The Grey NATO – 303 – Face To Face For A Weekend In Toronto

Published on Thu, 10 Oct 2024 06:00:00 -0400

Synopsis

This episode of "The Great NATO" podcast features hosts James Stacy and Jason Heaton recording together in Toronto. They discuss their experiences at the recent Toronto Timepiece Show, including meeting watch industry figures, participating in a live recording, and hosting an afterparty with Marathon Watch Company. The hosts reflect on the personal significance of having James' parents attend the show and introduce their live recording. They also touch on watches they exchanged with each other and some fun activities during Jason's visit to Toronto. The episode has a loose, conversational tone as the two friends catch up in person and share highlights from their weekend together at the watch show.

Transcript

Speaker
James Stacy Hello, and welcome to another episode of the great NATO. It's a loose discussion of travel, adventure, diving, driving gear, and most certainly watches this episode 303. And it's proudly brought to you by the always growing TGN supporter crew. We thank you all so much for your continued support. And if you'd like to support the show, please visit the great NATO.com for more details. My name is James Stacy. I'm joined as ever by my friend and co host here in my living room, Jason Heaton. How we doing, man?
Jason Heaton I feel like my voice is resonating a bit.
James Stacy I had a lot of talking yesterday. We've been talking a lot. We kind of, honestly, we took a bit of an introvert Sunday today. Yeah, we did. We've been very lazy. We went and got some sushi. For those of you who are just joining in and maybe for whatever reason missed 301, probably pause and go back. It'll make more sense. 301 was the episode we recorded at the Toronto Time Piece show. I don't think it could have gone any better if we had invested half a million dollars more in money. And all we did was show up with a small zoom recorder and, uh, and the audience came and we had a really good time. If you haven't listened to that episode, there's a few fun things I don't want to give away, but go back and check them out. It was, it was pretty great, but man, it's an, I can't tell you, it's like a legitimate treat to have you in Toronto.
Jason Heaton It feels really natural. It feels like something we've, we do all the time and we don't, but it's, um, I'm, I'm still, I mean, I've had a great few days here. Um, but also I'm kind of basking in the afterglow of yesterday. It was incredible yesterday on in every respect was proof of concept, a true highlight for me, um, for this year, you know, as, as far as TGN goes, it's been, it's been such so much fun. And this is great too, to be able to record another episode face to face is our second in a row. I can't think of if we've done that before. That's pretty awesome.
James Stacy I'm not sure. I don't think we have, but you were smart enough to notice just how crazy my schedule is for like the next two weeks. And you're like, well, there's no way we're going to record an episode. on Friday, I go to Newport for the odd rain, which is incredible car show that goes like Friday to Sunday. Oh, and then I fly home Sunday night. And it's you can't go from Newport to anywhere quickly. So I go I think like Newport to Boston, Boston to eat up or maybe Newport to EWR like to Newark. Sure. And then home. Oh, and then I think I'm home for like four hours. Oh, man, enough time to get like maybe two hours of sleep repack And then I'm in New York for a week for this UBS thing that Houdinki is doing, which is, I genuinely believe will be amazing. We've put a ton of work into it. Then you blink and you go like, Oh wait, we know we need two shows. Yeah. Yeah.
Jason Heaton So thank you for reminding me. Yeah, no, no, it's a, this is good. And if, if it feels a little bit out of step, it's cause it is quite a bit earlier than, than it'll air certainly next Thursday.
James Stacy But, uh, this is kind of an update from the weekend we've had. Yeah. You came in on Thursday. Um, I've been working our way through like a video project. And if you're on the subscriber side of sort of the TGN world. Yeah. We pulled out all the toys this weekend. We did. Yeah. I, I, I bought, um, I bought some stuff. So I already had those Mike twos, which I've talked about on the show before the DJI system. Yeah. But I've been very tempted for quite some time and I'm actually shooting a little clip on it now while we sit here, uh, which will probably be in this final video. And, uh, so I ended up buying this DJ Osmo three, uh, DJ Osmo pocket three. And, um, It's really cool. It's a little tiny thing. It takes incredible video. We went hiking on Thursday. We were at the show for the kind of mixer on Friday, and then we're there all day Saturday, did a bunch of different stuff. And the video quality is really cool. It's, it's like a lot of fun to play with something that feels like an entire, entirely different generation than the last time I tried doing this. You know, some of you who have been fans of mine and bless you for that for a long time. Remember I did, you know, like 2017, I did these vlogs from Baselworld and SIHH or SIHH and then Baselworld for a blog to watch, maybe even 2016 to be honest. I'd have to go back and double check. It was maybe like 10 videos. Yeah. And you know, they were of a certain length and of a certain quality that doesn't make sense anymore. But at the time, like the, the joke we were making, we were on this hike, um, is I was, uh, literally taking like the sport housing of a GoPro three, maybe a four and, JB welding. If you know what JB welding, it's like a two part epoxy system usually used in automotive applications. But I was like JB welding, a mic cold shoe and a, uh, action mount into the bottom and a spot for a light and all these other things to make what this thing essentially is, which is, you know, a, a camera you can face towards you and hold. And as a wide enough lens to, to be able to talk into it and then some way of capturing the audio. And now everything's just so much slicker.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. And it's been fun to even just watch it because it has the gimbal on top and like, it's always moving around. It's always moving around. And, and I mean, essentially this episode is kind of brought to you by DJ DJI. Essentially.
James Stacy Yeah. I guess we're on the take of the Chinese government or the Chinese, you know, tech-opolis. Uh, the products are incredible. We're about to get into the whole drone thing. And, and, you know, Jason and I made a trade for some very different hardware, but I think both filling a hole that each of us had in our, in our world.
Unknown Yeah.
James Stacy But yeah, so if you're on the subscriber side, stay tuned. I'm hoping by the end of October, maybe early November, I'll be able to crank this video out. I've got the first two to three minutes done, and we're going to go from there. We haven't even finished shooting it, to be fair. By the time we're recording this, we'll have some sort of an outro, either this evening or on the way to the airport tomorrow when I take you to fly home. But it's just such a treat to be able to hang out. How many naps have we had? I mean, not together, to be clear.
Jason Heaton Nothing wrong with that. No, of course. You nap how you want to nap. I'm a terrible napper. I mean, I get really ambitious about my naps, but then like today we were like, you know, up late last night talking, everything else. Let's take a nap. And I don't think either of us slept, but you know, like you said, it's sometimes it's nice to just lie down in the dark, close your eyes a bit, even if you're not sleeping.
James Stacy Yeah, even just to watch a YouTube video and not talk for a little while. Like you and I are, we talk about this a ton on the show, but you know, genuine introverts. And yesterday was an extrovert's paradise. It was all day long talking to some of the coolest people. We'll get into it. We had an incredible party with Marathon. Incredible. The absolute now gold standard for the type of thing that we would like to do with 70, 80, 90 people, something like that. But yeah, I mean, I guess the first, like you came in Thursday, I picked you up and then we kind of hung out for the day. My folks came out because they hadn't met you before. So my mom and dad came out to Richmond Hill for a little cookout. We did fish tacos and steak tacos and that kind of thing. Turned out pretty well. I've not cooked fish tacos before, but I don't think I messed it up too badly.
Jason Heaton The highlight was the corn, the Snyder's corn. I mean, tell people about Snyder's corn. I wasn't aware of it, but it was hands down the best corn on the cob I've ever had. Not only the corn itself, but the way you cooked it. It was just tremendous.
James Stacy So I'm very fortunate in that I grew up within the territory of Snyder's corn, and it's the best corn, certainly in Southeastern Ontario, in my opinion. North America, let's just say that. The cool thing is, is my, my kid sister, whose name is also Sarah, she married Henry, who I really love. And he's a listener of the show. Shout out Henry. I couldn't be a bigger fan of you. And his family is the Snyders. He is Henry Snyder of the Snyders corner. The season actually closed yesterday. They shut it down. So it's over. So we had one of the last, last pieces. We smoked it on the Traeger for maybe 30 minutes. And I would say that I'm probably like a six out of 10 on core normally.
Jason Heaton I'm even less. I rarely eat corn because I hate getting it stuck in my teeth. It's got to be really good corn to like make it worth me. Yeah.
James Stacy I don't like doing the toothpick thing. It bugs you for the next day or two, but Snyder's corn on the smoker and then olive oil, butter, salt, whatever your preference is. It was so good. Oh man.
Jason Heaton And the fish tacos were good.
James Stacy It was a very regional episode.
Jason Heaton You know, I did a rare dip into some steak and I mean, it was, uh, yeah, it was, I know my way around a steak.
James Stacy I'm a fish that was new for me. I can, I can, I can get a steak going perfectly.
Jason Heaton Now we've gotten ahead of ourselves. We haven't done a risk check.
James Stacy No, we haven't. It's true.
Jason Heaton And we're both wearing, uh, this is all part of the story, right? Yeah. We did a lot of trading here. You brought me a ton of stuff to be fair. Well, I came out okay myself, so I'm, I'm, I'm equally happy. Um, But yeah, let's quick just talk about what's on our wrists here. It was a trade, indeed. Why don't you go first?
James Stacy Yeah, sure. I'm fortunate enough to... Jason gave me a watch that I was actually planning on trying to procure anyways, which is the Elliot Brown Beachmaster. So this is a watch that we've talked about on past episodes, probably about five or six, seven episodes ago, we did five minutes on it, and Elliot Brown was at the Toronto Timepiece Show. It was really cool to finally see their stuff in person, but even more cool for me to see the watch that I'd like the most. And Jason just pulled it out of a bag and handed it to me when he showed up and that's the beach master. And this is a very much, I would say like a combination of a field watch, a GMT and a diver in one.
Unknown Yeah.
James Stacy It's a fairly clever outlay where there's a tie to 12 hour hands. So you have 12 hour time, 24 hour time, a 60 minute bezel and a 24 hour Ria. So you can do 12 hour time, 24 hour time, a GMT and an elapsed time measure. And it's about 40 millimeters. It's I'm genuinely surprised by how nice all the finishing is.
Unknown Yeah.
James Stacy Given the price of the watch. Yeah. Yeah. It's a little big for a 40. It sits tall. I would say it wears a lot like a black bay 41 almost identical in my mind anyways. Yeah. Maybe a little smaller. Yeah. Um, it's great on a NATO. I'm just really impressed by this brand. The people are so lovely.
Jason Heaton They really are. It's, it's, it's one of my favorite smaller brands and they've kind of really come to I wouldn't say prominence necessarily, but more notice among, uh, enthusiasts, uh, in the, just in the past, within the past two years, I would say, and the beach master to me kind of hits that same, uh, solution or, you know, problem solving, uh, thing that, that something like the, at a very high level, the, the tech Gombesa from, from Blanc Pandas, it's like someone just thought of a problem that needed a solution. In this case, it came from, I guess, a Royal Marines unit in the UK. that they were looking for a way to track countdown and count up, uh, over, you know, a mission timer sort of thing. And to use the GMT hand with a second arrowhead on it to, to track using that internal rotating 24 hour scale. It's just kind of genius.
James Stacy So you can go with GMT or you could have a 24 hour chronograph.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's really amazing. And, um, yeah, it's really cool. And it was fun to meet the people and they're just enthusiastic. You know, so many of these, small brands. I think, you know, we'll get into it when you talk about the show itself, but the, um, the fun about meeting these, these folks from these smaller brands is that the enthusiasm is still there. They're just, they get a buzz out of any sort of exposure or anybody that's interested in their product. And that's totally what Elliot Brown's all about. So, and what have you got on? Yeah. So this is super fun. Um, I actually wasn't expecting this. This isn't something we worked out. You know, I, I came, you were kind of giving me a little tour of the house and your, your lovely office downstairs here. And, uh, I saw those, um, this Timex Ironman watches that you got, um, you know, from Timex Japan. Yep. And, um, and I was just kind of gushing over them and you said, Oh, why don't you take this one? So lo and behold, I've got this, it's full gray, triple gray, um, Timex Ironman from, uh, Timex Japan. It's still on their website. You know, it's the, um, it looks like they call it the eight, eight lap gray shades, TW five M 54 500.
James Stacy Um, hit the show notes. It'll be faster.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. And it says $98. I assume they've translated that. Now I'm in Canada. I don't know if that's Canadian translated from yen.
James Stacy Um, en.ca and the URL.
Jason Heaton Nope. It's timexjapan.com.
James Stacy So it should be 98 us.
Jason Heaton I mean, can't beat that.
James Stacy I mean, a little on the high side to be fair, but it's, it's worth it. They're very cool.
Jason Heaton You know, and, and look, I had an iron man, you know, the old orange and black one back in the late eighties when I was running a bit more. And, uh, you know, this, this just, just kind of was gushing with, with nostalgia for me to see this watch. And in this cool gray shade, I love it all the more. I don't think I would actually go for the old black and orange one now.
James Stacy I have the recreation of that downstairs too. You can check that out before you leave.
Jason Heaton But I just love this gray one. The strap is gray. The case is gray. Um, it's, it's just fun. So I've been wearing it. I turned on, or you turned on the hourly chime for me, which every time it goes off, I say, you know, Oh, it's 1989. Um, cause it just totally reminds me of the one that I used to have. And so I've been wearing it more than I, more than I probably should. Cause I've also had this, this marathon jumbo day date that I wore for our, our event yesterday into the show. But I put this one back on. It's super comfy and just so much fun.
James Stacy Yeah. I mean the other plus for that one, especially even over the Abu Garcia, which I showed you, it has the luminous case, which is crazy. Yeah. But the Abu Garcia is a negative LCD. Oh yeah. And whereas this is a positive. So when you click that Indiglo button, the entire face lights up.
Unknown Yes.
James Stacy it is being six years old for me. Again, I go back 32 years for three seconds while I press that button down. And I told you that I'd considered opening both of these up and switching the module from this one to the Abu Garcia. So I would have the luminous case and the positive display. And honestly, I might, I might take the display from one of the other ones and just mod it. Cause like, dude, we're talking about a hundred dollar watches.
Jason Heaton Do anything you want. Who cares? I mean, yeah, this is, Look, we, we aren't, uh, we aren't snobby on, on TGN here. I mean, we're talking here going from, you know, you're, you're just talking about going on a long press trip to see some nice cars in Newport. I'm wearing a $98 Timex.
James Stacy Well, I mean, you know, you know, I'm not showing up with a long to Newport. You can, you can, you can borrow the Ironman back. We did get to hang out with Julie Crowless quite a bit this weekend and she all weekend long. Where's her favorite watch all the time. Unbelievable long a one. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, really, really, I don't know. There's something about a long one I would love. To have one.
Jason Heaton And I love the way she wears it. I mean, it's just, it's just her watch, her daily watch. And you know, she showed up, saw her a couple of times and it's just, uh, it's fun to see those in the wild. They're just, you just don't see those watches day to day.
James Stacy Yeah. And for those of you who don't know, and we'll get into this as we get through the rest of it, but Julie Kralis is a very good friend of my wife and myself, but she's also probably the finest like watch artist in the world, or at least definitely in the running for that. She does these hyper-realistic drawings, pencil-based drawings. of watches and many other things, but predominantly watches, which he's known for in our world. And it was a real treat because she had, uh, uh, a talk at the show as we did on Saturday and that sort of thing. But we are getting ahead of ourselves as, as, you know, as it's sort of the format.
Jason Heaton Yeah. It's a very loose show today.
James Stacy Oh, it definitely is.
Jason Heaton In fact, we have some bourbon going here.
James Stacy So this is a living room show. Yeah. We've got, we've got, uh, uh, Mitchsters high rye for those of you who care. I pulled out all the stops. That was probably the best thing I could find at the LCBO in my neighborhood. You're in your sweatpants and your heat t-shirt. Yeah, I'm in my sweatpants and my heat t-shirt. So apologies for those who have to see the video. I mean, I love the heat t-shirt, but I'm not really a sweatpants guy. I would never, I don't leave the house wearing them, but if we record in the home, that's how it is. The other thing is, uh, speaking of things, we brought each other. Yeah. So we arranged a little camera trade. I'm not sure you can get more different cameras. Maybe, kind of, but not really.
Jason Heaton I still think I came out ahead on this one.
James Stacy You've been giving me stuff for a long time, so we'll be fine. But I traded you my Leica Q and for your DJI Mavic Pro 2. Uh, I've wanted a drone for a really long time. All of you in the audience would not understand how excited my eldest daughter was when I told her I had a drone.
Jason Heaton I could hear the screeches. I was in the basement, quote unquote napping. And I heard this shrieking upstairs.
James Stacy Absolutely thrilled. Uh, they have wanted a video drone for a long time. We of course have the cottage property and like we, I showed my daughter and this is a beat, this is kind of like a medium size, medium class drone. And I had to register it and get a license. The rest of it, that's all fine. Um, we flew it for a little bit for that vlog I told you all about, but I, I folded it out and showed my daughter and her first question was, can we make a nature documentary? I'm like, yeah, let's do it. Let's go. Let's find the beavers at our cottage and we'll make a nature documentary about them for sure. So I, I'm, I could not be more excited, but at the same time, I'm also absolutely thrilled that the Q went to like within minutes, you were kind of gushing about it. And I was like, all right, so I'm not just, I haven't totally drank the Kool-Aid. This is just, if you love cameras, you like a Q.
Jason Heaton And I'm, I've been kind of neutral on the whole Leica thing. I don't, I haven't really. It's a tough vibe at times. It is. And you know, it's kind of, it's kind of like a Porsche vibe or, you know, vintage Rolex vibe, whatever. And I understand the quality. I understand the luxury aspect of Leica and I admire the product, but I never had a strong desire to own one. Mainly because of the price point, whatever, but knowing you were a Leica guy and you had this cue and we started talking about this and I thought, give it a go. I got this thing and I was expecting something more and For those of you that know Leica, you'll roll your eyes. But I thought it was going to be more fiddly, more complicated. It is the simplest camera and it feels really good in the hand. I already ordered the grip.
James Stacy Oh, nice.
Jason Heaton Good. So that should probably be waiting for me when I get home. That's the only thing I was kind of hoping for.
James Stacy I just got used to not having it.
Jason Heaton Yeah. But other than that, it feels good. It's got good weight to it. And what I love about it is it feels, I mean, it is, it's got manual controls with the shutter speed dial on top and then the aperture ring that you turn manually and then Like if that's all you do, that's all you need to know. And I love that. I just use it with the eyepiece or I have been over the two days I've had it and immediately picked it up and got some pretty decent shots. And it's just been, it's just a Rishon machine as well. It is. And, and you know, I asked you about the, the app because I've had some disappointments with Nikon and Sony transfer apps on the phones, getting photos off for like kind of quick use play memories. Oh, horrible. The Leica one was like a photos with an F was a, Delightful. I mean, it transferred quickly. It was easy to use, connected nicely with the QR code on the back of the camera. I couldn't be happier.
James Stacy I'm just thrilled. I'm so happy that it's going to go to someone who's going to get good use out of it. And to be fair, Leica just launched a camera that should be pretty interesting to people who love taking pictures of watches. It's a Q3, but instead of being 28 millimeters, it's 43. So a watch should look more accurate to the way we see it with our eyes on your wrist. I'm definitely going the SL two was like a move to not buy another cue two or three. Yeah. And if I give the, the SL two another six months and it doesn't feel right, I'll buy a cue too. I just, there's something so sweet about the standard cue. I've got the batteries, you put a decent memory card and you just go. Yeah. Yeah. The camera requires so little of you. And you know, I've, I've watched your photography really evolve over the last several years. But one of the evolutions is you use your phone a lot. Yeah, I think, yeah, you can use this camera just like a phone. Yeah, yeah, it's just, well, big jump.
Jason Heaton I had a, I had a use case where the, this, this cue would have come in really handy. And that's when I was on that boat a couple of weeks ago with Oceana because I had the Nikon Z seven great, lovely camera. Wonderful. Great. Um, but it was, it's, it's a primary underwater shooter and I had it in the housing and you know, with a, a fisheye conversion and you know, wide angle lens, it just wasn't set up for the other stuff that I wanted to do. So to take the top side, photos for the story that I've worked on for Houdinki that people will see at some point. You know, I was using my phone or I was taking the Nikon out of the housing and trying to use that with the lens that was with it. If I had had the Q along, which is a very compact camera to pack, it would have been perfect for kind of just not well behind the scenes or just topside stuff around the boat and kind of scenery stuff. So now I've got that camera. Yeah.
James Stacy So yeah. Yeah. I mean, look, I'm a huge fan of it as a compact option. I don't, I'm not feeling like I'm going to miss it or anything like that. And yeah, we, we had a good time as far as tech goes. We went for a great little hike. It's I wouldn't like hiking is a strong term. It's more like a walk in the woods. Yeah. Um, but it's Jefferson forest I think is like a gem in my area. It's so beautiful. You can walk far enough that you can't hear any road noise anymore, but you're deep in the city still really mature trees, tall trees, really Hilly.
Jason Heaton Like it's like we're driving, you know, like an intersection of kind of highways. And then suddenly you park on the shoulder. We walked across the street into the woods. And you're just like in this wonderland. It's the best I've found yet. Gets cool and shady immediately. And there's a breeze all the time. Yeah. I don't know why, but there is. Mountain bike trails crisscrossing. We saw a lot of cyclists and other people just walking. And, uh, it was a nice way because, you know, I had, uh, I had essentially just, you know, landed the day before and, and it's just nice to get out and just to get a little fresh air. And the weather has been amazing here.
James Stacy So the weather has been really good and we had a nice time in Jefferson forest. And then after that, we, uh, what did we do that evening? That was the VIP event.
Unknown Oh, that's right. Yeah.
James Stacy So after that, we went to down to the Toronto time piece show, which was at like a courtyard Marriott downtown. And also for those of you who are already planning to come next year, it's not the same place. So please don't plan your hotel. They'll they're announcing the new location soon. Uh, I believe it's at like a performing arts center in a different part of Toronto. So don't book your hotels just yet. Be a little bit patient. But I would say after we've now experienced the show, please do come. Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty good. If you're coming from the States, your dollar still goes 30% further currently right now. I think it's one of the better deals in terms of a, uh, a watch show you could travel to because you're, if you're in the, if you're spending USD, it's definitely in your favor. Um, but we, we were able to go down to the courtyard Marriott and hang out with it. We saw a ton of folks. I mean, that, that first evening was just, yeah. people like us who were like part of the show, but not vendors and vendors. Right. It was really cool. Yeah.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Good chance to get a few laps of the, of the show and catch up with old friends.
James Stacy And I mean, I mean, you walk in as Oris immediately. It's Josh, it's Mark. Yeah. Yeah.
Jason Heaton And I hesitated. I started a list of people that we met this weekend and I feel, I feel like if we start listing the names, we're going to forget somebody important and I'll feel really bad. Yeah. But at the risk of that, I mean, we, we did, I mean, it was so fun to, I mean, everybody from, new friends. You know, you got to finally meet, uh, you know, Jim and, and guy from Elliot Brown. And of course we catch up with old friends, the oldest of friends, uh, Mike Pearson, uh, Chris, Jason Gallop, Jason Gallop.
James Stacy I mean, what, what fun to see him. So, I mean, if you listen to three Oh one, you know, a bunch of this already, but I also was just walking through the show, saw Rico of Rico's watches podcast. Again, I realized right next to him was Ken lamb, Ken lamb.
Jason Heaton That was, I don't know. Last time I was that surprised shock of the weekend, like genuinely, like Ken just pops up in the most unexpected places. The last time I saw him, I can't, I can't unsee that now. Somebody, you know, people have been calling that on the slack and Tom Place has been calling. Yeah. Now I can't unsee that.
James Stacy If you, if you see a picture of Ken, he bears some resemblance to the, the, you know, John Wick character.
Jason Heaton Yeah. You know, the, the people that I met here that, um, well that I hadn't met before, um, Julie Crowless, Julie's really enjoyed talking to her quite a bit over the past couple of days. Another person that I have met before but hadn't spent a whole lot of time with that I really got to chat with extensively this weekend was Rhonda Rich, a writer for Watchanista that is a long time watch journalist, kind of flies under the radar because she's not this big... She's not in it for... She's not a huge personality in the way that some people are out there on social media and kind of... It's not about her, it's about what she's doing and she's a fascinating, quietly intelligent
James Stacy Lovely. We had Rhonda on with Jason in the previous episode about a watchmaker shortage. Yeah. And the only thing I've learned, because I, we just, I just worked with her for a little photo shoot for Houdini magazine, the next upcoming issue really genuinely no, not only knows a ton about watches, like someone who's worked in the industry as long as she has, but also just has a very specific. And I think very highly evolved sense of taste that just doesn't reflect the Steve McQueen knuckleheads. Yeah. It's not vintage Rolex.
Unknown So many other things. Yeah.
James Stacy Yeah. Yeah. You know, a big group of us, I'm, I'm, I'm going to jump ahead a little bit on Saturday, which is the main day of the show. We didn't have that much, like we had, we had lots to do. You wanted to do laps and say hi to everybody. And look, we have so many buddies there. Jonathan from fair was there and Mike Pearson with Christopher Ward and obviously the marathon group and their whole booth was, you know, like three stacked all day long. Uh, and it was kind of endless. We had, we had an, uh, and I met many new, new buddies and new friends and that sort of thing. But at one point I was like, well, we should get some lunch before we go too far. And on Friday night we had told Kenneth, well, if you're in visiting from the UK, let's visit your town from the UK. I was like, you should try Swiss LA if you're here and you just want some quick food. It's not quite fast food, but it's close. Yeah. Yeah. Fast casual. Yeah. And he went and I'll, I'll include, Where will I include this photo? If you want to see the photo of Ken's absolute dismay at getting to, uh, Swiss Chalet that should have closed at 10, like 9.50 and it was already closed. I'll put it in that vlog. I think I'll do my best. Yeah. Uh, if I can build that into the story of the vlog, but I figured I felt like it would just be kind of fun. We talked about Swiss Chalet recently on the episode. Let's make it a little bit of a bit, especially for this vlog. It's a whole segment of the vlog. So it was myself, my wife Sarah, Julie Crowliss, Rhonda Rich, Jason Gallop, Jason Heaton, and Kenneth from Arkin. And we went to Swiss Chalet right in the middle of the day. It was like a, I don't know, maybe 10 minute walk from where the show was. And you'll have to listen to 301 if you missed it for his take on it. He was very perplexed by the chalet sauce, which to be fair, if you didn't grow up with it, is an exceptionally strange take on a jus, essentially.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. I dipped a fork in, I tasted it and it is, it's just chickeny.
James Stacy It's chickeny nonsense. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I really like it, but I also, like, I have to say that if I came from a different part of the world, I would go like, what is this? Yeah. Yeah. And then they, they still, I didn't realize this cause I eat out so often. Like I'll, there's one up the street, I'll pick it up and bring it back or have Uber Eats deliver it. but when you're done, they bring you like the hot water with lemon in it.
Jason Heaton That was a nice surprise. Isn't that cool? Yeah. It reminds me of trips to Asia where it's like where you eat with your fingers. Yeah. Which I guess you do.
James Stacy Especially cause they started serving ribs, which I think why they started doing that, but they do it for every meal.
Jason Heaton You had a wrap. Yeah, I know. I know how my fingers weren't dirty, but I love, I love that kind of lemony water.
James Stacy Yeah. It's a type of cleanliness that I find quite comfortable. Chemicals make my fingers, bother my fingers.
Jason Heaton Yeah. I don't want a sanitizing wipe, you know?
James Stacy the stuff we use during the pandemic. Right. It just smelled like tequila.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. And then, uh, you know, speaking of Rhonda, I mean, you know, she came along in this little adventure and the whole while we're walking there, she's pointing out the sites and, and, you know, it was like a tour attractions of, of downtown Toronto. And, um, it was, it was just delightful. Yeah. So it was great. She's a, you know, she, and she knew all about, you know, Gordon Lightfoot and some of the lyrics of his song she was explaining and things like this. So, uh, it was, it was a great day. I mean, it was, It was kind of this weird unscripted highlight and sort of, um, ad libbed adventure that we, we baked into the, into the day, a very busy day. Yeah, for sure.
James Stacy But it was great. Yeah. The show took kind of a different turn for me if, if I'm going to just speak really personally, because my parents came and I don't want to get emotional. I don't think that adds anything to the show necessarily, but I think I kept it under wraps. I didn't, I, there were no tears or I didn't well up or anything like that, but it was, this is not an easy world to share with someone who can't travel or doesn't want to travel or doesn't, isn't, isn't a traveler.
Unknown Yeah.
James Stacy Yeah. And also even if they are like, it's not like press trips or they're like, Oh, bring you in. Why don't you bring your mom or your dad? Right. Like that's not a thing. Yeah. And so it's, it's, it's kind of like difficult to explain the gratitude and kind of the feeling that it is to be able to do a live show with my folks right in the front row. And I mean, my mom did the intro.
Jason Heaton Yeah. That was really special.
James Stacy I mean, yeah, my mom's never missed an episode. I, we don't probably give her enough shine for that, but like she's been holding us down for eight years. Yeah. We're, we, she listens to us on her walk every day or every, you know, every Thursday morning or whatever. And it was a pretty incredible experience to be able to occasionally glance up and see my folks right there. And, you know, I'm used to having the support of my amazing wife and I absolutely need that support. I'm not used to having the onsite support of like parents. Yeah. Yeah. Because this is a weird world and I don't know what people said to them while they were sitting there and they were talking about Rico, who's just an absolute sweetheart. So that's fine. Yeah.
Jason Heaton Pretty special for me to be able to have them there. That that melding of worlds is, is pretty special. And, and you, you know, you can't put a price on that. And I think if we ever get the opportunity to have, have, uh, one of my parents do an intro or just have them on the show. Well, and beyond all of this, I think my finally being able to meet your parents was a, was a big moment for me.
James Stacy I am 50% of each of them, I think.
Jason Heaton Yeah, yeah, definitely. Definitely. Look, and, and you know, we're, I'm not going to go into it here, but we can, you know, if anyone wants to, you know, ping me offline, I mean, I can, I can, I can tell you all about James's parents, you know, I mean, it's like, and kind of the relationship.
James Stacy I come from, I come from a very lucky scenario.
Jason Heaton My parents are amazing, wonderful people. And, uh, that, that evening here, not to, not to rewind the tape too much here, but that evening here having dinner, I just felt like I'd known them already. And I think it's because I know you obviously very well. And, uh, and I, I've chatted a bit.
James Stacy Cause they're very important to me.
Jason Heaton So they come up every time we, you know, and I've exchanged messages with your mother occasionally about different things. So I kind of get a, get the vibe and, uh, it was, it was just such a comfort level and to have them there and to have her up on the stage with us doing that.
James Stacy I wasn't sure she would say yes.
Jason Heaton And, and let me just say this, you know, in this industry and in what we do in this medium of podcasting and in the luxury watch space, et cetera, whatever you want to call us, lifestyle, journalism, et cetera, like eight years into our show, just after our third 300th episode to have your mother up there doing that, like nobody, I mean, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna pat ourselves on the back here, but like nobody else is doing that. Like it's unheard of. And the ability to be able to do that, um, is what makes the great NATO really special. So.
James Stacy I've always, I've always been a fan and we've talked about it on the show. Actually just recently we talked about Wolfpacks in France. They're, they're Wolfpacks, Wolfpack the band, they're France show, but they're Madison Square Garden show. There's a whole element of the show that is Jack Stratton's mom. Oh wow. And I always thought that was awesome. Yeah. And then of all the podcasts that I listened to and have listened to for a really long time, my brother, my brother and me, their dad reads their intro. Huh. quite famously, but he reads it live at every live show.
Unknown Oh my gosh.
James Stacy Wow. And it's a long intro. It's a funny, long, like it's very silly. Yeah. Yeah. But he has become like a special celebrity. And if, if TGN is going to have a special celebrity, it should be my mom.
Unknown Yeah. Yeah.
James Stacy I think that's fine. So I, you know, a big thank you to everybody who was actually at that taping and got to see it. And it's on 301 if you, if you happen to have missed it, If you allow me some engineering to make a very sweet moment for me after many years, but the idea that my parents are going to be in the crowd, they came all the way. They're not big travelers necessarily. They're not bad travelers. They don't necessarily seek it out. And for them to come into town and, you know, they took two trains and then walked the rest of the way. And they're just, I love them so much. And it was such a treat to finally have them.
Jason Heaton And so kind of what we do and so fitting for the first Toronto timepiece show and our appearance there.
James Stacy And I just, especially because it's so grassroots. Yeah. Yeah. This feels like a show from 15 years.
Jason Heaton Yeah, it really does. It really does. And I think, you know, you talked about kind of the tide turning or the, the kind of the vibe turning for us in the afternoon that day, your parents arrived shortly after that, there we were doing our, our live recording and you know, we don't need to belabor the point. Like you can listen to it. If you go back and listen to three Oh one. I mean, it was a, it was really special. And I think it is when that's, look, I loved meeting everybody. I loved walking around and seeing watches and chatting with people. But like at that point, four 30, um, um, Saturday was like when things like the, the trajectory of the whole weekend just went vertical. And I think to do such an amazing episode and to be able to get that flow of, of kind of guest speakers and Mike Pearson doing the Q and a and the outro and things, and then to, to segue into our evening with marathon was like, it was, it was like the perfect, the perfect, uh, what works, you know, four 30 until 11 o'clock or whatever it was, you know, the perfect six hours.
James Stacy Our party that was sworn to end at eight 30 ended at 11. It was supposed to be a two hour event. It was like a five hour event. So I want to, I want to be very, very clear that for all of you who came out to the hangout on Saturday night with marathon, like this is because the folks at marathon genuinely took time to understand what TGN is. to listen to the episodes, to offer Mitchell to be part of an episode that a bunch of you have provided really positive feedback about. And then Martin, the VP at Marathon, just opened his house to all of us.
Jason Heaton And what a house.
James Stacy I mean, I mean, it's like I say a house from a TV show. That's because it was in six episodes of Suits in season four. Yeah. It's an incredible home. It's a retired fire hall. And Martin was just the consummate host. We had some incredible beers, some great wine, a table full of food.
Jason Heaton The table was the tray.
James Stacy I want to be clear, like all of y'all who came did a really nice job at putting a dent in that table. Cause I looked at it and I was like, that's too much food for 80 people. It just is. And I'm glad y'all came hungry. It was tasty, but we had such a good time. It was so casual and easy. And you know, we've worked with a lot of great brands over the years. We really have. but marathon absolutely matches our wavelength. I had to twist Martin's arm to even do a talk. And I think that talk lasted three minutes. Yeah. Right. Right. Like a hello and enjoy yourself sort of statement, like a normal host party sort of thing. It was just, we had such a good time.
Jason Heaton And they put together such a generous swag bag too. I mean, everybody that came left with a bag that had a, you know, a toque or, you know, to translate from Canadian, you know, a beanie or a stocking cap.
Unknown It's a nice toque.
James Stacy It's all like Bergeron spring bar tool. Not the cheap one, the nice one.
Jason Heaton With the big grip.
James Stacy And then a really cool little clock, which is now on my desk. You know, Marathon, known for their clocks and their work in the clock space. But, you know, at some point maybe we're like going too long on this, but it was... I mean, we can celebrate. There was a better part of a hundred people, probably like 85 people came through during the hangout, which is perfect. And it was just this absolutely gorgeous home. The food was great. I've got, I ordered way ordered over beer, but I was terrified to not have enough. So we have like three, four cases of beer here. I'll get to it. Don't worry about it.
Jason Heaton Maybe we should have started instead of the bourbon, we probably should have cracked a beer.
James Stacy I can get you a beer anytime. I've got beer for the next three months or six months. But yeah, no, I just, we don't have a strong format for this show, so we're just kind of having a good time. It's such a treat to have Jason right here in my living room, but I do want to make a very concerted shout out. Um, marathon, everything we've done with them, they match our wavelength. I don't mind paying for stuff, but I want to split it. Yeah. Yeah. And they're just very keen to like, we would love to do a party. Do you think we could get a certain number of people? I said that that number is easy. We can do more than that. That's fine. Yeah. And I bought the beer. They bought the wine and the charcuterie and I'll probably make them solid on, you know, we gotta, we gotta sort out some math, but it worked out really well. And I like being a little bit transparent about these things because I want folks who came to it and people who came last night to know that this was just, this is very grassroots. Yeah. This isn't, you know, we're not, we're not starting some grand partnership or whatever. These are people we really like. We very much respect the product and but also the product is, I would say weirdly secondary. Don't get me wrong. We, we talk about marathon. They're, they make great watches. Right. Right. You don't need us to tell you that. Yeah. It's the people and it will always be the people. And I feel like that's kind of what we, you, you underline or relearn at one of these shows. Yeah. It's, it's the Rondos, it's the marathons, it's the gallops and the Ken's and Mike Pearson's and every, all these people we meet and it's, it's a, I don't know. This is one of those weekends that makes me, it's going to give me six months of energy to keep operating.
Jason Heaton It's kind of what I said earlier about your trip with Lange to the car show. It takes a level of confidence for a brand to just not have to feel like they need to be, to not care and just be like, it's all about the people. Let's come together for a good time. And Marathon is not Lange. They're not playing in the same space. But I love that these brands that we like, whether it is a Lange or a Marathon or a Christopher Ward or an Elliott Brown, they get it. Yeah. And I love that. And certainly the folks at Marathon are just so pleasant and such a varied mix of people and personalities. And that was reflected even in our crowd of friends and supporters and subscribers and listeners that showed up.
James Stacy You guys didn't drink enough beer. So I just have a garage full of beer. Yeah. Yeah. Which is fine. I've never bought beer for a hangout before. So I just Yeah. You don't know how much people are going to drink.
Jason Heaton I rolled the dice. I apologize.
James Stacy You know, the, the TGN Kitty is a little lighter now. I spent, I spent a bunch of it on beer, but it is what it is. But working with a brand like that is so easy that it doesn't feel like work, which is exactly the way that you and I would like to work.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. And top to bottom in that company. I mean, you go to, you know, going to their booth, it's all the same experience. Yeah.
James Stacy Yeah. And I mean, their, their big release is the new, 41 millimeter Osar D, which is not that new as an idea.
Unknown Yeah.
James Stacy It's based on a reference model. And if you go through all of the promotional material for this, you'll see some TGN folks.
Unknown Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
James Stacy So shout out Brock.
Unknown Yeah. Definitely.
James Stacy If I was shooting. Yeah. Yeah. If I needed a model for a really cool guy.
Jason Heaton I think Brock fits the bill.
James Stacy Yeah. Yeah. Brock killed it. And I think the watch is absolutely gorgeous. I think that in photos, the super oversized, markers on the dial feel like a lot and in person they work really well, but you want to know the real one that surprised me. It's a watch I didn't even realize they made as a standard model, which is the full black SAR.
Jason Heaton Oh yeah, that's right. I got a wrist shot of that and I was like, with the bracelet? I mean, I didn't even realize. Yeah.
James Stacy So yeah, they call that the 41 millimeter anthracite SAR, but if you look at the photos on the website, I think you get most of the way, but there's something about the bezel in person. Yeah. It's all black. Everything on the watch is black except the markings in the hands. So it's super bright in terms of contrast. And I saw Martin wearing it the first day. And then of course it was at the booth. Otherwise I highly recommend that was the one where in person, it was a watch I had never seen in the metal before. And I was just like, Oh wait, no, no, this is, that's awesome. If you're going to do a black watch that much white and like high contrast works really well.
Jason Heaton And it was great. Yeah. I'm glad we didn't over-plan things. I think we had some idea of maybe going to the cottage or, you know, going, you know, seeing the sites. I would have loved to get you to the cottage, but it's not going anywhere. Yeah, exactly. And I, part of me thought, well, should we have done that? And maybe done some filming or recording or something. But in the end, like, I think the pace was right because yesterday was a long day and, and you know.
James Stacy It was a lot, it was great, but it was a lot.
Jason Heaton It was a lot of great. Yeah. Yeah. So, and today was very chill and nice. And here we are able to record an episode, get one in the, in the hopper for when you're gone during your busy weeks.
James Stacy Yeah. And yeah, we're, we have the, the lucky op option of a late night meal with our buddy Wesley Smith from standard age. So we're doing that in the next several hours, but I don't know, we, we didn't really have a plan for this show and I'm more than comfortable with the ones where we're in the same room being very loose. Every time we do one of these things where we do get to hang out together, it just reiterates how much we should do it a little bit more. And I would like to know, especially if you're in the Slack, but even in general, if you, if you feel so strongly that you would send me an email, thegranadoatgmail.com, I would love to know if we did a big thing in Minneapolis, if you'd be interested. Yeah. If we could get a decent number of folks together, we have people we could work with. We could have a really good time. We could do something. Obviously we can't throw a Toronto timepiece show in Minneapolis. We'd leave that to Jason. Yeah. He's the man. If a hangout would be cool and we could do another maybe vlog or something like that, maybe go on a group hike or something. I don't know. Yeah. How many kayaks can we get? Yeah. Right. Let's go 40 kayaks.
Jason Heaton We probably could. Yeah. Raft them together in the middle of the lake. It's probably doable.
James Stacy Yeah. We find some sort of a fun adventure and then a hangout in the afternoon. If you, if that might be interesting, let us know. I'm gauging interest, but the, the, the easy response is, I couldn't be happier to have Jason in my living room. I couldn't be happier to have a watch show here in Toronto. And I'm genuinely blown away by how well they did.
Jason Heaton Yeah. You know, big corporations have these annual meetings where they get everybody together and talk about corporate culture, et cetera. This is, this is our version of that. Yeah. And yeah. And I go away from this thinking that, you know, just, just kind of jazzed for the next six months or whenever we do it again. And it's, uh, it's been great.
James Stacy So, yeah, I mean, if, if, let me be clear, if folks are keen, I would love to get to Minneapolis before proper winter sets in, I would do something that quick. Yeah. Yeah. What we did this weekend was not that expensive. Not that difficult. Huge fun. Yeah. Those are the three things I like. Yeah. Yeah. So let us know, uh, in the Slack or, or again, if you, if you're not part of the Slack, if you're not on the subscriber side, I highly suggest you could, but if you're not drop us an email that we can just, just get a rough idea of what the interest level is. Yeah. Um, because I think we could do something, but, uh, look, I think that's probably enough rambling about our very cool and fun weekend that I'm going to think about for the next several, uh, weeks. And I have some really good weekends that had to be fair, but this is going to be a tough one to top. Would you like to dip into some final notes?
Jason Heaton Yeah. The cask strength, the bourbon starting to catch up with both of us here. I think it might be. Yeah. Right. Um, I'll go first. I, you know, so I, I'm going to kind of geek out on my sort of Land Rover side of things here with, uh, with my final note, there's a, A couple of guys that I follow on YouTube, um, that they go by the handle seriously series and series, uh, is a reference to the series line of Land Rovers, which was the first versions of Land Rovers that came out series one, two, and three before it became the defender. And, uh, and they do these kind of quirky homespun they're Australian, um, you know, kind of Bush mechanics repair videos, um, adventure videos, et cetera. And they made an actual full-on documentary that's, you know, now on Amazon Prime that you can buy for, I think it's like $2 or $2.99 or something. And they have an IMDb page. It's called Road to Ruin, which is a great name. And I'll read the blurb here. It says, follow four modern-day explorers in this raw and real adventure as they aim to retrace in the footsteps of Alfred Canning, I'm not aware of who that is, along the world's longest and remotest track, 1,100 miles or 2,000 kilometers, Though due to remote punishing nature of the Outback, it turns into a nail-biting adventure of survival on their own. Now, these guys, like, they just have this really homespun sort of vibe to them. They're dealing with very old trucks. I believe one is a Series 2 long wheelbase. But they know what they're doing. And, you know, the tips that Jeff Lewis, the guy who kind of runs this thing on YouTube, are great. Like, he'll teach you how to Start a car that's dead using by jacking up the rear wheel and spinning it to like crank the engine. Sure. You know, all these like little bush tips about, you know, how to, how to, you know, start a fire and how to cook, you know, make your tea and, you know, fix this and that. It's just delightful. So I really recommend both following Seriously Series on YouTube and their videos. They're also on Instagram as well with the same name and checking out this movie Road to Ruin on Amazon Prime.
James Stacy That's a great pick, man. I got, I got to say like Australian automotive YouTube is. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah.
Jason Heaton It's great. I think you've got kind of a complimentary final note here, don't you?
James Stacy Absolutely. So this is one that I, we might've talked about just a hundred episodes.
Jason Heaton Oh, well, okay. But yeah. And you just brought this up the other day as well.
James Stacy Yeah, for sure. Yeah. So my daughters have really recently become obsessed with this. So I wanted to bring it back up because I've rewatched this probably a third time through the series. This is our man in Japan with James May. So James May of Top Gear. And then later the Grand Tour with Amazon Prime. This is another one of the shows that he's done with Amazon. Imagine a more lighthearted James May take on like No Reservations. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It's so sweet. It's so fun. My daughters are obsessed. They really like James May, which is obvious. That's that makes sense. Yeah. And so the first series was Japan. Then they do India. Then they do Italy. I have not watched India or Italy yet. but I've now watched Japan a few times and I just, I just absolutely love it. It's the exact right scope of James Mays personality and all these scenarios that the producers kind of force them into and the ones he's actually interested in. It's like a mix of those. Yeah. It's really good. It's very watchable. If you have other kids and depending on what you want to expose them to, there can be some stuff in there. There's one episode we skipped for my daughters. It was like a, fertility festival of some sort in Japan where everybody's wearing penis shaped hats and that sort of thing. Yeah. I don't need to go through that necessarily with the 10 and seven year old. Yeah. But they laughed at the, you know, the interstitial ads for, for that kind of stuff. Yeah. And otherwise, you know, there's a little bit of bad language and that kind of thing. But, um, I'm, I'm very comfortable with, with the way it's presented as far as how it would work for my kids. And I just, I'm, I'm forever and will forever have a very soft spot in my heart for James May.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Oh, that's great. I'm going to check this out. I, James may kind of reminds me of, he's, he's kind of a more modern day version of what I remember from the guys that did, um, the Monty Python shows that they kind of spun off like in post Monty Python, their careers, Michael Palin specifically, like he's done some great travel shows. He has that similar delivery. It's a little quirky, very humorous, very, very nerdy. Also very, very smart. You know, um, try learning nice take on travel.
James Stacy Occasionally, you'll get a very deep reference. Yeah, British Society. Yep. Shakespeare.
Jason Heaton Yeah, exactly. Right.
James Stacy Right. Right. I mean, Michael Palin. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Good stuff. But yeah, our man in Japan, James May, and I'm, I'm gonna go out on a limb. I haven't watched them yet. I will because my daughters are asking our man in Italy and our man in India are probably both awesome. And I mean, look back on the Top Gear specials that they did in India. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. Like truly hilarious, funny, enlightening, all that kind of stuff. Good. All right.
Jason Heaton There we go.
James Stacy I think we'll call that a face to face episode. Welcome to my living room, of course. Yeah. And to Toronto. Yeah, man, I can't tell you.
Jason Heaton Yeah. It's been, uh, it's been wonderful. I'm, I'm, uh, I feel like I've already kind of, uh, made my home here. You know, you put me up in a very, very comfortable space in the basement. It's nice and dark and cool. Great place to sleep. It's really lovely set up here. a little garden in the back with the Traeger, you know, smoked, smoked corn. I'll have that, you know, every, I'll make it for you anytime you come up every, every Thursday evening. It seems like a good tradition, at least in the summer. For sure. So yeah, this was great.
James Stacy Well, look, as always, thank you so much for listening. If you'd like to subscribe to the show notes, get into the comments for each episode, or even consider supporting the show directly, and maybe even grab yourself a new TGN signed NATO, please visit the greynado.com. Music throughout is Siesta by Jazzar via the Free Music Archive.
Jason Heaton And we leave you with this quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson who said,