Hello, Math Therapy listeners! This is David, Vanessa's producer, and before you skip this episode, because I know you are not subscribed to it to listen to me, I could not resist putting together a short bonus episode to share with you. So, Season 5 was a huge success, and I know everyone's back to school, so if you missed any of the previous seasons, or you need a little inspiration or motivation right now, I definitely recommend revisiting some past episodes.
Now, I don't have to tell you that Vanessa is a phenomenal interviewer. She's got such a natural talent for putting guests at ease and for diving right into complex topics. However, there was one challenge that kept coming up this season. Vanessa forgot how to say goodbye. This had never been an issue in the early seasons of the podcast, but I started to notice it creep up a little in season four. And last season, it was totally out of control, as you will soon hear.
So, very quickly, all of our interviews are recorded remotely, and they'll start with Vanessa and the guest chatting a little bit. That way I can test out the audio on both ends, and they can get relaxed and comfortable with each other before we begin recording. Then, in theory, at the end of the conversation, once Vanessa has asked her famous final two questions and starts to wrap up, she'll say something like, "Oh my God, thank you so much for coming on my podcast".
That's my Vanessa impression. And then the guest will be like, "thanks for having me, that was so much fun". And then Vanessa would say bye, the guest says bye, and then that would be the end of the interview, but they would both know that they'd be staying on after the call to debrief. They're just saying goodbye for the podcast, they're not going to say goodbye and hang up right away. So that all seems very normal, right? Well, she just couldn't do it.
Guest after guest, it actually got more and more awkward, and I recently listened back to some of them and I thought they were hilarious, so I just had to share them with you because I think you may too. So without further ado, I give you what I consider to be my personal crowning achievement in my work on Math Therapy, a brief bonus episode I like to call "The Awkward Goodbye".
Okay. Tell people where to find you and like what things to look you up at.
Yeah. So my website is robertkaplinsky.com, openmiddle.com Openmiddle on social media as well. If you're interested, hit me up.
Okay, now we have to say goodbye. Okay. Bye Bye
Bye Vanessa.
Bye You have to say bye back.
Buh-bye
Oh my God. I'm dead, if you could see David's face right now. I dunno!
Just, just say goodbye as if you're saying goodbye to someone.
You know how you're always like, why do you hang up so fast on the phone?
Yeah,
I think that's why I think I have a problem with doing it.
Just pre, you're pretending you're, because obviously you're not gonna hang up, but just like,
but it's weird, it's inauthentic.
Just role play. Imagine you were just saying goodbye to him.
Okay, Robert. Great talk. All right, I'll talk to you later. Bye.
That's not what what you would do!
What do you mean that's not what I would do? What would I do?
You did it so quickly!
But I do do it quickly. You're always getting mad at me cause you're like, why'd you hang up so fast? Okay, we're done by the way. What a treat. Oh my God. I'm so glad I was eating a sandwich on the floor of that hallway that one day. This has been amazing. Um, Bye.
What's wrong with you?
Okay. That was pretty bad, Vanessa. I'm sorry. I'm with David on this one. I'm sorry.
I feel like I, I don't know. I don't. It's so
Try that again. Try that again.
Just be like, you say like, oh my God, this has been so amazing. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast.
But I don't say the word "bye"?
You don't have to.
Fine. Liesl, this has been absolutely so amazing. I'm truly honored. Thank you so much for coming on my podcast.
Thank you. It's been such a pleasure.
That was a great improvement. And then if you wanted to take it a step further, then you could simply say bye.
But think about it. Watch this. Liesl, thank you so much. It's been amazing. It's been an honor. Thank you so much for coming on my podcast. Bye.
Oh
No, after she says thank you.
Oh, after she says thank you.
Yeah. I got, yeah. Let me, let, let me,
Okay. Right. Liesl, it has been so amazing. It has been such an honor. I'm such a huge fan. Thank you so much for coming on my podcast.
It's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for having me.
Bye. I don't like it. I don't like it. It's weird! It's weird.
David, edit it. Make it sound right.
you can find me on Instagram crystalmwatson You can find me at crystalmwatson.com Um, or you can find me out and about in Cincinnati. So if you see me on the streets, holler I'll, I'll say What's up. I'm pretty, I'm, I'm a pretty cool person.
You're so cool. Okay. has been the fucking best. You are the best. Loved every single minute of this, and I hope to see you in the streets of Cincinnati or Wink, wink, wink, wink, Canada, maybe sometime soon?
I'm on my way. I'm on my way.
That's the end. You don't need to say goodbye because the music will start playing. Oh my God, David is hanging his head in his hands right now.
Just say goodbye.
Thanks for coming on the podcast.
Thank you so much for coming on my pod
Wait until I finish talking and then say it.
Oh, Crystal, thank you so much for coming on the pod.
You're welcome. Goodbye, adios, auf wiedersehen, all of the things.
Bye. She did it for me. She did it for me. That helped.
I know. That's the thing you have to trust the guest to help you with the goodbye.
Great, and stay tuned. Maybe we'll do episode two where I live. Read Dan Meyers's birth chart
Bonus. Bonus for, yeah, the subscribers bonus for the uh, Patreon
Okay, this has been amazing. This is the part where I say goodbye.
Thank you. So long.
Goodbye. Don't actually go though.
Cut.
Did I, look, I did it! I said, bye.
You did, but you still were kind of awkward about it, but you, but it was good. It was better.
This has been so fun. I can't believe we did it. I can't believe we met. I can't believe we're both Canadian. I can't believe you used to be a professional paddler and honestly, you're changing the world. This is so cool, and I think you're great.
Thanks, Vanessa. I think you're great too, and I'm going to correct this great egregious oversight of not following you on Twitter.
Oh my God. This is actually a huge deal. Are we still recording? Yes. Okay. This is a big moment. This is a big moment for me. Thank you so much. Okay. There. I don't even have to say bye. Right. We can just end.
Yeah, we can just end.
No you should still say goodbye.
David's gonna kill me. Davids gonna kill
You should still end the, the interview session.
And on that note, Peter Liljedahl has followed me on Twitter, everyone. I don't know, I, have you? Have you? I'm gonna check.
I will, I, I'll do it right now.
Bye. Don't hang up.
I won't hang up.
I thought you said I didn't have to officially say bye cause I was so weird at it. Um, um, um, um, okay. Let's start, I guess.
Sure.
Trying to think now if I wanna start like this, I am gonna start. We're just gonna start. Hello.
Ok. Hi!
Hi. Oh, and wait, I have to tell you this because I have huge insecurities about it. At the end, I'm gonna say bye, but don't actually hang up and like, David's already eyerolling, I just am very awkward about it. I'm not gonna be awkward. It's gonna be fine, but like, don't actually hang up at the end.
Yes, because then we talk afterwards and I, we can say bye, but then stay.
That's what I mean. Yeah. And I just have a lot of goodbye anxiety. Like, like people have math anxiety. I have good, I have completion anxiety. That sounds like something else.
You can practice a goodbye right now.
I'm not practicing a goodbye.
Well, I typically expect that we're going stay on to wrap up. I promise I won't hang up!
Okay. Great, great, great, great, great, great. Okay. Deborah we are here. We have made it. I, first of all, welcome to the podcast.
Thank you. Glad to be here.
Okay, great. Yeah, I have hello and goodbye anxiety. Okay, well next time you see me, I will be rocking the rhinestones. Thank you so much. This was the best. Thanks for being on the pod.
Thanks for having me. This was fun.
David's face right now if you could see David he's just like
You just can't do it.
Uh, that was not bad.
It was not good!
Oh my god.
You just make it awkward.
I don't know man, I can't Okay Thank you so much. This has honestly been a highlight of my entire life. I'm not even saying that with hyperbole
Thank you very much for having me.
Great. That's great. You can stop.
Yes, we did it. Okay. I've had a rough, I'm sorry. I don't know how to say goodbye, but I'm getting better at it. Good. Just, I just, now I'm picturing when she says it that the music will come up and that's making it feel more natural to me.
Okay. All right, that's it. I hope that you found that as entertaining as I still do, and I also hope that you will forgive my increasing frustration with Vanessa over the course of those recordings. The wheels are in motion over here for the next season of Math Therapy, and in the meantime, as always, you can reach Vanessa on social media at TheMathGuru. Feel free to offer any support or advice in dealing with her sudden onset goodbye anxiety.
You can also hit her up if there are any specific topics that you want her to explore next season. As for me, all that's left to say is, Goodbye. Now that wasn't so hard, was it?