーランドの首都ウェリントン（Wellington）。Maiは友人のJaneとウェリントンを観光する予定だったのですが、彼女の前に現れたのはJaneではなく、お兄さんのBob。今回、二人はウェリントン市内の博物館や、Beehiveと呼ばれる国会議事堂などを旅します。そして最後に、何とJaneが意外なところで姿を現すことに・・・。 リスナーの皆さんも、どうぞMaiとBobと一緒にニュージーランドの旅をお楽しみください！ 今回お借りした素材 写真（ニュージーランドの国会議事堂、通称"Beehive"）：Wikipedia Download MP3 （12:38　7.4MB　中級） "A Tourist in New Zealand" (C) 2012 Ayumi Furutani and FLaRE.A Tourist in New Zealand (Part 2, finale) Written by Ayumi Furutani (in the building) W: What can we see in this museum? M: It's got all sorts of things. For example it shows what animals there were and are in New Zealand, how the land was made by the dynamic earth movement, and there are modern works of art. They have a Maori culture exhibition too. W: Oh, I'd like to see the Maori culture exhibition. M: There is a marae, created by leading Maori carvers. W: What's a marae? M: It's a communal meeting place. My high school had one in the school where some students get together and practice dancing. W: The carvings are beautiful! I saw these patterns at the airport and on the signs in the streets. M: Yeah, these Maori designs can be seen all over New Zealand. You can see more New Zealand art on the upper floor. There are European, Maori, historical, and contemporary works. W: I think it's wonderful that Maori culture is not lost even though a lot of people came from Europe to this country. M: Yeah. I think we do pretty good at trying to keep a balance between European and Maori culture. W: And it's very island-like to use woods and shells. M: These paua shells are often used for accessories…Shall we go to the next place? W: OK. I'm hungry. How about you? M: Me too. Let's get something to eat. What would you like to have for lunch? W: How about a meat pie? M: A meat pie? I thought you'd say something more Japanese, like sushi or something! W: I love meat pies and fish and chips. I think I should start a business in Japan…a fish and chips shop, or a meat pie shop! They might turn out to be another fast food shop, like McDonald's in Japan! M: …Maybe…Hey, I know a shop. They have great meat pies! W: OK. Let's go! …… (After having meat pies) W: Wow, that was good! Where are we going next? M: I'm thinking to take you to the cable car. W: Sounds nice. How do we get there? M: We just walk there. The station is in the middle of the city…It might be a little bit hard to find. Shall we go now? W: OK……Wellington is not a big city for a capital, is it? There don't seem to be many shops. M: Yeah, it is small compared to Tokyo! But there are a lot of office buildings. There are also museums, a zoo, parks, and beaches. I think it's a nice city. Wind is strong, though…Oh, there's a wind turbine on the hill too…Can you see the sign for the cable car station? Woman: That? I didn't think it would be around here! This is like the middle of the city! M: Ha ha. Good eh? ……Let's get in. W: This is lovely! And it's a great view of the city! By the way, where are we going? M: There's a Botanic Garden up there. I'm thinking that we'll walk down. You're not tired yet, are you? W: Of course not! Let's walk. M: (walking) So how did you meet Jane? W: We became friends on the Internet. There was a Web site that introduces people who want a pen pal. M: I see. W: She said New Zealand is a very nice place, so I decided to come here. It's a shame I can't see her…do you know if she's free tomorrow? M: Hmm…Ah…I think she'll be at the stadium tonight. I asked her to come. W: Really!? That's great! I wonder what she's like… (A little later) W: Oh, I can see the city street now. Where do we go next? M: We're going to see the government building. W: Is that so? Those European buildings? They look like castles! M: Yeah, this is where the government buildings are. That's Parliament House, an Edwardian neo-classical building. And can you see the unique building over there? W: That circular building? M: That's The Beehive. It's the Executive Wing of the Parliamentary complex. The name comes from its shape. That's where the Prime Minister and other ministers have offices. W: I see. Wow, I really love Wellington now. Thank you so much for showing me around. I really liked it. M: You're welcome. I'm glad you had a good time. OK…Shall we go to the stadium? We'd better get in there before it gets crowded. W: OK. Hey, who do you think will win tonight? M: The Hurricanes, of course! W: Wow, you're a real fan of the Hurricanes! M: Yep. W: When will Jane come? M: Ah…Um…Mai…I have something to tell you. W: …What is it? M: Um… I'm Jane! W: WHAT!? M: I'm the Jane you met on the Internet. I was pretending to be a woman. So sorry! W: …So, you were lying to me from the beginning? M: I didn't mean to…I just thought it would be different to pretend like a woman. I'm sorry for not telling you the truth until now, Mai. W: I guess I shouldn't trust everything on the Internet! M: I didn't mean to trick you! And I'm so glad that I can be with you, here, now. W: Whatever. Goodbye…Give me the tickets. M: Huh?...(she takes the tickets) Hey!! W: I'm going to watch the game with a MAN!......(She walks away and comes back seconds later) Hi, I'm Mai. Nice to meet you. M: Huh??? Hi, um, I, I'm Bob. W: Would you like to watch a rugby game with me? M: …Ah, OK!……(To self: Ah, I can never understand girls!)

７月と８月の第１週は「ドラマで英語を学ぼう」の新作「ニュージーランドの旅人（A Tourist in New Zealand）」をお届けしています。今回はその第２回目にして最終回です。 舞台はニュージーランドの首都ウェリントン（Wellington）。Maiは友人のJaneとウェリントンを観光する予定だったのですが、彼女の前に現れたのはJaneではなく、お兄さんのBob。今回、二人はウェリントン市内の博物館や、Beehiveと呼ばれる国会議事堂などを旅します。そして最後に、何とJaneが意外なところで姿を現すことに・・・。 リスナーの皆さんも、どうぞMaiとBobと一緒にニュージーランドの旅をお楽しみください！ 今回お借りした素材 写真（ニュージーランドの国会議事堂、通称"Beehive"）：Wikipedia Download MP3 （12:38　7.4MB　中級） "A Tourist in New Zealand" (C) 2012 Ayumi Furutani and FLaRE.A Tourist in New Zealand (Part 2, finale) Written by Ayumi Furutani (in the building) W: What can we see in this museum? M: It's got all sorts of things. For example it shows what animals there were and are in New Zealand, how the land was made by the dynamic earth movement, and there are modern works of art. They have a Maori culture exhibition too. W: Oh, I'd like to see the Maori culture exhibition. M: There is a marae, created by leading Maori carvers. W: What's a marae? M: It's a communal meeting place. My high school had one in the school where some students get together and practice dancing. W: The carvings are beautiful! I saw these patterns at the airport and on the signs in the streets. M: Yeah, these Maori designs can be seen all over New Zealand. You can see more New Zealand art on the upper floor. There are European, Maori, historical, and contemporary works. W: I think it's wonderful that Maori culture is not lost even though a lot of people came from Europe to this country. M: Yeah. I think we do pretty good at trying to keep a balance between European and Maori culture. W: And it's very island-like to use woods and shells. M: These paua shells are often used for accessories…Shall we go to the next place? W: OK. I'm hungry. How about you? M: Me too. Let's get something to eat. What would you like to have for lunch? W: How about a meat pie? M: A meat pie? I thought you'd say something more Japanese, like sushi or something! W: I love meat pies and fish and chips. I think I should start a business in Japan…a fish and chips shop, or a meat pie shop! They might turn out to be another fast food shop, like McDonald's in Japan! M: …Maybe…Hey, I know a shop. They have great meat pies! W: OK. Let's go! …… (After having meat pies) W: Wow, that was good! Where are we going next? M: I'm thinking to take you to the cable car. W: Sounds nice. How do we get there? M: We just walk there. The station is in the middle of the city…It might be a little bit hard to find. Shall we go now? W: OK……Wellington is not a big city for a capital, is it? There don't seem to be many shops. M: Yeah, it is small compared to Tokyo! But there are a lot of office buildings. There are also museums, a zoo, parks, and beaches. I think it's a nice city. Wind is strong, though…Oh, there's a wind turbine on the hill too…Can you see the sign for the cable car station? Woman: That? I didn't think it would be around here! This is like the middle of the city! M: Ha ha. Good eh? ……Let's get in. W: This is lovely! And it's a great view of the city! By the way, where are we going? M: There's a Botanic Garden up there. I'm thinking that we'll walk down. You're not tired yet, are you? W: Of course not! Let's walk. M: (walking) So how did you meet Jane? W: We became friends on the Internet. There was a Web site that introduces people who want a pen pal. M: I see. W: She said New Zealand is a very nice place, so I decided to come here. It's a shame I can't see her…do you know if she's free tomorrow? M: Hmm…Ah…I think she'll be at the stadium tonight. I asked her to come. W: Really!? That's great! I wonder what she's like… (A little later) W: Oh, I can see the city street now. Where do we go next? M: We're going to see the government building. W: Is that so? Those European buildings? They look like castles! M: Yeah, this is where the government buildings are. That's Parliament House, an Edwardian neo-classical building. And can you see the unique building over there? W: That circular building? M: That's The Beehive. It's the Executive Wing of the Parliamentary complex. The name comes from its shape. That's where the Prime Minister and other ministers have offices. W: I see. Wow, I really love Wellington now. Thank you so much for showing me around. I really liked it. M: You're welcome. I'm glad you had a good time. OK…Shall we go to the stadium? We'd better get in there before it gets crowded. W: OK. Hey, who do you think will win tonight? M: The Hurricanes, of course! W: Wow, you're a real fan of the Hurricanes! M: Yep. W: When will Jane come? M: Ah…Um…Mai…I have something to tell you. W: …What is it? M: Um… I'm Jane! W: WHAT!? M: I'm the Jane you met on the Internet. I was pretending to be a woman. So sorry! W: …So, you were lying to me from the beginning? M: I didn't mean to…I just thought it would be different to pretend like a woman. I'm sorry for not telling you the truth until now, Mai. W: I guess I shouldn't trust everything on the Internet! M: I didn't mean to trick you! And I'm so glad that I can be with you, here, now. W: Whatever. Goodbye…Give me the tickets. M: Huh?...(she takes the tickets) Hey!! W: I'm going to watch the game with a MAN!......(She walks away and comes back seconds later) Hi, I'm Mai. Nice to meet you. M: Huh??? Hi, um, I, I'm Bob. W: Would you like to watch a rugby game with me? M: …Ah, OK!……(To self: Ah, I can never understand girls!)

先週に引き続き、イギリスを舞台とした会話をお届けします。今回のタイトルを直訳すると「イギリスっ子は時に文句を言いたがる」。パブでの男女の会話から、イギリス人気質に迫ってみたいと思います。果たして会話の男女はどのようなことについて不平を言っているのでしょうか。 今回お借りした素材 写真：Wikipedia Download MP3 （18:59　11.0MB　初級～中級）** Script *** (Slow speed) 03:15-05:35 (Natural speed) 14:25-16:15 Brits Sometimes Like to Complain Scene: A man and a woman bring their drinks out into the pub garden. M: Ah, I love a nice pub garden! W: It would be nice if it was a little warmer. M: What are you talking about? It's spring! I saw daffodils in the park! W: Daffodils are NOT the sign that it's OK to sit outside. I'm freezing! M: There was no room inside anyway. We might as well make the best of it. Look, there's a bit of sunlight over there! W: How very British. As soon as there's a sign that the sun's coming out, everyone rushes outside in shorts and t-shirts with picnic baskets! M: Well, you know: it's not often we get good weather like this. It hasn't rained in a week! W: That's true. I tell you what, though: the price of beer has gone way up! M: I know, it's awful. W: And the queue at the bar – how long did we wait? Ten minutes at least! M: They need to hire some more bar staff, if people are having to wait that long. The service in this place used to be so much better. W: I prefer the King's Head to the Lion, anyway. M: You say that now, but when we went to the King's Head last time, that woman was there with her baby, and it wouldn't stop screeching the whole time we were there! W: Oh, you're right. I almost started screaming myself! M: Oh no, look! That man's bringing his dog in… It's one of those horrible dangerous-looking ones. What are they called, Bull Terriers? W: I wish they'd ban bringing dogs in here, especially those kinds. Did you hear about the man who got killed by one a couple of weeks ago? M: Yes. How terrible! I mean, what is the government thinking, allowing that kind of thing to happen? W: Oh, don't even start with those incompetent fools-- ruining this fine land of ours! M: … British people really do love complaining, don't we? W: Of course. It's our version of medicine! (Written by Anna Hill)

先週に引き続き、イギリスを舞台とした会話をお届けします。今回のタイトルを直訳すると「イギリスっ子は時に文句を言いたがる」。パブでの男女の会話から、イギリス人気質に迫ってみたいと思います。果たして会話の男女はどのようなことについて不平を言っているのでしょうか。 今回お借りした素材 写真：Wikipedia Download MP3 （18:59　11.0MB　初級～中級）** Script *** (Slow speed) 03:15-05:35 (Natural speed) 14:25-16:15 Brits Sometimes Like to Complain Scene: A man and a woman bring their drinks out into the pub garden. M: Ah, I love a nice pub garden! W: It would be nice if it was a little warmer. M: What are you talking about? It's spring! I saw daffodils in the park! W: Daffodils are NOT the sign that it's OK to sit outside. I'm freezing! M: There was no room inside anyway. We might as well make the best of it. Look, there's a bit of sunlight over there! W: How very British. As soon as there's a sign that the sun's coming out, everyone rushes outside in shorts and t-shirts with picnic baskets! M: Well, you know: it's not often we get good weather like this. It hasn't rained in a week! W: That's true. I tell you what, though: the price of beer has gone way up! M: I know, it's awful. W: And the queue at the bar – how long did we wait? Ten minutes at least! M: They need to hire some more bar staff, if people are having to wait that long. The service in this place used to be so much better. W: I prefer the King's Head to the Lion, anyway. M: You say that now, but when we went to the King's Head last time, that woman was there with her baby, and it wouldn't stop screeching the whole time we were there! W: Oh, you're right. I almost started screaming myself! M: Oh no, look! That man's bringing his dog in… It's one of those horrible dangerous-looking ones. What are they called, Bull Terriers? W: I wish they'd ban bringing dogs in here, especially those kinds. Did you hear about the man who got killed by one a couple of weeks ago? M: Yes. How terrible! I mean, what is the government thinking, allowing that kind of thing to happen? W: Oh, don't even start with those incompetent fools-- ruining this fine land of ours! M: … British people really do love complaining, don't we? W: Of course. It's our version of medicine! (Written by Anna Hill)