Hey, this is Mike Bobbitt. I'm a guy who used to make things and sometimes I still do. These days I prefer making podcasts and I have a new one called Soundtrack to My Life. On this podcast, I talk to different creative people about the music that shaped them. Sometimes the conversations are funny, and sometimes they're just kind of sweet. I love that Pina Colada song. Yeah, I do. Rihanna has had a huge impact.
on my songwriting. I'm diving into the ocean finding that one fish that has toxins and I'm just drinking those toxins all day. Maybe they're saying like you should now go forth and rock. It's like a peace be with you situation. Also have a playlist called We dance to a jazz version of My Favorite Things. Soundtrack to My Life. It's available exclusive on Spotify. It's a sclusi. I'm going to try to make that work.
It's a music plus talk show, meaning I can play songs in their entirety. So think of this as an interactive playlist with some of the coolest creative people I know, and you should know too. Soundtrack to my life, a Spotify exclusive. Hi, I'm Mike Bobbitt. I am a lot of things. I'm a comedian, I'm a podcaster, I'm a writer, an actor, and a storyteller. But most of all, I'm a dad now. Movies were an important part of my childhood, and I'm hoping they'll be an important part.
part of my kids' childhood too. So through this podcast, I talked to my friends about movies that were important to them when they grew up, and I also talked to my friends who were parents about their experiences introducing their own kids to movies. This is Movies for Kids. Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever grow up Sometimes I wonder if I know it's
I am talking this week to one of my newer friends. She started comedy last year, I believe. Am I right on that? About two years ago. Two years ago? Okay. Yeah, but you gotta go through the mumble jumble of... you got to do new way bar a hundred times and then right and then you're More official. I think that's how it works. When I started, it was Club Bart, which is, you know, within spitting distance of New Way. So, yeah, you just have to start somewhere at nine and Woodward and then.
Yeah, yes. Hopefully you're indoors. And you've also become sort of like the photographer of comedians as well, too, which is really awesome because you have such an amazing eye. Thank you. I love how like most recently. Well, first of all, we're talking to Kara.
Karachi which I double checked with Alex and he said that that's the right way to because I was like I've only seen her name written I've never hosted a show where I had to bring you up on stage or anything absolutely Like you most recently took pictures of our friends, Johanna Madranda and Connor Mead, who don't have... a ton of self-esteem and i say that from knowing them and loving them like daughters and you made them look so beautiful and i could tell how proud they were of those pictures
You have such a fantastic eye, and it's really neat looking at your work. I'm in awe of it. My background is television and radio. And even though I should have an eye for composition, I don't think it's something that can be taught. I think you were born with this natural and artistic ability. And it really shows in your work. And it's incredible. Thank you so much.
That really means a lot. I'm like, I'm going to try not to cry here. You posted something a while ago on Facebook that really made me want to reach out to you, even though we don't really know each other very well, but I found it. incredibly profound. And it was something that I really wanted to include in this podcast series because I think a lot of people can take...
something from this. I'm going to read what you wrote. You wrote, too many people say if I only had blank, then I could blank. I grew up with minimalist parents. As a kid, I learned how to make something out of nothing. I found happiness in listening to Andy Williams records. in front of a mirror in the 90s. I used sour cream containers as Barbie doll bathtubs. We had two TVs in our house.
One was a black and white TV with no remote, and it's not meant to be some hipster decor. Stop thinking you need. That's not where happiness resides. And I was like, wow, that is so true. Honestly, it's something my husband and I continue to go through where we're... especially with kids. When I got married to my husband, him and I lived very different lives. I think a good example is he was the type of parent who would go to Sam's Club and
And he had to have every cupboard in the whole refrigerator full at all times, right? Even if half the food was going to be thrown out. And I'm the opposite. I'm the type of person who's like, well, I'm just going to eat what I need. But I'll go to the store every three days if I have to. I'm just, I'm very much a necessity.
And sometimes it was too extreme. So we've learned to even each other out. So with that particular comment, I think especially we're going through it right now with COVID and with this pandemic, people have lost their jobs. and I'm saying to my husband like well why don't people have money in savings or why do people think they can't live right now why can't people make it day to day this is
Like, I cannot make sense of it. And so that particular comment is just ultimately saying, like, we need to start to define what is wants and needs. Absolutely. Yeah. We talk very often, my husband and I, that. Isn't it amazing that people's salaries will increase, right? We make more money than we did when we were 20 years old. A lot of people do when they were teenagers. So what has changed? then.
I don't know if it's an American thing or if it's a, but why do we feel that we always have to, you know, spend 80% of our income? Right. It's always interesting to me that people feel this need of whatever, keeping up with the Joneses. You don't have to. And that's where that comment came from. I don't know. I grew up with, I remember having a costume box and it was just, you know, it was like old clothes of my mom's that she didn't want or whatever. And that was like, you know, that was us.
having fun let's just literally like mr dress up you know okay let's go into this costume box and see what we come up with and i didn't grow up in the type of household that it was like oh there's this new doll out and i have to have it I'm going not only do I have to have it, but I'm going to get it. I grew up maybe how your husband did, because I'm unfortunately the same way he is now. But like, for example, anything Star Wars that came out.
I ended up getting. There are some things, because I still enjoy looking at the old Star Wars stuff from the late 70s, early 80s, where I'll look at something and go, oh, yeah, I forgot. I owned that. But a memory that I still have that has never gone away was one time my mom had like a Better Homes and Garden magazine or something like that. And they had sort of like rainy day crafts.
And they had a thing on how to make papier-mâché caves and stuff like that for your kids' action figures and stuff. So I still remember my mom blowing up balloons, wrapping it in papier-mâché, and then... giving us little huts and stuff like that to play with. Because that... ultimately meant way more than going to Toys R Us and buying a Hoth playset that I completely forgot existed until, you know, maybe a month ago or whatever. So, yeah, it is right. You know, like you said with the
sour cream containers doubling as Barbie bathtubs and stuff. Yeah. Yeah. So I, I'm nervous that that is going to completely just go away, that we just live in this world of I see something on Amazon, I need it, and I'm going to get it now. In fact, I'm going to get it in 24 hours.
I mean, all of that to me is just mind-blowing. I'm afraid for the future. And I feel like totally an old lady. I feel like my parents having this conversation. I'm really hoping that Benji... will be a little bit more like me where, like, if I have a free hour, I'm going to enjoy much more editing one of my too many podcasts than I would...
playing a video game. I still have a game that I got for Christmas that I haven't even started yet because I just enjoy creating more than I enjoy consuming. Yeah, that's awesome. How did you go about...
trying to instill that in the kids then? It's tough because it is two different households. So now my one stepdaughter loves... to write you know sits right now she's writing a book um which i can't even comprehend but um i try to remember too is that okay just you know it's a different day and age and that okay her sitting down and writing that's great She's being creative and I can't expect that they're going to use sour cream containers for her.
for barbie dolls they might be a little too old for barbie yeah yes they've given they have given up on them but i do think um that and then we're really big on trying to get them just out of the house and in nature and just putting the phone down that's been part of our parenting style they're kind of on that cusp where they didn't necessarily grow up with technology when they were two or three or four benji is your son correct yep okay so
I'm worried about Benji, who's going to, he's going to be creating a website when he's four. Yeah. And I... It is a different way of learning creativity. I just think your mind works differently. Yeah, I'm trying to do a good job of keeping him away from technology, but I was just talking about this at work. yesterday where I'm like, man, it's so weird that he's so drawn to my cell phone. Like he'll...
push past all of his toys just to get to my phone. And I can't figure out why that is. It's not like, like I have another friend that I work with and her daughter is four and she's all over her phone because she likes looking at TikTok videos. And I'm like, But yeah, Benji's 10 months. He doesn't know how to look at videos or whatever. And they pointed out, they were like, does he see you on your phone a lot? And I'm like, oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.
So I'm trying to get better at not being on my phone around him because I don't want him to be one of those kids who's glued to a screen all the time. Sure. It's interesting. Yeah. I've just adapted to who my. parents are so much my folks just had never really there's completely the type of people that are oh if it's not broke then why fix it you know
I think we've got the same kitchen table we've had for whatever, 45 years, because it's just a table with chairs. Yeah, my dad died two years ago, and it was... particularly hard on my mom because there was a lot of stuff that they had from when they first got married or my dad brought to Michigan with him that he's had since college and trying to let go of that kind of stuff is...
really really hard and you know Allison and I were very much like well we have our stuff because we had a home before too so we can't have double things and it became a really difficult thing to navigate where we had to kind of accept and understand that there was 50 years of sentimental value attached to these things and we couldn't expect her to not only lose my dad, but lose everything associated with him. It was a really difficult time. Yes. You...
I sound like excited. I don't mean to sound excited. Gosh, I think you could do an entire podcast with people who have. are going through exactly that right so my next podcast will be called my dead dad yeah oh oh my gosh um sam rager will do a spinoff called my dead mom yes i love it Oh, my gosh. It is totally about that.
emotional connection. It also goes back to your Facebook post, too, where it's the difference between want and need. And in all honesty, there were some things that my mom needed then. She has boxes now of stuff to donate to Goodwill that she needed at the time, but she knows she doesn't need now. I think maybe that's important, too, to recognize that there can also be an emotional need.
Besides just a practical need. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yes. I'm glad that we're having this conversation. Aww. I'm glad we're having this conversation, too. Now, I will say this, because I don't... I don't think I come across this way necessarily to people. I struggled the other way. And what I mean by that is that I struggled with buying new things.
for years i mean it wasn't it truly wasn't into the past eight years being with my husband because my whole life was hand-me-downs and i'm the youngest of two older sisters they're 10 years older than me I would always I always poke fun that like I had a my first bike was a 70s banana seat bike not because it was cool by any means but by
Because that was my sister's bike and I got the hand-me-down. My first bike was a 70s banana seat bike too, but that's because it was the 70s. There you go, right? Yes. It was red and I had a sparkly seat. Oh my gosh. I bet it was, yes. It was truly my husband that got me to that point. He's like, you don't have to live this way. Because I was almost living uncomfortably because I wouldn't just like spend the money. Yeah.
Then it was like this reflection of myself. Well, like, do you not feel like you have you heard of Miranda July? I feel like. Oh, yeah, yeah, of course. Yeah. Me, you and everyone else I know. Do you know the movie? Yep. And she has, okay, great. Cause you're like one of the few people. And there's a scene in the movie where that her shoe is rubbing against her foot and.
The guy's like, do you think you deserve that? And so I always think of that scene and I think of myself and I'm like, do you think you deserve, like, do you don't have to live with that pain on your heel? You, you have enough money, you work hard enough.
that you can have nice things. And so I always thought like nice things was, I don't know, I just had a negative connotation with it. Yeah. Like flaunting or whatnot. And I've... try to embrace that like no I just want to have nice things once in a while because you know what I worked hard for it and I don't
I don't have to explain myself. Yeah. And that's the thing, too, about, you know, like you were saying with people who just want to buy off of Amazon because it's easy. Maybe if you don't buy everything you want in that instance, it's going to make it. easier to get the nice thing later that lasts. Like after I got divorced, I had a lot of Ikea furniture. But when Allison and I were starting a home together, it was one of those things where it's like, well, even
though we're not planning on moving again, because now we have a mortgage, we should have nice things. We should have a nice kitchen set and stuff like that. And I don't have to worry now sitting on a kitchen chair that's wobbling going, well, that's not going to make another move.
For sure. And I think that becomes then a reflection of your... relationship and your marriage and you know we're in this together forever and so yeah because my ex-wife and i did a lot of ikea stuff wow it's interesting i yeah i don't mean to laugh about
that but yeah that was a great wow that's a great analogy oh my god wow that's yeah that is heavy yes my husband i think you know we're very much into energies and whatnot like that's so we you know we whatever we believe in all of that um so i will also say this because i posted that facebook post on linkedin but i wrote it a little differently okay i think it was all the same except the very beginning i said i think i said too many people think that
they need a new camera in order to become a good photographer. But you need to learn how to use the camera. Because I think that happens... And we, you know, we, gosh, we especially went with that. We dealt with that with kids. And you'll see this with your son where.
He might want to do everything on, you know, he might want to do everything. I want to try lacrosse and I want to do basketball and guitar. And then, and oh my gosh. And before you know it, you're spending thousands of dollars for this kid to. kind of sort of like and try everything my philosophy with that too is just well if you really want to learn something then you can learn on you know the hundred dollar camera and then once you start to get better at it
Because I see that happen all the time. These parents will be like, well, my kid's going to play guitar. And then they buy him this electric guitar. And then before you know it, it's just collecting dust. My nephew plays guitar and he learned on like a guitar that. I got from JCPenney when I was...
A teenager. And it turned out to be a thing that he stuck with. And through the years, he ended up getting other guitars and more equipment because it turned out to be a thing that he's really passionate about. But he didn't start off. with, you know, offender or anything like that. So yeah. Yes. I'm so glad that we had this conversation today. Likewise. I'm going to add, in addition to being a great photographer and comedian, you are also an incredibly profound
person and i cannot wait for this pandemic to be over so we can do a show together and uh i don't know if your comfort level would include doing the truth cast but if you ever want to act profanely silly with me and alex we would love to have you on that too absolutely because Yeah, I love that whole entire concept. It kind of intertwines almost improv and comedy and all that.