Props with Pop

Back to back interview sessions! This week Becs wanted to explore the other side of the grandparent perspective. Becs interviewed mom for this grandmotherly episode. We laugh, we cry and we talk about all the wonderful things about raising a little baby in a loving family. 

Here are the questions I asked mom:

• When you first found out you were going to be a grandmother, where were you and what do you remember thinking in that exact moment?
• Did the news hit you more emotionally, practically, or somewhere in between?
• Was there a moment when it really clicked for you that this was your new title and your new role?
• How has becoming a grandmother brought you back to memories of when you first became a mother?
• Did this milestone make you feel older, wiser, more excited, or a mix of all three?
• Has becoming a grandmother changed the way you think about time and how fast life moves?
• What is your favorite part of being a grandmother that surprised you the most?
• What do you hope your grandchild will always remember about you as their grandmother?
• What values, traditions, or life lessons are most important for you to pass down as a grandmother?
• What is something you appreciate about being a grandmother that you couldn't fully appreciate when you were busy raising children?
• Do you think becoming a grandmother has changed the way you look at your own kids as adults?
• If you could describe this chapter of becoming a grandmother in one sentence, what would you say?

Thanks for tuning in for this family-centric episode. If you have a story you want Props with Pop to cover, please email us at [email protected]. 

Follow us on social:

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• Facebook: PropswithPop
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• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

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Welcome back to Props with Pop! This episode is a very special one today, Becs sat down with Pops for a grandfather interview. Bec’s sister Sam recently gave birth to a little boy, and the whole family is overjoyed.

Becs wanted to know how pops felt about the whole experience and asked the following questions: 

• When you first found out you were going to be a grandfather, where were you and what do you remember thinking in that exact moment?
• Did the news hit you more emotionally, practically, or somewhere in between?
• Was there a moment when it really clicked for you that this was your new title and your new role?
• How does becoming a grandfather feel different from the season of life when you first became a dad?
• Did this milestone make you feel older, wiser, more excited, or a mix of all three?
• Has becoming a grandfather changed the way you think about time and how fast life moves?
• Do you think grandparents get to experience family in a more relaxed way than parents do?
• What feels like the biggest privilege of being a grandfather?
• Has stepping into this role made you think differently about the kind of example you want to set now?
• Do you think becoming a grandfather has changed the way you look at your own kids as adults?
• If you could describe this chapter of becoming a grandfather in one sentence, what would you say?

Thanks for tuning in for this family-centric episode. If you have a story you want Props with Pop to cover, please email us at [email protected]. 

Follow us on social:

• Instagram: PropswithPop
• Facebook: PropswithPop
• Reddit: PropswithPop
• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome back to Props with Pop! Today we are discussing burn out stories people wrote into us. Burn out is a very real feeling we all experience, especially in high intense and high pressure roles, but it can happen to anyone. Some solutions Becs & Pops talk about are staying hydrated during long shifts, talking to experienced people in your industry who have handled it well, and setting clear boundaries between your work life and your personal life. 

Here are the stories we talk about:

1. Megan, 29F nurse, experiencing burn out. How do you know when you are just normal tired from being an adult versus actually heading into burnout? And how do you stop feeling bad for not having the same energy you used to?
2. Carlos, 38M truck driver, experiencing financial panic. How do you keep rising prices from taking over your whole mindset? How do you stay calm and not live in constant financial panic when everything feels expensive all at once?
3. Tara, 22F freshly graduated student, feeling behind applying for jobs. How do you keep from feeling down when life feels paused and everyone else seems to be moving? How do you stay hopeful in a chapter that feels so uncertain?
4. Darrell, 47M dad of a teenager, feeling easily irritated about the small stuff. How do you get back to gratitude when negativity starts feeling like your default setting? How do you change your mindset without forcing it or pretending life is perfect?
5. Linda, 56F looking for purpose after being an empty nester. What do you do when you are not falling apart, but you are also not okay? How do you climb out of that quiet kind of sadness before it becomes your normal?

If you have resonated with any of these stories, please email us at [email protected]. 

Follow us on social:

• Instagram: PropswithPop
• Facebook: PropswithPop
• Reddit: PropswithPop
• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week on Props with Pop, Becs & Pops are wrapping up their deep dive into Ruthless River by Holly FitzGerald. Picking up on on February 23rd, 1973, Holly and Fitz are five days stranded in a flooded Amazon forest, trapped in a dead end logjam, their Pink Palace barely holding together. 

Planes have passed overhead without turning back. Escape attempts have looped them in circles. By the time this episode begins, survival is no longer about reaching Riberalta, Bolivia. It is about making it through one more day.

In this episode, we cover:

• Repeated swim and paddle attempts through the submerged Amazon forest that brings them right back to where they started
• Rationing sugar by teaspoons and stretching coffee into pure morale
• Eating frogs, snails, berries, and eventually baby birds in a devastating moral crossroads
• Fitz losing his wedding ring in the river and breaking down
• Severe physical deterioration as they grow skeletal, dizzy, and dangerously weak
• Storms and swarms of bees battering their fragile Pink Palace
• The moment two Indigenous turtle hunters finally discover them on Day 26

After their rescue and recovery, they made the remarkable decision to continue their yearlong honeymoon, traveling across Europe, Asia, and Africa before eventually returning home to build their life and family. What an incredible story. 

If you have a story you want Props with Pop to cover, please email us at [email protected]. 

Follow us on social:

• Instagram: PropswithPop
• Facebook: PropswithPop
• Reddit: PropswithPop
• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In Part 2 of our deep dive into Ruthless River by Holly FitzGerald, we pick up with Holly and Gerald William FitzGerald drifting down the Madre de Dios River, still riding the high of survival and convinced the river is guiding them safely toward Riberalta, Bolivia.

Before the chaos unfolds, we explore the river itself. The Madre de Dios, meaning Mother of God, was once called Amarumayo, the River of the Serpents, by Indigenous communities because of its twisting, unpredictable path. It stretches more than 700 miles through Peru and Bolivia and ultimately feeds into the greater Amazon basin. It is powerful, remote, and anything but forgiving.

What begins in “Huck Finn mode,” inspired by Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, quickly unravels.

In this episode, we cover:

• Being shot at by border guards when arriving at the Heath River checkpoint in the dark
• An invasive search that leaves them shaken and without key supplies
• Brutal heat that turns the Pink Palace into a floating oven
• A violent nighttime storm that rips their shelter apart and fire ants
• Getting swept into a flooded dead end logjam with almost no food left
• Abandoning the Pink Palace to paddle for survival on a tiny raft
• Spotting a plane overhead that never circles back

By February 23rd, they are five days stranded, starving, exhausted, and clinging to hope.

Part 3 is where everything changes.

Follow us on social:

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• Facebook: PropswithPop
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• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, we’re diving into the unbelievable true survival story told in Ruthless River by Holly FitzGerald, a book I truly could not put down. It is an exciting, heart pounding, and deeply inspiring account of how a dream honeymoon turned into a fight for survival in the Amazon jungle. 

Holly and her husband, Gerald William FitzGerald, known as Fitz, set out to travel the world on a modest budget. They never imagined that their trip of a lifetime could have been their last.

Before we get into the chaos of the jungle, we are unpacking the backstory of Holly and Fitz. From a chance meeting at a Halloween party in Boston in 1969 to marrying just five months later, their love story is bold from the very beginning. 

They saved carefully from their modest jobs, Holly as a counselor and teacher and Fitz as a journalist, in order to fund a yearlong honeymoon traveling the globe. What started as an ambitious backpacking journey through South America slowly transformed into something far more dangerous.

In Part 1, we cover the major turning points that shifted their honeymoon into survival mode:

• Fighting through a desperate crowd to secure seats on a small plane leaving the Peruvian jungle
• Surviving a terrifying plane crash landing in a remote clearing
• Discovering that the crash site was actually a Peruvian penal colony surrounded by some of the country’s most dangerous inmates
• Realizing they had missed the last commercial boat out of Puerto Maldonado
• Making the bold decision to build a handmade raft and float nearly 500 miles down the Madre de Dios River

By the end of this episode, Holly and Fitz are launching their bright pink tarp covered raft, “The Pink Palace,” into a rising and unpredictable river, convinced it will carry them safely to Bolivia. What they do not yet understand is that the river has other plans.

Part 2 covers their first five days on the river. Part 3 dives into the unimaginable ordeal that followed and the rescue that brought them home.

Follow us on social:

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• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome back to Props with Pop where we are currently on part 2 of discussing the famous book, How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie. In part 1, we discussed the many genuine ways in which we can win friends, and in this episode, we are going to discuss the ways in which we can genuinely influence people, with respect and trust. 

In this second part, we discuss the following themes & examples:

• Why Winning an Argument Often Costs More Than It Gives
• Benjamin Franklin and Avoiding Arguments
• The Strength of Admitting You Are Wrong
• Admitting Mistakes Quickly
• Helping People Feel Like the Idea Is Theirs
• Letting Others Feel Ownership
• Encouragement Changes People More Than Criticism
• Praise Progress, Not Perfection
• Showing Sympathy First
• Giving People a Fine Reputation

Then Becs & Pops answer some write-in stories related to the book:

1. Emily, 22 - College senior, part-time barista
2. Jake, 27 - Sales coordinator, first corporate job
3. Sarah, 19 - First year college student
4. Ryan, 30 - New dad, project manager
5. Olivia, 24 - Marketing assistant, hybrid work schedule

Follow us on social:

• Instagram: PropswithPop
• Facebook: PropswithPop
• Reddit: PropswithPop
• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Happy to announce this is our 50th episode! What an accomplishment, half way to 100, it’s been lovely to record with my pops. Wanted to start 50 with a bang by discussing one of my favorite books, How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie. 

In this first part, we discussed the following topics to help you create long lasting friendships:

• Why simple kindness still matters
• Why Criticism Rarely Changes People
• Theodore Roosevelt’s Father and the Power of Encouragement
• The Quiet Power of Feeling Appreciated
• Charles Schwab and the Power of Praise
• Being Interested Instead of Trying to Be Interesting
• Theodore Roosevelt and Genuine Interest
• Small Gestures That Make People Feel Seen
• The Impact of a Smile

Follow us on social:

• Instagram: PropswithPop
• Facebook: PropswithPop
• Reddit: PropswithPop
• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome back to Props with Pop! Wanted to piggyback off of our first episode of 2026 with new year resolutions write-ins. Thank you everyone who submitted, we appreciate it! Here are the topics discussed today:

• Amelia, 27: My New Year goal is pretty basic: I want to move my body consistently and stop falling off after a few weeks…
• Lucas, 32: This year my goal is to get better with money, saving more and being more intentional instead of just hoping it works out…
• Jordan, 24: My resolution this year is to eat healthier and feel better day to day, but I get overwhelmed really fast…
• Kelsey, 36: This year I decided my main goal is taking better care of my mental health… 
• Marcus, 39: I’m 39 and this year I want to make time for personal growth again reading more and finally learning guitar like I’ve always said I would…
• Similarity of goals 

It’s an interesting conversation and we are curious if anyone has resonated with this before, we encourage you to write to us at [email protected]. 

Follow us on social:

• Instagram: PropswithPop
• Facebook: PropswithPop
• Reddit: PropswithPop
• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome back to Props with Pop and welcome to 2026! We are officially in season three of the show, which is wild considering we launched back in January of 2024. Becs and Pops kick things off by recapping what 2025 brought them, including a new house and a new marriage, two pretty exciting milestones. From there, they talk about what people are actually striving for in 2026 and wrap things up with a simple and tangible way to put those goals into action by creating punch cards.

What other people are striving for:

1. Exercise, Healthy Eating, and Physical Health
2. Financial Goals
3. Mental Health & Well-Being

How to Start a Punch Card at Home:

Here’s a quick starter guide for someone curious:

• Step 1 — Pick a Specific Habit
• Step 2 — Make the Card
• Step 3 — Track Progress
• Step 4 — Add Rewards

Optional but motivating:

• Finish 30 workouts → new sneakers
• 20 home-cooked meals → dinner out
• Rewards help reinforce follow-through

It’s an interesting conversation and we are curious if anyone has resonated with this before, we encourage you to write to us at [email protected]. 

Follow us on social:

• Instagram: PropswithPop
• Facebook: PropswithPop
• Reddit: PropswithPop
• X: @TotalGDaddyMove
• Gmail: [email protected] 

Podcast theme music by Transistor.fm.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.