All right, everybody, welcome to the Other People podcast, a weekly program featuring in-depth interviews with today's leading writers.

I'm Brad Listy. I'm your host. I'm in Los Angeles. Thanks for being here. I appreciate it. Don't forget to hit the subscribe button wherever you listen. You can also subscribe on YouTube. Follow me on social media, blue sky and Instagram. Maybe TikTok, though it seems like TikTok might go away. I don't know what's going on.

And it's obviously been a crazy few days here in Los Angeles. I would be remiss if I didn't mention the fires that have torn through multiple communities within the city and have been just awful to behold.

Skies filled with smoke and pollution and God knows what entire communities just wiped out. of houses thousands of families left homeless

and with just like the clothes on their backs it's been wild and 2025 so far this year has been wild

i'm recording this and we're in January.

We're not even halfway through January.

There's already been like a terrorist attack on Bourbon Street in New Orleans.

Some crazy person driving a pickup truck at high speed down Bourbon Street at 3 o'clock in the morning.

Some guy blew himself up in a cyber truck outside the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas.

And now we have these fires.

I've got to say, like I expected 2025 to be a horror show.

And so far, we're exceeding my expectations

I was joking with a friend because I have to find like some kind of dark humor

like joking with a friend that I you know like I forgot how much I missed masking in fear putting on an

N95 to walk the dog and I've also been joking that I've been keeping like an Excel spreadsheet

keeping a list of everybody who has texted me to check in to see if I'm okay. Because, you know, if you start to think about it, you're like, wow, I'm living in an urban inferno in a disaster zone.

If people that you think are your friends aren't checking in with you when this kind of thing is happening, maybe they don't really like you.

I mean, it seems like a pretty good litmus test, doesn't it?

But, you know, I say this and I should also mention that my own sister didn't reach out to me until today.

So I guess it's complicated.

Maybe people feel like you might be busy. They don't want to bother you with text messages while the world is burning. I don't know. But suffice it to say it's been brutal.

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