Episode 106 - Inside the Big Wins: Gabe Norcross on Squeaky Floors & Hidden Time Capsules
Episode #106 | Inside the Big Wins | Gabe Norcross on Squeaky Floors & Hidden Time Capsules
Mark brought Gabe back to Mysa Hus one more time to talk about the thing that actually makes a house feel like a home, and it is not the granite. They dig into why cracked plaster is a compliment, why Gabe writes hidden notes inside the walls he builds, and why Mark thinks every builder is secretly a choir conductor. It ends on a tattered flag analogy that will hit different if you have ever weathered a storm of your own.
About The Curious Builder
The host of the Curious Builder Posdast is Mark D. Williams, the founder of Mark D. Williams Custom Homes Inc. They are an award-winning Twin Cities-based home builder, creating quality custom homes and remodels — one-of-a-kind dream homes of all styles and scopes. Whether you’re looking to reimagine your current space or start fresh with a new construction, we build homes that reflect how you live your everyday life.
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Mark D. Williams 00:04
No story is is done alone in a vacuum. People, if you're an author, you're influenced by your life and other people around you. In this story of this home, this story, while I'm a character in it, literally this affected 1000s of people, which is pretty humbling, but also really encouraging because you realize like this is the voice of a choir. Today, the Cures Builder podcast we had Gabe back. We you'll notice he's been here three weeks in a row. This one we talk all about Misuhu's storytelling and really the power of multiple people being along for the ride. Without further ado, here's Gabe Norcross. Welcome to Curious Builder Podcast. I'm Mark Williams, your host. Today we're on a rainy day at Misahoos, and no one is showing up to our open house right now. We had 91 people, so I thought. I mean, I've got an expert World Crafts craftsman here, Gabe. You flew all the way up here from Louisville. We heard your Monday story. We've done two losers or winners stories. Let's dial into the craft, and obviously it's a little bit of a self promotion. But I want your honest feedback. You've seen me. We're recording in Misuhus. You saw it yesterday on a sunny day. You've seen obviously what I've been doing for two. Well, you haven't known me for that long. Call it a year. You've seen me give my presentation at at both contractor coalitions. You saw me do the initial brand one with Nick and about White 45 White Oak and Misu, who is back in Chicago. Then in Denver, I did a solo one just about how a brand story house. I mean, how much has changed for me in those six months from one presentation to the next. And then the last part is just I did that keynote speech twice on boundaries, great freedom. All of that, the audience isn't going to know all those things, but some of them will. I'm just curious, from your point of view, now that you're in this house, what are some things that stand out? What are some things that you've noticed about the story, how we've marketed it? What are some things that you've seen that you mentioned in a text yesterday? Like, you know, the brain is starting. Like, you're already thinking about how this may or may not either impact your business or things that you want to do. I'd just love to hear it for me, but obviously for the audience too. That's why we're recording. What are some feedbacks or things that you've seen or observations that you've sort of made in this last, call it eight nine months of observing our business, Mark Williams Custom Homes, as well as you know Misuhu specifically, since you're sitting in the sunroom right now.
Gabe Norcross 02:30
Yeah, I like the whole business model of a brand or Story House was something other people did. The builders that are have very large social media presence have partnerships. Those are those other people do those types of projects, and then you realize, oh, people you know do those types of projects, but also it's possible to do these types of projects, like anybody can create the relationships. You have put the work in. Anybody can create the relationships to do these projects. But there's also opportunity out there to do them. Where I think as builders, we're like, oh, we got to find a client, and they have to pay us, and we build this product, and that's it. And we move on to the next one. We move on the next one, I'm always trying to use best practices. I want to use the best products that we can for the applications of the the project we're building, but I purchase it at the lumberyard down the street. I'm not talking to the manufacturer. the the The company reps or the company owners aren't coming to my project, and we're walking through process on why this product was designed a certain way, what its actual job is to do on a home, and especially on this one with the wellness aspect, it's like we want to know more than just like, oh, this is a wellness product, great, let's slap it on the side of the house. What was the intention around creating this company and this product that we're going to put in here, because that's the story behind. That's that is you know one chapter of the whole story, and humans love stories. Like there's a connection, a deeper connection when there's a story behind something.
Mark D. Williams 04:17
Stories are sticky. I've always loved. I mean, I've loved books. I've read books my whole life. I mean, we bonded. One of our first biggest bonding moments was over Louis the Moor. I thought everyone read Louis the Moor. Turns out that's not true. There are Louis the Moor, Archie comics. There are some things that are just true as time is true. And anyway, but the point about storytelling is, I remember back from history class. Do you remember what the A Troubadour was so troubadour was before there was written language, I believe, or even if there was, not that many people could read and write. But people, ordors, storytellers would go town to town, village to village. They would be put up at like a bar or an inn, and they would share the news through storytelling, through song. I mean, one of the things that music. That is so strong. Is I mean, think about like some crazy songs, like you remember from the '90s. Like, how in the world can you remember lyrics from a song in high school? I can't remember what my wife told me to do this morning, but I can remember. You know, actually, you know what the first song
Gabe Norcross 05:15
when it comes on the radio, you sing along like yes, you don't miss a beat. You know every word. You may not think of it now, but as soon as it comes on, on
Mark D. Williams 05:21
123, If I had to tell you right now to sing a whole song, be in the end. What would it be? 123,
Gabe Norcross 05:26
Ice Ice Baby. I was gonna
Mark D. Williams 05:27
say baby got back. Or yeah, no, I like Big Butts. Yeah, yeah, that would do. It was like that was so strong in high school. But anyway, like the the point of we got completely off the rails here. Typical. But the point of what I'm saying about storytelling is that we are preconditioned as humans to love stories. That they're they're sticky. I find that I have a hard time remembering people's names. I never forget people's faces. I'm really good at facial recognition. Like I don't know if yesterday when we had lunch, did you see me say hi to that couple? I had no idea what their names. I've seen them at every one of my show homes. I know who they. I know they know who I am, and I always see them at my homes. I'm like, "Hey, great to see you! And it's not one of those fake ones. It's like I know I've seen them before. I just can't tell you their name. But where I'm going with this is like stories. Like you can recall details. And I actually picked up this book. I haven't read it yet. About have you heard much about memory palaces? How you can like actually create? I should actually. Well, I guess we're here now. We'll keep going down this 88th tree here. But like a really good friend of mine, you know Greg Swenson, Laura Swenson's younger brother. You probably don't know them, but anyway, long story short, he set out to memorize the Bible, and memorize the Bible word for word, and he made it. I think through the whole Old Testament. I haven't checked with him a couple years, but there's a thing like you ever seen these people that do like memory competitions. So you build like let's use the room we're sitting in. It's a and and you come up with the formulaic way. So you usually they tell you to to remember your favorite like your childhood memory, whatever your strongest memory of like home that you grew up in. So you close your eyes and you picture exactly the home. I can picture mine right now, and then when you walk in the front door, you arrange things in each room. So, like if you walk, there's actually a pattern to this. So you'd walk into the room, let's say into the sunroom, and the left wall. Let's just pick Psalms 23 because it's the famous one Bible verses here. But it would be like you know, the Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. And like each wall will have a like a like a word or a number, and then this wall gets painted with all the verses, and that's you start laying it down. There's actually like a numerical, mathematical way to remember stuff. I've not gone too far down the road, but I was like, when I he told me about them, like it actually makes sense. But like it it comes from a picture, and where we started here with storytelling. Storytelling is so sticky, and the reason we did Misa Hus was a variety of reasons, but the biggest one being is that I think spec home builders, when you build a home for everyone, you build the house for no one. You know the lumberyard is a great place to pick up materials, but it's a bad place to create a home. When I say like it's not specific enough, there's no story there. It can be anything. You mentioned the previous episode that one of the coolest things one one of the coolest things that you enjoy is when people come in, you know you drop off the lumber a week later you built it, but you building it is the story. The material is just the assets. That's the words on a page. It's no different than like a book. Like any book could be any novel, but how you construct them and put them together that's the art. And so, anyway, creating a story house. I was talking to Nick Schifrin, the Monocraftsman, about it, and he had not heard that phrase before. And now I've affectionately called Misu as a story house. I mean, I won't build a spec home again without doing it this way.
Gabe Norcross 08:35
I don't know how you could. I couldn't go back.
Mark D. Williams 08:37
I can't go back.
Gabe Norcross 08:39
It's when you taste something of that's so so good, it's like why would you want to go put slap gray walls? Let's do let's do off white trim and and gray walls again, and the richness of just the textures, like bringing it back to what I feel when I walk through this house and how I, how I think most people will feel like you can see in the textures that hands created everything in here, like it was not done like it was done in a factory. So you can feel the love and energy that was put into each product, the trim, the casing on that wall, the softness of the wood because it's linseed oil and not a varnish that was sprayed on. It feels like it wants to pull you in and tell you a story, and that it's so rare. Like you don't walk in most houses, and it's furnished too. It's furnished in a way like that it wants you to just come down and sit sit inside of it and and relax and absorb what it has to offer.
Mark D. Williams 09:43
You mentioned something yesterday when we were going back for lunch. What did you say about the wood floor? Oh, that a lot of wood floors feel perfect.
Gabe Norcross 09:50
Yeah.
Mark D. Williams 09:50
But it had an organic. What was the word you used? A very no one had described it that way before, and you nailed it perfectly. Do you remember exactly how you said it?
Gabe Norcross 09:59
Yeah. I think I made the analogy like, like if you're gonna you get a new car, you're gonna park it down at the edge of the lot because you don't want anybody to ding it. Like these houses, you could move into this, and the floor has already aged. Like it, it looks like it's been here for 100 years, and that that feeling of like I can just move and live in this house feels. I don't have to protect this perfect thing and keep it so it's pristine. It's you can move in and just be comfortable and live.
Mark D. Williams 10:26
I mean, it's funny, and well, I think why I smiled when you said that is that was it was awesome. I mean, you're a master craftsman, you know that. But I also like that you you were able to articulate it in a different way. But people, there's a book by Malcolm Gladwell called blink, which basically we underestimate our ability to quickly size things up, like very quickly, like blink in a blink of an eye, you can feel something. And when the whole goal with this home originally was Maya Angelou's quote, which is people forget what you say, but they never forget how you make them feel. And for decades, we've always built really high-end quality homes for our clients. And when people would come through our artisan homes or parade homes, they would always say, "There's something different about your homes. And I used to not like that compliment because it wasn't specific enough. And now I realize it's actually one of the highest compliments I can get. It's no different than someone came in and say, "Like Gabe, I don't know what it is about you that I like. You just make me feel comfortable. That like your intuition is telling you that this is a safe person to look at kids. Not every kid will go to you know to every person, especially the little little ones. Like they have to feel there's something special about certain people, and there's certain something special about certain homes. I didn't know if we could do that. I had a feeling we could because we'd already done it unintentionally, just through good work and craftsmanship. This was creating a story from top to bottom, the story, the character in the story, which was our family, and then the story of wellness, which was kind of the last piece. All of those together created something that was meant to be organic, kind of something that could antique and age. You know, I think actually age is beautiful. I look at my grandma who passed away a couple months. She was 99. To me, she was the most beautiful woman I'd seen. She's just beautiful. She was radiant in her age, and I think you know we our culture celebrates things that are new. Go over to Europe. Tell me you don't love one of their old broken-down villas, the cracked plaster. I already know what I'm going to say when someone moves into this house and says they call me and they're like, "Hey, Mark, the plaster's cracking. Good, it's supposed to. Perfect. It's finally doing what it was meant to do. That's patina. It's like crow's feet. You know, when people talk to your face, it's
Gabe Norcross 12:28
settling into its new home. Like this is its footprint. It's settling in, and it's gonna. I. My house still pops every now and again, and I love it because my floors squeak. You in California that bugged me. Like when I did a project, the amount of labor and effort we would put in to make floors not squeak because my clients didn't want it. Like I can't put any more nails in your your one inch oak because there's more nails than wood showing. Like it does not. That is not the the issue that we're trying to solve. But I walk to the kitchen at 2o'clock in the morning to let the dogs out or or get a glass of water. It's like squeak, squeak, and I love it. It is actually makes me feel like my house is my home now.
Mark D. Williams 13:16
This episode is brought to you by Pella Windows and Doors. I've used Pella for 21 years as the exclusive window company on every one of my builds, when people ask me who I trust for windows and doors, it's Pella. Every time, their craftsmanship, their innovation, the top-tier service make them a no-brainer for any custom home builder or designer who demand the best. Whether you're designing something bold or building something with timeless elegance, Pella has you covered. They're also the only window company that has a lifetime warranty on all of their windows. I've gotten to know all their people at Pella Corporate as well as locally here at Pella Northland. I'm proud to call them our partners and our friends. Visit Pella.com to learn more and connect with your local reps today. For more information, you can also listen to Episode One, where I interview the Pella Northland founders, as well as episode 109, where we talk all about their latest innovation with the steady set window. You know, it's funny is like you know when you do break, and obviously we tried not to do that in a new construction, but that is character. That is a story. This home in particular was built to combat. I think if people have listened to four of our episodes now, they clearly know we have you know what'd you call it neurodivergent.
Gabe Norcross 14:25
Neurodivergent.
Mark D. Williams 14:26
I love that word. Makes it sound like you're really like it's a superpower. Ah, it's very fancy. But I actually sound was one of my number. I went down a wormhole on sound. I picked triple pane windows now for energy efficiency for sound, and you know I have 16th inch rubber beneath all the wood floors in this house to stop like the pounding of feet with little kids. You know the squeaking thing. That's what made me think of it. Is because like we live in a 1919 house. It'll be nice when the kids get in middle school or high school if they try to sneak out. Yeah, because the top three the top three stairs all squeak. It's like a alarm defense system. That's actually. It
Gabe Norcross 15:00
might be like a very specific design detail that you that would be totally
Mark D. Williams 15:04
less like a hair tripwire, but you know, sound is such a big thing, and so I think because it's hard for I don't know about for you, I'm guessing it's the case. It's hard for me to be quiet or alone with my thoughts. Again, that's why I exercise so much because that flow state, or by physically exerting myself, I'm able to quiet my mind.
Gabe Norcross 15:23
Yeah,
Mark D. Williams 15:24
because you're devoting so much energy to another thing that it sort of like counteracts it. Yeah, but anyway, a house can do that too. I think people there are certain people that like why do we feel good about certain people? You and I, I don't actually. This is meant I guess it's getting way more emotional than than probably either of us know how to. At least I'm not trained as a sociology. But like, why do certain people make you feel comfortable? I don't know the answer. There are certain people. The moment you meet them, you that you know they're your person. You instinctively feel that. There are certain homes that when you walk into them, you're like, I could live here. You could spend the next hour, three hours, 60 days, trying to justify what you intuitively knew in a blink of an eye.
Gabe Norcross 16:10
There's homes that I have forgot. I probably remember their addresses if I really thought about it. But I, I went in, did something, and I left. There's a house in San Francisco. It's a 12,000 square foot Victorian, and I worked on it for eight years. I touched every room in that house, and just we did a full renovation, and then we just fixed. I just kind of kept her going, kept her her wheels greased, and just made sure like that she was well maintained.
Mark D. Williams 16:35
Is her the house?
Gabe Norcross 16:36
Yes. Okay.
Mark D. Williams 16:37
Yeah. Her. Yes.
Gabe Norcross 16:38
And like I opened up a wall, found the original doors that were that had been taken out, and I reinstalled them. Like in the house, I had moldings reshaped, I had horsehair corbels made to match at the 45 feet off the ground, and I just like I took care of this house. It just went on the San. It became the San Francisco Showcase House, and so 25 designers came in and redid the entire thing, and my heart hurt watching them paint the cedar, the old growth cedar coffered ceiling in the entryway. They painted it white, and it was like I was watching this unfold on Instagram, and I started talking to the designers, and I'm like, just so you know, behind that wall is this, or there's an actual old sunroom ceilings up. I bet they loved it. They engaged with you. Yeah, they did. I gave them a bunch of nuggets and like, and some of my stuff is still stayed. They didn't touch it, and which is cool that I got to watch it. But the emotional journey I went on watching him change this house, I've never had that effect before. I've never had that that that happen to me because no one's ever showed me or videotaped the actual renovation of a project that I was so ingrained with, and but that's the emotional journey that a house can bring you on.
Mark D. Williams 17:48
You know, I was just thinking while you were chatting about that is that there's no question, and we used to have this early tagline was the difference between a house and a home is you, and I think that's true. I mean, the people like I, you mentioned homes. I think the homes that stand out to me, the home is more forgettable. It's the clients I worked with that I remember the most, and I. It's not surprising I like people, and I remember this one client, beautiful person, and she had a kind of a national builder home. They had done very well in life, and they were building a beautiful home for their young family, and she was in the great room, and she started crying. And I said, "What's the matter? She goes, "I I feel like I'm building too nice of a house, and I feel like my friends will feel will feel uncomfortable if they come to this house. And I was so touched at her emotion, and it wasn't had anything to do with her. And I said, "I want to say her name. Anyway, I told her. I said, the people that come to your house will feel welcome because you make them feel welcome. And I've told this story many times in the podcast because it's it's. But I don't. I mean, I could tell you about that house because I remember stuff like that. But that's not what makes that build special. What makes that build special was the homeowners and their family, and I do think the the homeowners obviously influence the house to a huge degree. I I struggle greatly, and I think home spec home builders too. If you don't have a key storyline, which is what this is going to call the story episode, you're basically just creating blank pages. And I think one of the reasons why this story home was so powerful me for me is it gave it counteracted my ADHD and gave me a single thing to focus on for two years, and it was hard because I'm not used to focusing on one thing.
Gabe Norcross 19:29
It's all you. It's all me. But it wasn't to wait for a homeowner to make a decision. You are the. It is, and that's a lot.
Mark D. Williams 19:34
I actually think it's good for people to go through that experience because you have to go. You reaffirms again how important the client's life and story is to building your home, but where I was trying to go with this clumsily is that the home informs the people, and the people inform the home. My goal is that the someone that would come into this home, that there are aspects of this home that would be aspirational, that maybe this home could help them quiet down. There's no TVs on the upper two levels.
Gabe Norcross 19:58
I love it,
Mark D. Williams 19:58
and I do actually. Think we're going to as fast as the world is spinning with AI, and it's here to stay. It's not going anywhere. I think we're going to see people move to analog and a lot of stuff. I mean, we've already seen a huge uptick. You know, we have our curious builder boot camps and Sonic camps. I mean, the idea that I could get 23 owners to leave their families to go work out with no phones, you know, in the desert or on the ocean or whatever-it's
Gabe Norcross 20:20
glorious.
Mark D. Williams 20:21
But a big part of it is that we are seeking human connection, and and I think that's one of the things that construction has going for it very well. Is there so much human interaction with it? I actually think our best days are ahead.
Gabe Norcross 20:34
I agree. It's there. One of the reasons why I want to scale back is because of this opportunity that I see to create the environment, multiple environments to to foster that human connection. We are on job sites and projects with people all the time, and it's always surrounded around building. We're creating a craft, but those same people need connection outside of that, and but we have this common thing, and so the the boot camp to be able to unplug with people you have a common, you have such a big common life experience with, but yet you cannot be distracted by picking up your phone or answering an email, I think it's going. It makes a lot of people uncomfortable, and you've mentioned this before. Like people, you've had to refund people because they didn't feel like they could show up and actually and give up their phone for three days. That's how tied we are to everything else around us. You know what
Mark D. Williams 21:38
they call that, right? Addiction.
Gabe Norcross 21:40
Addiction. I mean, no, I kid you
Mark D. Williams 21:42
not. And the reason I, you know, I've always kind of joked with Misahu and even these other events is, believe it or not, I didn't create them for other people. I created them for me, and I'm sharing them with other people. And the reason I say it's a difference is, I don't think I'm very good at predicting what other people will like. I know. Like, if I built a spec house the way I think someone might like it, I believe I would fail. That's never been my gift. I think some people are gifted at that. I'm really good at telling you what I like. I'm. It sounds really corny, but that's how I framed it in my mind, and that has been very freeing, and that has unlocked a lot of my creativity. And I, you know, we mentioned earlier in the episode. I think anybody can do a story home, just but my encouragement to you would build would say be your story. Let it be authentic to you because we're all unique little snowflakes, and we all have. I hope Misu inspires other builders to create their version of whatever, and I'm you know we have plans to license Misa Hus to other builders if they literally want to do the same thing and help them train them how to do it. That's something I want to do. I think it's it's powerful. I loved it. I want to share that experience with somebody else, and it's a separate business. Why not? But regardless if that becomes somebody's route or not, is not the point. The point is, is like the more you get to know yourself, it goes back to what we said in our previous episode. The more confident you are in your abilities, whether it's financial or whether it's your, you know, loving yourself, all of these things all come to the same thing. It's know thyself, and the more you know your story, you can share it with other people. You're you'll be happier because you're fulfilling your purpose, your joy, and you're doing it in a craft that you love. And honestly, it is completely freeing when you create it that way. That's how I feel. That's why it's. It was hard to create all that because I didn't know what I was doing. Now that I've done it, the reason I couldn't do it any other way is this is who I am? I can't change who I am. You can't change who you are. I think we can evolve. I think we can, you know,
Gabe Norcross 23:45
who you are. But you, you
Mark D. Williams 23:47
are who you are.
Gabe Norcross 23:47
Even as you're evolving, it's still you. Like you, yeah. And I wouldn't want to change who I am because I'm selling myself out. And that's then that just feels like that just makes everything harder. I've tried to like, oh, what other box can I fit in to make my life easier? It's like I don't want to fit anybody else's box. I want to be myself. And you you touched on earlier, like it's the people that and not the homes. And I 100% agree. I often think about randomly in the middle of nowhere. I'm like, I wonder what those two kids are up to. When I was when you know when they were eight and nine we used to play basketball in their front yard before I'd go home and I was like 1819 years old and we we'd shoot hoops and it's like I wonder what they and I would receive Christmas cards for 1515 years and I moved too many times they didn't have my address but I I remember I have more pictures of homeowners dogs in my phone than probably and I miss the dogs when I leave. Like build these relationships, but it is. I I remember all the families that that I worked for, and um, and then there's a very few distinct set of houses that I was with for so long that like I I also built relationships with those, and I like when something happens to them. It's like how I wrote that. I'm like I told you yesterday. Like I took a block of wood and I wrote, if you open this wall, please call me and let me know why. Because I want to know why down the road this is being you had to open this back wall of the shower. Did something fail on my end? I want to learn from it. Or is that like
Mark D. Williams 25:17
did you take a pinch of it? I
Gabe Norcross 25:19
think I did.
Mark D. Williams 25:19
That would have been an amazing story, but I've
Gabe Norcross 25:22
I've taken off baseboard before, and there was a in California there was a somebody had signed it in 1923, and that's why I wrote Gabe Norcross. This was in like 2024, 2004. I wrote 2004, and then I put it back. It was, and it's like somebody's gonna find it 50 years from now. It's like a time
Mark D. Williams 25:41
time capsule. I mean, we did this in this house. That's where I got the idea. Is because this was such a story house. I wanted. I wrote. I don't know how many quotes in the house. A lot, but I would ask my framers to write their name. Or I like quotes, so I tried to get people. But sometimes people just feel that's just not how they think, which is fine. Just their name and a date is fine. But I had the H back guy write Lennon is his name. He wrote on the plenum on like the metal on the going up into the attic, and so I just think it also we can't. No story is is done alone in a vacuum. People, if you're an author, you're influenced by your life and other people around you in this story of this home. This story, well, I'm a character in it, literally, this affected 1000s of people, which is pretty humbling, but also really encouraging because you realize like this is the voice of a choir. I've often said it's been one of my new dangerously famous or favorite quotes, which is, "If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. But I think of like Pavarotti is one of the world's you know best singers. I don't even know if he's still alive anymore, but that guy can sing like very few people can. You get 100 people in a choir, you can't even hear Pavarotti, and that's what a story house is with a lot of other people. I mean, I think what you know when you have this many people, architecture, designers, teams building you know systems, all this stuff working in concert together. Honestly, every builder is a freaking magician. They're the lead conductor in a choir. The amount of things that you're navigating to different tunes and making them harmonize-that's really that's probably the best algebra I can think of right now. That is the the people that are at the highest end of their craft are phenomenal conductors.
Gabe Norcross 27:23
The I think part of the story of this house and shameless plug, like on my projects, how many, especially in Louisville, because I'm still setting my expectations for what I want or what I need for for the final product, and I've had carpenters and finish carpenters that I've had I've brought on to move things along, and they're like, "I'm so sorry that's it's taking so long. And I'm like, "Do not apologize for it taking so long. Said, "I would rather you take your time and learn from this, but also put your best effort in than speed it up. I don't want speed. I want efficiency, but I don't want speed. I want it to be done right and the first time. And if that takes you four hours longer, I don't have to come back and take it out and replace it. And I want you to learn. You can ask questions if you've never done this before, but I want you. I want you to take the time now. They are now involved in the story of that house instead of just blowing and going and getting out of it, the by you including your subs trades, sub trades coming in and and writing writing notes or quotes inside, you've now put them into. They are now part of the story of this house. They will remember this house for the rest of their lives because they are now a part of the story of it, and they have a personal touch on it, and and I think that just keeps feeding that what you were trying to accomplish here, which you did
Mark D. Williams 28:52
it. Um, thanks again for coming in for Louisville for
Gabe Norcross 28:55
I'll be here next week.
Mark D. Williams 28:56
Yeah, I mean at this point it's just going to be the the the Mark and Gabe podcast. We're just gonna keep this rolling. If no one shows up on this rainy day, we might just we might just batch record 20 minute episodes for the next three months. Like, let's get ahead of it. Yeah, actually, one final thought on ADHD. I meant to say this in our last episode, but that's coming back to me now. I was thinking about like with the way the brain works. I actually think the analogy of a big tree works. The core thought, like up up the shaft of the tree, the trunk, but all the branches-they're all connected. They they don't always go anywhere. They might go out to a far branch, but they're all connected back to the same source. I don't know. I was just I had this this visual picture of like how our brains are firing to all these different points. I think they all come from the same trunk, and the reason why we go down that this branch is we think it's relevant, and sometimes the audience, of course, has a hard time tracking what we're jumping to. But inevitably, it usually came from something that comes back to you know back to the source, back to the tree. I don't know what do you think about that analogy.
Gabe Norcross 29:55
I I have come like I've. Had that exact. I've had that exact same analogy, especially when I was weathering my storm, and my men's group and all the men that were there, who would check in on me and call me. Like I, I told them, I'm like, you were the roots grabbing, grabbing the earth, and I was hanging onto the branch, and but it's very similar. I told my wife this one time. I said, "I am a tattered flag flapping in the wind, but you're the pole that's holding me in place. And she has been that foundation and that pole that has kept me. Sometimes I'm flying in in great wind and I'm perfectly positioned, and sometimes I'm flapping and tattered, and and it look like I'm hanging on by one clip. But she's always been there to hold me in place, and and I think that's the that is a perfect analogy of how the ADHD and and just life happens to me, my personal ADHD journey. But yeah, I know. I think some technology.
Mark D. Williams 31:02
I like that. Thanks for tuning the Curious Builder podcast, Gabe. Thanks again, and we'll see you next week. Thanks for tuning in to Curious Builder Podcast. If you like this episode, do us a favor: share it with three other business owners. The best way that we can spread what we're doing is by word of mouth, and with your help, we can continue to help other curious builders expand their business. Please share it with your friends, like and review online, and thanks again for tuning in.
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