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The only Mental Health podcast that shares honest and authentic accounts of living with mental health issues, that's also hosted by individuals fighting the same fight you are!Providing information and resources for help with a heavy dose of humor and entertainment. Helping you find hope and the strength to fight on.
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Episode 194: From memes to Community Impact: The Lowercase Dooms Block Party's Mission
How did a casual joke in a group chat evolve into the lowercase dooms block party, an event with a profound mission? Join us as we sit down with Luke Cavanaugh, Travis Thompson, and Kevin "BK" Shears from Snake Farm to uncover the origins of this community-driven initiative. This episode sheds light on how the block party aims to foster camaraderie and support critical missions like the FOLAND initiative, all while collaborating with organizations such as the Combat Control Foundation. Discover the importance of creating genuine, impactful gatherings that go beyond fleeting get-togethers to truly resonate with and support the veteran community.
Transitioning to civilian life can be a challenging journey for veterans and athletes alike. We discuss the invaluable support offered by organizations like the Honor Foundation and Shift Group. Kevin provides insights into the rigorous training and job placement assistance that Shift Group offers, emphasizing the importance of utilizing available resources to make transitions smoother. The unique camaraderie and humor found in military meme culture also play a crucial role in providing support during these pivotal moments. Hear compelling anecdotes that illustrate how shared experiences and humor can help ease the stress of life changes.
Lastly, we are inspired by the story of a community project honoring the memory of SSgt Forrest Sibley, a fallen Air Force Combat Controller (CCT). Led by Brent Sibley, Forrest's father, this initiative has transformed a piece of land into a sanctuary for Veterans, Active duty service members, and their families to bond and heal. With the community's support, this outdoor retreat has become a site for resiliency retreats and team-building activities. We also explore Travis and Luke's strategies for balancing demanding civilian careers with family life, emphasizing the integration of family time into work routines. Learn how these veterans leverage their military skills in civilian roles while maintaining focus on what truly matters.
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The Lower Case Dooms Block Party is going down July 26th through July 27th. For more information, CLICK THE LINKS BELOW!
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Produced by Security Halt Media
security hot podcast let's go with an expert in guerrilla warfare, with a man who's the best with guns, with knives, with his bare hands, a man who's been trained to ignore, ignore weather.
Speaker 3:To live off the land job, was disposed of enemy personnel to kill period.
Speaker 1:we are back today. I am proud to bring you some very rough individuals luke cavanaugh, travis thompson and kevin from snake farm. Gentlemen, how are you today? Good, today we're going to be talking about the uh upcoming block party for lowercase dooms Guys. How the fuck did this get started? That's what I want to know, because for years now I've been following this page, and it's not just entertainment, but it has built a community, and now you're trying to do something amazing, which is bring everybody together and, kind of like, have a good time celebrating some amazing folks. So, all right, take it away.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, you know how group chats go. Everyone's probably just listening to this, probably in a hundred different group chats, and we're just chit-chatting in one group chat and I think, if I'm not mistaken, kevin kind of just said it as a joke at one point and then we just start talking about how we're going to roll with it and we sort of ended up here realized there was a bunch of missions that we were excited about, namely on this one, the FOLAND initiative and that sort of thing. So we started taking it there and you know, everyone's got their opinions on the foundations and things like that, and we just like, hey, this is how we want to get our guys together, this is how we want to get together, this is how we want to do it. So that's what we ran with it and whatever.
Speaker 4:Luke and Kevin have to add on top of that. No, it's a good like. We built a community out of this, you know, collaborated with some other companies you know misfits and snake farm and some other teams and we reached out and Travis made the connection to us with combat control foundation and they're willing to help us out with that side of it to get everything up and running.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's kind of a hard thing to try to do something new and branch off and try to avoid having 75 different individuals try to put their fingers in everything, like there's a lot of great organizations, there's a lot of great outreach, but at the end of the day, when you want to do something authentic, maybe it just takes like a smaller group of people. Like what was the first catalyst for this whole thing? Like kicking off and like how did it go from initial joke because I'm probably, I'm pretty sure it was, maybe it was just a joke in the chat, like you said and then kicking that ball down the road, actually like making some real movement with it I think it's.
Speaker 3:it's just sort of like it takes a spark to make fire and like with a lot of parties in general, the fixed ones are the ones that kind of just are pre-planned and that suck. Like no one wants to go to the squadron Christmas party. No one wants to go to this pre-planned thing. No one wants to go to that. Like the best get togethers we have have almost been impromptu or just when the guys are handling or the guys are getting together going to do, whether that's a Super Bowl party or meeting up at coasters or wherever that is. So we were kind of just talking about that. Now we want to get everyone together.
Speaker 3:It's not just in the special operations or the combat control community that we're having this identity crisis where we're not feeling that sense of camaraderie we might have once felt. So it's like, hey, guys, how do we get that together? Well, it's not really, like there's no one else there to do it. So we want to do this. We can do it right. That's where we ran with that. Of course, kevin's the creative one of the bunch and when he's done running 100 miles a day, he comes in with some great ideas on how to do it.
Speaker 2:So now it's like we were just talking shit and one of our business partners and great friends and fellow tag team, jared Taylor, was like you know, we know we should do something, we should do a concert or a comedy show. So we started doing comedy, uh, before the summer, uh, and then I started talking to luke um and the lcd guys again, um, about the community and where we were at. It was like, dude, let's just throw, let's just throw a big-ass party, right. But like, we don't want to just ask for money, and you know, and, and yeah, just you know, spend on alcohol, right, there has to be a reason, there has to be an end state for right, or else we just become one of these bro chariots which is like rage in and then we fucking off to the off, to the right, you know, with all your money.
Speaker 2:So that's where tk was instrumental, because he's been working with mr brent sibley, father of fallen's combat controller for his sibley um, to build up FOLAND, which is 100 acres of Floribama land and have, you know, not only Air Force Special Warfare, you know, community members and families come out there already, but like teams, you know, guys get back from deployment, go out there right as a way to bring in a bunch of money, bring in donors and then build that whole. You know, lodge out and build more room so we can have multiple teams, so we can do this multiple times a year and that could be a haven for all the guys you know who've put in work the last 21 years, 20 plus years, right, like they, you know they deserve that spot, you know, dude absolutely build it Right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that the other thing that we have to touch on here is everybody here has transitioned, made their way out. I think, luke, you're the last man out right, we did it, one of us. I think it becomes more important to build a community once you're on the outside Because we were talking earlier, kevin you start a business, you become an entrepreneur, you start a job. Everything kind of takes the backseat, like being able to stay connected, being able to have friends, being able to like in your own journeys guys like how has that been? Like have you dealt with that? Being able to like now you're no longer walking in that team room every morning. Now it's like all right, I'm walking in the office or I'm working remote. How do every morning? Now it's like all right, I'm walking in the office or I'm working remote.
Speaker 3:How do you continue to reach out to each other like um? I mean, we have all these group chats, all these random little sub communities like these are the people. I got um hobbies on top of that work. I mean, luke and I work the same company. Now I'm working for elastic. Uh, it's just good to have everyone around and, like your bros are your bros whether you're working with them or not. My closest friends that I had on the teams are still some of my closest friends now, even if I haven't seen them in years. I'm just kind of the way it goes and it's I know.
Speaker 2:so I had a kind of different transition, so to speak, from these two dudes, because they were active duty, uh, and I was in air force, uh, or a national guard tack p or national guard tack p, uh. So, like the last three years you know, four, four years when I was thinking about transitioning out, I had a part-time job in a tech company, right. So I was doing that while like one foot in the door and the catalyst for me was like, dude, I'm not being a good team leader anymore, I'm not being, I'm not giving the guys my ultimate value, right, because I'm working on Snake snake farm, I'm doing my family, I'm practicing for 190 miles a day, right. So that was like the catalyst for me to transition out, like, hey, I need to go find what makes me happy and what's going to make, you know, put my energy into like good, not evil, right, which is, you know, smoking, like one levels and shit, and just like teaching j-tac classes. So I left easy at 17 years and I think it's cool I've been able to be in the guard and kind of help a lot of dudes transition out, like Luke and I have talked a lot about I'm not saying I helped Luke out, like everything Luke is he owes to me now.
Speaker 2:But you know, it's just like. You know, I've kind of had my foot in both worlds in the civilian and the military world and it's just been like, hey, dude, here's what I see, or here's what you really need to do to set yourself up Right. Like 20 plus years of dudes just crushing it over overseas, like a lot of these guys are coming back. You know, a lot of my friends are like, hey, I, you know, can I get a job here or there? I'm like, dude, this is a technical. It Like not being like you know, like all that other stuff is what gets you in the door. But it's been, you know, it's been weird watching friends transition right, some of them do it successfully and some of them do it not successfully. Yeah, it's kind of hard, it is hard.
Speaker 1:It's difficult and we got to be able to take a look at every aspect, even the guys that don't do so well at first. I think there's there's lessons learned in those experiences too and we can bring back to everybody. Uh, I do want to give a quick shout out to an organization that's helped uh, three of us the honor foundation. Yeah, I know, travis, we went through it together and Luke, you went like right after, that's right. What were, what were some of the things that you feel that organization was able to give you and prepare you for making that leap out into the real world?
Speaker 4:For me I would say, just transitioning into the real world. So the military you get everything, everything's allocated to you, paid for your BAH, everything they help prepare you for that, help prepare you for, set conditions for financial reports and issues like that and then they get you. The biggest part, in my opinion, was the networking aspect. I didn't know like that. What I was doing through the military all these years was actually networking. They put a title to it, taught me how to do that formally and how to reach out to people, and then you know, the mock interviews at the end of that were instrumental in acquiring the job I have now.
Speaker 3:Honestly, what about you, travis, similar to the networking thing and other stuff we've alluded to, when you're leaving a community or when you feel like you have this team that's alongside you going towards a common goal with the Honor Foundation. It's like, hey, this is a place people would come together as a new common goal. Like hey, we're all making this transition, we're all doing this. So it's people kind of left and right, you people to bounce ideas off of and not just feel like you're figuring this all out by yourself. On top of that, like there's just some awesome people associated with that organization. I didn't necessarily use that network to get the job I'm in now, but like I talked to so many people and met so many people on the way that it took a lot of worries off my shoulders. I'm like, hey, man, like we all got each other's back, just like with anything else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, and we tend to think that transition has to be this thing that we do by ourselves, and it's absolutely not true. You have teams on the outside, you have individuals that care and want to give you resources, and it's not about getting a handout, it's just about being willing to step up to the play and say, hey, like I've never done this before, I need help, and like there's so many people who only come out of the woodwork if you're willing to just be that little bit of vulnerable and just say, hey, man, like I need a little bit of help on this.
Speaker 2:So you know, go ahead, kevin yeah, so you guys mentioned honor foundation. Luke luke put me on to Shift Group, which is another awesome organization to take, like former NCAA athletes, you know, division One athletes, and and then veterans who have, like you know, essentially are transitioning out and they've lost their team. Right, they both are hanging out the uniform. So then they give those guys through like a rigorous course, sales, sales experience, sales engineer experience so that you can go in and then they place you with a job. Right, you know they try to place you with a job. Uh, and I went to that course and they were awesome, those people were great. Um, I didn't need the job placement, it was more about learning the skills. But just like the fact that those guys are putting in that work and like that mindset is like, hey, you know, you've training on a team for a high level, like a sprinting team for years and years college, you know some opportunities after that, and then you hang it up and you're done. Same thing with the military, right, but those guys were saying, like their attrition rate for that course is like 70%, like 70% of veterans that they accept don't finish this courseware, it's just like it's the same thing everywhere, right, like you know, all you have to do is outwork somebody a little bit more um, and you're probably gonna be a lot better off than they are. Um, and that comes with using resources like this man, these there's so many cool resources for veterans transitioning out.
Speaker 2:I think guys are just like nah, you know, we thought everybody talks about the same. You know, like I don't know, I don't want to do that, but I don't know um, a lot of cool opportunities to change your life and not have to work for boeing for the next 20 years. Dude, what? Hey? Hey, don't kill me, I'm just kidding. I haven't seen my family in three months, but I make fucking four hundred dollars.
Speaker 3:I get a month off straight. Who else gets that?
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah, yeah. I see my kids, that bitch debbie took them all. Right, we got this.
Speaker 1:That's the lowercase dooms coming out, dude, oh yeah yeah, dude, speaking of lowercase dooms, um, now that everybody's out, let's uh, let's dive into that. Like our the military meme space is filled with individuals. But I feel like your, your brand of comedy on that page is absolutely like just ridiculous. Uh, going back to like when I first found it and seeing like there is so many things you guys put out there that it's just like jesus, fuck christ, it's hilarious, like who, who comes up with this shit? And then I meet luke and it's like okay, now I know where it's come from. Like what was the catalyst to start this thing off, man?
Speaker 4:I would say the origins of that started years before on facebook, back when we had facebook. Before now, just at facebook, the generation before us, crusty, trying to stay relevant, say some. Then, of course, we just tried to make fun of them because it wasn't, you know, relevant to what's going on now. So we're like, yeah, you're up. It started as Place of Mantor on there, or Tack Peas on Facebook.
Speaker 2:Sorry what it essentially started with us trolling older Tack Peas on Facebook.
Speaker 3:And that was ironic, because that's where Luke froze out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just know how to use the internet. Baby, what the fuck, dude? I don't know how to use this stuff. You ain't got enough dedicated wham you know what I'm saying Dedicated wham, combat controllers at the handheld link 16 conference.
Speaker 4:You got enough dedicated wham, yeah, so we're just sitting around on our couches in March of 2020, not being able to do anything, and we're talking about how much this is bullshit. And then we started talking about memes and stuff. We're like let's just start a meme page about it. We started making memes and then, all of a sudden, people started talking about it. We were going places and we're like, oh, oh, this is cool About us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I wonder who Dooms is, I guess who is he?
Speaker 4:He's not handsome Over the years, but sorry, I guess.
Speaker 1:That's all, luke dude. Yeah, it's funny because you guys have started some pretty. There have been some grudges and some feelings hurt to the page. Yeah.
Speaker 4:You know it is what it is. It hurts your fee fees. It's probably a little too true for you.
Speaker 2:I don't know yeah, it's not that serious it gave me context in my, in my real life, though. Like so if I see something that pisses me off, like oh, biden's, we're gonna be a skin suit, you know, I'm like that's pretty whack. And I'm like, wait, remember when these guys would deem us like do you really think I can't read a map? Are you fucking kidding me? And I was like didn't you fail jtac use anyways? So, like you know, like I love you dude, uh, we're friends now. But uh, the guy I'm talking about, uh, yeah, you know. So it's like, oh, it's just not that serious.
Speaker 2:This is the fucking internet, right, and it was just like a, a cool way for us to like talk shit and like kind of bring the vibe up for the, for the guys, right, so we'd have dudes from all across the spectrum sending us stories, sending us memes, like hey, did you care about the guy?
Speaker 2:Straight, the fucking op the other day with f16, crazy hashtag, nsw, right, and it was just like. It was just, you know, we would take that and like put those little blitter blotter stories out for the community, because it's just like no one else was doing it for our specific job, right, you know, there was. There was the 18 disaster, one of the og dudes, like he was a fucking killer, um, like you know, but no one was doing it for us, you know. So, again, it's always it's always been about like making us happy, right, whether like we're shitting on fat air national guard tech peas, right, you know, fucking soft dudes who black out their stuff, you know just, you know, at disney, like what dude's chill brother, you know mulan lake like you know, it was always talking shit about everything us to make us feel better.
Speaker 1:So yeah, representation matters, especially in the, the soft community, in the meme world. Jarvis, I want to ask you, man, how has it been being able to work with you know, force's dad, and building this FO land project?
Speaker 3:No, yeah, it's definitely been awesome and rewarding. I mean I grew up in the outdoors and that sort of thing, so like it's a natural fit. I mean, who doesn't want property they can hunt on or access to? So I mean that's the selfish side of it. But on top of it it's like man, no, this is something way bigger than me. Like this is. Forrest bought this before he died. He was exploring it with his dad, walked all four corners of the property and it was like it, this is a spot for the guys, this is what it is. And when Forrest was killed in Elma and his dad was like, hey, this is kind of like my purpose now, this is how I'm going to give back to the community in this, and this is all he does. I mean, brent spends sometimes six out of seven days a week and his old lady is not happy about that and he's just out there mowing lawn, cutting down trees, getting the tree stands ready, getting camping areas ready.
Speaker 3:I mean they made a shower and like a nice outhouse so people's wives or girlfriends will be happy to go out there. Like that's what it's about. It's like they want this to be the outdoor retreat so you don't have to spend 60 bucks to go camping at some campground and have another thing 10 feet next to you. But yeah, I mean it's been ultimately rewarding. You've been seeing to seeing that out there has been awesome. I mean like shout out like edwin perez doing a lot of stuff out there and peter guy, I saw him get his first year this past season. It was pretty cool. Um, seeing that sort of stuff. On top of of that, I mean the chaplain, the squadron and a few other groups have gone out there to do just pure resiliency retreats. And then on top of that it's like to give to that next community and like, as the global war on terror has died down, it's like these new guys like how else do they get a pulse on it? So it's kind of turned into a place like where teams will take out their new or take out the whole team to just do work and like hey, this is a gold star thing, this is how we're going to give back to them. And it sort of puts into perspective and makes these gold star people not just names on a wall. It's like they were real people and this was it. So that's kind of like the full spectrum rewarding of it. On top of that, just to ramble on some more.
Speaker 3:Like the way we kind of I thought that this would be a good thing for this lcdbp to add on is like we kind of made an impromptu party last year. Um, because at this point we full land. Like we built a small little four bunk cabin and a lot of times guys go out there with the teams of their families and like these four little twin beds in the cabin like aren't supporting that. So like we did a fundraiser to build this giant pole barn and it is massive. Um, we exceeded our standards and goal. We made like 20k and cast night, built this awesome pole barn and that's it stands now. Like we have the pole barn there and that's about it. So now it's like we got to outfit this thing Cause like we were not expecting that to happen on our stupid party at coasters and some raffles going on with that and mafia styling for raffle tickets, but it was awesome. Everyone came out to support and that's what we hope happens again this time Absolutely man.
Speaker 1:Luke, do you have something to add on to that?
Speaker 4:Travis has been instrumental in interfacing with the FOLIN part of this. I've been pretty hands-off of that and I knew about his fundraiser. He did last year. I wasn't able to go to it and when we were spitballing in the chat about like, if we're going to do this, where are we going to bring the funds? We don't want to just give it to one of our awesome nonprofits, we want to give it to a nonprofit, like work with a nonprofit, to give it to a specific goal. And Travis, you know before, immediately after we asked that, travis was like let's do Poland and everybody was like, yeah, a hundred percent got to do Poland.
Speaker 3:I mean, think about it, danny, like it's super cool, like he was killed in, like a third group, seventh group, rip, and like this is a property. It's like man, we have this built out here, like this is now the event spot and that's what this place is for. It's not anyone's personal property. I think it's like hey, here's the gate, you guys know the gate code, you're trusted people here. And like this is our area to do what we want with. And like who has that? Like that is awesome for us to have, especially around here in the pan. Now even guys in this is just awesome, and we see the vision through.
Speaker 1:It's beautiful, knowing the area too, like there's. There's places that you meet up, that you know specifically. Oh, that's, that's our JTAC, cct brothers. They're meeting up here in this area. This is their bar, this is, and you walk in and for the Green Berets, like we have Charlie Mark in North Carolina, like Charlie Mike's bars, like just decorated evergreen break. We've lost and when you, when we had those bars that you would go to and you see the lineage of all your brothers, all the air force special operation guys, that's something unique to that Northwest Florida area. And for you guys to have that plot of land to bring guys out away from the party scene, away from the constant drinking scene, that's even more therapeutic because now we know, like the efficacy of being on the out, being in the outdoors, hunting, hiking, being outside with your friends, being able to enjoy an area that's. That's a testament to the guys that it's built for it's gonna always be there.
Speaker 3:Your friends keep you away from your family and your family keeps you away from your friends, so like what's a place you can meld those? It's like a place like that. So like then there really is no excuse and it's a true community type of thing, absolutely we, uh I was very fortunate to experience one of those for the first time.
Speaker 2:Our friends and the co-planners of the lcd block party alpha resolute group ran by a bunch of legendary combat controllers uh, we just call them friends. Uh, they, uh they invited me out to north uh, new york for my first turkey hunt hunt ever. Right, I'm, you know, one of the dudes. Uh, never hunted before and it was amazing and it was just. You know, a couple veterans and you know family, and he, you know the owner of the land had his kids, chris peck, and it was just, you know, I don't have anything but like being with my friends there. Um, it was, it was really, it was such. You know, I don't have anything but like being with my friends there.
Speaker 3:Um, it was, it was really, it was such a meaningful time and be able to do that in large scale for dudes, um, that we know and love and care about, that's that's pretty powerful I'm happy you brought that up, kevin, because the operation second chance I've done another retreat with the guy, um, mark petranis, who runs a camp up there in michigan as well, and like going up there and him hosting the guys he's just a firefighter, regular dude and he wants to get back to you know, wounded veterans and that sort of thing and like what that started, as is like a lot of people that had lost their legs or lost limbs and stuff like that.
Speaker 3:And now, like you don't see as much of that. So like I'm fortunate enough to get out there, like I'm banged up and not missing, knock on wood. But like the thing with fo land is, we would like to be able to do the same type of thing there, like once that is outfitted and ready for that, like that we I've talked to brent about and like that's something he would love to do be able to host guys out there and bring people out there to give the whole veteran community some sort of retreat, um, and just be able to do it right rather than just yeah yeah, because there's nothing.
Speaker 1:There's nothing like we have a lot of fishing chargers, a lot of stuff out there, but as far as like getting out and hunting and being out in the area, we don't have that. Guys are always having to go out to louisiana and go to all these other non-profit areas, but to have it in the backyard that makes it so much easier for guys to say you know what? Yeah, I'm gonna take a weekend off, I'm gonna take the kids, take the wife, we're gonna go out there. And you don't have to worry about putting in a uh, a request for long distance travel or any of that shit or go test pass on the redneck range that everyone northwest florida has been do before to go zero their guns, yeah I gotta love crestview is that hooter still there?
Speaker 1:same one single waitress still working there.
Speaker 3:Lost a lot of good men there a lot of good men there shift a cracker barrel kind of bouncing in the boat. God bless them you know, bless the troops.
Speaker 1:He's a busy lady these days no, fuck the troops, all right I want to ask you, man, like going into the space, like like you have travis and you have luke, they went out there, they're crushing it, found an amazing business to work with and going to entrepreneurial route, going after your own thing with snake farms what was that like in the beginning?
Speaker 2:I mean it's cool. It's been Snake Farm, it's been by a committee, right. We've always had at least four members at all times running the company. All Combat Controller, tacp. One time we had a Green Beret. So you know, it's different, right, because we are all used to working at a high performing level but we learning to slow down and it's different. Man, I enjoy it. Yeah, I don't know. I've already read the question. I was like how do I want to?
Speaker 1:answer this shit. It's miserable. I hate it yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, if I wouldn't? Yeah, I stayed up late last night working on some shit, so that's why I'm like you want to know my fucking thoughts, brother. Exactly that's the real shit I want to know. Yeah, I mean, that's what it is, though you're not talking about it before, is like when it's yours and you've worked on something for forever. Right, we started to snake farm in 15 like, or, yeah, 16. Uh, like dude, like you, like all those details matter, right. Like not getting that customer, not seeing that customer, who's like yo, what the fuck? Hello, I emailed you like, oh shit, dude, I was worried. I was doing a hundred other things. That shit still hurts, right, like you know, a couple of years later, um, I love it.
Speaker 2:I love being able to work with dudes who dream bigger than regular stuff. You know, like regular, normal, like man, I'm going to go to Cancun this weekend. I'm going to fucking do some fun stuff. You know, like, we're like dude, let's build a, let's build a fucking party, you know, and have a football game and tournament style and let's give, you know, broadcasters down here, right, like being able to work with dudes and vision and actually create shit like that. Like when you know, um, is is amazing and it's it's given me a lot of resiliency. When, when told no outside of the military Cause, like you get told no, the military, it's like, oh fuck, that sucks Like out here. It's like why, like no, you gotta give me some justice. Like we need to. We need to justify to me why this plan isn't good, right, and so, yeah, you know, running your own business and is challenging as fuck. It's not as fun as everybody looks like and he thinks it is, but man, when it hits, it hits. So love this thing.
Speaker 1:It's aight, webpages look fun, but when you're one doing the work to make it all look awesome, yeah, it can be a challenge.
Speaker 2:And I was in the Air Force, so I can read at a very high level and this shit's not that fun sometimes.
Speaker 1:Webpage design shit's not that fun sometimes Web page design shit's not. And, Travis and Luke, for you guys, coming out of this, going into your own new endeavor, new chapter in your life, have you been able to manage? Being able to focus on family, focus on your hobbies, going into this new realm, working for somebody doing high demand work?
Speaker 3:I wish I had an answer for you. It's just kind of like it's very cool. As much as I like to think I'm organized and methodical on things, a lot of time it is like putting out fires. It's like if you're having issues in this space, you got to go focus on that. And then it's like oh man, I might make sure I'm tracking all this, so I like the chaos a little bit, that. And then it's like oh man, like did I might make sure I'm tracking all this. So, like I, I, um, I like the chaos a little bit.
Speaker 3:That's how how I function as a person, even on top of you know the typical things. I have a million and one hobbies on top of it and I'm always want to learn something new. And that's just how I thrive, because if otherwise, I get I personally get very complacent and start forgetting things. If I'm going slow, when I'm going fast, I'm turned on all the time and I understand the risks and things with that and I've gone in the dark side of that. But I feel like I'm in a much healthier place than on the teams when a lot of things work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yep you're just looking balloon. I didn't do that.
Speaker 1:All my hands on my thing the entire time gestures um, so what you have to do is you have to stand up and take your pants down and just kind of, I didn't do that. Oh, my hands are on my thing the entire time. Hands up, camera gestures. So what you have?
Speaker 2:to do is you have to stand up and take your pants down and just kind of, what does this do, what does this do? So, like that's, that's cool though. Like having, you know, been in business and tech for the last four years. Like seeing dudes come in and use their ability to manage talent and manage a team, like that's all it is. Like you were managing a team, right, and you know you're managing assets. So this, you know, this guy, this asset, works better with this because it has this munitions loadout, right.
Speaker 2:Same thing, like, oh, I'm now running a team as a program manager, right, because a lot of guys go from being a PIMP to getting a PMP. So like then, okay, how do I translate those skills? Well, dude, you used to manage people all the time. Fucking. Do the same thing here. Like, hey, abdul, you're not doing a really good job, you know kim fee is.
Speaker 2:So you know, moving those pieces around in those spaces is how guys, um, perform, right, it's like one of the guys are like, oh, I'm quite professional, like I, you know. Like you know, wait for someone else take the reins. Do like, don't be an alpha male dickhead. But you know, we have these awesome soft skills of being able to negotiate, see both sides and fucking kind of play this little like second third order effects, like well, what's going to happen if I do this? A lot of civilian people don't have those skills and they've never had to negotiate with somebody to do something. High risk, right yeah, for us in the Air Force high risk is driving an ATV, so you know we've had to do it for everything.
Speaker 3:It's funny how guys' confidence goes away in that realm. And you do see some dudes that are the most confident guys in the world and then they talk about like transition or something new and they're just like oh I don't know if that's for me or you know any other thing that comes along for them. A lot of it's just trusting number one, trusting yourself. Some people learn that and some people never truly grasp that. Like if you can accomplish hard things, hard things, you can train a monkey to build a rocket, like you can train anybody to do anything. It's just trusting yourself that you can learn it and you can apply these skills. Yeah, so true, luke and I really lucked out where we're at and just one way or another. I mean it's not a military based company at all. Of course there's a big PubSec thing with it, but on our team alone it's like myself, luke. We have another Green Beret on our team and now we just started a Skillbridge guy coming in. I'm also a combat controller.
Speaker 1:So it's really funny how that worked out and like how we have this little like Mike team or Mike force sitting here at a tech company. But it's cool, that's badass man being able to bring in good friends and being able to build something that assists other individuals to get into that space. I have to imagine once you see somebody in that tracker that's coming in from that soft background, it's almost like it would be too easy to be like, hey, we're going to pull this guy into our team and it's also looking out for each other man.
Speaker 4:Hey, we want to pull this guy into our team and it's also working out for each other man. I was just going to go back to the original question about the family and new job and everything. So you know JR Butler at Shift Group that Kevin shouted out he had a really good thing to say. One time we were on a call and they said how do you balance? You know your life and your family and stuff. And he said you don't balance it, you integrate it. So that's how it works. And so integrating that family and figuring out your priorities again same theme it's no change from what we're doing in the military, it's prioritization of workload, right. So family business and then your actual nine to five job. That's kind of where I've seen that a lot and it's really resonated a lot since I started this new company. You know, after Jr said that in a call one time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we. We tend to think we got to jettison everything and then fucking laser focus on one thing and everything else has to fucking fall by the wayside. But that's not the reality. You just have to figure out how to make it work together.
Speaker 2:I'm thinking that's hard for everybody. I got I got an 11 year old kid and a 12 year old kid who both are like awesome, you know, in their respective sports. One is jujitsu full-time, the other does like basketball and they both do football and like. So I've had to learn how to work on the go and that's huge right, like I'm not going to have my big 49 inch you know curve monitor in front of me. You know my kids a lot of times when I was working in tech, you know, I exited last October. They're like dad, why do you come out of your office so angry? I'm like yo, dude, chill, that's my face.
Speaker 2:I got RBF, you know, and so like learning to work near them, with them, have them in here and not be like I'm trying to write this white paper, you know like so now I can be more creative. Now, like the, the deadlines aren't as harsh. It's, it's still work, but yeah, man, finding time to enjoy it around your family, uh, is big. But yeah, that's good, luke, integrating them and not being like hey, I'm in the silo, I'll see. I got to lock you in. It was like oh shit, dude.
Speaker 3:Does that mean you have a family helping with RFPs and stuff? Is that what? Integrated? I'm like, hey, what are you doing? Kpi should be For me. I'm going to be watching some Netflix. Yeah, dude.
Speaker 2:What are you saying? Yeah, hey, baby, try to do this for me real quick.
Speaker 1:I'm going to have some cereal, we'll get another fresh squirt oh my god, are you guys thinking to eventually maybe have a lowercase dooms non-profit? You develop something together, or I think?
Speaker 3:it'll vary, but yeah, go ahead luke. I just think the running a non-profit is a lot of work.
Speaker 4:Like that's a full title I don't want to do it yeah so biggest thing for us is you know, we decided to put an LLC under Lovercase Dunes, put up a shop just for people to have swag. We don't anticipate making any money off it. Anything we make on it that's outside of what covers business costs is going to go back to the community to some capacity. So we want to keep it like that. We don't want to make it a nonprofit of our own. We think there's personally I think there's a lot of nonprofits out there. It's probably a pretty saturated market and a lot of them do really good stuff and we'd rather partner with those nonprofits and help them any way we could. As far as the LCD side is concerned, yeah absolutely, I think, like.
Speaker 2:So, what we learned from you know is being able to not I don't wanna say jump, but what do we need to fund? Or what do we need? What's our community need right now? Right, Right now, our community needs full land, you know, to be built up and and they'll your money, your mark, for travel for teams next year. Right, that's what our focus is next year. Um, something else might be our focus, right? Or? I just think it's better that we we don't't build, we don't oversaturate and create another nonprofit and we just utilize different ones as the need comes up and we raise different money. You know, I just stay agile.
Speaker 3:what you're good at, like once the right, is you don't want the man coming after you Like let go and go at Combat Control Foundation. Like in the lanes on that. I'm going to go and go at Combat Control Foundation like keep you in the lanes on that.
Speaker 4:Not to mention Lowercase.
Speaker 1:Doom's content probably doesn't really coincide with the nonprofit organizations.
Speaker 4:How dare you? I'm happy they're working with us and we're going to work with them and we're going to do great things together, but I don't think we have the same outlook sometimes when it comes to what we post.
Speaker 2:Well, the first name for the lowercase dooms block party was a lowercase dooms summer turndown LCD STD and it was just like. We don't think anyone is going to say like, let's donate that, but we think it's hilarious. We're going to be by ourselves, you know, in a cabin, by ourselves again.
Speaker 3:I got crabs at the lowercase STD Dude, I might still in a cabin by ourselves again.
Speaker 2:So I got crabs at the lowercase std.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying, dude, I might still make that shirt I think that that sells that you got to know your community, you got to know your humor. It's it's very much in line. I think people need to understand too, like humor is humor and it's part of the community. Like when you understand that you're not looking at clean, normal people, you're not making humor for normies, you're making humor for your specific community and that's the thing I love about it. If it's not for you, keep moving on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, please don't beat us up, they were just memes.
Speaker 4:yeah, luke and I are too skinny ah hey, your son's done bjj, so he's got our back I don't want to bring him.
Speaker 2:I like my kid, I'm like dude. All these grown men want to beat me up for making memes.
Speaker 3:Teach me we're tying up, like we're finishing up some of the designs. I think we got the venues and stuff figured out. Yeah, food wise, like we're still working on it. Kevin wanted some like paella or something. We told him that's a little too granola, so we're gonna go maybe some a boil or something. We'll see, uh, but yeah, it's tying up. Good, we'll probably start pushing it down people's throats even harder, because you know how it is. It's sometimes pulling nails to get guys to have fun and then they have a good time.
Speaker 1:So what are some of the things that are outstanding? What are some of the things we need for fundraising right now? Nothing.
Speaker 3:We've had some big donors pop in already and thank you to those guys. Guys like marcus mader, um, appreciate you and they borrow. Those are some awesome donations. At this point, like, like, some guys at the squadrons are starting to push it out to each other and make some posters.
Speaker 3:Um, that's going to be on us to start pushing it out some more and just getting people to sign up, um, some of it gets tricky, so we need to probably give some faqs out there, like hey, like, yeah, you just got to buy a ticket and you're welcome to come to everything, because we hear questions, like questions on football. Like, really, like, what we want people to understand is like we're we're gonna coordinate them having an awesome time, but like your money's like we're not making anything off it, it's just purely to build money. It's like, okay, we're gonna make this a great time. A lot of people are donating stuff, venues donating us to have the venue and stuff of that to help with this. So, like, their tickets are just mostly going to help go towards a bigger cause than them without them having to do any work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we're gonna have, you know, classic, um, we're gonna use, uh, we're gonna make our whole production product line right. We'll do hats, t-shirts, tanks, probably a fanny pack, you know all that stuff will be pre-sold so that, uh, you know, you'll pick it up at the event and then whatever we have left over we'll put online.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, so what are the dates for? Uh, for the event?
Speaker 2:just quick, do a quick rundown of all the things are going down 27 yeah, it's like 26 27 two-day block party in fort walton beach, florida, for past, present and future. Air force, special warfare, special tactics, battlefield airmen. If you're nasty, uh, come home, all right, come back, come over. If you've never Come home, all right, come back, come over. If you've never been. A lot of coming either way, so to speak. But yeah, it's just going to be a what, what Dude, I'm doing my thing, yeah, yeah, so yeah, fort Walton Beach 26, 26, 26, 27 July, yep, and look, I'm killing it.
Speaker 1:What are some of the?
Speaker 3:activities that are planned. An intro party the 26 at Al's started at. There's going to be some bands playing Brent Sibley has a pretty awesome band and Scott called the sky dogs. Um, jt is bringing his band. They're going to do that and we might have this PJ. A PJ DJ does have a day, but he's a PJ who does some DJ stuff. Uh, help out with that to fill in the blocks on that stuff. So we'll see. It's going to have some food there and that. And then the 27th is going to be we're going to probably kick it playing football all day.
Speaker 3:Right now we're looking into the park, but we might switch it to the beach just because, you know, families might want to go hang out at the beach while we're over there. So we'll keep updating on that. We's going to be plenty enough of scragglers and misfits there. We can combine for teams. Um, yeah, it's going to be awesome. And then we're going to finish that off at the venue, um, which is a private event there with the comedy show going on there. We're going to have some raffles going on, um, swag, that sort of thing, and typical finish the night at coasters to salute the dead and hang out with the boys.
Speaker 1:Hell yeah, who's going to be doing the comedy? Is it just open mic or no?
Speaker 2:So Jared Taylor of Black Rifle and I and a friend, caleb Francis, kind of went on a comedy. We kind of became comedians a couple months ago. By that, I mean we just did a couple shows, and you know, just for to have fun, right, just fuck off sometime, baby. And so through that that we kind of like loved it and we're gonna yeah, we're gonna put together a little, we're gonna produce a little show. So there's gonna be some, some in-person comedy. We're gonna film some sketches ahead of time, show them to the guys. Uh, some shit that you know we wouldn't put on the internet. Um, you know, uh, we're probably gonna have some uh mean tweets read uh, you know like, uh, from some sammy's workers. Yeah, you know, like, here's what I think about the knife and like, oh, who would say that? You know, it'll be cool, it's a little variety show oh yeah, it's gonna be an amazing event.
Speaker 1:Man, I am so pumped for you guys in the community because, uh, yeah, you guys this long long time coming. Man, I loved being in the area. Now that I'm away from it and I don't get out to Red Door or Coasters or any of those places, it's a good time and a good place for my memories, just for thinking back to the good times that's held out there for you guys. Thank you all for being here. Luke, any last words?
Speaker 4:Yeah, I mean, this is for everybody, right, it's not just for our braywares, but it's also to bridge the gap between our braywares. So we have a lot of tech peas who didn't go through school in florida like we used to, like we did, and they went through texas. So we want to show them, they want, we want them to come, we want them to be welcome, come and see this and see like, hey, this is the legacy of tech p, like you know. I mean tech p's blacked out walking across this bridge on the way home, like this is this is kind of where it started for us.
Speaker 3:So we want a bridge to get out between the generations, for sure I'll tell you, it's tying back in with the local community and like getting them to know, like yeah, yeah, that's the military community around here. Um, getting the ac-130 guys in there, that's definitely going to be a priority. They're here, so we want to get those guys out there. Green Braves, we want everyone who's around and wants to come to get out there, because that's what it's all about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the more the merrier Guys. Thank you so much for being here. I cannot wait. What are the dates again for the lowercase Dooms block party? July 26th, 27th Awesome, it's almost here, guys, so please head on over. Where can they get more information for this amazing party? And there you go with the action shots. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Go over to Snake Farm, american Misfit, lowercase dooms or I think even Alpha Resolute Group. They have a link of it somewhere up there they can go look for. Otherwise everyone's got to post a bit up if the link's not already in the bio or something. So check it out there.
Speaker 1:Fuck yeah, guys. I'm so pumped for this. I cannot wait to see pictures of Luke probably naked somewhere on a beach. I can't wait to see that.
Speaker 2:Classic, classic Luke move.
Speaker 4:Those days might be behind me, but we'll see oh it's a butt Make a family no.
Speaker 1:Luke. No, put it back. Oh, kevin Travis, luke. Thank you guys for coming on and we'll see you all next time. If you like what we're doing and you enjoying the show, don't forget to share us. Like us, subscribe and head on over to our Patreon, where you can be part of our community and get access to all of our episodes as soon as they drop. And remember, we get through this together, take care.
