Integration over Balance and What It Means to Hustle with Kids | Eric Bahn (Dad of 2, Hustle Fund)

Eric: Maybe in your early life, you had these roommates that you're living with and they were your best friends and coming home to them. Then just kick it with your best friend. Roommates was just such a great feeling. And that's kind of what it is in my house right now.

It's just, I come home kicking it with my kids, my wife, we just love each other a lot, you know, and just enjoy hanging out with each other. It's just such a wonderful vibe. And from that pure selfish feeling, I highly recommend kids, if you're on the precipice and if you don't want kids that's fine too, but this is Startup Dad.

So you're probably thinking about having the kids just fricking do it.

Adam: 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. In today's conversation, I sat down with Eric Bahn. Eric is the co-founder and general partner at Hustle Fund, a pre seed venture capital firm based in San Francisco.

He's also been an entrepreneur and an operator. Founding and scaling a GMAT prep course he built to 3 million members and as an early PM at Instagram and Intuit. In addition to both being a husband and a minivan enthusiast, Eric is also the father of two kids. In our conversation today, we spoke about the decision making process to have kids, how he works to prioritize his wife over his kids in a continuation of the first team concept I discussed on the pod a few weeks ago, and how he solves for integration across all aspects of his life.

We also talked about how he recharges his batteries in a somewhat non-traditional way, some home plumbing projects he's taken on recently, and the most interesting companies he sees emerging that will impact kids and future generations. I hope you enjoy today's conversation with Eric Bahn.

Adam: I would like to welcome Eric Bahn to the StartupDad podcast. Eric, it is a pleasure having you here today. Thanks for joining me.

Eric: I'm really excited about this conversation. I think it's going to get really weird, really fast.

Adam: Anyone who has “minivan enthusiast” as the primary part of their LinkedIn bio must be on the Startup Dad show. That is a hard and fast requirement. So, man, the fan mail I'm going to get after this is going to be off the hook.

Eric: Or hate mail.

Adam: Or hate mail. Very polarizing topic. We'll get there. Trust me. Before we get into it, though, Eric, I do like to talk a little bit about people's professional backgrounds for just a hot second, even though we're talking about dadding here.

But tell me a little bit about what you do for work.

Eric: So I am a venture capitalist. So here comes the hate mail, by the way. So I help run a fund called Hustle Fund. Focus on early stage investing. Before that was an entrepreneur for many years. But I've been doing Hustle Fund for seven years now. And I think this is my last job.

Adam: Okay. Awesome. And we're going to talk a little bit about that and how that relates to your kids, but you have a six year old and a nine year old. How do you explain what you do to your kids? And is this a confusing concept for them?

Eric: Actually, I think they have a pretty good understanding of what I do. So in two ways, One is I have a rule where they are allowed to come in and join any meeting at any time so long as they don't speak. And then afterwards we can debrief it and talk about what happened. So they often are sitting near me kind of listening, doing their homework or just playing.

The other thing that I do is at the end of the day I have this ritual where I like to take a shower with my kids. I have a nice big shower for that. And as we're washing together. I'll try to pitch them a company that pitched me that day to see whether they understand it. And it turns out that my kids love enterprise SAS.

They hate web three. So, their instincts are spot on and I think they're gonna be great VCs if they choose that path in the future.

Adam: They love enterprise SAS. Oh, I don't even think my kids know what enterprise SAS is, but they also don't know what web three is. So, that’s good.

Eric: Yeah. Even more blessed. Yes.

Adam: And you've been doing this a while, but as I understand it, you, I think are from my hometown or at least from the same part of the world that I'm from.

You grew up in Detroit. Is that right?

Eric: Yes, I did. So Detroiters know there's Detroit. And then there's Bloomfield Hills on the west side, which is basically not Detroit, but in proximity. Were you on the west side as well?

Adam: I was on the east side, but my extended family was all on the west side. So definitely Bloomfield Hills, Farmington. That's where my parents are from is Farmington.

Eric: So you're more of a Grosse Pointe kind of

Adam: That is where I'm from. Born and raised. Yep. Yep.

Eric: Yeah, I guess people, the few people that understand that, like, like will know that there's like a little dynamic there. That's like old wealth versus new wealth. It's like West Egg versus East Egg in the great Gatsby world.

Adam: I was just going to say that it's basically the Great Gatsby East and West Egg. That's an awesome analogy

Eric: So I'm Gatsby, and you're the beautiful woman that I'm trying to court on the East Egg side, basically.

Adam: That’s great. That's how I like to approach conversations with Startup Dad all the time. So, you're from the West side of Detroit. What was life like as a kid? Tell me about growing up.

Eric: Well, for those of you who aren't familiar with Michigan or Detroit we see a lot of crazy news about Detroit and it's been popularized movies like Eight Mile and so forth, but the area that I grew up was quite nice. It was a pretty lush suburb. Kind of well to do. Very forests and green and everything like that.

So, I was lucky in that I was born to the parents that I was born to. My parents are immigrants from Korea. Took all the sacrifices. My dad went to medical school and all that stuff in the United States here. And by the time I came out in the eighties, like all the sacrifices were made. So I, Basically grew up in these really nice suburbs, Rochester Hills, then Bloomfield Hills, all these other areas like that.

And was just asked to enjoy life and dream really big. And that's kind of what I did. So I was a bit of a nerdy kid, studied really hard, but, you know, spent a lot of time outside too just exploring, like all the forest land that's like nearby. So I went through the woods with my BB gun and would just, you know, shoot my friends in the legs and all that stuff.

That's what we do in Michigan, by the way. It's called one pump, the game. I don't know if anyone's ever played it. And then, um, you know, it was kind of boring. So like, you know, growing up in the 80s and 90s in my part of Michigan you know, we, we weren't known for like the cuisine or maybe even like a lot of like amazing cultural things outside of amazing cars that people seem to drive.

So I, I felt like it wasn't really quite my place and I seemed to understand that even as a young kid. So. By the time I got to high school, I knew that I wanted to explore a different part of the world or country. And I went to the college I got into that was furthest away from Michigan to make a change.

And it turns out that I loved where I landed, which is the San Francisco Bay area, and I've been here for the last 24 years.

Adam: Awesome. Awesome. I'm coming up on 20. So not too far away from you, I spent those four years before that. In Michigan, going to college there. and then I fled. So I have a question for you. So your parents are Korean immigrants. And I think I have two questions actually about this.

One is, you know, I've definitely talked about growing up in an immigrant family with various people across the startup dad interviews that I've had. And I'm curious. You know, would you say that you had kind of like a typical, you know, first generation immigrant family upbringing or was yours different?

That's sort of question one. And then question two is what was it like growing up on the west side of Detroit? As a Korean person, because I, for the life of me, think I maybe only knew one Korean person growing up in my hometown, the other side of Detroit. So yeah, I'm just kind of curious about that.

Eric: Yeah. I'm sure that Korean was the best kid you knew too. So, uh, of course it was a bit lonely. I'll say there weren't that many Koreans, at least on my side of Detroit. There were Asian Americans though. So I knew other Indian families, Chinese families. So, you know, so pretty well educated area that drew people in for like the interesting job opportunities and good quality of life.

So, there was some diaspora there. But I did feel a little bit lonely. Michigan has a really interesting history when it comes to immigrants and just like its place in America. On the one hand, it's an extremely friendly place and very neighborly kind of environment to be a part of. But at the same time, you know, there's a little bit of implicit racism that I did feel of just like a sense that we were a little bit different or I was treated a little bit differently from, I guess the rest of my local society there. And it was nothing terribly overt for the most part. And I did feel like people are quite nice to me, but it's a little bit of a, you know, polite in the front, but a little bit less polite, maybe inside was kind of the feeling I felt.

So that part did wear on me a little bit and was an instigator to leave. In terms of the environment that my parents put together. So. Within our household and like their immigrant journey and, you know, how they raised their family they're wonderful people. Mom was a bit of a tiger mom, but she really pushed me in good ways and I appreciate that now. Dad was breadwinner. He was a doctor. So, you know, had a great career Michigan, but there are some things that they've done, I think that's atypical to what a first generation parent raises their kids in America would do. So the first was lot of attention towards assimilation.

They only let me speak English in the household. So I don't know. I mean, Korean, actually. I actually really regret that because I think it would have been lovely to connect my roots that way, but they want to practice a lot of English and it was critical for them. So they allowed only English inside the house.

The second thing that was a little bit odd. That ended up being a little bit of a sad advantage is when my dad moved over with my mom to the United States, they Germanized the spelling of their name. I think the correct way to spell Bahn is actually more like a B A N or P A N even, but he made it more German looking with the idea that if it looks like a white person's name on an application, maybe there will be advantages for him and his wife, but also for the kids.

And I got to say, this is manifested in unusually real ways in my life, you know, just when I did my college interviews, people are like, so are you adopted or something like that? Or I wasn't expecting someone that looked like you. Again, a little bit of implicit racism as well. I found that I've been able to get my foot in the door through small kinds of hacks like that, that parents sort of foresaw when they made their immigrant journey in.

So a part of it, it's really a bittersweet thing to reflect upon. On the one hand, they wanted what's best for the kids. And it created that environment of assimilation and even how they spell their name. But on the other hand too something was lost, I think with adding to the cultural tapestry of America was just being unapologetically yourself, right?

So conversations I have with my therapist every week.

Adam: How do you talk to your kids about this experience and are you trying to swing the pendulum maybe a little bit back the other way, or is that not not a thing in your household?

Eric: Yeah, I'd say that while I did marry a Korean American woman from the deep South Texas, so similar in terms of her parents were immigrants from Korea, but they ended up in McAllen, Texas, which is the most southern part of Texas next to the Mexican border. Fun fact, it's actually the least educated county in the United States with an average of a seventh grade education.

She grew up very poor. But her family was really unapologetic about trying to preserve their heritage. So they taught her Korean you know, gave her lots of delicious Korean food as a kid and taught her a lot about her upbringing as well. So. I've actually learned a lot about my heritage through her, even though we're both Korean Americans of the same generation.

And I gotta say, it's because of her influence as well that it's a little bit easier actually to talk about our culture to our kids. And my kids are really curious about what their ancestors were doing. And we still have the majority of our families on both sides in Korea. So I've taken my kids back since to Korea to meet their cousins who only speak Korean, but they get along great. And they love the food, my kids. And, you know, they love the culture, the music, everything. So I think my role as a parent is to just nurture that curiosity and let them go as far as they can in that journey. And I'm excited about that because they're pulling me along too, as they learn.

Adam: That's amazing. And sometime maybe towards the end of this, I'll ask you about flights to Korea with young kids. It's always a favorite topic on the international travel, here.

Eric: Yeah. You drug them with melatonin and it's totally great. No problem. Easy. Done.

Adam: Love that, Ok. You heard it here first folks. So you mentioned your wife Korean American from the deep south of Texas. I know where McAllen is. Which I don't know why I know that, but it's right there. It's on the border. How did you meet your wife and tell me about what she does?

Eric: I met my wife in the very first hour of college. So when I was moving into the dorm room, unpacked my boxes, I decided I should probably get to know my neighbors. I knock on the door to the right of my room, and then I opened the door and I see my wife sitting next to the window with her roommate.

And first thought was obviously, Oh my gosh, that's a real hottie. I gotta hook up with this chick, right? And then and then she's like, Oh, you know, I got a boyfriend. And I was like, you know what? I'm a gentleman. I never am a homewrecker or never cheated, you know, like I don't believe in that kind of stuff.

I try to live by those values. I'm like, okay, good for you. So we became friends. And then over the course of three years, as I waited for her to break up with her boyfriend, eventually it happened. And then the moment I heard on AOL instant message. Immediately, AIM messaged her. It was like at 11 o'clock saying like, hey, let's go to like junior pub night, somewhere down the street.

And the rest is history. And I've held on to her for the last 21 years married for 16. Now we have two kids and she is the best person in the world that I've ever met and will ever meet. And on top of that too, you know, she inspires me so much because she's also a really talented founder herself.

So she was the co-founder of mine, actually in our first company where we had a great outcome. And then today she's an executive coach. So she's been doing this work for the past seven years. She's got an amazing set of clients and corporate clients and keeps the house, is a breadwinner and is also a terrific mom.

So, it's incredible and inspiring person to, to be partner with.

Adam: That's awesome. And you started your first company with her even cooler experience. 

Eric: Yeah. Oh, I loved it.

Adam: You learn a lot about somebody in the co founder relationship, I guess.

Eric: I got to say this. I mean, it's risky, right? To do business with any family because it's hard to separate business from personal, but when it works, it's incredible because you have someone that absolutely a hundred percent has her back and really odd things began to happen too. So we would see each other all day long and in the evenings and weekends, we would tend to just be apart.

We just say like, hey, I'm going to go on a trip with some guys. You know, this weekend, or I'm going to grab dinner with like these founders. See you later. We just didn't need to see each other in the evenings and weekends during that period of our twenties. And it allowed me a lot of flexibility personally to just get to know a ton of people in Silicon Valley as I was growing my career.

So that's changed since we now do different things and really cherish our evenings and weekends together as a family. But it was a really weird kind of set of circumstances that allowed that level of flexibility. And I loved that period of my life.

Adam: That's awesome. And so you married 16 years ago, but you've known each other for, you said, 21 years. Tell me about the decision for the two of you to start a family. What was that like?

Eric: I don't think I've ever really wanted kids. I've never been ultra against them. I'd say I was like 55 percent against having kids. But, my wife really wanted kids. So that was pretty much the end of it. And, in terms of the timing for when this all started was, very, very privileged set of circumstances.

So my wife and I had sold our first company together and we had been working with the acquirer for about a year and a half, had gone through the integration well, and were looking to just take some time off to go on a bit of a sabbatical. So we spent nine months traveling. We went to 17 countries, just really, really slowly traveled without an itinerary it was the best experience.

And then. Somewhere in Poland, we definitely got pregnant because I found out in Germany that, uh, you know, she woke me up at 3am saying like, I am pregnant. And I remember waking up at 3am and I was like, oh my gosh, that's great. And then she kind of got mad at me because I just went back to sleep. I was like, I'll just deal with this in the morning. So conceptually, you know, exciting. We were trying, but it kind of happened way faster than I expected, and then we had a baby, so, I wish there were a more romantic way to frame it to my son later. You know, it was just like, oh, we were waiting for you forever. No, but the reality was like, I'll just sort of, okay with it.

And then she really wanted it and we decided to go for it and it just happened. I mean, we'll get to this maybe a little bit later Adam, it ended up being the best like decision ever because my two kids are now like my two other best friends outside of my wife. I mean, we have so much fun together. For those of you watching this version, like you can see a crazy garage behind me.

It's a real background, not a fake one full of toys and all that kind of stuff. And my kids and I are here all the time, hacking away at great stuff, forming good memories. It's been amazing.

Adam: That is amazing. And also to think that you were kind of like a 55 percent you said maybe no on kids. And then now it seems like you couldn't imagine life without them.

Eric: Yeah. Actually, I can explain the 55 percent too. So there comes a point after college maybe, or as you're getting into your career where things are starting to go well, You're starting to make more money and then the vacations get way better. If you want to eat out at a nice meals, like whatever, it's just our cash.

So there's like that dual income, no kids, DINK life that you start to enjoy. Right. And then. You start to conceptualize what life would be like with a kid and you can run the calculator in your mind, which is daycare costs as much. If you want a nanny, which is exciting, it's like way expensive.

You do all this stuff, all these other child expenses, toys, whatever, clothing, saving for college, and then the lack of sleep, the poopy diapers, you start to like focus on these negative things as a first time parent, I think I did that a lot and I noticed a lot of. People before their kids often focus on the negatives, but then you learn after the kid comes about this really basic, selfish thing that happens, which is put aside the lack of sleep, the less money you're going to have all these other things that feel negative, the poopy diapers, the pee.

At the end of the day, just imagine the situation where maybe in your early life, you had these roommates that you're living with and they were your best friends and coming home to them. Then just kick it with your best friend roommates was just such a great feeling. And that's kind of what it is in my house right now.

It's just, I come home kicking it with my kids, my wife, we just love each other a lot, you know, and just enjoy hanging out with each other. It's just such a wonderful vibe. And from that pure selfish feeling, I highly recommend kids, if you're on the precipice and if you don't want kids and that's fine too, but this is Startup Dad.

So you're probably thinking about having the kids just fricking do it.

Adam: There's this audience is like two people thinking about having children and maybe three people thinking about it. People like in the thick of it looking for advice and then people who are like approaching their empty nester years and are like, oh, this reminds me of a time when… what's the earliest memory that you have of becoming a father Right after your oldest was born.

Eric: I guess the earliest memory of me becoming a dad was in the hospital. So my wife goes through a C section, unexpected, but it was really well done. And I am not a very squeamish person, so I really like seeing everything. So I saw the incision, I saw everything getting opened up. I saw the little dude getting pulled out.

And then when he came out, two things happened. One was I was surprised by how large this thing was. I was like, wow, that is like, like a long thing that just came out. Like, I didn't expect that in such a tiny package. It's just my wife, right? And then the second thing I remember, and this is probably the memory that really I hold dear, I just blurted out pretty loud, “he's beautiful!”

Right. That was like the first word I didn't plan that. Those are the first words that came out was, he's beautiful. And I was really stunned by how good looking this dude was. Right. I have a joke with my wife and it's, might stop saying this, but like my son looks like how I wish I had ended up looking like he does look like me.

It's there's, okay, I'm going to show you like a really mean thing here. And please don't hate male Adam for this, but there's this meme I once saw of like, It's so mean, but it applies to me a little bit. It's like Adam driver. It looks like what Keanu Reeves is. If you drew him by memory, it was like a Reddit meme.

And I laughed so hard at that. And I do think Adam Driver is a handsome guy. So please like be nice, but I'm like that. I am the Adam Driver. My son is the Keanu. And I'm like, wow, this guy is like so pretty and gorgeous. And now he's just a wonderful human being to just like a really funny guy and yeah, all the best.

Adam: That's awesome. Your son is the same age as my son actually, but that's, he's my youngest is nine and my oldest is a couple of years older.

Eric: Two Adam drivers here

Adam:There you go. There you go. My son is a very handsome kid. Thank God he got all my wife's jeans in that regard.

Eric: Exactly, right? I say the same all the time.

Adam: So you talked about kind of going from 55 percent to like can't imagine life without, kids, what's like one of the more surprising things that you've discovered as a dad on that journey? 

Eric: Probably the most surprising is how not strict I am. So, I thought, growing up in a highly disciplined household driven by my mom largely, that I would also have really high standards, be pretty strict with my own kids. But I found actually my parenting style is highly millennial in the sense that it's very social, emotional, learning driven, quite nurturing.

I never yell, definitely never hit. My wife is the same as well, which is quite different, frankly, from our households where as immigrant parents, they yelled and hit all the time. So that was a surprise to me, which is just how much softer I am as a parent. But I think the other thing kind of related to this is I don't speak to my kids in a very baby like way.

I do talk to them like a young adult in many ways. So, when they ask questions, I don't try to dumb it down to like a really young age thing. I try to speak to them with big words and things like that so that they can understand just what adult conversation is like, maybe I do that a little bit too much to some degree, but the other thing too, when it comes to the nurturing is I never tell them to stop asking questions. So there is an annoying phase when your kids keep asking why. And the game I play for myself is I'll always keep on answering and eventually they get tired of it. And then they tell me to shut up. Right. But love it because I think that we sort of forget the curiosity, the ability to ask great questions as we get older.

And I think that's when things start to calcify and feel much more fixed mindset. So that's what I think the big challenge is just like, maybe I could be really nurturing all that stuff, but so long as you have a lot of curiosity and maybe a innate sense of growth mindset, then that's could be enough of a foundation for them to be fine.

Adam: Do you think that that approach has helped you In your professional life too, because you work with a lot of founders, you engage with a lot of people whose job it is to ask questions and question things and go deep and get curious. And do you see parallels between that and work? I mean, shouldn't say founders are children, but you know, they're pretty young sometimes.

So are there, there are parallels that you've noticed there. Have you thought about that at all?

Eric:  I mean, so again, yeah, our founders definitely adults, you know, functioning adults, I hope. But there's something that I established in my household that I tried to establish as a social contract with our founders, which is this notion of emotional safety and vulnerability. So in my house, I try not to get mad when my kid does something that is a bit screwed up or they make a mistake or something that is quite annoying, and we try to talk through it, right?

And, never want to get angry at them, especially when they're trying to be honest with me about something that they messed up. All right. So for me, that's something that I try to, in some ways reward is just like, I appreciate that you're, bringing this up to me directly. Right. That's the place I start. With founders, the dynamic that is somewhat in parallel to that.

And I was the one that made this mistake a lot. When I was the founder talking to my own investors, when things are going really badly, I got nervous about explaining what was happening. I probably waited too late to explain to my investors what was going on. And by the time I shared it with the investors, it was almost too late.

It's like, and now we're out of money, kind of thing like that. So. In the very beginning of the engagement that I have with our own founders, I try to set that social contract, which is like, we'll always be blunt and honest and direct with each other. But assuming that comes from a good place in our heart, there's no problem that scares me ever.

And I would love to be the first person you choose to speak with, like whenever a real serious problem is happening. So when we can successfully let that message land with founders, It's a great relationship afterwards. Like regardless of whether the company works out or not, and those are the founders, I'll continue to back over and over again, regardless of outcome, because it just feels like we are so transparent with each other.

And those are just the relationships that just give me a lot of joy.

Adam: I really liked drawing that, parallel between those two things. That's a pretty amazing how many parallels there are between parenting and building a company, which I guess is why I do this show. So speaking of which and partnership though, you know, I've talked with a lot of people.

Even more recently on Startup Dad about how you prioritize different aspects of family, you know, prioritizing your partner, your kids, et cetera, et cetera, and Patrick Thompson just recently talked on the show about this concept of first team. Which I think professionally, we know a decent about.

There's been, you know, some studies about that and popularized and talked about in management theory and things like that. But it sounds like this is also a priority for you in your personal life. So tell me about how you prioritize your wife over your kids? That's an actual thing that you told me when we were prepping for this show.

Eric: I wish I could take credit for those concepts, but I think I saw this from a relationship psychologist a long time ago that I forgot who it was about this notion of prioritizing your wife. over your kids And I actually think it's an important foundation for my marriage right now. I chose, and my wife chose me. Right?

Like we love each other through choice. I love my kids, but they kind of just arrived the way that they did. Right? So I'm compelled to love them. And I do explain this to my kids, which is mom and I are the first important unit here. Obviously, you're a close second,

Adam: Mm hmm.

Eric: And I also share like fun examples, which is like if mom had to select like who would die like you guys or me, like she'll pick me every time, right?

Because like, that's how much we love you. But like we need to be actually the first love and express that and really understand that. And you need to understand that too kids. So I tried to explain this to my kids as well. And actually also I want them to imprint this for their own relationships with whatever life partners they select in the future.

One of the stories I heard a little bit earlier in my career was from kind of an early mentor when I was just starting off in my twenties, and he sort of talked about his divorce and, you know, he'd been married to his wife for 27 years. They were just divorcing. And the warning he shared with me was we focus so much on the kids that we sort of lost each other.

And by the time the kids went off to college, there wasn't really anything else that we had in common. So we just kind of drifted apart. Right and  he actually said to me, he's like, you know, for your fiance or girlfriend, whatever it was that time. You know, when you do go down this journey, make sure that you really emphasize treating your wife well, and like investing in that relationship.

So a combination of that cool psychology article, and then what my old boss mentor used to say to me really did land for me, which is, this is a relationship that has to endure until the very end and has to be the one that is most important. So, I think I'm lucky to be married to a woman that also shares that kind of level of commitment too.

And we work really hard, you know, to express love with each other, putting in the date nights, the occasional solo child free hotel nights once a quarter, I wish there were like more like once a month and then you know, just holding time with each other. And whenever, by the way, whenever we do our date nights and things like that, we try to limit how much we talk about our kids.

Adam: Hmm.

Eric: We want to just like talk about other things besides the kids, because it's just too easy to focus on our cute kids, but you know, I'm going to keep her updated on hobbies and like things that's happening at work and so forth and just laughing at jokes. And that's at least working for us right now.

Adam: What is an area where you and your wife don't agree when it comes to parenting? I always ask people this question and I think especially interesting to hear from you about it because you just talked about being on the same team, sometimes you disagree with your teammates.

Eric: Yeah, certainly. It's a challenging one because she might be watching this, but

uh,

Adam: No, of course not. Of course not.

Eric: No, no, actually it's a hard one largely because we've kind of grown into being the same person. And I've been with my wife for half of my life at this point, you know, dating and then the marriage. And I almost like to think of it as like two trees that were separated.

And we're kind of now just like one tree. So our values are quite, quite similar. Now where we might disagree. I'm trying to think through this a little bit. It's still hard for me to come up with something.

Adam: What about an area when you first got together or maybe when your kids were the youngest and you kind of were still going through that growing together process, do you remember something where the two of you really had to work to get on the same page about something,

Eric: Yeah, actually something does come to mind and maybe that does trigger, I think even something today, but we're more, we're kind of getting closer to this, which is actually spiritual life. So my wife grew up in a very Christian household and when we got together, that was really important to her still.

It was never as important to me when I was younger. The interesting thing though, where we are today, 21 years later is we've almost flipped a little bit. Like I'm feeling more called these days to re kind of assess my own spiritual understanding, what I want in my life. My wife is a bit further away from where we started as well.

And we just are trying to reconcile right now. Like, what does that actually mean for our kids? Should we start going to church more? Should we put them into church related activities? You know, are we ready to make that kind of commitment? Should we actually commit to it first ourselves, you know, and like reconcile that within ourselves before we actually do something like that.

So I can see the benefits of why her Christian upbringing was so great for her and setting good values for her. And I really do admire that. And I, do you feel like we should probably do something or explore something with our kids, but we're in kind of a debate ourselves as to like, what is this going to actually mean for our family?

So that's probably the big one right now is like, we just struggle to reconcile, like what faith means for ourselves. And as a result, what it might mean for our kids too.

Adam: That's really interesting. And I mean, disagreement doesn't have to be a shouting match or anything. It can be just like, we're still trying to figure out where we come together on this, like those trees growing together.

Eric: To my wife's credit too, like, we never really shout at each other. Like when we have vehemently disagreed, but what I love about my wife is her place is she'll pause before she really wants to go at me and she will apply clinically precise argumentation at the time of her choosing to debate me on the topic.

Right. And I think like the reason why she can do so well is she's probably the most talented people manager I've ever seen when we were working together. She was always the person that people like her organization was the one that everyone wanted to work with. And I seen her in other bigger organizations after the acquisitions of that.

She was like an insanely talented manager. So we can go into a bit of a business mode in our family. And how we share feedback to people. And in fact, it gets, we kind of make fun of ourselves. It's like, I'll tell my son, like, hey, I have some real time feedback for you right now. Right. It's like, you know, like, and you know, like bullshit like that sometimes.

Adam: Speaking of this sticking on this topic for a second, I saw a tweet that you had about your wife. I think feigning interest in your enthusiasm around home plumbing projects. What was that? I'm very curious about the story behind that because one doing home plumbing projects kind of risky, but also it could have just meant like screwing a washer onto something.

That's how I would define a home plumbing project,

Eric: Yeah. Okay. Yes, to be clear, I'm not like rerouting a bunch of valves behind some drywall to like, create like a showerhead from the ceiling or something. That's a little bit above my pay grade. But one of the surprising things I've learned as I get older is just the weird shit I just, I'm starting to get really into.

And, the area of pride that I find myself having a lot of these days is I'm oddly handy. I didn't realize how handy I was. So you just go on YouTube, you watch a couple of videos on how to do something like three ways. And I'm like, okay, I got it. So I can fix all the cabinets now. For the plumbing side of it is actually something that's sticking with me because recently there's some sort of like hissing valve or something in a toilet.

And then a plumber came by and was like, yeah, I can fix this for like $350. I was like, go fuck yourself in my mind. I did not say it to this gentleman who was probably quoting me fairly given the market. So I went on YouTube and I just started understanding like, what's this problem here? And then I basically disassembled the toilet and then, you know, put it back together with all these new, like fill valves and floppers and things like that.

And it was really satisfying. It was actually quite messy because it turns out that emptying the tank is quite, is more challenging than you might think. So you had to put a bunch of towels on, but you know, I cleaned it all up and it's working perfectly for all my toilets. I saved probably a thousand bucks there.

And then more recently when that tweet happened, it was because I was getting really frustrated that one of the, a couple of handles in my shower are getting quite loose. And I knew this was going to be expensive cause my parents had the same problem at one point. I got to go fix theirs now too.

And they said like, oh yeah, someone quoted me like a thousand dollars to fix this when I YouTube and then just spent like an hour or two going through all the bathrooms, disassembling the units, like putting it back together, understanding the problem. I was like, look, the handles on tight to my wife. And she was like, oh my gosh, Eric, how wonderful.

You know, like it was like, I think she was happy, but. Probably like happy when like your three year old daughter scores a goal and you're like good for you, you know, happy. It felt a little bit that vibe. I loved it though.

Adam: That's awesome. She gave you a pat on the head and was like, oh, here's a popsicle. You can go out and play now.

Eric: We troll each other all the time. So like, I feed off that stuff too.

Adam: I love that story. Thank you for sharing it with me. If you could hit a button, get in a time machine and go back to younger version of Eric, that 55 percent no kids, Eric. What advice would you give yourself about parenting?

Eric: I think there's two things and the second thing is something I'm still trying to grapple as to what I believe. So the first is don't overthink it. It's just like, you know, you're putting too much logic behind. Why this is like a costly endeavor or is going to shorten your lifespan due to the lack of sleep and all of that stuff is true, but you're kind of missing the point, you know, like, just like the level of joy and love that you get to unlock within your heart is like far greater than anything you're ever going to imagine.

All right, so just like stop overthinking it as part one. Part two is a part that I'm still kind of grappling with that I both really agree with and maybe disagree with too, which is you should try to start having kids younger. So I was in almost my, in my mid thirties when my first kid came out. And you know, and now I'm in my forties and my kids are still relatively young and now I'm a little bit sad.

I'm thinking, you know, they're a lot younger than me and I'll be dead by the time they're like, you know, still sort of young adults too. There are some people that I was friends with in college, actually, even who are like teen dads and moms. And at the time I was just like, wow, that is horrific.

And it was really hard. It does not look like it was easy. But now. It seems like the greatest blessing ever. It, they're literally growing old with their kids, you know, like my buddy, he's like 42, he's got like, a kid in his twenties now, who's also just a wonderful human. They're like, you know, go mountain biking together and like, and he's like really treacherous kind of people are working out and they both look like ridiculously good.

And, you know, maybe almost looks like brothers to some ways, but they got the transition into this like very different, kind of parent to child relationship that I don't think I'm going to be able to unlock for quite some time. Now the reason why I'm a little bit hesitant about this is like, obviously waiting was really good for us because we got really far along in our career.

We were able to hoard a lot more cash and wealth, you know, to pay for things like a nanny and all this stuff. And that has been a true lifesaver. So in the younger years, I think waiting has been amazing for us, but I do kind of think a little bit into the future of just like, you know, when I'm like 70 or something like that, will I be a little bit sad that like, you know, I'm not really quite growing old with my family.

And I think I will be a little bit, but who knows, maybe I'll, you know, someone's going to figure out some longevity drugs I can take at that point. And I'll be like, ah, that's silly. You know, thank goodness you changed your DNA, you know, 10 years ago or something.

Adam: Aging in reverse. We'll get there eventually. Science will, you'll probably invest in a company that does that. Although maybe they'd have to have an enterprise SAS model for that to work out.

Eric: Exactly. Yeah. For like a thousand dollars a month, you can upload your brain to this robot body and then just, you know, live for 20, 000 years.

Adam: Speaking of investing, your company is called Hustle Fund and I know it's co-founded. And so there's lots of people who are involved in the success of Hustle Fund. So I just want to call that out. I'm sure you would have if I didn't. Now the word hustle is in there and I'm curious because, you know, there's a lot of conversation around startup hustle and the grind and how that relates to family life. And so I'm curious to hear from you, what does it mean to hustle? And then how does that meld or mesh with your family life?

Eric: It's an interesting question. So we thought a lot about the name of our fund, obviously, when we got started about seven years ago. And hustle has a lot of interesting connotations. So one of my favorite albums came out in 1993 is the Ready To Die album , by Notorious B. I. G. Right. So in the song Juicy”, he's talking about hustling on the street corner to feed his baby daughter.

He's like slinging, you know, drugs on the corner. So hustle for some period of time meant like illicit activity, like trying to basically like perform criminal activity to make money or something like that. There is a magazine called Hustler as well that has like some pornographic connotations as well.

Maybe the latest incarnation of hustle is, you know, sometimes called like referred to as like hustle porn, which is this notion of like grinding yourself down to basically nothing for the work and putting all sacrifices towards the job versus anything else. For us, hustle has a really specific definition.

And the choice for why we chose hustle is also interesting too. So hustle for us means great execution meets high velocity. It means for the unit of hour that you work, you are applying lots of creativity and effective prioritization to drive as much output as you want during the period of time that you choose to work.

And I'd say that the best hustlers that I know within our hustle fund portfolio, aren't actually working 80, 90, 100 hours a week. They actually seem to have relatively reasonable hours, but they seem to produce 10X more than anyone else. Right? So, so that is actually our definition of hustle at Hustle Fund.

But in addition to that too, Hustle Fund is only one of 5% of us VC funds is actually led by women. Two out of three of my co founders that are general partners are women. 60 percent of our team are women. And what I liked about the name hustle when it was suggested to me by my co-founder, Elizabeth was that we often think of a hustler as sort of gender assigned to like men, right?

But we are a female led fund of hustlers, right? So I love the cognitive dissonance of like, one, can we redefine hustle around this notion of great execution meets high velocity and not about working yourself to death. That's kind of a fun challenge. And then two, can we actually make the idea of a hustler, just gender normal, right?

Like it just normalized, right? It's not just like a male thing or like a macho thing, but it's anyone that can actually apply great execution meets high velocity. So it was a fun challenge. And I do think that really apt for the kinds of fibers that we like to back today.

Adam: I love that it's actually something similar to what I'm trying to do here with Startup Dad, which is dads can have conversations about parenting stuff too, especially successful, you know, professional dads and we should ask them to talk about it more. So that's kind of the thesis behind that is sort of like flip the script a little bit.

Eric: Well, I think what you're highlighting to Adam is really interesting because one of the best graduate school of education is for becoming a hustler. Great execution meets high velocity is becoming a parent because when you become a parent, you suddenly learn prioritization. Like a genius, right?

Like when you're working from like eight to five or eight to six, for me, it feels like a straight up adrenaline rush for those periods of times I choose to work. And the throughput of what I can produce and what I prioritize is so much better than when I was at twenties, you know, just dating my girlfriend slash future wife.

I was like, well, I have all the time in the world. I'm just going to like, you know, mess around and spend 80 hours in the office doing pretty much inefficient crap. And like not prioritizing very well. So that's a big difference. I think between like my early twenties hustle pre kids and my now PhD level of hustle due to my children.

Adam: Yeah I've talked to many dads who are like, oh, parenting is the ultimate unlock in figuring out how to allocate your time and be maximally productive, you know, in minimal time.

So, yeah. Would you say that your leadership style or how you lead Hustle Fund versus other things you've done in the past has been influenced by having kids?

Eric: So when I decided that hustle fund was going to be my very last job with Elizabeth and my other co-founder Sheehan. It's interesting because a couple of things sort of settled in one was I thought very deeply about what is my definition of joy? And a big part of it is just constantly surrounding myself with people who inspire me to feel joy, right?

So you gotta be really intelligent really biased towards action, have a great sense of humor and just someone that, you know, I want to dig in with and really feel excited to get to know you personally, as well as professionally over years, right? And ideally decades. Right. So I think at Hustle Fund, one of the big blessings I figured out is just, I've kind of figured out, I think our Shakespearean troop of people that we really want to invest in together to like grow this thing, gain wealth together just do the whole thing until done working.

And I guess maybe this was a little bit less influenced by my kids directly, but it is actually like a philosophy I learned that I try to apply it to both working kids a long time ago. I came across this Buddhist saying that. I think about every day and it's actually probably my mantra for life, which is when you bow to the mirror, the reflected image bows back. When you bow to the mirror, the reflected image bows back.

So the way that I've always interpreted that is how I treat my environment will naturally be reflected reciprocated and kind if I'm an insecure asshole to people and I have been that guy before my early 20s when I was an insecure asshole, a bunch of insecure assholery where he gets just like thrown back at you. You just find yourself in these kinds of toxic environments. Or if you treat people with love and respect and vulnerability, you tend to find that gets reciprocated back.

And that is the community I'm trying to build within Hustle Fund with our founders, our teammates and so forth. But it's also what I try to encourage within my family too, which is this idea that, yo, we can get vulnerable with each other. You know, we'll have a lot of good times. Yes. But when it's time to cry, it's time to cry.

You know, when it's time to fail, it's time to fail. Right. And it's not good or bad. It's just, you know, feelings or it's just like what it is. Right. But we can feel safe with each other. Right. So I think my wife and I are very aligned on that for how we treat our kids and each other. And that feeling of safety, I think is the thing that I really want.

And maybe is actually the difference between my childhood and my kids childhood too. The more I think about this, because you know, I was really afraid of disappointing my parents when I was a kid, it was just like, they had very high expectations, very tigery. And so stylistically, you know, I kind of am just like, look, if you like fail or something like that but you learn something great from it, we're going to like appreciate that moment, right? Like it's, there's no like just pure success or just pure failure here, right? This is just the journey, but we got each other, right? And we can feel safe about that. And I'm really hoping that's something that my kids are truly ingesting as part of it, as well as my teammates too.

Adam: Awesome. I wanted to talk a little bit about, I guess, as an extension of Hustle Fund and kids, which is, you know, you've invested in a lot of companies. Hustle Fund's invested in what? Hundreds of companies, probably?

Eric:  530

Adam: 530 companies. And you've probably seen, you know, how many companies do you have to observe to make 530 investments?

Like 10 X, that number?

Eric: To date, over 60, 000

Adam:  Okay. So I wasn't too far off but maybe even more the thousand plus X or whatever. So I'm curious with all these companies that you see, what are some of the more interesting things that you've seen that you think are going to impact kids and future generations?

Eric: One of the more common narratives that's happening in Silicon Valley today, but just the notion of how kids learn using AI. So, this is probably the most exciting use case I've seen with AI, is this notion of like personalized tutoring. And, Already, there was maybe theorists back in when Google was coming out saying, like, we're someday going to outsource our brain to have just like the search engine that has all the knowledge in the world.

And that was kind of true. But what was missing was that's a really generic scope of how you approach knowledge. And today with LLMs and, you know, all sorts of amazing machine learning and natural language processing and all that stuff. A. I. Is actually starting to understand how an individual prefers to learn and tailoring how to teach these kinds of concepts.

So I get really excited about this and also really scared because on the one hand, I think A. I. Is going to be an amazing lifelong tool for learning. And I actually have a lot of my own custom GPTs already. So for me, one of my hobbies is actually racing cars. And I actually tried to find as many PDF manuals on high performance driving and I upload that to my own personalized GPT and I have it serve as a coach for me on like, what can I be doing better to like take a corner at faster speed? Or, you know, like why am I oversteering so hard right now? Like, what can I be doing to like adjust like my breaking points and all that stuff.

And it's pretty damn good actually. So when I look at my younger kids, they're a little bit too young to actually be interacting with AI right now and I'm not pushing it on them too much, but I do think that it is going to be one of the best tools for being a, just a lifelong tutor for my kids.

And it starts to beg the question for me of then what is the purpose of like higher education? So I get it for like, okay, if Adam, your kids are just like, I'm going to be a surgeon one day and you're like, okay, like enjoy this AI, you don't need medical school. I'll be like, do not operate on me. Okay. Like I still like want you to like go through and do the like medical school stuff and get an A in your biology class and all that stuff.

Right. So maybe some of those things less so, but there are a lot of disciplines where I'm just like, you know, if it's about the learning, maybe for my kids, their path is going to be better served by personalized AI. Now, the only thing that this is a little bit of tangent, like I still believe in college and I do think that they should go to college and I told them I'll pay for it.

So just go right largely because of the community. Right. Just having that space to just understand yourself, find your best friends for life. It's just good. Slow thinking time for them to become adults and they're going to be privileged enough where like, like mom and dad are actually offering to pay for it, which is a ridiculous privilege.

Right. So you should take it. But that said, if there were an alternative where it's just like, you get this amazing lifelong learning tool. That can replicate or even exceed the quality of education from college. And there's a different kind of path for forming that kind of community and bonds that you get in college, then, then, maybe that is going to be the ideal way to be caught, to transition into adulthood.

Then what we are seeing today, which I would argue is quite broken, inexpensive, or super expensive and unaffordable. And you know, I think creating a lot of havoc when you start your life with so much debt and all that stress, like it's just not like the ideal way to like begin your adulthood here too.

So all of these are kind of the loose mixtures, but that personalization AI learning, I think is the one that gets me so excited right now.

Adam:And are you seeing a pretty big I mean, there's an explosion in AI companies holistically, but are you seeing a pretty big explosion in education and learning and tutoring and that sort of stuff?

Eric: So many of these companies are taking a, their own take at AI education right now, to be honest with you, I'm not investing in any of them really. The reason why is. It's such a thrashy moment right now, sort of like this creative destruction moment I feel like where like certain kinds of companies are innovating very fast, like the open the eyes and tropics and what they're pushing out is that such high velocity is difficult to understand where moats are actually being set and where those boundaries are.

In the case of AI education, I would say that good luck right now, trying to like creating a path that's going to be as differentiated from like open AI, because they're just accelerating so quickly. And but I'm hopeful that it won't just be one player that can win in this space. I hope so.

Adam: When you think about, so you mentioned your younger kid, you think maybe a little too early to be engaging with AI. What is the relationship that you want your own kids to have with technology as they go through their life?

Eric: Yeah. And I think you're actually raising the biggest insecurity that my wife and I have right now. I'm going to admit that since COVID we've been way too lax when it came to devices. My kids are on their iPads way too much. And it's really easy to make excuses for that. You know, my wife and I lead pretty busy work lives as well.

So like we got to take a lot of meetings and just like how TV in the nineties was a, the latch key kid thing that I got to do after latch key you know, I've had to start turning into that too. And I do think that those devices are pernicious in different ways too. And they're sort of designed to be addictive.

And I worry about like, we're fucking up their brains or something. Right. That said, a little part of me is excited. A very small part of me of just like, I don't know where the line is being drawn. I want them to have real engagement with people in the real world, play, play with their hands, like build stuff with Legos.

And we got to find a better method to sort of encourage that. This is kind of like our summer project. Me and my wife to figure out like better rules for how much to engage with these devices, but on the other hand, already, like with my nine year old and six year old, the way that they engage with their devices is just fascinating to watch because I can see that they're going to be so much more sophisticated than me.

Like in the next six months or a year, even right. Just even like when I haven't promises, you really do become like that old person over and over time. Sometimes I'm like struggling with settings on something and my son's like, here, let me just do it. He's just like, does all these things. I'm like, oh my gosh, like I am now like my dad.

Who's just like, how do I turn this thing on? So it's crazy. Right. And And if that's the reality of just having skills like that, of course we want to nurture it. I just don't know where that line is anymore.

Adam: Yeah. That's really interesting. And kind of what YouTube videos are to you, AI could be to your kids, right? Like you, you use that as a reference to figure out how to do stuff and they will probably use AI, which will bring them the video instead of having to go somewhere. So.

Eric: I agree. And so I use YouTube a lot as a search engine and knowledge resource, but you know, there's a lot of crap out there online. It's just like sheer entertainment addiction that my kids, I think like a little bit too much as well. So that's That's the part of me that's like very luddite, which is like, Oh, these damn kids need to go outside, you know, that said though, like, is there a hidden advantage that I just can't see yet?

I'm trying to be open minded to that. Just like how my parents were probably not as open minded to me playing with a computer and playing video games so much when I was a kid or watching so much TV. I think I ended up okay. And I have a little bit of hope that as little humans, they're going to end up okay too, even though I feel like they're doing it a little bit too much.

Adam:So you hinted at this about 10, 15 minutes ago but I wanted to ask you how you recharge your batteries or center yourself. I'm thinking it has something to do with car racing, but tell me, I mean, do you read books? Do you listen to music? Do you go out and race cars? Is that the way that you do it? Tell me about that.

Eric: Yeah. So, and this actually is more of a newer thing for me. I'll start with this and I, I think this is a lot of your audience. Maybe yourself too, Adam can relate to this. When you have young kids, sometimes as a dad, you feel a lot of guilt. You might have like hobbies like golf or cycling or high performance driving.

That was my son over there. And you know, it takes a lot of time to do these things. So for me, I start to fall into the trap of like, there's an opportunity cost. I could spend four hours doing this thing, or I could be spending time with my kids or giving my wife a break or, you know, doing something else.

And in the last two years or so, there's something that has changed that my wife reminded me, but also my kids have reminded me. As I started to get into high performance driving, this is in like the last two, three years or so, like this is track driving with like a fast car and all that stuff, it takes a full day for me to do this thing, like I go to a track early in the morning, two hours away, and then I come back really late at night, and I feel guilty about it.

My wife was just like, I want you to do this because you like it. And then my older son also says the same thing. It's like, I want you to do this because it's really cool for you. Right. And then you start to kind of believe it of just like, oh, they want me to be happy because they just want me to be happy.

You're right. And so I'm the one that's painting the prison for myself. Right. So. This may not be as easy to do when your kid's like six months old or two years old. Logistically, you probably have to, you know, sacrifice something for that. Not everything though, but once I gave myself permission because my family gave me permission.

Yeah, high performance driving is my thing. So, you know, I once took a course on like driving really fast around a track at Sonoma Raceway. I was completely hooked on it. I'm a huge F1 fan. I love actually all racing formats. Now. I just recently bought a gaming device so I can get into iRacing, which is a little bit more convenient to just get in a quick race.

There's a little bit of a rig over there that you can't see. You can see the pulsing computer, though, that I just set up. And I find it to be the coolest hobby ever for a very specific reason. One is that when you feel the vibration, noise, going like 140 miles an hour down the street, it is actually all consuming how much your senses are taken over by it. Too though, and this is where it becomes really meditative. You cannot afford to not pay attention. If you don't pay attention at that speed, miss your breaking point, you actually could go into wall and die or injure yourself or fuck up your car, which is almost like the worst thing that could happen about three things.

So for me, like if you have to have a hundred percent concentration when you're done with like your 20 minute sessions of track driving, they're usually 20 minutes at a time. It feels like you've taken like a mental shower. It's like, all I could have thought about right now is how awesome it was driving this car super fast and just paying attention on how to get faster.

And it has been wonderful. My racing career is actually pretty nascent. I'm going to do more competitive racing on iRacing, which is an online thing. And then eventually I'm going to do very slow racing with like a MX 5 Cup Series or GR86 Cup Series or something like that. These are basically like much slower cars.

It's sort of like doing like the 50cc races with Mario Kart. That's my level of risk at this point, yeah.

Adam: That's awesome. What a fascinating hobby too. It's almost what you were describing there. It's almost like a flow state that you get into when you're out on the, when you're out on the track. Right. And that focus

Eric: Absolutely and the whole production Adam is like, you know, the whole production behind this too is just you know, there's very few things I like to wake up for. I'm not a morning person, but when I know it's a track day, I will wake up at 4:30 in the morning to drive to Sonoma and I'm just excited and happy the entire time there.

And I feel so blessed that there is a hobby that exists that makes me feel this way. And now the way I justify it to my family, especially to my kids is like, when you're an adult, I want you to feel the way I feel about your thing that you love to do just for yourself. And if you can find that and make sure that it's really clear that you need to integrate that into your life.

Then I think that's just going to be good for everyone around you too. So that's how I justify it to myself now too.

Adam: Okay. I wanted to ask you two final questions before our really quick rapid fire round. One is what is a mistake that you've made as a father?

Eric: I think I still make this mistake, which is using my device in front of my kids when it should be family time. So if it's like after dinner or something, and we're watching a movie or something, I always have my device on me and I'm checking mail and sending messages and I need to stop that because I do think it's imprinting the wrong kind of antisocial behavior to my kids.

Adam: Hmm. That's a good, that's a good one. One that I'll probably all of us could benefit from. Last question for you. How can people follow along in your journey or be helpful to you? Okay.

Eric: Yeah. Well, first of all thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to chat about these kinds of topics and you really know how to hold space and make me feel seen. So I so appreciate this.

I'm really active on social media. You can follow me on X slash Twitter. I'm just Eric Bahn ERIC BAHN. I tweet way too much. That's probably the easiest way to serve. Follow some of my real time thinking when it comes to work or F1 racing or track driving or anything else that's kind of on my mind. I try to really just like dump my thoughts as my public diary there.

Adam: Yeah. Awesome. I will make sure that we link to that in the show notes and impossible to not know that you're very into racing. If you get lost on your Twitter feed, which is what I did for at least a half hour, 45 minutes looking at your stuff.

Eric: Yea. My apologies for that. Yea.

Adam: It's okay. I it's research for the pod. So, all right. Are you ready for the rapid fire round?

We will be quick!

Eric: Yes, sir.

Adam: So here we go. What is the most indispensable parenting product that you have ever purchased?

Eric: Squatty potty.

Adam: We'll link to that. What is the most useless parenting product that you've ever purchased?

Eric: I think white clothes

Adam: Finish this sentence. The ideal day with my kids involves this one activity.

Eric: Getting bagels in the morning.

Adam: Nice. What is the best piece of parenting advice that you've ever received?

Eric: Take a lot of even the bad times.

Adam: Okay. Speaking of which, what's the most frustrating thing that's ever happened to you as a dad?

Eric: One time on a flight, my son vomited and diarrhea’d on my lap and I had four more hours to go. I was not very happy that day.

Adam: What was the most embarrassing thing that you have ever done in front of your kids?

Eric: I am that dad and my wife is that mom on the sidelines of the soccer games. We don't get into fights with anyone, but we are cheering the loudest and saying, that is my son!

Adam: Awesome. Have you ever secretly thrown away a piece of your kid's artwork?

Eric: Almost every day.

Adam: What is the most absurd thing that your kid has ever asked you to buy for them?

Eric: Yeah, we went to a museum once and they saw a sculpture that was $800, 000 and they asked me to buy it for them.

Adam: Awesome. What is the most difficult kids TV show that you've ever had to sit through?

Eric: Anything Cocomelon.

Adam: Oh, Cocomelon is a fan anti favorite. I will say, have you ever used your kids as an excuse to get out of a social event? What is your favorite kids movie?

Eric: That's a good one. I really love a lot of them. Still one of my favorite movies even before kids, Ratatouille.

Adam: Oh, just watched that recently. Again. Amazing film. What is the worst experience that you have ever had assembling a kid's toy or a piece of furniture

Eric: Yea. There was one specific IKEA cabinet set for my daughter's room that was the worst piece of shit ever. It was so hard.

Adam: With the little dowels that you probably had to like put in? And, oh

Eric: Screws were missing, like shit like that.

Adam: Yep. Yep. How long can a piece of food sit on the floor and you will still eat it?

Eric: If it's Cheerios, like, weeks, no problem.

Adam: What nostalgic movie can you just not wait to force your kids to watch with you?

Eric: The Rock.

Adam: How often do you tell your kids back in my day stories?

Eric: Every week.

Adam: How many of those involve snow because you're from Michigan?

Eric: Once a month.

Adam: Okay. And finally, and I've been waiting for this question for almost an hour and a half. Your LinkedIn profile lists you as a minivan enthusiast.

What is your take on minivans.

Eric: I love them. One time, this guy insulted me for driving a minivan, just some random dude on the street, and tried to say emasculating things. And I thought about it and I was like, the irony behind this is I have a minivan because I helped make children, which is maybe one of the more manly things that you can do.

What if I reinvented the entire image of minivans and just made this my identity, that was seven years ago.

Adam: Proud minivan owner. Awesome. The only thing that could be even better is if you told me you own two a minivan inside a minivan. All right, Eric, this was awesome. Way to end on a high note with that minivan enthusiasm. Thank you so much for joining me on the show and I appreciate you sharing everything that you did.

Eric: Adam, it was such a blast. Thank you so much for putting this show together. You're going to have another new listener that's religiously listening. That's me. So thanks for all that you do.

Adam: Thank you for listening to today's conversation with Eric Bahn.

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