Welcome to Botches Off Road. Join us as we talk about everything from gear reviews to
trail stories, tank camping to rock landing and all things to do with the outdoors. Today
is another Radio Chatter game episode with really special. You know, we recorded these
backwards and I'm just noticing that we've got the people that actually made Radio Chatter
here and they're going to play the game with us a little bit, but we already recorded the
hour long episode that comes out after the one. So you'll get to hear them and give the
little game reviews. And then in a couple of days you can listen to them tell their
story. So I guess that works out that way. Absolutely planned. Yeah, exactly. I think
originally he talked about doing the half an hour before the hour was just get my stuff.
I definitely did talk about doing the half hour first. That's okay. That's okay. Yeah.
We roll with it. Well, Alex, how about this? You want to you want to start off with their
our first card here? Sure. I'll just draw off the top of the deck today. Draw off the
top of the deck. Man, and we get an after dark card right out of the bat. What would
be your rigs porn star name? Oh gosh. Red rocket. Yeah. Yeah, that was pretty. That's
pretty good. His is our Colorado's red. Oh yeah. Valentine's Day. So we it is named Valentine.
We call it Valentine. What's your porn star name supposed to be like at first? Your street
name your dog's your dog. But I'm gonna replace it to be like the street you grew up on. Yeah.
But I gotta add your vehicle's name. So it's like Percy Valentine. Red Rockets. I like
that. Yeah. Red Rockets. And she added on deck too. Yeah. She thought about this. She
thinks a lot about it. I do not. You know, mine would be Midwest Silver Bullet. Yeah,
the Silver Bullet. Yeah, I could definitely see that. Mine would be something along the
lines of like broke back Nellie or something. It is because it's always breaking too. So
it's really kind of a double double. She's the she's the I don't want to say milk. She's
the guilt of the group. Yeah, I'll be honest. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't really
think about mine, but I just call her like Big Cherry or something like that. You know,
I can't really. It's hard to describe my FJ, you know, in any other way. But big, you know,
in a way and dark cherry dark color of a black cherry. Yeah. So that that's that's the only
one that was a interesting one to start on. All right. Well, you guys draw on this stuff.
Yeah. Yeah. Check. I was just I just haven't made out. Go ahead. What close encounter with
nature have you had? Oh, I haven't run into that one yet. That's that's a are we are we
talking like dangerous creatures here or we just could be anything. Anything. Yeah. So
I'll tell you. I was I was going to say, I think initially when I read that, I think
of like an animal. But sure. Like, did you get stranded? We made it a point to poison
ivy or something. Yes. And with nature, because there was some we had some like we had some
questions about like, you know, what was your worst like breakdown on the trip or something?
And we're like, no, that's all like bad. You do like bad. We're not even going to put questions
to like prompt the conversation about that. But this is yeah, this could be like, did
you get broken down in nature? You know, like out or something. Because the other thing
too is like, we also want them to be like, open to interpretation. Yes. Right. Yep. You
know, I think the with anything, if you were playing with somebody and it's like, yes,
yes, I have. Oh, yeah. No. But yeah. You know, like you, I want to hear the stories. You
know, have the conversation. So I was camping in Carr Canyon in Sierra. Well, I guess technically
it's not Sierra Vista. It's whatever the city next to Sierra Vista, Arizona is. And I went
to get in the driver's seat of my J 4000 and there was a rattlesnake curled up on my driver's
seat. Oh, that's a close encounter. And I had to I had to find a stick to kind of coax
it out of the cab of my truck. How close were you from sitting on it or like? Oh, I noticed
as soon as I opened the door, it didn't even notice me before I noticed it. OK, so OK,
so wait, how did it get in there? Was the window cracked? It's an old truck there. I'm
sure there was a hole somewhere. Fair enough. Fair enough. But I had it parked. I had it
parked. So the windshield was like, you know, it was kind of facing west, kind of right
over a mountain. So it was right in a clearing. So the inside of the cab was nice and warm.
That snake must have just wanted in there so bad. It was toasty, man. Got to bring them
inside, heat them up. I thought I thought I wanted this is like a silly one because we
shared this one a few times. So but something different. So with the alacav, we like to
leave the windows open and doors open like when we're at the campfire because you just
get in and grab a beer. But you're always getting bugs in there. So we decided to hang
the little buzz bugs, zapper things, USB things. So this will this will, you know, zap them
all. Yeah. Didn't think. No, I thought it was a repellent. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I thought
it was like, you know, like office making that thing where it casts like a 20 foot radius.
Yeah. It's a light, right. And so we are carrying that around us. We had it hanging in our truck
and Jason was like, is that going to attract the bug? You know, that attracts the bugs.
So we had it in the camper. So we got in that night. We had like every, every species. Oh,
flying insect. So bad. So bad. We had like a moth that was like, I was like, where did
that? Yeah. I mean, it was just, we just grabbed our hands and we're just smearing bugs. Oh,
yeah. That's nasty. It was like, it was literally like we stepped into the camper. It was like,
yeah, they were just like, oh, yeah. Terrible. Terrible. Yeah. See, that's a, that's a live
and learn lesson. Oh yeah. That's a live and learn for sure. So now that we'll do that,
but we'll put it like away from where we want to sit to try and like, yeah, draw them away.
Yeah. Yeah. We, we do have one of those thermo cells. Those actually work pretty well. I
just, I don't like the smell like in the camper. So what we actually did, I haven't installed
it yet, but a friend of ours, Sean, he makes these sweet lights. And they're mostly for
like alley cabs. Just it fits perfectly, but he fabricates them. And it's just like a big
light, that's Bluetooth. And it, it's great because it'll cast like kind of a light all
around the camper, but it does attract all the bugs to be six feet above the camper.
So I'm super looking forward to that because it's, it'll be cool. I haven't installed it
yet because I'm a little worried to be a little too tall to get in the garage. Once I put
it on top of the camper. What a nice segue into what is your next upgrade. I'm installing
a camper light and a winch. I don't have a winch on my truck. Really? Oh yeah. Yeah.
I was anti-winch for a long time. Mainly because, well, I'm with a bunch of people that have
them and I'm very, not a winch. That's a funny common nickname for my wife too, but she beats
me up. Yeah. Mine, mine is like with the alley cab and stuff, it's, we're pretty heavy and
so I'm very weight conscious and the winch is definitely more weight. And so I've been
holding off, holding off, holding off, but I have all the stuff to do it now. So. Yeah.
I think, I think for me, I have actually funny, funny enough, we said that I have winches
my next one too. Yeah. Got stuck, trying to pull someone out, Muskegon area on the way
to pull someone out. And I was like, yeah, you know what? I could have got out of here
if I had a winch. I really could have. And I been searching around anyway and found one
over there by Chicago. Originally brand new for those winch mounts. It's, you know, it's
pretty expensive, you know, $800. So he was selling up for 150. I, I threw a message to
him, just asked him, Hey, you, would you be willing to take a hundred? And he goes, sure.
So we ran down there, picked that up Sunday and did that, that little drive, took the
freeway the whole time. And now, now I just got to buy the winch and I'm set. I feel like
the odd man out with a winch not being my next upgrade. I've already got one of those.
Yeah. Yeah. What's your next update? And what close to the rattlesnake. So, yeah. So, so
my next upgrade, I've got a set of rear icon shocks to put on and I'm going to relocate
my shock mount from inside the frame to outside the frame. Okay. That, that is one upgrade
I did. I had a buddy do that for me. We relocate. Oh, there you go. Yeah. I, we did that. Oh,
and old man, emu, uh, Springs for it. Yep. Yep. Cool. I, uh, Oh, I will add, uh, my last
nature encounter, um, was botches, our little botches yearly trip. And, uh, it's more of
a funny thing. If anything, we, we had our tents set up, uh, in a weird, in a, what would
you call that? Uh, Glenn, uh, a clearing, a, you know, orchard. I don't even know what
I'd call it. It was the trail V off right there. So we just kind of set up camp right
in the V big real tall grassland. And, uh, there wasn't a lot of optimal tent spots.
And so we just kind of picked the best one and I'm sitting there in the middle of the
night and, uh, I kind of have my hand fall off the side on the floor of the tent. And
then I feel something under my hand moving around and I'm like, Oh my God, you know,
I got really scared. I'm like looking around on the floor. What was that? There's nothing
on the floor of my tent. And I'm like, okay, you know, this is really weird. So I kind
of let it go. And then, you know, I think it was the next day we're kind of cleaning
up the floor of the tent because the kids messy and, uh, we start hearing the squeaking,
the kids standing on something. So you're hearing the squeaking and he steps off and
there's a, a little mound where he was standing. It was like a little weasel that we, we put
our tent right on like a bunch of like little weasel holes or something. And they were popping
up and running underneath the bottom tarp of the tent. It was like a little whack-a-mole
situation.
That doesn't seem as gross or scary as, I don't know, something. Yeah. Oh yeah. It could
have been, it could have been anything else. And in, uh, you know, a couple of months earlier,
it was kind of a weird situation to her. It was raining a lot and we went to go, I went
to go close the zipper all the way. And I went, you know, in the middle of the night,
you go to grab the zipper. And all I felt was something went slimy. I'm like, Oh, what
was that? I turn around and there's a tree frog sitting on my zipper.
I thought this was an after dark card.
Yeah. No, thankfully not. No, there's nothing weird waiting for me, but yeah, just weird
little nature things that have happened that, you know, the past couple very similarly close
to each other.
Yeah. I was about to say mine would be the botches trip too. Cause those, those invaded,
I think all of our tents underneath, they were just running around every night. I'm
like, what underneath? It was weird. My dogs were doing this, uh, this really funny jump
thing. They'd be in the tent and they just jump and dive on top of whatever was moving.
Yeah. Yeah. They all had us down. Well, what about you, Mark? What's your, uh, what's your
next step grade?
Uh, well is now upper control arms and, uh, reinforcing my, um, knuckle now. Is that really
an upgrade or a repair? It's kind of both is better. The upper control arms definitely
better than what's on there currently, but beyond that it would be a bumper and winch
eventually.
Yeah. Yeah. Mark had a little oopsie there. Had some, had some things happen, but it's
all right.
I kind of sent a tractor tire flying and bit my alignment way out of whack.
Oh, are you going to buy a bumper? Are you going to get one fabricated?
I'm going to buy one. I'm looking at a C4 rock runner.
Okay. I have not heard of those guys.
C4 is quite a proper brand actually. We got quite a few stuff out there. Yeah. Yeah. Have
you checked out Victory? They're in company Victory for back there.
Oh yeah. Yeah. We've got quite a few people that went through them. They're not too happy
about customer service for them. So we're, I'm going to not 100% with it.
Bummer.
Yeah. We all, uh, we do all try to stay away from all Amazon bumpers though. So anything
Amazon we try to keep people away from.
We did accidentally, didn't you buy a Max? Should we realize that you got like fake,
fake Max tracks?
I did. Yeah. I bought years ago and like they came in the Max tracks box. They came with
everything and just look different than the website, but I was like, whatever. And use
them for years and then bought a mount to mount them to the camper and they weren't
fitting. And I was like, I wonder if these aren't real Max track. This is now starting
to make sense to me. And it turns off. They were not. And I contacted Amazon and after
years they actually gave me my money back because someone clearly in a warehouse was
swapping them for them. And like originally like there's nothing we could do. There's
like no proof of this. And I was like, I've talked to Max tracks. They're like, these
are not legit. Like, and so they actually gave me my money back. I'm talking, it had
been years, years. Wow. Wow. I mean, cause I used them one time and they also like, they
flattened, like it was like nothing made sense. And then it wasn't until I actually tried
to mount them on a Max tracks mount and they didn't. I was like, yeah, like things didn't
line up. And I was like, this is.
Great. Is it our turn? Yes. Oh, what is your favorite road trip music?
So I'll say generally, um, we'll turn on either folk type stuff or like seventies rock led
zeppelin type thing. Like to me, that's my camp vibes. However, I'll start with that
because I'm thinking like I'm at camp, but then like a few hours into the drive, I usually
got to flip it. And as I get closer to camp, I feel like my music amps up. I'm a, I'm a
heavy metal kind of guy. So you want to say hi?
The kid has shown up. Yeah. You must be on board with YouTube.
He's the one that when you order a pack of cards, he signs your name and his name is
practicing. Yep. Is that right? Okay. Hey, don't play mad. So, so yeah, I'm kind of a
metal head. So when I do a lot of driving, so usually the drive turns to metal as I start
like going crazy and I need to get like amped up, but like at camp full, like we love like
good night, Texas type stuff. There's one of our trips to MSO we had because you don't
always get like a reception or satellite. We, I think you downloaded the good night, Texas.
So it was like, we just listened to that album on repeat and it was fun because you're driving
through like the mountains of West Virginia. So it was very like appropriate when they're
talking about like hollers and working in a full line. And so like now when I hear those
songs, I think of like that trip, you know, and like how like music brings back memories.
Like it's, I'm glad that that particular trip we listened to like that album like nonstop.
And then I would say as far as music, he does the majority of the driving. So by default
we get to listen to his music. This is fine. I mean, he does a pretty good job of trying
to be mindful of me being in the car. But yeah, I'd say that sometimes every now and
then during COVID we realized we both really love 80s music.
80s like pop.
Yeah.
Oh yeah. Yeah. We were on our trips. My wife is more the countryside. I like more of the
heavy metal rock. And so, so when we start our road trips, it starts out country. Let
me get through my album or my playlist a few times and then I'll switch it to you like
heavy metal. You know, she starts reading her book. I'll put on my audio book. Yeah.
And then if we do a kids camp, it's windows down Fergie, my humps going on at full volume
and we're singing it on the way in. But yeah, I mean, music is really important. It helps.
It really helps put that, puts the drive into a different mood.
Well here's a, here's a fun possible future card then. How do you enjoy your music? Do
you use your phone? Do you have an MP3 player? Do you have a CD player?
I don't think barely any of us do that anymore. Alex, I think you're the only old fashioned
guy we got around.
Mark, you're too.
I'm rocking one too.
Binder that while you're driving you like, so I got one of those actually in mind.
He does. I've got 15 CDs on my son, Pfizer. I've got my Microsoft tune that I still use.
Oh my gosh. That's awesome.
But I actually, I drove my dad down to Florida this year and somewhere in Georgia, like the
car place stopped working. So I didn't have, I didn't have the GPS. Like we were on this
road for like 300 miles. So I didn't really need the directions, but I couldn't listen
to music. And then we had to go back to like the radio and there, like not even if it's,
we didn't even have a CD player. We didn't even have CDs with us, but it was the worst
and getting like the crackle of the radio. And then it's just commercial after commercial.
Yeah. It was, I got it like probably six months ago, I got fed up with paying for music streaming.
So I just started using CDs. And then I was like, you know, I could get my zoom back out
and then just load it up with everything I want. And now I use it probably 10, 15 hours
a day at work. I use it in the car all the, all the time.
That's awesome. Yeah. That works. Yeah. Yeah. We, I will say I'll add to this real quick
before we do another question is, um, miss Rachel, uh, has been a very common repeat,
uh, her songs, uh, off of YouTube and just constant. My son loves miss Rachel. He loves
all those, uh, those ABC learning songs. So to soothe the beast, we'll put that on there
towards that four to five hour mark. Yeah. I would definitely lose my mind. Yeah. That's
when it happens. Like we've, we've done things where it's like, we've got some audio books
he'll like, or things like that, or PBS is actually starting to do podcasts of their
really some of their shows. So it's really just listen to the show, but it's on podcasts.
So that's when you just kind of turn the speakers all the way to the back and just hit play.
And so like that way he's not on headphones because he does watch movies and he has a
game and council or whatever. But like sometimes you're like, dude, you're just like, look
out the window and not get car sick. And we'll try to just look out the window and listen
to. And at that point, then we just played in the back and we'll just sit in silence
for a bit. So, oh yeah. Yeah. We don't want, we don't want ours to be, uh, very dependent
on screens. We want them to be able to enjoy what's happening while we're out. So we're
trying to do that the same way, but there are certain times where everybody needs a
break. And uh,
I think you'll not like notice as your child gets older, like Jacob will get to a point
where he'll turn it off on his own and like, he just hired of it or like, we'll be like,
Hey, you can watch it while you're on the expressway. But once we got off the expressway,
you got to turn it off and look out the window just to like put some kind of limits on it.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, but yeah, it's like also like you guys do, we got to do. Yeah.
On the pavement, whatever dude, watch a couple of movies. Yep. There's a, there's a porn
star name pavement pounder. Perfect. Man. That's a good one. Yeah. Well, you hit mall
crawler. Is that what you said? Yeah. Yeah. It's a lot like a lot lizard, but it's for
the park. I think it's, uh, I think it's your guys's draw now. Oh, do a, well, we got time
for one more Alex. Yeah. We got time for one more. All right. Um, let's see here. Let's
do, uh, yeah, something different. And we don't play this card a lot. So that's why
I try. What do you always bring extra of on a trip? I know your answer. His answer is
underwear because he doesn't change it. Yeah. That's true. Tools. Is that, is that group?
Oh yeah. Tools. Yeah. Is that, is that wait, we bring stuff that doesn't even make sense.
Like an electric buffer. I forgot about that. It's a good back massager. It is a very good
back massage. Uh, gosh, I'd probably say, uh, food and toilet paper. I'd be like, or
yeah, food and toilet paper pretty much. You do not want to run out of either. Yeah. We
bring too many snacks. We realize that you get tired of your snacks. And so like we went
on that two week road trip with Jacob, we just, by the end of it, every time we stopped
at the gas station, we were just getting a bag of chips or something. Yeah. Which, which
backfired on us because then like later on in the summer, his parents watched Jacob for
us and they stopped somewhere to get gas and they're walking in. He's like, well, can I
get a snack? And we're like, every time they stopped at the gas station, he's like, I want
a snack. And they're like, what, why are you? And we're like, yeah, we, we kind of conditioned
them to that. I feel like anytime you travel with kids, you like, you're just trying to
think of every contingency and like on that trip too, it's like, I feel like we went,
as lean as we could between the two of us so that we could bring like 90 pounds worth
of toys. Yup. We made a ton of concessions so that he could have all of the stuff. So
that way just again, to hopefully make the trip go that much better. But, yep. Oh yeah.
Get that a hundred percent. And get the bumbo seat and you know, all that. Yeah.
Yeah. We also get too much beer. We don't go through the beer as much as we should,
but that's because like I buy two six packs, you buy a 12 pack, Alan buys a six pack and
they're all different beers. So we have a good variety. Yeah. When you're drinking M
43, you're going to get full fast. That's, that's, yeah. I, we didn't even talk about
that. What beer were you enjoying today? Oh yeah. Okay. So this is a pernicious from wicked
weed. So it's, it's out of North Carolina. You can't get it up in Michigan. And so when
her, you can get it in Florida though. So whenever we go to Florida to see family, we
get it there. So her dad was coming back from Florida and he's like, he texted me, he's
like, you ran right to the store when you came down to see me, what beer did you get?
I'll bring you some home. I was like, that's I'm pounding down a bunch of those cause it's
it's an IPA. So I like, if you like cigar city, highlight or zombie dust or like any
two hearted, it's very, it's very similar. Sounds like are, are definitely my kind of
thing. That's my, except lately we've been drinking El Chavo from Blake's hard cider.
Okay. Oh my God, this is so good. Is that like a Mexican lager kind of thing? Is it
a no. So it's a cider, it's mango habanero. Ooh, I do like me saying habanero. Usually
anything spicy. I'm like, man, that doesn't belong in a beer, but for some reason this
beer is so good. Yeah. How did you find out about that again? Oh, someone left this variety
pack in my fridge and it was the very last one that was left and I wanted a beer. So
I was like, you know what, I'll try it. And then suddenly the three that were there were
gone and I was buying another six pack. Yeah. My, my wife and I, uh, we don't drink a whole
lot and, uh, we bought that little variety pack and we liked all the berry flavors, the
cider berry flavors. We're like, yeah, that's good. I tried that mango habanero one and
I was like, yeah, this is not for me. And, uh, and so, yeah, I, I, I donated. Beer lever.
Yeah. Yup. I donated it to Alex's, uh, stash and, and then he ended up loving it. And then
everybody else, like, like Mark liked it. Alan liked it. I'm like, what the heck? I'm
like, man, my taste buds are messed up. It's like, it's a little, it's kind of mango heavy
at first and then you get just that kind of spicy flavor at the end. Yeah. Yeah. Good.
I mean, if I dive down to Indiana to pick up habanero, that was the closest location
to me. Like, yeah, just get M 43. Yeah. We, uh, I mean, we probably go through a six pack
or two in a couple of days. I mean, we, we go through these like their water. Yep. It's,
it's kind of a problem. It's so bad. Before that, uh, we've been drinking a lot of locals
light from a shorts brewing company. And then they also have, um, their summer IP or no
spring IPA spring hazy. I think it was a spring one that was really good. Yeah. The spring
hazy. I hope they bring it back. Cause it is the best beer they have. Yeah. I just don't
have a beer taste, man. I like, when I tried it, I was like, I had a little bit of fruit
and then it was like hatch chili almost like, I was like, ah, don't like this at all. And
then, uh, so yeah, I'm very much a cider guy. So the sweeter stuff is, and I don't, like
I said, I don't drink a lot anyway. So half the time I'll buy a 12 pack. Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
We're going to drink, drink and have a good time and relax honey. And she's like, yeah,
yeah, we're gonna, we're gonna do it. And then, uh, we, uh, maybe open one and drink
it halfway. And we're like, yeah, yeah, we're tired. Just go to bed. So it never ends up
working out like that. And then we donate it to someone or, you know, just leave it
at someone's porch. My fridge. Yeah. That's how it works, man. Yeah. Well, I, uh, I appreciate
you guys, uh, coming in here, uh, and doing both episodes for us. We're really sticking
it out. Yeah. It was, uh, it was a lot of fun talking to you guys, getting to know you,
uh, you know, before this, I didn't actually know you guys were from Michigan. So that
was actually kind of a funny surprise. Uh, but yeah, it was really cool meeting you.
Uh, we were going to have to meet up and, uh, and do some, uh, do some camping, maybe
do some family camps or something too. Yeah. Cool. Well, yeah, thanks so much for having
us. We appreciate you reaching out and, uh, yeah, happy episodes. Yeah. Yeah. All right.
Well, thank you. Later.