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The Grey NATO – 379 – Slack Crew & A 2026 [Part 1]

Published on Thu, 11 Jun 2026 06:00:00 -0400

Synopsis

In episode 379 of The Grey NATO podcast, hosts Jason Eaton and James Stacy dive into a wide-ranging Q&A session with their Slack community supporters. The episode opens with automotive adventures - Jason shopping for a Toyota Prius while James successfully revives his Jeep Wrangler after eight months of storage, getting it up to their cottage for the summer. James also reviews the impressive new 2026 Longines Hydro Conquest Diver in 39mm, praising it as an exceptional value at $2,200 that competes with watches costing significantly more.

The bulk of the episode features thoughtful questions from the TGN Slack crew covering diverse topics beyond their typical watch-and-adventure fare. They discuss the evolution of their paid subscription model and Slack community, share their favorite hiking experiences (from Scotland's Quiraing to New Zealand's Milford Track), explore poetry and literature preferences, and reflect on what makes quality television and books engaging. Jason champions Mary Oliver and Gary Snyder for poetry, while both hosts praise shows like "The Agency" and books ranging from Donna Tartt's "Secret History" to Chuck Klosterman's essays. They also address their roles as reluctant "influencers," emphasizing their commitment to authenticity and their preference for the more intimate Slack community over broader social media engagement.

Show Notes

Transcript

Speaker
Jason Eaton Hello and welcome to another episode of the Grey NATO, a loose discussion of travel, adventure, diving, driving, and gear. Oh, and uh forgot about that. Watches as well. Uh this is episode three hundred seventy nine and it'sly pro broudught to you by the always growing TGN supporter crew. We thank you all so much for your continued support, and if you'd like to support the show, please visit thegraynato.com for more details. My name is Jason Eaton, and I'm joined as ever by my friend and co-host James Stacy. James just thought I'd throw a little wrench in things. I don't think we've ever done that with the intro. I hope that's not sacrilege.
James Stacy No, we'll leave it in, man. In the age of AI, we've got to accept that the mistakes are what make us special.
Jason Eaton Right. I uh I I think that's fine.
James Stacy Uh uh Lord knows I've definitely done ones where we have to do this three or four times and I just keep the good one. Uh so uh that's good. And I promise there will be uh plenty of watches in this episode, so I'm glad that we uh that we added that in.
Jason Eaton Yes indeed. Uh well great. So how
James Stacy have you been? I've been uh I've been doing
Jason Eaton pretty well. Um yeah not much uh exciting stuff to report here other than we had a great meetup in uh St. Paul just on Saturday. Um Steve T from the Slack group, he's been in town or or actually in Minnesota for several weeks now, visiting family and staying in an Airbnb with his own family and uh they've had a a couple of meetups and and I went to the second one which was on Saturday and it was well attended. Um I'm not going to try to name everybody that was there because I'll inevitably I'll forget somebody, but we had I would say eight to ten people show up at Lake Monster Brewing. That's nice on a pretty hot Saturday. We just kinda it's a nice place to big airy spot. We sat inside at a big long table and some good watches came out and uh some good chatting and so yeah, it was uh it was a lot of fun. Yeah. Yeah, always encourage people if you're passing through to to put out the put out the word in the meetups channel on Slack and uh it's always fun to kind of just do an impromptu thing with with folks. So great fun and thanks to Steve for initiating that.
James Stacy Yeah, that's great. Glad to hear it. I saw a few of the picks and I saw uh Tom Place had done his uh his sort of AI video uh you know re rethinkings of things that happened. I saw you throw a guy through a plate glass window. Uh that was a little bit, you
Jason Eaton know, I mean that's my alter ego. Exactly.
James Stacy And speaking of meetups, let's not forget that we have a meetup with Ciziten at Windup Chicago on July the 10th in the evening. That's the Friday. It'll be seven to nine at Forbidden Root. And stay tuned to the Slack and an uh upcoming episode for information about the RSVP. Um, but that'll be really good. And uh Jason, my flights are booked. Your flights are booked.
Jason Eaton Yeah, we're good to go. We're good to go.
James Stacy I'm looking forward to it. It's gonna be a fun few days in Chicago. Just a month away.
Jason Eaton Yeah, exactly. We're gonna do some sushi, um, as as usual, you and I and uh our meetup on Friday and then Saturday we've got the show kind of the first half of the day and then we're gonna go do some diving for the wind up in a lake organized by our buddy Chris Sowell, among others, and uh that should be a lot of fun and uh turn around and head back on Sunday, back home after uh some morning shenanigans, I'm sure. But uh it should be a kind of a whirlwind trip, but always fun to to meet folks. We we skipped last year's wind up in Chicago, so it'll be good to be back. I had a little sneak peek of wind up in San Francisco just for a couple of hours uh last month, and that was a lot of fun. But uh Chicago's always a favorite, so for sure.
James Stacy And then beyond that, it looks like you and I had the loosely similar automotive themed weekend. Yeah. You were car shopping. I was reviving a car, kinda kinda pulling out the defibrillator and get getting my uh getting the Jeep up and running. How how did yours go?
Jason Eaton Uh pretty well. It started last week. Um I'm I'm in the enviable position of not really having to to make a quick decision, so just started to look. Um this is actually a car for for my girlfriend Christy, whose um existing car will be passed on to her daughter uh at some point here later in the summer. So we're starting to look for a replacement. And you know, th those who know me uh might be surprised to to hear of my recent love of uh love might be a bit of a strong word for a Toyota Prius. Um uh I begrudgingly, you know, occasionally drive uh Christie's Prius or did that starting last year, and I've really kind of grown to like this car. It's uh it hauls a lot of stuff, it's very versatile. Obviously the gas mileage is great. Um I can't say stylistically it's my taste, but I've just really kind of come to appreciate kind of the opposite end of the car nerd spectrum as opposed to my Land Rovers.
James Stacy The appliance spectrum. The appliance. Or the appliance
Jason Eaton end. Exactly. Right. Hey there's
James Stacy somebody said for a really good fridge, right? Exactly.
Jason Eaton Right. And I I like your you know, we we' weve've been talking over the past uh week or so about cars and that sort of thing, kind of philosophy of cars, and and I liked your point about how you know you you can buy a car as a as an enthusiast vehicle, um, but if you're not in it for that, you might as well get the most practical thing. And
James Stacy totally the the Prius is that. It's a
Jason Eaton it's an A to B vehicle. It's also extremely practical, very reliable. I had some some fun uh replacing the front bumper on on the existing one here, um which was such an easy process to go to the dealership and buy the bumper and spray it and then and put it on pretty easily. Um so I'm kind of enjoying that aspect of of a very different sort of vehicle. And so long story short, um, I'm seeking a replacement Prius actually, looking for the bigger version. I don't know if it's called the V or the Five. It's it looks like a Roman numeral five. Who knows? It's more of the wagon version that they produced for a couple of years. And uh have one in mind, kind of narrowed down, just kind of waiting for something on it that needs uh fixing from the the used car dealer um before you know making a decision on that. But uh yeah, just taking taking my time and looking around and kind of having fun. I haven't shopped for a car in a good long time. So it's it's kind of fun to dip back into that world.
James Stacy Uh it's a good time. I'm glad. Yeah. Hopefully you you score something you're really happy with, and it's nice and reliable and it's easy to live with, and that gives you the sort of brain space and budget and the rest of it to deal with cars that
Jason Eaton aren't. Exactly. Perhaps like old
James Stacy British SUVs. Right. Um although to be fair, both of yours have have actually been quite reliable. So I'm not sure that always holds up.
Jason Eaton Yeah, right. Uh especially if you're willing to do a bit
James Stacy of wiring yourself, which is uh brings us to my lovely Jeep.
Jason Eaton Yeah, right. Speaking of uh four by fours with electrical issues.
James Stacy Yeah. So yeah, I've uh you know, in I guess it would have been that weekend you were here last year,
Jason Eaton mm-hmm uh Sarah and I had just transitioned
James Stacy from um I guess we had the the Wrangler and the the Toyota minivan, the Siena at the same time. We just got in the van and I think I hung I think I kept the Jeep in like by my house because you were around and uh and we were gonna be doing a fair bit of driving. If you remember we went down to the marathon event
Jason Eaton yeah um in uh in Martin's
James Stacy neighborhood and and we drove down with the the freedom panels, the the front part of the roof off and the weather looked fine, so I just you know, I was in a good mood. Uh that's usually when I make my worst decisions and uh and you know, went into the party and then part way through just could hear just a torrent of rain outside. And it we just, you know, it was up to the it was up to the ankles in there. Of course, you know, it's it's a jeep, it's fine. It was already rusty, so I'm sure we only contributed a small percentage in addition to that. But shortly after that it went to live just in my parents' driveway. They have a driveway that can fit more than a a few cars. And uh where I live in uh in Richmond Hill I can just fit the one and you're not allowed to street park. So it becomes this sort of complicated scenario if you want to do two vehicles and and not put one in the garage, which is now full of bikes and strollers and tires and all that kind of stuff. So uh lived at my parents' spot, and of course my dad was you know starting it every now and then and then one day it just wouldn't start. And I said, Yeah, that's gonna be the battery. Uh there is a uh a ground issue, so there's a open circuit somewhere, probably due to the some damage to one of the front fenders, you know, that tore a light out and uh and I just have to get in and and sort that wiring and I just haven't. Um I tried to re-establish the ground, it didn't make a difference. This probably isn't that interesting to most people. So anyways, went out um got really lucky actually uh uh really this never happens to me, so I will share it on the show. But I walked I I took the battery over to Canadian Tire, which is like the local auto parts sort of option for me. And uh it's where I bought the battery a few years ago. Same same, same, you know, chain. And I walked in and put it down and said, just another one of these, please. I this one is, you know, it it shows a charge, but it doesn't have enough cranking power. And so they're like, Oh, just one second, and they asked me for my information and they're like, Did you buy this for the Jeep? I said, Yeah, yeah. And they said, Oh, um, warranty's up tomorrow. So free
Jason Eaton one. I can't believe that. Wild,
James Stacy right? Yeah. So I they did a bit of paperwork and handed me a brand new battery.
Jason Eaton Wow. Uh I got that back to my parents
James Stacy the next day, put it in the Jeep, thing fired right up. Um it did not want to move from where it was. Uh so with uh with some careful clutch work and a lot of throttle, we were able to defeat the rust on all of the the uh rotors. And once that was kind of cleared up and we took it for a shakedown drive and got it sprayed off at the car wash, everything was good to go and it it did a a really solid, smooth three hour drive up to the cottage.
Jason Eaton Oh, nice. Um on route, uh,
James Stacy because I had an empty vehicle. Uh on route, I stopped by to pick up a barbecue. I'm this has been my barbecue summer. I've built bought and built two barbecues so far. Uh, for those curious both, were four hundred series Weber Spirits, uh, seemed to be the best, or at least among the two or three best under a thousand dollars Canadian for barbecue. So this is a four thirty five, which is a nice big four burner. Everything's metal. You can def I put it I've now built two of these myself. Uh had some help with the first one. A little bit of help does does go a long way in the starting phases, but once you've got the basic frame built. M ofost it just kind of snaps together. Uh nicely designed, easy to put together. Everything's metal. Everything's replaceable. I like Weber stuff. Anyway, so picked up one of those at home depot on the way, got it up to the cottage. So kind of two birds, one stone, uh with, uh getting the Jeep up there for the summer. You know, we don't have a trailer hitch on the van, and I don't really want to treat the van like a tractor.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh if I if I don't have
James Stacy to. So we just figured it was just sitting there. It costs nothing to insure. So simply uh, you know, I took it out of storage in terms of insurance and got it up to the cottage. So now we've got that up there as well, and a new barbecue. It's a pretty good weekend actually. Got got that done, had a bit of nice weather on Sunday, just kind of sitting around, watched the you know, Monaco F1, and uh made some you know first uh first cook was uh Costco hot dogs, an absolute favorite for me, uh, and for Sarah. Uh so that was delicious. Then we did a couple steaks that evening. Worked worked beautifully. And my parents I we got them the same one earlier in the summer and it's been lovely.
Jason Eaton Wow. Yeah, sounds like a classic uh summer weekend. Jeez. Fixing a car and yeah.
James Stacy And and to be clear, I have no relationship with Weber. People love to claim anything that we s that I bring up. I've I I spent I b I got fifty dollars off because it was on sale at Home Depot, but otherwise these were bought at full price by me with my own money. I I'm not a Weber ambassador or uh or uh gorilla marketer. Not yet. I I'm open to it. I mean I've been I've been talking up Traeger for years.
Jason Eaton Man I just spent I just spent some time cleaning
James Stacy the Traeger yesterday. Huh. That is a that is a grimy job if you if you let it go a little bit too long. I can imagine.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Wow. But
James Stacy yeah, so uh it's it's been nice uh so far and um and yeah, that was my weekend. Really nice to have the Jeep back, just a delight to drive stick again..
Jason Eaton Yeah Um, and I took the freedom panels
James Stacy off and did that drive up with uh with the a lot of wind and noise in my hair and face. Uh but really nice and uh and it'll be useful to have up there for you know, towing trailers to the dump or moving stuff around the property or even just having a a second vehicle uh if we need it. And it's also like the ideal going for ice cream for the afternoon. We like to drive up to Minden. There's a cool ice cream spot. There's actually a Boschkung brewery has an ice spot there as well. Um, but there's a great ice cream spot that the girls like, and myself and Sarah can I can undo the four or five bolts.
Jason Eaton Yeah. I it should be six. I think I have five
James Stacy left. Um that hold the top on, the main part of the top and lift it off. It's not that heavy. I've actually put it back on once by myself in duress. That was difficult. But uh it's a two man job. So you can just pop the tops right off, go for a drive, come back, throw them back on before uh the you know, any weather comes in. So nice to have up there for sure.
Jason Eaton Yeah, that's great. You park it undercover somewhere up there or is it sitting out getting bird poop on it and that sort of thing?
James Stacy It is sitting out getting bird poop on it for sure. Just just like it did at my parents for the last eight months. Um I'm not definitely not at this point going to become precious about the the paint finish.
Jason Eaton Yeah, good. Uh I believe that ship has largely
James Stacy sailed. Uh this is very much a tool for our enjoyment and it you know if I could before this vehicle moves on to its final you know resting point uh if I could teach a couple more people how to drive stick in it that would be great. And certainly we have the space in the room and the little trails and stuff like that of the cottage are kind of fun. So uh had uh had my my eleven month old son out in it uh kind of crawling around the property and he was having a blast with the horn and that kind of stuff. So
Jason Eaton nice. Yeah. Very oh speaking of uh okay, this is a bit of an aside, but speaking of uh four by fours, um it just reminded me that uh uh the uh the remote controlled camel trophy Land Rover that you sent me uh as a gift, I think it was last year or the year before. Um it's been it it it scares Ruby the dog when I buzz it around the house. So I don't use it much in the house, but then you know we got Smitty the cat and we've put a harness on her and we tether her out in the middle of the yard. She loves that thing. So I I I bring bring now I bring it out in the yard and I just buzz it around. That thing's amazing. It goes through the tall grass, it goes over little sticks and you know mulch. And it it's it just looks in its element and it's just such a blast to sit there and cruise it around and watch both animals kind of perk up their ears and chase it around. I put Ruby's favorite fetching ball on top of it on the roof rack and buzzed it around and she took the ball off the top of it it. I mean, it's's it's just been it's been loads of fun. I mean, in a very juvenile way, but it's it's great.
James Stacy Oh man, that sounds awesome. Yeah. Uh sounds yeah, really good for sure. You'll have to send me a video of that 'cause I'd I'd love to see it rolling around the uh rolling around the driveway. That'd be or around the backyard. That's a good thing. I've definitely looked into those and even especially the the ones that are like construction equipment.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Backhoes and dump trucks
James Stacy and that kind of stuff. But my son's, you know, not old enough to like he loves, he's obsessed with cars. We do a lot of hot wheels, that sort of thing.
Jason Eaton Yeah. It's his number one toy, but we're
James Stacy not at the point where he he would understand what we're doing. But once as soon as we're there, it's gonna be it's gonna be costly for
Jason Eaton sure. Yeah. But very
James Stacy cool stuff. Well, hey, how about it's uh some wrist check and then we'll get into the the start of the slack crew and a for twenty twenty six. Pretty exciting day.
Jason Eaton It is exciting. Yeah I need a little help with today's watch. So I'm wearing my uh my Zin 144S. This is the all black uh Zen chronograph that I bought from Tom Place last fall in Toronto after a few whiskeys.
James Stacy Allegedly. Yes. Yeah.
Jason Eaton I absolutely adore this watch. And my problem with it is I am just not an all-black watch person. And that goes to the mainly to the strap, you know, this kind of all-black bracelet, all black watch. Off the wrist, like just when I see this watch, I'm absolutely smitten with it. I just adore it. I put it on, and like it just doesn't feel like me. And I'm really trying hard. I I want to keep this watch. I love this watch. Um, and I'm just curious, like, I I would love for either from you, James, or you know, if people want to write to me on Slack or pitch in on the episode chat or something, of the kind of an ideal strap choice for this. Um that's that's not leather. I mean, I could do NATO, but my my quandary is uh and I I know you can order NATO's with black hardware, but I really like the hardware on my straps to match the finish of the watch. So that's a that's a priority for me. Um could be something rubber, canvas, NATO, whatever. So I'm I'm open to ideas. I just want to switch it up a bit um from from the this beautiful black Porsche design bracelet that uh Tom sold it to me on, which is it it fits the watch beautifully, but like I said, all black bracelets just for some reason, um, I just find I don't I don't uh wear them very much. So that's where I'm at
James Stacy yeah. The first one that leaps to mind if we're not doing leather, because like a brown bund would look very cool with that watch and be very U.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um, maybe a nice like rally
James Stacy style strap could work, but it's the summer. You're gonna destroy that stro that strap very quickly. That's a fall option, right?
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh I I would probably
James Stacy go Hirsch pure. I remember wearing the black Hirsch pure with my uh 144 GMT.
Jason Eaton Yeah. And it suits the watch really
James Stacy nicely and it can fit into that lug space. Like normally I would just say just buy the marathon, like if you're gonna buy a nice rubber strap, buy the green or the black marathon 20
Jason Eaton mil. Yeah, I don't know that it would fit into
James Stacy that gap without trying it. Yeah, but I wear my green um marathon on anything that's 20. I really enjoy it. I also think a green strap would work with the black case in the orange accents. You could obviously do uh TGN 10 with black hardware that might be a little bit fancier or flashier. It's quite a flashy, sort of bright, excited sort of strap. But I I would go Hirsch pure and I'm I'm almost positive in that I at one time I said I wish they made a green one and then a bunch of people who listened sent me links to a green one that just wasn't on the website I was checking.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh so the Hirsch pure I think also
James Stacy comes in green. And that's uh pure rubber, so it doesn't wear like FKM.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um and I think they look pretty good and
James Stacy they're very much designless. They're a strap of rubber with a little bit of a curvature on the inside to help deal with warmth and sweat and that sort of thing.
Jason Eaton Okay. All right. Well that's I'll add that to the the short list. Um yeah at the at the end if you
James Stacy can find if you can find one I think you'd be happy with it.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Yeah. And you know I have way too many straps already and I've I keep emptying my box upside down on the table hoping like the magic strap will just sort of pop out and appear. But um anyway. So
James Stacy in there. Yeah for sure. Right. And you've got something
Jason Eaton interesting on today. Is this there's this one that's in for review?
James Stacy This one's in for review. I've just it' its a's a watch that so many people have either messaged me about or asked me like hey why why you know is this as good as people say it is? And that's the new so that the 2026 Long Jeans Hydro Conquest Diver in 39mm. And uh the the main culprit in pestering me about this watch is Thomas Holland.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um you know of
James Stacy Throttle House and uh the Grand Tour. He he he was very much keen on it. And I thought obviously Longines makes a quality watch, an incredible watch at the price point, I think. That's been my experience. I absolutely love my titanium Zulu, uh, the Hodinki L.E,. but this is a $2,200 dive watch, and uh I've had it on my wrist for uh you know maybe thirty-six hours at this point, and it's just deeply impressive.
Jason Eaton Hmm. It basically nails everything you
James Stacy want from a watch if you want to go that step up from Seiko that really feels like you're getting most of the way to a tutor.
Jason Eaton Yeah. This is it. But
James Stacy let's keep in mind this is 2200 bucks on a
Jason Eaton bracelet. Wow. You can get it on a rubber
James Stacy strap, you can get it on a mesh, you can get it on a bracelet. It comes in a black dial with a black bezel, it comes in a black dial with a blue bezel, it comes with a black dial with a gray bezel, I believe. It comes in a full blue, which is what I've got, which is just a very navy, very elegant, classy, and then it comes like in a full green.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Wow. Look at the variations. Really cool.
James Stacy These are half the money of a black bay.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. And I think that's worth considering, but
James Stacy I don't think this is a watch you would buy exclusively because it's a good deal. It just feels like a watch that's reasonably priced in that like twenty seventeen way of pricing watches, if that makes any sense.
Jason Eaton Yeah. This feels like where Omega kind
James Stacy of left over the last twenty years. Mm-hmm. Uh as they went up market and they opened the door for longines. The The case is really great. It's 39 millimeters. It's nice and thin. The bezel's 120 click. Not overly loomed. I would say the loom is maybe the part that makes it feel more dress diver than to a watch, which is honestly kind of fine. The loom is fine. It you could still read it in the middle of the night. It just doesn't have that like seiko instant insane burn when you come in from outside.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um, but there's still plenty there. The dial's
James Stacy quite nice, it's applied markers, it has a a date window with like a proper frame. The bracelet is probably the thing I'm weirdly the most impressed by. It uses um split pins, so that's a little bit of a pain as you kind of get the sizing sorted out.
Jason Eaton Yeah. But you'll be able to do it pretty quickly because it has push
James Stacy button sliding adjustment, very similar to like what's in the Tudor.
Jason Eaton Yeah. It doesn't have a quick release, which
James Stacy my titanium bracelet does. But the build of this feels really good. I think it suits the watch really nicely. Uh the crown is good. The finishing on the case is good. Like it's all I think if this watch came in at five hundred dollars less than a black bay, you'd still be like, Yeah, there's the competition.
Jason Eaton Yeah. So at twenty two hundred dollars, uh I
James Stacy had said that it was sort of half would a black bay fifty eight might cost. It's actually less than that as the current running price of uh of a black bay fifty eight on the bracelets fifty two fifty. And I I don't know that they're direct comparisons. The Black Bay has the Tudor catalog of design. Uh it's it's maybe a better lineaged product than this one. And and the other thing is, and I I, you know, I'm calling the balls and strikes here, you are the the a big piece of the appeal of the long jeans is its design, which is very submariner coated in the colorways, in the dial design, in the shiny ceramic bezel. And I don't think that's going to stop most people. I don't think you're buying this as an homage to the submariner, but it would stop me from from jumping into one simply because I don't have a strong appeal. I don't find a strong appeal in the six-digit sub.
Jason Eaton Yeah. I find it quite shiny. Um, I think
James Stacy this wears better than a six digit sub being slightly smaller 39 instead of you know Rolex's 41. Um I really, really like this watch. It's super conventional. A lot of the things that I love about Ipelagos 39 in that they just kind of went with the normal option with as many things as possible, make it a very tractable, easy to understand, easy wearing, all of that's present here. And if you can align yourself with the sort of submariner coded design language, I think it's an absolutely incredible watch. So that's my that's my uh fairly uh praise laden uh coverage of uh Rescheck for the new uh Hydra Conquest Diver. I'll I'll I'll work out a hands-on or something in the future. I'm not sure, but I definitely wanted to talk about on the show. Uh 'cause it comes up a lot and I think they have nailed something pr pretty impressive here for the price point for sure.
Jason Eaton Yeah, I'm glad they they did this kind of redesign of some of the hydro conquests because the the old one never never spoke to me, you know, with those big oversized numerals. They they just had a very kind of dated look for quite a few years. I th they're still on their website, the the forty-one millimeter size, but uh these are really sharp.
James Stacy Yeah, they do this, they do this new version that we'll call it the 2026 in um 39 or 42. So if you prefer a slightly larger watch, 42 isn't really that big in the Pantheon of Dive Watches, but it's certainly bigger than 39, but that gives you both options.
Jason Eaton Sure. Yeah. All right.
James Stacy All right. Cool stuff. That uh takes us through risk check, which means it's my turn to uh bumble and trip through an explanation of what the Slack crew in A is. This is the first outing of the 2026 edition of the Slack Crew and A. Normally, if if you're listening and this is your first time, I apologize for this. It's like trying to get into the l the lore of something very quickly. Normally we do a monthly ish Q we do 12 a year of a QA for the paid side of the platform, the Slack crew. And when we do those, those are based on audio recordings from the crew themselves, which are emailed in and we edit them in to kind of allow people to hear other voices. It feels a little bit more like a call-in show, all that kind of stuff. This idea actually flips the whole thing on its head where we go to the Slack, also a benefit of the paid side of our platform, which is starts at as little as five dollars a month. And we flip it on its head where we ask the crew members to simply do text questions. We open a thread usually for a couple of days. U ash, we record this, we have sixty-seven questions. By the time you're listening to this, we may close the thread. I don't know that we're able to get to much more than that in a year. I think we did seven or eight parts in 2025. But it gives us a chance to one handle questions from people who don't want to record their voice and do all that work. Uh two, just very fast questions. Some of these will take 30 seconds to answer, some will take longer. And uh and three, it gives us a chance where if we don't have a topic that's really burning a hole in our s our calendar, then we just get to jump into one of these and we have a really good time. So with that, uh Jason, you want to kick it off with one from our friend Michael Harris?
Jason Eaton Yeah. Michael, uh, you know, active Slack user, longtime supporter. Thanks for sending this out in Michael. Uh he says, in all seriousness, how y'all doing? It's been a crazy few years of TGN Slack with massive growth of the crew, adding two more moderators than we started with, a few buy sell trade shenanigans, etc. How are you feeling about adding the paid tier? Still feel like it was a good idea? You could if you could do it all over again from scratch, would you change anything? It's a good question and a and uh kind of apropos to kind of kick this one off as as James uh was explaining how this all works. Um how do you feel about this? I I think we're probably both gonna have a similar answer about kind of our looking back at at our transition to the subscriber model.
James Stacy Yeah, I mean the goal was to provide a value to the people who were the most dialed on what we were doing. And on the other side, a little bit of money coming your way and my way. So that if we want to invest in something, if we want more gear, all that kind of thing. That said, I I think we're on record. We thought maybe two hundred people would do this.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Not upwards of
James Stacy a couple thousand. And um and I I'm fine with whatever the natural kind of comfort zone of that number is. We don't promote the show. We don't run a show Instagram. We don't market the show. We just kind of make the show for the people who want to listen to it. And then occasionally new people find it or it gets recommended by a friend. And I'm largely okay with that. If this was something where it needed to be your and my full time thing, we could ramp up from here. Right. But this is essentially us operating at idle. And I think for the five dollars a month, or shout out to those of you who do the hundred dollars a year, um, which gives us a little bit more predictable income, if you will, and and you can get yourself a T GN Grey NATO for the first year. Big shout out to people who do that. But between the five or what's that, nearly eight dollars a month. Uh I'm very comfortable with the value that we added. You know, I've said in the past when we've had questions like this that I definitely would have gone with to with Patreon and I wish we had,
Jason Eaton yeah, versus Substack. I really
James Stacy don't like Substack. Uh it really is designed to do really one thing and they promote it as being capable of doing a bunch of things. And you can kind of bend it to do some things, but it's wild where you know they'll send us an email saying that we're one of their most important, you know, and productive accounts. And we'll go, hey, do you think you could do this like one little change for us? Like could you make it so we could embed our shows?
Jason Eaton Yeah. And just, oh yeah, that's not possible.
James Stacy They'll they'll take an embed from like 20 other podcast platforms, but not this major one that we
Jason Eaton use. And it's just like
James Stacy I don't I'm not sure how that works when when you look at like the amount of money that they get from our cut. I'm being very transparent here.
Jason Eaton Yeah. It works. It gets us covered. It gives
James Stacy us a spot for this. But a lot of what Subsec offers in aggregate or even in totality has either been replaced in the in the last several years by other platforms that are less money, possibly free, or can now be done in house and run from your own platform, run from your own servers, that sort of thing. So yeah, that that would be the only one. Patreon I think would would have enabled us to do to have some more flexibility and to be able to speak directly to the those who are paying for the product versus those who aren't. Otherwise, I I think it's worked out really well. Uh there's no way that we would have predicted uh the Slack would have become kind of the main value driver in that five dollars a month. And at the same time, maybe we should have predicted it. I don't know. Um, so I I suppose there's a world in which that could have been additive to the pricing scheme, but that's not really the way that Jason and I operate. Like we we haven't changed the pricing since we started, and we probably wouldn't unless our scenarios changed.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. Right. Like you we're either unless
James Stacy we're able to suddenly add more value or go like, hey, it it would need to be this much a month, or we can't do it anymore. And we haven't really hit either of those zones. You know, I'm I'm happy to add incremental value, but unless we added a a big thing of some sort of video, a monthly video platform or or uh more live stuff or a tour or something like that. I just otherwise I'm pretty happy with how it's gone. Yeah.
Jason Eaton How about you, Jason? Yeah, I agree with all that. I think um, you know, moving to a subscriber model from ad sales was was such a no-brainer and such a natural move for us to have this freedom to do what we want without having to insert ad reads in the episodes, which neither of us liked when we did that for a short time. It also has really fostered this sense of community. I think there's kind of a mutual trust and respect that was kind of fostered by kind of having this supporter network. Um and then I mean, yeah, like you said, who could have predicted that Slack would have blown up the way it is to to almost I would say, you know, overshadow the podcast itself as kind of the main driver. And I I think I am so okay with that. I mean if if that's if that's what T GN becomes known for is this uh incredibly respectful, robust uh community, then uh then I'm all for it. So that's great. Um and the challenge for us going forward is either to grow TGN carefully or to not grow it at all. I think you you know you mentioned it just be f before I started here and and it's uh it's my feeling as well that we you know, we we aren't here to to grow a a big number. I mean it it could be just fine the way it is. It just kind of settles to its natural size, and I think that's kind of happened and I am really happy about that. So
James Stacy Yeah, I mean uh you and I talk about this with some frequency and if there was a world in which this was my full time, I don't even know that I would really change what what I feel is working for a set of people that I really feel aligned with, the crew.
Jason Eaton Yeah. I'd probably go additive,
James Stacy like make another show entirely. Like like there's a world in which TGN could spawn a watch only show.
Jason Eaton Yeah. That would definitely be doable. Mm-hmm.
James Stacy Um or a weekly show with that's more of a panel discussion with a bunch of our buddies. You could find a roster of I mean it's all people who've been on the show before, but you could find a roster of 15 people.
Jason Eaton Yeah. And then once a week get three
James Stacy or four of them on a Zoom call and record that. That'd be fascinating. Work really easily. Not that difficult to spin up. And then I would probably you would probably break that off so that everybody involved could get paid for it.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um rather than it coming out
James Stacy of uh the you know the TGM books or whatever. But yeah, I I've got a thousand ideas, but my main my main goal is like don't do things that that could upset something that's working. You know, it's it's if if you're if those of you in the audience you have young babies, like you can't make a happy baby more happy.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. Yeah. Just let it sit to a
James Stacy certain extent. Like let it do what it's doing. Yeah. Um I think the show will grow if it deserves to grow. And and I think if there's a world in which people are coming to us because of the slack versus the show, that's going to be a tough world for them to navigate the translation, the the you know, the internal language, the the vibe, but not in not insurmountable. And like I said, I mean especially when it comes to the slack, I'm okay with it being inscrutable. I don't want it to be this like very easy thing that people can just kind of come into.
Jason Eaton Yeah. I want you to to kind of have to cross
James Stacy a couple rivers on your way, if you will.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. Uh so that you're you're kind of aligned
James Stacy by the time you get there, if that makes any sense. Yeah. But yeah. Thanks for that question, Michael.
Jason Eaton Yeah, and thanks for your support, of course. Um next up we've got a question from Elias Garios who says uh new to the chat, so apologies if this has been asked before, but he's curious if either of us have any guilty pleasure hobbies that are very un TGN. Hmm.
James Stacy I couldn't come up with anything. I'm I'm kind of embarrassed.
Jason Eaton Well uh I don't like having no
James Stacy answer to a question. TGN's kind of my hobby.
Jason Eaton Yeah, I I mean I feel like um it's hard to say because I I think uh not to over inflate us after especially after the answer with Michael but Slack and the community, but T GN is us, right? I mean so by default anything we do as a hobby is probably already the Grenado. Um so um I guess if there are things that maybe don't fit the superlatives, you know, adventure, travel, diving, driving, gear, and watches, gardening, I I think there are a a good number of T Jan folks that garden. Um I I'm quite passionate about it, especially vegetable gardens. Um I've you know, I look forward to you know, our we have a short growing season here, but but it's something that I look forward to every May when the last frost is finally left and can start getting stuff in the ground. And um just this morning or actually sorry, just just yesterday I harvested just a massive pile of strawberries and already harvesting kale and arugula and herbs. I've got tomatoes in the ground and squash and chili peppers. So, you know, I it's something that I'm uh quite keen on and I don't really publicize because it's, you know, gardening is its own thing and there's a huge, huge world of gardening out there, including several podcasts. And I don't think we need to add gardening to our our list at the top of the show here, but uh that's that's the one that I come up with.
James Stacy Yeah, I mean the the show basically is formed around the things that we're into.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh so I definitely don't have any hobbies,
James Stacy like even into things like 3D printing. I wouldn't say that necessarily aligns. I have a huge I remain a huge nerd for random tech. Uh try and keep up with as much of it as I can. But like i in many ways it's like tech that reflects the other things. Like I might be printing something that I'm gonna use when I'm doing one of the things that would align with the show or whatever.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um and and you know between
James Stacy X number of hours a week with with Hodinki m way over a full time job. And then this, which we have to be very um which we have kind of designed to be very uh efficient in terms of the hours we put into it.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. And then uh an eleven month
James Stacy old son, two daughters. Uh, you know, Sarah has all of her own hobbies and her own interests, including a couple of beautiful garden beds out back. Uh I yeah, I don't I don't know that I'm in a phase of my life where there's another hobby that's just waiting to be out there. You know, I've I've I keep I every six months I go through the process of like designing and figuring out all the bits to do like a proper racing sim or driving sim
Jason Eaton mm and then I just don't I don't buy it. I
James Stacy just move on. I go like, oh I'll I'll spend five or six thousand dollars or now with the price of RAM and the rest of it more and I'll have something really good and then I won't have the time to drive it.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Kind of the same reason I haven't bought a sports
James Stacy car. What what am I gonna look? I'm gonna s sit in the garage and look at it. I got I got things to
Jason Eaton do. Yeah. Yeah. Elias, hopefully
James Stacy you stick around with the show and it's and it's a pleasure to have you uh in the audience, of course. And I would love to one day have a really good totally left field answer to this question, like if I get into a certain esoteric type of painting or uh or or something like that or keeping orchids or something. Um I'm not sure. But uh hopefully we can get there one day. But I don't I'd right now I'd say TGN is my hobby and my hobbies are all reflected on the show.
Jason Eaton Well, and I think too, um I always refer back to this uh sort of phrase that I picked up from Ben Klymer many years ago when he was just getting into kind of vintage cars. Um, you know, he called it his the civilian side of his life. And I think that he's probably transcended that now and he's kind of known as a car guy. But back then, you know, I think he was he was the watch guy. He still is kind of the high priest of horology as the New York Times called him. And I think, you know, he when he got into cars, he liked to be able to go to things where he wasn't known in that space. And I think a lot of these kind of if you want to call them un TGN hobbies, um kind of exist in that in that area as well. And I kind of enjoy not sharing certain parts of my life that are, you know, not necessarily aligning with with some of the stuff uh that that we talk about regularly. So good question. And yeah, well you know I'm sure we've got some other things that are sort of internal nerd um pleasures of ours, but uh yeah gardening is mine and James I can you know I I know you with your tech and 3D printing and stuff, but you know, it's all it's all T GN as far as I'm concerned.
James Stacy I think so, yeah. So thanks so much for that question, Elias. And sorry we didn't maybe like a more interesting answer. Just you know, Jason's gardening's not not interesting. But I think you get my point. Yeah. Next up, let's jump into one from Brendan who's got a question. Oh, I guess we're I'm in the wrong mode here. I got to read these questions. You can tell I'm doing QA's. All right. Next up, let's jump into one from Brendan who says, I always enjoy listening to you both talk about books in writing, but understandably a lot of those discussions skew towards spy thriller adventure fiction or TGN-related nonfiction. Do either of you have poetry that you find meaningful or that you revisit? Uh, how about fiction that strays far afield from the TGN superlatives?
Jason Eaton Good question. Um just speaking for myself, I actually have written poetry. I still do from time to time, and when I was in college, I that was kind of my thing. I I I was writing short stories and poetry and I actually had a couple of poems published many years ago. It was uh back in you know when I was a young man and uh they were very small kind of local literary journals, if you will. Um, nothing that still exists or even can be found online. Probably for the best. Um but yeah, I I kind of came up as you know, as an English major, I had to study poetry in school and I've developed kind of a, you know, small list of poets that I find to be my favorites. Uh Mary Oliver being one. She's a just a great um, as just as a keen eye. She really incorporates a lot of kind of nature observations in her poetry, as does Gary Snyder, who is um kind of a Beatnik. I think he's still alive, actually. He was a California-based Beatnik poet who um bit of a Zen Buddhist and um mountaineer of all things, so he's some some interesting stuff and uh and then one of my favorites is Michael Ondacce who wrote The English Patient as a as a novel, which is one of my favorites, but also he's a very talented poet. He just has such a way with language that I that I love. So um yeah, that's kind of my background with poetry. And I do read kind of fiction that's not aligned with um, you know, here we go with the T GN superlatives again. But uh, you know, I I it was only in recent years that I discovered kind of adventure thrillers and when I started fancying myself as kind of an author of those, um, because I was kind of tired of of reading books that required too much sort of mental energy and kind of interpretation and um but I I you know still have I still do read other stuff as well. So and we've talked about a few of those on on past book club episodes.
James Stacy For sure. How about you James? Uh yeah no poetry for me. I just I don't I you know the last time I think I read poetry was stuff that was offered in in you know university literature classes, things like that. But lots of books, uh lots of books that fall outside. I think a lot that I talk about or have talked about in previous episodes, but if you just want a very quick list, here's six. Uh Secret History by Donna Tart, absolutely fantastic. Uh I can't say enough good things. You should just read it. Uh really any Donna Tart's gonna do it for you. I prefer Secret History, um, but there's they're all good ones. More recently, I read Martyr by Kava Akbar via the Anthony Jesslinick kind of end of the year book list. Absolutely incredible. My buddy and colleague Tim Jeffries bought me One Man's Meat by E.B. White, uh, which is a collection of E.B. White's writing, and it's absolutely awesome. It's just I can't tell you how much I enjoy it, how different it is from what I normally read. You can kind of sit in and read one of them and get out. It's a you know, nice sort of short, not short, they're not stories necessarily, they're like essays. Um, and they're great. Uh Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel. Anybody who's read it is currently nodding. Absolutely incredible piece of uh sort of pseudo-science fiction, but not really, but at the same time it is. But uh Washington Bullets by Vijay Prashad. And then as as I've spoken to it, I think probably since very early episodes, pretty much any Chuck Klosterman.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm an essay, a full on book, whatever you like.
James Stacy I um you pick a topic that hits you. If you like basketball, the obviously there's uh we're in the middle of the the NBA finals right now. If you like basketball, go back and read his uh his interview with Steve Nashh. U, absolutely incredible, really, really good. Some stuff I remember from that piece of work that I try and incorporate into my own writing. I just like his writing. I like the way his mind works. His audio books are incredible, the ones that he reads. These are from years and years ago. I I you know, I read and listened to those probably within the first couple of years that Audible even existed when I was uh you know, in in university and shortly thereafter. But there's there's six starting points for you for sure.
Jason Eaton Yeah, good ones. Um and I think I would encourage uh Brendan also to if you're not already to join the the book club channel on Slack. There's a lot of good discussion there and I I get a lot of recommendations from there myself. So
James Stacy Yeah, those guys are voracious readers. Yeah. And all sorts of it's not just uh uh you know, spy thrillers and and military dramas and stuff like
Jason Eaton that. Yeah, definitely. All right. Thanks
James Stacy so much for that question, Brendan. Uh next up we've got one from Steve W. He says, What's the favorite hike you've ever taken? It can be a favorite for any reason. Absolute beauty, sense of accomplishment, pushing yourself or seeing some cool animal. And a bucket list question. Say you had a full week to go anywhere to hike in the world. Where would you go and which hike would you take? Thanks so much. All right, Steve W. Good question. Jason, uh what's the what's the standout favorite or couple of favorites?
Jason Eaton Yeah, a couple of favorites. I mean it's hard to narrow down to um to the absolute favorite. I you know, just last year, just a little over a year ago, I was in Scotland um for that project with Paul and then spent a few extra days um with Christy over on the Isle of Skye and we did a pretty amazing hike on this um in this area called the Quirang, which is hard to pronounce, we can throw it in the show notes, but it's it's this kind of cirque of or amphitheater of cliffs. Um I'm not sure what the uh what caused them to form this way, but it it's sort of this narrow valley with these very steep, jagged peaks kind of all around it, and you kind of hike the circuit around and through the bottom of it. Um, that was really beautiful. And what really stood out was the fact that it was light until about midnight when we were there, and so it was such a luxury to to be able set off on a hike at, you know, four or five in the afternoon without having to worry about being caught out after dark. Yeah. Just I loved that. Everyone was kind of gone for the day. So we had the whole place to ourselves. Um I did a a hut to hut hike years ago in the White Mountains out in New Hampshire, which is part of the Appalachian Trail. Um, you know, staying in these kind of community huts. It was a uh very I don't know, it was a it was just a great uh you know, kind of opportunity to kind of intersperse some really tough vertical hiking out there, which really caught me off guard how how steep and rocky um the trails are out there with kind of this these evening sort of not luxury, but you know, you're you're sp spending it in a hut with lots of people from around the world that were on the way as well.
James Stacy Mm-hmm. Up here in Minnesota, we've got the
Jason Eaton Superior Hiking Trail, which is really world-class. It starts in Duluth and goes all the way up to the Canadian border. Um many of the sections of the trail have a view out over the lake and and some great wildlife. And then finally the this trip I took um I don't know over a decade ago to New Zealand and hiked on the South Island on a a well known path called the Milford Track, which was a three day hike, um also a hut to hut, um, that just went over some mountain passes, um, you know, across some snowy areas with incredible waterfalls. They were the guides were calling in helicopters to ferry us past landslide dangers. Um it was just it was it was just a really, really amazing experience and a beautiful hike. And uh those who've been there will know what I'm talking about. And then it finishes at Milford Sound, which is just this jaw-dropping kind of fjord that kind of is an inlet from the ocean. So those are ones that stand out. I mean, there are many more. And I in terms of what where I would go. U thath's a tough one. I I you know, Switzerland is is hard to beat. I've done a lot of hiking over there and and um you know kind of do some some longer hikes there where you can hike from one end to the other and then take the train back to where you started. I think would be really fun to do. I've never really had the Everest base camp on my list. I've always kind of felt like it feels a bit cliche, a little bit, you know. Um, I don't know, if I guess if you want to go to Everest, like I'd not that I ever want to climb Everest, but I feel like why would you just go to the base camp? I want to climb something if I'm over there. But um that's not in not in my future. So um how about you? You've done you've done a good deal of hiking as well. What are your favorites?
James Stacy There's the classics in Vancouver that I've I've talked about for years on this show. The Gross Grind of Crown Mountain um was always kind of like the the one I looked forward to once I was fit enough. So the Gross Grind is is you know two point nine kilometers almost straight up the ridge of the North Shore Mountains, uh up the slope of the North Shore Mountains, then you get to the top and you traverse um uh a pathway across a few other lower peaks and then down into a valley and then up into Crown Mountain, which is the highest peak visible into the north shore. And that was always an absolute favorite. Um that was probably I think maybe 10 or 12 kilometers, maybe a little bit more than that. Uh the one time you can download so you don't have to hike down the the fo like back down the north shore.
Jason Eaton Um you can come down on a gondola,
James Stacy assuming that's working. If you've listened to previous episodes, you'll remember one where I it wasn't working and I walked down. Uh and that was a long day for sure. What else stands out? The Coleman Glacier uh via Helichrope Ridge, which is uh on the side of Mount Baker. Um when I first started spending time in Washington, we were down there for I think a Canadian Thanksgiving, if I remember correctly. We were staying in glacier, and my brother and I did this hike, and it was the first time I had seen a glacier with my own eyes. I just wasn't ready for the size
Jason Eaton at all. And it was like quite it's in a moment that I
James Stacy just remember. Um, you know, if you've ever if you've ever had the the fun of coming out of a tunnel in the Alps and seeing the expanse,
Jason Eaton yeah. It's kind of like it hits you, it hits
James Stacy you really hard. Yeah. And uh and that's what that glacier was like. That was a great one. Not a tough hike or anything. Mount Brunswick was probably the most personal to me, which is in uh which is in um the mountains uh uh in the how sound mountains. It's the highest peak. I think it's just shy of eighteen hundred meters. You kind of start down against the water in the sound and then climb up. And I I did it a couple times. I I finally was able to do it quite quickly, had really good weather, had really good fitness, all that kind of stuff dialed in. And I still go back and look at those photos. You're just on top of the world. You're up you're up you're kind of a ahead of everything else or above everything else that you can see. Just an incredible hike. Really, really good, really fast, really tough uphill um hike that kind of pushed me to the limits. So I mean, I I used to I used to do a ton of hiking when I lived at West. It was one of my favorite things to do. It was something I trained for all year, so that by the time May and June came around, I just had to get my mountain legs back.
Jason Eaton Yeah. And once I had them back, I was out. I
James Stacy was out and going. And then as far as a dream goes, I've talked about it a ton. I'd planned to try and do it for my 40th. Um we'll we'll delay that uh to some extent. But the tour de Mont Blanc, I'm not sure you could get it done in a week. I'd have to be quite fit. Um but I could do pieces of it for sure in a week. Um I think it's like a hundred and seventy kilometers. Um but that that one looks like the absolute dream as far as the a a nice tour of the Swiss Alps would go for sure.
Jason Eaton Oh yeah, that'd be amazing. Wow. Yeah. All right.
James Stacy I can put some I can put some of that into the show notes, the the you know, the all trails or whatever. Um but if you're going hiking in Vancouver or or around Vancouver and you want any advice, just uh drop me a note on Slack. We can figure it out.
Jason Eaton All right. Thanks for that one, Steve W. Uh next up we've got a question from Andrew Ive. I believe I'm pronouncing that correctly. Apologies if not. Um Who asks what book or TV series recently has either captivated you or made you question reality or taste just real bad? What is the bare minimum a show or book requires these days to be considered decent in your view James got some opinions here on TV or books and kind of what makes one hold your interest?
James Stacy With books there's there's you know, I I tend to
James Stacy get to them eventually. Mm-hmm. But if I'm not if I'm not in it after a couple of chapters, I probably won't keep with
Jason Eaton it. Yeah. Um and then I'll let it sit
James Stacy on the Kindle and a couple years later I'll pick it back up and try again. So I I don't know that I've read I've read anything. Like I I'm I'm a picker and chooser when it comes to books. I'll just read whatever somebody said was the best book from last year. How bad how bad is a book like that gonna be? You know what I mean?
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh so I can't I can't really weigh in
James Stacy on anything that made me like question taste, whether it's my taste or the taste of the book or or or its audience. Um and then as far as TV shows, the last one that hit me in any meaningful way, like a show where I wanted to see every episode, I was really dialed and invested into the episodes and I can't wait for more. That's the agency. Probably the only example in the last several years. There's lots of shows that I like. Uh Lioness. Um uh you know, I I talked about the pit on some recent episodes. It's one of those ones where like if if if Sarah was like, I don't want to watch TV tonight,
Jason Eaton yeah. I'd go like, all right, fine, I'll read a book,
James Stacy I'll do something else. Yeah. Whereas like if if there's an agency episode waiting, I'm I'm gonna have to I'm gonna have to watch that.
Jason Eaton Yeah, everything gets set aside for that. I'm the same way. I think it's I think
James Stacy it's back in ten days. Yeah. Uh you know, seven days from when you hear this, I think. Something like that, close to that. So very excited for the second season of that one. It looks gnarly already.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Let's
James Stacy see. You know, the the as yeah, and then like books that I got dialed into recently, I I enjoyed the terminal list.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. I really enjoyed Cry Havoc,
James Stacy which took you back into Vietnam and I got to learn a ton of stuff and I was there was one of those books where I would I would stop, you know, I'd put the put the thing down or or use the highlight feature in the in the Kindle to get a definition.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh just just so I could stay on top of
James Stacy the the acronyms and and the other stuff like that, which I like. And then I think I talked about a ton on the show. Uh Thompson's The Getaway. I just I can't recommend it enough. Not written like anything else I'd really come across, very detailed, very tactile, very fingertip, very inside somebody's head, and uh just just really really, good. How about you, Jason? Anything anything really grip you? Anything you're you're like pretty pumped about?
Jason Eaton Well, the agency for sure. And I think you know, yeah, we're we're so spoiled for choice when it comes to good TV series these days. You know, they've completely in my mind usurped lar for a large part um movies. You know, mov a good movie I I kind of comes along um you know it's like one in every 10 movies is like worth like actually going out and dropping money on. Personally, um, some people will just see anything and everything. Um, but but with TV series, like I I almost can't keep up. There's just there's so much good stuff out there. You know, I think of um you know, the agency is definitely at the top of the heap, but you get something like Slow Horses, which is not far behind in terms of quality, such a great show. Um, in kind of a different realm or different kind of vibe is uh the diplomat, which I've I've really enjoyed. Yeah, and then recently um DTF St. Louis finished that one. I was really pleasantly surprised, kind of took me off guard. Um, Jason Bateman and David Harbour and that one, and they did a really good job with that. Uh I would say if there's anything that kind of causes me to abandon a show after like an episode or two, it's just like by and large, like I find and this is a complete generalization, but like British and European TV is just superior still to a lot of American shows with some exceptions. Um, in terms of kind of the realism of the characters, I think um if a if a show has too many, and I, you know, hate to hate to be prejudice in this way, but you know, too many pretty people or too many kind of kind of perfect scenarios or kind of glib responses and things, it just strikes me as just doesn't hit right. So I abandon that. So I think just more realism and less predictability, I think is kind of my criteria. And then in terms of books, uh recently uh fiction-wise, North Woods uh by Daniel Basley was fantastic. I loved that book. And then uh most recently London Falling by uh Patrick Radden Keefe as a nonfiction book was just a absolute could not put that one down. Um the guy I'll I'll read anything that guy does um for nonfiction reporting. So yeah, good stuff.
James Stacy And then yeah, I mean for me the the one thing you
James Stacy said, what's a bare minimum for a show? I don't know how to quantify that, if I'm honest. Uh or maybe I don't understand the question. Um I would say the thing that gets me out of interest very quickly is when it's kind of clear that the show was written from an entirely casual point of view. It it feels like there's a lot of shows out right now that are more about the the celebrity that they have in the show or the fact that the show is exclusively very beautiful people, or that it's kind of a a premise that's kind of the hook, and things like the plot line, the dialogue, um, and all that kind of go out the window.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh if you need an example of this,
James Stacy uh your friends and neighbors on Apple TV is just like an it's some of the most vapid. It feels like they watch they went out and watched um you know, it feels like they went out and watched Weeds and Californication and you know, some of these like very high level like even elements of like uh it just looks like they they went there and they took those plot lines and they slotted famous, pretty, handsome, you know, beloved people into them. And there's like a moment in an episode that'll be awesome. And then the rest of it will just kind of be like nothing.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Yeah. And it it all kind
James Stacy of feels like a show made for somebody where they go, well, this doesn't matter. A person's gonna be on their phone by this
Jason Eaton point. Yeah. Yeah. We just we gotta
James Stacy fill the next six minutes. Mm-hmm. And you go like and I'm sitting there going like, well, I know exactly what's gonna happen next. And I know the next five or six things that are gonna happen because I've seen the show before, just not set in the same place and not with the same people.
Jason Eaton Yeah. The bare minimum is I don't want anything
James Stacy that's that's like casual. I just
Jason Eaton don't. Right. Look look at look at what look
James Stacy at my extreme love for Michael Mann, the the least casual guy of all time. Every detail matters. Everybody's intense. Yeah. Uh nobody's relaxed. Uh, you know, it's it uh I that's that's sort of my zone.
Jason Eaton All right, good one. We've had a couple of kind of literary and T V and movie questions. We've had a uh actually we've uh I'm just scrolling back here, we've really haven't had any uh watch questions. Which is uh quite interesting. Doesn't look
James Stacy like we're gonna get there either. Yeah, right. All right. Well, look, I think it's been a good one so far, but let's close it out with uh with another question, and this one's from Dan McFly, who asks, You both seem to be introverts and have always been interested in your thoughts on becoming influencers. Also, how often do you intentionally keep something you're interested under wraps during an episode to avoid attracting extra attention and driving the prices up? Um
Jason Eaton I don't know. James, I I I would consider myself and I'm guessing you'd feel the same as a reluctant influencer. I think uh
James Stacy Yeah. I think it's not something I
Jason Eaton set out to be and and I don't know about you, but um it just happens and I think p I can't deny that that we have some influence on on people. Um but I don't think it's anything we've set out to be. And I I just I I personally feel like mm you know my tastes and opinions are just those of an average, you know, flawed person with very specific interests, um no different from anyone else's. And I one thing I've enjoyed about this the Slack group is is just being up I'm quite awed by the amount of talent um and wisdom and things that we have among our community. And I'm just like, don't listen to me. Go go to Slack and like read what all these other amazing people are doing as well. So that's kind of you know a bit of an aside to the question. But uh I don't know. Uh in terms of the kind of the main question here. Are you do do you intentionally keep things under wraps? I I I haven't gotten that sense.
James Stacy No, I mean I I don't even like the assertion, if we're just being honest. Uh the entire purpose of the show is to talk about what we're into.
Jason Eaton Yeah. If something's good, it will get the attention
James Stacy that it deserves, whether we talk about it or not. And uh and I would I would never be like, oh, let's not talk about that because I'm trying to trying to buy it or something. I think there's been lots of times where we've talked about stuff and it it later became unbiable because it sold out, or maybe it was just a one of one.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. Extra attention is great. Good
James Stacy things should have a attention. And as far as driving the price up, that's super dependent upon what's being sold and how.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um, you know, if if we want to talk about
James Stacy watches that we really like that are kind of, you know, like a two two five four Omega, yeah, those have gotten a lot more expensive in the span of time that I sold mine. And now I don't know that we're to blame to that. We we're part of the course of people who like and promote those watches, kind of the same thing with an aerospace. Yeah. They're more expensive now than they used to be for sure. Um, but no, I'd I would never I would never like hang on to some information that the goal the goal of that information is talking about it. We're making content.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um and uh
James Stacy and I think it would it would make the show a weaker thing if we were saying like, oh let's let's leave that off so we can wet our beaks first.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Um I'd I I you and I aren't
James Stacy that active of buyers in any scenario. Aside from let's be clear, like ten, fifteen dollar Amazon straps, I might have a problem for sure. Right. But we're not we're not market movers in these in these spaces. And then as far as the uh you know, the the first part of the question, you know, I think I think the influencer thing has been largely not comfortable for me. Um uh mostly because the world became kind of a meaner place over the last seven or eight years. And as your audience grows, you eventually get to the point where there is a percentage of the audience who has no history with you.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Yeah. So they're coming in based
James Stacy on something you said today or last week.
Jason Eaton And they don't have the context of understanding
James Stacy why you might have gotten there, what you know, what other jobs you've had, all that kind of stuff. And yeah, I I think you can look at the way that it's happened to me. I just have slowly pulled back from scenarios where I have to interface with that type of an audience. I make investments, critical, time-worthy investments, into things like the Slack and speaking to people who are, you know, in the zone,
Jason Eaton yeah, so to speak. Um, and I do
James Stacy less and less on Instagram and in in the more like broad scope, super casual sort of setting. So like I'll put a photo up. I don't really care what anybody says about the photo. And you just kind of move on. So as as a as a proper introvert, I'm deeply compartmentalized uh as to where I put my energy and I I would say that the longer we've been doing this, the more I've found ways to keep my energy in places and modes that that feel like it it's accepted in a way that feels realistic.
Jason Eaton Yeah. But you know, you do something for twenty years,
James Stacy there's your audience comes and goes, they change, they evolve.
Jason Eaton Yeah. And uh and you you can definitely
James Stacy end up with um with a type of attention that that isn't isn't comfortable. And that's that comes with it. It's not something you have to change. It's something you have to manage.
Jason Eaton Mm-hmm. Yeah. Good point. All right. Good thoughtful questions. Um really actually very thoughtful uh outside the box questions here. So we appreciate everybody that wrote in Michael, Elias, Brendan, Steve W, Andrew, uh, and Dan. Uh appreciate that. Yeah, there's plenty more to come. James, you said 60 plus questions. I'm as we're sitting here, I'm seeing more come in. Um, and we'll close that that thread down shortly here. We'll never get through all of them this year. But uh uh thanks to everybody that wrote in.
James Stacy Yeah, thank you so much. That was super fun. And uh we'll get to more of these, uh definitely several more over the summer as Jason and I try and you know daw back a little bit and take some time off we can bank episodes like these. So we do really appreciate the questions as allows us to kind of manage the time um in scenarios where there's not a huge watch release or uh you know an earth shattering guest of which you know, we love for when both happens, but we also enjoy the space between.
Jason Eaton Yeah. All right. How about some uh final
James Stacy notes? Yeah, I've got a quick one.
Jason Eaton Um you'll recall my defender trophy qualification participation back in I guess it was May, Defender or Land Rover, they've been kind of slowly editing together and putting out short videos that kind of encapsulate or summarize the the different qualification rounds from around the world. They've done Taiwan, I think they did South Africa, a couple other places that they put out on their YouTube channel, and they just yesterday they dropped the uh the the North American uh qualification round video summary. Um I uh sadly I don't appear, or maybe not sadly, I don't appear anywhere in this video. There there were three waves of forty people, so there were a lot of people and looked to me like they did most of the filming in maybe the other two rounds after they kind of I was part of uh one of the early rounds and so maybe they kind of learned from ours and and filmed more of the stuff with the other two. But um great to kind of see um I was quite proud to see, you know, how how how great it looked and how great the vehicles looked and some of the challenge events and things. So just kind of fun to to watch that and and for me it was a bit of a trip down memory lane. But if you're interested in seeing how they went about selecting the uh the top two Canadians and the top two uh Americans for the finals in October in Africa. You can check that out on YouTube.
James Stacy It's great. Yeah, I s when I saw this in the show notes, I watched a piece of it. And kudos for them for putting out a 17-minute video.
Jason Eaton Yeah. So it doesn't just feel like a three-minute
James Stacy ad. Yeah. That runs before the video that you want to get to. And it this looks like a proper bunch of adventure for sure. Yeah. Very
Jason Eaton cool. Yeah. All right. What do you got?
James Stacy Yeah, mine this week is actually weirdly in a similar sort of space, but uh definitely more on the more on the the uh lifestyle side, I guess, than uh than something as gnarly as the Defender Trophy. This is uh a really good video I watched earlier this week from a YouTube channel called Silver Symbol Workshop. And it's just a guy uh showing this build of a four-season tiny shelter, which he made out in the woods on a wood platform um that's fully self-supported with heat and uh and power, um, but it's based on like a uh a hardcore sort of foam insert that would normally go into the back of a pickup truck, and instead he's put it kind of out on its plank and it's room for a f a couple of people. Um obviously more designed for like sleeping or possibly just resting, uh getting out of the the gnarly weather.
Jason Eaton Yeah. Uh but just a really, really
James Stacy cool idea um and really thoughtfully put together. Like you can tell this is a guy who's gone down every other version and decided to kind of tailor this for his needs. Uh just wait till you get to the heater, which is entirely enclosed in a pelican case.
Jason Eaton Oh wow. It's just like really, really fun,
James Stacy really cool. Like this is stuff that I I I enjoy just kind of watching for uh you know some time. This is a a 13 minute video, so you can get in and out of it really easily. Uh I just think he did such a nice job. It's only a month old, so it's still relevant if that matters. Um, and I just think it's a really good, you know, option where maybe you don't want to go do the full bunky build. Maybe you want something that's truly remote, and then this without all the gear, the foam thing is only a few hundred pounds. So it could be moved. If you want to move this to a different part of your property or or something, but you want something that's akin to a cabin. But as we all know, kind of like with a tent, if you're in the right spot and the weather cooperates, you're really only in your tent or your cabin to have a nap.
Jason Eaton Yeah. If you sleep for the night. Right. That sort of
James Stacy thing, right? The rest of it you could probably do elsewhere. And this is just a really cool build. He walks you through how the elec some of the electronics are designed and the heating and
Jason Eaton Yeah, this is really cool. It it looks like you know like a camper or a rooftop tent scenario or something like for overlanding, but it's stationary and and it's not something that is in the cards for me. I can't see myself doing this, but I love like all the little bits just as I'm kind of scanning through this. It's uh really fun. I'll give this a watch. Very cool.
James Stacy Yeah, it's from so the the the basic build is from Freedom Campers, which I believe is like it's a type of styrofoam.
Jason Eaton Um so it's very you can cut it,
James Stacy you can f add things to it. So he's adding a roof vent and and you know, scenarios for uh piping in and out heat and all that kind of stuff. It's uh I just really enjoyed this. It's fun.
Jason Eaton Yeah, nice. So yeah, that's uh that's
James Stacy uh building the ultimate four season tiny shelter packed with survival tech from silver symbol workshop. Pretty solid uh YouTube channel as well.
Jason Eaton Nice, great name. Symbol C-Y-M-M-B-A L. Yeah,
James Stacy exactly. Cool. Well, as always, thank you so much for listening and for typing in your questions in the T GN Slack thread. If you'd like to subscribe, if you're not in the TGN Slack and you would like to subscribe to the show notes, get into the comments, and even consider supporting the show directly, which will get you into the Slack and part of these conversations, please just visit thegreenado.com. Music Throat is Siesta by Jazer via the free music archive.
Jason Eaton And we leave you with this quote from Thomas Berger who said, The art and science of asking questions is the source of all knowledge.