I've definitely seen more people having a crack at MMA. Do you think

that's become more popular? It comes in waves, though. If you're not a 60-year-old German

man, you're not wearing Birks. The last couple years, it's transitioned into

The CrossFit movement. Yuck. F45. Yuck. It's

a healthy outlet, so power to them. They get them fit, they're hanging out,

they're building a community of friends. But they won't stop f***ing posting about it.

Welcome to the Better Bloke Podcast. I'm Matty. I'm Rob. And

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What's not, what's hot. There's a lot of things people get way too into. Well,

okay. Not way too into, but it's bordering obsessive.

Yeah. But if you love it, I guess, yeah, whatever. So the first one

that comes to the top of my mind that you see like all the

time, guys hit 30 run clubs

or they're doing a marathon or they're training for something crazy. And by

Could you imagine like going out and doing like a 18k run

and then your phone has like messed up and the apps quit and it didn't save

You can spoof GPS. A lot of people do that. Yeah. When there's like

competitions, you can like make your phone, trick your

phone into saying the GPS is somewhere and you can track it from point A

to point B over a certain time period. So it looks like a

Yeah. Run club sounds fucking disgusting to me. Yeah. You don't like it?

No. I don't like running. I'm not

I think it's a very good healthy outlet at least, but I

can't think of much worse than like doing

a marathon. It's just, especially

the training, the preparation, and maybe doing it

as a self challenge, but when it becomes your entire identity

online, it's a little much. It's

See, I don't know. If creating that identity gives you the

motivation to do it, I'm not against it. Just

No. I think this list that we're working through today is going to be kind

of like that. It's like, okay, I can see that one. I

can't see that one. No. Or I can see why people would do it,

I think there's going to be a few on this list that both of us may lean

into. But also there's a few that we're definitely not

going to lean into. Like, I'm not going to go out there and run a fucking marathon. That's

I could see myself maybe doing it once to say that I did

it and going through a few month period where I'm like,

maybe I'll give this a crack. I've got a couple of mates that have done it. Maybe

Now, it all sounds terrible to be honest with you. Yeah. Moving

on to something that we're probably going to disagree on. I

see the value in it, but I'm not going to do it myself. This whole smoking meat,

12 hour cook time shit that people are getting into. They're spending a

lot of time, a lot of money and a lot of effort to cook some meat

But you don't get the flavor. I'm a big fan of smoking meat. I

know. I've got an upright smoker. This may

get a lot of people offside and it's electric one. So

yeah, it's not, not a real smoker, but I

still smoke meat in the food sense.

You know, probably good to add that in. I don't smoke other meat, but

Sure. Yeah. Do you think it's one of those slippery slopes where you start with

your little electric one and then you got like a four bay thing in the

Yeah. We went into barbecues galore the other day cause I was getting some rubs for

more smoking meat. This bloke. Um, and I

saw the Traeger's there. They're pretty, they

are very, very pretty. They're also like four and a half grand.

That's a lot of money. I don't know if I can invest that into

If you're looking at hobbies, you sort of got to compare prices across. Cause if

you're into offshore fishing and you need a $40,000 boat, four

I mean, I don't know boats. That's very apparent. Let's

Okay. Um, so obviously David Ongi

Big shout out to. Pitmaster University, I think

is his, uh, his little tag, but he is a gun

Probably the only man that's posted photos

where I'm like, ah, maybe I'd try that. Cause that looks good. It's

like the pork crackles, the slow cook shit, the briskets, all

that stuff. He plates it up. He teaches people how to do it. And

obviously he's become a bit of a icon in the page because of

Like it's essentially. food porn is what he's

posting because it is... 100% food porn. Presented perfectly, it's

And the reason it's popped off is because so many boys are going down this

Yeah, it's become way more popular. Way

Yeah, I think it's become popular but does that make it like... What constitutes

a trend? That's probably something we should have spoken about at

Neither, I'd say. No? I'd say they're both staples. gourmet

burgers, they'll become a trend. Yeah. Like people would

like $28 burgers with like deep fried Mac

and cheese balls and shit like that on it. Yeah. Maybe that's a bit of a

trend, but you know, Macca's isn't

Speaking on, this is going a little bit off topic. I

It's fucked. Yeah. Ronald McDonald is bending us

over and just fuck you, Ronald.

He puts sick kids in a house of some kind.

I went to Hungry Jack's the other day and I got, it was like the big Angus

burger with all the shit on it. Large meal. It passed 20 bucks.

I'm like, that's a lot. That's like, that's rough.

Yeah. Past 20 bucks for a one meal. Seems

It's that just, everything's fucked. Inflation's corked. It

is what it is. But we digress. We'll go back. So

smoking mate. talking about how expensive it is. It's

not a cheap game to get into. So not only

for like the actual utensils you cook with, but

the cuts of meat. Yeah, they're pretty

Yeah, because I had a crackhead arm as a reverse searing. And

You need to think well, no can, but you just got

I blasted it to well done immediately twice in

a row. And it was like not cheap steak, but yeah, you

really need to buy like, you know, two or three inches, something

like that. And then that starts running you like 30 bucks a piece. Like if

I did it twice. Fucked it both times. Back

I'll fix it. Once you do a reverse sear properly, game

changer. But yeah, I guess that's

just one of those things where if you've got the time, And I guess the

luxury of being able to spend the money on getting some decent meat. Yeah.

It's probably one of those things too. We spoke about it in the saving money

episode. If you're doing bulk meat buys and you're buying like a whole rump

or something like that, there is probably benefits of like

Yeah. And you, if you're buying a whole rump, you can cut it yourself then too. So.

All right. Similar style hobby, something

that I'm, I got more into, and I think you're not so

I'm not into it because half of my lawn is dirt. Yeah.

The perks of living in a Renault. So yeah,

look, it's just, you know, I can't relate to it because

we end up ripping up ours whenever we

are doing shit around the house. But I can respect a

Yeah. Are you in Oz lawn fanatics on Facebook? No. Massive, massive

group. And it's just guys like posting their lawns. And

some of these dudes dare

say autistic about it. Yep. They're talking about, should I cut it eight

mil or 10 mil? And they're mowing like

every second day. They got the roller mowers. They got the line trimmers. They're

really, really into it. I'm not that far, but

you know, I'm getting the fertilizers and all that sort of stuff. And

it's rewarding when you take it from utter shit. Cause I had clover and all

sorts of crap going in there to actually bring it back to

Controversial topic. And I put a, put

a video up on my Insta the other week where

I was just sitting back relaxing while the missus was mowing the lawn.

Yeah. She likes mowing. I'm

not going to stop her from mowing the lawn. Are you not

No, I guess if she wants to. I've just always been thrown out

there in the yard to do it, but... See, I'm all about equality, so

if she wants to mow, she can mow. Yeah, I'm sure, like, I do dishes, you

I don't do the dishes. You don't do shit. Nah, that's not my job.

So, no, I'll do the dishes and I'll do all that. But

yeah, if she likes mowing, I'll let her go out and mow. She does a good job, so.

Chicks can have hobbies too. Maybe Jess is going to get into Oz lawn

fanatics, spend four and a half grand on a roller mower,

get a nice line trimmer. You might have to lay some

Look, if I'm spending four and a half grand, I'm going back to Traeger and I'm, I'm buying a

Traeger. Something that, you know, I can fill my stomach with

I'm glad you said baths. I'm like, no, I haven't. Yeah, we

can. Yeah. No, I haven't done ice baths. But I

get this sort of takes us back to that, you know, like the whole trends thing.

They have been popping up in my Instagram feed so much that

Ice bath is a 2023, 2024 trend for

sure. Like it came out of nowhere that, uh,

is it Wim Hof? Yep. Like that guy's been doing it 50 years or

whatever, but once it started taking off, the influencers

jumped on it, the athletes jumped on it. And then everyone's like,

Oh yeah, I can convert a old chest freezer into it. And then

the brand started popping up with these inflatable ones or whatever. It's

I think that there's a lot of science behind it with recovery

and whatnot. But I think a

lot of people are getting into it for the is the mental side

of it more than anything now. And I guess this sort

of leans into that whole breath working thing. I think that's a lot of the

reason behind it. Like, would you call breath work a

I mean, they sort of like breath work and ice bath sort

Yeah, a little bit. That whole movement of stuff that maybe was more Byron

Bay, yogi, hipstery, not

hipster, you know, hippie type stuff, maybe

being pushed into the mainstream a little bit more. That's kind of

Yeah. See, look, we don't have any of that shit where I'm

We got tea ceremonies. We

spoke about earlier the whole psychedelic movement. That's

obviously been a thing since the 60s, probably before that. But

psychedelics have definitely made a bit of a movement

Well, I think not even maybe psychedelics, but all

you do is look at- I mean, look at all the ads that you get popping

up in like your feed and whatnot behind like

all the different mushroom juices, I

guess they are, is what you can get. You know, some help you sleep. Some

give you like clarity of the mind. I don't know if there's any truth

I was going to say, are we, are we talking trends or are we talking

which company's got the biggest advertising budget to put it in

effect? That's what it seems like. Cause they're ice baths, they're definitely

spending a shit load of money on ads. I know those mushroom execs,

No, no, I think it was real. I think he mentioned them once and

Like you do. If Joe Rogan even slightly mentions you,

you just cut that up. Just roll with it. Yeah. So

Yeah. I think psychedelics is an interesting

one because obviously back when it first started, it first

started as like a research experiment way

back in the day. There's a whole bunch of conspiracy theories that we won't touch. And

then it got into sort of the recreational like hippie love space,

especially with LSD, mushrooms, things like that. But

then in more recent times, it's been the research into how

it as a drug, the different kinds of psychedelics can

be used in real life applications. So

there's a lot of like, even MDMA therapy, but definitely mushrooms

and all that sort of stuff used in therapies,

used in trauma, used in

terminal patients to improve outlook on life. And

there's some real, real research going into that. And as

it becomes more mainstream, I think more people are adopting it into

their normal life to, I don't know,

get a different viewpoint. It's really powerful for that.

That's a bit of a fine line to walk down between, you know, like

scientifically proven medicine using those sort of

things and then bring it into your personal life to start

playing around with that shit. That's probably something we need to mention is,

you know, if you're going to dabble

down that side, through the professionals. Maybe

just keep it to the professionals that, you know, are putting in all that research and

I'm gonna push back a bit there. Because if

we take it back even 10 years, you know, we,

we look at weed and THC, for example, and

the professionals are bound to what the government says is okay. Yep. Right.

So 10, 20 years ago, no go, full illegal, can't

Well, it's because you can't tax it. They figured out

I know, but that didn't change the effects that it had on people. So

Australia is more or is less progressive than say

some other countries when it comes to, let's use mushrooms as an

example. So just because

we can't access it, not because the health professionals say it's

no good, it's because the government says we're not doing

that yet. which we will because we follow suit in

other countries. I don't think that's a reason not to touch it. You just have

to be more mindful about the way you sort

It's yeah, mushrooms for example are not

something that you tend to abuse. It's not like a cocaine or

a thing like that. It's As

an actual tool, if you're doing the research behind how to use it, which

you can kind of do on your own, you can watch videos. It's

a whole thing on YouTube, Reddit, whatever. Don't

believe everything on Reddit. You can figure

out a way to set your intentions and your pathway

through that experience and then kind of self-guide yourself through

it and go low dose, don't go high. Mushrooms are probably

one of those things that people could very much

guide themselves into, as long as they are smart

about it and responsible about it. Much the same as they

would have done with weed. 10 years

ago. It doesn't mean it's right for you. Like everyone's going to

react different to other stuff, which it would be great if there was, um, more

therapists and stuff like that. And they do exist definitely in Northern rivers as

people doing all sorts of therapy, psychedelics that might not

be as mainstream in other parts of the country, but you can look it up and, and

No. Um, one thing that we've sort of, Probably

been seeing more of it, and I think I know the reason as to why we've been seeing

more. Probably not something you lean into. Golf.

Do you think that's a trend? Or do you

think that's just a lot to do with the likes of

I think it's a trend in the younger generation. So golf, like

when I was in my teens would be sort of the old man thing. Like it'd

be like the 50 year old people go out, have a hit where

now it's like, you know, these younger people in their

twenties and thirties are like, that's what they're doing on the weekend for fun. Instead

of going to bloody run club, they're having a couple of beers and

No? No. Hey, golf is where all the deals are done. All

Maybe if you're one of those old 50-year-olds. No. Hanging

No. Mate, look at all the young people that are in businesses now.

We need to do it. We'll go play some golf. I'm not good at

it, but we can just smack the shit out of balls and

I've noticed a lot of my mates getting into golf in the last couple

of years, and I'm not sure if that's because it is getting more

popular in the younger generation, or I'm transitioning into

It's probably a mixture of both, but see, I'd

bring it back to that whole sort of live what they're doing with golf is,

well, you've got, look what they just did in Adelaide not too long ago.

You've got the likes of Fisher there doing shoeys at the watering hole and

Cam Smith's doing his shoeys at the watering hole and all that sort of thing. They've

got a dedicated hole to sinking piss. They have

a big party every night. Like it's not your typical golf

crowd. But like they're doing numbers. So

I don't know, I think that's maybe what's bringing it more into

It's a smart play, right? They're doing, they're bringing in entertainment, young

influencer culture, all those things, kind of like what UFC has

done over boxing. So UFC's come

in and we're like, we're for the fans. We're putting on the entertainment. We're putting on the fight.

We're going to absolutely destroy social media. We're going to have the biggest characters.

It's a marketing play to sell tickets, to get more people involved.

Where boxing's like, you know more about that, but it

seems all over the shot. You hear about the odd fight here and there,

I guess, well, you've got the likes of No Limit in Australia. They're doing some

pretty big things, but they're going down that path with social media and

doing what they're going to do. But on a grand scale compared to

the likes of Live and the likes of UFC and all that sort of

stuff, no. Boxing in Australia, it's not

Next one, similar to the Run Club, is the CrossFit movement.

Yeah. It's much the same thing. Um, with

people doing it, it's a healthy outlet. So power to them. They get them

fit, they're hanging out, they're building a community of friends, but they

It's CrossFit's the new vegans, I think.

But they're not as bad as vegans. No. And I

don't think they're as bad as Run Club. Like

Run Club's the new cyclists. Run club

is a new song. You get a whole bunch of sweaty boys that

go for their run and then they'll go sit at the beach and drink a coffee at your favorite

You know how girls wear the little booty pants? Yep. I seen LSKD are

Nah, look, it doesn't have quite the G banger effect, but it's kind

of like skins. But we, we used to wear skins like under basketball

You'd just wear that. Just wear that. You'd want a fair hog on you to be able to show

Well, it just further backs up what you just

said. The new cyclists. Just

Off the back of those two sort of fitness-based ones

and the advertisers being in the space are those whoop

They're like, what was it, Fitbit or something? It's

kind of like one of those things that tracks your activity, it tracks

Yeah, I don't think it has a screen or maybe it's got a real small screen or something

like that. It's really like a band that tracks everything

Do you remember those power bands from back in the day? Yeah. That was

literally like just a black band and it had that little holographic thing

in it, you know? I think it's along those lines. It gave you the strength and

Yeah, gave you power. This is purely tracking shit. Yeah, okay.

Again, it probably just plays into, hey, people are running, like,

let's punch ads into these kind of people and sell

this product that fits. So advertisers cashing in,

Another one that's more up your alley is fighting. So from

someone that's never been involved in any of the boxing, MMA, jujitsu, there's

Can we, I'm just gonna pause you there. Can we not use jujitsu in

Yeah, that is a much better way to put it. Yeah, cool. That's

It's not weird. It's just don't call it a sport. Call it what it is. It's just

Fucking hell. All

those things have gotten more popular, maybe not in 2024, but

over the past maybe five years. I think it's kind of like CrossFit,

people are going into this community vibe. It's a

different aspect of what they're actually doing, but I've

definitely seen more people having a crack at MMA or, you

know, whatever it might be. Do you think that's become more popular, even

I don't know if it's become more popular or if it actually Yeah,

I think it comes in waves though, like you'll see an

influx in any sport that you do. Come, you

know, that beginning of the year, everyone, you know, ticks

off the New Year's resolution, New Year, new me bullshit, and

they'll just go join something to do it. But

I don't know, I'm seeing more people probably consistently stay

in it from this year. Like, yeah,

just down at the boxing gym, the classes are fucking massive

now, which is good. Anytime someone's trying to better

themselves, yeah, sweet, but I don't know. I

think there's a difference between all of those things where like, you know, doing

like MMA, doing jiu-jitsu, doing boxing, doing kickboxing, like

any form of that fighting, it's very different between

doing, you know, like boxercise and boxfit to actually jumping in

and either having a role with someone or, you know, trying to

have a bit of a sparring session and whatnot. If you're going about

it just for fitness, sweet, but, you know, there's levels

to it with people actually jumping into sparring. I'm not saying I'm any good at it,

I'm shitty at it, but, you know, I'd still jump in, have a go,

Keeps you humble, probably gives you a bit more motivation next time you are training to

Yeah, actually do it. Or you just back off and don't work so

hard in the first two so you've actually got some gas and take the third. Right?

This one's popped up. I reckon it got big during

COVID is the whole crypto and

day trading movement. Another one that you get smashed for ads

on. We get posts and blokes advice of guys like chiming in.

Some dudes are really into it. Um, buying all sorts of

Yeah. Oh, I can't get around it purely just because

a lot of the boys that I've seen that get into it, they're usually fucking

snakes. You know exactly who you are. Um, I

don't know. I feel like they just prey on the boys

that are looking for that quick get rich thing. Is

Well, there is, but you got to time it well and you're only going

to go up a certain amount. And once you cash out, if

you made your wealth off getting lucky, how are you going to make more?

You're better off just going to the casino then? Is

it the same thing? Like, I don't know enough about crypto to actually comment on it.

No, there's definitely an element of especially a

lot of people are trading in meme coin and stuff like that now, which I

don't want to say is, well, I will say it's unpredictable because

you don't know which one's going to pop off and it is going to give you crazy big

returns. And I think that's very much like gambling. I think a lot of people are

dropping 50 bucks in here, here, here, here, here, here and seeing which

one pops if it does. And I would say that's kind of like gambling.

How I've done crypto is pretty much I've stuck with

like the top three and I just put money in and I don't touch it.

And that's why you have like 300 Bitcoin. Yeah, wouldn't that be nice?

That would be great. Which I guess is is more used

as like, to make more of a diverse sort of

savings. Wallet. Yeah, I'm not trying

to trade it daily to like, maximize my returns. I've

spoken to some accountants and whatnot. And

they're like doing the returns for people and it's like this

guy made 450 transactions during the year. His

profit was $120. And he's got to pay capital gains

So you're better off just to, if you're going to do it, just hold

Look, if it's a hobby that you're into and don't get me wrong, there's people making

money. Like I don't know nearly enough. If you actually look

into stuff and you're doing it all properly and you have access to all the

information, there are people making money and this

is their job and that's what they do. So you can't knock it completely, but

I definitely say it's a trend because people are talking about, I

made $10,000 in a day and then people

get in as a hobby, but they're not

Yeah. Yeah. Again, I don't know enough about it. I mean, I've bought

some crypto and then I forgot my login, so

I could be doing well. It's probably worth heaps. No, it could be, who fucking knows. You

should figure that out. It's better just to forget about it in case it is. I think that

Yeah, he's like, I bought some dogecoin thing years and

Yeah, I think it was like some ETH or

something. Yeah, it was only two bucks a coin. Yeah, it

I'll finish it off with something that's been a bit of a pet hate of

mine. It started with Birkenstocks. Don't

get around Birkenstocks. If you're not a 60 year old German man, you're not wearing

Birks. The last couple of years it's transitioned into

They're great. Comfort, functionality, reliability,

comfort. You can put gibbets in them to

The points it loses on aesthetics takes it below zero. No.

Yep. No. Crocs are The

I'm not getting around it. I'll never get around it. I'll run a marathon before I

Yeah, I've paid extra for that. You can't be commenting about, you know, like, style

and all. Crocs are fucking amazing. Let

us know. I'm upset that I'm not wearing my Crocs now, actually. Do you have Birks? Nah,

I don't have Birks. Would you wear Birks? I would wear Birks. Maybe.

I don't know. They're pretty expensive, so... I

don't know. I'm pretty cheap when it comes to actually buying shit, so.

Yeah, right. Well, that's just a straight up no for

me. Mind you, I don't wear thongs either. Why? I

Oh, I thought you were talking about other thongs. Like

Mankini episode, that'd be great. Do you reckon we need to do that? I

If you want to do a Mankini, you want us to do a Mankini episode, you know,

reach out to the socials, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube,

Drop a comment with some of the trends, what you thought about any

of these, like the boys like to read through it. And it's, I think this is a

pretty funny one because you can throw a bit of banter. Um, what's

good, what's hot, what did we miss and what did you agree with? Make