Nothing Compares To You
47:24 Share

And here we are again. Boy, the weeks go fast. Hi, it's Jan. Jan Arden. You're listening to the Jan Arden Podcast and Show. Just moments ago, I was sitting right next to you, Sarah Burke. Right next to you, right here, just to my right. And now you're back in Toronto. But man, that was a fun trip. It was so fun. I had a great time and I already miss you and Poppy. Poppy loved having everybody here. It's so funny. Whenever I have company...

He stands at the top of the stairs when we get up in the morning and he's like, huh? I'm like, no, there's nobody down there. Well, let's let me go just check just in case. Let me just go down. Blip, blip, blip, blip, blip. I hear him go down there.

He looks around, he's going into all the bedrooms and you're gone. I just want to say, Sarah, you and your friends are great guests. This is a great guest. And you guys know this because during the summer, if you're in cottage country or if you're someone who owns a cabin or a trailer, you are inundated with summertime guests, right? And people come and usually every weekend is filled up with somebody new. I know my friends have a cabin in Montana.

every weekend. It's just like, oh my God, you can't come on the fifth because we've got so-and-so. And anyway, you guys are awesome because you're like, the beds are all made. We stripped them off. We remade the beds. And Sarah was so cute. She said, I hope I've got the pillows right. Cause you got a shit ton of pillows down there. And I didn't know, I didn't know what went where. And plus all the towels are in the dryer and we didn't have a chance to fold them all. Oh, and the garbage is out of the bathroom. And we washed, we cleaned the mirror off. You guys are awesome. Yeah.

Well, funny, I drove to the cottage, my parents' cottage, as soon as I got home from my red-eye flight, okay? So it's like 9 a.m. on Saturday. The first thing my mother asked me was if I stripped the bed. Did she? She's like, I hope you being a guest at Jan's, you really made sure that you took care of everything. You did. And your mom's only seven years older than I am. Your mom is 68, right? She and I, we are cut from the same damn cloth.

So she knows. I've definitely had people that stay here and it's just... It's a pile of stuff in the morning. No one cares. Yeah. Yeah. There's lots of crap on the mirror from brushing teeth and the towels aren't even hung back up in the little hoop things and there's garbage and...

I don't stay at people's houses very often. I'm probably not a great house guest. I like staying in a hotel. Yeah, you guys were awesome. It was great having you here. Thank you for having us. Thank you for supporting Enviros. I still don't know how much we raised. I'm hoping it was like $40,000 or $50,000. Speaking of charity events...

So a couple of days ago, I golfed in an SPCA fundraiser. What does that stand for? The Society for the Protection of Animals, right? Okay, okay. It's an international thing. They have chapters all over the world. Let's look it up. SPCA. Okay, here. I got you here. SPCA. SPCA.

Society for the Protection. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. That sounds right up your alley. There was 150, 160 people at this event and they served a lunch. Guess what they served? No. Well, hot dogs and smokies. No. But this is about indoctrination of how people think and how it's so filled with hypocrisy and people do not bat an eye.

You know, I'll tell you what. People can make every excuse in the world. I tweeted about it yesterday and some guy called me a twat. He literally called me a twat. He said that, oh, I didn't think you liked wieners anyway, that that really wasn't in your wheelhouse, you twat, or something like that. So I probably told him to F off or something. I said something disparaging, not proud of it, but I blocked him and fired that off. So he probably didn't even see it, which is stupid.

And maybe I'm completely overreaching here as far as how people, the perception of what they're doing and why I think it's wrong. We lose our crap when we read about people eating cats and dogs and having dog eating festivals and stuff. They do it in a lot of parts of the world. I'm not going to say it's culture. I'm just going to say that's what they do. No, it doesn't seem pleasant to us at all.

But here at the Stampede a few weeks ago, they had a rib eating festival. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Like, you know, it's pork ribs and beef ribs and people come all over the world and blah, blah, blah. So our perception is so, it's so distorted and there's so many frayed edges to it.

But I just, I was disheartened and I was disappointed that at a society for the protection of cruelty to animals, they're serving hot dogs. They didn't have hamburgers. They had smokies. So it was probably mostly pork, but I just shook my head and. Like not even a, not even a vegan option. There was nothing there for me to eat unless I wanted a hot dog bun.

Oh my God. Nothing. That is surprising. I find that really shocking. It is. And I made a donation and, and, uh, of course our green fees, my friend Bev just put a team together cause we wanted to support the town. And anyway, moving on from that, it's just when you talk about indoctrination and that seems to be the hot word of the minute these days, whether it concerns the LGBTQ plus two spirit community or

you know, indoctrinating children with this ideology. We're indoctrinating each other all the time. The meat business, the agricultural, industrial agriculture is indoctrinating people and young children all the time. Oh yeah. So people are throwing this word around, like they're exempt to how they operate or the, you know, how they make their way through the world.

And we are all guilty of antiquated ideas that we are trying to make work in a modern society where there's a climate crisis. But boy, that message really twisted my mind up. Did you say? Not a word. You're not the type of person who like you wouldn't just quietly say to an organizer, hey, just a thought. I wanted to. I wanted to. But I figured I've got a podcast.

And I'll say it on the podcast. Yeah, you do. And I'm not pointing fingers, but think it through. What a great opportunity to have plant-based products. And I'll tell you what, people wouldn't have noticed. And further to that, in my mind's eye, people would have been very open at an SPCA event to try something that was cruelty-free. What an opportunity to have a veggie wiener

IKEA is doing stuff all the time. They're swapping out all their meat to vegetable. They're halfway there now. They've got a veggie meatball. They've got veggie hot dogs that far and away outsell their other stuff. And I know I rant and rage about this, not only because it's extremely cool to animals, but listen,

And we talked about this on other podcasts, Sarah. Look at around the world. They're shutting down, you know, the Parthenon. And, you know, in Athens, they're just like, they can't even have tourist things open because it's 45 degrees, 44 degrees. Also, Rhodes in Greece, where I'm going, is on fire right now, literally. Is it? On fire. You go next week, don't you? End of August. But point is that this stuff is happening all over. The temperature in the water in the Mediterranean is hotter than a hot tub.

So they clocked it at 102 degrees, 103 degrees or something. And so they don't know what's going to happen to sea life. They don't know what's going to happen to coral, to algaes, to the small plankton type stuff, the little fish that feed all the big fish. It really is...

It's appalling. It's really, really dangerous what's happening. And people are laughing. They're jumping into the ocean. They're thinking, oh, it's so warm. It's beautiful. It's gorgeous. Oh my God. Their Instagram moment. And meanwhile, the planet is literally dying. We've been here hundreds of millions of years. This planet has been spinning around, not human beings. And in the last 150 years, we've annihilated it. This version of human beings is

So, directly, our grandparents and our great-grandparents have completely effed the planet. You want to know what blew my mind this morning? I had to stop by my car dealership to get a light bulb fixed because I'm not going to see my dad for another week and I needed to drive safely. So, while I was there, just for fun...

you know, because my car is getting a little old. It's a 2016 Jetta. I was asking some questions. I'm like, what's going on with electric vehicles and Volkswagen right now? Like, and is it good to wait? Like, is it easy to get one if I want an electric vehicle now? All of that. 2035 is when they think that

the infrastructure for like all the charging stations and everything, probably 2035 before the infrastructure, the charging stations and everything is readily available. Because right now, and I was talking to a woman about this, she's like, you know, I also want an electric vehicle, but I worry about like not being able to charge and running out of gas somewhere and being alone because I'm a single person and all that. So 2035, like we're still a ways away. It's not too bad. I mean, it's a drop in the bucket, really, when you consider...

how long petroleum has been ruling the world. I mean, early 20th century, right? Here's Jen's optimism. You can hear it. Well, I'm really not that optimistic these days. And the SPCA thing kind of made me even, I walked away from it going, if you as a group of individuals, full ass grown adults are sitting around planning this tournament and getting stuff donated, I'm sure,

Jesus, guys, come on. Right? Yeah. Just do better. Think it through. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. Serving hot dogs. And think about the stressful brides and grooms that are making sure that their vegan options at their weddings, you guys can do better. They didn't even give it a thought.

Do you want a smoky or a hot dog? So did you eat a bun? Nope. I didn't eat anything. I had a bag of chips like on the ninth hole or something. I had a Gatorade and a bag of chips. And it's funny, this golf course didn't even sell nuts. And I think it was because of allergies, maybe peanut allergies, but usually my go-to, but it's my bad. I didn't throw anything in my bag.

18 holes with not a lot of nourishment. That's a long hole. Drank a lot of fluids. And listen, I'm fat. So it's not going to kill me. Stop. Stop it. Please don't talk about yourself that way. And you are not. No, I'm just saying my...

My critics would say she can afford to skip a meal. Anyway, enough of that rant. You guys know how I feel about at least making an effort to do some plant-based stuff. So we've got lots to talk about today and a little bit of sad news that just popped up on our respective screens. As we were just getting prepped to start recording today, a little pop-up on Sarah's computer that the incomparable, extremely talented Sinead O'Connor

has passed away at 56 years old. So what a career this woman had. What an impact on pretty much every female artist that's working today. When she broke out with Nothing Compares to You, a song written by Prince, I might add, everyone recalls the beautiful black and white video of a closely shorn Sinead O'Connor, those big, beautiful eyes.

And the very short hair, very little makeup and looking dead into the camera. And that was the entirety of the video. And it was superstardom. What ensued was a frenzy. I don't think the girl could take a breath. You know, here's this Irish girl that...

I think any kind of fame that hits you that fast, that hard is unexpected. You can't sit there and go, oh, I knew it. I just don't, I don't think that's part of what a person thinks. But she, she just toured all over the world. Everyone might recall her infamous appearance on Saturday Night Live in the, in the early nineties, where she ripped a picture of the Pope, the then Pope in half and

sending the world, I mean, the media, the, and this is preemptive really of social media too, wasn't it? It was a little bit before all that stuff, but yeah, what a, what a sad thing. There isn't any really information as of the time of this recording. Um, here's the statement. It is with great sadness that we announced the passing of our beloved Sinead. Her family and friends are devastated and have requested privacy at this very difficult time. Um,

Just being real, like before we started recording, Jan and I, we both, both of our brains went to the same place, which is the long struggle with mental illness has been very public. Yeah. Long, long history with that. You know, social media, please have somebody help her. Yeah. And her son passed away 18 months ago. Yeah. You know, how do you... That would be so tough. Yeah. How do you keep going?

I'm not a hugely religious person, but I would like to think that there is a piece for her. She leaves behind an incredible body of work, just her music. And I'm sure we're going to see, as we always do when someone passes away, be it Prince or, uh,

Whitney or Michael Jackson, any of those people, they skyrocket as far as streams. Spotify goes crazy. iTunes go crazy. Amazon goes crazy. People really revisit music. And people are going to be very surprised at the diversity of her music. You know, it was so many genres. So I clicked on an article that was from the Irish Times. I was like, oh, I wonder if this is going to be different than what we're seeing in the CBC or the BBC right now.

And she actually won an award this year for classic Irish album at the RTA Choice Music Awards, which is something that they do in Ireland. She got a standing ovations for the album. I do not want what I haven't got. And, you know, again, that love for like your your home. She came up busking on the streets in Ireland. Well, it's the 56 years she packed a punch. Yes, she did.

There was a lot of living. There was some high, high highs and some low, low lows. She stood up for what she believed and she was willing to stick her neck out and to make statements and to make people think, you know, it's not always popular expressing an opinion. You're not always a popular person. You put yourself in harm's way in peril much of the time. And she was more than willing to do that, to say and do things differently.

and represent ideas that she really believed in. And so many people these days are spineless. You know, they just go along with what everybody else says. That's three quarters of Twitter. I would imagine as a fellow singer songwriter, though, just from what you and I've talked about in the past, how, you know, maybe women in publicity telling you, you should look a certain way and all of that. I bet you her career was also inspiring for you that way, not even musically, but how she presented herself.

Well, you know, Sinead, she just was head and shoulders above this curve. I mean, she really opened doors for so many women because what was happening when she was coming, breaking through was the grunge scene on the West Coast. So all that stuff was happening out of Portland and Seattle with Nirvana and Pearl Jam. I mean, there was dozens of these bands. Once Nirvana and Pearl Jam hit,

Labels were signing up, everything in their wake, anything that remotely sounded like that, that's what they wanted. And Sinead was probably one of the first superstar women that we saw of a new era of music. So I'm going to say right now that

You know, Alanis Morissette, Shania Twain, Celine Dion. Dolores O'Riordan. Dolores O'Riordan. So many huge, big names in female music. They were empowered and emboldened by the work that Sinead was doing. And, you know, she didn't just cave in and keep doing commercial stuff. She kind of had a knee-jerk reaction to Nothing Compares to You. And she just...

Some of her records were just so kind of cutting edge and angry in the way she danced and the way she moved. And I don't think they'd really seen anything like that out of Europe since probably Kate Bush was

This Mortal Coil, Alison Moyet, you know, there was some really cool artists that were doing stuff, but she just blew, especially when you, like you said, appearance, Sarah, how you, your appearance, she was androgynous, but she was so beautiful. She was beautiful. Yeah. She was beautiful. And it wasn't about flinging her hair around and she wasn't hyper-sexualized either. Although I'm sure so many women and so many men found her absolutely very sexy and

But she didn't play it. It wasn't a card she put on the table. Politics and music too. Like she was boycotting the Grammy Awards and the Oscars and all that stuff way before we heard the stories of Trent Reznor and all those people. Yeah. I love this quote, to be part of a world that measures artistic ability by material success, not something I want to be a part of. Yeah. Like how much stuff do you have? And even artists are hypercritical of each other.

Because they basing, oh, I got way more followers than them. Like basing artistic credibility on how many followers you have. How many trophies you got on your back wall. It's just nothing to, awards, it's nothing to do with how many records you sell or

you know, real artists. There's tens of thousands of real artists working right now, but we only know the handful that are in the Hollywood movies, you know, and SAG is really bringing this whole, you know, strike is bringing so much awareness to, like I said, the hundreds of thousands of other actors that are trying to scrape by a fricking living. Did you hear about the donation that was made? I think it was today. Dwayne Johnson, the rock, he donated $1,000.

So that the people struggling with SAG, with the strike right now, can get paid. I made a huge donation today. Jeez. You know, my mother used to say, you have to hit the bottom of the barrel, you know, in order to push yourself back up. And maybe that's what the artistic community is doing. And these things constantly reset themselves. It's not a new narrative. It's not a new story in how these things work. You know, whether you're making cars for a living or whether you're...

The petroleum industry, at some point, people pick their heads up long enough to go, hey, what we're doing isn't right. We're not getting paid. We don't have the benefits that we need to keep doing our job. So let's hope it doesn't last forever because I think there's going to be a real issue when people go to hit that Netflix streaming button.

Or Disney or whatever, and there's no new shows. Well, to wrap up our conversation about Sinead O'Connor too, going back to our conversation a few weeks ago, I'm going to hope that her soul has just gone to another dimension and quantum immortality. Yeah. Yep.

Remember that we were talking about a woman that was really freaking out millennials saying, you know, don't worry about dying, but just worry about living forever, that you live forever. And kids were freaking out. Like, what do you mean? No, no, you literally live forever for eternity. And I guess she was freaking these people out. Anyway, Sinead O'Connor, we sure appreciate you. We appreciate your music, safe travels, wherever you are. You're up there with some really great people. You're listening to the Jan Arden podcast and show, and we're going to be right back after this. We're going to talk about,

making new friends at a certain age, maintaining friendships, and the difficulties in those lengthy friendships where suddenly your friends have taken a whole different path in life than you are, which is fine. But we're going to talk about maybe some of the things that we can do for that. We'll be right back with this Jan Arden podcast and show. I'm here with Sarah Burke. Don't go away. ♪

We are so excited to welcome another new sponsor, our friends at Cove Soda. Have I pestered Cove enough to come and join us here at the Jan Arden podcast? I love them so much. They are Canadian, first of all. They are a natural, certified organic, zero sugar soda, which includes, get this, one big

probiotics. I kind of sounded like Dr. Evil there, didn't I? But seriously, you can get 80% of your daily vitamin C in just one can. Cove Soda is on a mission to promote gut health for all, and you still get to have a delicious treat while

while putting a gut-friendly, guilt-free drink in your body. Cove Soda is available in 12 delicious flavors all over North America. So for our American friends, you can find it. They've got this fruity lineup that's fantastic. I drink those all the time. They've got the classic lineup. If you like a

A cola or a cream soda, root beer, yes indeedy. And they've got their limited edition summer flavor, which will take you right back to the second grade. You gotta try the ice pop one. Head to janardenpod.com to find out where the closest place to you is where you can go and buy Cove. Go right now.

Welcome back to the Jan Arden Podcast and Show. I'm Jan. I'm with Sarah. Making new friends has been one of the most gratifying things, I think, certainly of my late 40s and 50s. Making friends at this age, as opposed to having friends from high school or junior high, which is great. It's great having an old friend and people that know you. It's absolutely important.

I think it says a lot about you as a person and your character to maintain friendships,

For 30, 40, 50 years, my mom and dad had friends that were 60 years. There's a whole different vibe to it. And you probably know this even in your mid-30s, Sarah, that making a friend now is different than making a friend in university. Because you know more about who you are. Okay. So what goes on the table? And have you made new friends in the last five years? Absolutely. Okay. What was the circumstances? And I'm saying work involved.

Yeah. But maybe the word is effort. What went into making and curating a friendship? Is that the right word? Sure, sure. It's funny because I think your friendships from high school or junior high or whatever, they know the you from the past. They know the you who's grown up. They know the things that irked you then. They know the things that irked you now. And that can be beautiful.

But I think in my mid-30s, I'm a completely different person. So the people I gravitate to now are not the same type of people. A lot for me in the last five years has been about common ground. And I think that friendships from the high school days for me, all of those girls, I love them. I love them to the moon and back. But they have families. They were all about, let's have kids as soon as we can.

But, you know, I'm very goal oriented with my career right now. And sure, if guys pop up along the way, you know, I just got out of a relationship like guys can be a part of it. But I'm into people who are motivated, trying new things, taking risks like those are the people that I gravitate to now. What's the last friend that you made? You don't have to say what their names are, but was it in the last four or five years? What were the circumstances? Where were you and how do you meet? How do you make a friend?

Where do you get the courage from, I guess is what I'm saying, Sarah, to put yourself out there for a new friend? For a friend. Never mind boyfriend. Nothing romantic, but just a goddamn friend. The gym is a great place. That's a community. But do people want to be talked to when they're farting, lifting a hundred pound barbell? No.

No, but when you've like, so I go to an F45. So it's like, it's more of like a fitness community. You're signing up for classes. You see the same people every day, right? It's not just like a giant good life where you wander in and do your own thing. Okay. So I've made some great friendships over the last five years because they're all people in my neighborhood. And then once in a while we'll do a social thing, right? You'll do something outside of the gym. Like you will be like, do you want to go?

Okay. My new friendship from the gym that emerged from like from F45 is a 50 year old woman. She just turned 50. Oh, God forbid, Sarah, 50. No, I mean, I mean, like, I love how I stumbled into a beautiful friendship with someone from a different generation. And we have so much in common. But there's also so much to learn from her. And she's learning from me. It's beautiful. We go on walks all the time and try to solve the world's problems. So.

So what is your advice then to people? So go to a gym. So if you want to meet people, you have to be willing to put yourself out there a little bit. Now, let me ask you, 36-year-old woman, is there an app for people to meet friends? Not booty calls, not lovers. Is there anything out there that touts itself as this is not sexual, no one's going to be touching weenies, there's no boobs involved? No.

This is people that are going to get together for an iced tea or a walk with their dogs. Is there any, are you looking it up right now? There's this one app called Peanut. My girlfriend, my former roommate who now has a new baby, she was feeling really isolated in the new mom situation. She went on this app, she put herself out there

There's now a woman in her neighborhood that she goes on walks with, with the strollers, even though it's an app for new moms at the center of it is a friendship, a new relationship with someone who understands what you're going through. Cause that would be really great to have something. And Tinder really isn't equipped. People who are swiping on Tinder are looking for definitely friends with benefits. They don't want to go watch a movie. They want to be able to

do tonsil hockey and, you know, grabbing of bums. I mean, let's be honest, right? Let's go back to, to this idea of putting yourself out there though. That's what I think the key of this conversation is. And it doesn't matter if it's at the gym or somewhere else in your neighborhood, it could just be your local coffee spot where you go and grab your coffee in the morning. If you are seeking a friendship out, putting yourself out there as the first step and you can't be afraid, the worst that happens is someone says, uh, I'm not really interested. And,

But taking classes too, you know, there's a, there's a, there's many benefits here. It gets you up and out of your house. Cause a lot of people have been in their homes for two and a half years. Let's face it. They've been working out of their houses. They've just been there with their cat or just by themselves in a condo or an apartment or a house somewhere. And,

And I really would say take a photography course or a pottery class once a Wednesday and get out there amongst people because everyone's going to be talking to everybody. Everyone's going to be talking to everybody, but you can't expect to sit on your couch, on your chair and lament that you don't have a friend. Like if you like Wynonna Earp, I know a lot of people have met through

liking a TV show, it's groups of people that get together to talk about the first it's happens online. Oh, to watch the bachelor. Did you see this episode? But then they find out, Oh, there's four of us that live in Edmonton. So let's book clubs are great. Book clubs are great too. So please just don't sit there and think that wishing or hoping is

Because I'll tell you what, I don't care if you're 50, 60, 70, 80, there's an opportunity to meet a new friend. Like my friend, Marianne, who's one of my very dearest friends.

We met, she just came backstage and she had bought a tie, I think. I'd met her a couple of times in Saskatoon. And we just became friends. I think I gave her my phone number. I said, here, my phone number. No, and you're a private person, right? So for you to feel like I want to keep contact with this person. Oh, she cracked me up. She was awesome. Don't you subscribe to the belief that every person that you come across in your life, you gain something from, like someone you have a relationship with.

with, not just one-off people. I really believe that. And that's why it doesn't bother me when now thinking about friendships going to the wayside because it's like, well, there's all these new friendships. Like Cynthia, people are always like, how did you meet Cynthia? Well, I did the social quite a number of times. I think Cynthia and I are coming up on, oh gosh, it's got to be 10 years that we've known each other. But I remember she asked me, I think the third or maybe the second, third, fourth time I'd been on the show, she goes, I

Do you ever want to like just go and have a drink after the show one day? And I was like, okay. Cause you always just get your stuff, grab your bag. We just leave and go back to the hotel or whatever. And Cynthia's like, we should go and have a drink sometime. And I did. And literally since that moment, I,

We just started working on a friendship and you do work on it. You know, there's all the questions that you ask and, you know, family history and how many siblings do you have? And oh yeah, what was that like for you? And what kind of a kid were you in school? I liken it to dating in a way. It is. It is. Look at you and I.

We're definitely friends. Not dating, for the record. We're not dating, but we'll always be friends. I think there's a huge respect for the work, non-work dynamic for both of us. There's just lines you don't cross. You don't screw somebody over because you're a friend and you don't show up. I phoned Sarah today. I said, I'm going to be 15 minutes late. I'm in town. This is taking longer than I thought. Sarah was like, let's do 1230.

Let's just give you that extra 15 so you're not gunning it. And it all worked out fine. And going back to like what you said last week, you were like, we should grab a clip from your Women in Media podcast to see how far we've come in our on-air chemistry or whatever. Put a little clip in this podcast. See if there's something there and timestamp it because I have a feeling it was before COVID. It was during, it was... Was it? January 2022. January 2022. So this was only a year and a half ago, kind of?

I'm Sarah Burke, and this is the Women in Media podcast. Not sure if you're ready for my next guest. She is a multi-platinum, award-winning singer-songwriter, actor, author, broadcaster, and podcast host herself. The president of the record company at the time offered to give me a lift home, and it's not what you think it was. It was nothing gross like that. We were driving, and he was smoking a cigar. He was a huge man. He took up the whole backseat of the limousine. He was dropping me off, and he goes, you know, Jan...

You're 30 pounds away from superstardom in this country. I didn't know what to say. So I got into the hotel and I phoned my mom, collect. I told her the story, told me I was 30 pounds away from superstardom. And she says, well, why didn't you tell him you didn't want to gain any more weight?

And I thought, oh my God, that's my mom. That's where I come from. Jan Arden is my guest today. That's all the time we have, Sarah. So I like your glasses. Thank you. They're new. I just got them this week. Literally. Thank you. So Jan, I don't know how much you know about my podcast, but-

The Women in Media podcast is a place where I'm looking at the challenges, the triumphs, the celebrations of women in the spotlight. And you very much cover that with your career and perfect timing with a new record. Why did you call the record Descendant? Just because of thinking about my great-grandmother in particular, to back up a little bit, this whole pandemic thing, it's affected everybody very differently. And to me, I'm just like,

I wonder what our ancestors would actually think. I wonder what my great grandmother would, I wonder what my grandmother would think of this. Nevermind my mother. My mother passed away like three years ago, but I'm just thinking they would probably be rolling their eyeballs going, really everybody? Wow. You grow relationships with people where you like genuinely care and want to make sure they're okay. You know, I think asking questions and literally taking an interest in someone. So please, if you're listening and you are feeling uncomfortable,

a little bit lonesome and feeling like you want to expand those circles. Do it. Don't be afraid to pick up the phone and do a class. Like, like Sarah said, a book club, there's gotta be things in your community. And I may, I also say this. I think a library is a fantastic,

fantastic place to meet people. Oh yeah. And I know they have singles nights. This is a whole other thing. A lot of libraries have singles nights. People that like literature, like reading, like learning. Sign me up. They call it micro learning. Micro learning. We're just going to put a, a

a hat on our new friendship conversation. Dating apps. Are you on dating apps right now? I'm only on one. I'm easing back into it. Which one? It's Hinge. I'm not really ready to like go on a date or anything. I'm kind of just seeing what's around.

Okay. And Hinge is what? I don't know. I would say it's like Tinder. Like, same, same. Tell me right now, what's your profile say? Oh, my profile? Yeah, I want to know. Okay, okay. Hold on. Logging in, I'll read it to you. I mean, I have nothing to hide. Whatever. God, you're putting it out there for all these guys. You can at least put it out for us listeners. I'm so new on the app, I can't even find my own profile. Hold on. Sarah Burke with an E. There you go. Stop!

So actually, it just says Sarah on my profile. And you have a picture? Six pictures at the top. Okay, some are with glasses, some are without glasses, some are athletic. They make you choose and hinge three written prompts, right? So to tell people a bit about you. So the first one I chose, like there's a drop-down list, is my simple pleasures. I put coffee, vinyl, a bike ride, anything active, or being outside. The way to win me over is, and I wrote, I

wrote Ice Cream. Nice. Here I have I Go Crazy 4 and I wrote Toronto Sports, Golf and Concerts. I love it. I think that's great.

Some of the dudes I'm coming across. Okay, so here's, this guy's name is Nigel. This is how you know I've been spending too much time with you, even if it is a digital studio. Okay, okay. When I see the name Nigel, my simple pleasures are riding my motorcycle. I'm somehow picturing Nigel's, your Nigel's voice. I'll ask him if it's him. Riding my motorcycle, relaxing at the cottage, chopping firewood. Chopping firewood. Yeah.

Is that a metaphor? I go crazy for. This is another guy's prompt. Riding motorcycles, live music, long unplanned adventures, building things with my hands. Like he lost me a motorcycle.

No. Okay. My simple pleasure. Brand new socks. Brand new socks. I mean, it is a simple pleasure. Oh my God. I'm going to be alone forever. The one thing I'd love to know about you is, would you rather live without wheat or dairy? I was like, dude, you got to get a life. He asked you that? That's what it says in his dating app. So it's asking whoever's on his profile. Would you rather live without wheat or dairy? Dude,

Dude, if you think that's going to be our first topic of conversation, it's not even happening. Well, I'm going to say dairy like right now. That's not a no-brainer. Nobody gets hurt with wheat except if you're gluten intolerant, but nobody gets killed. Anyway, those are my dating escapades right now. But this weekend, you know what's funny is like a few guys have asked me to golf because they see the golf stuff on my profile. All right. Well, that's good. I just haven't gone yet, but it's like you can learn the best and worst with someone on the golf course. So I think it's...

Kind of brilliant. Well, you would think I was a raging lunatic if you were golfing with me because I'm like F this, F that, you effing. We heard you. We know. Yeah. It's just like if I duff it or miss it or hook it or pull it or. Slice it.

Yeah. We're talking about golf, by the way. Just to clarify. Speaking about other apps. Okay. So Elon Musk has rebranded Twitter. I haven't seen anything on my phone. It's called X.com.

It's called X. On my browser, the blue bird is gone. If you look at Twitter right now, if you go, it just shows you a big X. I'm on my phone on Twitter, and I've got the blue bird on my phone. Just go to Twitter.com in your browser. X.

Yeah, you see it now. Just an ex. They're calling it one of the worst rebrandings in history. He's rebranded the logo three times. Like, normally you do this stuff behind the scenes for years and years and years. He's like, oh, I'll just do it publicly while everyone's watching. Did you read the article a couple days ago about Twitter employees were told to, like, take anything related to the Bluebird off the building? Uh-huh. You still have to get permits for things like that so that pedestrians walking by don't have stuff falling on them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right?

Still said like the end of the word Twitter. They got stopped halfway through. So it's er. It's just er. This guy. You know, somebody who's done, you know, so many high profile things. I mean, Tesla, Starlink. I mean, multi-billion dollar things. The space stuff that he's done. Why would this be...

so difficult to just do this in a dignified, streamlined, professional way instead of every move he makes on this app now seems to come from vengeance. He hates his own subscribers.

He thinks we're all a bunch of a-holes. And he just, he does everything to discourage us to make us not want to be there. Like, I just don't know what kind of a business model that is. What about the fellow whose account he stole? Did you read that part? Yeah, the poor ex-guy. He's been for 10 years, he's been at ex-ex.

And he woke up to being punted from at X. I don't even know if that's legal. No one else has the power to do that. That's because Elon Musk is abusing his powers. So that guy got no compensation. You know, why wouldn't have someone contacted the fellow that was at X and say, we're doing a rebrand. And obviously we would love to have this. Somebody might've said, I want $20 million.

Yeah. Right? Why not? I would have asked for it. So I think they were avoiding that somehow, but maybe they could have offered him shares. They could have done so many things. But just to wake up and it's no longer you. So Elon is at X now. You know, it's like Prince, the artist formerly known as Prince. It's like the app formerly known as Twitter now.

So what's happening on threads? 150 million subscribers or something? So the one thing that's really bothering me, and I wonder if anyone else who works in a world that you have many social media accounts is going through this, but like to go on threads on the Jan Arden pod account, I have to like log out of mine. There's no like seamless way to switch. But they said they are going to fix that. How are you finding the user experience in the meantime here? I'm really liking the absence of vitriol.

It doesn't seem to really attract the right. I don't feel like I'm reading a lot of hateful, disparaging comments or even threads that are people going back and forth kind of yelling at each other. What are you talking about now? Did you just find something? So we've only got two replies on threads. Yes.

It was from a post a few weeks ago. Lisa Thornberry wrote us and said, well, hashtag labia laughs is my favorite hashtag on thread so far. It was when you were talking about denim shorts and you said, kids, they got to be longer than your balls and longer than your labia. Well, it's the truth. That's the only prerequisite. I don't care how short your shorts are. That's the only prerequisite that I think should be adhered to is you shouldn't be hanging brain.

Having any kind of flesh wings coming out of your body. But I am noticing that threads is, I don't think it's that active yet.

Like, it's kind of quiet still. Mine's pretty good. I mean, I think I've got like 19,000 people, which blows my mind. Yeah, being Jan Arden on threads would be a little different. I'm finding some really cool nature stuff. Like, I'm looking forward to when you can start following... I don't know if they'll ever have hashtags, but when you can start following things that interest you. You're allowed to use hashtags, but I don't think you can follow them yet. I can't get hashtag...

And I'm not sure what I'm being loaded up with because I'm following, you know, a few hundred people, but I'm getting other stuff that I'm not. I don't really understand it yet. Let me put it that way. I don't really understand it yet. I think everyone's trying to insert the Twitter model into threads, but that's not how it's operating. We'll put it this way even for like your account. Like I saw that you put kids these days, right? And you shared a link, um,

That was three hours ago from when we're recording this. You only have nine replies. And I think normally you have hundreds of replies in three hours. Sometimes. But I mean, a woman, a 16 year old had a fight with her mother in a hotel and lit the couch on fire. They had to clear the whole hotel out. She's like, I'm going to lay, I hate you, mom. I'm going to light this couch on fire. For one thing, I would never do things like that because my parents would have killed me. I would have been deceased.

if I would have behaved that way. Like I see people with their kids in restaurants. We were so quiet. If we went to a Denny's or one of those steakhouses, Bonanza, there used to be Bonanzas where you'd kind of take a tray and go down a line and get your potato and do your salad bar. We just sat there. My brothers had their hair slicked back with buttoned up shirts and

We didn't say a word. We just ate our meals. But yeah, but I just see kids crawling on the floor and chucking shit and I don't want that. And I'm like, is this really parenting these days? Like, come on. I did save a few listener comments that we got from last week, but from other apps, we didn't get them on thread. So thread us this week. Thread us at the Jan Arden pod, right? Thread us. Okay. So Jillian Lebda sent us a note.

She's asking our advice on this. Hello, I have a quandary for you all and your listeners, perhaps a conversational topic. A friend's car broke down and I gave her mine to use for the weekend. Uh-oh. Upon returning it...

It was messy. She texted me to state that she hadn't showered and her ride home was following her. Additionally, she asked if she could just give the keys at work the next day. I was home. I asked her to just leave the keys in the car. I feel it's a bit rude that she couldn't take 45 seconds to hand me the keys and say thank you in person. Am I overreacting or being hypersensitive? No, not overreacting at all. I think it was rude.

and they should have absolutely dropped the keys off to you, that's a bit much. Come on, people. Don't push it. Give them an inch to take a mile, right? Yeah. Completely unacceptable. I would be, not only would I hand the keys back, but I would also get them a gift card for like 25 bucks to Starbucks or something. Or bring them a bottle of wine or whatever you do. Something. Come.

Come on, step into your adulthood. Do better than that. That's why you don't have friends. We just were finished talking about making friends. This is how you unmake a friend. One more from Megan. Listening to your podcast from June 30th, I'm a bit behind, but I'm working on it. I'm curious if you would ever discuss city zoos. I have young kids who I'd like to share animals with, but I often debate if zoos are really places to

because they're not beneficial for animals. Possible topic, love your podcast and what you believe in. Depends on the zoo. It just depends on the zoo. A zoo is a horrible word. I think it conjures up a lot of really horrible things for people. In times of war, which happens a lot, some of the saddest stories you'll ever see is starved animals, forgotten about animals, bombed out animals,

The city of Calgary has a zoo. I've been quite supportive of them. The Calgary Zoo does an amazing job with conservation. They have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on increasing the sizes of their habitats, if you could call them that. They've faced a lot of criticism, but I think they do a good job. And the sad part of what's happening is that someday, and if all you have to do is look at Twitter and trophy hunting,

The only place you're ever going to see any kind of wild animals is in a place where people have got them protected, I guess, from hunters and things like that. It's outrageously unbalanced right now. We need to find something that works with conservation in real life. We need to be able to have children be able to enjoy animals in a real life setting.

I went on a safari, a couple of safaris that were really, really well done. There's absolutely zero interaction with the animals. Zero, nothing, nada. You are very far away from them. You're looking with binoculars. It's not like some of the things you've seen. And I think it's as natural and as real as you're going to get.

It's not like having a leopard jump into your Jeep. I don't think that's even legitimately how these things should operate. Anyway, that's a whole other day and we thank you for the question. But yeah, it really is a tough decision to make with children, but I think it's also important for them to

A lot of kids now, they see a gopher, they don't know what it is. They don't know what birds are called. They don't know what a fox is or a freaking, they just, they can't identify anything because they have no actual interaction with anything wild. People that live in the cities tell you, if you're living in Manhattan,

You might see a mouse once in a while and a goose flying over. I don't think there's any interaction with anything nature wise there. Write me and tell me I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong. Good take on that. And thank you for your questions. You can always send us a note on any of our stuff, but I'll do a listener question call out on threads and we'll see what we get back for next week. Okay. Okay. Sounds good. Interesting day. Uh, poof, Shane O'Connor.

So, so sad about that. Sad to hear about that. It was hard even doing the show thinking about that. The music is always here though. So go listen to some Sinead O'Connor. Go listen to some Sinead O'Connor. Thanks for listening. Hit subscribe. Makes it easier for you to find our podcast week after week. And thanks for always keeping us way up on the top of the charts. We appreciate it. Look after yourselves. We'll see you next time too. We do.

This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.