Life 2.0

I first met Dino over 30 years ago, when we were both working on a big sports memorabilia project focused on Joe DiMaggio. Selling high-end fine sports art wasn't on my dance card, but I knew there was more to this project to explore than the commissions (which were great!). Back then, he was an intense, intelligent, and interesting guy that I'd never thought I would ever see again. But through the magic of online connecting platforms, we reconnected, and I learned of his journey from millionaire promoter to finding out that you can have it all-and still not be satisfied, and fill the emptiness with alcohol and drugs. Now sober and clean, Dino shares his  remarkable story, and how a little wristband is changing lives. 

Have we lost our collective perspective on the rapture of being alive? Has unsocial media bent our joy factor totally out of whack? Are the billionaires (and millionaires) who live lives filled with stuff, bells and whistles that most of us don't have creating a modern-day caste system? Garry and John take a deep dive into figuring out what makes up happiness and how to offset the influx of internet overflow that can erode our sense of wonder. Does it really matter if you are someone who "Summers in the Hamptons" as opposed to summering in your own backyard with your feet in a kiddie pool?

You might be asking yourself, "Why is John doing an episode on an office chair?" Well, if you listen, you will learn about the puzzle pieces that led to me getting a new chair called "The Vortex" have more to do with than just replacing an old chair; it includes another strange "WTF, how did this happen" moment for me, when I found someone's car keys in my pocket after going to a White Sox game, which then led me to trying to find the owner, which in turn led to my conversation with Garry Meier about the "vortex" concept and a set of keys I lost 18 years ago. Yeah, it's a lot, but the real takeaway is that if you listen within, you will never go without.

When he was just a 14-year-old lad, Dan Mason was sending production notes to radio stations he listened to and was a "contest pig," sucking up everything from Beatles tickets to trips to Coney Island. He became an overnight DJ and moved up the radio ladder to program director at various stations and eventually was named President and CEO of CBS Radio not once, but twice. He talks with Garry and John about his new book "FEARLESS," his rise to fame, what it was like having to fire Don Imus, the time when Howard Stern called him the "C" word on air, and the time Taylor Swift jumped up on a table and gave him a private concert. Wrapping up the episode, John shares his recent unexplained experience of how a set of car keys (not his) ended up in his pocket after a recent White Sox game, with zero idea of how they got there. Garry thinks a vortex or the full moon is responsible. So, if you were at the Sox game on August 8th for Ozzie Day, and you lost your car keys...JSA has them.

Contrary to the Rolling Stones, time is NOT on your side. Digging through some of my audio archives this morning, I came across one of my favorite clips from back in 2001, when vaunted sports writer Dick Schaap was my guest on the radio talking about a new book, and we surprised him with a call from an old friend, Jerry Kramer. Dick passed away six months after our conversation, but Kramer is still kicking it at 90. The average life span is 78, which translates to 28,470 days to be alive-if you get that far. Dick passed away at the age of 67, which is the same age I am now-or 24,455 days for his lifespan. Some get more, many get a lot less, and maybe it's not adding years to your life, but rather life to your years that matters most.

They're back at it again, another weekly foray into varying levels of WTF with John's experience of spending 3 hours watching Matt "Bourne" Damon and his son Tom "Spider-Man" Holland while learning that it takes 6 feet of film to create 1 second of an IMAX movie. And why does it cost so much coin just for a couple of sodas and popcorn? Garry takes a deep dive into R-rated AI content with "Leave it to Beaver" (what's next? The Waltons?), and Bill Kurtis adds his thoughts on an indoor compost toilet on Earth Matters. Are you ready to use your own waste in the garden for bigger, plumper tomatoes?

It was a random Facebook post by a young friend of mine that seemed to be filled with despair about another horrible human tragedy that prompted this particular episode of the Life 2.0 podcast. The post started with..."What's happening to our world?..." and went on from there. I've been pondering (once again) what appears to be the deterioration of the human condition, until I think back to the time I was the same age as my friend, and all the difficult, horrible, low-down, bad news of that time. The "same shit different day" line comes to mind. A perspective shift is needed if we are to maintain our spiritual balance, and I suggest you take a stroll through history through times much more difficult than we are living in now, and consider that if your moral compass is determined by someone in political office, you're giving up your inner GPS to the headlines, and not your lifelines.

This is a total free-fall, free-for-all, freebie S&S episode in which a listener wants to know whether Garry and John are really doing this podcast or if it's AI-generated. From there, it's a deep dive into another year of Shark Week (more JAWS!), the evolution (or devolution) of the human condition when it comes to the DUI/OWI of Tony Romo, John explains to Garry the phenomenon of owning a Jeep, and more about Gavin McLeod and "The Love Boat" than you ever wanted to know. And for the record, the content is unscripted and human-generated, because we checked the box.

Happy Heavenly Birthday, Sweetness.

 

Worked with Walter on his foundation, golf outings, and other assorted projects for a couple of years. There's a whole chapter on him in my first book, "Living An Uncommon Life."

 

One of my favorite memories is when I once brought my three-year-old son Andy to the office. We had meetings with K-Mart about a major sponsorship for a project. About halfway through, Walter gets up, takes my son by the hand, and leaves the conference room. After the meeting is over, I find them both on the floor of his office, using golf balls to knock over tees like a mini-bowing alley while crunching down on "hard candy," aka Starlight Mints.

 

One of a kind, on and off the field.

111 years ago today, July 24th, 1915, the Eastland was bound for a day trip across Lake Michigan filled with employees of The Western Electric Company. Over 2,500 people boarded the boat, docked on the Chicago River, and less than an hour later, 844 men, women, children, and crew were killed in what was the largest loss of life from a single shipwreck on the Great Lakes.

 

So, how is it possible that over 90 years later, the name "Niels Petersen" was broadcast in an edit suite at the Oprah Radio Studios in 2008 on a speaker that wasn't even plugged in?

 

One of the most unbelievable experiences of my life, and it's why every July 24th, I make sure to remember the victims of the Eastland and to visit the resting place of Niels and his son Royal, who also perished.