Founding A Company As A Single Dad | Andrew Song (Dad of 2, Make Sunsets)

[00:00:00] Andrew Song: Even if one person out there that is listening to this right now is struggling. I want to connect with you, just wanna say that, Hey, let's normalize mental health. Let's normalize all this kind of stuff, because the way that people talk about cancer should be how people talk about mental health.
[00:00:13] Adam Fishman: Welcome to Startup Dad, the podcast where we dive deep into the lives of dads who are also leaders in the world of startups and business. I'm your host, Adam Fishman. Mental health is something that doesn't get talked about very much by dads, especially when it's responsible for separation and custody battles today.
[00:00:35] Adam Fishman: Andrew Song joined me to talk about his journey in getting sole custody of his boys and raising them as a single dad because of their mother's struggles with bipolar disorder. Andrew is the co-founder of Make Sunsets, which is attempting to reduce global warming by creating reflective clouds in our stratosphere.
[00:00:54] Adam Fishman: He has two boys, ages five and six, and is a single dad In today's conversation, we spent a little time on the history of make sunsets and why he's motivated to pursue it, how mental health has affected his family and his journey as a single parent and startup founder.
[00:01:09] Adam Fishman: His contrarian take that you really can thrive in the Bay Area without a big tech salary. How he's created a village of support with his immediate family and traveling the West Coast in an RV with a two and 3-year-old. If you like what you hear, please subscribe to Startup ad on YouTube or Spotify so you never miss an episode.
[00:01:28] Adam Fishman: You'll find it everywhere you get your podcasts.
[00:01:32] Adam Fishman: Welcome Andrew's song to startup Dad, Andrew, such a great pleasure to have you here with me today. Thanks for joining me,
[00:01:39] Andrew Song: Thank you for having me.
[00:01:41] Adam Fishman: and I would be remiss if I didn't give a special shout out to, the guest of my 33rd episode, which is Casey Handr for introducing the two of us. this episode is almost a hundred episodes later from that conversation, so we'll get to see if I've made any progress as an interviewer since that conversation with Casey.
[00:01:58] Adam Fishman: But thank you to Casey for connecting us.
[00:02:01] Andrew Song: Yeah, Casey's awesome.
[00:02:02] Adam Fishman: Okay, so Andrew, you, are a single dad with full custody of your two boys who are five and six, and you've also been building a company for the last three years as a co-founder, which, is a wild, like mashup of responsibilities in my mind. So kudos to you for making it work, surviving, as we talked about before.
[00:02:25] Adam Fishman: and normally I don't spend too much time on work on this podcast, but the company that you're founding, and have been founding is so unique and interesting that I wanted to start there. So tell me about Make Sunsets, which is the name of your company.
[00:02:40] Andrew Song: Thank you for that intro. Uh, so make sunsets, uh, launches reflective clouds, uh, near the ozone layer to cool earth. And so, uh, as you might know, it's getting really, really hot. as it gets hotter. There are more severe climate activities that are happening, like floods, fires, uh, heat waves. And essentially what we're trying to do is apply a little bit of sunscreen, uh, above the stratosphere, mimicking what volcanoes have been doing for millions of years.
[00:03:06] Adam Fishman: Whoa. So you launch reflective like balloon style things like,
[00:03:12] Andrew Song: that's the delivery method. Uh,
[00:03:14] Andrew Song: there's other ways to do it as well. You can use supersonic jets or jets that can go really, really high. So these are, uh, generally the altitude that we operate, it's about 66,000 feet and above.
[00:03:24] Andrew Song: so this is double the height of where commercial airliners fly. And so weather balloons can get up there really, really, easily.
[00:03:30] Andrew Song: Uh, and so that's the current delivery method. And, since three years ago, we've essentially planted the equivalent of 8 million trees, uh, between
[00:03:37] Andrew Song: two guys. And so, that's the equivalent. Uh, obviously we're not planting trees here, but
[00:03:42] Andrew Song: to give people an idea of the progress that we've made,
[00:03:45] Andrew Song: that's, the kind of, metric that we use.
[00:03:48] Adam Fishman: So these weather balloons take up into the sky up to, you know, 66,000 feet, like reflective, what are they? Like screens or like, something like that, that are essentially dampening some of the sun's rays or sending it back out into space, basically. Is that what's happening?
[00:04:05] Andrew Song: correct. and so what we do is we, is, it's dead simple where essentially we put sulfur dioxide along with some hydrogen, which is the lift gas that gets it up there.
[00:04:13] Andrew Song: Uh, you can use helium as well, but that's not a renewable gas. Uh, so we use hydrogen instead. But essentially what happens is that as the balloon gets higher and higher, the balloon expands because the pressure gets less and less,
[00:04:24] Andrew Song: uh, as you go higher.
[00:04:25] Andrew Song: And so eventually it'll just pop because these, uh, balloons are made out of biodegradable latex. and so these are the same balloons that, uh, weather services use to get your daily forecasts.
[00:04:35] Andrew Song: as it expands, it pops. And so what we're really taking advantage of once that, uh, SO two, uh, releases into the stratosphere. Uh, it then turns into sulfates, which just makes that really reflective material. And so what we're doing is essentially mimicking what volcanoes have been doing for millions of years. Uh, the one
[00:04:52] Andrew Song: that we're trying to actually mimic is called, there was one in 1991 called Pinatubo, in the Philippines.
[00:04:58] Andrew Song: that one volcanic eruption cooled the planet by 0.5 degrees Celsius for about
[00:05:02] Andrew Song: a year in freedom units. It's about about one degrees, uh, Fahrenheit. So a massive amount of cooling happened, which is just one shot. And so we're saying that, hey, until we can, uh, let Casey's, Terraform Industries, uh, scale up. we need to do something about the heat now
[00:05:18] Andrew Song: And so this is a, a temporary stopgap solution,
[00:05:21] Andrew Song: to essentially keep some of that heat at bay, until we can, you know, move off, move to more renewable energies.
[00:05:27] Adam Fishman: So you're essentially buying us a little extra time on the, on the planet to like have technology catch up to the point where we can have more permanent solutions
[00:05:36] Andrew Song: Exactly. I mean, we've been kind of backed into this corner now where, I grew up in California, there used to not be wildfires when I was, uh, you know, growing up as a kid.
[00:05:46] Andrew Song: Uh, but now it's happening almost every year. Uh, we even have days where there's, it's like completely orange.
[00:05:51] Andrew Song: And so that just seems pretty catastrophic to me. And, I'm looking at my kids when I'm doing this. Like, Hey, I'm trying to build a, a cooler feature for you
[00:05:58] Andrew Song: guys.
[00:05:59] Adam Fishman: when it launches up into the area, it was still a sort of a temporary solution. So like the balloon pops, the chemical reaction that's happening up there is sort of doing the reflection, does that eventually dissipate.
[00:06:10] Adam Fishman: So like you have to kind of keep launching
[00:06:12] Adam Fishman: balloons over time.
[00:06:13] Andrew Song: correct, correct. And so, yeah, it's, it's called Residence time. And uh, essentially it's the same type of phenomenon that we're using, is how ozone layer is created. And so, the ozone is created actually near the tropics.
[00:06:26] Andrew Song: UV light is continually bombarding the equator, uh, and turning O2 molecules into O three molecules.
[00:06:32] Andrew Song: And so what'll happen is that, there's this thing called a Brew Dobson circulation of how aerosols transport, uh, throughout the earth. And so at the ozone layer, uh, about 66,000 feet, uh, what it does is these ozone molecules or sulfate, uh, aerosols, what they'll do is they'll start the equator, go east and west, or west and east, and then slowly travel up into the, to the poles. Uh, and so what we're essentially doing is creating this very, very thin, sunscreen, uh,
[00:06:58] Andrew Song: to reflect some of the sun's energy back into
[00:07:00] Andrew Song: back into space.
[00:07:01] Adam Fishman: And so how do you guys get the financing to launch these balloons? It looks like it comes from investors, you know, individuals can like buy, can they buy like a launch of a balloon or something like that? Is that how that works?
[00:07:16] Andrew Song: exactly. exactly. It's, it's funny to that you ask 'cause uh, most of our customers is what I call climate dads. literally our best customer is Casey. He,
[00:07:23] Andrew Song: he's the guy who, uh, has a STEM background or finance background, has kids, young kids that, you know, deeply care about the future.
[00:07:30] Andrew Song: It probably has a Tesla in the driveway,
[00:07:32] Andrew Song: probably has solar panels, uh, on the roof. they understand what's at stake here and want to try to do something. And so, you know, we're starting small, but, we are speaking with, you know, multinational companies as well as governments right now to see.
[00:07:45] Andrew Song: And if we can scale this up further, but,
[00:07:47] Andrew Song: right now we're starting with, uh, we have roughly around 950 customers, but ranges from people like, uh, Casey, er, to Palmer, lucky, uh, Emmett Shear. Uh, we even have one of the co-owners of the Minnesota Vikings, that are contributing to our, our deployments.
[00:08:01] Andrew Song: And
[00:08:01] Adam Fishman: last question and then we'll move on to family stuff. about how much does it cost to like launch one of these, build and launch one of these things into the air?
[00:08:09] Andrew Song: yeah. Yeah. So the way that we break it down is by, uh, what we call a cooling credit. And so
[00:08:14] Andrew Song: one cooling credit offsets the warming effect of one ton of CO2 for a year.
[00:08:19] Andrew Song: And so that's a one to million leverage the weight of a dollar bill. and the cost of a dollar bill can offset the warming effect of one ton of CO2 for a year.
[00:08:26] Andrew Song: And so it costs a dollar to offset that ton for a year. and so it's super cheap. and it's because sulfur is extremely inexpensive, uh, and
[00:08:33] Andrew Song: to get it up there right now is not that expensive either. We're just using very, very old technology from the 17 hundreds, to essentially loft these aerosols into space.
[00:08:43] Adam Fishman: well, you strike me now that you mention it as a climate dad. and so like, how did you get into doing this? Like, this is not your background as far as I know, right? Like you, it wasn't like you were like a climate scientist or anything, or like, like even Casey with like a PhD so how did you even get started like a, a few years ago on this journey?
[00:09:04] Andrew Song: Sure, sure. It was actually my co-founder, Luke Eisman. and so he had read this book called Termination Shock by Neil Stevenson, uh, who's a very well known sci-fi author. he wrote about crypto before crypto was a thing, uh, about Google Maps for Google Maps sort of thing. And so a lot of Silicon Valley types, will read his books and say, Hey, this is the near future that's happening.
[00:09:23] Andrew Song: and so when the book came out, my co-founder essentially reached out to Neil and said, Hey, is this real? Does this work? and he did a lot of research, read a lot of academic papers, the question came up is, why isn't anyone doing this? and so he wrote me in because, you know, we had met back in 2015. during Y Combinator he was working there and I was going through a startup, during that time. And essentially, we just built that relationship where he would be pitching me ideas about, how to make money and, and do something good. and when he talked about stratospheric aerosol injection, which is what the phenomenon that we're trying to, create,this is crazy, but like, after I read the research papers, I was like, I asked myself like, why isn't anyone doing this?
[00:10:03] Andrew Song: Clearly climate change is happening. Clearly there are fires and floods happening around the world, and catastrophic damages are happening. I mean, since I think Bloomberg came out with a report saying in May, 2025, if you go back 12 months, there's been about a trillion dollars. it's a trillion dollars worth of damages, in the past 12 months, just in the us.
[00:10:24] Andrew Song: So this is like a lot of property being destroyed, a lot
[00:10:28] Andrew Song: of people's lives being destroyed. if there's a way to prevent that from happening, uh, why aren't we trying to explore it?
[00:10:34] Adam Fishman: Wow. Amazing. Well. With that, I'm gonna do the ultimate segue here. this kind of pivot has never before been executed on this show, which is that this was not your career path when you were in college.
[00:10:49] Adam Fishman: You told me that in college you actually wanted to become a Catholic priest.
[00:10:54] Adam Fishman: So how's that listeners for a pivot?
[00:10:56] Adam Fishman: we've gone from climate, climate science to Catholicism. so you wanted to become a Catholic priest when you were in college, but then you decided not to because you actually wanted to be a dad more than you wanted to be a priest.
[00:11:10] Adam Fishman: And so talk me through that and then we're gonna start talking about fatherhood.
[00:11:16] Andrew Song: I was born Catholic. Catholic autism was a huge part of my life. at age eight I started to be a altar server, uh, and be part of, you know, the community helping out volunteering every Sunday, and carrying out mass. it just stuck with me all the way through college, where I was also older serving during that time. And, built a relationship with, essentially the Dominican community there. Uh, so there's different types of, Catholic sex. Like, you know, there's the Jesuits who might know,
[00:11:41] Adam Fishman: Yep.
[00:11:41] Andrew Song: also the Dominicans, uh, a bunch of different types. And so, When I was there, when I was attending college, I started to think like, should I be working on Wall Street or should I be becoming a Catholic priest? Or like, you know, I was the typical college guy trying to figure out, you know, what do I wanna do with my life? And, there was such a strong community, at my college around the Catholic community that I thought, this seems wonderful.
[00:12:04] Andrew Song: Uh, this seems like a, a perfect place for me to be able to, help other people, to meet all people, like walks of life and, you know, do good in the world. but, when I kept on asking,I, I had lot of Catholic priests who were friends and, you know, one thing they I kept on asking is like, what's your biggest regret? if you could turn back time, like, what would you do? And he's like, I wish I had kids. even though, you know, the trade off is, hey, everyone becomes your kid because you're the priest of this community and, you're the pastor who takes care of its flock. But at the end of the day, a lot of these priests said like, you know, I wish I had kids.
[00:12:37] Andrew Song: And when I kind of looked at my own family where I grew up in a family of four, four kids myself, I thought I want that as well. And, I think I can do both where I am, you know, taking care of my family and raising wonderful kids, but then also trying to help out the world. And so that kind of big change yeah.
[00:12:56] Andrew Song: Happened during college and, you know, I kind of stumbled my, my way to make sense that's uh trying to figure that out.
[00:13:02] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:13:02] Adam Fishman: And you've, you found that Venn diagram of like raising a family and helping the planet, helping a lot of people. So I think, while the Catholic Church may be sad that you didn't become, uh, become a priest, uh, the rest of the planet. Thanks you
[00:13:14] Adam Fishman: okay. So I mentioned at the outset of the show that you are a single dad of two kids, five and a 6-year-old, and you have full custody of your kids. And so, you know, there's somewhat intense reasons for that
[00:13:27] Adam Fishman: and, you know, we talked about this beforehand, but you told me you were okay talking about it on the show.
[00:13:31] Adam Fishman: So I'd like to discuss that a little bit, in the event that it helps, you know, at least one person out there, I think it's important conversation. So, So,
[00:13:39] Adam Fishman: tell me, why do you have full custody of your kids?
[00:13:43] Andrew Song: So the, the high level, and I think this was a funny joke that landed, was, uh, I'm Kim Kardashian and my ex is Kanye. and so to peel the second layers that unfortunately my, my ex had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and Was extremely intelligent. She's a, a graduate from, uh, MIT, got a PhD in computer science.
[00:14:03] Andrew Song: So extremely intelligent woman, just like Kanye's, an extremely, talented, uh, artist. And unfortunately, uh, she decided to choose between, uh, being smart because the medication made her feel dumb.
[00:14:16] Andrew Song: unfortunately that then affected the rest of her life and being able to be a, a present mother to her children. and so the courts decided that I should get full custody of the kids. And so, that was something that happened before I started to make sunsets. and then,during the time,the first couple of years I was in the middle of like a custody battle trying to figure out how to, raise these kids.
[00:14:38] Andrew Song: And
[00:14:38] Andrew Song: so,it was a very intense time. It was just like right after the pandemic. And, just trying to navigate that whole thing. But, you know, really the thing that kind of actually kept me sane was working on something really, really impactful in my opinion, and something that was very mission driven.
[00:14:53] Adam Fishman: Yeah. So how old were your kids when this was going on? And, Were they too young to have like an understanding of, what was really happening there?
[00:15:02] Andrew Song: so the younger one didn't, but my oldest child, I think, understood some of what was going on because it was something where it wasn't like diagnosis of bipolar disorder and then, you know, automatically I get default kids. It, it took some time where the courts had to figure out like, okay, clearly this is not working for the mom.
[00:15:22] Andrew Song: And, during that time it was, there were some intense things happening at home,
[00:15:26] Andrew Song: she had custody of the kids. And so the state had to step in and
[00:15:29] Andrew Song: essentially, uh, make that decision for us.
[00:15:33] Adam Fishman: And so when this is happening with your older son, who kind of can kind of observe and see what's going on, even at, you know, maybe three or however old he was.
[00:15:42] Adam Fishman: what was that conversation like with him, or how did you, did you talk to him about this or was that even something that you could, you could do,
[00:15:49] Andrew Song: there's only so much you can, you can tell a 3-year-old but the way that I approached it was with transparency he would ask, Hey, where's mom? would say, Hey, mom's sick. I would say, is she gonna get better? he understood what medication was because, you know, I would give him some, you know, Tylenol or something if he was sick
[00:16:05] Andrew Song: or some allergy medicine, if he had allergies. But, you know, essentially it was something where like, it was this kind of weird loop that would happen where I would say, yeah, mom is sick. Uh, she doesn't want to take her medication. Uh, so she remains sick. But then he understood that, hey, if I take medicine, I feel better.
[00:16:22] Andrew Song: and so just there's this weird tension obviously happening where like, why doesn't she wanna take her medication?
[00:16:26] Andrew Song: And I
[00:16:26] Andrew Song: had to then explain like, one of the symptoms of bipolar disorders. Like, you don't wanna take your medication
[00:16:32] Andrew Song: because of the highs and lows that you feel if you don't.
[00:16:35] Andrew Song: the conversation has evolved since then and like try to also like equate it to cancer, which is again, like a very scary disease. it's just something that right now is incurable for the most part. and it's something where he's seen that with other families as well. Uh,
[00:16:50] Andrew Song: in terms of like that, I think that helps try to explain it, but like to tell currently a 6-year-old, like, Hey, the brain chemistry of, of your mom is messed up and like, therefore it's causing her to do things that, you know, she doesn't want to do.
[00:17:04] Andrew Song: and it makes it hard for her to take care of you. you know, causes a lot of confusion. And so, they're seeing therapists obviously. they're navigating this as, as they grow up and, as they grow up, you know, I'll hopefully be there for them to, to explain what's happening.
[00:17:18] Andrew Song: And,I wish, you know, the mother, their children will get better, but, you know, I can't continue to, you know, hope I have
[00:17:25] Andrew Song: to move on and, and figure out what's, what's best for the kids.
[00:17:28] Andrew Song: And I, right, right now at this time, I think it's, it's making sure that, they know that hey, Mom and, and dad are taking care of the kids.
[00:17:36] Andrew Song: and,making sure that hey, I'm, I'm doing something that is fulfilling in my life outside of being, being a parent.
[00:17:42] Andrew Song: But, I'm not saying this is a, a walk in the park.
[00:17:44] Adam Fishman: It sounds like you've done a really good job though, to the extent you can, it, it explain to your kids that. Mom's not a bad person.
[00:17:52] Adam Fishman: She's just dealing with some tough things. And it's better for dad to be kind of in charge while she's doing that.
[00:18:02] Adam Fishman: And, that's kind of the end of it. Right. so kudos, to doing that. And we will talk in a second about what it's been like building a company while being solo, single dad.
[00:18:12] Adam Fishman: but I wanted to ask one other thing, which is, you know, I imagine, that, well one, you know, people don't often talk a lot about like mental health issues, especially in relationships and things like that.
[00:18:22] Adam Fishman: So certainly, it's probably a rarity for someone to come on a podcast and talk about this. the other side of it though is I imagine it's actually slightly a bit more common than, than we might think. and just 'cause people aren't talking about it doesn't mean it doesn't exist,
[00:18:35] Adam Fishman: have you been able to seek out community or find other people who are going through the same thing to kind of commiserates the wrong word, but like, you know, have some support or at least like a, a network of people to Yeah. Camaraderie. Yeah. That's a great thing.
[00:18:51] Andrew Song: You know, this is the, one of the reasons why I, I wanted to come onto this podcast was because, there's a really weird Venn diagram of there trying to start a startup as well as being a single father. you know, I asked ChatGBT, this custody battle happened in San Francisco, which is, you know, one of the most liberal, cities in the
[00:19:07] Andrew Song: world. it was like, yeah, less than 5% of fathers get full legal physical custody of their kids. And so it's, it's very rare that happens, and for good reason. and then also, how many of those are actually starting companies? again, very rare, uh, within that dim Vve diagram itself. I even post on Twitter, Hey, are there any single dads out there?
[00:19:28] Andrew Song: you know, are there, tried to go back to church, but I just didn't feel like it was a good fit.
[00:19:32] Andrew Song: you know, seeking out community there. But it's, it's something where, I'm kind of like, right now, the man of one, that is trying to figure this out. And so. Even if one person out there, that is listening to this right now is struggling.
[00:19:43] Andrew Song: I want to connect with you,
[00:19:44] Andrew Song: just wanna say that, Hey, let's normalize mental health.
[00:19:47] Andrew Song: Let's normalize all this kind of stuff, because yeah, again, the way that people talk about cancer should be how people talk about mental
[00:19:54] Andrew Song: health.it's not something that should be shame. it's just unfortunate the hand that I was dealt. but I don't want to sweep this under the rug, because it's not something that you should be suffering in silence for with,
[00:20:04] Andrew Song: and, you know, I have, but you know, that doesn't mean that I should be quiet about it.
[00:20:08] Andrew Song: And I wanna share that with people out there.
[00:20:11] Adam Fishman: Yeah. Well, I'm so, so appreciative that you're, able to come on the show and talk a bit about it. to anyone who's listening, if you can, share any sort of overlap with Andrew on this dimension, please, you know, reach out to him. Reach out to me, and we'll, we'll find a way to get you all connected and build some, build some community.
[00:20:28] Adam Fishman: So, what has it been like the last few years building a company that is. probably as intense as any startup is, needs to find investors, needs to find customers. Also, you're a single dad that you're solely responsible for your kids. Like, how do you make that work?
[00:20:47] Adam Fishman: Or like I mentioned before, just survive that experience.
[00:20:51] Andrew Song: I lived a fairly sheltered life. you know, I'm very, very blessed and privileged to be where I am today. I, I grew up in the Bay Area. these things, you know, I do not take for granted. I think if I was in a different socioeconomic, class I don't think I'd be on this podcast right now.
[00:21:07] Andrew Song: I'm not saying I was born on third base, but I like, maybe first or second,
[00:21:11] Adam Fishman: Right, right, You're not still swinging at the plate.
[00:21:15] Andrew Song: it took hard work, right? Uh, it, my, my parents, you know, were immigrants from Korea. They moved here in the late 1970s, uh, with very little money in their pockets. but they achieved the American dream. And, uh, because of that, they were able to put me into good schools. They were able to, provide the best that they could for me. And, that allowed me to take risks. and like when I graduated in 2008, right at the start of the financial
[00:21:42] Andrew Song: crisis.
[00:21:43] Andrew Song: And so, fortunately I was able to find a, a job after being laid off after six months at, like, at my first job outta college. Like laid off six months, and then. was able to, you know, find another job quickly because, uh, at a previous internship kind of thing. but you know, throughout that time I had the support of my, my parents. I didn't have college debt. and so that was something where. I was able to take these types of risks and, work at companies, uh, at startups essentially, either as like the first sales hire or the first non-technical hire at, uh, a lot of startups. And so kind of created this muscle of being resilient, of being able to take the ups and downs of startups
[00:22:19] Andrew Song: and really liking it.
[00:22:20] Andrew Song: because I did work in the corporate world for a little bit and I just thought, this isn't for me. Like, I want to start my own company, start my own thing. and so, you know, going through that and then having the opportunity where my co-founder, you know, I, I told him I, I laid all the cards Like, Luke, I don't know what, if you wanna hire me or not.
[00:22:35] Andrew Song: Like currently going through like a custody battle, like
[00:22:38] Adam Fishman: here's what you're getting yourself into.
[00:22:40] Andrew Song: yeah, it's another marriage in, in,
[00:22:41] Andrew Song: my opinion. And so you want to pull all the skeletons out of the closet, but hey, he still said, Hey man, like you were at the top of my list and this is something where, uh, I wanna try and build this company. You're. clearly resilient here.
[00:22:54] Andrew Song: Like clearly you can take some licks
[00:22:56] Andrew Song: and, you know, it's still, obviously it's still TBD, but we're three years in and we've still got about 18 months worth of runway on our, company. and so we're still, pre-product market fit, but figuring it out and getting a lot of attention while doing it.
[00:23:08] Adam Fishman: that's awesome. And you got some great backers too, which is, which is awesome. So, There's plenty of people that would hear this and they would be like, well, that's crazy. why won't you just go get a cushy SAS job or an AI job? Like, you're playing life on hard mode right now.
[00:23:24] Adam Fishman: but that's not what motivates you. And, why don't you take the other path, which could be that cushy job or, something that's more balanced and less like, of a grind of, of startups. What, what is it that motivates you to not do that?
[00:23:39] Andrew Song: it's my kids and it's my upbringing. I think my dad took a risk, my parents took a risk coming to the US and trying to start a new life. and it would be really unfortunate if, I had that privilege of then just, you know, just trying to do a little bit better than them. I have the opportunity to swing for the fences and,my kids really understand what Dad is currently working on. Like, they, they get some ideas. They get to play with the balloons. They get to, you know, tell their kids like, or tell their friends, like, Hey, what does, what does your dad do? Oh, he works at Google, he works at Facebook, or whatever. It's like,
[00:24:12] Adam Fishman: Right.
[00:24:12] Andrew Song: uh, my, my dad sends, you know,
[00:24:15] Adam Fishman: Balloon. Balloon.
[00:24:16] Andrew Song: into the stratosphere.
[00:24:17] Adam Fishman: My dad sends balloons to space.
[00:24:19] Andrew Song: to try and cool the planet. Like, and so like, I think just them have that line, they can pitch it as just as well as I can, 'cause they hear me all the
[00:24:27] Andrew Song: time talking about it. is, is something where I want to inspire them to reach, reach for the stars.
[00:24:33] Andrew Song: Uh, because,we're maybe getting ahead of ourselves, but like AI has completely changed the landscape of education of, the future. Uh, I used to work in AI before I worked, on Make Sunset, so I worked at Scale AI back in 2018.
[00:24:44] Andrew Song: it is like I saw what was happening back in 2018. I was like, clearly this is gonna be a big deal.
[00:24:50] Andrew Song: I'm a glutton for punishment, like what you said before in terms of like living life on hard mode. I was the guy that would always pick the,
[00:24:56] Andrew Song: you know, in Doom they have
[00:24:57] Andrew Song: like the hardest mode, I
[00:24:57] Andrew Song: forget, I forget what it's called,
[00:24:58] Adam Fishman: God mode or whatever. Yeah, yeah. I know. I know what you're talking about.
[00:25:01] Andrew Song: I would pick that, I wouldn't pick the easy mode 'cause you, you would quickly get bored in my opinion.
[00:25:05] Andrew Song: It was just like, your weapons were all super strong. And so, and the enemies would die very
[00:25:09] Andrew Song: quickly, but like,
[00:25:11] Andrew Song: how do you do it on hard mode? and again, it's because of the background that I, I came from. obviously if you know other, Dads out there are in different types of situations.
[00:25:20] Andrew Song: you know, obviously take stock of what that is, before taking, taking these types of risks. But, I'm playing my game, I guess is the best
[00:25:26] Andrew Song: way to say it.
[00:25:27] Andrew Song: I chose to pick hard mode.
[00:25:29] Adam Fishman: Well, and then also you've got the advantage now of you, you are really fun at career day, at school. Like when your kids bring you in for show and tell, you got some fun stuff to talk about so
[00:25:38] Adam Fishman: you can bring in a giant weather balloon.
[00:25:40] Andrew Song: And we kill it at science fair, so,
[00:25:43] Adam Fishman: That's awesome. That's awesome. so, you know, you mentioned you live in the Bay Area and the Bay Area is a expensive place to live. I mean, I think there's like, people are like, oh, you know, you make 300 grand a year. You're like lower end of the totem pole here. Like, you're like the low end, low end.
[00:26:00] Adam Fishman: but You know, you're not, not exactly like, uh, paying yourself a gigantic salary or anything. So one of the things you told me as we were getting ready for the show is that, you believe that you can live on $60,000 a year in the Bay Area, support two kids, and run a startup and raise money from investors, be a single dad, and have a fulfilling life.
[00:26:24] Adam Fishman: And the reason you believe this, I'm guessing, is you're actually doing this. how do you maybe live your life a little bit differently to kind of make that all work in the Bay Area, which is like epicenter for expensive life.
[00:26:38] Andrew Song: well, I mean the largest costs right now is probably rent. Uh,
[00:26:40] Andrew Song: I pay $3,700 a month for a one bed, one bath, in Saratoga. Uh, so it's a very nice neighborhood.
[00:26:47] Andrew Song: but I treat that as, tuition for my kids because they go to a public school.
[00:26:51] Andrew Song: I guess a lot of barrier people who have the income to do so will, usually try and send their kids to private school or, uh, live in nice neighborhoods.
[00:26:59] Andrew Song: And so that's one of the hacks in how I, you know, do the calculus in my head of saying like, okay, I want to live in this area because one, I grew up here and two, my, my parents are close by.
[00:27:09] Andrew Song: that's how I kind of stomach it, uh, in terms of the cost. but then in terms of food, in terms of, you know, I cook for the kids to try to do that kind of stuff.
[00:27:16] Andrew Song: That's, that's probably second biggest cost. So like those, those are the things that I, I, I try to keep aware of, but like, you know, I don't have to, you know, buy all the Legos. I don't have to buy all the clothes. Like we, I have, you know, older siblings that have kids as well. So, you know, they'll do hand me downs and stuff like that.
[00:27:32] Andrew Song: And
[00:27:32] Andrew Song: so it's the community and it's not so much making sacrifices it's just like. I've had fun. I've had that six figure job, like I've had the nice things.
[00:27:42] Andrew Song: but I don't need a fancy car. I don't need, to live in a big house right now. I know what my mission is, it's to take care of my kids, and, try to grow a company,that my kids will be proud of, uh, in the future.
[00:27:55] Andrew Song: And so it's just, I think a matter of prioritization. we can do a screenshot of like Monarch, uh, the Monarch app, uh, like later if you want. So like, here's the breakdown of all our costs and stuff. And you go like, what the fuck? You only spend this much money on like, on this. So like, I can give you a monthly, like, where does the money actually go?
[00:28:13] Andrew Song: and you know, also, I guess this is kind of like off topic, but I, I do like trade a little bit of stocks here and there, and I'm like, okay at
[00:28:20] Andrew Song: that.maybe that helps on the side, but it's not like a, a huge like
[00:28:24] Andrew Song: portion of my income or anything Like that. It's just to. I can see around the curve a little bit,
[00:28:29] Andrew Song: and, it's just like a subsistence training,
[00:28:31] Andrew Song: if that's the word, or a terminology.
[00:28:33] Andrew Song: Like, if I see an opportunity, I'll I'll do it kind of
[00:28:35] Andrew Song: thing. So, maybe the Monarch app. Like Ill take a screenshot of like, my finances, like, just like, how the fuck are you doing this? And so like, like,
[00:28:43] Adam Fishman: I think what I'm hearing from you, you know, screenshot of, of Monarch Money aside is, you know, you have to just prioritize, invest in only the things that like absolutely matter. And so right now it's, rent. Modest place to live, but in an expensive area.
[00:28:59] Adam Fishman: But that allows your kids to go to public school and get a really top-notch education, which, you know, a lot of the state of California is not known for. so that's sort of one. And then two is like cooking and just being, kinda making really fiscally disciplined things because you don't have the luxury of trading money for time.
[00:29:17] Adam Fishman: Like a lot of, families who are pretty well off. So, you know, you're probably not door dashing a lot of meals for the, for the fam, right? Oh
[00:29:25] Andrew Song: Like, you'll probably see, like, you're like, wow, he's spending a lot on, on restaurants, which AKA is DoorDash, but
[00:29:32] Adam Fishman: yeah.
[00:29:32] Andrew Song: it's always in a pinch or,
[00:29:34] Andrew Song: yeah, it depends. So I'm not, I'm not perfect here.
[00:29:37] Adam Fishman: Yeah. Well, no, no one, no one is, I think we'll allow you that. So,
[00:29:41] Adam Fishman: cool. Uh, okay, so you have a couple frameworks or I call 'em maybe Principles for Parenting, and I wanted to talk about those, the one that you've alluded to already, which is being close to family. And you mentioned you grew up in the greater barrier.
[00:29:54] Adam Fishman: Did you grow up in the Saratoga area or like somewhere else in the Bay Area.
[00:29:57] Andrew Song: South San Jose,
[00:29:58] Andrew Song: the South Bay, so,
[00:29:59] Adam Fishman: Okay, great. so tell me a little bit about what that support structure looks like, uh, for you now.
[00:30:06] Andrew Song: I have three other siblings and, two of them live in the Bay Area as well as one in la. both my parents are still around and so, they're a huge help, whenever I need to go do a balloon launch. Uh, 'cause sometimes it'll happen, uh, after hours or, hey, I need to attend some kind of conference or customer meeting, or be somewhere else, uh, outta state. they're always there to jump in. and so that's obviously huge for me to have, childcare that is like, kind of on standby.
[00:30:34] Adam Fishman:
[00:30:34] Andrew Song: but, you know, I have to give 'em obviously like at least 48 hours of, of notice. This isn't something like, you know, I just go, you know, drop 'em off and then
[00:30:41] Adam Fishman: Surprise.
[00:30:42] Andrew Song: yeah, I want them to live there and they, they worked really, really hard to get to where they wanted to be, and I want them to enjoy their retirement.
[00:30:48] Andrew Song: but you know, at the same time too, like what's the point of being a grandparent if you don't have kids?
[00:30:53] Andrew Song: I mean, I'm sure there's. People who, who live that way. But, they're the ones who pressure me to have kids.
[00:30:57] Adam Fishman: Uh,
[00:30:58] Andrew Song: look, I delivered.
[00:31:00] Adam Fishman: you get what you ask for grandpa, grandparents.
[00:31:04] Andrew Song: know, they're, they're typical, you know,
[00:31:05] Andrew Song: Catholic parents, you know, trying to, encourage, that type of behavior.
[00:31:09] Adam Fishman: So do you see your parents, or do your kids see their grandparents or, you know, aunts and uncles, you know, your siblings, like on a regular, like weekly basis? Like are they, like a very deep part of their lives, it sounds like.
[00:31:22] Andrew Song: Totally. Totally. Yeah. my parents at least drop in at least once, once a week, uh, drop off food or,That's another thing that's probably not reflected in the Monarch, uh, money app. But, that's something where they, they will drop off some food and
[00:31:33] Andrew Song: pre-cooked meals and stuff like that to help out. there's always some birthday with some niece or nephew. the very bare minimum, I'll say my parents at least once a week, and then the, uh, larger family at least once a month, if
[00:31:45] Andrew Song: not more. And so it's something where we're very, very fortunate and very privileged to be able to have that type of, regular cadence of, meeting the family. But,
[00:31:55] Andrew Song: um, I know that's not, you know, typical of a lot of families
[00:31:58] Adam Fishman: Yeah, I mean, I think it used to be typical, but the village has dispersed a little bit as, societies has gotten older and we, I've talked to a lot of parents on this show who are kind of in one of two camps. Either they've got no one, you know, they live far away or they do live close.
[00:32:14] Adam Fishman: and it's nice that you still have that village, which is, you know, how we all grew up. you probably wouldn't be able to make it work without it, or life would look a lot different, so.
[00:32:23] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:32:25] Andrew Song: I don't think I could run, make sunset or even started if I didn't live close to my parents. painting, the picture of like how I grew up is like, we knew every kid on the block. We would, you know, bike around until sunset.
[00:32:35] Andrew Song: My
[00:32:36] Andrew Song: parents would say, stay at the house until, until sundown. Like that's, that was my life,
[00:32:41] Andrew Song: uh, playing street hockey, and all that good stuff.
[00:32:44] Andrew Song: And so like, I want that for my kids. times have changed, but you know, if, if you have the opportunity to do it, like, I want the same.
[00:32:50] Adam Fishman: Yeah. That's great.the other thing, and this is kind of come the other sort of principle you have, and this, this is something that's like become apparent as you and I have been talking here, is you have this philosophy that's like, do what you can when you can and then don't be too hard on yourself if you don't or you can't do it.
[00:33:08] Adam Fishman: And so
[00:33:09] Adam Fishman: to me this sounds like something that you've had to learn the hard way in life through, through the school of hard knocks. So, tell me how you like developed that philosophy.
[00:33:18] Andrew Song: it started at a young age where, my parents put me in competitive sports. I was
[00:33:22] Andrew Song: fortunate enough to be recruited to swim at the collegiate level. and I'm not the biggest guy in the room. I'm five seven on a good day.
[00:33:29] Adam Fishman: You don't have that swimmer's body. That's interesting. All my, all the swimmers I know who are like giants shaped like triangles,
[00:33:36] Andrew Song: exactly. I had the triangle body, but unfortunately my, it's my legs that were short, really short.
[00:33:41] Andrew Song: when you get started, like you start to figure out, you know, what can you specialize in? And what I was really good at was brushstroke,
[00:33:46] Andrew Song: and that's a more technical stroke where size really is not the key factor.
[00:33:51] Andrew Song: It's mostly technique.
[00:33:53] Andrew Song: And so if you can really iterate. And, understand how your body works and how to leverage that. you can beat guys that are 6 2, 6 3, 6 4, and I did,
[00:34:03] Andrew Song: that's how I got a place on, the NYU swim team because of that. it's something where, you know, I carried that on where, you know, sometimes I will not have a good day, uh, in the pool or at a meet. you did the best that you could or, you know, maybe there was, you partied too hard the, the night before and, you're just not feeling that good. And so, at the end of the day it's, it's something where, I try to put my best foot forward, but at the same time too, if, if you fail, like you can't dwell on that, like that will kill you.
[00:34:31] Andrew Song: That will cause you to not accelerate, in my opinion. Try your best. And if you do fail, like learn from it. fail forward.
[00:34:39] Andrew Song: that's the only way I think you can learn.
[00:34:41] Andrew Song: And so I, I think that muscle was created back when I was swimming because, you know, guys would beat me all the time. And I
[00:34:47] Andrew Song: was like, I hate this. Like, I don't like being beat here. Like, I know there's like a glimmer of hope because sometimes I would beat them in practice.
[00:34:55] Andrew Song: Like if I
[00:34:55] Andrew Song: could beat them in practice, I can also beat them on in a meet.
[00:34:58] Andrew Song: And,
[00:34:59] Andrew Song: that gave me the kind of like. The learnings to,
[00:35:02] Andrew Song: to say, Hey, I can apply this, this skill across, across other parts of my life.
[00:35:06] Adam Fishman: Awesome. One thing I didn't have on the Bingo card for this conversation was Andrew Song, competitive, uh, NYU swimmer. I did not have that. I did not know that about your background, so I'm glad to have known that explains a lot. Swimming is a very competitive, sport, so,
[00:35:21] Andrew Song: and you're judged by the time that's it.
[00:35:23] Andrew Song: You race against the clock.
[00:35:24] Andrew Song: And it doesn't matter how ugly your stroke is, it's like, do you get to the wall faster than anyone else?
[00:35:29] Andrew Song: that's the magic of, of swimming. It's, you know, what can you do with your own body and how fast can you go versus other people.
[00:35:36] Adam Fishman: I wanted to ask you about, uh, you know, a handful of years ago, your kids were two and three years old. It was 2022, and you decided I'm gonna buy an RV and I'm gonna travel up and down the West Coast. which sounds awesome and terrifying with a two and a 3-year-old at the same time.
[00:35:56] Adam Fishman: what was the motivation to do that?
[00:35:59] Andrew Song: it was at the start of like the unraveling of my relationship with my ex,
[00:36:03] Andrew Song: and so it's like. when the pandemic was starting to start to tail off in terms of like quarantining and stuff. and so I was just mostly cabin fever is probably the ma main motivation. And you know, during this time I got really in touch with like the friends who had. Been isolated, and instead of just like talking about, Hey, we should visit each other, blah, blah, blah, like, someday maybe we'll do this and, you know, hang out. Like I said, let's just, let's just do it. I guess when I was, uh, younger my parents bought like a, a conversion van. it was a GMC Ventura and, teal colored. And so it had, it didn't have a bathroom in it, but like it had it, like, it was a pretty big van,
[00:36:41] Andrew Song: those painter vans with like foldable beds and stuff. And so we would take road trips all the time. So it was kind of like in my blood. And so I just, I wanted to do what, like what my parents did and visit different national parks. see my friends who had kind of dispersed throughout the pandemic. 'cause they were all living in the bay, but then, you know, went to do the whole real estate arbitrage of, you know, living in less expensive places.
[00:37:03] Andrew Song: But, those were kind of the key factors of like, hey, I was living in San Francisco at the time, so that's maybe another, uh, thing to note. We were living in a very small apartment
[00:37:11] Andrew Song: there. so we were just very cooped up during the pandemic, and trying to figure out like what to do.
[00:37:16] Andrew Song: So,
[00:37:16] Adam Fishman: most people I think would find this, a little exhausting. And I say most people, I'm actually, I'm like, projecting here. This is me. I, I think this sounds exhausting with two kids. Two and two and three. how did you find it? Like how, how is that adventure?
[00:37:30] Andrew Song: I tried to take it easy, like, you know, I've been on very long road trips before, but you know, I would probably only drive maybe four, four hours a day kind of thing. And so we would take a lot of pit stops. And the great thing about Arby's is that you can literally stop anywhere. we would stop on the side of the road.
[00:37:45] Andrew Song: We would stop at rest stops. We would stop at Walmart's. hopefully most of the time we would try to find a campground or a national park, but, we were kind of flying at the seat of our pants. But that's the kind of convenience with RVs is that, hey, we're tired, or, Hey, someone needs to go to the bathroom.
[00:37:59] Andrew Song: You could just stop and go and do that. which I found convenient because like the last thing I wanna deal with is like a, uh, a gas station, restroom.
[00:38:07] Andrew Song: Um, and so, Obviously that doesn't solve all your problems, but they were old enough where they could be in their car seats.
[00:38:15] Andrew Song: And, you know, if we needed to stop, they could communicate saying, Hey, I need to use the bathroom. Or, you know, obviously I would check, uh, one of them. I mean, both were still in diapers at the time,
[00:38:24] Andrew Song: so,you know, I'd just take frequent stops and change the diapers,
[00:38:26] Andrew Song: uh, along the way.
[00:38:27] Adam Fishman: Yeah. What did you discover on that journey about yourself or your family or your boys? Like did you learn something about, yourself on that trip?
[00:38:40] Andrew Song: I think it was like the first time where I was like completely by myself, right? it was kinda like the start of like, I can do this.
[00:38:46] Andrew Song: I can do this by myself.
[00:38:48] Andrew Song: there's single moms out there that are just, doing it like,
[00:38:51] Andrew Song: like much respect to them,
[00:38:53] Andrew Song: um, with deadbeat dads that, that are not showing up in, in their kids' lives.
[00:38:57] Andrew Song: And so it's like, why can't I do it? and that sounds very, probably superficial, but like, in terms of like, during that trip it was, it was, I think we were, we were on the road for about three months. I learned about myself, I learned about my kids. and it was something where, they really enjoyed it.
[00:39:12] Andrew Song: Like they still talk about, I still have the rv. It's, I'm looking at it right
[00:39:16] Adam Fishman: I was gonna ask you if what happened to the RV post trip? Yeah.
[00:39:19] Andrew Song: But, but it's just this thing that, you know, I, I instilled my kids, like anytime we just go camping, I, I grew up as a boy scout. Uh,
[00:39:27] Andrew Song: so
[00:39:27] Andrew Song: I, I love the outdoors and, um, I'm glad that, you know, my kids also enjoy it, as well.
[00:39:33] Andrew Song: And so at any opportunity that we have, we can, we can share, an activity together that we
[00:39:38] Adam Fishman: Yeah, I'm glad that you mentioned that about like, single moms can do this too, so why can't I, you sort of rejecting that, the trope of the incompetent, bumbling dad, you know, you're like, Hey, you know, guys can be parents too. Like, we, we can do this. You know, we, we got this. So, so I love that.
[00:39:55] Adam Fishman: Uh, so thanks for saying that. I'm curious, you did this for three months. You drove up and down the West coast, like what was your favorite place?
[00:40:01] Andrew Song: Uh, it had to be Joshua Tree because, uh, I had never been there myself. And, uh, people always talk about it. And when we got there, it was like Mars, it's really, really cool. It's just all this desert and then these weird looking trees that are nowhere else in the world.
[00:40:17] Andrew Song: I've camped everywhere but I have never been to a desert and camped at a desert.
[00:40:21] Andrew Song: So that was just something where I thought was, was really cool. And the kids loved it because there's not a lot of light pollution. And so just seeing the stars at night, was something that was
[00:40:30] Andrew Song: really cool.
[00:40:30] Adam Fishman: very cool. Joshua Tree, I've still never been to, it's on my, it's on my short list of, of destinations, so, okay. I wanted to, transition a bit you mentioned ai. and before we get into that, I wanted to ask you about how you think about the relationship that you want your kids to have with technology as they're getting older.
[00:40:53] Adam Fishman: So, again, for context, your kids are five and six,
[00:40:56] Adam Fishman: maybe not yet fully immersed in technology. but how do you think about this or how do you talk about technology with, with your kids?
[00:41:05] Andrew Song: so, you know, they have an iPad that they share. they use this, uh, app called Alva for, for learning. it's a great app for, for learning. you know, just getting ahead, just a little extra if, if people wanna teach their kids how to, how to learn very quickly.
[00:41:18] Andrew Song: and so that's kind of the main thing that they use on iPad. Uh, I have downloaded chat GPT on the iPad as well, but that is something that is monitored very closely.
[00:41:27] Andrew Song: I will never let them use, uh, chat GPT by themselves. and so it's something where, usually it's like the way that it gets prompted of how, how they want to interact with it.
[00:41:37] Andrew Song: they'll ask me a question and I'll say, I don't know, like, to answer that question. the follow up would be, can we ask chat? And I was like, yeah, let's do it. Let's try. So then, you know, they'll ask their question, but then, you know, they always have follow-ups and stuff, but it devolves into like, Hey, can you fart?
[00:41:51] Andrew Song: Or can you tell me a joke?
[00:41:54] Adam Fishman: Sounds like a five and 6-year-old boy is what it sounds like. Yeah.
[00:41:57] Andrew Song: Exactly. And so, you know, it's, it's something where they're getting, dipping their toes into the technology right now. They understand that there is some kind of, you know, being out there that can literally answer pretty much any question that they have, which is kind of cool.
[00:42:11] Andrew Song: and that's something that I didn't have, like when I asked my dad a bunch of questions, he would just say, I don't know, like, or he would say, go look it up.
[00:42:17] Andrew Song: and so we had access to encyclopedia, like my mom, one of her side hustles, uh, while raising four kids was that she sold encyclopedias,
[00:42:25] Andrew Song: uh, door to door.
[00:42:26] Adam Fishman: like the Encyclopedia Britannica or whatever, or, or like
[00:42:29] Andrew Song: world Book. It was world Book.
[00:42:30] Andrew Song: the whole reason why she did it was because I think she, you would get a free, like, volume of it.
[00:42:36] Andrew Song: and that was her whole motivation. Like I think she maybe sold like, two or three, like, you know, volumes.
[00:42:41] Andrew Song: but then, you know, got all these free books. And so that was like our Wikipedia back in the day. And so I would just be, you know, we had the whole volumes A through Z plus the plus all the, uh, indexes. And that's where I would kind of immerse myself.
[00:42:54] Andrew Song: but now you have a little super computer intelligent being, you know, that, that knows a lot of things. Trying to, you know, not copy how I was, brought up, but, you know, trying to figure out what are those similar analogs that can, that can also, help my children learn.
[00:43:09] Adam Fishman: It sounds like the main, you know, use of technology for them now are learning and, you know, using it as a tool to advance their learning or get a question answered or, or something like that. Even if it does devolve into, you know, make a fart noise or something like which, which actually gr would probably be a better at than, than Chad GBT.
[00:43:28] Adam Fishman: But, uh, yeah. as a parent, what's the most like creative use of AI that you've found in, in like, doing fun stuff with your kids?
[00:43:36] Andrew Song: I mean, they love reading books and uh, me reading books to them. And one of the genres that they really like is like. This animal versus that animal. And like, these are two animals that would never see each other in nature in
[00:43:47] Andrew Song: real life, but they just wanna see, hey, like what happens if they fight each other? And so there's books like that currently, that do that, like the wasp versus the, tarantula or something like
[00:43:57] Andrew Song: that. And, uh, I was like, Hey, what other types of matchups can you do? And, uh, chat. GPT does a really great job of that. Hey, based off, you know, this animal and that animal, uh, and the characteristics they have, like how will they fare in a fight? And so just building that story with them, and then seeing it happen on Sora, uh, is really cool because like they get to understand not only like
[00:44:21] Andrew Song: the zoology of the, these animals. But then, kind of create a story around it. And, they really, they really love that 'cause it's not only, them learning something, but like I can kind of help guide them through that process
[00:44:31] Andrew Song: of making that story happen.
[00:44:32] Adam Fishman: That's awesome. Have they done like dad versus Gorilla yet? Is that as,
[00:44:37] Adam Fishman: is that coming?
[00:44:37] Andrew Song: though. Yeah. Humans versus gorilla. that would be a fun one.
[00:44:40] Adam Fishman: alright, well I think that is a lovely place to wrap up. and so I wanted to ask, before we get into our lightning round, how can people follow along or be helpful to you, either via, make sunsets or, or otherwise.
[00:44:59] Andrew Song: I mean, yeah, if you believe in climate change and the world is getting hotter, check us out at makesunsets.com. Uh, you can follow us on Twitter as well. We're just make sunsets. if you wanna reach out to me, I'm just andrew@makessunsets.com. So, hopefully those are enough leads to, help you out, or I put myself out there.
[00:45:17] Andrew Song: But, I, look forward to talking to your, to your viewers.
[00:45:21] Adam Fishman: Awesome. Well, thank you very much and we'll make sure to link to all those places in the show notes. Okay, it's time for lightning round. Let's get started here. Uh, what is the most indispensable parenting product that you have ever purchased?
[00:45:37] Andrew Song: Legos,
[00:45:39] Adam Fishman: What is the most useless parenting product you've ever purchased?
[00:45:43] Andrew Song: the iPad,
[00:45:46] Adam Fishman: Oh, okay. What is the weirdest thing that you've ever found in your kids' pockets or in the washing machine?
[00:45:53] Andrew Song: pretty typical. Like sticks and stones. Yeah. A acorns.
[00:45:56] Adam Fishman: Yeah, I love that. A lot of rocks. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, what would you say is your signature dad's superpower?
[00:46:03] Andrew Song: Keep going. Don't give up.
[00:46:05] Adam Fishman: Okay.
[00:46:06] Adam Fishman: building on that or maybe taking it in a very different direction. If your kids had to describe you in one word, what would that word be?
[00:46:13] Andrew Song: they don't know the definition of this word, but earnest is probably the, the, the word I would use.
[00:46:18] Adam Fishman: Cool. What is the most frustrating thing that has ever happened to you as a dad?
[00:46:23] Andrew Song: losing their mother,
[00:46:24] Andrew Song: to mental, mental illness.
[00:46:26] Adam Fishman: yeah. Yeah. What is the funniest thing? That one of your kids has ever said in public?
[00:46:33] Andrew Song: it's not so much funny but more shock.
[00:46:36] Andrew Song: we were road tripping. and we were up in, up in Napa stopping at this like small little town square. and I was next to a fountain, just kind of, you know, trying to decompress a little bit.
[00:46:45] Andrew Song: And they were just running around the fountain stuff and they found these older ladies. they were just far enough away from earshot that I couldn't hear the conversation. but I knew that they were talking to some older ladies, but like 15 minutes later they come back with a $20 bill. And I'm like, what is going on here? Why did you give my kids this money? Like, it's like, oh, they're so cute. Like, like, I don't know what they told 'em. They're just like, oh, they're so cute. there was an ice cream parlor nearby. I was like, go buy some ice cream for, uh, for the kids. I was like, okay. So like, clearly like my kids are hustlers, like, like they've got some salesmanship from their
[00:47:18] Adam Fishman: Yeah, I was gonna say natural salespeople like your, like their dad, so,
[00:47:23] Andrew Song: so, it was more funny, but it was like, okay, like the little chip off the old block and they're only, at the time they were like four and five.
[00:47:30] Adam Fishman: That's great. Okay, so you're, you're dressed quite nicely right now, but what would you say is your go-to dad wardrobe?
[00:47:37] Andrew Song: pretty standard stuff. Just a t-shirt, jeans and, uh, like a, a down jacket. So the typical Silicon Valley, like wear that most people
[00:47:45] Adam Fishman: Yep.
[00:47:46] Adam Fishman: Okay. What is the most absurd thing that one of your kids has ever asked you to buy for them?
[00:47:52] Andrew Song: Everything seems within its means, like, they ask for the typical stuff, like a bike or, uh, they'll ask for more Legos, or a book or stuff like that. So there hasn't been really any kind of ridiculous requests, but I guess as they get older, that might happen.
[00:48:06] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:48:06] Adam Fishman: no airplanes or anything like that? No. None of that? No. Okay. we've heard it all on this show, so, but your kids seem to have good, you know, good responsible, uh, modest means. Modest needs. So,
[00:48:17] Adam Fishman: what is the most difficult kids TV show that you've had to sit through?
[00:48:22] Andrew Song: the ones that the kids like a lot that I dislike are, and then I'll stop like within, like, I, I don't tolerate it like they like it for some reason, but it's like a lot of the Twitch TV streams.
[00:48:33] Andrew Song: there's this one and it's like, it's, it's a kid and his dad playing video games. I think it's, it's brain rott. It's, it's a lot of slop.
[00:48:40] Andrew Song: they are consuming it. They are like, they'll then say, Hey, can we buy that video game? Which I'm totally fine with. but then like, they know every single move. They know every single like,
[00:48:49] Andrew Song: hidden trick. I think it's more like what, what they like is like the, the relationship with the dad and the, the kid playing video games together.
[00:48:56] Adam Fishman: Yep.
[00:48:56] Andrew Song: it, like, when you're in the middle of it, watching it just like, this is pure slop and like, like this is not, this is not helpful to my kids.
[00:49:03] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:49:04] Adam Fishman: Okay. What is your favorite kids movie?
[00:49:07] Andrew Song: I really like. Pinocchio the latest one,
[00:49:11] Andrew Song: it kind of addresses like the whole like, loss of a parent.
[00:49:14] Andrew Song: you know, there is a little bit of that drama, but still it's a very well touching movie. that's probably the one that I like a lot and the kids like a lot,
[00:49:21] Adam Fishman: Okay, great. What, uh, nostalgic movie can you just not wait to force your kids to watch when they're old enough?
[00:49:29] Andrew Song: star Wars,
[00:49:30] Andrew Song: starting at, uh, episode four,
[00:49:32] Adam Fishman: okay.
[00:49:33] Andrew Song: one through
[00:49:33] Adam Fishman: That was my follow up. Was gonna be what, in what order do you watch it? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:49:39] Andrew Song: the way it was, rolled out
[00:49:40] Adam Fishman: Okay. What is your favorite dad hack for road trips or flights? You probably have a bunch 'cause you did a road trip.
[00:49:48] Andrew Song: it's not even like, don't give 'em the iPad. 'cause I think we like to sing a lot. we like to play games like, know, the typical stuff that you did when you were a kid, like, if you see a VW bug, you know, call out punch buggy, uh, we don't punch each other, but like, stuff like that just
[00:50:03] Andrew Song: keep them, you know, occupied.
[00:50:04] Adam Fishman: Yep.
[00:50:05] Andrew Song: But, you know, there's, there's some benefit to boredom, right? And so I, I think that's something that helps a lot for flights. let 'em loose on the plane, usually you see the poor mom with two kids on a plane, and then they're screaming, but like, when they see two dads, like, you've got a secret power here.
[00:50:20] Andrew Song: It's
[00:50:20] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:50:21] Andrew Song: Like there's something going on. Like this is, this is not typical where the dad takes two kids
[00:50:25] Adam Fishman: Right,
[00:50:26] Adam Fishman:
[00:50:26] Andrew Song: and so there's a lot of grace that I'm, taking advantage of.
[00:50:29] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:50:29] Andrew Song: like, you can't keep a kid on a, plane seat for more than like an hour or two before they start
[00:50:34] Adam Fishman: Right, right.
[00:50:35] Adam Fishman: and they're cute. And so like, as, as I said, they are, they're a little hustlers. So they'll talk to, anybody. And so I think that's part of it. So, Let 'em loose.
[00:50:44] Adam Fishman: Untethered, I was gonna say, based on that story you told, like, if anything, your kids will come back with a $20 bill, you know, so, or some extra snacks.
[00:50:54] Adam Fishman: okay. Last question. As the owner of an rv, what is your take on minivans?
[00:51:01] Andrew Song: I think what I have is just a bigger minivan that you can poop in. And so it's like, like I don't have to like, you know, crunch my body to, to get my kids unbuckled. They can unbuckle themselves now,
[00:51:13] Adam Fishman: Yep.
[00:51:14] Andrew Song: enough and they have the finger strength. But,I understand the benefits of a minivan.
[00:51:18] Andrew Song: Uh, I had a SUV before this. but, you know, having an RV where you can just stand up, and literally just like stretch out and run around, like, that's, I think one of the big advantages of having one.
[00:51:28] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:51:29] Andrew Song: but that's just like an RV is just, uh, a minivan on steroids, in my opinion.
[00:51:34] Andrew Song: it's a Sprinter chassis.
[00:51:35] Andrew Song: So
[00:51:35] Adam Fishman: Yeah.
[00:51:36] Andrew Song: Sprinter chassis C class, roughly around 25 feet. So it's not like, you know, those big, uh, diesel pushers that you might see on the road, but like
[00:51:44] Adam Fishman: Yep.
[00:51:44] Andrew Song: compact, uh, rv.
[00:51:46] Andrew Song: I will always remember what you just said, an RV is just a minivan you can poop in. Uh, and on that note, that is a great thing to end on. Uh, so Andrew, thank you so much for, taking the time to join me today for everything you shared on the pod and, uh, best of luck to you and your family and make sunsets keep buying us time on climate change.
[00:52:10] Adam Fishman: so Casey gets his act together, so really appreciate it. Thank you.
[00:52:14] Andrew Song: Thank you.
[00:52:16] Adam Fishman: Thank you for listening to today's episode with Andrew Song. You can subscribe and watch the show on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. Visit www.startupdadpod.com to learn more and browse past episodes. Thanks for listening. See you next week.