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Host: Brett McKayProducer: Kate McKay October 20, 2026In: Podcast, Social, Social SkillsIt’s always been intimidating to enter a room where you don’t know everyone, or anyone, and to initiate conversation with people at a wedding,…
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A while back I wrote an article about what I eat in a day, and in it I talked about how I meal prep lunches for the week.Here’s the gist: on Saturday or Sunday, I’ll either slow cook or grill a bunch of chicken breasts, or grill a big…
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We’re going to be okay, arent we Papa?  Yes. We are. And nothing bad is going to happen to us. That’s right. Because we’re carrying the fire. Yes. Because we’re carrying the fire.  Once a year I read The Road by Cormac McCarthy. The…
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Host: Brett McKayProducer: Kate McKay October 13, 2026In: Culture, Entertainment, PodcastIf you’ve been following the Art of Manliness for a while, you know that I typically interview the authors of books on this podcast. But, if…
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Back in 2013, we published a set of propaganda-style posters on cell phone etiquette. Some of the rules hold up, but a lot of them focused on talking over the phone, while everyone pretty much just texts these days. “Don’t choose a…
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Building a fire is one of the 100 skills every man should know. But every outdoor situation requires different types of campfire lays (set-ups in the firewood), so it’s imperative to know how to make more than one kind.Here we highlight…
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Riding the Rails Through Tulsa. I thought hobos riding the rails got left behind in the 1930s, but the tradition is still alive in 2026, and there’s a guy with a YouTube channel who gives you a peek at what it’s like, including the…
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Host: Brett McKayProducer: Kate McKay October 6, 2026In: Character, Podcast, Self-ImprovementWe live in a world of pervasive noise. Even when we’re alone and our surroundings are quiet, our devices bombard us with an endless stream…
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A reader recently wrote in with a question I’ve gotten some version of dozens of times over the years. He’s a year into fatherhood, his wife is about to go back to work, and he’s struggling to fit in exercise, friends, hobbies, and…
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The Wind Beneath the Stone by David Keohan. For millennia, stone lifting was an important part of cultures around the world. It was not only a feat of strength, but part of weddings and funerals, used as a job interview to assess…
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Host: Brett McKayProducer: Kate McKay September 29, 2026In: Culture, Entertainment, PodcastModern life is filled with conveniences designed to make things easier. We can order dinner without leaving the couch, check ourselves out at…
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If you’ve got a philosophical bent and you like to lift weights, you’ve probably heard of Yukio Mishima.Mishima was one of history’s most interesting cats. He was a Japanese novelist and playwright, a martial artist and bodybuilder…and…
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Salesman. My latest Criterion watch was this 1969 documentary, which follows four door-to-door salesmen from the Mid-American Bible Company as they work Catholic parishes around Boston and then down in Florida, trying to move a $49.95…
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Host: Brett McKayProducer: Kate McKay September 22, 2026We all have things we’ve always wanted to know how to do, but have never gotten around to learning. Speak a foreign language. Play an instrument. Write a book. Take up surfing.…
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The raglan tee (or as most guys know it, the baseball tee) is a shirt with sleeves that contrast in color from the body. Those sleeves are its defining feature: instead of attaching at a vertical seam on top of the shoulder, they’re cut…
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In one of the emails Oliver Burkeman, author of Time Management for Mortals, sent out to his subscribers, he talked about how we typically treat our to-do lists like buckets that we need to empty every day. The problem, Burkeman…
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The virtual Criterion Closet. If you’ve been following along with me for a while, you know I’ve been on a quest to become a cinephile, which I’ve been pursuing by watching films from the Criterion Collection during my zone 2 cardio…
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By: Brett & Kate McKay September 17, 2026When it comes to camping, there are rules you should follow to respect nature: don’t use even biodegradable soap in streams to avoid disrupting the ecosystem; pitch your tent on…
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Hard as it may be to believe, we’re less than four months away from the end of 2026. If this year has gone by like many of the rest — starting with high hopes, only to fall into ruts of malaise and disappointment — then make the decision…
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Host: Brett McKayProducer: Kate McKay September 15, 2026When people are faced with problems and complexity, our instinct is to add instead of subtract. As a result, we have a tendency to make our work and our lives more and more…
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