This week on 5 Random Questions, podcaster and geeky dad Jon Powell tells us about riding his elephant to the taco drive-thru, what devious prank he'd play on his daughter, how to spend a million dollars, and more.

Answering the questions this week: Jonathan Powell

Jonathan is the co-host of the Time Pals podcast, where four geeky dads squander their mid life crises by diving headfirst into the best, worst, and weirdest corners of geek culture. He spent 10 years working as a Silicon Valley corporate drone, before he left to work for a local school district so he could impact his community as opposed to a CEO's wallet. He loves video games and pop culture in most forms, and his happy place is sitting by the fire pit with a book and cooking something on the smoker or grill.

Jonathan's Website

@timepalspodcast on Instagram

Further reading for this episode

• CONCERTS | MONSTERS OF ROCK
• RushCon 2026 Toronto | Rush Fan Convention & Events
• Anika Nilles - Rush drummer
• Queen - Don't Stop Me Now (Official Video) - YouTube

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Jon: With a million dollars, I can afford an elephant. Probably see if I can find

Jon: a decently affordable warehouse in the industrial district nearby and create

Jon: a nice little, you know, decent sized space for the elephant to live.

Jon: Almost like a stable. And I guess I would just drive over and hang out with that.

Jon: And I'll put a little office in there for myself so that I could do some work

Jon: while I hang out with my pet elephant.

Danny: Hi, and welcome to 5 Random Questions, the show of unexpected questions and unfiltered answers.

Danny: I'm your host, Danny Brown, and each week I'll be asking my guests 5 questions

Danny: created by a random question generator.

Danny: The guest has no idea what the questions are, and neither do I,

Danny: which means this could go either way.

Danny: So sit back, relax, and let's dive into this week's episode.

Danny: Today's guest is Jon Powell.

Danny: Jon is the co-host of the Time Pals podcast, where four geeky dads squander

Danny: their midlife crises by diving headfirst into the best, worst,

Danny: and weirdest corners of geek culture.

Danny: He spent 10 years working as a Silicon Valley corporate drone before he left

Danny: to work for a local school district so he could impact his community as opposed to a CEO's wallet.

Danny: He loves video games and pop culture in most forms, and his happy place is sitting

Danny: by his fire pit with a book and cooking something on a smoker or grill.

Danny: So Jon, welcome to 5 Random Questions.

Jon: Thank you for having me. I'm very excited.

Danny: I'm excited to have you here, Matt. And we were speaking about this in the green

Danny: room just before we started recording, but you like to get your cook on with your smoker or grill.

Danny: What would be your go-to that you would cook if I was coming over or you got

Danny: friends or people that have never been to your place before?

Jon: Probably cooking several different chickens.

Jon: Chickens um it's one of the things that's kind

Jon: of nice about having space on the smoker and with the u.s economy the way it

Jon: is for you know beef and other things chicken is still relatively affordable

Jon: so you know grabbing four chickens four roll chickens for a reasonable price

Jon: and seasoning them up each differently

Jon: and having a bit of variety for folks. That's something I, that's kind of a go-to for me.

Danny: Yeah. The price is crazy. I know there was like, I'm in Ontario.

Danny: So I'm based in Ontario, Canada and there's an Ontario subreddit and it shows

Danny: you prices from various stores across the region.

Danny: And it's mad like beef at the minute. It's just out of the stratosphere.

Danny: So yeah, chicken, great. And it's a good little food as well.

Danny: It's easy enough, you know, to make up.

Danny: And one thing that I did, I mentioned, I've been listening to catching up on

Danny: your podcast. and one of the recent

Danny: episodes of Time Pals stated that your favourite TV character sucks.

Danny: And the one that stood out for me among many good examples was Scrappy-Doo.

Danny: So what is it about this little dog that seems to rile pretty much everybody up?

Jon: It's a really good question. You know, the way we usually do the episode formats

Jon: is me and my co-hosts will each grab, you know, three, four,

Jon: five, depending on what we're going for for length or...

Jon: If one of us can't make it. So then we're down a co-host.

Jon: And that was, that was my co-host, uh, Doms.

Jon: And I almost don't have an answer, at least an answer that is logical for it.

Jon: It's just kind of like, uh, the character has always annoyed me.

Jon: It's kind of like they force-fed this nepotistic nephew character into your face in Scooby-Doo.

Jon: We had a great crew of them, you know, and then all of a sudden,

Jon: here's an extra character.

Jon: It didn't seem like it was there for, I mean, we already had comic relief.

Jon: That was kind of the entire show, really. And there was some,

Jon: you know, oh, we seriously need to figure out who the bad guy is.

Jon: Is it old Mr. Johnson, the farmer? Is it, you know?

Jon: I don't think he, I don't think Scrappy Doe lended anything to the series.

Jon: And I, I feel like a lot of people felt that way, including...

Jon: You know, current and future writers. Because another thing that my co-host

Jon: brought up was that in the newer series that HBO made, Velma,

Jon: in that television show,

Jon: Scrappy-Doo was the bad guy and was just a being of pure evil.

Jon: And I think people took that annoying character and said, he is so annoying

Jon: what if we just make him a complete bad guy for it yeah i wish i wish i had

Jon: some sort of justification almost but i don't really

Danny: No i think you you you covered it well then like you say i mean i'm i'm from

Danny: the og scooby-doo series back in the 70s basically i'm watching in the uk uh

Danny: and and for me i i think he reminds me i'm a big star wars fan he reminds me

Danny: of the Jar Jar character.

Danny: You know, you had your established characters and maybe he was put in there

Danny: for comic relief and, you know, merchandise or whatever.

Danny: So I don't know, maybe that's it. But yeah, Scrappy-Doo is just one of these

Danny: characters that seems to, there's very few people I know that actually like

Danny: that character you know, or tolerate him anyway.

Jon: Yeah, I don't think of anybody, I mean, I've seen plenty of people with Scooby-Doo

Jon: tattoos and things like that.

Jon: I don't think I've ever seen anybody with a Scrappy-Doo tattoo.

Danny: Yeah, exactly. Or it's like colored out, scrapped over or whatever.

Danny: But yeah, no, I like that. And as I mentioned, and obviously I'll be leaving

Danny: the links to your podcast in the show notes, but that's a fun episode to listen

Danny: to if it's one of your first, you know, you catch up on the episode.

Danny: But speaking of episodes, it's your time to jump into the 5 Random Questions hot seat.

Danny: So if you're ready, Jon, I will bring up the question generator and we'll see where we go.

Jon: By all means, sir.

Danny: Okay, let's have a look. Question number one, kind of a superpower,

Danny: maybe, I'm not sure. Question number one, Jon, if you're invisible for a day, what would you do?

Jon: Oh, that is a, oh, nothing nefarious.

Jon: I'll start off by saying that nothing, nothing evil, but, um,

Jon: I mean, there would be, no, chaos is too strong of a word.

Jon: I'm a big practical joker. At least I used to be. I found that now as a father,

Jon: I'm surrounded by people who don't like that.

Jon: So finding a way to pull off some overall innocent practical jokes on people

Jon: for the day and at least making myself laugh,

Jon: readjusting things on their desk if they leave for the bathroom or something

Jon: innocuous, turn off the microwave when they're heating up their food and they come back.

Jon: I swear I'd hit start on the microwave.

Jon: I almost miss being able to pull small little pranks on people and the ability

Jon: to get away with that relatively scot-free for 24 hours would be fantastic

Danny: Well you mentioned there because obviously you've got kids now you

Danny: have three kids um uh so maybe some

Danny: of your practical jokes that you would have done previously are less you know

Danny: to do now but maybe going back before credits then would you would you have

Danny: done something more nefarious would you have just like done something not to

Danny: hurt people obviously but you know would there be stuff that you would have

Danny: done differently then as opposed to now Oh.

Jon: Absolutely. As a suburban youth who idolized jackass?

Jon: I mean, the amount of absolute stupidity,

Jon: you know, I would have happily snuck into my friend's house and then when they

Jon: were in the shower just gave them a swift tap right in the balls and then walked away.

Jon: I mean, just something completely asshole-ish, you know, just snuck in,

Jon: popped a couple of firecrackers on the floor while they were asleep and then left.

Jon: Really, yeah, it's stuff like that. Again, nothing that was,

Jon: I would say, truly dangerous.

Jon: I always at least had somewhat of a mind for the safety of others,

Jon: safety for myself a little bit less so, as I think a lot of us were prone to in our youth.

Jon: Yeah I think it would just nothing extreme but again a little bit more fun a

Jon: little bit more youthful exuberance for it and yeah yeah.

Danny: Well it's funny you mention Jackass I love that show and again I've been in

Danny: Canada 20 years now so my time watching Jackass was primarily in the UK before

Danny: I moved over and then watched them over here you know once I moved over but

Danny: they always use them I always see these little memes online where,

Danny: it's basically a simple statement it's like this is why women live longer and

Danny: then you see the jackass guys doing stupid shit right, it's just this is why

Danny: we die, why we get hurt, why we get injured but I do appreciate that you still want to keep it,

Danny: respectful to others as well right, so you don't want to because there's so

Danny: much you could do from a bad point of view if you're invisible you had no morals,

Danny: didn't give a crap, there's so much you could do so it's nice to hear that you still keep it within,

Danny: the boundaries And I guess because you've got three kids, is there one thing

Danny: that you know would not set your kid off in a bad way, but you know that would

Danny: be like the best thing to do to them because you were invisible?

Jon: So my oldest plays violin in orchestra and several mariachi groups.

Jon: I would absolutely detune her instruments when she wasn't looking.

Jon: Just not a ton, enough to wear just a couple twists back in,

Jon: you know, but enough to make her sit there and wonder, like, didn't I prepare?

Jon: I swear I just did, you know, I did my waxing, I did my this,

Jon: I did it on it, and I made sure it was in tune.

Jon: But doing something like that and doing it, I almost want to say repeatedly

Jon: through the course of the day.

Jon: Towards you like no i know i just did it now something's going on that's probably

Jon: yeah that would probably drive her nuts and i would i would enjoy doing that

Danny: And then pay the price afterwards exactly.

Jon: As proud as i am i have to it was like one of my proudest parenting moments

Jon: that she got first violin at university orchestra and all of that stuff i would

Jon: still absolutely love to screw with her on that

Danny: You love it i i love when like parents you

Danny: can always tell a parent um because to know the kids well i i

Danny: love it that you do something that would be fun but still really mess

Danny: up you know because it's it's something that she knows that she did like you

Danny: mentioned the microwave earlier right you you know you put the stuff in the

Danny: microwave and it's not cooking what happened there yeah yeah i enjoyed that

Danny: one it's a good one it's a nice easy one i feel nice nice good one to to kick

Danny: things off with so let's have a look then at question number two,

Danny: Okay, question two, Jon. If you were asked to teach a class,

Danny: what class would you teach?

Jon: So I have always wanted to, and just the way my life kind of flowed,

Jon: I've always wanted to be a history teacher.

Jon: I found that history is one of the things that is incredibly lacking in the

Jon: American education system.

Jon: And I had an amazing, amazing history teacher when I was in eighth grade.

Jon: And one of the things that was so great about it is he definitely went off book,

Jon: but also he would do certain things to make it a little bit more interactive.

Jon: So when we were learning about the Revolutionary War,

Jon: you know, it's all well and good to say like, oh, okay, so you have your first

Jon: line of people kneeling, they load their musket, okay, they fire and the people

Jon: behind them fire, then they fall back and then, great.

Jon: I've brought in a 30-pound sack of flour and several boxes of tissues.

Jon: We're going to make flour bombs. Half of you are going to go on this side of

Jon: the field. Half of you are going to go on this side of the field.

Jon: And we are going to recreate a musket fight with flour bombs.

Jon: And so I'm sure to the rest of the school, if people are walking by looking,

Jon: seeing just a bunch of kids kneeling, throwing firebombs at each other and then

Jon: falling back in line. And then the next line.

Jon: And it was, it was a lot of interactive stuff like that, that really took something

Jon: that would just be, I don't want to say mundane, but the method of teaching it.

Jon: And that's probably just because I'm not really a sit in a classroom and learn

Jon: type and just listen to somebody, just drone on and on.

Jon: But that coupled with his knowledge of kind of deeper history of things like

Jon: the civil rights movement and even kind of like the American Wild West and going into...

Jon: More than just what the books went into was it

Jon: was really it made it so much more interesting so much more

Jon: fun it was one of the classes I was an awful student you

Jon: know I barely graduated middle school

Jon: by the skin of my ass but history

Jon: class was the class that I actually was interested in and got a decent grade

Jon: in because of that teaching style and so that's that's one of the things that

Jon: i thought would be or i have felt would be an absolute wonderful career for me

Jon: were i able to sit through classes to get my teaching credentials and become a teacher

Danny: Yeah because it's like it's a long it's a long thing to do as well right it's

Danny: like one of these professions you have to go for so such amount of time to actually

Danny: get your your qualification uh i'm with i loved history school history english

Danny: and art that was my three that i loved,

Danny: But it's interesting you mention, and I've had a conversation about this with

Danny: TK Dutas on, I think it was the first episode of the last season,

Danny: or it might have been the second of the last season, and that came up about

Danny: education and whether it was down to stereotypical,

Danny: what's often stereotypical of views of, say, Americans that they don't travel

Danny: much compared to, say, Europeans or Asians, et cetera. I'm not sure if that's the case or not.

Danny: But I wonder when you mention about the education system in the US,

Danny: Is it that the education system teaches more about American history as opposed

Danny: to other external history? Or what would you say?

Danny: It's something like that's a European looking in on the U.S. system.

Jon: I feel that it's definitely a focus on American history, of course,

Jon: because we want you to learn about the country you're living in and how it was started.

Jon: And all of the, frankly, the lunacy that came with that, because that was not

Jon: a smooth, that was not a smooth thing.

Jon: But all of it, be it US history, be it world history.

Jon: Seems to be so tightly focused through like a, a, a filtered lens.

Jon: Like I, you know, it's, it's the way it's, it's the same idea of mostly in other countries.

Jon: I hear this now, all of your news is filtered. All of your news is controlled.

Jon: All of the things that you're learning are controlled.

Jon: That's whatever they want to put in the books that are being sold to you.

Jon: And I feel like it, especially when it comes to the natives and people of color's

Jon: experience in the United States, it's extremely filtered.

Jon: You know, I don't think, I think when I grew up the most, I think the most important

Jon: black man I learned about, I want to say, was George Washington Carver.

Jon: And that's because he created peanut butter and everyone's like,

Jon: Oh, peanut butter. We all love peanut butter. We're kids.

Jon: And I mean, I think everybody knows that there's thousands and thousands of

Jon: other incredible people who, who are responsible for,

Jon: for not just political changes, but scientific agricultural and it's just like,

Jon: well, why are we focused on just these things?

Jon: And it's, it's, it's the same thing, especially, I feel like there's a huge

Jon: gap on European and history.

Jon: What did we learn? We learned about the Romans. We learned about,

Jon: and even that was much we learned about, you know, Greece and,

Jon: and, and kind of that historical period.

Jon: And then kind of nothing from there, it would seem like, you know,

Jon: then it just, just jumps ahead.

Jon: It's like, Oh yeah, there was all this bit. There was, there,

Jon: there was Romans, there was Greece and then some, some stuff happened.

Jon: And then this guy, Winston Churchill came around and this Hitler dude what happened

Jon: in the middle you know it's it's yeah I do understand that it's

Jon: I mean, there's obviously a ton of material to cover, so you have to be somewhat

Jon: selective, but I feel like a restructuring is in order.

Jon: I mean, there's nothing that says you can't start teaching kids about the world

Jon: in elementary school and primary school, you know, more than just like,

Jon: oh, Big Ben, oh, the Eiffel Tower, these are so cool.

Jon: And then that's it because it's in a picture book for kids. It's really interesting

Jon: because even now I'm watching my younger two are 12 and 9.

Jon: So they're going through very different educational phases.

Jon: And looking at how my 12-year-old went through the end of her elementary school,

Jon: I'm realizing that it did not do a good job of preparing her for that next stage.

Jon: And then looking at what she's learning in this middle school,

Jon: I do not think that it is properly preparing her for high school.

Jon: Both from kind of like a workload perspective, as well as just like the breadth

Jon: of education of love that like the topics she's learning.

Jon: So, I mean, saying you should restructure the entire U.S.

Jon: Education system is probably a big, big, big ask.

Jon: So I'm not sure what I would really do with that. But, yeah,

Jon: it's it's it's interesting because I feel like it's changed even a significant

Jon: amount since since I was in school. And that's, you know, that's been a couple of decades.

Jon: I don't know. I don't know if it's like an overall, I don't know.

Jon: Sometimes it's, sometimes I feel like I let internet and news propaganda get the better of me.

Jon: And I think things to myself like, oh, they are purposely trying to dumb us down.

Jon: They are lessening education so that they can.

Jon: And then I'm like, okay, well, let's, let's, let's not get sucked down a rabbit

Jon: hole and then spend, you know, 12 hours on Reddit reading conspiracy theories.

Jon: And I have to kind of pull myself out of that.

Danny: No, and especially Reddit can be a crazy place, as we both know.

Danny: It's interesting you mentioned about the learning about other countries or other

Danny: continent's histories.

Danny: I know, like, here in Canada, there was a big reckoning,

Danny: I'm going to say about four or five years ago, but maybe a little bit less,

Danny: but certainly in that timeframe,

Danny: about how the Indigenous people and the First Nations of Canada were treated

Danny: and how kids were pulled from their families and put into these,

Danny: reformation schools that were led by the church, etc.

Danny: And not a lot of Canadians knew

Danny: the full horror, and I certainly didn't as someone coming into Canada.

Danny: I've been here 20 years, but what I've found interesting following that,

Danny: so there's been a big conversation about reparation to First Nations people,

Danny: but in the school, so my daughter's elementary school, she's in grade eight

Danny: now, she'll be starting high school next year.

Danny: And obviously they're teaching the kids about that and having conversations

Danny: about that. But they're expanding it and using examples of other countries.

Danny: So the Australians and how they are racist towards the Aborigine people.

Danny: The British and how they were horrible to the Indians that they colonised in

Danny: the last century, for example.

Danny: So it's interesting, I feel, sometimes it might take a bad thing to happen to

Danny: learn, you know, more about your country and how its place in the world as well, you know.

Danny: And yeah, it was always true because when I think of the US education,

Danny: I think of Jon Hughes movies from the 80s, right?

Danny: That's my take on the US education system.

Danny: And I know that's a very, you know, glamorized, ideal world kind of thing, you know.

Danny: So yeah, but it's always interesting. I always like hearing about other countries and what they do.

Danny: But yeah, that was like, I think, yeah, an overhaul in an education system,

Danny: it's one of these things that, you know, it's probably above our pay grade, mate.

Danny: Be nice, you know, be nice. But speaking of education, it's time to be educated

Danny: on your answer for question three.

Danny: And that was a really bad segue. I'll have to work on these.

Danny: Terrible, terrible pun there.

Danny: Question three, and it's a music one. I always love when a music one comes up.

Danny: Question three, Jon, what is your favourite song of all time?

Jon: Oh, my. Oh, my.

Jon: I feel like I could almost tell you which of my children is my favorite easier than that. Jeez.

Jon: I feel like that's, that's, I'll have to go with just one that I know I will

Jon: always and forever enjoy because I think picking a favorite is akin to a true

Jon: favorite is akin to dividing by zero, you know?

Jon: So I think that one, one song that I will, I will never dislike.

Jon: And I've probably answered it in the past when I, when I just kind of turned

Jon: my brain off and answered questions, similar to this would be,

Jon: um, don't stop me now by queen.

Jon: The, the overall pacing and composition of that song, I almost always have to

Jon: stop what I'm doing unless it's something where,

Jon: you know, I'm on the road and if I stopped what I was doing would be very bad to sing or enjoy it.

Jon: I, I, I, I can't even really tell you specifically.

Jon: I mean, I know I think everybody is just like when you hear Freddie Mercury's

Jon: voice, it's hard to it's hard to ignore it.

Jon: It's hard to not just be drawn to whatever song is playing.

Jon: But there's something about that one that just gets me every time and it puts me in a better mood.

Jon: It makes it I mean, it makes whatever I'm doing kind of better.

Jon: You know, a bit of a pep in your step, as it were, just, yeah.

Danny: It can be hard because obviously as you get older in life and your music tastes change as well.

Danny: My music taste as a teen is far different than my music taste as a man in my 50s.

Danny: And there's all these songs in between. So I completely get you on that.

Danny: And in that song, was that when Queen sort of moved or they were starting to

Danny: move more from their rock that they got known for to start with?

Danny: More into like a sort of disco pop vibe at the time?

Jon: It definitely comes off as one of their more poppy songs, yeah.

Danny: Yeah, I was like you say, like Fred and Mercury, did you watch the Queen movie

Danny: that came out, the biopic?

Danny: I think it was Bohemian Rhapsody, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. A couple years back.

Danny: Yeah, yeah, I really enjoyed it.

Danny: I know there's been some back and forth, how factual some of that was,

Danny: but I thought all the actors nailed their roles brilliantly.

Danny: Oh, yeah, the cast was amazing. Yeah, so, so good.

Danny: And it was just interesting to see the story like how they met and how he became

Danny: their singer and some of the stuff that happened like I said,

Danny: I don't know how much of it was or how much of it was glamorised for Hollywood

Danny: but I did, I actually was at the Live Aid concert,

Danny: in 1985 at Wembley and I was sort of,

Danny: so if you're watching the movie you'll see obviously the crowd is massive and

Danny: in sort of the centre of the crowd maybe about 100 rows from the stage you've

Danny: got the big sound stage area where the engineers are and everybody so I was

Danny: to the right of that stage a little bit in front of it so I know exactly where

Danny: I was when I'm watching that movie,

Danny: I was so impressed at how much they pulled that 20-minute concert scene off. It was incredible.

Danny: It just took me back in a heartbeat to that moment in July in the UK.

Jon: I bet. That's one of those things where when I hear people who had the ability,

Jon: or had the ability, had the, I don't know,

Jon: the luck, the the the fortune of being alive

Jon: when queen was at

Jon: the height of their their fame and being able to not only see them just in you

Jon: know a regular arena or or a decent sized concert hall but but i mean to see

Jon: the show that you saw i'm i'm blown away because that's something that that

Jon: I would kill to see Queen live with Freddie Mercury.

Jon: It's the same thing with, I mean, I'm sure we all feel that way about a lot

Jon: of musicians who, over the years, we've, oh, you know what, I can't get off work for this.

Jon: Or, oh, it's too far away, I wouldn't make it in time.

Jon: And then that happens for sure. And unfortunately, then somebody passes away.

Jon: I never got a chance to see Ozzy Osbourne. I never got a chance to see Ronnie James Dio.

Jon: I'm finally going to go see Rush for the first time this October.

Jon: And that's a close second to Don't Stop Me Now, which is 2112 in the Temples of Syrinx by Rush.

Jon: I mean, it's able to reach out and touch the one leading the pack there.

Jon: But the fact that Neil Purtis passed away, it's like, I wish I would have done

Jon: this years ago, but I still am going to love seeing Rush in concert.

Jon: And I knew as soon as I saw that the tickets were up, I'm like,

Jon: this is my last opportunity for that.

Danny: And the drummer they've got in, she's amazing. Yeah. She is really, really good.

Jon: Yeah i went i was i was curious about i'm like oh

Jon: who is drumming for them now and i saw some clips i saw

Jon: some some some clips from the actual shows and

Jon: then just clips of her and i was like holy shit she

Jon: is amazing this is oh it's good it's i

Jon: i don't need to worry about that i'm just going to go and enjoy this

Jon: concert and i'm taking my girlfriend who's never listened to rush before oh

Jon: wow yeah and so i think it's a bathtub some before i exactly i was like this

Jon: is something I've been waiting for for years and years and this is going to

Jon: be your first experience of it I'm going to enjoy that

Danny: That's amazing no i i think yeah i think it'll

Danny: be a blast it'll be amazing because obviously you've got the two

Danny: front guys and the drummers are excellent so it'd be excellent i know

Danny: my first concert was a meatloaf funnily enough back in 85

Danny: which i i feel is a nice one is your first concert as a teen like going to a

Danny: meatloaf concert when he was at his peak yeah like his stage theatrics were

Danny: amazing um so yeah i i'm i always speak to my wife my wife's a little bit younger

Danny: than me and she's always called me old man you know because he's something about

Danny: what we're older But I'll say, yeah,

Danny: but I went to these concerts that you'll never see, unfortunately.

Danny: So it's just like the Foo Fighters when Taylor died.

Danny: And the Foo's are still gone, obviously still as great as ever,

Danny: but it just doesn't feel quite the same, right? There's just that little thing

Danny: because you know Taylor's not behind the sticks.

Danny: But yeah, it's just one of these things. That's one of the things you're getting

Danny: older. People you admire, love, they start to go, they start to pass, right?

Jon: Yeah.

Danny: Well, let me know how the Rush concert goes because I love the live music.

Danny: And I love rock music so let me know how that goes because I think it was probably

Danny: in Canada as well at that time.

Jon: I would hope so. I'm actually curious because I remember reading some years

Jon: back about Rush that there was actually somewhere in Canada RushCon which was

Jon: a convention dedicated entirely to Rush and I'm not sure if that,

Jon: I haven't checked to see if that's still going on but it was a very interesting

Jon: concept to me to have a convention of any size around a specific band like that. And it just really

Jon: kind of points to the popularity of them you know that especially the home field popularity of rush

Jon: so i would hope because yeah it's the 50th anniversary tour so so i'm expecting

Jon: it to be big and i would really hope they did some some amazing shows uh up north

Danny: Yeah i'll look at once we finish recording actually i'm going to check that

Danny: out i didn't know there were touring this year but yeah i will definitely check

Danny: that out i'll go myself i don't care that'll be that'll see me but i like that

Danny: so like i say i always like it when uh a music question comes up,

Danny: So on that note, then, let's have a look at question number four.

Danny: Yeah, OK. I'm not sure that a million is a big enough number these days.

Danny: So anyway, I'm rambling there.

Danny: Jon, question number four. If you won $1 million playing the lottery, what would you do?

Jon: So interestingly enough, another question similar to this came up on Reddit

Jon: the other day for a significantly higher amount.

Jon: And then I was going through the math of certain things, age versus retirement

Jon: versus my current salary and things like that.

Jon: And I had settled on $1 million would be the right amount for me to place in

Jon: my – it's a very boring answer.

Jon: It's a very boring answer to put into my bank account and pull out just $2,000

Jon: a month to supplement my income and effectively put me into net positive each month.

Jon: So I didn't have to do any sort of side gigs or I have a pretty sizable comic book collection.

Jon: And so now that I've gotten older, I've realized these are just sitting in boxes.

Jon: They do me no good. it. It brings me, there's, brings me no joy and I don't interact with them.

Jon: Um, so I'll sell them. So, so a little bit less pressure to sell those, you know,

Jon: it's, it's like I said, and, and, and you said in my intro, you know,

Jon: I, I work for a local, I work for a school district and, and I,

Jon: I think, I think school district employees from the teachers,

Jon: maybe not the top, top folks.

Jon: I've seen those salaries. They're doing okay.

Jon: But the rest of us, especially in an incredibly expensive place like the San

Jon: Francisco Bay Area where I'm from, the salary doesn't... It does most of your bills.

Jon: So I was looking at them like, what would it take me to be

Jon: You know, just comfortable, have a bit of money to, to, you know,

Jon: do something fun or go on a small holiday without, you know,

Jon: having to save up, save up. I could just pull a little bit of money out.

Jon: The interest on it would be nice year over year as well. Make a little bit off of that.

Jon: But yeah, it's, it's a, it is a relatively boring answer because 1 million would

Jon: be kind of, kind of the perfect amount and i i did that math against you know

Jon: the next 40 years for myself

Danny: Well that's and that's why i said like i'm not sure if a

Danny: million is a good amount anymore i mean

Danny: if i've been speaking you know speaking about this maybe five years ago

Danny: um you know like you say put it in the bank get a

Danny: nice interest account for it's actually the interest is paying your your wage

Danny: essentially if you wanted it to be like you said you you'd use it to top up

Danny: your income which is nice because you work for a local school district so you

Danny: continue to do that because i know sometimes people wouldn't win a decent chunk

Danny: on a lot or they say okay that's it i hate my job i'm out here get out here

Danny: but you obviously you love what you do i.

Jon: Do i do and and and you know it was it was very much i enjoyed making silicon

Jon: valley money i don't think anybody wouldn't they they don't have a concept of

Jon: work-life balance there so everybody i'll say the blank the blanket of my age, quote unquote,

Jon: I will say anybody 35 and up, you know, because there's always going to be some

Jon: 24 year old from, you know,

Jon: Idaho, who's like, I'm going to go, you know, become a software developer.

Jon: I'm going to go work in Silicon Valley, who is happy to take a little bit less

Jon: money in exchange for a cool title to put on LinkedIn and work 12 hour days.

Jon: And there's, there's no competing with that when you have common sense of wanting

Jon: to have a family and work-life balance. It just, it just doesn't make any sense.

Jon: So when I got caught up in, I don't know if you remember, I don't know how,

Jon: I think this is one of those things I have kind of the tunnel vision on.

Jon: I don't really know how it impacts as far as other countries go,

Jon: or even a lot of the U S but, uh, when there was that, I think it was 2023,

Jon: Maybe the end of 22 mass, mass technology layoffs. I mean, almost,

Jon: I think a million people.

Jon: I was one, I was one of those.

Jon: And so, you know, I started applying for jobs and

Jon: And I'm looking and I'm like, oh, this is, you know, I know people are looking for jobs right now.

Jon: I know there's a lot of people out, but jobs that I would apply for that three

Jon: months prior would have only had 20 to 40 candidates now had 800 to a thousand candidates.

Jon: And, you know, I wanted to make sure I was doing the best that I could on applying for a job.

Jon: So I paid for the premium version of LinkedIn. So I could see analytics on it.

Jon: Okay. There's a thousand people, 50 of them have master's degrees.

Jon: Holy shit. I didn't even graduate college, you know?

Jon: Oh, another 80 of them have five or more years on top of mine of experience too.

Jon: And so I was like, this is like, you know, it's trying to beat a brick wall

Jon: down with my face, you know, at this point.

Jon: So I just kind of made a decision that I was going to take the opportunity to

Jon: pivot and finally get out of that, that I feel like it really was a soulless Silicon Valley grind.

Jon: You are, you're just part of a machine that pads a CEO's bank account.

Jon: And frankly, 90% of the software that gets created in Silicon Valley is solving

Jon: a problem that the people who created the software themselves thought up you know

Jon: And there's so many people that are there. I'm not going to turn this into a

Jon: rant about Silicon Valley, actually. Let me stop myself there.

Jon: I know where I'm going on this.

Jon: I'll spend the next 30 minutes shit-talking Silicon Valley.

Danny: It's funny you mention that, though,

Danny: because back, I used to work for a marketing agency a few years back.

Danny: And one of our clients, this was around a time when influence marketing was a big thing.

Danny: And you had, like, social platforms like Cloud, Cred, Tracker,

Danny: all that kind of stuff coming out of the woodwork.

Danny: And one of our clients was one of these platforms and the main guy,

Danny: I wasn't CEO, but one of the main execs or whatever would email you at one in

Danny: the morning and four in the morning, 10 in the morning, seven at night,

Danny: emails all over the place.

Danny: You're thinking, do you ever sleep? When? When do you sleep?

Danny: And it got to the stage where my boss just cut the client basically because

Danny: he was being ridiculous, you know.

Danny: And like you say to your point about work life, I think as you get older as

Danny: well, you appreciate it.

Danny: Certainly when family comes along, I used to commute two hours each way every

Danny: day for the first three years of my kid's life.

Danny: So I missed a lot of big moments and it sucked the life out of me.

Danny: And when I quit, it was the biggest, it was like a massive weight was lifted

Danny: off me. I'm sure you were the same, even though you got let go, it wasn't ideal.

Danny: But I'm sure looking back now, that was a good thing that happened to you.

Jon: Absolutely. Absolutely. And it was just like you said, a weight.

Jon: That decision to say, you know what, no, I'm not going to keep applying and

Jon: applying and applying to go back to...

Jon: Some company where I feel the same way. I feel just, you know,

Jon: one of the many nameless people working there, that was so incredibly freeing.

Jon: And I know that at my job now, you know, it's, it's a big school district.

Jon: There's, you know, several thousand employees. I'm very sure that

Jon: all except for, I don't know, maybe 40 people there know who I am because of

Jon: just the way it's structured because I work specifically in purchasing.

Jon: So the way the approval flow is structured and how it goes from the teacher

Jon: to the school administrator, to this, to that, to me, most people don't interact with me.

Jon: It gets funneled very tightly because otherwise I would just have people just

Jon: fucking coming at it, coming every direction at me.

Jon: But it's okay because I get to look at these things and like I said a big a

Jon: big driver for me was looking at at the way the world is

Jon: And realizing that there's a certain amount of effort that I feel people haven't

Jon: been making in their communities, which is focusing on your local community.

Jon: And for me, that's not necessarily just the city I live in.

Jon: I mean, I'm sure you know that the Bay areas are very densely populated,

Jon: you know, and just city, next to city, next to city, next to city,

Jon: just all crammed together.

Jon: But being able to review these contracts, vet the people that are coming into

Jon: the schools, ensure that we're spending our money as best we can to make sure

Jon: it's benefiting the kids as much as possible.

Jon: Even though I have to be a bad guy a lot, I do a lot of saying no.

Jon: There's a lot of things that get delayed up to the wire because I'm telling

Jon: people like, no, we need to do this.

Jon: We need to do that. No, your person cannot start without a valid contract.

Jon: It's a lot of tedious work, but it's rewarding because when I talk to school

Jon: administrators who put these requests in and they're telling me,

Jon: you know, I'll see a really cool performance coming to the school.

Jon: And I asked, well, how did it go? This looked amazing.

Jon: I mean, just the other day we had, we approved a couple of contractors to come

Jon: and help the kids at the school right next door

Jon: build a garden so that they could learn about gardening and growing vegetables

Jon: and herbs and things like that.

Jon: It's right out my window. So I can open my window,

Jon: hear all of the kids laughing and playing and on a, on a particularly quiet

Jon: day, I can even hear the lecture that they're getting about the garden and things

Jon: like that. And it's just like,

Jon: There's nothing better. There's nothing better than hearing all the kids being

Jon: happy and enjoying themselves, knowing that even though it's this much,

Jon: it's 1% of it, I somehow helped with that.

Jon: I mean, I know our teachers are the forefront of that. The teachers are giving them these words.

Jon: But the fact that I can benefit them, it's breathed life back into me.

Danny: And I think that's it. I mean, the sound of a kid's laughter,

Danny: it's like the most, or one of the most choice things you can hear, I feel.

Danny: You know, because you know it's natural, it's not tainted by any,

Danny: you know, adult mindsets that you might grow into in here down the line.

Danny: So yeah, and yeah, I'm always a huge supporter.

Danny: Kudos to anybody in the schooling system that helps that. So even though you

Danny: say you're like a small part of it, it's a pretty big part when you think of,

Danny: you know, what it's doing.

Danny: And like it's, you said about, He's going to be a bad guy sometimes.

Danny: It kind of reminds me of the Wreck-It Ralph movie where they're doing their therapy group.

Danny: And I think it's Zangief, the Street Fighter guy, that says,

Danny: just because I'm a bad guy, does it mean I'm bad guy? Or the way he words it or whatever.

Danny: So I thought that just reminded me of that anyway, just like a little tangent for that.

Jon: A hundred percent, a quote I go back to very regularly. It is a good one.

Jon: I'm happy you pulled that one out.

Danny: Kindred spirits, mate. Kindred spirits. Speaking of kindred spirits,

Danny: We're both, well, I say we're both arriving, you're arriving at question number five.

Danny: So let's, I'm going to go with this one, actually. This has been on before,

Danny: but it's a very, very early episode. I think probably even season one,

Danny: midway through or something.

Danny: So question five, Jon, if you needed to hide an elephant, how and where would you hide it?

Jon: I mean, part of me wants to ask more questions. Who am I hiding it from? Why?

Jon: You know, are we dodging? I've reported, like, what's going on?

Jon: Can I just stick them in the house?

Jon: Or, like, you know, there's so much clarification that I want.

Danny: So, I guess, let's maybe clarify a little bit for you.

Danny: Let's see, you really want a pet elephant, but your girlfriend hates elephants.

Danny: And you've gone, you've won the $1 million lottery that we just talked about.

Danny: And you thought, you know what? Screw it. My first purchase,

Danny: I'm going to get me an elephant. Go.

Jon: Huh. Maybe instead of hiding it, it's more of a misdirect.

Jon: I've bought an elephant, but also, look, here is a brand new car or a brand new Tiffany bracelet.

Jon: Look, just look over this direction. You know.

Danny: The Tiffany bracelet's at the end of the elephant's trunk. Yeah.

Jon: And hopefully her vision is so but

Jon: uh you know it's that wouldn't work though she's not she's

Jon: she's very she likes she likes some

Jon: jewelry things and she's got her her her piercings and things but she's not

Jon: she's not really a material person so that would be that'd be a poor that'd

Jon: be a poor one um well with a million dollars i could afford an elephant probably

Jon: see if i could find a decently affordable warehouse in the industrial district

Jon: nearby and create a nice little, you know,

Jon: decent sized space for the elephant to live almost like a stable.

Jon: And I guess I would just drive over and hang out with that. I'll put a little

Jon: office in there for myself so that I could do some work while I hang out with my pet elephant.

Jon: I don't know if there are any laws in California about riding an elephant down the street.

Danny: That'd be awesome.

Jon: In my city, there are definitely people just kind of up in the hill areas.

Jon: There's several smaller ranches.

Jon: And there's people that are riding their horses around through, you know, the other.

Jon: We have a lot of wonderful street vendors. and i went to go get tacos a couple

Jon: weeks ago and turned around and boom there's two guys on their on horses at

Jon: nine o'clock at night going to pick up tacos if i could do that with the elephant then i mean a

Danny: Dry through of an.

Jon: Elephant yeah exactly take take him out for a a quick walk bring bring him to

Jon: the local schools to to so they can see an elephant at the same time i would

Jon: be concerned about the liability i've seen enough videos of like elephants charging

Jon: people in southeast asia then i'm like maybe that's not a good idea well

Danny: And they're big they're big old beasts as well that's right they're not the smallest of things.

Jon: No yeah that's what i think it's it's if i'm spending the money on an elephant

Jon: i need to spend i need to spend the money on a a proper place to uh to house

Jon: it and uh i think that the hiding of it would just be um saying yeah yeah Yeah,

Jon: I am. I am driving to work every day.

Danny: Well, that was going to be kind of like a little follow-up question because

Danny: I mean, I guess at some stage you're going to have natural things that you can

Danny: be doing, you know, when you're going to visit that.

Danny: So you could be going just grab some groceries or like you say,

Danny: you know, I've got to work coming back.

Danny: But would there ever be a time maybe where your girlfriend's getting a little bit suspicious?

Danny: Well, why are you going out and disappearing for an hour or two at a time?

Danny: Because I know you're not going to work. You're not at the gym or whatever.

Jon: So I am an awful liar to the point where

Jon: And fortunately, my younger brother backs me up on this every time,

Jon: which I greatly appreciate.

Jon: I just start laughing when people

Jon: ask me questions to the point of it just immediately getting guilty.

Jon: And there's been so many times where my brother has had to tell my parents like,

Jon: no, no, no, he's telling the truth.

Jon: I would get found out immediately.

Jon: I am so bad at lying. I cannot lie. Most of the time.

Jon: There are certain times at work where I'm trying to spare somebody's feelings about things.

Jon: Yeah, so I think there would not be... The first time she asked, the ruse would be up.

Danny: Guilty, guilty. It may just be easier building an extension in your backyard or something.

Danny: Let's be done with it. this happened let's do it let's deal with it.

Jon: I mean it could also be one of those situations where i tell her the truth and

Jon: it's so unbelievable that her response is oh fine if you don't want to tell

Jon: me then don't tell me because i'm like well yeah i bought a warehouse and i've

Jon: got my pet elephant and it's just like what shut up what do you think why won't

Jon: you tell me i'm like i'm i'm telling you

Danny: Well if you do win that million um again you know keep me updated i would love

Danny: to share updates about your elephant and how your girlfriend accepts that.

Danny: So it's a nice way to finish off your time, I feel, in the random question hot

Danny: seat, and thank you for that.

Danny: As is only fair because I've had you in the hot seat for about 45,

Danny: 50 minutes now, it's time to hand the question asking Baton over to you. Good sir.

Jon: So if you could, so first off, what is the, in your opinion,

Jon: the best and at the same time, okay, well I'll ask it as two parts instead of combining it to one.

Jon: So what is the best decade?

Jon: For music in your opinion

Danny: For me it's an easy one i'm going to say the

Danny: 80s like i was born very late end of the

Danny: 60s so i was kind of not really any music in the 70s i was

Danny: listening to some but not into it my teen years

Danny: were the 80s and that's i feel where a lot of your music is informed um living

Danny: in the uk um i kind of covered a lot of um genres if you like so i got into

Danny: the new romantics so juran juran spando ballet uh i guess i stick camera would

Danny: be part of that And then from there, moved into more rock.

Danny: So like I say rock, we got Bon Jovi, Def Leppard, ACDC.

Danny: I went to the Monsters of Rock concert at Donington for a few years.

Danny: Always good times there.

Danny: So I would say for me, 80s for the decade.

Jon: Okay. And then the follow-up question to that would be,

Jon: if you could travel back to that period to relive that era of music,

Jon: but you could not travel back to the present, would you do that?

Danny: So I could go back to the 80s, but I can't come back to my time now.

Jon: You cannot go back. So you would travel back to the 80s.

Jon: You'd be able to experience firsthand that decade of music in its entirety,

Jon: knowing everything you know now about who, you know, seeing small bands before they got started.

Jon: But that from that point, you would live out the rest of your natural lifespan. Right.

Danny: See, this shouldn't be a hard question because I'm a parent.

Danny: I'm married, so I've got a family.

Danny: And I would never, ever want to give that up. That being said,

Danny: the 80s, for me, the 80s were like, music-wise, it was great.

Danny: But the 80s were also a really, really good time of my life.

Danny: I was in the Army Cadets, which taught me a lot about responsibility and teams and community, etc.

Danny: I had got my first job. So I had my first love. You know, a lot of major events,

Danny: if you like, happened in the 80s.

Danny: So that's actually a harder one. And it should be because, like I say,

Danny: as a family and you, you're a family man yourself.

Danny: You know, you wouldn't want to leave your kids. Right. You'd want to come back. Right.

Danny: So it's it's I'm going to give you two answers. And they're both bad.

Danny: Not bad. So they're both a cop out. Sorry. If I was single.

Danny: Yes. 100%. 100% I would go back

Danny: and I would be super happy and live out my life, you know, at that time.

Danny: But because I don't have, you know, I've got a family, my two kids who I adore.

Danny: I couldn't, I just couldn't not come back. I'd either have to banjax him and

Danny: bring them with me and they just wake up and he's pissed off because now they're

Danny: having to live through my decade and then we're all stuck there.

Danny: Or I would just have to stay.

Danny: I would love, and then just, you know, stick a Spotify playlist on or something

Danny: like that. and, and, you know, live vicariously through that one.

Danny: That, that would be my, my cop-out answer.

Jon: Awesome. I like it. And I, I 100% understand it. You know, I'm, I'm the same way.

Jon: I'm, I'm sure it's, it's the same with you, but, but the, the family,

Jon: the kids are the driving force behind most things, the, the drive to constantly

Jon: get promotions and move up and get better jobs and better everything.

Jon: That happened when I became a dad the job that I had before I became a dad I was delivering pizza

Jon: And then, or sorry, no, I was working in an insurance call center, actually.

Jon: And that was a step up from delivering pizza. And then from there,

Jon: I got my first job in software doing customer support.

Jon: And I mean, that was just, and every, I just kept pushing higher and higher

Jon: and higher, better wages, better positions, everything, because I wanted to

Jon: be able to take care of everybody.

Jon: So, so, I mean, the question that it's, I would give the exact same answer with, without hesitation.

Danny: Yeah, and it's like you say, it's like you do things that you don't want to

Danny: because it's for a better life down the line, right?

Danny: It's like a tired old saying that you want to give your kids a better life than

Danny: you had, but it's true. You know, you don't want to spoil them,

Danny: but you don't want to struggle either.

Danny: So anything you can do to make it simple and a good life, you'll do it, right?

Danny: It's just a parent thing, whether you're a mum, dad, or someone that's in that

Danny: position because mums and dads aren't around for whatever reason,

Danny: but they're taking that role on, right?

Danny: But yeah, great question. It's something I've never even thought of.

Danny: Been asked before, obviously.

Danny: Never been asked before, but never thought of. So a great question,

Danny: especially because of that decade.

Danny: If I didn't have that decade, easy peasy, but no, no, that's a good one.

Danny: So thank you for that, mate.

Jon: Awesome, yeah.

Danny: So thanks for that, mate. I really enjoyed that question. And I've enjoyed chatting

Danny: to you and hearing your answers and how you'd get around some things and maybe

Danny: not get around some things.

Danny: For the listeners that want to find out more about the podcast that you run

Danny: with your co-hosts, find out more about what you do, you know um in general

Danny: catch up with you online connect etc where's the best place for everybody to check you out.

Jon: So for anybody that wants to find us um it's google

Jon: is the easiest way honestly just searching up

Jon: time pals podcast i believe it's buzzsprout that we use and that hosts our episodes

Jon: but it also hosts links to you know all of the other podcast platforms you would

Jon: use and our social media as well um if you want to find us on social media of

Jon: choice uh time and pals are separate words.

Jon: I don't know if it comes up if you serve it together, but yeah,

Jon: we strive to keep it easy.

Danny: Yeah, and that's Time Power's podcast. It's as easy as it comes from search.

Danny: And I'll be sure, as always, to leave all the links in the show notes anyway.

Danny: So whatever podcast app you're listening on or you're listening to this on the

Danny: website, just check the episode show notes out, as always.

Danny: And all the cool links will be there over to Jon and his co-hosts,

Danny: podcasts and socials, etc.

Danny: So again, Jon, thanks so much for joining me on today's 5 Random Questions. thank.

Jon: You so much for having me it was it was a blast and you know i did not know

Jon: what to expect with the questions but they were a lot of fun and i was i was

Jon: surprised by how fun and how much i had to think for some of these answers

Danny: Well that's always good to hear one of the reasons i love this show because

Danny: it just gets everybody thinking which is always nice and there's no pressure

Danny: to come up with the best soundbite answer so i'm glad you enjoyed yourself man i appreciate it,

Danny: thanks for listening to 5 Random Questions and if this was your first time

Danny: here feel free to hit follow and check out past episodes if you enjoyed this

Danny: week's episode i'd love for you to leave a review on the app you're currently

Danny: listening on and if you know someone else that would enjoy the show too be sure

Danny: to send them this way it's very much appreciated

Danny: until the next time keep asking those questions.