Overtired

Join the chaotic conversations as they dive into Marjorie Taylor Greene's bizarre weather tweets and the climate disaster threatening Asheville's arts scene. They debate pop culture like Joker 2 and Deadpool vs. Wolverine, while exploring the future of self-driving cars and the quirks of the Cybertruck. Personal anecdotes about blogging and mental health emerge, alongside a humorous look at corporate drama in the WordPress community. Get ready for witty banter and unexpected insights on everything from tech innovations to personal finance tips!

This is the first of two episodes. The idea was for Merlin and Jeff to discuss how they were using chatGPT in ways that are maybe novel. The thing is, the pre-show banter became in-show banter that barely touched the intended topic, which is awesome because now, thanks to the transcript of this episode, we have fodder for chatGPT experimentation between episodes. Sponsor 1Password Extended Access Management solves the problems traditional IAM and MDM can’t . It’s security for the way we work today, and it’s now generally available to companies with Okta and Microsoft Entra, and in beta for Google Workspace customers. Check it out at https://1password.com/overtired. Show Links With that, we present to you these show notes: Overtired #402: Emotional Sweep with Merlin Mann is a pretty good introduction to the chatGPT conversation we’ll have in the second part of this two-episode set. This episode has a Spotify playlist! Merlin in the wild Merlin’s website Merlin’s Wisdom Project (Referred to repeatedly as “The Document”) Do by Friday (Podcast with Alex Cox. Hi Alex!) Roderick on the Line (Podcast with John Roderick) Reconcilable Differences (Podcast with John Siracusa) Merlin on Mastodon From the Music Jags Recommended Trash Theory episodes (YouTube): The Story of Pulp & Common People Sweet Dreams: How Eurythmics Shocked America and Made MTV Before 1976 Revisited: How Punk Became Punk Before My Sharona: How Power Pop Became Power Pop Before Nevermind: How Grunge Became Grunge Mind-bending live music recordings: Queen: Somebody to Love (Montreal 1981) Talking Heads (Rome 1980) Vivaldi’s “Summer” Presto, feat. Anne-Sophie Mutter [Maxell XLII-S Commercial] (1992) Columbia House Record and Tape Club commercial(1985) Musicians talk about how they got their Zappa gigs: Andrian Belew Steve Vai Vinnie Colaiuta Terry Bozzio Scott Thunes From the Movie and TV Jags Real good noir: Double Indemnity (1944) The Big Sleep (1946) Human Desire (1954) The Killing (1956) The Long Goodbye (1973) Blood Simple (1984) The Big Lebowski (1998) Barbara Stanwyck and Fred MacMurray in Double Indemnity Billy’s wonderful Letterboxd account Door management in the Walking Dead Father Gabriel opens the gate’ Tom Waits singing “River of Men” on Fishing with John Ice fishing with Willem Dafoe on Fishing with John From the Mental Health and Wellbeing Jags Merlin’s list of useful things to say to yourself: “Not now.” “Stay on target.” “Stop.” “Just keep doing the thing.” “Whatever, you’ll get it next time.” “What exactly are you saving this for?” Books: Zorba the Greek by Nikos Kazantzakis Full Catastrophe Living by Jon Kabat-Zinn How We Live is How We Die by Pema Chödrön Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman Odds & Ends A People’s History of the United States (Howard Zinn) The Political Gabfest “mean time to weird” episode John Dickerson is very handsome and very smart and once showed Merlin a very large binder clip A collection of “Under Construction” gifs and images from Geocities Join the Conversation Merch Come chat on Discord! Twitter/ovrtrd Instagram/ovrtrd Youtube Get the Newsletter Thanks! You’re downloading today’s show from CacheFly’s network BackBeat Media Podcast Network Check out more episodes at overtiredpod.com and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Find Brett as @ttscoff, Christina as @film_girl, Jeff as @jsguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Merlin Mann (Part One): S-Tier Face [00:00:00] [00:00:04] Introduction [00:00:04] Jeff: Hi, everybody. This is the Overtired Podcast. I am Jeff Severns Guntzel. I am normally here with my comrades, Christina Warren and Brett Terpstra. They are not here. [00:00:16] Jeff: They are comrading somewhere else with somebody else, and I have instead Merlin Mann joining me. Hello, Merlin. [00:00:23] Merlin: Jeff, how are you? I love your name. You have a, you have a nice, no, I like, I like the, the, as we say in poetry class, I like the scansion of your name. I like how, I like the mouth feel of your name. I shouldn’t [00:00:33] Jeff: Is that the, is, is that the poetry version of, I like the cut of your jib? [00:00:36] Merlin: It is very much like that. It’s a very, it’s kind of nautical verse. [00:00:39] Jeff: Nautical verse? Yes. Hey, listen, I want to get something out of the way. [00:00:43] Merlin: Yes, do. [00:00:44] Matthias Jabs [00:00:44] Jeff: Um, which is, um, and I put this in the, in the show notes kind of cryptically, um, there have been a couple of cases in listening to your podcast [00:00:53] Merlin: Wait a minute, this is about the scorpions. [00:00:56] Jeff: yes. [00:00:57] Merlin: The [00:00:57] Jeff: where, where you are, you are starting a [00:01:00] sentence that is about to include the name Matthias Jabs. [00:01:04] Merlin: no, I got it wrong. [00:01:05] Jeff: I say to myself, I don’t know, maybe it’s not, how is it supposed to be said? [00:01:08] Merlin: The thing is, you know that phenomenon that needs a name? I’ve read this word approximately 200 times, but I’ve never had to say it out. I still have friends where I don’t know really how to pronounce their name, and I don’t know, and like, you pick up your, in my case, that’s how I learned the solo for No One Like You was from Guitar for the Practicing Musician, which would have, every issue would have, this is usually called magazines, you’d buy them, and it had tablature for usually like three. [00:01:38] Merlin: Like songs. It could be eruption. It could be, you know, whatever, but like, yeah. And I, for some reason, my friends and I, I guess, cause we thought we were cool. We, we said Matthias, but I don’t think that’s right. [00:01:48] Jeff: Matthias. Yeah. I would have only read the name in Hit Parade or Circus Magazine. You know what I mean? [00:01:53] Merlin: Boy, they loved Def Leppard for a while, didn’t they [00:01:55] Jeff: loved Def Leppard. So okay. So here’s, here’s why Matthias [00:02:00] Jabs, I mean, besides the obvious, which is that he should be spoken about [00:02:03] Merlin: He shreds. Is he the one with, is he the one with the Explorer? [00:02:06] Jeff: yeah, I think he’s the [00:02:07] Merlin: He’s kind of the more, he’s, he’s the less, he’s, I was going to say he’s the handsome one, but he’s the less grotesque of the, uh, of the people. [00:02:13] Jeff: a nice way to put it. And also like saying his name as a young man might’ve been the first time words came out and I felt sophisticated. Matthias [00:02:21] Merlin: Yeah. Isn’t that a good feeling until the second later when someone goes, that’s not how, [00:02:25] Jeff: That’s how you say it, exactly! So there have been these, I think it’s twice, maybe three times, I’m listening to a podcast, you’re talking, you’re starting a sentence that will ultimately have the name Matthias Jabs in it, and I somehow know it’s coming, and it is said in my mind at the same time, and I think, how the fuck does that happen with Matthias Jabs? [00:02:45] Merlin: Isn’t that, isn’t that funny? [00:02:46] Mean Time to Weird [00:02:46] Merlin: Before we were recording, we were talking about an affliction, affliction, a gift that, that some people like us have, which is like you have a very close association between some piece of audio and either like a time or a location or a feeling, [00:03:00] often a location. But I think it’s somewhat allied to that or like today when the 45th president, because I’ve watched a lot of his rallies, [00:03:08] Jeff: That’s the one with the T. [00:03:10] Merlin: the testosterone? [00:03:12] Jeff: No, the letter T. [00:03:14] Merlin: Oh, yeah, but that’s all, it’s also the testosterone. That’s part of [00:03:16] Jeff: Yeah, that’s also the [00:03:17] Merlin: Yeah, yeah, they put it on hats now. But, uh, but he, uh, but [00:03:21] Jeff: Don’t lick my, stop licking my hat! It’s getting aggressive! [00:03:24] Merlin: ask you nicely, very nasty woman licking my hat. Think of it. He, but no, he does that thing where he goes like, you know, they’re bringing in, they’re letting him in 21 million people. [00:03:34] Merlin: They’re, from their, from their jails and their prisons, their mental institutions and their insane asylums. [00:03:40] Jeff: they’re insane. It’s like chai [00:03:42] Merlin: Okay, but here’s the thing now, Jeff, because we are, we are in the same, um, carass about this. Do you know what the next thing might be after he says, and insane asylums? Do you know what the next line is, could be if he’s in the right mood? [00:03:57] Jeff: What? No. [00:03:58] Merlin: He simply says the, he [00:04:00] begins next, his next sentence, he pauses for a minute to soak in the adulation, and then he says, the late great Hannibal [00:04:07] Jeff: Oh, the late, great Hannibal Lecter, of course! [00:04:09] Merlin: And do you know, do you know, have you, have you arrived? The reason why he always says that right after that, [00:04:15] Jeff: No, I’ve never gone for the full context, which is probably what he would ask me to [00:04:19] Merlin: this is something we’ve been exploring on, uh, do by Friday, another podcast I do, and I, and this, this very much is, um, is I’m applying scholarship from, from actual, like journalists and professional spec, professional speculators, but. What does he say? He says that they’re bringing over, they’re emptying out their jails. [00:04:35] Merlin: Then you hear, the crime is down in Venezuela, and he’ll say 70, 72 percent, 80 percent, 90 percent, right? But in this particular one, this is the vintage of the last few weeks has been, they’re emptying out their jails, their prisons, their mental institutions, their insane asylums. Hold for whatever. And then he goes, the late Great Hannibal Lecter. [00:04:56] Merlin: Silence of the Lambs. Does anybody remember the movie Silence of the [00:05:00] Lambs? You know, he would like to have you for dinner. And this has been widely, widely reported, but I wanted to, for those of you who have not heard this, or maybe you don’t follow this stuff as closely as I am, um, apparently doomed to do, what’s the last thing he said? [00:05:14] Merlin: D D D D D, ellipsis, mental institutions, and insane asylums. Somebody figured out, he thinks that, that is what political asylum is. [00:05:24] Jeff: Yes, yes, yes, yes. I was [00:05:26] Merlin: Or he’s made an association in his head the same way that we have these broken brains where like, I think of an overpass in New Zealand, every time I think of talking about vocational wheel, like he, no, that’s, that’s that back to work podcast episode, but yeah. [00:05:39] Merlin: Yeah. So like it’s. And you’re like, oh, and then, because he really is, I said to somebody the other day, it’s, it’s almost like he’s memorized a Markov chain, like somebody gave him an MD5 hash, and he somehow unintentionally memorized it, and now he can’t unremember it. 729 2202 was my phone number when I was 10, and I [00:06:00] will know that for the rest of my life, and I don’t need to know that. [00:06:03] Merlin: But if I see the number 729 in the wild, I think of my phone number. If I see the number 207 in the wild, I think of my laundry number in military school. You can’t unlearn those things, and I think he is in such a state at this point. Cut all of this out. I’m so sorry, Jeff. Hi, Jeff. How are you? [00:06:20] Jeff: I love it. I love it. I love it. [00:06:21] Jeff: Um, and also you’re reminding me in that sort of, um, that space between saying insane asylum and saying Hannibal Lecter, I’m reminded, I know you’re a fan of John Dickerson. [00:06:32] Merlin: really, I think John Dickerson is so smart. I [00:06:35] Jeff: In the most recent Political Gab Fest, he, he coins the phrase Mean Time to Weird. [00:06:41] Merlin: Oh, am I allowed to cuss? Forgive [00:06:43] Jeff: Yeah. Yes. Please, [00:06:44] Merlin: Hey Jeff, fuck you, because I actually wrote that down. I wrote, no, let me find it, um, no, it was so funny, and, cause he said it, and I was like, there’s no, wait, what, [00:07:00] that, that, okay, I have this from, in drafts, oh god, this is a really poorly taken note, on, uh, September 12th, at 3. [00:07:07] Merlin: 44pm pacific time, I wrote down, John D, Mean Time to Weird. I literally wrote it down in drafts. That’s the only thing in the whole draft. [00:07:16] Jeff: That’s awesome. He’s brilliant. He’s brilliant. He’s such a delightful thinker to follow. [00:07:22] Merlin: was watching him after the most recent debate, um, with Kamala Harris and on Colbert. And one of the things I really admire about him is he does something that is so. unusual and so difficult to do well, which is like Colbert would ask him a question, and when every time he’d respond, he’d have a very thoughtful response. [00:07:43] Merlin: But whereas a lot of people would hear a question and then go like, Okay, well, I have the training to know how to reframe this into the answer that I want to give. And that usually involves beginning a sentence with the word so period. And so you, you know, you do this thing where you go, so [00:08:00] the way that this, but in John’s case, he doesn’t do that. [00:08:03] Merlin: And he doesn’t sound like an asshole, but he very gently acknowledges what the person says, integrates it into his answer. And then rather than necessarily exactly answering the question he was given, he provides the context that he thinks is necessary for understanding how the thing that person said fits into a larger landscape. [00:08:21] Merlin: He never loses track of that. And even as he does that, he does not sound like a conservative. Conservative, small c, Ding a ling, like he’s a very active thinker about things and he never stops reprocessing things at levels that a lot of us who are obsessed with media and think everything is everything, like he’s really good at disassembling the parts of something in a very humane way, giving it back to you in a way that makes you both seem smarter, which is really difficult to do, believe me, I know. [00:08:47] Jeff: It’s a great way to put it. I also love something he does often when he’s talking is he stops and says, what do I mean by that? [00:08:53] Merlin: Oh, I totally agree. And I’m like, I like, even on that, if you go back and watch that Colbert interview, where he’s wearing a very [00:09:00] handsome suit, um, you know, [00:09:01] Jeff: a very handsome man. [00:09:02] Merlin: he’s really good looking guy. I mean, his face from every angle is, is, is very, is very, he has an S tier face. [00:09:13] Jeff: From every angle. Oh, [00:09:14] Merlin: angle, I’ve seen every angle of his face, I’ve photographed his face, I know it’s dimensions. The other day I posted a photo of him and me outside my office because I’m [00:09:23] Jeff: I saw that. I saw [00:09:24] Merlin: Now that was followers only, but I had to, I realized I know too many people named John. It occurs to me every time I look at my photos. [00:09:33] Merlin: Persons area. And I’m like, I know too, I know too many men named John or some variation of John and like that I need to really cull this herd at some point. Um, yeah, I mean, but he is also, I find him, you know, I’m, I’m gonna say something Jeff. I don’t, I don’t use this word a ton because I think it has not only been abused, I think it’s not a useful word. [00:09:55] Merlin: And I think on some level it doesn’t mean what people think it means. But I find him inspiring [00:10:00] in the sense, and I’m not saying like I want a poster of him or something, or get a. John Dickerson poster that says hope for some reason. I don’t mean inspiration in that way, I mean the way he rolls. The way that he conducts himself. [00:10:12] Merlin: He is, in the true sense of the word, a gentleman. And, and being just very, very, very, very, very, very lightly acquainted with him. He’s like that. He’s really, really nice, and really warm, and really smart, and he’s, he has worked his humanity, his history, his background, his family, and his Catholicism into a worldview that I find very invigorating. [00:10:37] Merlin: I wish there were more John Dickersons in this world. [00:10:39] Jeff: And he’s someone like Colbert who works his Catholicism into his work in ways that are just really, really beautiful. [00:10:47] Merlin: his nerd stuff! The same way the [00:10:48] Jeff: And his nerd [00:10:49] Merlin: is always fact checking the Lord of the Rings stuff. [00:10:52] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. [00:10:54] Merlin: fact check. No, they couldn’t have taken the eagle, I know. [00:11:00] Um, but yeah, it’s I think Mean Time to Weird is good. I’m sorry, continue. [00:11:05] Jeff: Mean Time to Weird. [00:11:07] Merlin: One thing I really I was looking I’ve been looking forward to doing this with you despite what you could have guessed over the summer with our various [00:11:15] Jeff: Oh, shit. Shh, [00:11:16] Merlin: this. [00:11:16] Merlin: Shh, shh, shh, shh, shh. Settle, settle. No, no. I didn’t mean it that way. I meant to say, I really, I was just, uh. I, I would like to do this show probably more often than you would like, because [00:11:29] Jeff: Nah, no such thing. [00:11:30] Merlin: this tickles a part of my brain that begs for more use. And on the one hand, it’s fun because I get to go off with you about things that sound like, sound like Guided by Voices EPs. [00:11:43] Merlin: But also, like, this gives me access to discussing the kind of stuff that I feel is so, sometimes so subtle. And yet so powerful, and yet gets kind of dropped out of the discourse in which everything is everything, and I’m really grateful that you put up with me to [00:12:00] schedule this, and, uh, I, I enjoy being here, and if you wanted me to be on more often, I would. [00:12:04] Merlin: Not, not enough to be annoying, but I really enjoy talking with you. And I follow you on the internet now. [00:12:10] Jeff: guess. Good to see you on Mastodon. [00:12:12] Dingalings Failing at a Heist [00:12:12] Jeff: Uh, recently a, a, a big hit on, on Double Indemnity. Um, [00:12:18] Merlin: my God. [00:12:19] Jeff: a movie I had honestly hadn’t even registered, or I probably heard of it. Hadn’t registered until, [00:12:25] Merlin: I think everybody’s probably seen clips of Barbara Stanwyck walking down the steps or something. But you like, if you’re like me and you grew up with My Three Sons, you’re like, I cannot believe that it’s Fred McMurray. It’s, it’s, he’s so off, and Edward G. Robinson, all three of [00:12:40] Jeff: Edward G. Robinson, my [00:12:41] Merlin: good in that movie. [00:12:42] Merlin: It’s really, it’s such a well played movie. Told Noir and I think it’s not only famous because it is a very good noir but also just it’s a very watchable noir in a way that like The Big Sleep is completely confusing. Don’t bother reading the book. The book does not make any sense at all but The Big Sleep is still a fun movie. [00:12:59] Merlin: But like you [00:13:00] ever see DOA? [00:13:01] Jeff: Nope. [00:13:02] Merlin: Um, can I give you the log line? [00:13:04] Jeff: Yeah. Give me the logline. [00:13:06] Merlin: A guy realizes, I want to say that every guy realizes he has been poisoned and has 24 hours to find the person who poisoned him and why. And this is from the 50s. [00:13:19] Jeff: Yeah. [00:13:19] Merlin: How cool is that? It’s got been remade badly several times, [00:13:22] Jeff: It sounds, yes, so I’m, I am kind of in love with 40s and 50s noir movies right now. I watched, like, I watched The Killing. I watched Human Desire, Double Indemnity, of course. And, and I am, I am amazed. I think when I was younger, I watched a lot of this kind of stuff. But I mean, I’m talking when I was like 16 or 17. [00:13:39] Jeff: And as a grown ass man, it all just lands differently. Like it’s a, it’s, [00:13:45] Merlin: I totally agree. And as a grown man, but also as if I could add to that, as somebody who then has unintentionally been loving movies and increasingly now TV shows that you don’t even realize are a noir, I mean, it’s [00:14:00] just, I’ll be basic. The Big Lebowski is a noir. There’s two big genres that we tend to think of as artifacts from other decades. [00:14:07] Merlin: Times when they’re really, like, and less so, like, noirs, right? Like, I don’t think noirs were ever that mainstream. I mean, what is that Elliot Gould movie? It was a long, uh, the long goodbye in the 70s. There’s all these kinds of movies that are noir ish, but, you know, the other one’s westerns. Where there’s so many things, when you watch them and really pay attention, I guess Star Wars is kind of, in some ways, uh, considered a western. [00:14:30] Merlin: But, like, Mandalorian. is straight up a Western down to like when he walks, there’s a spur noise. [00:14:36] Jeff: yeah, exactly, exactly, [00:14:38] Merlin: And, but like, you, you know what I’m saying though, what’s interesting about that is like, it’s to me, this kind of synthesis, contra my, my declaration that not everything is everything. I do think it is really. [00:14:48] Merlin: Um, uh, it gives me life to be able to associate one thing to another and then to look at the, to compare and contrast. But even just on an aesthetic level, it’s so fascinating to [00:15:00] be, to be into the second act of almost anything. Everything the Coen brothers has ever done and realized, I mean, yeah, I get that this is about ding a lings failing at a heist, but I didn’t get how much so many of their movies are really a kind of a noir, but simple, I guess, obviously, but [00:15:17] Jeff: Blood Symbol, so good, [00:15:18] Merlin: oh my God, how great are those kids? [00:15:21] Jeff: yeah, [00:15:21] Merlin: But yeah, I mean, I, uh, I like stuff a lot, you know, and [00:15:26] Jeff: love stuff. [00:15:27] Merlin: I really, oh god, I love stuff. [00:15:29] Music is the Best (Part 1) [00:15:29] Merlin: Again, I told you, I was up till three last night for absolutely no good reason apart from I just kept listening to music that made me want to listen to more music. And [00:15:36] Jeff: And what was the, what was the chain, what was the [00:15:39] Merlin: do you really care? Christ, this is hard to meter because it involves YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music, Apple Classical App, but let me go look at my Mastodon because that’s usually, that’s usually the trails of my effluvium. [00:15:58] Merlin: That I can, I can best. [00:16:00] I can see I ended with Freddie, Freddie Mercury. Oh, you know what it was? I got into a little bit of a jack. Oh, yes, you know what it was? Um, do you ever, there’s a really good YouTube channel that I recommend to people who like things. Um, Trash Theory is a YouTube channel. Yeah, so it’s this English guy. [00:16:17] Merlin: I love it when people Really put effort into something and this guy makes these videos like the one I recommended the other night was hey Have you ever heard that song Common People by Pulp? It’s a song that I really like a lot It’s a very important song to me from that time. He does this amazing video about like how we got to Common People. [00:16:34] Merlin: He does one about like pre 1976 punk. One of my favorites, for selfish reasons, is like Power Pop before My Sharona, like how we got [00:16:44] Jeff: Oh, nice. [00:16:45] Merlin: but he in particular has a series, because he’s an English person as far as I know, called New British Canon, where he’ll just do a thing on Suzy and the Banshees. [00:16:52] Merlin: His one on Eurythmics is so thought [00:16:55] Jeff: My eyes just hit it at the same time as you said it, yes, [00:16:59] Merlin: I give you a [00:17:00] factoid? [00:17:00] Jeff: please, [00:17:01] Merlin: Um, so they, they arrived pretty big in, I think, 82, 83, 82, I think, with Sweet Dreams in America. You know, and of course, he goes through the tourists, the two of them, their previous pop band in England that I adore. But he goes through all that, blah da da blah da blah, but by the time, I think it was their second video, uh, uh, D k d k d k d k, Love is a Stranger, where she’s in the backseat of, like, a limo, and she’s got, [00:17:25] Jeff: yep, totally. [00:17:26] Merlin: yeah, um, MTV pulled that video until she agreed to show her birth certificate to prove that she was an assigned female at birth person. [00:17:34] Jeff: Wow. [00:17:35] Merlin: Now, I didn’t know that. And that’s just one of the indignities to which she was subjected. Who does that to Annie Lennox? She’s Scottish. It’s horrible. Check out The Tourist. Check out the tours. They do a cover of, uh, I Only Want to Be With You, that old 60s song. They do an amazing cover of that. It’s real, real earworm. [00:17:55] Merlin: Um, and, oh, but like, okay, so I was listening to Trash Theory, and I was listening [00:18:00] to an episode I’ve heard before, but I actually really, really listened to it, which is Another one of those, so you get the idea, which is like, almost like, uh, Hit Parade, the way Hit Parade goes, the wonderful podcast Hit Parade is like, this is a song that was number one, fantastic podcast, where he’ll go like, and so that gives you, let me tell you the history of boy bands, or let me tell you the history of, one of my favorites is an early episode, UB40’s, the history of UB40’s Red Red Wine. [00:18:24] Merlin: Which is a surprisingly compelling episode. Great [00:18:27] Jeff: Awesome. [00:18:27] Merlin: Ditto with this guy, where he’ll go like, how we got to Nevermind. And I, I love Nevermind. That was a super important season of music for me. That’s my season of Superchunk. That’s my season of my second wave of teenage fan club, um, [00:18:43] Jeff: your seeds around. Around. [00:18:47] Merlin: Cast Iron. Cast Iron. And seed toss. And then they, they, they, they, they, they covered two sedo songs. They cover, not only did they cover two Sedo songs on the same record, they released a [00:19:00] single that had a, and the B side were both Sedo songs, both from the same album. And actually, uh, I think it was from Weed Forton. [00:19:07] Merlin: They covered two songs that were actually like, like in order on the Sedo album. That’s a ballsy move in [00:19:12] Jeff: That’s an excellent move. That’s [00:19:15] Merlin: know, any thought could be the beginning of a brand new tangled web you’re spinning. Anyone could be a brand new love. Um, but anyways, so I was watching this one on, on grunge and I have to be honest, like I’m in, in the many, many, many genres out there. [00:19:30] Merlin: Grunge is not near the top for me as a thing, but like mainly there was a, we had a free jukebox in college that had. That Mudhoney, Keep It Out of My Face song on it. I knew that. I knew the drummer in my band really liked Melvin, so I knew Houdini. I knew a handful of things. I don’t know, I really lost you there, yeah. [00:19:50] Merlin: I don’t mind stealing bread. But, like, going back and listening to what, like, actually what Soundgarden sounded like at first, all these bands sounded like at first, and that got me into a [00:20:00] Melvin’s Jag. Then, I [00:20:01] Jeff: that’s a good jag. [00:20:02] Merlin: rediscovered, oh my god, have you seen King Buzzo show you how to play, um, Honey Bucket? [00:20:09] Jeff: I have seen that. And [00:20:11] Merlin: It’s so simple, but it’s so cool. [00:20:13] Jeff: was an HBO series at one point, I have a, we were on the same label, uh, Amphetamine Reptile Records. And [00:20:20] Merlin: wait, I’m sorry, I’m having, I’m having some kind of a neurological event. Can you just, is there a way to just include once, what, you, you, you were in a band that was on Amphetamine Reptile? [00:20:31] Jeff: yeah, yeah, the Meathead label. I mean, I say that lovingly. [00:20:34] Merlin: Do, do, would I, would I know the name [00:20:36] Jeff: You wouldn’t, we were at the end, we were a band called the Freedom Fighters. We were one of the last like four releases before Tom Hazelmeyer just like burned out and shuttered the whole thing and just spent all his time at the shooting range. [00:20:48] Merlin: See, like, the kids don’t know from this. Today you say Homestead Records or Caroline Records and people are like, what? What? I like indie records. Anyway. But, oh, okay. So. Wow. Wow. My [00:20:58] Jeff: And the AMRAP [00:21:00] offices were in an old dentist’s office here in Minneapolis, um, and the studio was downstairs where they recorded the records, but there was this one room that was just piles of weird shit like promo, like test pressings and, and VHS recordings of, you know, shows from the various bands over the past like 10, 15 years, and I’d been such a huge fan. [00:21:21] Jeff: So I put in I just start putting shit in because there’s a TV and a VCR there and there was some HBO show that I’d never heard [00:21:29] Merlin: And you don’t know. You have no idea. There’s probably a piece of masking tape on there that says show three or something, [00:21:34] Jeff: exactly. Exactly. So there’s this I put in this VHS thing. It just says like, it just I think it’s just says Melvin’s and there’s just a bunch of random shit on it. And and Buzzo is on the HBO show where he’s going to buy a mansion, which he can’t do. And, [00:21:47] Merlin: Wait. Approximately what year? [00:21:50] Jeff: this must have been okay, [00:21:51] Merlin: Did he have the big hair and everything? [00:21:52] Jeff: yeah, definitely. [00:21:53] Jeff: I would have been in there in like 98, 97. And so it would have been around around there. So he walks in with this realtor this [00:22:00] mansion and he’s carrying he’s carrying a lunchbox like a 1950s style [00:22:03] Merlin: got to see this. Oh my God. [00:22:06] Jeff: and [00:22:06] Merlin: How so that now that’s an HGTV show. I would watch sort of like fishing with John. Yeah. Where you go [00:22:11] Jeff: Fishing with John. Oh my God. [00:22:12] Merlin: Yeah. Yeah. But I would, I would watch, I would watch an HGTV show where just King Buzzo goes to different places. Open houses. [00:22:20] Jeff: Oh, yeah, totally. What? Fishing with John a, a mixtape favorite for [00:22:23] Merlin: I bought a, I bought a, I bought a, the Criterion DVD of that. The Willem Dafoe episode of Fishing with John is very, very important. [00:22:31] Jeff: and, and the Tom Waites one has a bit where he’s singing in the canoe along the river of men, of men [00:22:38] Merlin: Can you imagine fishing with Tom Waits? [00:22:41] Jeff: no, I can’t, but I can kind of ’cause of that show. Okay. So anyway, he’s, he’s, he goes into, and the realtor’s looking and I’m like, who the fuck? Fuck is this? I mean, of course, it’s like, you [00:22:51] Merlin: For those of you who don’t know, King, uh, what’s his name, Buzz, [00:22:54] Jeff: Oh yeah, we should do this. Yeah. Buzz Osborne. [00:22:57] Merlin: these three guys, talk about a power [00:23:00] trio, these three guys who at first were one of the fastest punk bands of all time, but then in time became famous. Their contribution in the canonical story of Seattle Grunge, they were the ones who brought in very heavy, very loud, very loud music. [00:23:15] Merlin: Um, people say Black Sabbath, I don’t totally agree, but like, for, for, but think [00:23:19] Jeff: slow, but fast. [00:23:20] Merlin: think about Sabbath, Bloody Sabbath, one of the greatest songs [00:23:22] Jeff: That’s a good. Yeah. Yep. [00:23:27] Merlin: You know, like that, but so sledgey. Oh my God, going blind. [00:23:31] Jeff: Oh, oh, [00:23:32] Merlin: he, as a power trio, the three guys, all great musicians and Buzz, known as King Buzzo, how, I guess an afro? How do you describe what his hair was? It was like a weather system. [00:23:43] Jeff: special. Yeah. It’s a weather system that works. Yeah. That works. [00:23:47] Merlin: And he’s out buying a mansion. He’s buying a mansion, huh? [00:23:50] Jeff: looks like the stills of the early nuclear tests, you know, a little bit. [00:23:53] Merlin: Yeah, or maybe like, like you could have mistaken for like a silhouette of Sideshow Bob. [00:23:57] Jeff: And his lyrics are complete gibberish [00:24:00] and yet evoke emotion in [00:24:03] Merlin: You wouldn’t know, but he’s really [00:24:04] Jeff: really smart. Really smart. So, so he’s buying this house and the, and the realtor’s like increasingly just like, who the fuck? This isn’t real. And, and when he gets the sense that that’s happening, he, he kneels down and he sets the lunchbox on the floor and he opens it up and he pulls out a magazine on which he’s, he’s on the cover. [00:24:21] Jeff: And, and it just says, king BuZZo, god of grunge. And he says, he says, well, look, you [00:24:28] Merlin: Well, that and 20 percent will get you a [00:24:30] Jeff: like, yeah, he’s like, you can see here, I am the godfather of grunge, on which he tries to buy this house. [00:24:36] Merlin: mean, like you can keep that copy. I’ve got more, but that’s now my, that’s my 20 percent is me on the cover of this. [00:24:42] Jeff: Incredible. [00:24:43] Merlin: sent you the, uh, do you remember when the solo records came out? [00:24:47] Jeff: Oh, yeah, of [00:24:47] Merlin: So, there’s three guys in the Melvins, and this, I posted this last night, and this is how I remembered this, was like, the, the, oh my god, the whole story of the KISS, the KISS solo albums are their own story. [00:24:57] Merlin: Like, the cutout sensation of my youth. [00:25:00] The, the four KISS solo, the four KISS solo albums were in cutout for over a decade. Everywhere you went, there was copies of, like, the Ace Frehley one with, you know, New York Groove. So, when the Melvins did solo [00:25:11] Jeff: was, was Beth on Peter Criss solo [00:25:14] Merlin: No, Beth was on Destroyer. [00:25:15] Jeff: I don’t do Kiss trivia well. Okay, go ahead. [00:25:17] Merlin: I think they were on Destroyer 76. [00:25:19] Merlin: Um, but anyway, there was that and that led me into, then I got into looking at one thing I love about Trash Theory also. Hi, my name is Merlin Mann and this is a podcast about things I like. Um, he does a really good Spotify playlist for every episode. And you’ll get why, like, like, you know, let’s talk after and I’m going to curate exactly the right first episode for you to watch of Trash Theory. [00:25:41] Merlin: But then he does a really good, like, like Hit Parade, there’s a really good Spotify playlist where like every song that he played a portion of is in it. But then that led me into. Oh, then, then the Algo pulls up, um, Freak Scene by Dinosaur Jr., and I suddenly was struck. Here we go, Jeff. You ready? Write it down. [00:25:59] Merlin: Here’s another [00:26:00] one. The very clear recollection of me, not arguing with, but bantering with Chris and Marty, the other guitar player and the drummer in my band in college, about whether Bug, the was just a little bit too poppy because I, I had cut my teeth on You’re Living All Over Me. That was what got me into Dinosaur, was then, which is a little heavier, definitely a little weirder. [00:26:23] Merlin: It’s got Polito. It’s got that weird Sebedo song on it. And, but then the Algos, now it’s off the hook because now I get Love is All Right Tonight by Rick Springfield. And that is one of the This performance in particular is like, you don’t realize like how gifted that band was. You just think of like, oh, it’s the guy from General Hospital that had a pop [00:26:43] Jeff: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Heh heh [00:26:44] Merlin: a Sammy Hagar cover. It’s really weird. But, um, but that’s really, and then that got me into Pat Benatar. They whisper [00:26:50] Jeff: hell is for children. [00:26:53] Merlin: and the one, two, three, four. And they’re still married. Did you know that? They’ve been married [00:27:00] since 1980. I checked chat GPT. I said, I said to chat GPT last night. Ooh. [00:27:05] Merlin: You see how I bring it around? You see how I bring it around? [00:27:07] Jeff: heh heh heh heh heh heh. So, [00:27:11] Merlin: I, [00:27:11] Jeff: to Chep GPT, [00:27:13] Merlin: says to it, I says, I, and what had happened [00:27:14] Jeff: is that, Derry Girls? So I says to myself, says I. Heh heh heh heh [00:27:18] Merlin: I’ve been tied up with my own shoelaces! They tied me to the radiator! It’s just not as nice! Um, God, I love that show. Um, so I open up Chat GPT, I open up, uh, whatever, 400IO Preview, and I just type the sentence, Are Pat and Spider still married? No context. Are Pat and Spider, Spider with a Y, still married? [00:27:40] Merlin: And it said As of my knowledge, cut off in October 23, Pat Benatar and her husband, Neil Spider Giraldo, are still married. They’ve been together since 1982. Does that make you feel good? [00:27:51] Jeff: makes me feel super good. [00:27:52] Sponsor: 1Password [00:27:52] [00:28:00] [00:29:00] [00:30:00] [00:30:36] Full Catastrophe Living [00:30:36] Merlin: I’m almost done. Then the Algo brought up my favorite version of Somebody to Love by Queen, which is not, I, everybody’s like, you know, Live Aid’s a good show, but there are other shows, people. [00:30:49] Merlin: Um, Somebody to Love in Montreal, 1981. This is all on my internet site, you can find. Um, and, and that got me into that, but then that got me into, I went off on a jag and somehow I [00:31:00] went off on an angle. And usually at this point I would open up Apoclassical and listen to Vivaldi’s Summer and try to go to sleep, but, which I shouldn’t do because the last, last movement of that is one of the most baller metal things ever written. [00:31:11] Merlin: But I, and I found myself instead listening to lots of, I don’t know what you call this genre, but do you know the band Boygenius? [00:31:16] Jeff: yeah, yeah [00:31:17] Merlin: Okay. So like, I don’t know what you call that genre. [00:31:20] Jeff: which is like a super group, right, [00:31:21] Merlin: Yeah, there’s, it’s, it’s Lucy. I gotta say this right, it’s Lucy Dacus, Phoebe Bridgers, and uh, and um, and Julien Baker. These three women who are just super interesting. [00:31:33] Merlin: And I got into like, and then I was listening to Hannah Eide, who I can highly recommend, and I ended up going back and listening to Torres, T O R R E S, one of the great records. If you like theatrical, musical theater, oh, oh, oh, I have a Torres video, it’s gonna change your life. Um, and that’s where I was and then I finally went to sleep according to my watch. [00:31:51] Merlin: I went to sleep at like 3. 05 AM. But, but here’s the thing, Jeff. I made a logistical pivot at this point. uh, uh, uh, I, [00:32:00] I don’t, the listener is almost certainly not familiar with my work. But, but one of my thought technologies the last few years has been, uh, it’s one thing to feel bad and it’s another thing to feel bad about feeling bad. [00:32:11] Merlin: And so I’ve discovered that applies very heavily to sleep in my case. Well, yeah, I mean, it’s the second arrow. Like it’s, it’s what the, the Buddhist, the Buddhist says, you know, the first arrow is the one that, that somebody shoots at you and hits you in the leg, but you feeling about bad about that is the arrow you shoot into yourself. And, and all of my, so many of my strategies to, to bring in another piece of terminology of mine, the mean dad voice. Sometimes when we’re not sure what to do in life, or when we’re vulnerable, or just in our repose, or just being alive, a mean dad voice tells us what’s wrong with us. And how we’ll never get it right. [00:32:50] Merlin: And that is a uniquely terrible thing to be litigating as you’re theoretically trying to go to sleep. [00:32:57] Jeff: Awful. [00:32:58] Merlin: You can’t make yourself go [00:33:00] to sleep. You can’t, you can’t yell yourself into falling asleep. Like it just doesn’t work that way. And so, this little part of the concerto I’ll draw together by saying like, so, I think the practice in your words for this is to say to yourself, I mean, you could do something as glib works for me as like, I’ve decided, I’ve decided, I’ve decided not to worry about this or I’ve decided this is going to be okay. [00:33:26] Merlin: And like kind of make a deal with yourself and it can may sound like happy talk, but like seriously, dude, has, have you, as yelling at yourself ever helped your heartbeat go down and let you go to sleep? And I’ve realized, and so I [00:33:38] Jeff: knows I’ve tried. [00:33:39] Merlin: And I’ll cut, flash forward through years of this practice, and I have a lot of practices about sleep I’d love to share with people, um, but one of them is I say to myself, hey, you know what? [00:33:48] Merlin: What, what, what, what’s, what’s going to happen? What’s the worst thing that’s going to happen? Like tomorrow is actually Thursday is my Thursday. Thursday is my day when I do things like schedule a podcast with my friends, but it’s also when I do a lot of my like power pottering [00:34:00] around the house stuff. [00:34:01] Jeff: Yeah. [00:34:01] Merlin: And so, like, what’s the worst thing that’s going to happen? I said, well, I know I need to be up to talk to Jeff at, you know, ten. So just set an alarm for eight. I had four, four and a half hours of sleep, and then it’ll be fine. You’ve done stuff on four hours of sleep lots of times, and maybe you’ll take a nap later and maybe you won’t, but you can’t really catch up on sleep, but you also, there is no benefit to stressing out about sleep you didn’t catch. [00:34:30] Merlin: And knowing that before you, quote, try to go to sleep, I find more helpful than it seems. Does that make sense? [00:34:39] Jeff: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. I mean, it just, it’s the worst thing in the world to be wrestling with yourself. [00:34:44] Merlin: inclination then is to go, what the, what, what’s wrong with [00:34:47] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Come on, man. [00:34:50] Merlin: on! Um, that, you know, another one, another, if you, in terms of these, I should write these down, but another nice thing to just very gently say to yourself, [00:35:00] you know, I’ve decided not to let it bother me. That’s the actual phrase that I, I [00:35:03] Jeff: Mmm. [00:35:03] Merlin: for lots of things, but, but another one is, oh, I’m going to put this right on my list. [00:35:09] Merlin: Um, you ready for this? This is a thing you say to yourself. So, however you got where you are in a given moment, you find yourself thinking. You don’t yell at yourself. You find yourself thinking, um, it’s not the time for that. [00:35:24] Jeff: Mmm. Yes. Yes. [00:35:27] Merlin: how about just very gently, not now. way you’d say to a little kid, well, as much as you want to go to Disney World, we need to go return these batteries at Walgreens. [00:35:37] Merlin: And [00:35:37] Jeff: It’s a, the not now thing is a huge act of self compassion. [00:35:41] Merlin: oh my God, do you think, do you do, do you do anything? No, honestly, do you do anything like that? [00:35:46] Jeff: You know, it’s only, I don’t, I hope this is related enough, but it’s something that really [00:35:50] Merlin: not gonna matter either way. I’m just like [00:35:52] Jeff: I suppose, while, while you were talking, something that kind of came up for me that, that, that really made me think of. So I had a, I dropped my, uh, [00:36:00] oldest son, my first born off at college about a month ago, like 11 hours away. [00:36:04] Jeff: And, and man, with two things. One is I did have to decide months earlier, I have to stop grieving this now. Because there’ll be a time to grieve it. [00:36:12] Merlin: I’ve already started. I’m still, I’m still grieving stuff from sixth grade as my kid is getting ready to apply to college. I’m still, I’m still two wars behind at every juncture. [00:36:25] Jeff: Yes, yes, yes, it’s hard. Well, so but here’s the thing. Okay, so I successfully, it took me a minute and it took me, you know, bringing it up in therapy, but I got to the point where I’m like, okay, I’m not grieving this anymore, because I can’t enjoy him here. Because everything makes me think about how he’ll be gone. [00:36:42] Jeff: Right? I can’t do that. [00:36:44] Merlin: Oh, oh my god. [00:36:45] Jeff: I want to have here. [00:36:46] Merlin: Oh my God, I’m so ashamed of how often I think that. I’m so, there’s one point, there’s one point in the early part of my kid’s transition where I were like, we just kind of quietly, not like banned photos of my kid on [00:37:00] devices, but there was a time when we were still like getting our hands around it, where it was weird to see a photo of our baby and be like, Oh my God, we’re adjusting to so many things. [00:37:09] Merlin: In addition to everything about having a teenager, there’s another big thing. That wasn’t bad in any sense. I think. I don’t know. I hate to sound needy about it, but like, I fucking love my kid. But like, there was a point where like, you’re like, in the same way for you, like, the day that you dropped your kid off at college may not be the day that you come back and watch that video of your kid having a bath [00:37:29] Jeff: it’s [00:37:29] Merlin: he was, when he was one. [00:37:31] Merlin: Maybe that’s not the best day for that, [00:37:32] Jeff: It’s not the best. It’s not the [00:37:34] Merlin: Or maybe it is. Maybe it is. I mean, I guess it varies. [00:37:37] Jeff: The thing that I think was actually a, a first time truly integrated lesson in this was that, um, in the week before we were to take him, I was a wreck. I was feeling agony that was flavors of a terrible breakup, um, and, and flavors of a death where you’re like, I don’t have anyone to be mad at. [00:37:57] Jeff: This, I mean, you know, some deaths, I don’t, let’s say a [00:38:00] natural death. I don’t have anybody to be mad at. I can’t reverse [00:38:02] Merlin: Well, it’s hard to say you didn’t know it was going to happen. It’s like, [00:38:05] Jeff: Exactly, [00:38:05] Merlin: not surprising that it happens. It’s surprising when it happens. [00:38:09] Jeff: So I was having these moments for that entire week. It really is kind of this, it’s this agony. And now I’m still, I don’t cry easy. And that’s not a point of pride. [00:38:16] Jeff: I just don’t cry easy. Um, and, and as it’s getting closer, I am almost by the end, I’m in a constant state of sort of sniffling. And I can’t say words that are related to us taking him away. I can’t even say the words, right? [00:38:30] Merlin: Talk about a deep down, complicated, like, knot of emotions. It’s not even, it’s not one emotion. It’s not like you go, I’m sad. It’s like, it’s so, it’s, it’s like almost the definition of the word bittersweet. Which is like, I have irreconcilable feelings right now, and it’s not one or two or three feelings. I have like seven irreconcilable feelings. [00:38:50] Merlin: And they’re all real. There’s none of them that aren’t real. [00:38:53] Jeff: And, and there’s this point where it’s like, yeah, This, I’m like, okay, agony. I can, I can sit with agony and figure this out a little [00:39:00] bit, because I’m doing this to myself right now, right? Like, I can be very sad, um, uh, without doing this to myself. And I was like, I had this thought, because I was really crying. [00:39:10] Jeff: I just had to kind of steal away to cry all the time. [00:39:12] Merlin: Especially if it’s not easy for you, right? I mean, you have to like almost like probably enter into some kind of like a chamber and like go, well, now here comes the process of me letting this happen. [00:39:22] Jeff: I have to be like in a car or something. So, so I’m like, okay, I’m crying at this, and I need to cry through it. Like, I’m moving at this, but I need to move through it, right? Like, that’s, [00:39:32] Merlin: only way out is through. Yeah. [00:39:33] Jeff: Oh my God. And when I, when I had that, I was like, it still was hard. Next couple of days were really hard, but there was such a different feeling to it. [00:39:42] Jeff: And again, it’s like one of those things where it’s like an accidental, I mean, I guess the act of self compassion was just stopping and being like, okay, fucking hold on. This is horrible. Let’s just take this apart. [00:39:52] Merlin: Well, I mean the act of compassion is like you’ve accepted that You can’t, in the same way that you can’t yell yourself to sleep, [00:40:00] I, I, I say in that document, like, that I feel like negative, quote unquote negative emotions are like cockroaches, where like you can scare them away for a little while, but that, they’ll, they’ll come back. [00:40:11] Merlin: They’re like the sand people. They’ll, they’ll be back in greater numbers. You know what I mean? You can’t, yeah, they, they, they, you know, that’s why they walk single file. To disguise their numbers. Feelings. Hi, I’m Merlin Mann and I think feelings are like Tusken Raiders. [00:40:31] Jeff: But then it becomes like the, um, what’s the, the feist video for the 4 song where you think it’s one person and then the, yeah, it’s great. Um, yeah. So anyway, that was, you ha, I thought about that when, when you were talking about this, it’s like a, it’s a different thing. It’s a different space, but it is that thing of having to tell yourself, hey, [00:40:50] Merlin: But you can’t do that. I can’t do that. Anyway, without a certain level of just to really state the obvious. I find it difficult to do that unless I make it a [00:41:00] practice or a special project or unless I basically say to myself, you know what, I, going in this, like a, it’s almost like a Daniel Kahneman thing. [00:41:07] Merlin: Continuing in this first order thinking way about this is not great for me. Like, I can actively put all of my energy into avoiding this feeling or I can accept that maybe the feeling won’t kill me and it might actually make me feel more human in some way. [00:41:23] Jeff: yeah. Yeah. [00:41:24] Merlin: There’s a book, um, God, where is this from? Oh, it’s originally from Zorba the Greek, but a guy wrote a book, which, oh God, who wrote this book? [00:41:32] Merlin: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. This is Jon Kabat Zinn. The, the [00:41:34] Jeff: Oh, [00:41:34] Merlin: writes a lot about, yeah, you [00:41:36] Jeff: Also, weirdly, Howard Zinn’s son in law. [00:41:39] Merlin: I did not [00:41:40] Jeff: I built Howard Zinn’s website. [00:41:43] Merlin: Are you kidding me? [00:41:44] Jeff: No, I’m not kidding you. Yeah. [00:41:47] Merlin: um, let’s can you put a pin in this one? We I want to talk about, um, fame famous pe websites for famous people we’ve made. Let’s let’s will you write that [00:41:54] Jeff: Okay. That’s great. Yep. I’ll write it [00:41:55] Merlin: My kid is currently I we had we had back to school night for my kid’s junior year, [00:42:00] uh, last week. And, uh, one of the things they’re reading is people’s history. [00:42:04] Jeff: Oh, that’s excellent to hear. [00:42:06] Merlin: I mean, you could do a lot worse. Yeah, this school, boy, they’re terrible. They, they include social justice in everything they try to do. What a bad school. [00:42:13] Merlin: Oh, my God. I love this school so goddamn much. Um, yeah. So have you heard of this book, Full Catastrophe Living? You might [00:42:19] Jeff: Yeah, it’s behind me. [00:42:21] Merlin: Oh, really? Well, it comes from Zorba the Greek, but he refers to life as the full catastrophe. [00:42:28] Jeff: Yes. [00:42:29] Merlin: Does that, I’m, I’m not putting this well, does that, maybe you could explain it better than I, but is that’s kind of part of it, right? [00:42:35] Merlin: Is instead of, instead of putting my, this goes for sleep, this goes for lots of things. Instead of taking all the energy from my, um, insert Star Trek reference, instead of putting all the energy into keeping my shields up, maybe it’d be better off to just kind of stop the air, stop the ship for a while, and really think about what we’re doing here because. [00:42:54] Merlin: The shields I’m putting up are not helping, they are depleting my energy, and it’s not getting me closer to saving the people [00:43:00] on the, uh, Kobayashi Maru. [00:43:02] Jeff: Yeah, definitely. I was reading this morning, I don’t have it in here, and it’s a name I don’t know I can say, which is Pema Chödrön, I think is her name. [00:43:10] Merlin: She’s the source of one of my all time favorite quotes. [00:43:12] Jeff: Which is? [00:43:13] Merlin: Remember, you are the sky, not the weather. [00:43:15] Jeff: Oh, that’s so good. [00:43:17] Merlin: It’s one of the greatest quotes I’ve ever heard. [00:43:18] Jeff: That’s so good. [00:43:19] Merlin: also has two diureses in her name. [00:43:22] Jeff: Uh, [00:43:23] Merlin: She has two umlauts. [00:43:24] Jeff: sounds, it gets too [00:43:25] Merlin: Sorry, keep going. [00:43:26] Jeff: stole the umlauts from my name at Ellis Island, I think. [00:43:29] Merlin: Really? It used to be Umlautowitz? [00:43:33] Jeff: Yeah, yeah. Whoa! Hey! So this book is, How We Live is How We Die. And it is [00:43:42] Merlin: Happy birthday, Grandma. [00:43:44] Jeff: yeah, I know, you know what’s funny? [00:43:46] Jeff: I was reading it [00:43:47] Merlin: I love you, Grandma. Here’s a book. [00:43:49] Jeff: I was leaving, I was reading it as my youngest came down and I hid the cover like it was porn. I was just, I don’t want him to just have to take that and be like, what the fuck? [00:43:56] Merlin: do that with my O’Reilly book about Pearl. [00:44:00] When my wife, when my wife comes in and finds me eating Snickers bars and listening to Valdi, I’m like, Oh, at least it’s wholesome. [00:44:09] Jeff: exactly, exactly. Yeah, so her thing is like, Think everything’s always dying, right? Like, I mean, it’s a, it’s a dark turn in a way, but it’s like, maybe we can find [00:44:21] Merlin: every glass is temporarily unbroken. But, [00:44:26] Jeff: Bridges says, in, in season one of the, um, of the old man, everything’s always in free fall, uh, which is a little dark, but, [00:44:35] Merlin: but that’s the full catastrophe though, is, is to, to realize it’s not, it’s not a way, and this is a very Alan Watts esque thing. Concept that I will very poorly mangle because I’m making this up as we go along. But like, the reason I keep saying stuff like this goes for sleep, one of my sleep technologies, and this is, I think, related, is that I started to realize things that tend to happen before I go to sleep. [00:44:58] Merlin: Not that I brush my teeth or turn off the [00:45:00] lights, because who brushes their teeth? But like, but at bedtime, there are things that go through my, I think, I bet everybody has these things. It’s usually described as like, my mind is racing or blah, blah, blah. I’m thinking about tomorrow and all these things. [00:45:11] Merlin: But I. Would sit with that and learned in time to sit with that and a funny thing we don’t time to get into this But like this is a huge deal for me is realizing there are three or four things That tend to go through my mind before I go to sleep. This was such a breakthrough for me. And, like, they include things like, well, first, I realize I’m, I’m, I feel bad that I’m not just going to sleep. [00:45:34] Merlin: I’m not talking about, like, being up all night. I’m talking about every single night before I go to sleep. This is, which is important. If you only meditate when you’re sad Did that become something that just you associate with being sad if you just start instead start noticing something on a regular basis and you make it a practice or a project. [00:45:49] Merlin: Nobody needs to know about it. Nobody needs to know about this, except that it might help. And I realized just in summary. Yeah, I tend to think like, Oh, man, I’m having trouble going to sleep. And then I tend to, like, [00:46:00] have a sudden jolt. of not panic, but I’ll suddenly realize something I don’t like thinking about right before bed. [00:46:08] Merlin: And everybody’s got their own version of that. Then I tend to realize sometimes I have a really weird, like sexual thought, like that’s not not even my sex stuff. And it’s just but like, it’s weird and like upsetting to think about. And then I, you know, but what’s funny is, Once you just watch the traffic without getting in the car, that all becomes very instructive because guess what I have now? [00:46:32] Merlin: Now I have a way of saying another phrase I like a lot. Oh, Here comes that feeling. [00:46:38] Jeff: Yeah. [00:46:39] Merlin: And because I’m the sky, not the weather, that feeling of that jolt. How about instead I realize that means I’m now in, for my purposes, step two of the falling asleep process? And like and now once I feel like a slight tingling. [00:46:54] Merlin: On my skin or on my like this part of my body, I know now I’m about 10 minutes from falling asleep or [00:47:00] five minutes from falling asleep. And like, you can make, you can think of that in any way that works for you, but like, no, we’re not at Disney World yet. But we just took the exit with a big green sign says Walt Disney World. [00:47:12] Merlin: So, Don’t worry, we’re still moving toward where we need to go. We’re not there yet. But once you’ve commuted on a route 50 times, you can have really, maybe even too clear heuristic for what happens. Oh, and when we see the water wheel, that means we’re five miles away from Auntie Susie’s house. Like you, you get more confidence why the way back is always seems faster than the way there. [00:47:36] Merlin: The familiarity of that. And once you stop trying, what is the takeaway, as they say, about that? Instead of trying to reject Or, uh, reparse, or normalize, or just reject a feeling that you’re feeling. How about you just watch the car how about you just watch the stream without jumping into the water, [00:48:00] and now you know, okay now, yeah, just like every night I’ve moved on to step three. [00:48:06] Merlin: And what’s weird is the weird meta part of that is once you know that that’s what you’re doing, and it’s gonna be different for everybody, but I encourage people to think about this and try this in sleep and life, but once you start doing that and it stops being something you fear or reject, It just becomes another thing. [00:48:24] Merlin: I mean, it’s like, it’s like you don’t get as mad or sad or you don’t feel as vulnerable and broken. And this last part of this is what I realized over time. I can’t, I can’t prove this, but all those little thoughts that unbidden that come to me, those, like, I’m trying to evade those thoughts or outrun them in my head. [00:48:45] Merlin: Like, First of all, yeah, well now that’s just part, I know that’s just part of the process, and that’s okay, you develop a certain familiarity with it, you start saying things like, oh, you know, here comes that feeling again, but the meta part of that is, now I’m not dreading [00:49:00] going to sleep, because I have a toolbox. [00:49:03] Merlin: for at least putting some kind of a frame around this, and the ultimate life hack, in some ways, is to not need the life hack. Like, once you’ve found a way out of your own aversion to the full catastrophe, I’m not saying it’s going to be easy, but that’s not a thing you get a vote on. You don’t get a vote on it. [00:49:22] Merlin: Why do I cry? after something is over? Why didn’t I cry at the time? Why is it that like you’re kind of like you’re describing, right? Like, but also why? Why are there’s all these things where the emotional part of it seems like it comes at the wrong point? Well, what I’ve realized is that in the same way that my young person telling me who he is, was a gift. [00:49:45] Merlin: My kid trusted me enough to tell me who he really is. I could be mad about like one, one could be mad about how your kid is not what you Expected and another one is to go, Holy shit, can you [00:50:00] imagine how brave that kid was to tell me who he really is? I’m the luckiest person in the goddamn world that they have a kid who knows who they are and then tells me who they are. [00:50:10] Merlin: And I don’t, I don’t think honestly, I mean, you’d have to know me to know, but, um, I can’t imagine a greater gift than that. And I maybe wouldn’t even have learned at that point How good my kid was at life until I had the vulnerability to go, that’s, that’s great. I, I have nothing to add to this holler if you need money, like just do your thing. [00:50:36] Merlin: But I don’t know if that makes sense, but, and so how do I attach that to sleep? Um, well, I start to realize that again, cause I have a practice of this, that vulnerability that I feel that I used to reject, that’s just an indication that I’m human and that I’m alive and that maybe. Is it possible? This is crazy. [00:50:55] Merlin: Really follow me on this, Jeff, because this is what they call the big takeaway at the New York Times. The big [00:51:00] takeaway is that, is there a chance that I had that feeling I don’t like having, specifically because I’m vulnerable, specifically because when do you get vulnerable? So, you get vulnerable when you’re relaxed. [00:51:13] Merlin: You ever had a cat? [00:51:14] Jeff: Yeah. I have two cats. That’s Yeah, exactly. [00:51:17] Merlin: a cat, and most cats, especially if they used, well, think about, think about this, you get a cat, and like, most cats like some kind of interaction, but, you know, some cats really like interaction, but most cats, in my experience, like interaction on their own terms. And so, they’ll come up and let you know when they want to scratch, or they’ll let you know when there’s a new box, or whatever. [00:51:37] Merlin: And sometimes, if the cat gets very relaxed, it seems to want you to rub its tummy, and But the thing is, a cat will get so relaxed, this is, this is, I swear I’m going somewhere kind of with this, the cat gets so relaxed, it kind of unintentionally lets you rub its tummy. But what happens, a cat is an animal, the cat realizes it’s on its back, and it’s vulnerable, its belly is up in the air, and it’s [00:52:00] just, it’s like a deer at the watering hole. [00:52:02] Merlin: And what happens when you rub a cat’s tummy, and then it realizes it’s getting its tummy rubbed? It might bite you, or it might scratch at you, or it might just simply leap out of your lap, [00:52:10] Jeff: Whoa, hold on. Yeah. [00:52:12] Merlin: because that’s the cat realizing it’s vulnerable, given a state of relaxation. Now, how can we, as just only barely slightly differently advanced beings, go, well, maybe that thing, that little, like, ah, I feel that maybe that’s life rubbing my tummy, where like, I feel I can cry. [00:52:30] Merlin: Because I’m not actively experiencing the bad thing anymore. Maybe I can have this feeling and that doesn’t undo me. I’m the sky, not the weather. And then I get to laugh at myself a little bit because I’m like a sleepy kitty. [00:52:43] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. [00:52:44] Merlin: you, I mean, do you get that? Does that make, [00:52:45] Jeff: Yeah. I totally get that. [00:52:47] Merlin: But, but if you don’t, if you don’t accept that, that vulnerability is part of going to sleep, it’s going to be hard to get a good night’s rest. [00:52:53] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And the thing that kind of occurred to me while you were talking about, you know, the whole watching the traffic thing is like, [00:53:00] you were talking on Mastodon the other day about your, your frustration about door management on The Walking Dead. And, and I feel like the way we instinctually [00:53:08] Merlin: to say about door management. And it made me realize that door management in life is about so many more things than the gate at Alexandria. [00:53:16] Jeff: it’s like, you left the fucking door open. And that is what you’re, [00:53:19] Merlin: Yeah, the fucking priest, the guy from The Wire, left the gate open? [00:53:23] Jeff: yeah, [00:53:23] Merlin: What? Didn’t, I thought you were just specifically hung a lantern on it. One of the other guys, the guy who leaves his own door open on his cruiser, Grrrr, specifically said, make sure you close the gate, church guy. Doo doo doo doo doo! I guess some people wandered in. [00:53:39] Merlin: Throw Rick out, he wants two of those strict measures! Anyway, door [00:53:43] Jeff: Close the fucking door. Well, that’s it. That’s it, right? So the, so the, the other, the other thing that happens in Falling Asleep when you’re yelling at yourself is you’re, you’re treating it as a door management problem, right? Or it’s like, why am I letting this shit in? Why did we leave the fucking gate? [00:53:58] Jeff: Who left the fucking gate [00:54:00] open? [00:54:00] Merlin: And what do you do? You say to yourself, well you use phrases, and again this is meaningful to me, I like words, um, oh god, I can’t go to sleep. I can’t stop thinking about this. Talk about rehearsing failure. And I’m not saying don’t acknowledge the truth. What I am saying is, why do you have to add such a negative valence to something instead of just looking at it? [00:54:20] Merlin: Like, why do you have to have a strong opinion about everything instead of just going, yeah, there’s a thing. There’s that feeling. There’s, you know, and like, I, or like, you know, what do they say in, in, uh, the, the singer in the Sondheim musical? I made it through all of last year and I’m here. Like, you know, the full catastrophe. [00:54:36] Merlin: Boy, this is a deep podcast, [00:54:38] Jeff: I’m gonna make it through this year if it kills [00:54:40] Merlin: I’m gonna make it through this year. You ever seen Craig Finn sing that with Mountain Goats? This is, this is maybe the thing, I’m guessing in my head, this might be the thing that John Roderick probably most hates me sending to him. But, cause I love the whole study. It’s Mountain Goats, um, performing this year with Craig Finn singing the lead vocals with [00:54:58] Jeff: Oh, I’ll have to look it up. You know, [00:54:59] Merlin: [00:55:00] And, no, but like imagine Craig Finn, like you can tell he’s a nerd, right? Even in his coolest moment you can tell he’s a nerd. He’s writing songs about John Berryman, who you know from, you know. [00:55:07] Jeff: yeah, of course he’s buried here. Yeah. [00:55:09] Merlin: But he didn’t so he died, you know? [00:55:11] Music is the Best (Part 2) [00:55:11] Merlin: Um, I don’t know if you, do you like the Holt Steady? [00:55:14] Jeff: So I have a very close relationship with that band going, going back. [00:55:18] Merlin: Do you, do you know Lifter Puller? Did you know [00:55:20] Jeff: Yeah. I, we used to play with Lifter Polar all the [00:55:23] Merlin: No way! That’s so cool! Their performance of Stuck Between Stations on Letterman is one of my all time favorite things. He likes the warm feeling but he’s tired of all the dehydration! The guy’s always in a totally pressed suit, he sleeps in a van, but then he comes out and, and he does the little Stephen vocals on Stuck Between Stations. [00:55:47] Jeff: yes, here’s the thing. So since we’re here and now we’re in, like, very obscure territory, and [00:55:52] Merlin: Show notes for this are gonna be a bitch. You’re gonna need technology. You’re gonna need, you’re gonna need a new model to help [00:55:57] Jeff: this is the only way Chippy T is going to come [00:56:00] into this conversation is when I throw the show notes through [00:56:02] Merlin: We have pages and pages of notes about ChatsheepieT to talk about. We got to do a part two. [00:56:07] Jeff: But let’s, let’s stay here because I. I absolutely loved Lifter Puller and I’ll, and I will send you this, but my band and Lifter Puller, I organized a Christmas show and, and we recorded a single together where we [00:56:20] Merlin: Oh man! By the way, single is, is, is a trademark of IRS records, [00:56:24] Jeff: yeah, exactly. And their song was called Bitchy Little Christmas. [00:56:30] Merlin: Were Lifter Polar, and please, please help people out by explaining what Lifter Polar is and why they have a funny, they have a funny spelled name. [00:56:37] Jeff: Lifter Puller was a, was a Minneapolis, was a Minneapolis band. [00:56:41] Merlin: It’s the guitar player and the singer from the whole study, right? [00:56:44] Jeff: Yeah, so it’s, well, Tad Kubler was the bass player, um, of the, of Lifter Puller, uh, and, and Craig Finn was the singer guitar player, and, um, they had a, Dan Monick was the drummer, amazing dude, amazing photographer, but anyway, Lifter Puller was this band from Minneapolis [00:57:00] that got a little bit, like, minor famous towards the end, and were on, like, Jenny Jones and Letterman. [00:57:06] Merlin: Were they like, were they like regionally, they’re not like twin tone famous, but like they’re regionally well known? [00:57:11] Jeff: Regionally. Yeah, exactly. People loved them here. People sang along. I mean, it’s hard not to sing along to those stories. And I guess the biggest thing, and you can say this too, the biggest thing about Lifter Polar and the Hold Steady is the stories are incredible. It’s like if Bruce Springsteen was one of us. [00:57:25] Merlin: and seriously, Stuck Between Stations is not like, I’m not here to say that it’s about John Berryman and the Dream Songs, but like, you know, John Berryman is like, he likes the golden gophers, you know, [00:57:37] Jeff: Yeah, yeah, yeah, [00:57:38] Merlin: yeah, but like, it’s like, but there is [00:57:40] Jeff: First time the Golden Gophers were ever mentioned on this podcast. [00:57:44] Merlin: I think, I think this might be why. Like maybe perhaps, why I can’t know if Roderick’s ever actually listen to them I mean, I think he’s just naturally he naturally rejects bands that are kind of similar as his, but um But that’s what really got me when I very first heard Not [00:58:00] Boys and Girls in America, but the oh oh oh oh oh Shoot. [00:58:04] Merlin: What was the one before, with uh, started out with, The Positive Jam [00:58:08] Jeff: yeah, yeah, [00:58:09] Merlin: you know the one, the first one, but when I first heard that and I was like, Oh my God, this is really, this is like MFA version of Bruce Springsteen [00:58:17] Jeff: Yes. Yes. Yes. [00:58:20] Merlin: with, with, with both of the things that make those two things wonderful, like reading, reading things like John Berryman, but also really enjoying something like Thunder Road. [00:58:28] Merlin: Like that is reconcilable in a really exciting way. Lifter Puller, man. [00:58:34] Jeff: Lifter Puller. Amazing. [00:58:35] Merlin: you heard Nothing Painted Blue? [00:58:37] Jeff: Heard what? [00:58:38] Merlin: Nothing Painted Blue? So I mentioned a minute ago the Mountain Goats, uh, uh, Peter Hughes was, he wasn’t in, he wasn’t in Nothing Painted Blue for my favorite time. He was in a little earlier, but I will find a record for you, but check out Nothing Painted Blue if you like Too Clever by a Half, you know, kind of like listening to Jonathan Colton sing [00:59:00] about fractals. [00:59:01] Merlin: Like, if you like that kind of thing, but like, a little more serious, uh, I’m gonna write that down. I’m gonna tell you about Nothing Painted Blue. Very, very smart band. Are we gonna talk about the internet, or not? [00:59:13] Jeff: We’re getting there, I [00:59:13] Merlin: people, people don’t tune in to hear us talk about life. They, they, they’re here for the hot tech tips. [00:59:18] Jeff: Sorry, fuckers. Oh, God. [00:59:22] Merlin: got, I got your model. [00:59:24] Jeff: Yeah, no, we can do this. I have to say, having wound our way to Lifter Puller, I’m a little dizzy. Like, how is this happening? And starting with Matthias Jabs, by the way, which is great. Like, just a nice bookends to that part. [00:59:38] Merlin: What was your, what was your, what was your first record? Was, was it, was probably, you’re probably younger than me, so probably the one with, uh, the Bitch is Hungry song on it. Dun dun dun. Rocky Like a Hurricane. That, that was probably like, see, I’m, I’m a breakout, I’m a breakout guy. [00:59:50] Jeff: Yeah, and I mean, I got to break out. Uh, I can say that when I got a viola thinking I was going to be in band, the only thing I ever learned was, was rock you like a, was rock you like a [01:00:00] hurricane. [01:00:00] Merlin: See, I would have thought you’d be into John Cale. I could see you being very into John Cale. Mmm. [01:00:06] Jeff: time. Long time. Yeah. But, but since you asked, but let’s just pretend you asked what my first album was generally, and I will say that the first one that I bought of my own volition was the cassette of Huey Lewis Sports. [01:00:16] Merlin: Oh my god, really, 1984. I, um, [01:00:20] Jeff: when I came [01:00:21] Merlin: so you’re also then, you’re also old enough to remember Columbia House, [01:00:25] Jeff: Oh, yeah. [01:00:25] Jeff: This, okay, so here’s the, so, okay, fine. [01:00:27] Merlin: ten, ten for a penny. I owed four, I owed 40 to Columbia House for six years because of sports. [01:00:35] Jeff: Oh, yeah. But they can’t come after you. You’re a [01:00:37] Merlin: And I didn’t have the sense to have it delivered to our neighbor’s mailbox, you know? That was, that was the good way to run the [01:00:43] Jeff: But Merlin, here’s what’s amazing that you brought that up, because I always have an asterisk in my head when I say that was the first one. What I really mean is that was the one that brought my first package of Columbia House [01:00:55] Merlin: Oh, that’s, isn’t that, that is so momentous, [01:01:00] oh my god, I have [01:01:01] Jeff: It was a [01:01:01] Merlin: I have such a story about that. [01:01:04] Jeff: Well, I don’t mind hearing it. I mean, I don’t know. Yeah. [01:01:06] Merlin: When I was ten, uh, living in Cincinnati, Ohio, uh, the neighborhood was called Grosbeck. One day, long story short, I, I go out to check the mail, I’m ten, right, this is 1970. It’s 1976, so I had a record player, so it would be 76 or 77. The point of the story is, oh God, I’m going to mess this up a little bit. I go outside and there’s a big package, and I think it was basically that thing I described a second ago. [01:01:32] Merlin: So the idea is, you would get these, there were these services where you, my parents did this, where you’d sign up for a service and you’d say, okay, um, I really like music. I’m going to, they’re going to send me seven 8 tracks cassettes or 10 or whatever. A Tracks cassettes, you know, for a penny or whatever, but then you’re signing up for this thing where like, if you don’t physically return, mail back a thing every month, they automatically send you a record. [01:01:56] Merlin: But what everybody did was a scam. A lot of people, anyway, [01:02:00] would like, do a scam of like, I get seven free albums and now my neighbor is on the hook for that or whatever. I went out and I got a big, there’s a big package like between our screen. Screen Door and Our Door Door. And I think it was seven albums. [01:02:13] Merlin: I’ll tell you the ones I remember off the dome. I opened this thing up, it was addressed, I guess it wasn’t addressed to me, but like, it was seven albums. I’m 10 years old. Now this becomes one of those stories that like in a shitty biopic, like this would be that moment like where Paul McCartney sees a bass in a window or whatever. [01:02:31] Merlin: Um, it was the, it was the greatest, it was a Dolly Parton greatest hits that had like Life’s Like a Butterfly, that era. Um, yeah. Beach Boys Greatest Hits, [01:02:40] Jeff: Mm [01:02:41] Merlin: The Monkees Greatest Hits, [01:02:42] Jeff: Mm hmm. [01:02:43] Merlin: Kiss, Rock and Roll Over, Kiss, Destroyer, Um, oh, oh, one that I didn’t love, a Jefferson Starship album, and I’m probably forgetting another one, but I think it might be the one with the, uh, with the Cunnilingus song, you know, I got [01:03:00] a taste of the real world, when I went down on you, girl, if only you believed in miracles, baby. [01:03:06] Merlin: It [01:03:07] Jeff: John Berryman. [01:03:08] Merlin: one that had the dragon on the cover, but anyway, that was my first, I suddenly had, An album by the [01:03:16] Jeff: Yeah. [01:03:16] Merlin: who at the time I was watching in reruns on UHF, [01:03:19] Jeff: yeah. So good. [01:03:20] Merlin: and I suddenly also had an album with stuff like Beach Boys In My Room, [01:03:24] Jeff: Mm. [01:03:25] Merlin: or like that era, the era, obviously, duh, I’m not basic, I mean, I like Pet Sounds quite a lot, but like, I also celebrate the catalog of the Beach Boys, especially right before Pet Sounds, [01:03:38] Jeff: yes, for [01:03:39] Merlin: even or especially stuff like Help Me Rhonda, but like In My Room and boom. [01:03:48] Merlin: Don’t worry, baby, don’t worry, [01:03:50] Jeff: Don’t worry, baby. [01:03:54] Merlin: um, yeah, that was my experience with [01:03:56] Jeff: was like their Ronette song. [01:03:57] Merlin: Oh, absolutely. It sounds like Hal Blaine. [01:04:00] That changed my life a little bit. That day where I opened up those records, and even then becoming like a familiar, like I didn’t play the Dolly Parton as much as, Kiss Destroyer, which is like, I mean, that was T. [01:04:12] Merlin: H., for people my age, that was T. H. E. Kiss album, like, if you, I mean, Alive 2, which is not very good, like, there’s all of those, and it sounds like you’re not a big Kiss fan, but Kiss Destroyer, it’s the one, it opens with, it opens with Detroit Rock City, it’s got [01:04:25] Jeff: Which is amazing, which is incredible. It’s a shuffle. It’s a I mean, it’s just an incredible song. Yeah, is that as a drummer, it was how I learned shuffles was that beat? [01:04:37] Merlin: end up being friends with drummers, it’s the weirdest thing. [01:04:39] Jeff: Johns and [01:04:40] Merlin: No, it’s the weirdest thing, all of my, all of my, all of my, my, my fake friends that have been in bands, the people who actually will talk to me, it’s invariably the drummers. I’ve made friends with so many drummers and I don’t know why. I mean, I guess, I guess because I can’t make friends with musicians. Oh! [01:04:55] Jeff: oh, both sides of the mouth. [01:04:58] Merlin: Are these, are these your drums? Are these [01:05:00] your drums? [01:05:00] Jeff: what? My son’s in, my son’s in a band and his drummer, and they both run cross country and his drummer who I’ve come to know a little bit and he was running and I, and he was kind of way back in the race. So he’s the only one coming through and I yelled both sides of the mouth to him because you know this joke, how do you tell if the stage is level? [01:05:19] Jeff: The drummer’s drooling out of both sides of his mouth. [01:05:24] Merlin: That’s funny! That’s funny, bullseye! I like that! [01:05:28] Jeff: I yell both sides of the mouth at this kid [01:05:32] Merlin: And you can already hear it in your head, Dad! [01:05:34] Jeff: It was a big mistake. That’s [01:05:37] Merlin: Um, can I, can I give you one fact that you don’t remark about and then we go straight into the actual topic? Is that okay? But I want, can I do a, can I do a mic drop right here? I’m tired all together. Um, it means a lot to me. My kid means a lot to me, but a big part of my kid meaning a lot to me is me getting out of the picture, or, you know, [01:06:00] not putting myself into the picture that was taken of my kid, you know, over a decade ago. [01:06:06] Merlin: It’s very difficult to do. [01:06:07] dadblog.blog [01:06:07] Merlin: I think, I think you know this, and yet I’m still very interested, and I’ve realized that, like, I only have access to parts of my kid’s life because that’s how it should be, but there are places where my kid is, you know, is, Himself and performs. I would, I would commend. It’s very important you put a link in show notes to his letterbox, because he’s a genuinely very funny writer. [01:06:30] Merlin: I’ll get you a link for that. But [01:06:32] Jeff: Okay. [01:06:32] Merlin: for the fourth. Fourth, separate time last night. I signed up for Instagram. [01:06:41] Jeff: For the fourth separate time, are they four separate accounts or do you just kill it and come [01:06:45] Merlin: I’ve had, I mean, all the good, all my good usernames are gone. But like, I signed up for Instagram when everybody first got on it. And I somewhat famously bounced because I’m like this. This is back in the better days, that essay I wrote. Like, this is about where I was like, fuck this. [01:07:00] A bunch of people who work at Apple taking pictures of birds on wires? [01:07:02] Merlin: No, thanks. of course, I did, I have, you know, Have my Facebook account like deactivated for like 10 years, but you know, everybody thinks I’m one of the hill people. So like, you know, hot dogs, ladies, that account’s gone. Um, so last night, uh, And don’t, I’m not, God, it’s so critical you’re not following me, but it’s just to say to you that like, I don’t know, you kind of, we’re familiar with each other enough that I think you would appreciate that like, that’s my bet noire. [01:07:30] Merlin: Like Facebook and Instagram are like, I don’t, I don’t want to yuck on anybody’s yum, but it’s not a thing I want to do and they’re bad. And no, but last night I, unwilling horse, This is my new account and I’m just [01:07:45] Jeff: hmm. Unwilling horse. Uh, [01:07:51] Merlin: to see my kid, but that’s, that’s like I need to bring the mountain to Mohammed and he said it, he said it was okay [01:08:00] to, to, to follow him there. [01:08:01] Merlin: So once a day or so I’ll. [01:08:03] Jeff: yes. You have to go. Yeah. Yep. [01:08:05] Merlin: was so bummed when I left Twitter, but I was like, and it was kind of abrupt where I was finally like, you know, imagine me clapping like, new dealer out of here. Like, I cannot be here anymore. And at this point, it’s just it’s just war criminals and war profiteers. [01:08:19] Merlin: That’s all who’s left there at this point. And people still send me things. All my friends who are quote off Twitter keep sending me things from Twitter. And I don’t understand how that works. But no, I can handle one thing at a time. I can handle one social network at a time. I can handle as well. [01:08:33] Merlin: Transcribed Probably talk about in some future episode, I can handle one. LLM with really mostly one model at a [01:08:42] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. [01:08:44] Merlin: I need to learn the hammer I’ve got before I buy more hammers. And I do not need more hammers, especially if they say Instagram on them. But I’m not covering myself with glory. I don’t fucking care. [01:08:54] Merlin: I’ll probably deactivate it. It’s just not worth it. This is a signup process. The [01:09:00] entire time we’re sitting there and eventually mom and Billy switch seats so he could sit next to me and make fun of me while because he doesn’t think I know how to use the Internet. [01:09:08] Jeff: Isn’t that funny? Listen, kid! Can you even spell angel fire? [01:09:17] Merlin: Listen, listen, let me explain something to you. I had an internet shrine to, to, to, to, to that, to that gal from Paramore before you were even born. It was on Geocities and I don’t know where it is now. [01:09:31] Jeff: And yeah, I couldn’t get the under construction thing off, [01:09:33] Merlin: I couldn’t get it, but I had a blinking gif. I had a, I had another one. I used a pencil for an HR. That’s a horizontal rule. [01:09:40] Merlin: Sit down. Let me explain to you. Um, but, like, you know, I’ll probably bounce off that and just see how it goes, but, like, you know, just to, the, the, crossing the T, I think, and I said this to my kid last night who, of course, looked at me very perplexed, uh, not perplexed because, because my kid’s dumb, but perplexed because I’m an idiot, but, like, um, I was like, you know, kid, [01:10:00] like, you know, perhaps know me, and I’m, I’m, I’m a, I’m a, I’m a laughing stock in our house in every conceivable way, which is okay, um, I, I don’t, I don’t draw that part of my life from my family. [01:10:12] Merlin: That’s not what they’re there for. They’re not there to make me feel smart and good. They’re there to be who they are, for me to stay the fuck out of the way. I’m a, I’ve said this since my kid was born, I’m a, I’m a basically a mule with a checkbook. Just, if you, if there’s nothing to do being a mule, and there’s nothing to do being a checkbook, you’re not needed right now. [01:10:28] Merlin: Nobody needs your opinion. [01:10:30] Jeff: so you’ve got cocaine and a checkbook. [01:10:32] Merlin: Well, yeah, they’re in my butt. [01:10:34] Jeff: Yeah, [01:10:34] Merlin: The checkbook. [01:10:35] Jeff: it out. You gotta go and fetch it. [01:10:36] Merlin: my, I keep all, I keep all my checkbooks in my butt because I’m a mule. [01:10:40] Jeff: Cause I’m a mule. [01:10:41] Merlin: Google it. Um, great. Now, now I’m going to have another thing on Urban Dictionary. Um, there’s Mann’s assumption and also checkbook, but, but, but, um, but no, I said, I said, yeah, I said, honestly, you know, not that it matters. [01:10:54] Merlin: You can’t be earnest with a 16 year old. But I was like, you know, it means a lot to me to look at new [01:11:00] things. Because, I didn’t say this, but I’ll say this to you, Jeff, like, the, our, this is in the document, like, I think, I know, for myself, and I think in most cases, most of us tend to become, I don’t know if it’s conservative is the wrong word for it, we tend to become hidebound in our ideas about things, and blah, blah, blah, this is a different conversation, but I was like, you know I like new stuff, like, my family’s constantly making fun of me, like, there’s a joke on, Messed on my podcast that the joke that started with next hempkin which tracks max would say stuff like oh this new iPhone I need it for my work and that became like so that that’s a running joke now is I need this for my work But like honestly when I’m like Madeline if you’re gonna rent a car Please rent a car with Carplay, and she’s like I don’t what and I’m like Yeah, but like, if we’re going to have a car for five days, A, I want car play in the car, and B, all my, I learned this from Jason Snell, I mean, everything is copy, as Nora Ephron says, like, um, this is all stuff that is applies to other things. [01:11:59] Merlin: And just [01:12:00] because you don’t understand what my job is, doesn’t mean I don’t understand what my job is. So I say to my kid, I says, I says to him, I says, you know, I like learning about new stuff. I said, but honestly, I’ve also learned that sometimes I need to revisit my priors about old stuff. Which, believe it or not, in this case is Instagram, because now Instagram is not just a place where they wheeze my juice and steal my data and try to sell me screen doors. [01:12:21] Merlin: It also is now a place where my kid is. And that, I don’t know if I’ll be there forever, or I don’t, I don’t need to have a big position on this. My kid’s on Instagram. I’ll look at it there. I found out my kid likes Talking Heads a month ago, and I’m like, how could you, why have you not sat down and watched the Rome 1980 concert with me? [01:12:39] Merlin: You need to tell me when you like things that are good. [01:12:42] Music is the Best (Part 3) [01:12:42] Jeff: Wait, is the Rome 1980 concert, is that on YouTube and not like an official release? Is that when Adrian Belew’s in the [01:12:47] Merlin: Oh, it’s, it’s the best. I’m somebody who watches Exit… Stage Left once a month. This is, it’s the best, it is the best recorded rock concert I’ve ever seen. [01:13:00] And don’t even, don’t even mention, don’t even mention that later one that’s also a very good movie. That’s a movie about David Byrne. This is a movie [01:13:07] Jeff: This is the one that is incredible energy, just unbelievable [01:13:11] Merlin: It’s got Bernie, Bernie Worrell, yeah, Adrian Belew, arguably at the height of his powers. Oh God, the woman, the singer, McDonald is her [01:13:20] Jeff: I’ve seen it and I actually sent it to my son and said this is, I literally said this is the best live performance I’ve ever seen on [01:13:28] Merlin: It is. It’s the best live performance. And like, especially if you like talking heads anyway at all, especially if you’re one of those people who came in, quote unquote, late with Burning Down the House. We were like, no, Fear of Music [01:13:37] Jeff: that was the Paramore [01:13:38] Merlin: Fear of Music is kind of their best record in some ways. Like, it’s definitely like the low key. [01:13:44] Merlin: Oh, yeah, this is like this. But Adrian Belew. And he has to play, he’s playing a Roland. He’s playing a solid state Roland [01:13:52] Jeff: hmm. Sure is. [01:13:52] Merlin: and, and his, [01:13:54] Jeff: He made some weird [01:13:55] Merlin: his weird, weird ass strat, it’s, he’s got, he’s, he’s taken out three of the five [01:14:00] springs in the back. So he’s got his whammy bar has two and, and he, but he, I think the thing is with that lineup, with like, Nine people on stage or whatever. [01:14:09] Merlin: I think he can’t play as loud as he would probably like to to play the way [01:14:14] Jeff: as many elephant sounds. [01:14:15] Merlin: cuz think about how much it’s not feedback in the usual sense. Like you really got me sense Well, it’s more like but like he He has to, and like you can see him struggling to, I don’t know, you play guitar, [01:14:27] Jeff: No, God, [01:14:28] Merlin: okay. But like, like on a guitar, like you, there’s harmonics. [01:14:30] Merlin: Like if you hit a harmonic on the B at the 12th, that’s a pretty easy harmonic. You can sound like the edge. Really easy. Do, do, do, do. Try and hit that one on the fifth string. And if you don’t have enough volume, you don’t get the overtones. And you can see him not struggling, but you could see all the effort he has to put into that. [01:14:48] Merlin: To do what he’s doing, Donette McDonald, that’s her name, and that’s also, I walked away saying, these are three of the best rhythm guitarists I’ve ever seen. Because Jerry Harrison and David Byrne, guess what? You know what? David [01:15:00] Byrne is a really fucking good [01:15:01] Jeff: Really great. Yeah, definitely. [01:15:03] Merlin: wanna, I wanna underline this because a lot of you are gonna be really smart and say, yeah, I really love Stop Making Sense. [01:15:09] Merlin: Here’s what I’m saying to you. Stop Making Sense is a very good movie. It’s a really good movie. It’s a movie about David Byrne. [01:15:13] Jeff: that’s a great way to describe it. [01:15:15] Merlin: I mean, this is a, like, you’re gonna, you’re gonna, oh my god, it’s so good, [01:15:20] Jeff: You’re gonna love them without the big suit. I’ll tell you [01:15:23] Merlin: it’s a good bit, it’s a good bit, [01:15:24] Jeff: It’s a great bit. It’s so funny you bring this up because what I’m remembering now is that so I’d already loved Adrian Belew, but I kind of just like left him in my King Crimson records. [01:15:34] Merlin: was your, what was your, oh, okay, so like, Discipline, Discipline, [01:15:37] Jeff: my uncle’s King Crimson record. [01:15:39] Jeff: The Court of the Crimson King. Yeah, it’s Unbelievable. [01:15:43] Merlin: Friend [01:15:44] Jeff: I still put it on all the time, but, [01:15:46] Merlin: to sign [01:15:48] Jeff: him, I left him there, you know, like I let him, he didn’t come out, uh, of that record, uh, for me. And so when I saw this, I was like, are you fucking kidding me? And then I went [01:15:56] Merlin: and he’s playing the whole time he’s part of the band. [01:15:58] Jeff: I went down such a [01:16:00] rabbit hole on YouTube that there was a point at which it was all it was feeding me practically was a new Adrian Belew content. [01:16:05] Merlin: Oh my God. Dude. Dude. Like for those of you out there who have not gotten the, the gospel on Adrian Blue, I mean, I think in, in a weird way, he might be best known from King Crimson, which is already so crazy that that’s what he’s well known for. But like, treat yourself like I think. A good starting point might be, after Heroes, it’s the Lodger. [01:16:27] Merlin: I think on the Lodger, on the Lodger tour, he’s on, I think he’s on, that’s mostly Carlos, um, Carlos Alomar, I think, but like, but there’s a live performance, but he’s wearing like pleated leather pants, and he introduces this young man from Georgia, Adrian Belew, and he’s still got hair and stuff like that, but then he was also in Zappa’s band. [01:16:45] Jeff: I was just gonna say, there aren’t that many people who were in Zappa’s band, and I am a, um, I’m a, uh, here and there fan of Frank Zappa, [01:16:53] Merlin: I, I like, I like Zappa songs and some Zappa. Zappa Records. And I like the way everything [01:17:00] sounds, but I can’t listen to like tons and tons of [01:17:03] Jeff: Oh, no. No, no, no. But what I love, and this is where that, where that, oh, it’s great, where that, where that rabbit hole led also was just people talking about auditioning for Frank Zappa, [01:17:14] Merlin: Oh my God. Can you imagine? [01:17:16] Jeff: genre that I highly recommend. [01:17:19] Merlin: That is so funny. And then what else? Uh, I’m missing another one. Then he was a do. DOA do. He’s on fear of music. He’s on anda you know that like, uh, what is that? [01:17:30] Jeff: Digga, digga, digga, [01:17:31] Merlin: Zimbra on Zimbra. Diga. Diga Dig. You know? Um, which does sound kind of like Fri uh, and then, oh, but he also has his solo album. [01:17:38] Merlin: You know, I’m Lone [01:17:40] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [01:17:41] Merlin: Like that was my introduction. My friend put an Adrian Belu, so my friend made me this amazing high quality Maxwell cassette of like a bunch. ’cause we were both [01:17:50] Merlin: XLII [01:17:50] Jeff: or XLII-S? [01:17:52] Merlin: it might have been XLII, as this is 85, so that might be an XLII, but it included, um, Mediterranean Sundance by Al Di [01:18:00] Meola, et al. [01:18:00] Merlin: It included Hot on Your Heels by, um, the band was Steeler, but by Yngwie Malmsteen, which is [01:18:06] Jeff: Mm hmm. [01:18:07] Merlin: Um, it included, ba ga da da dum dum, da ga da da da dum dum, uh, uh, uh, some Iron Maiden. Like, and, uh, oh, a little bit of Stevie Ray Vaughan, but anyway, it was all the shredding, like, good, classy shredding guitar people, and he put a lone rhinoceros on there, because he could make his guitar sound like an elephant or a rhinoceros. [01:18:25] Jeff: I’m going to blow your mind straight from Wikipedia right now. [01:18:28] Merlin: Do it, bring [01:18:28] Jeff: To say that in the list of contributions to records that he made, you, you’ve got a cluster of Laurie Anderson records followed by Cyndi Lauper’s True Colors. [01:18:39] Merlin: What? Oh, I heard an Adrian Belew fact. I find this difficult to believe for reasons we can litigate, but, um, okay, so my kid is a kid, and, uh, love that, um, we’re a big Ryan Reynolds house, for better or for worse, and like that video, what’s the video game movie, Free Guy? My kid really liked Free Guy. And there’s a song [01:19:00] that plays a role in that movie, it appears several times, and it’s a Mariah Carey song. [01:19:05] Merlin: Uh, it’s the one that goes, you know, it’s the sweet, sweet fantasy baby. Now what is the primary sample that you remember from Fantasy by Mariah Carey? [01:19:15] Jeff: I don’t remember a sample from [01:19:16] Merlin: It goes like this. [01:19:17] Jeff: think I was so transfixed by the fact that she wasn’t Minnie Riperton. Anyway, that’s another story, [01:19:21] Merlin: could totally hear that. Oh God, I rewatched Idiocracy last night with Minnie Riperton’s daughter [01:19:25] Jeff: which I have not watched. [01:19:27] Merlin: gosh, it’s awfully good. [01:19:28] Merlin: I’m going to give you four notes and a rest. Well, there abouts. Ba dum, bum, bum, ba dum, [01:19:35] Jeff: Oh, then it, uh, uh, fuck, fuck, fuck, [01:19:38] Merlin: What you gonna do when [01:19:39] Jeff: it’s not, [01:19:41] Merlin: I’m gonna have some fun. What do you consider fun? Fun. Genius of Love. Oh, talk about the black private. Wait, let me get this right. Are you talking about the black private dick? Who’s the sex machine with all the chicks? [01:19:58] Jeff: Yeah. No, but hold on. [01:19:59] Merlin: just, I’m just talking about [01:20:00] Shaft. [01:20:01] Jeff: that that’s yes. And then, and what follows that? Shut your [01:20:04] Merlin: Shut your mouth. Oh, he’s listening to that cassette all the time. Um, so, uh, Chris and Tina and Tina’s two sisters. Sorry, sorry, sorry. The Rhythm Section of Talking Heads. Tina Weymouth and Chris Franz. Now, I think even at that point, they were at least dating, probably married. The drummer and the bass player, Tina Weymouth and Chris Franz. [01:20:21] Merlin: She and her two sisters and Chris Franz did a really wonderful album, uh, called, I think Is it called Tom Tom Club? But it’s the one that’s got wording, opens with wordy rapping hood, but most famously has a song on it called Genius of Love, [01:20:36] Jeff: Yeah. [01:20:36] Merlin: is a song that I found completely beguiling, partly because of its wonderful animated video that I saw in 1983. [01:20:44] Merlin: But, you know, that’s that, that, ba dump, bump, bump, ba dump, which is sampled on that Mariah Carey song. Guess who played guitar on [01:20:53] Jeff: Was it Belew? [01:20:54] Merlin: It’s Adrian Belew. Adrian Belew found out only recently. This is the part that I have trouble with. He [01:21:00] just found out recently that like, and this doesn’t make sense because it seems like he would have seen some checks, but I, I, maybe he doesn’t have a writing credit. [01:21:06] Merlin: I don’t know. But point is, like you go and you see Free Guy and you’re going to hear that really catchy song. Sweet, sweet fantasy baby. Prominent sample. He discovered recently, he had no idea he had been sampled on like a top ten song. Can you imagine? That doesn’t happen to me. [01:21:22] Jeff: No, that’s never happened to me [01:21:24] Merlin: I mean, it just doesn’t happen in my day to day, at least not that often that I find out I’ve been sampled on something, [01:21:29] Jeff: Also, you know what I realized years after not being in a band anymore? It’s like, I thought I knew what I wanted to be true for me in a band and my band, but what I realize now is what would have been really amazing is to be exactly where I am now, which is not with a band, but every once in a while a royalty check comes in. [01:21:45] Jeff: Wouldn’t that be nice? [01:21:46] Merlin: That is, I’m thinking about that, that is a really, it’s sort of like how my friend John Roderick wants to be, this is very specific, he’s always wanted to be a retired head of the CIA. [01:21:57] Jeff: Yes. Yes. Exactly. Exactly. [01:21:58] Merlin: And there are numerous [01:22:00] steps that are missing from that stack. [01:22:03] Jeff: Yep. Yep. Yep. [01:22:04] Merlin: It’s funny because I was thinking, when I was thinking about Dinosaur Jr. [01:22:06] Merlin: and arguing with Chris and Marty last night, I had a thought. Which is like, I kind of miss being in a band and like, not again, not arguing, but like going back and forth with your friends about like what the best song on Trap Mask Replica is. [01:22:19] Jeff: Oh, completely. [01:22:20] Merlin: case, what’s your favorite? I really miss I miss the, [01:22:23] Jeff: Got me? [01:22:23] Merlin: I miss the, me and my girl named Mimbo, Limbo, Spam. That’s right, the Mascara Snake. [01:22:32] Jeff: Very special. [01:22:34] Merlin: a very special album, and it just goes to show you, you don’t really need to wear headphones in the studio if you can hear kind of a little bit through the [01:22:40] Jeff: No. Fuck no. [01:22:41] Merlin: Um, but I was thinking I do kind of, I, yeah, I mean royalties would be nice. [01:22:46] Jeff: Just to say about bands, you had said this twice now, that there’s sort of a relationship between banter and argument. And I think that what I miss most about being in a band is that practice space world where banter and argument are the same, [01:23:00] are sort of the, [01:23:00] Merlin: But also, also stuff where there wasn’t an answer. Like today, everybody’s obsessed. My, my, my, my, my dear worst friend, John Siracusa, who I’ve only recently realized mainly just cares about being right. He wants to be right, he wants to be right, and he wants you to know that we’ve already talked about this on the show before. [01:23:15] Merlin: That doesn’t come up at band practice. [01:23:18] Jeff: No, hell no. No [01:23:19] Merlin: Because I mean like in the same way that like I’ve tried to say to my dear wife, sometimes communication is not about relaying information. It’s about bonding, right? And like, that’s really good to know about me. Because when one of the bits in our, every family’s got bits, and one of the bits in our family come up, I’m not doing that. [01:23:37] Merlin: When I quote a Curious George cartoon, and there are Curious George cartoons that I quote constantly, like all the time. Anytime I hear, you know me, maybe a certain cadence. And I, I just, I just start quoting, uh, that’s a good amount, or a lot of cheese, or like whatever it is, or something happened in there, something monkey related. [01:23:58] Jeff: All I hear is woo. [01:23:59] Merlin: Ooh, [01:24:00] and he remembers Pigeon Compass. That’s such a good show. That’s [01:24:05] Jeff: That’s good technology. [01:24:07] Merlin: off Caillou. Turn off Caillou. [01:24:09] Jeff: Oh, turn off Caillou forever. Turn on Pingu if you can’t get [01:24:13] Merlin: What about that Mr. Hinkle? Has he ever been indicted? Remember, remember Caillou’s next door neighbor? That guy’s no Mr. Wilson, is what I’m saying. Um, we’re closing the threads on our threads. Um, useful things to, I sent you a screenshot, uh, useful things to say to yourself. Not now. Stay on target. Stop. Just keep doing the thing. [01:24:37] Merlin: Eh, whatever, you’ll get it next time. What exactly are you saving this for? That’s to the chicken wing that my wife put in the fridge a long time ago and I said, you’ll never eat that. Cause now, now we’ve got garbage and the cost of a bag. I’ve decided not to let it bother me. Any, I mean, obviously we’re going to need to have, uh, maybe next week or something. [01:24:56] Merlin: We will have another episode to talk about the dingus. [01:25:00] Uh, this feels, this feels like something good to do. [01:25:05] Jeff: I love [01:25:05] Merlin: I bet there’s some, one person, somebody who will like this. [01:25:10] Jeff: Oh yeah, for sure. I mean, [01:25:11] Merlin: I’m very deeply sorry. [01:25:14] Jeff: I [01:25:14] Merlin: is there a podcast? Are you listening to any good podcasts? Do you like, oh, you know, have you ever heard Serial? [01:25:18] Merlin: Yeah, I’ve heard Serial. Yeah, but like, is there one where they talk about Glenn Fleischman and Lifter Puller? [01:25:23] Jeff: of, have you heard the off week, uh, overtired? [01:25:25] Merlin: my God, it’s so good. What about Franz Nicolay? What, what about that guy who plays keyboards in, in, in the whole study? Do they mention him at all? Well, I heard on that show that, I heard that he likes the warm feeling, but he’s tired of all the dehydration, is what I [01:25:39] Jeff: it’s probably, that sounds about right. I’ve [01:25:41] Merlin: The hardest part about this is going to be finding things for notes, because this would be a very good notes episode. [01:25:48] Jeff: That’s actually the most fun part. Thank you, Merlin [01:25:52] Merlin: Wait, is that it? I mean, how the fuck is that the end? [01:25:55] Jeff: Didn’t you just say we’re done? [01:25:56] Merlin: Oh, I probably did. Let me look at my notes. I think I said I’m done. Let me[01:26:00] [01:26:00] Jeff: Feel free [01:26:00] You Still Gotta Do Shit [01:26:00] Merlin: Uh, what else did I wrote down? Oh, I wrote down the word, phrase, ditto health. Oh, oh, yeah. So one thing I was going to say, I realized this in life, but I really crystallized when I was, um, in the hospital in December for a while, a few days. [01:26:12] Merlin: And, um, uh, I figure what this is related to, but it was related to something you said earlier. Oh, about your kid. Oh yeah, you’re talking about, like, we were talking about kids, and like, you know, sort of, however you think of it, like, your kid’s going to college, you’re fighting the last war, you’re like, and you’re talking about, like, I kind of got the implication from what you’re saying, I think, of like, hey, I need to get my head in the game. [01:26:33] Merlin: Like, I’m not helping by being sad about who my kid is. I’m not saying you said that, but you know what I mean, like, and I realized while I was in the hospital, the thing that makes so many things so difficult in life is that everything keeps going on in life, no matter what is happening with you. Put differently, your entire life, your life that you’re part of, continues to go on even when you feel bad about life. [01:26:56] Merlin: And that’s, that’s an observation. It’s not, That [01:27:00] doesn’t, you don’t have to go run around, do anything, change your schedule. But, you know, it’s what makes it difficult. Like, when you’re trying to get help for physical or, God forbid, mental health, ask your co host about this. Your life will continue to go on. [01:27:13] Merlin: You still gotta do shit while you’re figuring out How to be who you are in a way that’s sustainable. All of life goes on without you. And the reason I say that here is for several reasons. Just in the generic. Well no, in specifics. With your kid, you’re losing actual time. Whatever time you have right now, Being how you are, you know, having the life that you have. [01:27:36] Merlin: And I’m not trying to make this a binary or digital. I’m not saying like, oh, my kids ate, so now I’m not sad anymore. No, but like, the problem is, like, your head’s not in the game, and you’re not there for what you do have. And the thing is, that goes for everything. And that requires an extraordinary amount of tolerance and forgiveness in yourself. [01:27:55] Merlin: And, and like, that’s why I try to avoid saying things like, you better do this or [01:28:00] like, you know, why don’t you just, or all those things that dumb people say. What I’m trying to say is like, everybody says, Oh, God, be sure to spend time with your kid. And it’s like, it’s true. Like, my tip was always free for, for, for, for. [01:28:10] Merlin: Parents, get on the floor. Go be dumb. [01:28:13] Jeff: on the floor. [01:28:14] Merlin: Do what your kid wants to do, even if, even or especially if you think it’s stupid. You don’t need to corral them or have like a personal intellectual rodeo that’ll help them be proactive in life. Like, just get on the floor and build whatever dumb crap your kid wants to build, whatever. [01:28:30] Merlin: But like, that keeps going. You can have relief from the feeling of always fighting the last war by not making it about yourself. And by saying, Hey, I’m Some days I’m the mule, some days I’m the checkbook. And some days I’m not needed at all. And that’s not bad. That’s just what it is. So instead of trying to constantly, in the same way that you cling to these pants that don’t fit anymore, and this chicken you’re never going to eat in life, find a way to disappear in Life’s chicken. [01:28:58] Merlin: And find your way to disappear into the full [01:29:00] catastrophe. The most that you can at a given time, but as you said earlier, we never got to this, but then make that a practice. Make it a thing you keep coming back to. If you have a fork in the road, like if you’re trying to be healthier and you have the choice of eating more well or less well, well, you always have that choice whether you like it or not. [01:29:18] Merlin: That’s the existential, that’s the Kierkegaardian dilemma of life. But like, you know, my kid will live with us, God willing, for a little bit longer. A year or so, and, and like, I have so many levels to that feeling, many of which I’ve gently tried to move aside, including, hey, why isn’t my kid, why doesn’t my kid like me as much as when my kid used to come crawl in bed with me before dawn on Wednesday mornings, because that’s when the new comic books came out, and we would read on the iPad, we would go see what’s new with Adventure Time, or, you know, or Spider Man, or whatever, and I miss that, but like, that’s That kid. [01:29:57] Merlin: That’s that person. And also, that was [01:30:00] me, then. And, uh And then, like, the next level becomes like, oh, that is sweet, you have that memory, you must miss it. And it’s like, well, it’s not that I’m, I wouldn’t say I miss it, Bob. But you would, but it is, sorry, that’s, that’s, uh, that’s, uh, office space, not idiocracy. [01:30:14] Merlin: But, like, you, but you know what I’m saying? Like, it’s, it takes a lot, the great Edgar, Edgar A. Guest, It takes a heap of living to make a house a home. It takes a lot of, like, gentle self awareness, or, Like, like non dad voice stuff to incline yourself toward accepting you are where you are. You’ve been where you’ve been. [01:30:35] Merlin: And that full catastrophe continues whether you’re into it or not. And I’m not saying you have to go out and zone out and buy a iPhone app that has a gong sound in it. But like, there is a way that you can incline yourself toward the tumult of things you care deeply about. And in some ways, maybe that vulnerability might bubble up in ways that are both instructive and reassuring. [01:30:57] Merlin: and useful, and will [01:31:00] help you transition to whatever your next thing is. And that’s that the full catastrophe goes on. If you’re living, it’s difficult. [01:31:10] Jeff: This has been awesome. [01:31:12] Merlin: This is the best. Thank you for having me. And thanks for playing with me and and tolerating me. And, um, hello, hello, hello, everyone. And sorry for how we are. [01:31:24] Jeff: People died for us to be able to do this [01:31:25] Merlin: Yeah, I watched. I didn’t watch my buddies die face down in the mud. Am I wrong? [01:31:33]

Join three hosts as they navigate the chaos of recording at odd hours, tackling everything from heavy metal noise to quirky prescription bottle museums. They dive into candid tales about mental health mishaps and medication management while reminiscing about unforgettable Vegas adventures. The whimsical world of classic films like 'Repo Man' and 'Fast Times at Ridgemont High' gets explored, alongside amusing insights into tech tools for college students and the colorful chaos of fandom culture. Laughter and relatable moments abound!

Christina, Jeff, and Brett dive into a rollercoaster episode packed with wild travel tales, parenting epiphanies, and tech geekery. Christina shares her whirlwind trip to San Francisco, while Jeff reminisces about meth-centric band auditions. Brett navigates an Accidental Vyvanse Overdose and a transition to VS Code, with plenty of geek love for GitHub extensions and markdown editors. They debate light themes, licensing chaos, and the quirks of macro automation tools. Sponsor 1Password Extended Access Management solves the problems traditional IAM and MDM can’t . It’s security for the way we work today, and it’s now generally available to companies with Okta and Microsoft Entra, and in beta for Google Workspace customers. Check it out at 1password.com/overtired. Chapters 00:00 Introduction and Podcast Updates 00:46 Christina’s Exhausting Trip 02:09 Travel and Mental Health 02:22 Brett’s Upcoming Vegas Trip 03:17 Brett’s Sleep Struggles 05:25 Vegas Experiences and Shows 07:42 Journalism and Blogging Challenges 13:13 Conference Stories and Intersections 18:38 Jeff’s Parenting Reflections 33:13 Christina’s Family Visit 35:52 Sponsor Break 39:06 Jeff’s Meth Story 41:32 A Strange Encounter: Learning About Meth 42:16 Oasis: The Meth Incident and Live Performances 44:21 Oasis Reunion Tour: Hopes and Realities 48:45 Accidental Meth and Concert Expenses 51:44 Switching to VS Code: A Developer’s Journey 01:09:33 Automation Tools: Keysmith and Default Folder X 01:21:19 Concluding Thoughts and Personal Updates Show Links Oracle Cloud World VS Code Keysmith Default Folder X Join the Conversation Merch Come chat on Discord! Twitter/ovrtrd Instagram/ovrtrd Youtube Get the Newsletter Thanks! You’re downloading today’s show from CacheFly’s network BackBeat Media Podcast Network Check out more episodes at overtiredpod.com and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Find Brett as @ttscoff, Christina as @film_girl, Jeff as @jsguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Accidental Meth [00:00:00] Introduction and Podcast Updates [00:00:00] [00:00:02] Christina: What? The feed’s been updated? You’re listening to Overtired. I’m Christina Warren, joined as always by Jeff Severinskenzel and Brett Terpstra. Guys, hello. [00:00:14] Brett: As, as always, sometimes, as sometimes, all three of us are here. [00:00:18] Christina: Well, look, I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s like, let’s just, let’s just focus on the fact that again, like I said, the feed’s been updated. Like we’ve got a new episode out. [00:00:28] Brett: Um, yeah, and I, the plan is to have new episodes for a few weeks in a row here, if we, if we stick to plan. We have sponsors, and It would be more trouble to not do the episode than to do the episode. So yeah. [00:00:46] Christina’s Exhausting Trip [00:00:46] Brett: Christina, how are you? [00:00:48] Christina: Pretty good. Pretty good. Um, I, um, had kind of, I, well, I mean, I’m, I’m fine now. I slept a lot, which was good, but yesterday, which was, we’re recording this on a Saturday. Um, I, on [00:01:00] a Friday, which was our normal record date, I would have been a lot more tired if we recorded then because I was in, um, San Francisco as an in and out, like on Thursday, like I flew in, uh, in the morning and then flew out in the afternoon. [00:01:15] Christina: And, um, I don’t know, uh, be, like spending more time in airports than you spend in the city that you’re visiting [00:01:21] Jeff: That’s the worst. [00:01:22] Christina: That kind of sucks, to be honest. So [00:01:24] Jeff: sucks. [00:01:25] Christina: it was a great trip and I’m really glad that I did it and it wasn’t like that bad, but it’s also one of those things where it’s like, it’s just a not a long enough flight for the whole thing to just be like, okay, in the future, if I can, I mean, in their instance, this was one of them were like, you have to do that. [00:01:41] Christina: And, and I’m, I’m glad that I was at least close enough to do it, but you’re also kind of like, yeah, this, this sucks. Like I’m now more tired than I would have been if I had just, you know, gone someplace and stayed the night and flown back. [00:01:53] Jeff: Right, right. I know I hate that. I hate that, uh, I’m always wrong when I make the calls. [00:02:00] I don’t like traveling anymore, though, is my problem. That much. I like traveling, uh, on a vacation. I do not like traveling for work anymore. [00:02:09] Travel and Mental Health [00:02:09] Brett: Which I think is a great segue into a mental health corner. [00:02:12] Christina: Yeah, I think so. [00:02:14] Brett: travel and mental health. I um, tomorrow, or Monday I leave as this podcast is released. [00:02:22] Brett’s Upcoming Vegas Trip [00:02:22] Brett: I will be on a plane to Las Vegas. And it’s the first time I’ve traveled. I, we did a road trip this summer, but it’s the first time I’ve like flown for work anywhere in years and Vegas is not my first choice for places to be. [00:02:43] Brett: Um, but I will be flying in for a few days in Las Vegas for Oracle CloudWorld. Um, [00:02:50] Christina: World? Hell yeah. [00:02:51] Brett: and I’m presenting on topics that. I only know about because I researched them last week. Um, [00:03:00] and I have to give, well, actually like I kinda, I got out of doing most of the, like leading the presentations, but I have to be there for support and live lab instruction and everything, which is a little stressful. [00:03:14] Brett: I’m a little stressed out and like. [00:03:17] Brett’s Sleep Struggles [00:03:17] Brett: This week I stopped sleeping again. Um, not on purpose. I, I might be manic. Hard to say because like during the day I’m pretty level headed. Um, but I do tend to get up at four in the morning and start like working on code, which is kind of manic behavior for me. Um, but I figured out. [00:03:39] Brett: So like I take Three 600 milligram pills of gabapentin every night, and it’s the only way that I sleep. But then even with that, I started waking up at 2 a. m. every morning, which is, you know, not, not great, and I couldn’t fall back asleep. So what I figured out [00:04:00] was I could take Two of those pills at bedtime because I don’t generally have trouble falling asleep. [00:04:05] Brett: I have trouble staying asleep. So I take two of those pills and that gets me through till 2 a. m. Then I take the third pill at 2 a. m. which gets me through until like 5 a. m. which is a reasonable time to get up because I’ve been going to bed at like 8 30. Oh, which is going to suck in Vegas because my flight gets in at like 11 p. [00:04:24] Brett: m. on Monday. And then all of our, all of our team meals and everything are like 9 45 PM. Um, Vegas time, which I think is West [00:04:38] Christina: hours behind. [00:04:39] Brett: yeah. [00:04:39] Christina: two hours behind you. So, so, um, like, whatever, like, so if you, uh, land, so it’ll be the equivalent of like 11pm for you. [00:04:47] Brett: Yeah. That’s nuts. I, I can’t, I can’t function that late. Um, but I guess I’ll have to, I guess this is a good time to get back into like crystal meth. Um,[00:05:00] [00:05:00] Jeff: I mean, yeah, that’s an individual decision. [00:05:05] Brett: consult your doctor. Um, [00:05:08] Jeff: Oh man, that reminds me, I’m gonna flag something, I’m gonna flag something for after the corner, uh, a meth story. [00:05:15] Brett: Well, that’s, that’s my corner. I’m, I’m stressed about travel. It’s not going to be a big deal. I always pull this shit off, no problem. Um, but, [00:05:25] Vegas Experiences and Shows [00:05:25] Jeff: I wanna, I wanna jump onto one thing you, one part of a sentence you said, which is, um, dot dot, which, no, which is dot dot dot, it’s gonna suck in Vegas. Everything sucks in Vegas. [00:05:35] Christina: Yeah. [00:05:36] Jeff: Except, you know what, except, and I, I resisted this so hard when my mother in law booked us to do this, except Blue Man Group. [00:05:44] Brett: Yeah, no, I love the Blue Man [00:05:46] Jeff: Kind of great. [00:05:47] Christina: Uh, [00:05:48] Brett: too. [00:05:49] Christina: I was gonna say if you can do the shows, right? Like I had a, I had an amazing time when I took my mom to Vegas. Like I had like [00:05:56] Brett: and Teller? [00:05:57] Christina: um, [00:05:58] Brett: didn’t you see like [00:05:59] Christina: saw, we saw, [00:05:59] Brett: [00:06:00] in Vegas? [00:06:00] Christina: no, no, we saw Taylor Swift in Atlanta, but no, we saw Adele in Vegas. We saw Adele at, at, at, at, at Caesars. And we saw, um, uh, the, uh, the Beatles, uh, Cirque show, now that they’ve raised, um, the, um, um, That, that, um, um, hotel, um, because it’s going to become like the hard rock or whatever. [00:06:18] Christina: Like that’s, that’s probably not ever coming back. So I was really glad we got to see that. But we, we like went shopping, like we, it’s, Vegas doesn’t suck unless you’re there for work. When you’re there for work, it sucks, right? Like, but, but, but, but that’s how most of us go at this point. And [00:06:36] Brett: it was, it’s like CES with like the Engadget crew was always fun. Like we had [00:06:43] Christina: for you, for [00:06:44] Brett: you know, karaoke [00:06:45] Christina: Well, for you, [00:06:46] Brett: and yeah. [00:06:48] Christina: you, if you were a reporter at Engadget, it was not fun, I guarantee you. [00:06:54] Brett: Um, okay. I’ll take your [00:06:55] Christina: I, I will guarantee you it’s not fun because you literally have to be on, [00:07:00] like, the entire time. You have to wake up at 6am to go to press conferences, and you have to also go to dinners with people. [00:07:06] Christina: And yes, you have time to do team excursions, but that also means that you again have to then go out to like parties that companies are having in schmooze and then get up at 6am and you have to blog five or six things a day. Like it sucks. Like you’re, like, [00:07:19] Jeff: five or six things [00:07:20] Christina: and while you’re [00:07:21] Jeff: I hated the early 2000s. [00:07:23] Christina: while you’re walking around the entire convention center and then at CES at that point was so big that it was too big for the convention center. [00:07:30] Christina: So you’d have to go from like one thing to another, like, um, It’s maybe fun once, but if you’re actually going to those things to work it like as a writer, no, CES [00:07:42] Journalism and Blogging Challenges [00:07:42] Jeff: still, here’s a question, and Christina, you might have the best sense of this. Are there still jobs in journalism where you are expected, like real jobs in journalism, where you’re expected to blog five or six times a day? [00:07:56] Christina: That much probably not, um, [00:07:58] Jeff: that nice? I[00:08:00] [00:08:00] Christina: yeah, it is, it is, except, but it’s funny because like the one exception are like the big event days, right? So like things like CES, or Mobile World Congress, or the Apple, you know, news days. That’s an all hands on deck thing to this day where you will have multiple people who will be contributing. [00:08:16] Christina: It’s And, um, yeah, I mean, but no, it’s no longer the, even the business insiders of the world and whatnot like that, like they’re not asking people to blog that much. Um, I think that it’s, it’s probably, uh, more, um, reasonably, um, gone to like a, a file once a day thing, which is much better. Um, and, and, and with BuzzFeed and all those things being gone, like you don’t even have like the quick, like listicle sort of shit. [00:08:42] Christina: Um, like the closest thing, you know, to that that’s still around, I guess, like I said, would be like Business Insider. And I think they’re probably, even for their interns, they’re probably only like at a file once a day place. So that’s good. At the same time, I will say as like bad as that was, that was like the best bootcamp I ever had as a [00:09:00] writer [00:09:00] Jeff: Mm. [00:09:01] Christina: was, was having to file a lot. [00:09:05] Christina: About a lot of different things. I mean, like you get burnout for fucking real, but you also get fast. And when there’s breaking news, like no one is faster than a blogger. [00:09:16] Jeff: What I always liked, I liked a version of this, which is, I’m thinking, so I covered the RNC when it was here in St. Paul, it was the McCain Palin RNC for this really cool site at the time called the Minnesota Independent, which is just a good kind of, it’s a good progressive journalism site. And, and I had just. [00:09:36] Jeff: Quit my job at a, at an alt weekly and needed something to do. And they, they brought me on and I, this is what I love. So I went every day to that convention. There’s tons of protests. So sometimes I would just follow the police around because that was a way to write about what was happening. I found my way into the convention hall at one point, whatever. [00:09:57] Jeff: It was just like adventures every day for a few days. And [00:10:00] I loved having an intense day and then sitting down at like 7 PM and having to write. 2000 words about that day. Um, because it wasn’t like, um, it wasn’t like I interviewed a bunch of people and I have to like write a kind of straight thing, like, but I love writing a good sort of very, like, meaty, not trite narrative piece, uh, at the end of a, at the end of a hard day. [00:10:27] Christina: No, and I think that can be great, right? And there’s nothing wrong with that. Like it’s just, but it’s hard when like, I don’t know. Um, and I always, I never minded doing like live vlogs. Like that, you know, I [00:10:38] Jeff: love live vlogs. [00:10:39] Christina: vlogs I always enjoyed. Um, and, and like, and like if somebody asked me like, can you do a live vlog right now? [00:10:44] Christina: I haven’t done one in like six years and I would be like, yeah, fucking put me in. Um, that’s a, that’s a muscle that like wouldn’t go away. [00:10:51] Brett: I think you were, so last time I was at CES, we were developing the new live blog software, uh, for Blogsmith [00:11:00] and it was me and Joe Bartlett and we were coding like non stop during the days because like they were live blogging CES and it was brand new software and we were bug fixing in [00:11:13] Christina: Oh, damn. That would be, that would be really hard. [00:11:16] Brett: yeah, it was, but like, I think it’s different. [00:11:20] Brett: Because we had one thing to work on and we were like heads down on that one thing and we weren’t like popping from event to event and switching gears constantly. [00:11:29] Christina: That’s what I’m saying. That, that, I, I totally think, like, like, it could still be stressful, but that would be fine. Like, but when you’re, like, as, cause I, cause I used to have to go to, like, Vegas twice a year. I would go in January for CES and then I’d go in April for NAB, which is like the, um, uh, National Association of Broadcasters, um, which is a smaller event, but a similar type of thing. [00:11:46] Christina: And I would have to, you know, like, go, yeah, from like thing to thing. And then you’re trying to do like your little write ups and trying to get like the news out. And like, in some cases you’ve been able to do it in advance because you’ve already been pre briefed on stuff and you can just hit [00:12:00] publish. [00:12:00] Christina: But in other cases, yeah, they’re like announcing things live. And so you’re having to figure out like what’s good live, like what’s worthwhile. And then you’re like walking the show floor and being like, Oh, okay, well, should I write about this or should I write about that? And, you know, want to make sure that I’m showing enough, you know, value for me being here. [00:12:16] Christina: Um, and I don’t know, uh, I’d be curious The big, the big conferences in that way, like for the blogs and the people who do go, I mean, it’s a lot of video people now more than websites, um, which is its own other nightmare. I was on camera, but I didn’t have to do the edits, but trying to edit videos, you know, to go up while you’re at those events, it’s another kind of, uh, version of hell because, you know, people want to see it as soon as possible. [00:12:44] Christina: But if it’s going to be good, it’s going to take more time to, you know, cut the whatnot. So you have some people who just live stream and like, great. But, you know, if you want it to actually look fully produced and that takes a lot of time and effort, and you’re also dealing with, you know, um, everybody else trying to [00:13:00] saturate the, the internet that you’re on. [00:13:02] Christina: Um, even if you bring in your own hotspots or pay for your own. Um, Wireless, or, or, or, Wired, Lines, or whatever. But, um, yeah, um, [00:13:13] Conference Stories and Intersections [00:13:13] Brett: I don’t remember which year it was but, um, CES one year coincided with the Adult Video Network Awards [00:13:21] Christina: Yeah, they did that for a number of years. They were the same week. Um, [00:13:24] Brett: gotta tell you live blogging that was actually pretty fun. The AVN awards, I mean, not, not CES. [00:13:31] Christina: right. Um, yeah, I, uh, I, I never went to any of that. Instead, what would happen, it would be, You would always have, and they would always be disgusting looking and, and acting men who would see a woman and be like, Oh, are you here for CES? Are you here for the AVGN awards or whatever? And it’s like, or AVN like, go fuck yourself. [00:13:49] Christina: I’m not fucking you regardless. Like genuinely, like, like, like fucking kill yourself. Um, you know, like that, uh, and, and the CES, like, I don’t remember who it was who [00:14:00] made them move it, but like, there were enough complaints about that overlap that like, they had to be moved [00:14:06] Brett: Yeah. I bet. I don’t doubt that. I don’t doubt that. [00:14:10] Christina: Yeah, because I think, because I think what would happen is I think that the adult actor, film actresses, I think they would get harassed too. I think they would have like people, especially people who are from other countries who don’t, who have like different social norms and don’t know how to act around people, would like just blatantly sexually harass them. [00:14:26] Brett: Yeah. Well, I imagine, I imagine that’s true for adult film actresses, just about everywhere they go. [00:14:33] Christina: For sure, but like there, but if you have people who are coming for a specific event from your industry, you might still have people who are gross, but you know, are going to maybe have a certain kind of, you know, decorum. And then you have people who are like, again, like from parts of the world where they just don’t respect women in any regard and really think that like, it’s okay to just, you know, Reach out and touch people or to say things, um, even in the best of times. [00:14:58] Christina: And, uh, and then you have like, [00:15:00] you know, like adult film actresses and it’s like, huh, yeah, maybe, maybe, maybe don’t have these two things the same week. I don’t know. [00:15:09] Jeff: yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Although, conferences and conference groups intersecting is one of my favorite things about going to conferences. That one’s just a little messy. [00:15:19] Christina: No, no, totally. No, look, look, if everybody can act like an adult, I’m in full agreement. I was actually, I was actually in, I was actually in Vegas, um, I guess like three weeks ago, four weeks ago. Um, yeah, a month ago, I guess. Um, for, it was, again, it was supposed to be like a 24 hour thing. I wound up in that case, actually being smarter and staying a second night. [00:15:38] Christina: So like I got in at like 7 p. m. and And we shot on the whole next day, and I thought that I was going to be leaving at like 7pm the following night, and we had the hotel suite for another night, and I was like, well if we have this, this is dumb, I will just stay the night and then leave at like 10 or 11am the next day, which is what I wound up [00:16:00] doing. [00:16:00] Christina: Um, and so I was there for like, 36 hours. Um, but, um, it was, it was fun because we were, uh, it was during def, um, uh, Blackhat and Defcon. And so, um, and I was interviewing some of our security researchers and I didn’t go to any of the events and I, I wasn’t able to go to any of the parties, which that’s okay. [00:16:17] Christina: Um, I didn’t want to get COVID or anything, so I was, that was fine. But we, um, me and like, um, the, the guys on our, our films team were fantastic. Like we hung out, we, did Topgolf and things like that. But like we went to this restaurant when we first got in and there was like this white party happening and we, we didn’t know like what it was for. [00:16:35] Christina: And, and, um, like even like the, um, waitress, she was like, I’m not sure what they’re all lined up for in this casino. And I was like asking, I was like, so, What are you here for? They’re like, Oh, it’s just a corporate company, white party. And I was like, trying to find out like what company they worked for and they wouldn’t like tell me. [00:16:47] Christina: And I was like, okay. So we were all like, okay, yeah, they must work at a cult. But that was kind of a fun thing to see because obviously there were all the security professionals there, but there were people who were in town for other things too. And seeing like, like, [00:17:00] like to your point, Jeff, like seeing those different types of groups intersecting, um, was, was pretty funny. [00:17:06] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah, I had one. I was in Omaha once and, uh, at the hotel. I wasn’t there for a conference, I was there for a project, but at the hotel it was like, I forget what the group was, but it was all, um, elderly women in, um, dresses made of sequins and hats with sequins. And then it was a, it was a bodybuilder conference. [00:17:25] Jeff: I’m sorry, a body, a bodybuilder competition. Um, and so the whole, the whole, like three days I was there, these were the groups that were like intersecting in the lobby and stuff. And it was just the best. It’s like a world I want to live in. [00:17:38] Christina: That’s amazing. I was at one in, in June for the AI Engineer World’s Fair. Um, was, was at a, um, uh, the Marriott Marquis in San Francisco. Um, but the other event that was there was, I think I took a photo of it, but it was like some sewing convention. [00:17:54] Jeff: Nice. Oh, that must’ve been gentle, gentle people. [00:17:57] Christina: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so it was, it was like this very weird [00:18:00] thing. Like they had like, they have like the signs like showing like, This direction for the AI Engineer World’s Fair, this direction for like the big sewing convention. And like, you could not have like a more different demographic of people. Like one is like, like almost entirely men, like in probably like their, their, you know, 20s and 30s, um, talking, you know, like AI nerds. [00:18:17] Christina: And then the other is like, I would say the median age is probably 55 and, and all women. That was pretty funny. [00:18:24] Jeff: Yeah. Oh man. Awesome. Awesome. Traveling, live blogging. Weightlifters. [00:18:32] Christina: Weightlifter. [00:18:32] Brett: your mental health, Jeff? [00:18:34] Jeff: Pretty good. Good. I’ve, uh, [00:18:37] Brett: I’m [00:18:38] Jeff’s Parenting Reflections [00:18:38] Jeff: I just, I can just say, I mean, what, what I can say in, in short, cause I’ve, I’ve talked about it in the last episode and, and definitely a few episodes ago as I anticipated it or approached it, but like, um, dropping my oldest off at college and then returning to a life where he is not a physical presence every day. [00:18:56] Jeff: Um, one of the, like, just really [00:19:00] kind of amazing experiences for me, like as a parent. especially recently, is like, I didn’t really anticipate how, um, parenting him would be different. Uh, because, so really he’s a great communicator and it’s very easy to talk. And I’ve said before, just like kind of like a great roommate basically, but also just like a really, really good kid. [00:19:24] Jeff: And, uh, and, And the way that you interact with your kids normally is like you catch them at the right moment. Maybe you have a nice conversation. They’re on the couch, you’re on the couch, you’re driving them somewhere, they’re driving you somewhere. Um, and a lot of, a lot of interaction, whether it’s like, uh, transactional or supportive or, or just, you know, like really connecting happens that way. [00:19:46] Jeff: Like just kind of ships passing in, uh, the day and night. Um, but when you’re, when you’re separate. It’s phone calls and, and there’s just a different, um, it’s a different experience, a different way of like [00:20:00] receiving him and being present to him and, and kind of a learning curve, not in a bad way at all, but just like trying to like figure out what is different? [00:20:09] Jeff: Why does this feel different? How, how, how can I be the same kind of present or like whatever this new present I need to be? Um, and And you know, first few weeks of college are hard. And so it’s been, you know, like a lot of sort of trying to be present and supportive and listening or whatever. And it’s been really awesome. [00:20:28] Jeff: I had this kind of weird realization, which is like, well, first of all, when I turned 40, I’m 49 now, when I turned 40, I literally remember I was walking in Omaha, probably that same trip. And I remember thinking, well, I’m about to turn 40. That’s probably it for new phases of my life. I don’t think it’s probably going to be too many big new initiatives. [00:20:46] Jeff: I don’t know why I was thinking that, but I really felt like it was, I didn’t feel [00:20:49] Christina: was over for [00:20:50] Jeff: was over, but yeah, but I just felt like, well, you know, the thing where I jumped from thing to thing or whatever, and maybe there’s a big left turn, whatever. I was like, Oh, it’s probably done. Um, totally not done. [00:20:59] Jeff: [00:21:00] And, and I also kind of like, I was thinking on that and then I was thinking about how like, What I’m experiencing now feels like a new developmental stage. Like, in terms of the sort of challenges it provides and like the, the sometimes like the struggles to recognize like, Oh, I’m in a new developmental stage. [00:21:18] Jeff: Like I am developing new ways of being in the world. And I realized that I actually have always loved entering those stages, even when they’re super, super hard. And, uh, and this one isn’t super, super hard, but it’s. It’s loaded with a lot of emotion and, and, and a lot of like wanting to, you know, maintain a connection at a time when, when your child is like in maximum new independence mode. [00:21:44] Jeff: Um, and so just figuring out like, it’s a change of identity and I, and so far, I really like it. And, and I was, did not expect that. I like the change in identity. I’d love to have them back more. I’d love to have them closer, not 11 hours away, but, um, anyway, so that it’s just, [00:22:00] I don’t know, but I think because that’s on my mind all the time, I think that’s the best kind of mental health check in. [00:22:06] Jeff: And also just that it’s hard when, when, when your, your kid is like, you know, on the like, rollercoaster of the first, I didn’t go to college, but from what I understand, that first semester can be hard. [00:22:16] Christina: It can [00:22:17] Jeff: as can the first [00:22:18] Christina: of changes. [00:22:19] Jeff: Yeah. It’s so many [00:22:20] Christina: you’re away, yeah, you’re away from home for the first time. Um, for, for, for most people, I mean, some people have had other experiences, but for a lot of people, you’re away from home for the first time. You have that first real sense of independence where there are consequences for, you know, like no one’s going to wake you up and make you go to class. [00:22:33] Christina: And you’re meeting all kinds of new people who are going through the same things and, um, getting really close to people really fast, um, because you spend so much time together and trying to figure out who you are and. Getting to reinvent yourself to some degree, you know, because It, you know, again, like it’s not the same for everybody, but depending on where you go, like, you might not have many of the same people from your high school there. [00:22:55] Christina: And so, you know, you kind of get to try on new, you know, like [00:23:00] personalities and, and other things and be like, okay, well, I don’t want to be like this anymore. I can be like this. And, and then, yeah, you know, if you, especially if you were close with your parents, like trying to figure out like, okay, well, how am I still going to see them and, you know, maintain those things. [00:23:15] Christina: Um, where’s he in school? [00:23:17] Jeff: he’s at, he’s at, well, he’s just, he’s at a college in Indiana. I don’t know why would I feel weird saying the name of the school. Um, but he’s at a college in Indiana and it’s, it’s where his mom went and, and, um, and it’s, it’s a great, it’s a great place, great campus. He’s very happy with all of that. [00:23:33] Jeff: But like, have you all ever been in a long distance relationship? [00:23:36] Christina: Yes. [00:23:36] Brett: Um, kinda. Yeah, [00:23:39] Jeff: Like, you know that thing where, if something’s, you’re talking to someone and you’re kind of stuck with whatever the last impression you had was on the phone, right, like pre text or whatever, or like [00:23:50] Brett: even when your partner is traveling. [00:23:52] Jeff: Yeah, same, same. I was gonna say, it’s like when you’re traveling where like, if it’s, if you have a, if you leave a call with a sense of [00:24:00] like, I don’t know what, like longing or sadness or, or if it’s happiness or whatever, you sort of keep that and realize only later that like, that didn’t freeze for that person, but it [00:24:09] Brett: happened in between. [00:24:11] Jeff: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:24:12] Christina: more things happened since then. Yeah. I have to, I, I’m curious, you know, because like when I went to college and, and I didn’t go very far from home, so it was very different in a lot of regards, but you know, um, but I did have the long distance relationships and stuff, but like, It was harder to keep in touch with people, you know, like we had cell phones, but we weren’t texting all the time and, and you couldn’t FaceTime with people, you know, and, and that kind of thing. [00:24:37] Christina: Um, do you think that, like, are you able to be more connected through like other ways? Are you finding that? [00:24:43] Jeff: Yeah. And, and also with that, like trying not to overdo it myself, you know, cause I could ask a question or check in every five minutes. Um, and so I’ve been, that’s the other thing I’ve been trying to negotiate in my head, which is like, okay, what do I, Right now, what do I need? And what I need [00:25:00] right now is some kind of contact, whether it was with me even briefly, Hey, I want to send you some, some slippers, you need slippers with your shoe size. [00:25:07] Jeff: And it’s like, tells me the shoe size, like, that’s it. Like, that’s the minimum I need. Um, And, and, but otherwise, yeah, it’s nice. Cause every once in a while, it’s just a loose text. It’s just a, like, kind of like, Hey, have you heard this album or whatever? I’ll get that or yeah, proof of life. And, and, and so, yes, it is easier to stay in touch because you don’t have to, it doesn’t have to be a call. [00:25:27] Jeff: And I think, I think, especially when as a parent thinking of the two of us here, like when you’re anxious, like one of the things I was really trying to do, we would only talk like every couple of days or do only talk every couple of days, but I was like, I don’t want to. I don’t want to burden him in any way with any of my anxiety. [00:25:46] Jeff: Um, if he’s describing something and it makes me worried or I project or whatever, like, and so if you’re, if you’re doing more texting and phone calling, it’s a little easier to control that, to like, just, just be really like. [00:26:00] Mindful of like, I don’t, we’re both going through our own very different thing and I want us to both know that we miss each other and all that stuff. [00:26:08] Jeff: But like, I don’t want to put my like, grown up ass dad anxieties onto his just freed himself into the world, you know, feelings. [00:26:19] Brett: I did not have to deal with this at all. I, I went to the U of M, so I was only a couple hours away from my folks, but I was so happy to get to know them. Get out of town. Um, I had like almost no contact with my parents for that first year of college and my roommate, my dorm mate was my best friend from high school and really the only friend that I cared to keep in touch with. [00:26:44] Brett: Uh, so I lived with him. My girlfriend had gone to the U of M the year before. Um, so I was basically getting out of a long term relationship by going to college. And like everyone I needed to communicate with was there in [00:27:00] my life and I had like no anxiety. It was, it was so exciting to be on my own and away from what I considered a pretty oppressive environment. [00:27:11] Brett: And yeah, it was, it was different than what you’re describing. [00:27:16] Jeff: Well, and that thing too. Oh, go ahead, [00:27:18] Christina: No, I was just going to say, but you know, it, but it’s also like your, it’s your parents react, you know, um, experience. I’m sure it was also different from Jeff’s, but like, it was different from what you were going through too. Right. Like, I’m sure, however they felt about you being gone and how you felt about being gone. [00:27:32] Christina: Like, you know, [00:27:33] Brett: think it was a huge relief that I was gone. [00:27:36] Christina: yeah, there might’ve been that, right. But it’s just like, but it just, you know, we remember like our perspectives. Like I, I’ve, I’m going to be honest until these conversations, I’ve never even really thought about like what it was like for my parents. Yeah. Yeah. [00:27:48] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. [00:27:49] Christina: Honestly, like it’s never even really even occurred to me to be thinking about like, oh, well, how do they feel about, you know, us being gone? [00:27:55] Christina: We weren’t that far. Like my sister was home more often than I was, but I, [00:28:00] you know, it was 30 minutes away and still came home some weekends to, to work, um, and, and do laundry. Um, but, and, and that happened less and less. That was really only the first year. And then after that, yeah, I was like half an hour away. [00:28:12] Christina: Um, and so it wasn’t, I don’t know. I never even really kind of like anticipated like, what’s it like for them to not have us there? Um, I, I imagined that it was relief, but, but it never really occurred to me, you know what I mean? Like, it wasn’t one of those, one of those things that was kind of like, top of mind at all. [00:28:32] Christina: Um, which is interesting to kind of like, you know, think about, be like, oh, yeah, no. What were they, you know, going through? Now when I moved to New York, that might have been different. But I’ll also kind of admit at that point, like, I was older and whatnot, and I, you know, haven’t ever, like, thought too intensely about like, oh, you know, how does this make my mom feel, you know? [00:28:54] Jeff: When there’s, I think, yeah, right, right. And I know I, and I didn’t think about it just because I didn’t go to college. Like [00:29:00] I, I moved out, moved into Minneapolis from the suburbs and, and was here for a long time. Then I started going to like scary places at a young age. And I don’t know how the fuck they dealt with that. [00:29:09] Jeff: But like, uh, but I, the other big thing, right? Like for both parents and the individual is like, did you launch or did you escape? Right? Like, and I escaped, uh, not escaped like the clutches of my mother, but like escaped. My life as a kid in school. And as a kid in the suburbs and all that stuff, I escaped and I, I, I’ll leave it to my son to tell to, to know whether he launched or escaped. [00:29:35] Jeff: It feels like a launch from my end. [00:29:37] Christina: Yeah. [00:29:39] Jeff: Yeah. Ah, yeah. Well, thanks. I thought that would be quick, but man, it’s, it’s definitely like the thing that’s always on my mind. It’s such a new, it’s new. Like I it’s, I he’s 18, right? It’s 18 years. He’s been in my house. I see him every day. I say good night to him. I say, good morning to him. [00:29:54] Jeff: Like, you know, like [00:29:56] Christina: You’re close and you have a, and you have a good relationship, which is also, [00:30:00] which is also like different, right? Like that’s not everyone’s situation. Like, like, um, you know, um, [00:30:04] Brett: that’s actually a rarity. [00:30:06] Christina: I think so. I mean, well, for both ends, right? Both for parents and for the kids, right? Well, especially when, um, and I would say, cause I definitely have like some friends who are close with their kids, but like, um, one of my friends, like his son is a senior in high school and is going to be going to school, not that far from him, like, you know, um, in the same state, you know, a couple hours. [00:30:26] Christina: Right. And so I don’t know, What their situation is going to be like, but they also, um, uh, he’s divorced. And so he doesn’t, he’s not with, you know, his kids full time all the time. So I, I don’t know like how much of their day to day will change, but if you’re close, you know, like that’s, that’s, that, that’s a, that’s a different dynamic. [00:30:44] Christina: Like I was close. I’m closer with my mom now, but like, I was close with my parents or I guess close to my mom. Like, I wasn’t really close with my dad, but wasn’t not close, but also I wasn’t 11 hours away. Right. Like I try to imagine like, what would have been like, like if I had gone to New York for college, um, right [00:31:00] away. [00:31:00] Christina: Right. Like, and, and have that sort of experience. Um, I will say it was interesting because there were definitely, especially once like the, my, my second year when I moved into my first apartment. And I wasn’t ever coming home to, to work or, or, or anything, um, because I had a, a job, um, uh, at a different location and, um, didn’t need to do that, like, you know, I, I would talk to my mom like less and less. [00:31:26] Christina: Like it was, it was funny. It was like, okay, we were half an hour away, but we might only talk, you know, every other week or something, you know, it just kind of depends. Um, and, uh, you know, so, so proximity didn’t play as much of a role there, but yeah, you know, cause you start to realize like, like you’re live. [00:31:41] Christina: Your life like evolves and, and, and launches off, but like your parents lives, like they go on too, right? Like that’s, that’s the thing is that everybody’s, everybody moves on. Um, and you just have to navigate, okay, well, how much, you know, how do we stay in contact and, and whatnot. And that’s not just like parental relationships. [00:31:59] Christina: That’s [00:32:00] like any sort of relationship. Like I had some friends and, and frankly, most of the relationships didn’t last, but like friends who didn’t maybe go to college or, or, you know, kind of stuck, you know, more closer to like my hometown and whatnot. Like, okay, well, how often are you keeping in contact with people or even friends who went to other colleges? [00:32:16] Christina: And, you know, it’s just like, okay, well, how, how, how are we all keeping in touch? You know, are we IMing one another? Are we, you know, emailing, you know, we making phone calls? Like what’s, what’s the deal? And like, you realize, okay, if you want to maintain these things, you have to put work into it. It won’t just sustain itself. [00:32:31] Jeff: Yeah, that’s another one. Right. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And then that thing of like, I mean, this, I can stop after this, but the, the thing that I’m sure both of you relate to as people who went to college. Um, I mean, I certainly relate to it in my own way, obviously. Is that thing of like, there’s still so much you’re doing for the first time. [00:32:51] Jeff: It’s like your first day every day to, to. Borrow from John Roderick. It’s like your first day, like every single day. Like, um, and that’s really, that’s [00:33:00] something I remember loving that. I just, I loved everything. I, everything I ran into, I’m like, I don’t really actually know how to buy laundry soap. I love that shit, loved it. [00:33:09] Jeff: But anyway. Uh, so, Christina, you wanna? [00:33:13] Christina’s Family Visit [00:33:13] Christina: Yeah, I mean, I’m, I’m fine. I’ve been, um, like I said, I just got back from a day trip. I was off before that. Like I was back for a week, but I was, um, it took like two weeks ish off. Um, I went to, um, to Atlanta to visit my family. Um, and, uh, I got to see my nephew go to his first day of preschool. Speaking of first, he’s three years old now and, and that, that’s wild, right? [00:33:36] Christina: Like just to [00:33:37] Jeff: Super wild. [00:33:38] Christina: just to see how quickly stuff passes, right? And, um, And my sister has been sending me photos and stuff. So, uh, so that’s been good, but uh, no COVID, um, knock on wood. Um, I had to do the thing where, because I went to Las Vegas for, like I said, for that day trip, I knew that, you know, cases were really high and I was concerned about, you Getting my parents sick. [00:33:59] Christina: I didn’t [00:34:00] really give a shit about if I got, you know, sick, um, because I’ve had COVID a few times. And at this point, um, I don’t think that would be negatively impacted or whatever, but I didn’t want to get anybody else sick, but it was like the worst. And I got my original booster of like in October of last year. [00:34:15] Christina: And I was like, I know this is the worst possible time to get a booster. Cause the new ones are about to come out and it’s like August 1st, but. I’m going to go ahead and get one anyway. So I got a boost for August 1st. And maybe that, while it being okay, it sucked because then like the new ones came out like August like 26th or something. [00:34:33] Christina: So I was like, well, now I have to wait, you know, two months before I can get One of the new shots, but, um, I did not get COVID and one of our video guys did. He thinks he got it on the plane and he was only maybe knocked down for like a day or so, but that was good. But yeah, it was one of those things I was like, okay, I was traveling. [00:34:50] Christina: Um, and then I went to XOXO in Portland and then went back to, um, uh, you know, Seattle, um, and, uh, you know, kind of, you know, [00:35:00] Reconvened work. And then I, like I said, had a day trip this week. So I’ve just been kind of traveling a lot, but, um, but mental health has been pretty good. Um, no, no, no real complaints about anything other than, um, yeah, weirdly. [00:35:14] Christina: And, and just hearing you talk about like your experiences with your son and stuff too, like watching my nephew, you know, he’s three, he’s only three years old, but still like seeing these kinds of moments, like it makes you kind of, I don’t know. I think about like my own, like, Not mortality, but you do think about just the passage of time in different ways, you know? [00:35:32] Christina: And that’s, yeah, [00:35:34] Jeff: Oh man, I’m gonna be 50 in January, and I realize, like, 20 years ago I was 30. In 20 years I’ll be 70. And that sentence that I just spoke out loud goes through my head daily. Like, what the fuck? Yeah, for sure. [00:35:52] Sponsor Break [00:35:52] Brett: So, um, should we take a sponsor break? [00:35:55] Jeff: Yeah, then can I tell my meth story? [00:35:57] Christina: Yes. [00:35:58] Jeff: Okay. [00:35:59] Christina: We’ll do, we’ll, we’ll [00:36:00] do sponsors first, meth, meth after the [00:36:02] Jeff: It’s not, it doesn’t actually involve actual meth, but It’s, it involves the topic. [00:36:06] Christina: Okay. I mean, I have actual meth stories, but we don’t, we don’t have to share those now. [00:36:10] Brett: As do I, but that’s a horrible segue. So, um, a lot of people don’t know this, but I’m going to let you in on a little secret. In my free time, I actually run a fairly large corporation, uh, somewhat shadowy, uh, with a bunch of shady contractors. And one of the things that really gets under my skin is how many of those contractors use devices and apps on my network that I can’t control. [00:36:37] Brett: And that’s where this week’s sponsor really saves my butt. Imagine your company’s security like the quad of a college campus. Speaking of college, that would have been a good segue. [00:36:48] Jeff: Meth was less of a good segue. [00:36:50] Brett: there are, [00:36:51] Jeff: the nature of your shadowy corporation. I don’t know if 1Password [00:36:54] Brett: I’m not allowed to, [00:36:55] Jeff: the space between meth and their [00:36:58] Brett: On the down low, I can’t talk [00:37:00] about exactly what my corporation does, um, for legal [00:37:04] Jeff: Sorry for getting you back in it [00:37:06] Brett: So, so, so, you got your, your company’s security quad of a college campus and there are nice brick paths between the buildings. [00:37:14] Brett: Those are the company owned devices, IT approved apps, and managed employee identities. And then there are the paths that people actually use. The shortcuts worn through the grass that are the actual straightest line from point A to point B. Those are your unmanaged devices, shadow IT apps, and non employee identities like contractors. [00:37:37] Brett: Shady, shady contractors. Most security tools only work on those happy brick paths, but a lot of security problems take place on the shortcuts. 1Password Extended Access Management is the first security solution that brings all of these unmanaged devices, apps, and identities under your control. It ensures that every user [00:38:00] credential is strong and protected, every device is known and healthy, and every app is visible. [00:38:06] Brett: 1Password Extended Access Management solves the problems that traditional IAM and MDM can’t. It’s security for the way we work today and it’s now generally available to companies with Okta and Microsoft Entra and in beta for Google Workspace customers. Check it out at 1password. com slash overtired. [00:38:27] Brett: That’s right, we got a custom URL. That’s 1password. com slash overtired. [00:38:35] Jeff: All right. Nice work. [00:38:37] Brett: Thank you. That was one take. Uh, there were, for anyone listening, there were no edits in that. I’m, except for the part where Jeff started talking about meth in the middle of the ad read, but I think they’ll, they said to make it our own. [00:38:51] Jeff: Hey, [00:38:53] Christina: I mean, look, look, look, look. If shadowy business stuff, [00:39:00] how can we not make Breaking Bad references? [00:39:03] Jeff: I’m [00:39:03] Brett: Right on. [00:39:04] Christina: I’m just saying. [00:39:05] Jeff: yeah, [00:39:06] Jeff’s Meth Story [00:39:06] Christina: All right, tell us your, tell, tell, all right, now, now that we’ve done the sponsor read, um, uh, Jeff, please tell us the, your, your meth story. [00:39:12] Jeff: Do you have a friend or are you the friend who has, um, this sounds like another ad read actually, [00:39:17] Brett: really does. [00:39:19] Jeff: who is the person that retains the memories? Uh, I have a, I have, I have a [00:39:24] Christina: Oh yeah, [00:39:24] Jeff: friends who, yeah, that’s you. I believe that I was, I would have guessed that. I have friends who remember everything. Um, Uh, name check, Danny Glamour. [00:39:34] Jeff: I see you. My friend, Joe, who’s been my, my friend since, um, eighth grade. He remembers we were in bands together. We toured together. He remembers everything. And, um, and, and he told me a story back to me recently that was incredible, which is that we were, uh, we w we had like a, like a 16 year olds as 16 year olds, we had like a heavy metal band. [00:39:53] Jeff: We were pretty good. And we even made like a demo. We had no singer. And, and we made this demo and. [00:40:00] And the guy who recorded it was also my drum teacher and kind of like a mentor to us. He had been in metal bands for a very long time in the region, basically. And, and we needed a singer and we weren’t ready to get out there into the world. [00:40:12] Jeff: I’m telling you, there were good songs. Okay. I still, I just recently listened to that. It was good songs for 16 year olds. Um, so we wanted a singer. We decided to put an ad in the Alt Weekly here in City Pages. Which is now long gone. And, uh, and, and all I remember about, and all Joe remembered about what we said, besides that we were looking for singers, was that we said we were young. [00:40:31] Jeff: We didn’t say we were 16 and that we were, you were going to meet at my mom’s house. Um, and, and we said that we had a label ready demo. That was our, that was the advice from our mentor. And, um, and, and I think about this in life so hard because we probably did. Seven auditions. It started with like a phone call. [00:40:48] Jeff: Um, and then, and then some fucking dude with like a mullet, um, and, and, you know, any number of like what it was like acid wash jeans, uh, any number of kind of looks were present. They’d show [00:41:00] up to, to jam with us. and would find out when they got there that they were grown men and we were 16. And, and a couple of us were very awkward. [00:41:09] Jeff: Um, and, and, uh, anyway, so like, they would say things like, well, I got to say, I mean, you said you were young in the end. I didn’t realize you were this young. Um, there was a guy who was so nervous to sing that he asked if he could take the microphone all the way into another room separate from us. So we’re like, dude, this is not a good start. [00:41:27] Jeff: We’re trying to get out there. Um, and, but anyway, [00:41:31] Brett: live gigs. [00:41:32] A Strange Encounter: Learning About Meth [00:41:32] Jeff: But there was this one dude who just wanted to hang out. And so we did like, we played and then we went upstairs into the living room. Uh, my mom was not there and we hung out on the couch and the guy, the guy told us at length, how you make meth. And like, there’s like, it’s just like, he’s preaching, doing like a sort of tutorial to these 16 year olds. [00:41:53] Jeff: None of them did meth. There was a lot of, there was a lot of pot. among us. Not me, but like among us. There’s a lot of acid among us, but um, no [00:42:00] meth. Uh, and, and this guy just went on and on at length about how he and how we also could make meth. And I, [00:42:08] Brett: that’s the story of how, how you found your singer. [00:42:11] Jeff: yeah, that’s how we found our singer, man. Yeah, I know that was a good band. [00:42:14] Jeff: Super jacked up. [00:42:16] Oasis: The Meth Incident and Live Performances [00:42:16] Jeff: Um, Also to say that I didn’t know the story about Oasis accidentally taking meth and then playing a show, but you can watch it on YouTube. Um, [00:42:24] Christina: What, what show was that? Cause that could be, [00:42:25] Jeff: it was here. I think it was in the States. I think it was in the States at a club. [00:42:29] Christina: okay, okay. All right. I, that, that, that tracks cause, um, I have seen the documentary about like their Wembley show, which was like one of their worst live gigs [00:42:37] Jeff: just watched it [00:42:38] Christina: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which, which I actually, I think I have like, I have like the live, and then they had to make that a live recording, [00:42:44] Jeff: It’s so painful to watch. [00:42:46] Christina: is so painful to watch. [00:42:47] Christina: But like, to see like how they were able to kind of cobble together the audio to make something somewhat passable to sell. And then you look back and you’re like, wow. And I, and now, now I’m going to be a really bad OASIS fan. I can’t remember which one fucked up. I think it was, [00:43:00] I think it was Liam who, who fucked up, [00:43:03] Jeff: Liam, I mean, the thing that you can watch on YouTube, which is like a bunch of cuts is, is, and I was never an Oasis fan. I honestly got obsessed with footage for some reason after they announced they were going to reunite, but it’s because it’s everywhere in my algorithm. But now I’m just like, I’m transfixed. [00:43:17] Jeff: I’m not even that big of a fan of the music still, but I’m transfixed. And it’s the one that I’m thinking of at one point is like, Liam Gallagher is singing. Not the real lyrics to the [00:43:27] Christina: Yes, yes, [00:43:28] Jeff: pausing to say things like, does anybody want some lasagna? Uh, [00:43:33] Christina: Exactly, [00:43:34] Jeff: fucking Wembley. It’s incredible. [00:43:37] Christina: he was like, purposely like drunk and angry, like they’d gotten in a fight. And, and like the second night he knew that this, that, you know, they were going to have to be making like, it, it, they had all the recording stuff there, like they knew this was gonna be the live album. [00:43:48] Christina: And, and he’s just like, fuck it, let’s do it. And like, in retro, and, and years later, I think he’d apologized, but Noel was just like. Beside himself, he’s just like, okay, I’m ready to go, right? I’m [00:44:00] ready to leave. And Liam’s like, oh, what do you mean we’re leaving now? And it’s like, Noel is just like, done, you know? [00:44:05] Jeff: it’s at Wembley. Yeah, no, it’s amazing. I have to say, like, I am transfixed by those two. I think I, so I’m confused. Christina, are you a good person to ask some OASIS questions? I can be brief. Until two weeks ago, I didn’t give a shit about OASIS, but all of a sudden I’m obsessed. [00:44:21] Oasis Reunion Tour: Hopes and Realities [00:44:21] Jeff: I was under the impression that Liam was the asshole, the bigger asshole, but now I’m starting to understand that maybe Noel is the bigger asshole? [00:44:28] Jeff: Or are they both just big assholes? [00:44:30] Christina: are, they are. That, that would [00:44:31] Jeff: In ways that are kind of delightful. [00:44:32] Christina: Yes, 1000%. I mean, which is why I’m going to spend so much money. I tried to get tickets for the reunion tour and, um, failed. And I’m going to spend so much money, like, it’ll, it’ll still be less than Taylor Swift money. Let’s be fucking for real. But like, I’m going to spend so much money on trying to get Oasis, um, uh, tickets. [00:44:50] Christina: Because the thing is, is like, I feel like I have to go to like one of the first shows in the UK because I have, it, it’d be like buying, uh, tickets to, um, you know, the Fuji’s [00:45:00] reunion, which they’ve canceled. Right? Like, you, you can’t buy tickets to any Lauryn Hill concert and expect to actually be able to go to that concert. [00:45:07] Christina: Like, that’s not happening. Like, there’s a 95 percent chance, probably actually a 99 percent chance that Lauryn Hill will not show up. Like, that’s just how it works. And I [00:45:16] Jeff: That sounds like the Oasis show a little [00:45:17] Christina: And that I was going to say, Oasis to me, like, feels similar. It’s like, okay, you have to like buy these tickets, like with the assumption, like even with, you know, getting them from Scalpers or whatnot, which is like, you’re just going to have to go to London for a completely different, you know, go to the UK for a completely different purpose and be okay with it because there’s a very, very good chance that that these two brothers will just absolutely refuse to go on stage with one another. [00:45:39] Jeff: Or that show might be five minutes long. [00:45:41] Christina: Right. But well, that, that I think would be less likely. I think that like, if they’re going to actually get on there, like they even did the full, you know, Familiars to Millions, uh, show. That was that, that Wembley thing. Like they, you know, did the full show, both dates. Um, like it was bad and they had to do a lot of overdubbing, but like they did the full thing. [00:45:58] Christina: Um, and [00:46:00] honestly, If you were there in the year 2000, you probably would have been pissed off, but in retrospect, you’d probably be like, fuck yeah, I got to witness that shit show like in person. Um, I’ve only [00:46:09] Jeff: It’s super 90s. I don’t even know if that was in the [00:46:12] Christina: It was, it was, it wasn’t it? It, it was, it was, it was in, um, 2000, which actually I saw that tour. [00:46:19] Christina: Um, I saw them at Music Midtown in Atlanta, uh, I guess in like, may of 2000. And I was, I mean, I, I liked Oasis, like everybody liked Oasis. Um, you know, like definitely, at least like where I grew up, [00:46:32] Jeff: Brett’s shaking his head. I was indifferent. [00:46:35] Christina: well, well, I just mean like in my group of people, right? Like I was definitely like where I grew up, we were [00:46:41] Jeff: Everybody liked Oasis, that’s a fair statement. [00:46:43] Christina: you know what I mean? [00:46:44] Christina: Like everybody, everybody had, you know, What’s the Story, Mori Glory. Like everyone had that album. Like the Blur vs. Oasis, like fan wars, at least in like the South, at least where I grew up, it was not even a competition. It was like Blur had one song and like everybody knew like [00:46:58] Jeff: Pock life.[00:47:00] [00:47:00] Christina: Yeah, and, and so, um, I mean, I liked Radiohead best out of all of them, but like, you know, I was definitely Team Oasis versus Team Blur. [00:47:08] Christina: But the thing that shaped it for me, and like, the reason that, um, was I saw them perform, like I said, at Music Midtown, like they ended like night one, and I was kind of indifferent about even sticking around to see them. Like, I was there for like, the bands that I was really into at the time, like, terrible in comparison bands to be completely candid with you, like, like Collective Soul. [00:47:27] Christina: And I’m like 16 years old. And, and, and I saw, and I saw Oasis do their live set. And it was to this day, like, here we are, like, almost 25 years later, like one of the best things I’ve ever seen. Like, and I don’t know, and I know that tour was hard for them, So I don’t even, I don’t know what their, you know, situation was with one another. [00:47:52] Christina: And they were, you know, performing at like this festival in fucking Atlanta, like downtown Atlanta. And they like, or Midtown really, and like [00:48:00] killed it. Were so incredibly good that I was like, well, fuck, I guess I’m, I guess I’m an Oasis fan now, right? Like I had, I had, I had a [00:48:09] Jeff: what’s happening to me. Yeah. That’s happening to me through YouTube now, except I still can’t listen to an album. I don’t know what the deal is, but I could watch that guy press his upper lip to that sure beta 58 all day long. [00:48:22] Brett: So as a segue into, um, First, I want to give Christina a heads up that I did actually talk about yours last week, but you’re welcome to repeat it if, if you think you have new things to say. [00:48:37] Christina: Oh, no. Okay. Well, if you talk about mine, then, then I will just once again, say Moom 4. Great. But that’s, uh, I’ll find another [00:48:43] Brett: I preempted you, I’m sorry. [00:48:45] Accidental Meth and Concert Expenses [00:48:45] Brett: Um, but speaking of accidentally doing meth, um, I am realizing in real time that I accidentally did meth. took a double dose of Vyvanse today, [00:48:56] Jeff: Oh, God, I’ve been [00:48:58] Brett: me, which has me pretty [00:49:00] fucking edgy right now. [00:49:01] Jeff: Yes, [00:49:02] Brett: It’s not a good feeling. Like, I have, I have abused plenty of drugs in my life, but I am, I am way past [00:49:10] Jeff: I’m sorry, Brett. I’ve done that, and it was not okay [00:49:13] Brett: It’s not okay. [00:49:14] Christina: yeah, I, [00:49:15] Brett: cool. [00:49:16] Christina: yeah, I’ve definitely, yeah, people don’t realize, yeah, the on, sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt, go on. [00:49:20] Brett: No, it’s okay. Uh, my, my other thing was like, Christina spends exorbitant amounts on getting to cool concerts and like, that’s, that’s important to her. And I want to admit that I spent a crazy amount of money upgrading my flights to Vegas to first class, um, because a three hour flight in, in, in what now passes for economy, where my knees touched the seat in front of me, um, just is so much hell to me that it’s worth a fuck. [00:49:52] Brett: Fair sum of money to fly first class. So on my way home, I could not get the [00:50:00] upgrade for the three hour part of the trip. Um, and so I am going to spend three hours in economy and it’s going to be a shitty way to end the trip, but the, the rest of my flights, four, four other flights are all, [00:50:15] Christina: So you’re not able, so you’re not able to do a direct, you can’t go Minneapolis to Vegas? [00:50:20] Brett: No. Um, I go lacrosse to Chicago to Vegas, and then Vegas to La Chicago to lacrosse. And I, I have three hour overlays at O’Hare, uh, which isn’t so bad. Um, I have, I have day passes to like the American Airlines, what do they call it, Lin Embassy? No. Admirals. Admiral Lounge. [00:50:46] Christina: Lounge. Yeah. [00:50:47] Jeff: Like, we’ve talked about lounges. Changed my life. [00:50:49] Christina: Oh, yeah. No, this is the greatest thing ever. Like, I have to like the Platinum American Express card, like specifically for that reason. Um, if you can find like places to have Centurion lounges, that’s great. But [00:51:00] even just like priority pass stuff, [00:51:02] Brett: what lounges? [00:51:03] Christina: the, uh, the, the American Express Centurion lounges, they’re not at every airport, but the ones they are at, they’re incredibly [00:51:10] Jeff: You know what else the metal American Express cards are great for? This is more for Brett and me, probably, is ice scraping your window. I keep an expired one [00:51:19] Christina: Oh yeah. No, that I’ve heard. I’ve heard that from people. Yeah. That is definitely like a thing. Like we do not have that in, in, um, [00:51:25] Jeff: You don’t [00:51:25] Christina: state. [00:51:26] Jeff: need to take advantage of that. [00:51:27] Christina: Not at all, but I have actually seen people like on like the Amex like subreddit like do that sort of thing with the metal cards, which is funny. Yeah. [00:51:36] Jeff: love it. [00:51:37] Brett: All right, um, I’ll kick off the Grapptitude because this one has been a long time coming. [00:51:44] Switching to VS Code: A Developer’s Journey [00:51:44] Brett: Um, I, as of, as of this week, have made the switch from Sublime Text to VS Code. [00:51:52] Christina: fuck. Fuck yes, finally. [00:51:54] Brett: VS Code is so much better than I thought it was. [00:51:58] Christina: it is. [00:51:59] Brett: [00:52:00] Especially with Copilot. Copilot fucking blows me away. Like, I type the first two letters of, like, a comment for a function, and it, like, knows exactly, and it, it does everything. [00:52:14] Brett: It’s, and it’s almost always right. Like, I’m like, I’m working on some sass for a redesign of my website and I type a dollar sign and it knows what variable I want to fill in. Uh, I, I put in like a font face definition and then I move down a line and type in that symbol and it just figures out what font files are in my folder and creates all the font face definitions for all of them. [00:52:42] Brett: I can turn a Ruby comment. I can just write a comment about what I want a function to do. And it’ll write a perfect, and, and not just a function based on an LLM, it’s a function based on all of the other files in my project. Um, and it can reference [00:53:00] variables and methods from other files and it’s just shit Sublime will never do. [00:53:05] Brett: Um, and it is, and it’s taken a little bit of getting used to with, uh, setting up key combinations and everything. Um, and there’s some frustration around keyboard shortcuts. Uh, especially when they overlap and, uh, but I’m figuring it out and the configuration is pretty easy compared to Sublime, like the, like the graphical interface for, because you can view your, your config as JSON or as, An interface and, and sometimes you have to open up JSON to add custom features and whatnot. [00:53:43] Brett: But all that said, um, it is a really solid editor and I am really enjoying it. [00:53:51] Christina: I’m so glad to hear that you finally like moved because I know because it’s one of those things like it’s hard to make the move like I, um, I did it because I, I, I worked at Microsoft at the time and, [00:54:00] and, um, know and still know frankly a lot of people who work on that team and, and I know a lot of people who work on the Copilot extension so I’m very glad to hear your feedback on that. [00:54:07] Christina: If you have other feedback, positive or negative, please let me know and I can get that to the right folks. [00:54:13] Brett: zero negative feedback. I am just constantly blown away by how good it is a [00:54:17] Christina: No, they do such a good job, and, and, and really, like, keep making that so much better, um, with so many constraints, and, um, extensions, which are in, um, uh, preview right now, but will be coming later, um, although, well, there are two types of extensions, but there are co pilot extensions, um, that can exist in VS Code, so that certain, you know, you can use the, um, the agents feature to basically ask an extension in chat, um, Various things that powered by Copilot. [00:54:43] Christina: I don’t know if you’ve played around with that or not, like some of the built in ones are like at Workspace and at Terminal and at VS Code, but other extensions can add those things too, which is really cool because then in your chat interface, you can just ask specific things about a certain extension, um, or service, um, as the case may be, which is [00:55:00] really fucking useful. [00:55:01] Christina: But like, no, I know how hard it is to go from like, you know, one editor to another, even if you know there are a lot of advantages around. And even if you know, like. You know, in my case, it was Textmate, and it was like, this is never getting updated again, like, this is, this is dead in the water. But it’s hard to, like, move editors. [00:55:16] Christina: And, uh, but, but, I, I’m, I’m glad to hear that you’re enjoying VS Code. Um, if you come up with, like, uh, I would be interested to see at some point, like, your, your, um, keybindings and, and settings files. That’s one of the things they’ve improved a lot over the last few years. Like, at first, you used to have to only, you could only edit settings in the, And then they started adding the graphical interface, and most things are there, but not everything is. [00:55:41] Christina: Um, [00:55:42] Jeff: to keep his key bindings to himself. [00:55:45] Christina: well, I would just like [00:55:46] Jeff: I take that back. I take that back. He wrote War and Peace, but it was key bindings. [00:55:50] Christina: Right, exactly, [00:55:51] Jeff: ahead, Christina. [00:55:52] Christina: No, no, I was going to say that one of the things that, and this is improved over the years, but I remember when they introduced this, I don’t know, probably four years ago, maybe longer than that at this point, [00:56:00] but the, the concept of having like profiles that you can sync and different types of profiles and, and like pre kind of defined environment setups, I love. [00:56:09] Christina: Because I can have, I have like a, I have one that I have just for writing, but I also have one that is basically like for demos or for workshops or whatnot that won’t have any of my pre configured stuff that’s, you know, basically kind of as close to like an out of the box experience as possible. Um, [00:56:24] Brett: set up a profile just for like testing extensions because my first time I tried VS code, I just installed like everything that looked [00:56:34] Jeff: Classic. Yeah, [00:56:35] Brett: pretty soon I [00:56:36] Christina: And it’s like a web [00:56:36] Brett: what was doing what and it was a huge mess. So now I have a profile just for fucking around with [00:56:43] Christina: Exactly. [00:56:44] Jeff: the, it’s like the raiding the store in Red Dawn. Uh, it’s just like, I’ll take a sleeping bag. I’ll take six arrows. I’ll take that bullet. [00:56:51] Brett: The only complaint I’ve run into is the Markdown, uh, packages that are available are not up to snuff for me. [00:56:59] Jeff: [00:57:00] Well, [00:57:00] Christina: Yeah. I have, I, I have some, I have some issues with that too. And so, [00:57:03] Brett: to, I want to port Markdown editing, which is a package I built for Sublime and then it switched to another maintainer who continued to extend it. And it’s all in Python and I’ve never written an extension for VS code, but I am interested in porting Markdown. [00:57:21] Brett: Cause it’s pretty, it’s pretty basic text editing stuff that just makes markdown life easier. [00:57:27] Jeff: this so much, [00:57:28] Christina: I would too. I would too. Cause, [00:57:29] Brett: magic links and magic footnotes I miss, [00:57:32] Christina: yeah, like that I would love. Cause like, cause that’s the thing, like there’s like the Markdown all in one package. There’s some other things like some, some, um, people have even put together some like collections of, um, uh, You know, extensions that you could not install altogether. [00:57:45] Christina: Like some of the GitHub documentation, people have done that. And some of that’s good. But yeah, I run into some things there too. So selfishly, this excites me that you are interested. Because if you’re able to work on porting, I’m sure we can find people to help with that and whatnot. [00:58:00] But, um, also writing extensions for VS Code is pretty, um, Straightforward. [00:58:05] Christina: And they, you know, um, borrowed a lot of things from Sublime and TextMate in the early days, which have still kind of continued onward. So, [00:58:14] Brett: there’s a Yeoman generator for making extensions and it is, it’s, it’s, that’s something that Sublime has never had and like something to like, uh, scaffold out a plugin. That’s pretty cool. [00:58:30] Christina: Yeah. They did that early on. I think that’s one of the reasons to be candid, like why, like it took off the way that it did was that they really put a lot into, from the very beginning, mean like, okay, we know this is only going to work if the extension community shows [00:58:43] Brett: Right. Well, yeah, and we’ve talked before about how vital, um, Uh, a community is to an app, um, and if you want an app to reach any level of general acceptance, at least in the nerd world, [00:59:00] like you need to some extent extensibility, but more importantly, you need a community. And that’s something like Obsidian has done really well. [00:59:09] Christina: done so well. [00:59:10] Brett: Code, TextMate did, like TextMate was to me, the gold standard for like. Building out a community and showing what, what an app could do [00:59:21] Christina: Yeah. [00:59:21] Brett: had a community. [00:59:23] Christina: And that was really impressive because that was really before GitHub, like obviously GitHub happened when TextMate was still, you know, popular, but like the early stuff didn’t even have GitHub yet, right? Like people were, you know, sourcing, were hosting things other ways and like people built, you know, kind of like ways to view extensions, if I recall correctly, there were like Plugins that you could install so you could view other extensions from other places, right? [00:59:45] Christina: Like, you know, kind of bringing it into their own app stores and whatnot, and like that, I think kind of set like the tone where you’re like, okay, if anybody else is going to, this is table stakes now, right? And I think Sublime did an okay job at first, and then I really just think that they just dropped [01:00:00] the ball. [01:00:00] Christina: Um, that’s one of the reasons why I [01:00:02] Brett: it’s just seemed kind of stagnant for a while [01:00:04] Christina: It has, right? [01:00:05] Brett: the, the package control ecosystem that was built for Sublime, um, was, it was great. Like for finding extensions, for sharing extensions, like it was great, but I just, Like I have an RSS feed from package control and mostly what’s coming through now is just new themes. [01:00:26] Brett: And honestly, there only need to be so many text editor themes. I mean, you’re basically working essentially with 16 colors. I mean, you can make a [01:00:37] Christina: There are only so many [01:00:38] Brett: color scheme. Yeah. Like you’ve got, you’ve got your, your Solarize combinations. You got your base 16 combinations and you got like, um, Uh, like the monokai variations. [01:00:51] Brett: And after that, like, what are you even doing? [01:00:55] Christina: No, it’s true. It’s true. What’s actually really funny is that still to this day, like the, the [01:01:00] GitHub repo that I have that has like the most like stars and other things from it is a, a, a TextMate theme repo. Um, that’s like, that I created like in like [01:01:10] Brett: Oh, and Twilight from text me. You need [01:01:12] Christina: You need Twilight. Yeah. And so, and people still download this and stuff. [01:01:16] Christina: And it’s like, you know, close to 15 years old, um, that, [01:01:19] Brett: cause TM theme, TM theme files work on every [01:01:23] Christina: Well, I was gonna say, that’s the thing. It became the, like, just kind of generic, uh, format, which is fantastic. Um, and people have made better ones since then, but it was funny. I created, like, this repo. I think I did it for a Mashable article, and I’d had a GitHub account, but I hadn’t done anything with it. [01:01:39] Christina: And I was like, well, I just need a way to distribute and show off these themes. And I even, like, people have asked me over the years, they’re like, can you put licensing in this? I’m like, sure can’t, because I don’t know where a lot of this stuff came from. Because I just found things from various servers and other things, like many of them, it’s funny, it’s like added from slash user slash Christina slash textmate dash themes, right? [01:01:57] Christina: Like a lot of these things were like, [01:02:00] you know, [01:02:00] Brett: and none of these are mine, so I can’t license [01:02:03] Christina: I can’t license them for you, right? I was like, I was like, I can, I can do all kinds of other, you know, I can, if there’s anything in the readme file on that thing, you know, that points to a person, I can give them credit. But like, I was very explicit. I was like, a collection of textmate themes I’ve gathered over the years, and people were like, what’s the license? [01:02:19] Christina: So I’m like. Good luck, right? Like this is, this is just kind of a, uh, you know, share and, and, and do go with God sort of thing, but don’t use this. I’m not telling anybody to use this commercially because I think some people, it’s funny, people have created like, um, TM theme, like editors and many of them, they pull in frankly from this repo, you know, it’s kind of like the kind of default themes to play with and modify. [01:02:42] Christina: And so for something like that, I could understand. We were like, Oh, it would be good to have a license around this. And I’m like, yeah, I’m, I’m definitely not. Good luck. I don’t think it’ll be a problem, but I wouldn’t use this commercially. Yes. [01:02:55] Brett: note, I, a while back, I decided to start using light [01:03:00] themes in my text editor, and I’m still dark theme and terminal. Um, but I almost can’t edit code. Have you ever tried switching from light to dark themes? Like, it, whatever you’re used to at the time, it’s really hard to see it anymore. Inverted. [01:03:16] Brett: Um, so for a long time, every time I looked at a light theme, it just looked wrong, um, and I decided for the sake of my eyes to force myself to make the switch, and I made my own light theme called Lucky Charms that I installed in, like, uh, in Vim and in, uh, Sublime and now in VS Code. And I’ve actually gotten bored with it. [01:03:42] Brett: And the snazzy light [01:03:44] Christina: Snazzy Lite is really [01:03:45] Brett: that comes with VS code is, is what I’m using right now. Um, but like, it’s weird to me that people default to editing in dark mode. Um, I find that so [01:04:00] strenuous on my eyes. Um, and if I’m looking at pages and pages of code, I absolutely, I’m a light theme guy now. [01:04:08] Christina: Yeah, I go back and forth. Sometimes I am lite. I’ve been, um, kind of probably a variant of a dark theme for most of my, you know, time in text editors, but I sometimes will use the lite. I will say the one time I always use the lite and snazzy lite is good. The github lite is another good one. Um, is, uh, when I’m presenting because, um, dark themes, um, when you’re using any sort of like, like projector, uh, system, you know, or, or whatnot, like to, to large audiences, oftentimes the, the, the bulbs and those things aren’t, uh, like frankly bright enough to really illuminate dark, um, uh, backgrounds. [01:04:44] Christina: And people don’t think about that when they give presentations, but if you, especially if you’re like in a big crowd, depending on, you know, just like quality of the screen that you’re on and, and, and all kinds of other things, like it can be really hard to see the text on screen. And so, um, I, that was like, uh, feedback that was given to [01:05:00] me, like, Years and years ago, uh, when I first started doing, um, conference talks and they’re like, no, use like, it was almost like a rule. [01:05:07] Christina: Like we use, you know, light themed for, you know, uh, text in, in our presentations. And I was like, okay, with that, I like how dark looks better. And then you realize, oh, okay. But inside a room, especially with various lighting things and whatnot, actually light is a lot better for that. And so, um, that’s made me more open to, Just depends, right? [01:05:29] Christina: Like, my eyes don’t bother me using dark things for the most part, but sometimes, sometimes it can. But I do draw the line, like, again, unless I’m in a presentation and then I might switch it. I can’t use a light editor for a terminal. I just can’t. Like, it, it, it, like, it feels [01:05:44] Brett: weird. It’s weird how different that is. Um, and I don’t know what the distinction is, but I’ve tried light themes in Terminal, [01:05:51] Jeff: we’ve been looking at dark terminals since Wargames. [01:05:54] Brett: maybe [01:05:55] Christina: I will say this though, like, especially depending on, like, what machine I’m on. So, like, [01:06:00] when I’m on my, um, like, iMac or, like, my 27 inch, um, uh, studio display, like, My terminal, um, text size is a lot larger than the text size is on my text editor. And I don’t know if that has anything to do with it, right? [01:06:14] Christina: Like, [01:06:15] Brett: I use, I use uncommonly large text sizes too. And it’s not just for my eyes. My brain just works better. Maybe seeing less on the screen at once, uh, which is the side effect of using a larger font, [01:06:30] Christina: yeah, no, I [01:06:30] Brett: like 14, I use like 14 point fonts in Terminal. [01:06:34] Christina: Yeah, I use, I use 16, um, for, uh, for terminal and I probably use like, you know, 12, um, on, um, [01:06:41] Brett: I do the inverse. I use 16 in my text editor and 14, 12 in, er, 14 in Terminal, I guess. Yeah. Anyway, uh, so that’s my pick for the week. I just used up like 20 minutes. [01:06:54] Christina: No, that’s great, though. VS Code. And, um, do you have any plans, like, as you start to play around with it [01:07:00] more, do you think you might, you know, dip into wanting to either share, like, your config files or extensions or anything like that? [01:07:06] Brett: Oh, absolutely. I, I, I intend to get into writing extensions. Um, yeah, I, my last couple, uh, forays, I wrote an Obsidian extension and tried to get it submitted to the repo. And it was a pretty basic extension. And they, I did, I made all the changes they requested on the PR And then they let it die and they kept sending me emails. [01:07:33] Brett: If this doesn’t get, uh, if, if this, if there’s no activity on this PR for the next 30 days, we’re going to close it out. And I, I kept bumping it. I’m like, it’s done. Could you, you know, merge the PR and they just, they never responded and it died. Um, so I’m hoping if I get into developing extensions for [01:07:57] Christina: VSCode is not that way. It will. It will. I [01:08:00] mean, at that point, like, I think it is literally just something like to get listed like in the marketplace is a very simple thing. Like, I don’t even know what the approval process is. Extensively, there’s one, but I don’t think it’s super strict. Um, and, uh, and you know, you can just, there’s a way to do it directly from, from GitHub. [01:08:19] Christina: Um, because on those pages, they go to like, you know, usually the source link is a GitHub link. And so yeah, it’s, it’s a relatively easy process. And that also makes it easy to push out updates and stuff too, because then the release notes, like anything in your readme from your GitHub, like kind of shows up, um, as, as the release notes or other things in the extensions. [01:08:37] Christina: So yeah. [01:08:40] Jeff: Awesome. I got one. [01:08:43] Christina: Yeah. [01:08:43] Brett: for it. [01:08:44] Jeff: All right, here’s the scenario. Every day I, I open up Firefox, I use containers, uh, and because I, for many reasons, but I have to open up four different Google accounts for work, like my personal account, my personal work account, our admin account, and [01:09:00] then another, just account related to the business. [01:09:03] Jeff: And, um, and every day I, I, I mean, not every day, I can, they can save, but I actually don’t like seeing these tabs when I’m not working. So I tend to even if, you know, like I pin them and then I kill them. But, uh, Basically, like, every day I, like, open up, I have a keyboard shortcut, open up my container for personal, open up my container for work, for admin, and then I open up two of those windows and I hit drive in one and gmail in the other so that, like, by the time I’m done, I’ve got drive for each of those accounts open, I’ve got gmail open, and, and it’s so fucking tedious and it seems crazy that I can’t automate that better. [01:09:33] Automation Tools: Keysmith and Default Folder X [01:09:33] Jeff: Um, But I, I was on setup. Sometimes I go on setup and I browse, which isn’t always a great experience because there are just some stinkers on there and some stuff that just hasn’t been updated in a while and it’s not, you can tell when you, you can go and look, but it’s not immediately obvious. Um, and, uh, so anyway, I, I stumbled into this thing called keysmith, which is just, it just records macros of what you’re doing on your screen. [01:09:56] Jeff: It’s similar to something keyboard. Maestro can do, except that [01:10:00] going into keyboard maestro is like going into an art museum where everything’s eight and a half by 11 and all frames are touching. Um, and, and it was beautiful. So I just like, I instantly opened up this app and I had it record doing this thing where I opened these different containers, enter Gmail, enter drive. [01:10:17] Jeff: It did it beautifully, added a keyboard shortcut. It was, it took me about, I Three minutes. I had to do just a little bit. You can go in and correct your macros like anything else that has a macro. Took him about three minutes. So elegant. So great. Uh, and, and I love it. And, and the app is like, um, and it can do a lot more than that, but that’s how I’m using it. [01:10:36] Jeff: It, the app was like a COVID baby, uh, came out in like August, 2020. It’s kind of adorable. It’s by two friends. They’re both named Daniel and they’ve been friends since kindergarten. Um, and it hasn’t had like a serious update since like maybe 2021, but they, they keep it like lightly updated. You know, when there’s a new OS, there’s a new version. [01:10:55] Jeff: Um, and there’s, you know, occasional bug fixes. Like they seem to be paying attention to it. Uh, [01:11:00] and it hasn’t been buggy for me at all. And I love it. It’s like, uh, it’s if you get it on setup, you just get it on setup. If you purchase it, you can do like a free license where you get like up to five macros or you can, um, you can purchase like a single license for 54 bucks. [01:11:14] Jeff: It actually looks like it’s just a permanent, like a forever license. Um, anyway, I was like so delighted to find this cause there are various things I do over the course of the day, various admin things with just like a lot of times with just shitty apps that. You know, you should not have to click this much and they’re not easy to automate. [01:11:30] Jeff: You could do it in Keyboard Maestro, but again, I love Keyboard Maestro. God, I sound like Trump. I love Keyboard Maestro, um, but uh, but [01:11:39] Brett: A lot of people are saying [01:11:41] Christina: lot of people are saying, a lot of people are saying it’s too much. [01:11:44] Jeff: lot, a lot of people are saying, um, yeah. That’s my first attempt at a Trump impression. Not, not great. Uh, that’s right. I did the hands. You can’t see it, but I did the hands. Okay. Like the accordion. Um, anyway, so [01:11:55] Brett: the, the Obama speech at the DNC.[01:12:00] [01:12:00] Jeff: So anyway, that was, uh, that, that’s mine and I’m, I’m so excited about it and I only discovered it yesterday. [01:12:06] Jeff: And so I’m going to play a bunch. [01:12:08] Brett: Yeah, I’ve actually played with that before. Um, it felt like adding one more thing to an already crowded automation setup for me. Um, but it was, it was. Uh, I think I, I think I passed on it because it was, um, simpler, um, conceptually than Keyboard Maestro and it felt redundant. Um, not that I was doing a lot of macro recording in Keyboard Maestro. [01:12:36] Brett: It just felt like if I was going to get into that, I already own Keyboard Maestro. And, but no, [01:12:43] Jeff: My, [01:12:44] Brett: that review is, is tempting. [01:12:47] Jeff: my, my issue with going into keyboard maestro, and this is not a problem. This is actually the, the great thing about keyboard maestro, but like, I totally go into Terpstra mode where it’s like, well, I could do this, but I could also do this. And if I’m doing this, I [01:13:00] could also do this. [01:13:00] Jeff: And then I’m pretty soon. It’s like, well, fuck, uh, I, I had a deadline an hour ago. Um, and, and so with this one, it’s, I always need like, I need the like automation app, like Keyboard Meister, where you could just like go in and you could go deep. And then I need the thing that’s like, I’m panicking. I can’t think straight. [01:13:18] Jeff: I’m having a nervous reaction to having to do this thing over and over. I need to fix it quick. And this is the, is a great little thing in the toolbox for that. [01:13:25] Brett: Did you ever see my Markdown document linker for Keyboard Maestro? That was the result of going into Keyboard My Shoe and just realizing I could do something, and [01:13:36] Christina: Yeah. I remember [01:13:37] Brett: two hours doing something. Like, [01:13:39] Jeff: Yeah, yeah, [01:13:40] Brett: give it, you give it like a root directory for like a Jekyll site, for example. Um, and as you’re writing, you can just type lnk. [01:13:50] Brett: And it’ll pop up like a Quicksilver style menu of all of the documents in your markdown directory. And you can use [01:14:00] fuzzy search to find one and it’ll insert like a liquid format or markdown format link to that document for like intro document linking. [01:14:09] Jeff: You know what? You know what just occurred to me? I bet you, I bet you sound like that when you talk in your sleep, what you just did. Parklife. [01:14:19] Brett: I laugh in my sleep. I sing in my sleep. Um, Elle finds it very endearing because They don’t have to share a bed with me, [01:14:28] Christina: Okay. [01:14:28] Brett: separate bedrooms. So just occasionally she’ll hear like singing coming and laughing. I’ll wake myself up laughing regularly. But anyway, Christina, would you, uh, would you land on [01:14:44] Christina: Okay. So since Brett mentioned Moom last week, and I’m sorry that I missed that one, but uh, uh, I will just co sign that. Um, and, uh, I, I upgraded, um, that, um, recently and I was super excited about it. I’d missed the announcement and I, I saw it, I think maybe like the [01:15:00] day before, but, uh, I had the upgrade price like change, but that was fine with me. [01:15:03] Christina: I’m still happy to upgrade. It’s a really good app. Um, speaking of kind of apps where there are some things that, um, you could do with other apps, including, um, things like LaunchBar or Alfred or whatnot. But, um, there are other things that I think are just really unique to this. Uh, we’ve talked about this one before, but a new 6. [01:15:21] Christina: 1 version, uh, just came out and adding Sequoia compatibility. Uh, and this is a default folder X. This is also available. on, um, uh, Setapp. Although I’ve also, this is one of those ones that I’ve like purchased, like a direct license. And then I use the Setapp version because, Brett, you’ve said, you’ve indicated before that, that like it, it helps out the developer more. [01:15:42] Christina: Um, if you use the Setapp version, um, frequently, then they’ll get a higher payment. But it was also one of these apps that is important enough to me that I’ve gotten enough value out of over the years that I was like, I’m going to buy it. Um, And use it as part of my subscription. To be clear, I don’t think, I’m not saying that that’s something that everybody needs to do. [01:15:58] Christina: Like, that’s a, [01:16:00] you know, Christina quirk. But default Flutter access is one of my favorite apps. If you’ve never used it, it kind of takes over the, you know, save as, I guess, screen on your Mac. And yeah, the dialogue, thank you. And adds in additional Chrome where you can Access more features like, you know, a specific set of folders or, or, um, favorite folders, or you can automatically say, you know, for this type of recent, yeah, for this, for this type of, you know, file in this application, I always want it to go here, regardless of what the most recent thing was, like this is where I always want it to open. [01:16:39] Christina: Um, I also have like, um, uh, keyboard, short, uh, uh, uh, uh, key bindings, um, within Finder where I can hit a certain combination and it’ll take me. immediately to a certain folder. And I know I could do that in any number of apps, but I use it with default folder X because I have some folders that are just always a favor that I always want easy access to. [01:16:59] Christina: And [01:17:00] they’ve, um, they’ve also just released a kind of a new feature to be able to do, um, I guess like a quick, uh, quick access, um, to, to files like across apps, something you could do in Alfredo launch bar, or if you want to access, you know, certain, uh, URLs or certain, um, um, Other, uh, stuff you can do that from kind of a quick link, um, uh, key binding shortcut. [01:17:25] Brett: Oh, cause they have, there’s like a quick search where it pops up like a, um, like a launch bar style window. And I’ve never used that. [01:17:34] Christina: I’ve used it a little bit and they just, they added some, some new things with that. Like, so, um, you can, um, now I guess one of the new things is that QuickSearch can be used to open, like, web URLs that are saved in your favorites. So that is kind of interesting. Yeah. Like, if you have another solution for that, like, I’m not saying that, that you necessarily need to use, uh, default folder Xs, um, in, in it. [01:17:57] Christina: in replacement of that, but there are some things that you can do that [01:18:00] are cool. And if you don’t have an app kind of set to do those things, I think it’s a, it’s a, it’s a nice little variant. But just, just for me, like, this is just a, um, the, the version six came out. I’m not sure when, um, it was either, uh, earlier this year, sometime last year, but it’s good. [01:18:15] Christina: But 6. 1 is going, you know, came out with Sequoia support and some other things. And I don’t know, um, it’s a really, really good app, really, really good developer. And so, uh, big [01:18:26] Brett: I’ve, uh, I’ve said this before, but, and I use default folder all the time. But my favorite feature is when you’re in an open or save dialogue and you open up the parent folder, [01:18:41] Christina: Mm hmm. [01:18:42] Brett: it adds arrows. And you can jump quickly to subfolders and parent folders, um, just from one simple tree and you don’t have to navigate folder to folder. [01:18:54] Brett: You can just jump around and you can jump up to parent directories and into a subdirectory [01:19:00] of a parent directory all without, with just one click and, you know, some hovering, but, um, I, I absolutely adore that feature. Can I tell you how I actually navigate directories now? [01:19:14] Christina: Yes, please. [01:19:15] Brett: So. In my terminal, I use a variation of something that used to be called bashmarks. [01:19:22] Brett: Um, and the way that mine functions is I have a folder called dotmarks and it creates symlinks. to anything that I bookmark. So all of my frequently used folders bookmarks and I can type because I’ve, I’ve written my own cd command. But I type cd and then any part of a bookmark name hit tab and it jumps to that folder. [01:19:47] Brett: And then I have an alias cdf that opens the current terminal folder in Finder. So when I want to navigate into like the image directory for my blog, I type [01:20:00] cd Oh, which is for some reason, the shortcut for my blog, CDO. And then I just type images and it will find that subdirectory of the parent bookmark, and then I just type CDF and I’m, and I have it in fine. [01:20:14] Jeff: Nice. [01:20:15] Christina: That’s awesome. [01:20:16] Brett: I it’s so like, it’s so easy to add new bookmarks and to navigate subdirectories of those bookmarks using my fuzzy CD command that really there’s Default folder X even. It’s just, it’s so easy [01:20:33] Jeff: Hey, do you use the, do you ever use the terminal in VS Code? Now that you’re using [01:20:37] Brett: I do. Yeah, I have. [01:20:38] Jeff: really like that. [01:20:39] Brett: I also enjoy the SSH remote config. Um, and I can, I can load up an Oracle cloud. Uh, I can load up a GitHub repository connected to an Oracle cloud instance, all in one term, VS code window and edit files remotely in a cloud [01:21:00] machine. And execute cloud platform, um, apps like spin up Pulumi and everything inside of a VS code window. [01:21:11] Brett: And it’s so integrated. It’s super nice. [01:21:16] Jeff: Awesome. [01:21:18] Brett: All right. [01:21:19] Concluding Thoughts and Personal Updates [01:21:19] Brett: We did it. I have to go pick up Elle. So we should wrap up. [01:21:26] Jeff: All right. [01:21:26] Brett: We’re like an hour and 20 in. [01:21:28] Christina: Hey, look, it’s been a while since we’ve all been together, so [01:21:32] Brett: alright, well, we all seem to be sleeping okay at least as of last night, um, but I think we could all use [01:21:40] Christina: we could use more for sure. And, and, and I hope you figure out, uh, things, uh, Brett, whether you’re going manic or not. I know we didn’t have a lot of time to talk about that, but it’s because it’s been a while since you’ve had a manic episode, hasn’t it? [01:21:51] Brett: Um, it’s, this might be a topic for next [01:21:55] Christina: Yeah, we, we, yeah, [01:21:56] Brett: like, I think I think my definition of manic [01:22:00] episode might be changing. [01:22:01] Jeff: Ah, super [01:22:03] Brett: no longer like five days with no sleep. Now it’s like three months with like less sleep and, and like less obsession, but still like from my normal elevated mood, I guess. But anyway, well, [01:22:20] Jeff: like, it sounds like the common thread is, I bet that it’s evident in your GitHub action. [01:22:24] Christina: Yeah. [01:22:26] Jeff: yeah, if we, we can go, we can go track that. Um, all right. Get some sleep. [01:22:32] Christina: Get some sleep.

A Brett and Jeff episode! The co-hosts discuss Jeff’s recovery from COVID, including musings on mask-wearing fatigue. Jeff opens up about the emotional experience of dropping his son off at college, while both share their struggles with being increasingly moved to tears by everyday events (like TV commercials). The duo also dives into their longtime fondness for apps like Noteplan and DevonThink, Brett’s rewrite of his tool Planter, and the newfound allure of VS Code over Sublime. Sponsor 1Password Extended Access Management solves the problems traditional IAM and MDM can’t . It’s security for the way we work today, and it’s now generally available to companies with Okta and Microsoft Entra, and in beta for Google Workspace customers. Check it out at 1password.com/product/xam. Show Links Leeja Miller Rock Scissors The Lab (Strong Coffee) Planter (Work in progress) Moom 4 NotePlan DEVONthink Chapters 00:00 Welcome to the Brett and Jeff Show 00:29 Jeff’s COVID Experience 01:33 Masking and Public Perception 02:32 Fleet Farm Adventures 06:18 Parenting and College Drop-Off 08:01 Mental Health Corner 14:28 Emotional Reflections 22:01 Sponsor Break: 1Password 27:04 Customer Support Onboarding Challenges 28:13 Mental Health and Emotional Struggles 28:19 Political Commentary and YouTube Recommendations 30:36 Activism and Personal Experiences 33:12 T-Shirt Store Relaunch Announcement 36:34 Planter Tool and Project Management 39:42 Reviving Old Projects and Tools 44:59 Window Management with Moom 4 50:11 Noteplan and DevonThink for Organization 57:03 Switching to VS Code 59:37 Conclusion and Final Thoughts Join the Conversation Merch Come chat on Discord! Twitter/ovrtrd Instagram/ovrtrd Youtube Get the Newsletter Thanks! You’re downloading today’s show from CacheFly’s network BackBeat Media Podcast Network Check out more episodes at overtiredpod.com and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Find Brett as @ttscoff, Christina as @film_girl, Jeff as @jsguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Making the Best of Goat Castration [00:00:00] Welcome to the Brett and Jeff Show [00:00:00] Brett: Welcome back to Overtired. Um, I want, uh, to have special theme music when it’s just a Brett and Jeff episode. It’s a Brett and Jeff episode! Brett and Jeff episode! Womp womp. Yeah, that works. Um, [00:00:21] Jeff: fair enough. [00:00:22] Brett: Well, it’s me, Brett Terpstra, here with Jeff Severins Gunthal. How you doing, Jeff? [00:00:26] Jeff: I’m, [00:00:28] Brett: Yep, there you go. [00:00:29] Jeff’s COVID Experience [00:00:29] Jeff: I’m, I’m getting over Covid. Uh, and I’m good. And I’m good. [00:00:33] Brett: was so well timed. [00:00:35] Jeff: Yeah, I [00:00:35] Brett: not even, I’m not even gonna edit out the cough. That was just [00:00:38] Jeff: No, it’s fine. It’s, it’s true. What’s true is what’s true, is true. You know, can’t hide the truth. [00:00:44] Brett: So, how did you get COVID? [00:00:46] Jeff: I don’t know. Transmission, uh, [00:00:49] Brett: Aerosols. [00:00:51] Jeff: aerosols, who knows? My groceries. Probably it was my groceries. I stopped wiping them off and I knew I shouldn’t stop wiping ’em off. Um, I [00:01:00] don’t know. I was traveling. [00:01:01] Jeff: I don’t know. [00:01:01] Brett: Yeah, traveling. [00:01:03] Jeff: Yeah, I don’t know. [00:01:04] Jeff: I was, I mean, I helped my, helped my, uh, firstborn move into his dorm. So I was around a lot of, a lot of people [00:01:12] Jeff: that weekend. That might’ve been it. [00:01:14] Jeff: That might’ve been it. [00:01:15] Brett: I got home from Maxstock and got an email that someone at Maxstock reported being, testing positive for COVID. [00:01:24] Jeff: It’s really, I mean, from what I understand, this strain is super contagious. Like so many people I know have It [00:01:30] Jeff: It can, it really can still kick your [00:01:32] Brett: yeah, totally. [00:01:33] Masking and Public Perception [00:01:33] Brett: And, and we’ve kind of, we’ve stopped taking precautions. Like even liberals have mostly stopped wearing masks except for people who are immunocompromised and are mad at everyone else for not wearing masks. But, um, yeah, it’s kind of, I don’t, I get it. I don’t want to wear a mask anymore. [00:01:56] Brett: Like I want it to just be over, but it’s really not. [00:01:59] Jeff: I, [00:02:00] for me, when I put them on, like, I, um, it just triggers so many fucking bad memories. And, and so I, I, as soon as I feel the heat of my breath in a mask, I’m just like, God damn it. I mean, I was a masked person to the end and, and M, I mean, I masked, I had to go one place and it was a big box store. I mean, it was better than a big box store. [00:02:19] Jeff: It was Fleet Farm, but I, and that place is always like, A, empty and gigantic. And I was, I think on the end of my I think I was, I probably was past being contagious, but anyway, I was careful. I wore a mask. [00:02:32] Fleet Farm Adventures [00:02:32] Jeff: But because I was at Fleet Farm, which is like, it’s a demographic. I mean, I’m part of the demographic [00:02:38] Jeff: for sure. [00:02:39] Brett: they are big Trump supporters. it’s a [00:02:41] Jeff: yeah, yeah, yeah. And, and, and yeah, lots of bubble trucks in the, in the, uh, in the parking lot. But I knew, cause I, [00:02:48] Jeff: I, [00:02:49] Brett: of camo [00:02:49] Jeff: I remember wearing, um, I remember wearing a mask early days to Fleet Farm, because I am part of the Fleet Farm demographic. My son actually made a Fleet Farm out of clay [00:03:00] in eighth grade. Um, but like, I, I remember going into Fleet Farm early days before everyone was wearing masks, but when like, when the liberals were wearing masks. [00:03:10] Jeff: And I, I, I remember just walking in feeling like I was ready to fight. I was just like, I was feeling defensive. I was like, why are you fucking looking at me? I’m wearing a mask, motherfucker. And I went in, I went in this time, no reason to believe that’s, that people were thinking anything about me wearing a mask, but I went in the same way. [00:03:27] Jeff: I’m like, you want me to fucking cough on you? Like, I literally had like an attitude [00:03:31] Brett: No, I, I have, I have, I have literally done that exact same thing at the exact same store. [00:03:37] Jeff: yeah, yeah, [00:03:38] Jeff: yeah, you gotta have, I bet you have a great fleet farm in [00:03:40] Jeff: Winona, [00:03:40] Brett: a fleet farm. I could walk to my fleet farm. It’s so [00:03:44] Jeff: Oh, that’s like, let’s live in a dream. [00:03:47] Brett: um, the, uh, the big, big news about our local fleet farm was Ivanka Trump showed up to pretend like she was of the people [00:03:59] Jeff: she there to buy [00:04:00] horse hairspray? Because [00:04:00] Jeff: that’s something you can buy there. [00:04:02] Brett: had, like, a photo op with, like, some stuffed animals or [00:04:05] Jeff: I remember this, actually. I remember this. Yeah, [00:04:08] Brett: It was. [00:04:09] Jeff: Stuffed animal. I mean, if you’re going to do a photo op of Fleet Farm, you have so many options. Like, there is a whole, there’s a whole horse section where you [00:04:15] Jeff: can get horse, you can get horse toys, [00:04:17] Jeff: you can get horse hairspray. There’s a [00:04:19] Jeff: section in my hometown where we have not Fleet Farm. [00:04:23] Jeff: But, Farm and Fleet. [00:04:25] Jeff: Um, [00:04:25] Brett: Wisconsin thing, isn’t it? [00:04:27] Jeff: that was Iowa, too. [00:04:28] Jeff: It’s Blaine’s or Blair’s, I forget, which I always get that wrong, even though I’ve been going since I was a kid. But you can get like, um, a bag of 100, 150, uh, goat, um, castration bands, which, Which look like the kinds of rubber bands you use for braces, which is terrible, because [00:04:44] Jeff: they’re that small. [00:04:45] Brett: holy shit. [00:04:46] Jeff: But what’s funny is my son and I, my youngest and I were there and we were, I like to, when I go to a new fleet farm or farm and fleet, I walk it because it, it all is a little different. If you’re in a, a more rural area. So my hometown is like a farming community slash [00:05:00] factory community. You’re going to get a lot more like proper farm stuff than maybe like in just. [00:05:04] Jeff: The immediate suburb of Minneapolis. So I walk every aisle, any fleet farm or farmer fleet I go into, cause I just love seeing what’s there. So we see these like goat castration bands. My, my partner’s like, you’re not buying those. I was like, they’re a buck 50. Like you never know when you’re going to need a small rubber band. [00:05:20] Jeff: And then, and then my son notices right after I say, you never know. Cause it’s some things you look at and you’re like, I can use that for problem solving down the road. You know, not just for, not just for goat castration. And, and all of a sudden my son notices that they’re using the goat castration bands to hold price tags onto all of the little price tag holders. [00:05:40] Jeff: And I was like, see, see, but I haven’t been back without her yet. And I mean, whenever I do go back without her, I’m buying my, I asked for him for a stocking, stocking stuffer this year. So we’ll see. But [00:05:51] Brett: Yeah. [00:05:52] Jeff: you know, I love a good, You know, something you can look at and go, I can problem solve with that. [00:05:56] Brett: It might be the only gift you get. [00:05:59] Jeff: That’s fine. [00:05:59] Jeff: I [00:06:00] really want them. I can’t stop thinking about them. It’s like when someone mentioned some like shitty food that you shouldn’t eat that, that, you know, you know, the second they mentioned it, all you’re going to think about till you actually get it is that thing, Fruity Pebbles are like that. Fuck. I did it. for me. But anyway, but yeah, so I, yeah, I had COVID, I was traveling. [00:06:18] Parenting and College Drop-Off [00:06:18] Jeff: I dropped my, my, um, oldest off at a, at a college far away and, and that was a life experience. And now I’m on the other side of that and COVID. [00:06:27] Brett: Well, welcome back to, I guess, normal existence. Minus one sun. [00:06:33] Jeff: Yeah. Minus one, one son. It’s pretty wild, [00:06:37] Jeff: but I was able to sleep in his room while I had COVID. That was a bonus. I met, I called him and I was like, your bed is super comfortable. And he goes, thanks. [00:06:48] Brett: Did you, did you spend more on his mattress than on your own? [00:06:52] Jeff: No, his mattress is like the one we had back when we lived in New York when he was like a little baby. Um, and it’s still super comfortable. So, [00:07:00] mission accomplished? I don’t know. [00:07:02] Brett: I still have, I still sleep on a, on a, Oh God, I don’t even remember. I think it’s purple. I got, I, over the years I’ve gotten two mattresses, uh, from people that sponsored our shows, um. [00:07:17] Jeff: Casper. [00:07:18] Brett: Casper was the first one, which now Elle has. And then the second one, whatever it was, is the one I still sleep on. And they’re, they’re very comfortable. [00:07:29] Brett: You know, the ones that show up in like a two foot by four foot box and like you unroll them. Um, [00:07:37] Jeff: like back in the Halcyon days when every podcaster had a Casper, a Synology, and a Sonos system? [00:07:44] Brett: Synology sent out, Oh, I would [00:07:46] Jeff: Well, they would have sent, probably to the ATP guys. Maybe That’s [00:07:49] Jeff: separate. That’s probably its own thing. You could send them things and it’ll really be worth it. [00:07:55] Brett: Um, I, speaking, let’s do a [00:08:00] mental health corner. [00:08:01] Mental Health Corner [00:08:01] Brett: We’re kind of already, we’re kind of already in it as is the way our show [00:08:05] Jeff: We’re already, we’re already in the corner. [00:08:08] Brett: Um, the only thing I have to report, I’ve been taking a break from therapy, not intentionally, just scheduling over the summer. Um, and I’ve gotten really bad about like doing parts work on my own. [00:08:21] Brett: Like I just, I just would rather go to [00:08:24] Jeff: we have therapists. [00:08:25] Brett: Yeah. Um, and. I did make the mistake. So I’ve been taking, in order to fall asleep these days, I need, I think I’ve talked about this, an excessive amount of gabapentin. Um, I’ve tried like all kinds of FDA approved sleeping, uh, medicines and none of them did anything and I was still not sleeping. [00:08:47] Brett: So gabapentin was the answer. I take the maximum allowable amount, 1800 milligrams of [00:08:55] Jeff: It’s like one, one bottle.[00:09:00] [00:09:00] Brett: It’s three 600 milligram tablets, um, [00:09:03] Jeff: I haven’t, I don’t know what to compare. Like what’s a, so what would a, like, I’m just starting out a dose [00:09:09] Brett: 300 milligrams. [00:09:10] Jeff: okay. Got it. Ugh. [00:09:12] Brett: Um, it, I think is the normal, like, we’ll try this first and see how it goes. So I went from 300 to 600 to 1200 to 1800 and 1800 works. I stay asleep most of the night. I still, I get up around five after six to seven hours of sleep. Uh, I went to a sleep study, uh, [00:09:33] Jeff: When? [00:09:33] Brett: I went to sleep medicine, um, [00:09:36] Jeff: Oh, not like an overnight, [00:09:37] Brett: it, well, they, it was a home, they, they sent me home with this thing that you wear a wristband, a chest monitor, like sticks to your chest, and then it has like audio. [00:09:50] Brett: It can detect you snoring. It detects you breathing. It detects your oxygen and pulse. And, and I just wore that overnight at [00:10:00] home. Um, and they diagnosed me with minor sleep apnea, like 3%, which was so low that. My local vendors wouldn’t supply me with a CPAP. Um, so I had to drive to La Crosse, Wisconsin or, or La Crosse, uh, La Crosse, La Crosse, Wisconsin. [00:10:23] Brett: And, and I got, I got my CPAP and I’m trying so hard to get used to it. And I don’t think it makes any difference in how I sleep. And so the next step with that is like CBT, uh, for sleep, which. [00:10:41] Jeff: behavioral therapy. Oh, [00:10:44] Brett: Um, so I, I’m going to keep trying the CPAP for a while, but anyway, all this is to say, so I’m taking all this gabapentin and just for shits and giggles, one night, L and I made root beer floats [00:11:00] with, um, [00:11:00] Jeff: did it. Now I got to have one of those. [00:11:02] Brett: with, with THC laden root beer, [00:11:07] Jeff: The, the whole cereal. Okay. Got it. I don’t [00:11:11] Jeff: know what that is. THC. What’s that? Oh, but it’s [00:11:13] Brett: Uh, sure, yeah, Delta 9 THC, which has [00:11:18] Jeff: Delta variant. [00:11:21] Brett: it has very minimal effect on me and I didn’t even, I felt a little bit relaxed, but then I took my gabapentin and there was an interaction and I conked out, slept through the night, woke up like at like 8am, tried to stand up, got so dizzy, I just. [00:11:41] Brett: Passed out back in bed and the effects didn’t wear off for like 24 hours. [00:11:48] Jeff: I know, because I sat in this lonely, lonely room waiting for you to come on to record and I was like, this is not like Brett, except for the one time, I think, that you were totally crashed out at recording time. Long time ago.[00:12:00] [00:12:00] Brett: Yeah, well, this was [00:12:01] Jeff: Normally, you’re the guy that’s like, hey, everybody on? Alright, ten minutes, let’s go. [00:12:05] Brett: Yep, yep, I’m usually first one at the party, last to leave. Um, yeah, yesterday was rough and I tried to like, work, but I was just so, um, dazed and like everything I said came out like monotone. I was just very low affect and it was, so I’m, until I stopped taking gabapentin, no more THC for [00:12:31] Jeff: like a, there’s a interaction, that’s a serious interaction, [00:12:34] Brett: Yeah, I looked it up, and, like, they talk about, uh, interactions with alcohol and with THC, and it’s not, like, highly studied, but multiple studies have shown, um, they actually use gabapentin in the treatment of THC addiction. [00:12:52] Jeff: Oh, really? [00:12:53] Jeff: Like to make it almost like when you make the thing, like when a [00:12:56] Jeff: dog gets an ointment so that when they lick it, it hurts, [00:12:59] Brett: Right, [00:13:00] or those, there’s like treatments for alcoholics that make you violently ill whenever you drink. Um, and I, I think that might, I don’t know anything beyond the fact that they verified that there were interactions with THC and gabapentin. But anyway, how are you? [00:13:19] Jeff: I’m good, but, uh, CPAP, I just have to say one thing about CPAP. Did you ever see the person who made an Alien Facehugger cover for their CPAP? [00:13:29] Brett: No. [00:13:29] Jeff: Well, it’s going in the show notes, baby, right now. It’s amazing. Um, and terrifying looking, actually. [00:13:37] Jeff: Uh, [00:13:37] Brett: Do not think I could sleep with that. Mine just goes over my nose. [00:13:41] Jeff: oh, okay, not a full, like, uh, whatever, [00:13:43] Brett: It’s not a full mask. It like, it works with a beard and it’s pretty, it’s pretty small. I have trouble breathing out through it though. Like I get [00:13:54] Jeff: ugh, that sounds, that made me feel a tightness in my chest as he’s saying [00:13:59] Brett: Yeah, that [00:14:00] big breath in is no problem because it’s assisted and then you try to breathe out and it’s like pushing against, well, resistance and, um, it does cause feelings of panic. [00:14:14] Brett: Um, and it’s really hard to fall asleep when you’re panicking on a regular [00:14:18] Jeff: you got a new problem. [00:14:20] Brett: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. [00:14:24] Jeff: doing good. I, you know, um, I don’t want to. [00:14:28] Emotional Reflections [00:14:28] Jeff: I know doing parent stuff when you’re not a couple of parents can be tedious or if you’re listening or whatever, but I do want to say that it was complete and utter agony leading up to dropping my son off at college. I mean, agony, like, I know that it is not a death and I don’t mean to minimize the experience of people dying. [00:14:49] Jeff: I wouldn’t minimize it just based on my own terrible experiences with it. But one thing. that I experienced in like the morning of especially was like, it was like [00:15:00] almost like a natural causes death where like, You can’t be mad at anybody? You can’t turn it around? You almost can’t understand it? Like, how the fuck did we get to this point? [00:15:10] Jeff: Like, I you were just this little thing, you know? And now you’re this, like, grown ass man who’s going to college? Uh, you know, and if you were just looking at Me, it’d be a first generation college student. Uh, but my wife has two master’s degrees. So he, I always knew he could choose. He was like, Oh God, don’t follow me. [00:15:31] Jeff: Um, but it was, I mean, it was, it was awful. And, and I was just, and I don’t. I don’t cry easy, and this is not a point of pride, um, actually I, I cry so easily in movies or shows or if I hear a sad radio [00:15:44] Jeff: story, but um, but in, in other parts of life when it would be good to cry, uh, not, not so easy, and I was just on and off, I was like low grade crying for like two days, like I was sniffling, like anything, I couldn’t say words related to him leaving, [00:16:00] in even like the most logistical way without like choking up. [00:16:03] Jeff: Um. But I realized something that was pretty important. I should say that like after dropping him off, it was really lovely. I mean, like, I felt really proud and excited and kind of in awe of him. And that quickly replaced the agony. And that’s more like me. I’m not Someone to like, overly grieve something that isn’t real. [00:16:28] Jeff: Um, I might do it in a flash. I might think about how, when I think about the fact that my wife or I will die before the other, most likely, uh, and when we don’t know which one that is, there are times when I think of that and it gives my heart a stop, a start, whatever. I guess it doesn’t stop or start because it’s already going. [00:16:45] Jeff: Um, but like overall, I don’t. And. And I had to stop myself like, uh, months ago, last summer, actually, when I realized it was the last summer with him, everything we did that was a normal summer thing, it was like, the last time we would do it. And it was killing me. [00:17:00] And I had to decide, and I probably discussed it in a mental health corner on this show, like, I can’t spend this year grieving something that’s not even here yet. [00:17:08] Jeff: Like, I will be able to grieve it when it happens. And that helped for a while. And then I had the agony. And I actually, like, one of those days when I was sort of like, just Low grade crying. I was like, okay, this is awful. And I realized that like, I wasn’t crying through it. I was crying at it. Like I wasn’t moving through it. [00:17:30] Jeff: I was moving at it. The thing, [00:17:32] Jeff: right? Like the transition, the move. Like I was, I was just like, I was approaching it. Like it was a wall I had to slam into. And, and then like what helped me a little bit for those couple of days, but really, really helped me when I had a felt sense of it afterwards. It’s like, no, it’s just move through this. [00:17:47] Jeff: Don’t. Don’t charge it, don’t move at it. Like this is something that’s, it’s inevitable. It’s just happening. You can’t stop it. And it’s beautiful. And it’s, it’s hard. And it’s, it’s all those things at once. That helped me a lot [00:18:00] in that last day, but it didn’t, it didn’t mean I didn’t experience agony. Anyway, in the days since, like. [00:18:06] Jeff: It’s been a little over a week, like, I can’t believe, because I tell people he is like, um, a great roommate. We don’t have, we have a great relationship. He has a great relationship with my wife. He has a great relationship with his brother. Um, they’ve never fought, like, that I can remember, except when they were little kids and they would have little, whatever, stupid baby fights. [00:18:26] Jeff: But like, um, I love having him around. And, and so that, that is strange, but it’s, Yeah, I’m so relieved that I, that I hold it as something really sweet and [00:18:41] Jeff: beautiful, and I hope the best for him. He said, you know, we were talking, he’s like, it’s pretty cool to make my own decisions every minute of the day. that is pretty cool. [00:18:50] Jeff: Like, you’ll lose that. You’ll lose [00:18:51] Jeff: that. You’ll, you’ll have it for the next like five, maybe 10 years. Then you’ll lose it. I didn’t say that. I don’t say shit like that. I don’t say shit like that. Uh, [00:19:00] cause I think that’s just not Awesome stuff to say as a parent. Just let him, let him have it. Anyway, so like, I’m feeling really good and that, and that’s a, that is a mental health thing. [00:19:11] Jeff: Like I, I worried I’d just be like curled up in a ball for a week or two, but it’s been really nice. [00:19:17] Jeff: So, and it helps that he texts me back mostly. Um, but yeah, so anyway. [00:19:22] Brett: So this, uh, this crying on a hair trigger. Did you always have that or did that develop later in life? [00:19:30] Jeff: definitely developed later in life. [00:19:31] Jeff: I’ve had it, I’ve had it for probably like a few years that I can remember. It definitely increased after I became a parent. I just became more emotional, [00:19:40] Brett: didn’t become a parent. I just suddenly, like a commercial could. And not outright. Not like tears running down my face, but like choked up, can’t talk. Like eyes, eyes watering a little bit. And. And like, I just choose not to say anything in those times so it doesn’t come out all choked up,[00:20:00] [00:20:00] Jeff: yeah, right. [00:20:01] Brett: like anything even remotely emotional or about like someone with, in like pain or someone who’s experiencing like hope. [00:20:12] Brett: Um, and like anything that causes an emotional reaction, I react to, and I don’t know if it’s like medication changes or just aging or, you know, I, I don’t know, but like something, something happened and now I tear up, uh, it’s stupid. [00:20:31] Jeff: Yeah, [00:20:31] Brett: not stupid, [00:20:32] Jeff: no, but like, [00:20:34] Brett: I’m easily emotionally manipulated and I hate that when something, when it feels like I just teared up over something that was designed to be a tearjerker. [00:20:45] Brett: Um, and then I get mad at the thing. Um, [00:20:49] Jeff: I think it’s funny because I definitely do it and I do it very secretly. Like I, if somebody is, or it’s really would only be watching TV with my partner, but like, um, I just have a little [00:21:00] heave in my [00:21:00] Jeff: chest. When something happens, [00:21:02] Jeff: but like, it’s, it is a little out of control. Cause like I was listening to a baseball game, not even a huge baseball fan, but I do like listening to games. [00:21:10] Jeff: I was listening to a game and the beginning famous Minnesota twin, Joe Maurer was, was inducted into the baseball hall of fame. I don’t give a shit about Joe Maurer. I don’t give a shit about the baseball hall of But he was giving a speech. And by the way, the baseball player giving a speech, uh, you know, to the, to the fans about, you know, thank you for all the years, whatever it, baseball players do not give emotional speeches. [00:21:31] Jeff: And this was not one, but just in him expressing all the years he spent and all that it meant to him to have crowd this big. You know, to be able to do this thing. I did the thing. And I was like, damn it. [00:21:46] Brett: Right. [00:21:46] Jeff: a shit about Joe Maurer. Like, he seems like a super nice guy. But like, that’s fine. [00:21:52] Jeff: There’s lots of nice guys. Um, so yeah, it’s out of control. It’s out of hand. [00:21:57] Brett: Yep. All right. Uh, where are we? [00:22:00] 21 minutes in. [00:22:01] Sponsor Break: 1Password [00:22:01] Brett: Let’s do our sponsor break. And then I have a couple, I have a couple of things to share. Um. We’re gonna, we’re gonna talk about one password this week, sponsor. Um, they want a, uh, a customized read, but nobody on this show has used the feature that they’re focusing on. [00:22:24] Brett: So I’m going to read the copy as is, and then I’m gonna tell you. Why I [00:22:30] Jeff: Oh, you’re going to do like the Elvis Costello on Saturday Night Live thing. [00:22:34] Brett: I don’t know what you’re [00:22:35] Jeff: He starts playing the hit because the record label told him he had to. And then he does this dramatic, like, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop. And then he goes into the song you wanted to play. I’ll put it in the [00:22:44] Jeff: show notes, but you’re doing a nice job, [00:22:46] Brett: Imagine your company’s security like the quad of a college campus. There are nice brick paths between the buildings. Those are the company owned devices, IT approved apps, and managed employee identities. And then there are the paths [00:23:00] that people actually use, the shortcuts worn through the grass that are the actual straightest line from point A to B. [00:23:07] Brett: Those are the unmanaged devices, shadow IT apps, and non employee identities like contractors. Most security tools only work on those happy brick paths, but a lot of security problems take place on those shortcuts. 1Password Extended Access Management is the first security solution that brings all these unmanaged devices, apps, and identities under your control. [00:23:30] Brett: It ensures that Every user credential is strong and protected, every device is known and healthy, and every app is visible. 1Password Extended Access Management solves the problem traditional IAM and MDM can’t. It’s security for the way we work today. And it’s now generally available to companies with Okta and Microsoft Entra, and in beta for Google Workspace customers. [00:23:56] Brett: Check it out at onepassword. com [00:24:00] slash product slash xam. That’s onepassword. com slash product slash xam. And now, hit I wanted to play. I love One Password. I was on a Zoom call with somebody yesterday. And I had to log into Oracle’s cloud, interface there, ue. And um, I just quick hit my keyboard, shortcut it, it loaded up. [00:24:29] Brett: ’cause they have a PAs key login for Oracle now. So it, I loaded up, uh, the little thing comes up, I sign it with my passkey. Uh, it also requires a password that , because Oracle is. Logins suck. Um, but 1Password filled that in for me automatically, and, and my coworker was very impressed. I guess they have not been using password managers, which seems odd in this day and age, [00:25:00] but, [00:25:01] Jeff: Why do that when you’ve got a Google Doc? Called Passwords. [00:25:04] Brett: right. [00:25:05] Brett: Um, yeah, but like the Passkey, uh, integration, I started using it with SSH credentials, uh, which is cool. But here’s the problem I ran into. And I want to talk to 1Password about this, but, um, [00:25:21] Jeff: this is where you go to camera one and you talk to one [00:25:23] Brett: yeah, 1Password, uh, can’t meet me at, meet me at camera too. Um, I. So it’s great to have logins from Terminal pop up and I can just authenticate with like my watch or whatever. [00:25:37] Brett: But if I am logged in over, say, an SSH session, or I’m using TMUX, then I don’t get the pop up. Uh, because it pops up on a remote machine, and then my process hangs, and I need a way to force the identification when there’s an [00:26:00] SSH session to use my, like, uh, private keys in my ssh folder instead of the 1Password identity management. [00:26:11] Jeff: Okay, Mr. Terpstra, I’m gonna put you on hold and try to get a manager for you. [00:26:16] Brett: But anyway, yeah, 1Password. I’ve been using it for, Jesus, like a decade or more. And I’ve been using it since it was called 1Pissword. [00:26:28] Jeff: What? That’s a thing? [00:26:31] Brett: The original name was 1Pissword. SSWD. [00:26:37] Jeff: Oh yeah, back in the fuckavowel days. [00:26:41] Brett: back in the Flickr days. Um, yeah, so I’ve been using it since before they rebranded. That’s all, like, that’s all I know. I lose track of time, but I’m a die hard user. I’ve actually worked for the company in the past, but I wasn’t good. They fired me. [00:26:59] Jeff: You weren’t good. [00:27:00] Did you compromise security? [00:27:02] Brett: No, I just failed. [00:27:04] Customer Support Onboarding Challenges [00:27:04] Brett: So when you first start, everyone, no matter what your position is, is required to do customer support. Um, and like, that’s how they kind of onboard you is by throwing you in and [00:27:18] Jeff: It’s like being an apprentice at a machine shop. Alright, you’re sweeping up the shavings. [00:27:23] Brett: and, and I did not do well with that. And so I felt like I never really integrated into the team. And then I, I had like some ADHD procrastination going on and I was working two jobs and I just kind of failed at being a strong employee for [00:27:44] Jeff: And now you won’t even read the fucking ad read in Leave It Be. [00:27:50] Brett: No, [00:27:50] Jeff: changed! Nothing’s changed, Brad! [00:27:52] Brett: I love them. I feel bad, but. Yeah. [00:27:56] Jeff: Well, anything, you know, loving and feeling bad, they’re interchangeable. [00:28:00] Um, [00:28:02] Brett: Like love and hate, uh, two sides of the same coin. I get that. But [00:28:07] Jeff: yeah? [00:28:08] Brett: loving and feeling bad, that just seems dark. [00:28:11] Jeff: Hm. [00:28:13] Mental Health and Emotional Struggles [00:28:13] Jeff: Back to mental Meet me back in the mental health corner. [00:28:17] Jeff: Alright, you got business. [00:28:18] Brett: yeah. [00:28:19] Political Commentary and YouTube Recommendations [00:28:19] Brett: So speaking of Minneapolis, have you ever heard of Leija Miller? [00:28:23] Jeff: No. [00:28:24] Brett: She’s a lawyer out of Minneapolis who has a YouTube channel where she talks about Um, mostly politics. Um, her last video was about why the left is so bad at organizing. Um, [00:28:40] Jeff: a favorite, a favorite talking point of people. [00:28:45] Brett: she digs into, like, how, like, unionization is at an all time low and how the right, um, has very, kind of, they have history on their side, um, like the country [00:29:00] had, like, misogyny and, uh, racism built in from the beginning, and so a party that Feeds on those things has a built in advantage and, uh, people can be, um, the, the, the right, the conservatives have one, one difference, and that is that they see the world as a hierarchy. [00:29:25] Brett: Uh, everything is hierarchical. You [00:29:28] Jeff: Whereas the liberals play out the world as a hierarchy and pretend there isn’t one. Yeah, exactly. I [00:29:35] Jeff: got it. I see you, Nancy Pelosi. [00:29:37] Brett: But yeah, yeah, God, Neolibs and yeah, like I’m, I’m talking more about progressives than I’m talking about liberals, but like for conservatives, like the idea that there are winners and there are losers, um, erases their need to try to level the playing field through government [00:30:00] intervention, uh, whereas progressives see. [00:30:03] Brett: More of the gray area and why they want, they want to remove things like racist policies, um, that. that don’t, that, that make the playing field so unlevel and conservatives just outright don’t want to do that. And so it’s really easy to message to conservatives. But anyway, I’m, I’m just, I’m, I just want to recommend the YouTube channel, Legion Miller. [00:30:30] Brett: Um, I’ll link it in the show notes. And I just, I, I was curious because she is from Minneapolis, so I didn’t [00:30:36] Activism and Personal Experiences [00:30:36] Jeff: Back in, in my Iraq activism days, I, uh, I would do just about anything up to risking my life, but I would not carry a fucking sign. And that is why progressives can’t organize. It’s just, there’s too much room for that kind of bullshit. [00:30:53] Brett: Yeah, [00:30:53] Jeff: Carry a sign, guy. Chant out loud, guy. No, I won’t do it, man. [00:30:58] Jeff: There’s too much nuance. [00:30:59] Brett: I [00:31:00] did the Black Block when I was [00:31:02] Jeff: Yeah, which is like, Which is like, put a fucking bandana on your fucking face and what? And get drunk. [00:31:11] Jeff: I’m not gonna lie. [00:31:12] Brett: it’s [00:31:13] Jeff: And and if you’re lucky, cash your trust fund check. That’s that’s 70 percent of Black Block. I know that. I’ve done the research, but not you. It’s not you, my man. [00:31:22] Brett: Um, that was not my experience with Black Block. It was mostly gutter punks and, um, people who, I guess, yeah, could afford to be activists, which is kind of a privileged [00:31:36] Jeff: No, but that’s okay. I’m not actually dissing on that. I just, Black Block guys, it’s too easy for the law enforcement to pretend they are them. That’s one of my problems. [00:31:47] Brett: Impersonation. [00:31:48] Jeff: Yeah, I’ve also, I’ve also never lied. I mean, in terms of the bandana thing, I’ve always been super against hiding your face and your identity and your intentions, even though it makes total sense. [00:31:59] Jeff: Uh, [00:32:00] but it, but it doesn’t make sense if you’re not actually working towards something meaningful, which for me, The Black Block folks were like chaos agents and they were young. [00:32:08] Jeff: and and to me, it’s like, you’re not even working towards something. If you were Daniel Berrigan, uh, who, this Catholic priest during the Vietnam War, who with his brother made their own napalm, broke into a draft center, pulled out all the draft cards and burned them in the street with homemade napalm. [00:32:23] Jeff: And then he went undercover. I mean, they went, sorry, he went on the lam and he was in hiding. That’s when you wear a fucking mask. [00:32:30] Brett: Right. Yeah. I, I showed up for a couple of, um, Palestine protests and they wanted to hand me signs and I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t want to sign. I, I believe in the cause. Um, I wanted to be there as a body, um, for numbers. But I just, I don’t have it in me to hold a slogan. [00:32:55] Jeff: the same. I’m the same. I’m the same. [00:32:59] Brett: we’re a couple of [00:33:00] easily emotionally triggered [00:33:02] Jeff: Like by showing up, by showing up, you are a walking, breathing slogan, but like, I will not hold that side. [00:33:09] Brett: Yep. Um, [00:33:11] Jeff: That’s awesome. [00:33:12] T-Shirt Store Relaunch Announcement [00:33:12] Brett: I also wanted to use this huge platform we have to announce that I have relaunched my t shirt stores. Um, the lab store has like my. My for, for my blog, it’s called the lab ratter.com. Um, so there’s, there’s some merchandise around that. There’s also some, some markdown jokes. I, I got this mug. [00:33:41] Jeff: Oh yeah. [00:33:42] Brett: It’s, [00:33:43] Jeff: asterisk, asterisk, strong, asterisk, asterisk, [00:33:46] Brett: the original, the original version, which is still available. Said asterisk. Asterisk, bold, asterisk. Asterisk. Um, and. That was pretty popular, and then John Gruber saw someone [00:34:00] wearing it and said, That’s incorrect. That sh that should be STRONG. [00:34:05] Jeff: And this is why the progressives can’t organize. [00:34:09] Brett: ha! So, in the interest of pedantry and semantic correctness, I have released the STRONG version. [00:34:17] Brett: Um, the, the BOLD one actually, it did good numbers because Gruber tweeted about it. Um, with his like tacit approval of it. And then, and then word got back to me. [00:34:32] Jeff: He’s the, he’s the Nancy Pelosi of, of Markdown users. I realized he’s also the creator, but. He’s the Nancy Pelosi. He can fuck you up or he can give you, you know, he can open the door. [00:34:42] Brett: Yep. Um, and so the other store is called Rock Scissors and it is all typographic, um, rock and roll t shirts. And I don’t know if you’ve seen these, but. The newest one, [00:35:00] it just says, pleased to meet you with a little devil horn coming off of the U, um, as a, as a stones reference. Um, there’s a, my favorite is the I wanna be t shirt where the I is a black flag logo, and then it says wanna be, and then underneath there are two checkboxes for anarchy and sedated. [00:35:22] Brett: So you’ve got black flag, you got, you got the pistols and you got the Ramones all in one shirt. [00:35:27] Jeff: Also why the progressives can’t organize. [00:35:30] Brett: the most popular one based on sales is the, is there anybody in their shirt where the in and the there echo the way that it did on the Pink Floyd recording? [00:35:43] Jeff: Is there a name? Can we come up with a word for that mixes entrepreneur and dad joke? Cause that’s, that’s what you are. [00:35:54] Brett: Yep. I guess so. [00:35:57] Jeff: That’s [00:35:57] Brett: Um, so anyway, yeah, if you’re [00:36:00] interested, the links will be in the show notes. Um, so yesterday when I missed our recording time. [00:36:08] Jeff: Yeah. [00:36:09] Brett: I thought it was 9 30 because I was, you know, [00:36:13] Jeff: In the morning, [00:36:13] Brett: extremely stoned. Yes, [00:36:15] Jeff: it was, uh, noon 30. [00:36:17] Brett: it was, yes, it was 12 40. When I saw your messages saying, Hey, you come, you come into our 12 AM or 12 PM recording time. [00:36:28] Brett: Uh, but what I was seeing. What I was lost in was Planter. Um, I released [00:36:34] Planter Tool and Project Management [00:36:34] Jeff: Speaking of the labs. [00:36:36] Brett: Yeah. I released a tool years ago called Planter that let you create, you could write, you make a text file and, and use a tab indentation to define a directory hierarchy, and then you could include. Template files in folders by indenting ones further. [00:36:56] Brett: And it was cool. Um, I used it for a while. [00:37:00] Um, I decided to completely rewrite it. Um, so I have, it’s not quite finished yet, but, [00:37:08] Jeff: Tell me, tell me all about it. [00:37:09] Brett: it’s, it’s now a gem and it, it, I don’t think it’ll integrate well with like Alfred and, LaunchBar. And I know, uh, [00:37:18] Jeff: don’t need it to. [00:37:20] Brett: I, yeah, I know Jay Miller was working on kind of a version that I think was Alfred compatible, but this is just command line. [00:37:28] Brett: And instead of like indentated, indented, indentated, indented, like config files, it uses a YAML config file and template directories where you build out the directory with all of the files and subfolders that you want, and then you just run plant, and and then the name of the template and it duplicates that directory into your current directory and anything with a template placeholder it’ll prompt you for variables on the command line or [00:38:00] you can pass them as arguments and it will update the templates, uh, with, you know, like class names or titles or like, uh, project names. [00:38:11] Brett: And, um, and you can do in your config, you can have regex replacements and you can define a GitHub repo instead of a folder. So if there’s a GitHub repo you have, that’s a good Base for your project. You can set up a Git pull and then, um, have it do a regex replace for like every instance of the name of the project and, and update all of the files and the readme and everything. [00:38:40] Brett: Um, and it’s working, it’s working really well. I’m really digging it. It was a weekend project that spilled over into my week. Um, But, uh, watch for an announcement on the blog sometime in the next couple weeks. [00:38:54] Jeff: What do you that’s awesome and exciting, I like Planter a lot. Um, [00:39:00] what do you imagine so you’ve got, you’ve got your labs, and you’ve got your like, active projects, and your sort of like, inactive projects that are in there, and they’re sort of sorted, right? Um, Is there something you have not tou you’ve touched a lot of your shit. [00:39:13] Jeff: Well, that sounds funny, but you’ve touched, you’ve touched a lot of this stuff over the last, probably five years, I would say. And, and when I first started talking to you, maybe it hasn’t been five years. Yeah, just about. There were certain things that you kind of felt like you were done with, but then all of a sudden you were like, And I’m curious if there’s anything out there, any of your tools that you haven’t touched in three or four or five years that you sometimes think, Oh, you know what? [00:39:40] Jeff: If I had a weekend, [00:39:42] Reviving Old Projects and Tools [00:39:42] Brett: Yeah, Slogger. [00:39:43] Jeff: Slugger. [00:39:44] Jeff: Yeah. [00:39:45] Brett: the unfortunately named Slogger, um, is a project that I have long, it, it, the thing was, so Slogger, it stands for social, it’s, Portmanteau, Social, and Logger, um, and [00:40:00] it would pull in like all of your Twitter, your Last. fm, your Facebook, your, um, uh, someone integrated it with like various health apps. [00:40:11] Brett: It was all plugin based. So people could write plugins for whatever service they wanted. And it would pull it all into like day one entries or markdown files. Um, every day and it would run automatically and just like keep a log of your presence on the internet in one place where you could tag and review and have a calendar output of like, what, what was this day like? [00:40:36] Brett: And instead of like journaling, you could just rely on. All the shit you posted everywhere. Um, but the problem was APIs got harder to, uh, work with and places like Twitter basically walled off any API access and [00:40:58] Jeff: up not mattering in the end [00:41:00] anyhow. Dead. [00:41:01] Brett: Yeah, it did, uh, but everything kind of one piece at a time kept breaking and it was hard to maintain and keep up with, but I really, like, I look back at all of my old Slugger entries and like in day one, it’ll be like, you had 23 entries on this day, you know, eight years ago, and I’ll go back and review them and they’re fun to read and it’s, it’s a really good kind of archive. [00:41:26] Brett: It tells you exactly what was going on for you. And like it integrated with Flickr. So there were like images in my post that it was, it was cool. And I would, I would like to revive it at some point [00:41:38] Jeff: That sounds so fun. Like there’s, there’s, um, there’s that tool dataset, which allows you to just sort of like work with SQL databases, but also there are some like utilities to turn your Facebook archive into a SQL but some of those things. But like, I have not found anything that like recursively. [00:41:58] Jeff: Um, we’ll do the work [00:42:00] I needed, but I keep my archives updated of Facebook. I did have Twitter when it, when it existed. [00:42:05] Jeff: Um, yeah, any, anything where I’m, uh, there’s any data, uh, you know, like Google takeout, anything like I, I keep updating it because I know that one day. Probably not too far in the distance. [00:42:17] Jeff: I’ll be able to use a tool that sort of gathers all that stuff up and tells me something meaningful. Um, I can already do it. I could already like load my Facebook shit into like chat GPT, but I’m not quite there yet. Um, it just feels like you’re double, you know, you got the Facebook problem already. Now you’re putting it into the AI people. [00:42:36] Jeff: It’s too much. Um, but it’s probably there already. So anyway, that’s really cool. That’s, that would be a fun one to redo. I still haven’t found, I don’t find, cause I don’t use dash otherwise. Like you had created, um, what was it called? It was like the cheat sheets, cheaters. Um, right. Was it called cheaters? [00:42:54] Jeff: Cheater, where you could just make your own custom sort of like, these are my keyboard shortcuts, this is the, you know, whatever, [00:43:00] um, still love that. Don’t use it anymore. And at times you’ve been like, yeah, just use Dash. I find Dash a very unsatisfying experience. Yeah. And, and a part of that, Brett, is that I’m not a developer and so I’m not using it anyhow. [00:43:12] Jeff: And so I find that when I go to use it, I don’t find it to be. As quick as I need it to be. Um, whereas your cheater was like, holy shit, you can just whip that thing up in no time. [00:43:24] Jeff: Um, but anyway, [00:43:25] Brett: but it relied on things like, what was that app called that created single site browsers? [00:43:33] Jeff: Oh, Dropler. No, [00:43:35] Jeff: not, sorry, not Dropler. That’s not what I meant. Um, uh, [00:43:38] Jeff: which you can kind of, Fluid, [00:43:40] Jeff: which you can kind of do now with Safari in a weird way, which is nice, [00:43:42] Brett: And you can, there are, there are newer ones like Unity and CoherenceX, but Fluid was the best one for making like [00:43:50] Jeff: Fluid was [00:43:50] Brett: Pinned, like pinned in your menu bar and you could trigger it with a hotkey. And like, that was ideal for Cheater, which is essentially just a, like an [00:44:00] HTML and JavaScript framework. [00:44:02] Brett: Um, and it could load like Markdown. You could write your, your shortcuts down in Markdown and display them in Cheaters and full keyboard navigation and everything. Yeah, it was cool project. Um, but with the death of Fluid, um, [00:44:18] Jeff: was great. [00:44:18] Brett: And my, my lack of desire to write my own kind of app, uh, shell for Cheater. Um, oh, it was called Cheaters. [00:44:29] Brett: It was plural. You’re right. [00:44:31] Jeff: Hey, look, I wasn’t going to challenge you on that. [00:44:35] Jeff: It’s your baby. [00:44:35] Brett: the icon was, uh, an Ace of Spades. Um, yeah. [00:44:42] Jeff: That’s cool. That was a good one. [00:44:45] Brett: Should we do a grAPPtitude? [00:44:47] Jeff: Yeah, we just did. We just did a bunch of, we got Fluid, we got, we got Cheaters. Yeah, let’s [00:44:53] Brett: Oh, we’re talking about all dead projects. That’s, this is a dead project grAPPtitude. [00:44:58] Jeff: yeah, why not? [00:44:59] Window Management with Moom 4 [00:44:59] Brett: Um, [00:45:00] my pick for this week is Moom 4, which just came out. Yeah. Holy cow. Um, so Moom is a tool for window management, um, that can do everything For example, I can hit my hyper key and down and the current window will center to a specific grid location on my screen. [00:45:22] Brett: But, I can also hover over the green button in the stop lights, or the traffic lights on a window, and I get a grid of ways I can reposition the window. Um, to like left half, right half, um, I can have like four, four front most, most recent windows organized themselves into a grid. Um, like, and it now has, you can now, that grid that I’m talking about, now you can expand it. [00:45:54] Brett: Banned to 61 presets. Um, and you can have, you can [00:46:00] organize your presets by folders. So should, for some reason, 61 presets not be enough for you, you can have sub folders of presets, um, which I just can’t imagine ever knitting, but they added drop zones, which are similar to, uh, snap areas in better touch tool. [00:46:20] Brett: Uh, but they like, you drag a window to the edge of the screen and these. Drop zones appear on your screen. You can drag a window to a drop zone and it’ll reposition to that drop zone. Um, yeah, it, I’ll, I’ll [00:46:34] Jeff: You can customize the little palette now. Like if you hover over the, in Moom, yeah, [00:46:39] Jeff: in Moom, if you hover over the green. Oh, [00:46:41] Brett: just said [00:46:42] Jeff: you just said customize the palette. You know why, you know why I didn’t hear that, everybody? [00:46:45] Brett: You were, you were reading through it. [00:46:47] Jeff: I know here’s the thing. Every once in a while, there’s an app update where the changelog comes up and, and it’s so much that I leave it open. [00:46:54] Jeff: The Moom changelog has been open Ever since it first popped up, which is about a week ago, [00:47:00] and, and so I’ve already had it open because I won’t close it because I want to read everything. And so while you were talking, I was like, Oh, what am I most excited about? Palette. But you already heard that from Brett, everybody. [00:47:11] Brett: Yeah, no, it’s an extensive changelog. Um, that’s what I’ll link, uh, if you go to the show notes. But the, the amazing, and I don’t know if I consider it reasonable or not, but for Moom 3 users, you can upgrade for like six bucks. [00:47:28] Jeff: Six bucks. [00:47:29] Brett: a new license is only 10 bucks. And honestly, this app is worth more than that. [00:47:33] Jeff: Everybody, since I have the change, uh, the changelog open six bucks through September 4th, after that eight bucks. So they’re really going to jack it. So get in there before they come for your money. [00:47:43] Brett: and it’s a, a permal license, no subscription. It’s, it’s just dirt cheap. And they, I just want them to charge more. Um, like he offered me a free license cause he’s doing a giveaway on, uh, brettsherpstra. com and. [00:48:00] I was like, six, no, I’ll, I’ll pay the six bucks. Um, I accepted, I accepted a free license for a 90 app recently. [00:48:11] Brett: Um, yeah, that was, that, that was an app that I thought was fairly priced and I was planning to buy it and he was like, Oh, don’t buy it. Here’s a license. And I was like, I’ll take it. I’ll take it. I’ll save a hundred bucks. But, uh, but six bucks? Yeah, I’m paying that. [00:48:29] Jeff: I, um, I think I use Moom in all kinds of ways, but the most important service it provides for me is what I call the panic button, which is like, I start my day organized. I got my windows where I want them, whatever, right? But then my brain starts going off in 50 directions. [00:48:46] Jeff: I have three monitors, And my laptop monitor, and shit’s everywhere, and I can’t think, and all of a sudden I can’t even do the thing I knew I had to do. [00:48:55] Jeff: I hit the panic button, just keyboard shortcut, and uh, and all of the main [00:49:00] important Apps snap into place in which browser they should be. And I can just go, okay, let’s do it again. And that, cause you can make these snapshots. You can say, you can say like, not only can you say, take a snapshot of all the windows as they are, you can choose to have it also snapshot the windows that are inactive, that are behind the windows and, and have those be where they are. [00:49:21] Jeff: And so it is just, if you, it’s worth that money just for that. Like it’s an amazing feature. [00:49:26] Brett: And you can call snapshots with AppleScript so you can integrate it with, like, a bunch. [00:49:33] Jeff: can. I have, I have is [00:49:34] Brett: Yeah, I do as well. Like, my podcasting bunch pops open all the necessary windows and then Moom puts them into a grid for me. [00:49:45] Jeff: Amazing. [00:49:46] Brett: Yep. Highly recommended. What do you got? [00:49:48] Jeff: Well, I got kind of a, it’s a bit boring because they’re both things. So I’ve talked about both of them before, but I’ve legitimately like, they’re the, you know, you have these old apps where like, you’ve, you’ve found other things [00:50:00] to, to solve those problems, but then things get tight. Things get tense and, and you need something right then. [00:50:07] Jeff: And the thing you’re doing that you replaced it with, isn’t doing the job. So you go back to it. [00:50:11] Noteplan and DevonThink for Organization [00:50:11] Jeff: And, uh, for me, there’s two things that I do that with Noteplan and Devinthink. [00:50:16] Jeff: I mean, I have Devinthink databases that are just evergreen and they’re there forever and whatever, but like, I don’t often use Devinthink to open a new project and, and with Noteplan, as we’ve talked about on the show, uh, I think more than twice, like, I don’t know. [00:50:30] Jeff: Noteplan is amazing. Um, it’s always more amazing when I come back to it. I do not usually last with it. Um, and I can’t actually put my finger on why. I don’t actually think it’s the fault of the app. Um, I think it’s just the way my brain works, but every time I go back to it, it has more features. [00:50:45] Jeff: It’s been loved. It’s been loved. [00:50:47] Jeff: up a little more and I stay a little longer. And so I’m back in Noteplan, which is fantastic. Um, if only because I can have, Noteplan is like a note taking, Kind of like a note taking app, but it’s really like an organizer shit. It’s marked [00:51:00] down and like, what’s amazing is that you can have a little calendar on the right or pulls in your calendar. [00:51:05] Jeff: And if I click on one of the calendar events, it’ll just automatically click or create a note, uh, a notes thing for that. It could do it based on a template. So if it’s a meeting and I click on it, I can have it create a template for that meeting for that project and put it in that project folder. And so like I can have different meeting templates for different projects and all I have to do is click on that calendar event and it’s going It’s going to pull it up. [00:51:26] Jeff: It’s going to pull it up. If it’s a week early, it’s going to pull it up if it’s a week later. Um, and I found that just an amazing way, way to, to handle that stuff. Cause sometimes I need to be forced to take notes in meetings. People are always doing it in like Google docs, but that doesn’t help me reference down the road. [00:51:43] Jeff: Um, and then the other thing that I love about it is like, you can have like daily notes. You can have notes in your projects, any kind of note, but if you put tasks in one of those notes, it doesn’t matter if you have tasks, like one task in one note, 50 in another, over the course of a year or 10 years, if you [00:52:00] just click tasks, it’ll show you all of your tasks from all of your notes. [00:52:04] Jeff: And so, and I have a problem of creating task lists. In whatever document I’m in that day. And so it, it really like, it helps me to be a more organized person. Um, and then Devon, I think it’s just, it’s still amazing. It’s so powerful. I deal with so many documents. I deal with such a need to like capture web pages or capture information for research projects. [00:52:25] Jeff: Like, and there’s nothing that’s ever replaced it in terms of ability to just. Quickly store searchability, like flexibility in searchability is, it’s just an incredible, it’s an incredible place. I actually have a full email archive in one of my Devon [00:52:42] Jeff: think, um, [00:52:43] Brett: that is to me that is one like so I did a presentation at MacSAC about how email is timeless and Like every five years people come up with a new way to collaborate and [00:53:00] it dies and everyone But email is like forever but Like, email searching is a pain in the ass, uh, like, unless you’re using Gmail in the web interface, which does an amazing job of searching, um, any other app you’re using, search sucks, and the best way to deal with that is to export archives, um, of all your messages into something like Dev Think, uh, which will cross index, correlate, Um, make it just infinitely searchable, and it is the ultimate way to maintain a database of a lifetime of emails. [00:53:41] Jeff: Yeah. And that, and for me, that, that involves like. My Yahoo account is in there. My, I wish my Hotmail account was in there, but that got nuked. But, um, like when I’ve had, when I’ve worked for organizations and I’ve had to be on their email, I always export my email. So like from different organizations, like that archive is everything. [00:53:59] Jeff: And, [00:54:00] um, and it’s incredible. Yeah. And I’ve been using Dev and Think, I don’t know how long, I want to say I’ve been using it for 20 years. I don’t know that that can be true, but I’ve been using it. Yeah, I’ve been using it since I lived in New York when my son was [00:54:12] Brett: Yeah, no, I, I remember, [00:54:14] Jeff: years [00:54:15] Brett: I remember, uh, 2004. I definitely was actually at that point I was using, what was their like light version? It was like a search crawler. [00:54:25] Jeff: with Devon Agent, [00:54:26] Jeff: but that is still a thing. [00:54:28] Jeff: Yeah. [00:54:29] Brett: Yeah. I, I, in 2004, I was definitely using Devon Agent. I don’t think I had sprung for Devon Think yet. But I eventually did, and it’s, it’s amazing. [00:54:39] Brett: On Noteplant, like, I’m the same way. Um, like, I follow his release notes pretty religiously, um, because it’s just amazing how, how, how much he adds that isn’t, um, Um, Bloat, um, it’s just better ways to work with like calendar [00:55:00] pickers for your tasks and, and UE, uh, niceties that like, like you said, it’s Markdown. [00:55:07] Brett: And if all it did was the things you described, uh, where you can like write a task list inside of your meeting notes and have it show up in a unified way, um, and like reschedule tasks and add due dates. And like, when, uh, when you look at a day’s. Like your planner for a day and all your previous tasks have like moved the ones that had the overdue tasks have moved into your new one. [00:55:32] Brett: You can reschedule them with, uh, with plain text syntax. Um, like it’s amazing, but it’s never, it’s not my daily driver. I still use OmniFocus and I still use NVUltra for all my notes. And, um, it’s just, it’s hard to tear [00:55:49] Jeff: well, you can’t, yeah, it’s not a, it’s not a notes manager replacement for me. And that’s where I get stuck. Um, it probably is where it gets stuck actually, even though I could [00:56:00] merge those folders. And I certainly can, I mean, I edit those notes in Sublime or I can have them in NVUltra or whatever, but like, that probably is the thing. [00:56:07] Jeff: It’s like, it just can’t be a notes repository the way an NVUltra can. [00:56:13] Brett: Yeah, it’s one it’s not designed [00:56:15] Jeff: And it’s not designed to be, no, no, totally. [00:56:17] Jeff: But then, but once I have things. [00:56:19] Brett: if he if he tried to be [00:56:21] Jeff: Yeah, [00:56:22] Jeff: my problem is once I have a category of things in more than one place, that’s the recipe for One of those tools to fall off. Um, and so I guess actually that’s helpful. [00:56:33] Jeff: Cause that may be part of it. And cause the crazy thing is what you and I have described, we’ve described three to four features and, and the amount of shit it can do is like obsidian level, but it’s like, it’s way more, I mean, obsidian’s elegant, but it’s like, it’s unstoppably elegant. Like, it just seems like, it’s kind of like when you make changes to your shit. [00:56:51] Jeff: It’s just like, How did, how did he pick just the right things and, and execute them? Well, you know, like, [00:56:59] Jeff: yeah, [00:56:59] Brett: It’s, [00:57:00] opinionated without being limiting. [00:57:02] Jeff: that’s a nice way to put it. Yeah. [00:57:03] Switching to VS Code [00:57:03] Brett: Um, speaking of Sublime, I think I just decided this today, but I think I’m finally switching to VS Code. [00:57:12] Jeff: Oh, says me every three months. [00:57:15] Brett: I, I, I [00:57:16] Jeff: Why? What happened? [00:57:18] Brett: just the, I opened up a planter that I’m, I’ve been working on in, in VS Code. I don’t remember why. Suddenly it was like offering to. Write the Yard documentation for a function or, or refactor my code or, and it was doing an amazing job, like I could hover over a method call and it would show me the Yard documentation in a popover from another file in the project, which I, which Sublime is supposed to be able to do and I’ve never gotten it working, but like out of the box VS code was. [00:57:58] Brett: And showing me all the [00:58:00] parameters, all the types, like everything I needed to know. Um, and the autocomplete is eerily good. Like I, yeah, I type like variable equals and then it pops in exactly what it should have been and like, like something I would have had to go look up and like, okay, this is, here’s what I need. [00:58:21] Brett: And it just suggested it and I hit tab and it was, it was correct. Like, it is just. It’s light years ahead of Sublime when it comes to code completion, artificial intelligence, um, just, like, it commented code and, like, described it better than I could have, uh, like, I opened up functions, I forgot what they even do, and it would like, dissect them, and this is with uh, Copilot, and, and it would literally like, put a, put a line comment on every line saying what that line was doing, and then [00:59:00] put a comment at the top of the method describing exactly what the method did, what parameters it, oh, it’s so good. [00:59:06] Jeff: almost like it’s resourced to the level of a small nation. That’s awesome. [00:59:12] Brett: Yep, yep, the config, once you have enough extensions loaded, the configuration is unwieldy, but their UE version is pretty damn good. So many settings though. [00:59:28] Jeff: So many settings, which is not bad. It’s just, [00:59:31] Brett: At least, at least you can sync your settings, [00:59:33] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. [00:59:35] Brett: Anyway, all right. [00:59:37] Conclusion and Final Thoughts [00:59:37] Brett: I feel like, I feel like that was, that was a Brett and Jeff episode for sure. [00:59:41] Jeff: It’s great. Yeah, it’s nice to talk to you too. It’s been a long time. [00:59:44] Brett: Maybe, maybe before, no I don’t have time. I was gonna say maybe I’ll write that theme song before we publish, but needs to go out today, so probably [00:59:54] Jeff: one of those where you just pound on the keyboard with your fist. It could be your fist wrist down. It could be your fist like, [01:00:00] you know, just you choose. It’s your artistic, uh, license. [01:00:04] Brett: All right, well good talking to you, Jeff. [01:00:06] Jeff: You too, Brett. [01:00:07] Brett: Get some sleep. [01:00:08] Jeff: You get some sleep.

It’s Brett’s 46th birthday bash, and he’s celebrating in style with Jeff and Christina. Expect gifts like Cooks Illustrated and flood detectors, riveting overflowing toilet tales, and sampling fun with Koala. Dive into comedy insights with an ‘Elf’ story featuring James Caan, and honor Bob Newhart’s 1961 Grammy win. Plus, a TUAW domain kerfuffle and Macstock marvels. Laugh, learn, and maybe even fix your toilet seat! Sponsor 1Password Extended Access Management solves the problems traditional IAM and MDM can’t touch. It’s security for the way we work today, and it’s available now to companies with Okta, and coming later this year to Google Workspace and Microsoft Entra. Check it out at 1Password.com/product/XAM. Chapters 00:00 Introduction and Birthday Celebrations 00:43 Gifts and Subscriptions 02:37 Home Improvement and Plumbing Stories 03:53 The Best Toilet Seat Ever 05:52 Plumbing Mishaps and Family History 11:10 Birthday Party Plans 13:40 CrowdStrike Incident 19:09 Sponsor: 1Password 21:20 Sponsor bonus content 27:33 Reviving TUAW: A Controversial Story 33:59 AI Articles and Identity Theft 35:08 The Resurrection of Old Content 35:48 Reflecting on Past Work 37:40 The Sale of Content Rights 44:50 Macstock Reunion 50:09 GrAPPtitude: App Recommendations 01:04:38 Remembering Bob Newhart Show Links Best toilet seat ever Major Windows BSOD issue hits banks, airlines, and TV broadcasters – The Verge A Beloved Tech Blog Is Now Publishing AI Articles Under the Names of Its Old Human Staff (404media.co) Early Apple tech bloggers are shocked to find their name and work have been AI-zombified – The Verge Apple blog TUAW returns as an AI content farm (engadget.com) Screen Studio Kaleidoscope Welcome Kaleidoscope 5 Koala Sampler Jammin’ on the One Join the Conversation Merch Come chat on Discord! Twitter/ovrtrd Instagram/ovrtrd Youtube Get the Newsletter Thanks! You’re downloading today’s show from CacheFly’s network BackBeat Media Podcast Network Check out more episodes at overtiredpod.com and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Find Brett as @ttscoff, Christina as @film_girl, Jeff as @jsguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Jammin’ on the One [00:00:00] Introduction and Birthday Celebrations [00:00:00] [00:00:03] Brett: Hey, happy birthday. It’s my birthday. It’s Overtired. Um, we’re all here this week. It’s Jeff Severance Gunsel, Christina Warren, and myself, Brett Terpstra. Uh, how are you guys? [00:00:16] Christina: Not too bad. Go on, go on, Jeff. Yeah, exactly. I was gonna say pretty birth I was gonna say happy birthday. I was like, not as good as you, birthday boy, but you know, [00:00:24] Brett: I’m 46 today [00:00:26] Jeff: Forty six. [00:00:28] Brett: I’m not lying about my age like some people do. Um, [00:00:33] Christina: It might be, it might be your birthday, but I’ll still tell you to fuck off. I can lie about my age as long as I want. [00:00:37] Brett: I wasn’t singling you out. I just said some people. [00:00:41] Jeff: Some people. [00:00:43] Christina: Some [00:00:43] Gifts and Subscriptions [00:00:43] Brett: Um, yeah, I, uh, I’ve had a really good birthday. Elle, Elle knows how much I love getting gifts and I’m too old for most people to give me so they take it upon themselves to shower me. With gifts every year. [00:01:00] Um, and this year they got me a bunch of cool stuff, including a subscription to Cooks Illustrated and, uh, the book Vegetables Illustrated from Cooks Illustrated, which I’m very excited. [00:01:11] Jeff: Print subscription? What a beautiful is this still beautiful? It’s been a long time. I don’t know if it got eaten by okay, [00:01:17] Brett: I was picking them up at the co-op and just like, well actually, uh, one of the, one of the families that EL was house sitting for had them laying out. And I had forgotten how much I loved that magazine. Even like, even as a pescatarian who can’t eat half the recipes in there, they’re still so beautifully illustrated and beautifully written. [00:01:39] Brett: And it’s just, it’s a fun read. It’s food, it’s food porn. [00:01:43] Jeff: in an era yeah, but with line art. But in a in an era of like, um, the horrible, awful, terrible, evil, fascist food blog, where it’s like, let me just push all this shit away to get to a very simple recipe. [00:01:59] Brett: [00:02:00] huh. [00:02:00] Jeff: How amazing that all of the extra verbiage in Cook’s Illustrated is just towards you learning. [00:02:07] Jeff: Uh, I think it’s amazing. It was like in the day, maybe it sounds like it’s the same, it was like McSweeney’s level design attention, but like even beyond that somehow. Yeah. That’s awesome. [00:02:18] Brett: That’s exciting. Um, yeah, she also got me the book, um, Hip Hop is History by Questlove, [00:02:26] Jeff: Oh, nice. [00:02:27] Brett: cause they heard a, an interview and they’re like, Oh, this is all Brett. This is great. So they got me the book. So anyway, it’s been a great birthday. [00:02:37] Home Improvement and Plumbing Stories [00:02:37] Brett: My parents got me a flood sensor, which at first blush is ridiculous because we live high on a hill. [00:02:45] Brett: Uh, on a bluff or like on next to a bluff, but like, there’s no chance of our house flooding, but I have done things like missing, poorly install a bidet and not [00:03:00] realize that I’m flooding the basement [00:03:02] Jeff: Yeah, those are great for the basements. [00:03:04] Brett: Yeah. So, so having some, some, uh, moisture sensors around the house could be. Could be truly valuable. [00:03:13] Brett: My dad got it for me because he had recently discovered that a 30 year old toilet had begun slowly leaking into the foundation. [00:03:23] Jeff: Oh man. [00:03:24] Brett: so he’s like, everybody gets flood detectors now. [00:03:28] Jeff: That’s amazing. I bet it wasn’t the toilets fault though. [00:03:32] Brett: Well, [00:03:32] Jeff: just like a seal or something? Cause the amazing thing about toilets is they can go forever. There’s such simple machines. [00:03:37] Brett: just solid pieces of porcelain. Yeah. It would have been like a seal or something. Um, [00:03:44] Jeff: Fascinating content. Hey [00:03:46] Brett: Yeah, yeah, subscribe, subscribe for more home improvement. Um, [00:03:50] Christina: Okay. Speaking of [00:03:51] Jeff: about it all day. [00:03:53] The Best Toilet Seat Ever [00:03:53] Christina: of toilets, someone showed me, no, no, genuinely, somebody showed me the best toilet seat I’ve ever seen the other day. [00:04:00] Um, it’s, it’s, it’s from like this, this, um, LA based artist who’s pretty awesome. And she, she basically took a bunch of old smartphones and made like a toilet seat out of them. [00:04:10] Christina: Um, let me, let me find the link that I, that I can give you guys. Um, it’s really good. It’s the only problem is, and the only reason I’m not going to have it is that it’s. Is 1, 250. So, um, you know, that, that, that, that unfortunately, um, prices me out just a little bit. Yeah. The woman’s name is, uh, is Bailey, um, Hikawa and her stuff is incredible here. [00:04:31] Christina: I’m putting this link in our chat here [00:04:35] Jeff: Do you ever have to tighten your toilet seat? [00:04:37] Brett: oh yeah, [00:04:37] Jeff: Man. [00:04:38] Brett: when you sit down and it wiggles off [00:04:40] Jeff: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I find that to be probably the most disgusting of toilet related maintenance because you have to get your hands around there and get your hand under there on the nut. Uh, just very terrible and preventable. I’m sure, [00:04:55] Brett: we have one of those like bolt on bidets and in order to [00:05:00] properly clean our toilet, you have to fully remove the toilet seat and the bidet. So about once a week I do that and I’ve gotten really good at it, but I’ve also stripped out the screws by using a drill on the plastic screw. [00:05:13] Jeff: oh no, you should have called [00:05:15] Brett: the chances of ever tightening it enough that that little slip doesn’t happen when you sit down, that’s going to require [00:05:22] Jeff: Wait, let’s make this the whole podcast. I have a couple of questions. Are those screws embedded or can you replace them? Cause they, [00:05:27] Brett: Oh, they’re totally replaceable. [00:05:28] Jeff: Okay, okay. Good to know. [00:05:30] Brett: I have replaced them multiple times. I even tried replacing them with metal screws once, but that was, uh, [00:05:35] Jeff: But you only really think about it when you’re on the shitter. Yeah, that’s a problem because you can’t do anything from there. Maybe Amazon. [00:05:41] Brett: How much, how long do you think we could talk about toilets? Because [00:05:44] Jeff: I’ll tell you what. [00:05:46] Brett: haven’t even gotten into the talking toilets with the built in bidets. I, [00:05:52] Plumbing Mishaps and Family History [00:05:52] Jeff: One, my entire line of, of Gunsels, uh, in America, up until my dad [00:06:00] became a teacher, was plumbers. Gunsel Plumbing and Heating ruled the North Side. Uh, and, and so that’s one thing. Two, the reason my name is Jeff and not John, is because is because my dad was worried that coming from a plumbing fact, uh, family, I would be ridiculed for having a name that is also what you call a bathroom. So I can talk about this all day, uh, but we should probably stop for the sake of our, our, [00:06:25] Brett: No, I’m, I’m digging this. It’s my birthday and I want to talk about toilets. I actually worked as a, [00:06:31] Jeff: what you wish for. [00:06:32] Brett: I worked as an apprentice plumber in, uh, in college and have installed my fair share of toilets. I enjoy everything from the wax ring up. Um, that’s, that’s actually [00:06:45] Jeff: The wax ring is fascinating. For people that don’t know, the seal that keeps your toilet from doing what Brett’s dad’s toilet did, for the most part, is a fucking wax ring to this day. [00:06:57] Brett: And it’s soft. It’s, it’s a soft wax ring. [00:07:00] Um, but yeah, and clearing out, um, toilets that people flush tampons down out in on campus. That was fun. [00:07:11] Jeff: I am the family’s plunger. [00:07:13] Brett: Hairballs were, I never, I never got used to hairballs. Yeah, I own my own snake. I can do all that stuff. [00:07:21] Jeff: I remember a friend of the show, Danny Glamour, telling me about his time working in a nursing home and how he at least once had to go into a bathroom and break up a poop with a screwdriver to make something work. Christina, how are you with all this? I don’t know. I have a feeling you’re either like, yeah, I’ll just listen. [00:07:40] Jeff: Or you’re like fucking stop. [00:07:42] Christina: No, I mean, I’ll [00:07:42] Brett: For all we know, she also worked as a plumber. [00:07:45] Jeff: know. [00:07:46] Christina: no. Uh, no. I’m the one who calls the plumber. Please, like, I’m the one who, like, does something dumb that requires the plumber to be called because, you know, yeah, you’re flushing the tampons down the toilet or whatever. Uh, no, I have [00:08:00] no opinions on any of this, but it’s interesting. [00:08:03] Brett: Can I tell you? Oh, go ahead. [00:08:04] Jeff: we’re both just ready to keep going. [00:08:06] Brett: We got stories, man. [00:08:07] Jeff: Uh, you go, I’ll go, and then maybe we can, [00:08:10] Brett: So my, the most recent time I had to call a plumber was our, our kitchen sink and the dishwasher weren’t draining. Um, and I had snaked down, my snake goes 50 feet and I had not been able to clear the issue. Uh, but I found, you know, the access valve in the downspout of the sink. [00:08:31] Brett: I’m, I’m, I’m fucking up technical terms here, [00:08:33] Jeff: Yeah, but your hand gestures are getting us there. [00:08:35] Brett: If I unscrewed it, it would drain. So there was something, I could not figure out why that worked, but like it was, it was baffling, so we brought in a plumber and he snakes like a hundred feet in, he can’t find anything wrong. Like he gets all the way to the wall in the basement, nothing clogging it, no problem. [00:08:56] Brett: The problem ends up being this little valve. It’s like a, [00:09:00] uh, I can’t remember what they call it. It’s just this tiny little part. It costs 15 to replace, but it costs us 200 in time for him to realize that the problem was right at the, at the faucet. Um, I couldn’t figure it out. I’ll, I’ll give him, I’m, yeah, they shouldn’t have charged me. [00:09:21] Brett: That’s the thing. If he, if he did all that and then realized that he missed an obvious thing he should have checked first, I shouldn’t have been charged 200. [00:09:29] Jeff: Ah, this is the this is the forever problem. Yeah. I don’t feel like we’ve ever had a contractor where it doesn’t end with, like, Uh, wait a minute, hold on. Ha ha ha ha ha! [00:09:39] Christina: you for what now? [00:09:40] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. [00:09:41] Christina: that you messed up first? Yeah. Which, uh Which I think, which uh, we’re recording this on, on, on CrowdStrike day, so I think that’s something that even people not dealing with plumbing can relate to. [00:09:54] Jeff: Yes. Yes. [00:09:55] Brett: we move on to [00:09:56] Jeff: Uh, after this one piece, um, so my grandfather, [00:10:00] my grandfather was the final plumber in the line, and I used to be at their home when he would get home from work. Man, they had an amazing little like Dodge white van that said Gunsel Plumbing and Heating. I’d kill for that van. Um, but I do have a giant framed Gunsel Plumbing and Heating poster from the 30s that is really awesome. [00:10:16] Jeff: But anyway, he would come home and he would go down to the basement and he would wash his hands for so long. long and I would sit there and talk to him and it was just like he’d go to the laundry, uh, to the laundry sink and just soap and fucking go and soap and go that like lava soap that like [00:10:32] Brett: Oh, I was going to ask if it was the orange stuff. [00:10:34] Jeff: I don’t think that was around yet because that’s sort of in the 80s like uh early or mid 80s and um but then today to this day I am always happy when I my hands have become dirty enough like I was out working on this like, ancient tool and my hands were just filled with grease. [00:10:51] Jeff: I don’t wear gloves. And I, and I am so thrilled when I have to come in and I just have to scrub and scrub and scrub and scrub because it just like, it feels like, feels like [00:11:00] Gramps. Uh, [00:11:01] Brett: your kids sit and talk to you while you do [00:11:02] Jeff: no, nobody talks to me while I do it. Nobody. Zero people. All right. That’s all I had to get out. [00:11:10] Birthday Party Plans [00:11:10] Brett: Oh, I was going to tell you guys about my birthday party before we move [00:11:14] Christina: Yeah, please [00:11:14] Jeff: Well, please, we asked before and that was what triggered us ending the pre show and starting the [00:11:20] Brett: I always hope that someone will throw me a cool birthday party. And I had, um, put together rough plans back in 2020 something, um, for, for my birthday. 42nd birthday party, which would have been four years ago. Yeah. So like 2020 and I was going to have a big hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy theme party. [00:11:44] Brett: And I was, I had plans for like a plaster. Head, like second head. So it could be, what’s it, Zaphod. Um, that all fell through thanks COVID and thanks Obama. And, um, and so I haven’t had a birthday party since [00:12:00] then. So this year I took it upon myself and I got, I sent out a Facebook invite to like 50 people, including Jeff, who doesn’t check Facebook. [00:12:10] Christina: Right. Because who, who, who, because who checks Facebook genuinely? [00:12:14] Brett: I do. Um, [00:12:15] Jeff: But you gotta, but text me, then I feel like I’m really invited. [00:12:18] Brett: Sure, sure. It’s just, I had a lot, I had a lot of moving parts. Um, but I put together a party at, uh, it’s called Suncrest Garden Pizza Farm. And it’s like big outdoor, they have a big barn with a wood fire, uh, wood Yeah, wood fire oven and they make pizzas to order and they do a vegan gluten free pizza and with your choice of toppings and then you eat outdoor. [00:12:44] Brett: There’s some picnic tables but most people bring a blanket and just like sit around and there’s live music. Huge craft beer selection and yeah so I organized my own birthday party and I’m pretty excited. I got like 20 people coming that’s not bad.[00:13:00] [00:13:01] Christina: pretty great, [00:13:01] Jeff: That’s awesome, man. That sounds amazing. I’ve always wanted to go to one of those. And I wish I was going to yours. I really do. And I’m looking up on Facebook now, the invite, just so I can at least enjoy it and acknowledge it. I really truly did not see it. And I’m sorry about that. [00:13:18] Brett: Yeah, I, I did, I did manually invite a few people. I assumed you wouldn’t be able to make it. So you’re lower on my list of people to like force invites upon, [00:13:29] Jeff: Yeah, but I agreed to a hour plus call with you today. [00:13:35] Christina: It’s true. [00:13:36] Brett: without, without travel time. [00:13:38] Jeff: But without travel time, that’s right. [00:13:39] Brett: yeah. All right. [00:13:40] CrowdStrike Incident [00:13:40] Brett: We should talk about CrowdStrike, um, that I don’t know how pressing it will be on Monday when this comes out, but for today, [00:13:48] Christina: for today, [00:13:50] Brett: It’s a hell of a thing to have happen on your birthday, [00:13:53] Christina: I mean, I’m, I’m glad that you’re not a Windows admin and, um, [00:13:57] Brett: right? Oh [00:13:57] Christina: genuinely that’d be the worst. No. So for [00:14:00] anybody who is not aware, um, three days ago, as you were listening to this, like the world woke up and everything was broken because CrowdStrike issued a driver update to tens of thousands of machines that Blue screen of death, everything. [00:14:16] Brett: planes, planes weren’t taking off. Online banking wasn’t working. Health providers were failing. Yeah, [00:14:23] Jeff: Oh, I couldn’t deposit checks at my bank today. [00:14:26] Christina: Oh yeah, no, ATMs are down. Like a friend of mine, um, is an ER doc at like one of the biggest hospitals in, in Washington. And, and like, uh, he sent me, you know, info. He was like, yeah, they just told us to bring our own laptops in today. And then he sent me like, like a, like the part of an email that like showed all the systems that are down. [00:14:44] Christina: I was like, holy shit. Now most of the main systems, I think like the really, really like important ones are back up already, but [00:14:51] Brett: they said. They said most, most users that could just reboot [00:14:57] Christina: Yes, [00:14:57] Brett: would come up fine. The [00:15:00] problem was automated systems that can’t be cycled in that way. [00:15:05] Christina: Right, yeah, so this is the funny thing, like the best solution to this is literally to restart it between 3 and 15 times. [00:15:15] Brett: you tried turning it off and turning it back on 15 [00:15:18] Christina: And yet that is actually one of the solutions, yeah, so I mean, people are working on some automated ways for this to work, but honestly, like, bad day for CrowdStrike, although, you know what, these are fucking McAfee people, so I don’t know why we expected more from them. [00:15:31] Jeff: Yeah, [00:15:32] Christina: Genuinely. [00:15:33] Brett: I like how ground news in their summary of this story. Uh, the third point was Crouch, CrowdStrike shares are down. And their competitor’s shares are up. Well, no shit. [00:15:47] Christina: Yeah. I mean, as they freaking should be. Um, cause they, this is a company that, uh, like has lobbied the hell out of various governments to basically mandate that anybody who does any sort of, you know, [00:16:00] government or, or, uh, public issued thing, they’re like, Oh no, you have to, um, use, um, us. There’s, there’s no way you’ll be protected and secure without us. [00:16:09] Christina: Please let us have control over all of your systems. And, um, And people, I guess, believe them. And, uh, yeah. This is a [00:16:19] Brett: many people do you think are getting fired? [00:16:21] Christina: I mean, a lot, I hope. Because if a lot aren’t, then what is this for, right? Like, honestly, like, I’m not usually, like, a big proponent of fire, you know, people who make fuckups. But in a case like this, like, literally your job is to You know what I mean? [00:16:34] Christina: Like, like, literally your job is, is you, you are saying to people, trust us for all of your security updates and for your antivirus and ransomware and whatnot, and trust us to protect your systems. And then you push out an update that is either not tested well, or something went wrong, and it breaks, like, half the free world. [00:16:51] Christina: Yeah, a lot of people [00:16:52] Brett: I was gonna say, so you got, you got like, you got a coder, and then you have hopefully like a peer review, and then you have [00:17:00] quality control, and there should have been at least two levels of testing on a, an update with this ram, with these ramifications, if not more. But, so that’s, that’s three, that’s three people slash teams that shouldn’t have a job. [00:17:17] Christina: right. Yeah. I mean, and their bosses, whatever their, whatever their process is, because this had to be a breakdown in process, right? Like, obviously they have processes to, to test, um, but clearly they’re not good enough. It was interesting. Um, I, I was able to find some proof that like, obviously people are, are understandably like taking digs at Windows right now. [00:17:37] Christina: The truth is this could have happened with any platform that CrowdStrike supports. It didn’t, but it could have. And in fact, I found evidence that in April and May, there were massive, like, kernel panics that happened on both Debian and Red Hat because of CrowdStrike. But I guess, you know, they just don’t have the same, um, like, [00:17:56] Brett: really, maybe it’s not a matter of people getting fired. Maybe it’s a [00:18:00] matter of CrowdStrike going bankrupt. [00:18:02] Christina: I mean, yeah, maybe. The CEO, his initial response, he didn’t even apologize. He was just like, Oh, we had an issue. Blah, blah, blah. And he didn’t even bother to say sorry. MoFo, read the room. Like, airports and hospitals and 911 systems are down. [00:18:19] Jeff: 911 systems, you know, when you fucking apologize is when hospitals and 911 [00:18:23] Christina: Exactly. Exactly. [00:18:25] Jeff: definitely a time to apologize no matter what your lawyer says. [00:18:28] Christina: Right, exactly. And then, exactly. Fuck your lawyer. Oh, we can’t show, you know, responsibility. You are responsible, motherfucker. You are responsible, like, literally. And also, again, you’re the people who have lobbied, you know, like, governments and institutions and been like, oh, you have to use us if you want to be safe and secure, right? [00:18:44] Christina: So if you’re telling people you’re good enough to be in those spaces, well then, fuck you. Buck stops with you, asshole. Um, he finally like released a slightly better statement, slightly, where he did put in an apology, but like, it’s still so minor and it’s still so like, [00:19:00] trying to just be like, Oh, this wasn’t a security incident. [00:19:03] Christina: Fuck off. Like, I don’t think people care about the nuances [00:19:07] Jeff: it is now. [00:19:08] Christina: Yeah. [00:19:09] Sponsor: 1Password [00:19:09] Brett: You, you would not believe how well I can segue this from here to our sponsor for today and then into our next topic. Man, I, my brain’s working on like, it’s like 40 chests [00:19:22] Jeff: what that is right now? That’s birthday [00:19:24] Christina: I was going to say, this is birthday brain. Hell yeah. [00:19:26] Brett: yes. So, speaking of safety and security, our sponsor today is 1Password, which we are huge fans of, and we will admit at the top that none of us have used it for IAM and MDM, so we can’t personally vouch for this aspect of 1Password. [00:19:46] Brett: But given my absolute faith in 1Password, I guarantee you it’s a great solution. So, listen up. Imagine your company’s security like the quad of a college campus. There are nice brick paths in between the [00:20:00] buildings. Those are the company owned devices, IT approved apps, and managed employee identities. And then there are the paths that people actually use, the shortcuts worn through the grass that are the actual straightest line from point A to point B. [00:20:13] Brett: Those are unmanaged devices, shadow IT apps, and non employee identities like contractors. Most security tools only work on those happy brick paths, but a lot of security problems take place on the shortcuts. 1Password Extended Access Management is the first security solution that brings all of these unmanaged devices, apps, and identities under your control. [00:20:37] Brett: It ensures that every user credential is strong and protected, every device is known and healthy, and every app is visible. 1Password Extended Access Management solves the problems traditional IAM and MDM can’t touch. It’s security for the way we work today, and it’s available now to companies with Okta, and coming later this year to Google [00:21:00] Workspace and Microsoft Office. [00:21:01] Brett: Entra? Entra? Christina? [00:21:04] Christina: Intra. It used to be Azure AD. It used to be Active Directory, but yeah, [00:21:08] Brett: There you go. Check it out at 1password. com slash product slash xam. That’s 1password. com slash product slash xam. [00:21:20] Sponsor bonus content [00:21:20] Brett: And then just to tag onto this, uh, there was a big hullabaloo around 1Password becoming an Electron app. But honestly, I haven’t even noticed. Uh, it’s been, it’s, the system integration is still so tight. [00:21:36] Brett: I just, I don’t care. It’s an Electron app done right. [00:21:40] Christina: Yeah, I fully agree. [00:21:42] Jeff: and if that read didn’t touch you, I just hear, I mean, I, one password is such, maybe as much an important part of my life as one or two of Brett’s creations, um, in terms of just how much I access it and use it every single day. And I have [00:22:00] never, ever had a problem. They only get. Better, they added the SSH business not long ago. [00:22:05] Jeff: I mean, maybe a year ago now, but like, they just. It’s incredible. And I don’t even know, like, I don’t even know what life is without it, even though there are other options. And also I’m in the process of doing some like business operations stuff for our company and, and realize that a number of our employees may or may not, don’t listen hackers, be using 1Password as directed. [00:22:27] Jeff: And so I’m also in the midst of like, writing sort of like a memo that’s like, here’s why you have to do it. Here’s how you use it. And here’s, um, and here’s, You know, here’s what will happen to you if you don’t. And just like having to kind of look into the features and, and the way this thing works today in order to write that. [00:22:44] Jeff: So I can help people get set up. That’s like, this fucking thing is amazing. It’s amazing. Thank you. 1Password. Also, I finally stopped about three years ago, uh, uh, using the same password for everything. It was one thing that 1Password was telling me not to do forever, but I was like, I can’t listen, [00:23:00] but now I do. [00:23:00] Jeff: So fuck you hackers. [00:23:01] Brett: every time you open it up into like an edit window, it’ll tell you, a watch tower will tell you if the site. Uh, had experienced a breach and B, it will tell you if 2FA is available and you haven’t set it up and it will tell you if, uh, passkeys are available and you haven’t set it up, um, which is super handy when you have, as most people on the internet these days do, you know, a hundred, some different logins for a hundred different sites, uh, and you want to use a different password on everyone. [00:23:34] Brett: You want everything to be as secure as possible. Yeah. And. And, uh, to the best of my knowledge, 1Password is one of the few password apps that have never experienced, uh, a major breach. Um, uh, uh, unlike LastPass, for example. [00:23:53] Christina: Yeah, yeah. I, I’ve been, like, I don’t know what my passwords are and I haven’t for, I guess, going on, going on 18 years [00:24:00] because I, [00:24:00] Brett: couldn’t possibly, yeah. [00:24:01] Christina: because I’ve been using one password, I guess, since probably 2007, so I guess 17 years. And I, I don’t know my passwords. I don’t know them. And, uh, and [00:24:08] Brett: all my passwords are random 20 character strings. There’s no way I could know my password. [00:24:14] Christina: Uh, and, and, and I will just give a little bit of love to the, like, the passkey, um, support. Like, I, I know that there are, are some things that are, you know, just because passkeys, there’s some stuff that isn’t figured out, like, exporting and whatnot. But, like, if you use passkeys on multiple devices, that, especially if they’re not all Apple devices, 1Password, in my opinion, is the best solution because it does, it’ll sync everywhere. [00:24:35] Christina: So a passkey that I have, you know, on like, uh, uh, you know, will work on Linux or on Windows or on my Mac or my iPhone or on whatever, which is really, really great. So, [00:24:46] Jeff: Yeah. Christina loves it on Arch Linux. Big. Big fan. She built, she built that from the ground. I mean, I have to, [00:24:52] Christina: I, I, yeah, yeah, I, I, I did. And because I’m going to tell everybody, you know, that I use Arch. But no, they, I, they do actually have a Linux client. [00:24:58] Christina: So, good [00:25:00] stuff. [00:25:00] Jeff: because this is almost as fun as toilets. Um, I just, a couple of things I want to add. One is that one thing I’ve started using more and more is in one password. You can send somebody a password, login information, and you can choose that it only goes that person. You can say it can only be used once. You can say it can be used for seven days. [00:25:15] Jeff: I use that all the time. And that became like, The importance of that became really incredible when I found an onboarding document in our, in our files that had, it was like a Google doc with all of our key passwords in it, despite the fact that we have one password. The other thing I want to say is that there is nothing more fun. [00:25:29] Jeff: Literally you could pass time doing this. If you were ever just kind of like bored, you were waiting at the doctor’s office. Just start generate, generating three word passwords. I’m going to do a few right now in one password. Okay. Here’s one, Kate. Pasty, Punt. That’s fun. Okay, here’s another one. Here’s another one. [00:25:44] Jeff: Imply, Soften, Eclat, Perplex, Kohlrabi, Posit. I mean, come on, this is a great time. [00:25:51] Brett: So, yeah, the space is a valid character in passwords. And once I realized that, uh, it increased my [00:26:00] usage of random three or four word, just random combinations of words, which on their own, uh, it becomes, uh, Not as unguessable as a 20 character random string with symbols, but, uh, but kind of on par. So like, um, Weasel, Monkey, Buttstuff can be a great password. [00:26:25] Jeff: Totally. Yeah. And by the way, everybody, when you make your O’s, zeros, it’s not helping you. [00:26:30] Brett: Yeah, right. [00:26:31] Jeff: but that’s, that’s another story [00:26:33] Brett: When you do, when you use leet speak, that’s, uh, that’s in most dictionaries. [00:26:37] Jeff: when you [00:26:37] Christina: Yeah, it is at this [00:26:38] Jeff: not helping you. [00:26:40] Christina: Unfortunately, we’ve all used, you know, whatever, like, the password, like, with one on the end. Like, we’ve all done that enough times that everybody knows. And the elite speak is unfortunately now in the dictionaries because, yeah, we’ve, enough breaches have happened and, uh, everyone knows our, uh, our [00:27:00] tells. [00:27:00] Jeff: But yeah, we reviewed one of those annual reports of most commonly used passwords once on this podcast. That is a really good time as well. It’s, it’s also humbling. [00:27:09] Christina: it really is humbling. You’re like, yeah, and this is why I don’t want to know what any of them are. Like, genuinely, like, I don’t [00:27:13] Jeff: Yeah, you do not want to know what any of them are. Cause you know what doesn’t come up? Zero, A, two, asterisk, four, three, A, B, capital C. Never comes up in the top used passwords. [00:27:24] Christina: No. No. And it’s great, too. Sorry, go on. [00:27:28] Brett: no, I was about to change topics, but you got more to say? Go for [00:27:31] Christina: No, I’m done. I’m done. [00:27:33] Reviving TUAW: A Controversial Story [00:27:33] Brett: So one of the people affected by the CrowdStrike problem, uh, was Tim Stevens, who could not board a flight and got stuck. And you may remember Tim Stevens as the editor of Engadget. Which, for years now, has hosted the archives of a little blog called the Unofficial Apple Web Blog. [00:27:58] Brett: Um, which was, [00:28:00] which was dead. You go to tua. com and it would redirect you to mGadget. But, Um, Yahoo, which now owns the 2R domain, or owned, past tense, sold it to a holding company which pulled some shenanigans. You want to tell us about [00:28:19] Jeff: This story, I’m just going to spoil it. The story is insane. And also I want to come back to your pronunciation of Yahoo later. [00:28:25] Christina: Yahoo! [00:28:28] Jeff: Yahoo! [00:28:30] Brett: I’m sorry, I just can’t do the inflection right. [00:28:32] Christina: Well, no, I think, I think we all just watched the, the ads so many times. Yahoo! [00:28:38] Jeff: Yahoo! [00:28:38] Christina: yeah. Um, anyway, yeah. Okay, so, this goes back about, um, two weeks now, as, as you’ll hear this. I was sick, actually. And I think this is important to know, because I, I, I, I’m very proud of myself for accomplishing what I accomplished while I had the stomach flu. [00:28:54] Christina: And John Gruber sent me a link to tuaw. com and it [00:29:00] had my byline on it. And I was like, laughing. I was like, okay, what is this? And then it turned out, I looked at it and I was like, why is this site still alive? Because as Brett mentioned, the site had been dead for close to 10 years. Well, it had been dead for, for close to close to 10, because it shut down in 2015. [00:29:17] Christina: And, um, It was just redirecting to engadget. com, not even redirecting to the article links, just a full on redirect. And I was like, okay, why is this here? And then I look at this face and I see this face that is not mine, but I see, you know, byline Christina Warren, and I’m seeing articles written. And I was, at first I’d assumed that maybe somebody had bought the domain and they were like trying to backfill some of the past articles. [00:29:39] Christina: I was like, okay, what is this? And then I looked a little closer and I realized, no, the site is back and they’re publishing new articles. Um, which, you know, look, that’s a thing. If Yahoo, the current owners of the AOL brands, Apollo Global, whatever, if they want to sell, uh, you know, an old domain because they think they can make a few dollars off of it, fine. [00:29:59] Christina: If someone wants to try to [00:30:00] revive the brand, fine. But what was odd to me is that My name looked like I was still publishing new articles in July 2024. I’m like, okay, what is this? Right. And so I look further into it and I look at the about page and all of the author names are historical old school authors of TUAW. [00:30:19] Christina: And so Brett’s name is there. Uh, uh, Victor’s name is there. Mike Rose’s name is there. Like everybody that we used to work with back in the day is there, but the photos are. AI generated. No, no. I mean, and this honestly pissed me off. I was like, could you at least have made me hotter? Like, genuinely, like that, that was like the biggest insult and injury. [00:30:39] Christina: So what they did, um, according to their own about page, they said that they acquired the domain only and not the content, but that they quote, meticulously rewrote the content using archive. [00:30:54] Jeff: Meticulously rewrote. [00:30:55] Christina: yeah, yeah, they said that they meticulously rewrote the content, um, [00:31:00] using stuff that was on archive. [00:31:01] Christina: org and, um, uh, to, to, to match, uh, current standards, which, okay. Um, and, and then they were publishing these things that way. So I, of course, immediately am mad and I’m sick, right? So I, [00:31:15] Jeff: Oh my god, I would have been sick if I weren’t sick [00:31:18] Christina: totally, totally. [00:31:19] Jeff: mean, that is awful. [00:31:20] Christina: I mean, cause, cause here’s the thing, like, we’ve seen this happen before. The hairpin is, is one recent example where like domains expire and somebody buys it and then they go through the archives to try to recreate the backlinks and, and sometimes the, you know, they’re somewhat adjusted, but whatnot, and, and we see that sort of thing before. [00:31:36] Christina: Um, it’s happened for years. It’s gross, but it’s a thing. What I, what I did not expect genuinely was for someone to try to revive a site and then start publishing new content. under the names of the people who used to work there. And then what got even worse is I realized that the articles that were like the past backlinks were not the same. [00:31:56] Christina: The slugs were the same. The articles had slightly, [00:32:00] sometimes the same headlines, sometimes slightly different, um, different authors attached. And then the content had been rewritten because what they did is they just, used AI to rewrite the content they found on archive. org, thinking I guess that somehow that would get them around the plagiarism issues, the copyright infringement issues, which it doesn’t. [00:32:17] Christina: Um, so I was big mad. And so I posted about it on Twitter and on threads and at Mastodon, and then I sent a strongly worded email to the email address that was on this site saying, take my name down. I’m immediately, or else I will contact, you know, I will get lawyers involved. You know, I’m, I’m a public figure. [00:32:36] Christina: This is going to harm, you know, my professional prospects. I don’t want any association with you. This is not my work. Fuck off. I didn’t use the fuck off part, but I was just like, take it, take it down immediately. And I didn’t expect anything. I didn’t expect them to respond, um, because I was like, I don’t know where they’re based, you know, I don’t know what my legal options are. [00:32:53] Christina: I was like, I will, in my mind, I was like, okay, I will contact a lawyer and send a cease and desist, but whatever. Um, [00:33:00] and then much to my surprise and delight, the tech press saw my posts and Engadget, 404 Media, uh, Jason Snell at Six Colors, uh, The Verge, and then later on, uh, people like Ars Technica and other places wrote about it too, all wrote about this. [00:33:18] Christina: And um, Ernie Smith from TDM was able to find out who is behind this shady company. And it’s this guy who um, he also did something similar to iLounge, although it seems like he might have officially bought that from the old iLounge owner. But like, they’ve done this before where like, you know, just buys like old kind of dead brands and, and then starts pumping out what looks like plagiarized content. [00:33:42] Christina: Um, You know, full of probably, you know, who even knows if they have affiliate links, but you know, just, I don’t know what their business model is, but he’s just been doing this stuff. [00:33:53] Brett: is what’s the fucking point? [00:33:55] Christina: Yeah, exactly. have no idea. I don’t, I don’t get it. [00:33:59] AI Articles and Identity Theft [00:33:59] Brett: [00:34:00] the end game of [00:34:01] Christina: I don’t either, because this is such a weird, like many years old strategy, you know, of trying to do something like Google doesn’t rank these things well anymore. [00:34:08] Christina: So I don’t even understand why this is here. Um, [00:34:11] Brett: if most of it was done with AI, like it’s still a lot of effort to put into what end, like, and like you said, this, like, I didn’t want these AI regurgitated articles coming up in Google searches for my name, [00:34:26] Christina: right. I mean, that, that was my primary concern, right? Was, I was like, I don’t want people, because for better or worse, like you’re the same way, Brett, like people associate us with TUAW and I don’t want people seeing things coming up and thinking, Oh, Christina’s writing for this site again, or Christina wrote this, right? [00:34:40] Christina: I’m like, absolutely not. So fortunately, um, after the first, um, Press came out, they started to change the names. Like first my byline was changed from Christina to Christina Warren to Christina, which I thought was funny. And then it was changed to Mary Brown and then they started to change everyone else’s bylines. [00:34:57] Christina: Now the past links that they’ve recreated, [00:35:00] like I don’t think there’s a whole lot we can do about that, but at least they don’t have our names associated with it. So that at least started within like The first six hours. [00:35:08] The Resurrection of Old Content [00:35:08] Christina: But then, and then more people wrote about it and it became kind of a second day story, which, which I didn’t expect. [00:35:14] Christina: Um, but um, like I said, what’s funny though is that because people figure out who this guy was, he then started to try to delete himself off the internet, which was really funny. Like, he started to try to, like, he started to try to hide, like, like, taking away articles that he’d clearly, like, self written about himself to make him seem like he was, like, this big shot. [00:35:34] Christina: Um, and, and, you know, removing his name from some other pages. And I was like, oh, okay, yeah, you, you think you can hide, now you’re just making this more interesting. Now we just really want to track down. Who you are, motherfucker. But yeah, what a, [00:35:46] Jeff: yeah. Now it’s a game. [00:35:48] Reflecting on Past Work [00:35:48] Christina: yeah, but, but what a, what a weird thing to like find a site you wrote for in college, you know, like resuscitated from the dead with a photo that’s not yours, but your byline.[00:36:00] [00:36:00] Jeff: Yeah, for Ichi, when was your last actual byline for I [00:36:04] Christina: Uh, for me, it was 2009. Brett, you worked there a lot longer. Cause I know you, you went on to work at AOL proper. [00:36:09] Brett: Right, that’s the thing is I kind of, I slowed down my blogging onto uh, when I started working for, as you call it, AOL Proper. [00:36:18] Jeff: like that, it’s like L. A. proper. [00:36:20] Brett: so I don’t remember what the last article I wrote was, but it would be prior to 2009 probably. [00:36:29] Christina: No, I think you were probably after that. I think you were after that. Yeah, but [00:36:32] Brett: wrote a couple here and there. Um, sometimes just to test new integrations I was building into Blogsmith. [00:36:40] Christina: yeah, because I don’t, I, I, I think, I think you started working for them like after I left, but I could be wrong. But regardless, it’s been a very long time for both of us. And so it was a weird thing to see it. And then like, again, this is a site that’s been dead for 10 years. So, you know, um, uh, Steve Sandy, I saw a comment that he made on Apple Insider that [00:37:00] showed that like, I guess Yahoo had approached him two weeks before all this was discovered, offering like him to buy the domain because he’d started like a, a similar site to Chua after the fact. [00:37:12] Christina: Um, but, but he’s retired and, and, and super into Jesus now. So he was not interested, but, um, [00:37:19] Brett: I feel like he always was, he just knew enough to keep his mouth shut. In polite company. [00:37:24] Christina: right, right. Well now that seems like [00:37:26] Jeff: What’s that, what’s that skill like? I don’t have that muscle. [00:37:29] Christina: But, uh, but, but he, he was not interested. And so, you know, it seems like, I guess they were looking at their assets. We’re like, Oh, well, maybe we can sell this cause it’s a four letter domain name and we can get value out of it. I don’t know. [00:37:40] The Sale of Content Rights [00:37:40] Christina: I just, what, what, what annoys me? [00:37:42] Christina: Like, I’m annoyed with a few things. Like, obviously my, my main annoyance is with like the, you know, grifter assholes who did this and tried to steal our identities. Um, but I’m also pissed off at like Yahoo, Apollo Global, whatever for selling this stuff. Just so haphazardly because it’s like it’s like[00:38:00] [00:38:00] Brett: could not, it couldn’t have been that profitable. [00:38:02] Christina: what I’m saying like the 15 grand you got No, that’s what I’m saying because they couldn’t right it turned out Mike Schramm looked back through his or instead of Brad Linder, Brad Linder looked back through his contract and found like and I went back and Found mine too like we owned The rights to our content, um, uh, AOL, Weblogs, Inc., [00:38:20] Christina: whatever, had a perpetual license to, a non exclusive perpetual license to, you know, uh, republish it, but we owned our content, so they couldn’t sell the content. But like, yeah, it had to be like between five and 15 grand. I’m sure it was a cheap sale. You’re Apollo Global. What are you getting out of this? [00:38:38] Christina: Like, somebody felt, somebody felt like, Oh, we’re, we’re doing super well here, guys. Yeah. Well, I hope that the bad publicity You know, shamed you of that, like, notion, but yeah, very frustrating, but very funny. I, I, I changed my avatar at Work Slack to the AI avatar, and then someone said, you should do that on all of your [00:39:00] socials, and I did that for a few days. [00:39:01] Christina: Um, and, uh, I have a blue check because, um, Elon gave me one, and because of that, like, I had to wait a few more days before I could change it back to my normal face again, which was pretty funny. So [00:39:13] Brett: changed, they changed my, they gave most people full name changes. That’s it. [00:39:17] Christina: they only made yours, like, the, the first [00:39:19] Brett: I’m, I’m Paul Terpstra now, [00:39:22] Christina: Yeah, [00:39:23] Brett: is how I, which is how I almost introduced myself at MacStack when I [00:39:27] Christina: you should have. You should have. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, honestly, like, I think if you wanted to, you could probably send an email and be like, you need to make this even more distinctive. I don’t want any Terpstra association, you know, with this, with this site. But [00:39:40] Brett: Yeah, no, I probably should. And they probably, I mean, given how fast they changed all those [00:39:45] Christina: yeah, no, I think they would. I think they would because I think, [00:39:48] Jeff: There’s a potential, [00:39:49] Christina: know. [00:39:50] Jeff: there’s a potential upside that hadn’t occurred to me until just now, because I only saw downside, which is that all of us have posts online. Probably that we’re just like, maybe it’s just like, I have some blog [00:40:00] posts, like from my journalism days where I’m like, Oh, stupid. I was just on, I had a quota and I wrote this thing and I really embarrassed that’s even there. [00:40:07] Jeff: If it gets flooded with fake stuff, then it can be like, I don’t know, is that real or fake? And then nobody can judge you. If I, when I meet people and describe my work or something, and then I imagine them going and Googling me and finding some city pages, which was like a village voice media, all. Alt, you know, weekly thing, post from like 2007. [00:40:26] Jeff: I’m like, Oh God, anything I said is a lie. Anyway, I’m sorry that happened. What a mess. [00:40:33] Christina: Yeah. [00:40:33] Jeff: future. [00:40:34] Christina: I mean, look, thank you, John Gruber for like finding this. He, he was trying to find out why something wasn’t working on his system and he did a search result and it came up in Google. So apparently, you know, because I guess if the, the, the, the domain, because of the number of backlinks I’m, I’m assuming, um, and I guess this is why they did buy the site and why they recreated the backlinks. [00:40:53] Christina: They were able to still rank in Google News. Now that to me is a fundamental Google problem. Like you should look at a site like this. This should [00:41:00] never be allowed to be indexed and be part of. You know, your stuff and to be serving stuff, um, but it was already getting served there. And so he was surprised. [00:41:07] Christina: And at first, like I said, like, I didn’t even know what I was looking at at first. And then I looked closer and I was like, wait a minute, they’re publishing new content. Okay. Absolutely not. Like, [00:41:16] Brett: well, so my first thought was they, they bought it all and like recreated it and then just didn’t bother to, because like you said, the slugs didn’t change and the slugs contained the date, uh, which, which always disagreed with the published date. In the article itself, and I thought that was just laziness, but then I started reading my so called posts and did not, A, half the time, I didn’t remember writing about half the topics I was, had a byline on, and the ones that I did, the ones that I did remember, I’m like, that doesn’t sound like me. [00:41:51] Brett: I, I would have, I would have written that more tongue in cheek. I, I know myself better than that. [00:41:56] Christina: know, and you did, it was funny because, uh, The Verge did a, did a [00:42:00] comparison between like the same post with the, with different, with the same link, like from an art, one from archive and one, the rewritten one to show like what the differences were. And, um, uh, Jason from 404 Media, um, who, who was great, who I talked to at length about, um, uh, for the story and who was very kind and quoted me a lot. [00:42:17] Christina: Um, he, um, did the same thing. Like, I was on the phone with him talking to him about it. And we were both going through things together and like finding like the differences in how the rewrites had happened. And then there were certain things that we would just like cut off. Like it’s like the archive didn’t grab the full thing of the page. [00:42:33] Christina: And so it would just like sentences would like just cut off mid sentence in certain posts, just the laziest implementation. [00:42:39] Brett: Yeah, if you, if you read that 404 article, you would think Christina was the only writer at 2A. [00:42:46] Christina: Well, I’m sorry, but I, I, but also, never, [00:42:50] Brett: he, uh, he asked me for a comment and I just wrote back, this is terrible. I hope we can find some recourse. That was like, at which I think he did quote, [00:42:59] Christina: did quote, he [00:43:00] quoted you in SRAM and I was just, I was willing to get on the phone because here’s the thing about me, I will never, um, like, take, you know, like, lose the opportunity to, you know, take a bad situation and turn it into good publicity. Like, you know what I mean? Like, [00:43:15] Jeff: Can we just say 404 Media, it is, it feels like a death wish to name your, your organization this, and I’m referring to all the times I go to my old stories and get a 404 error. Uh, it’s a little bit of a, you know, you don’t want that to be a self fulfilling prophecy. [00:43:32] Brett: Right. [00:43:32] Christina: Uh, they’re a great site, though. Uh, they’re, they’re, um, a, um, a, um, like, um, author owned site, kind of like Defector. It’s a bunch of people who used [00:43:39] Brett: They’re, they’re new, right? [00:43:40] Christina: yeah, used to be the motherboard team, and they’ve started it. They’re really, really good. Um, I, I pay for them. They do really great work. Um, they’re gonna be at XOXO, and so I’m looking forward to seeing them, um, there. [00:43:51] Christina: But yeah, they’re, they’re really good people. So, [00:43:54] Jeff: I feel like used to be advised has to be asterisks like the good ones. [00:43:57] Christina: Yeah, exactly. Well, yeah, no, but this is, this is, [00:44:00] this is, this is, this is, uh, uh, Jason Peebler and, and, and Joseph Cox and, um, [00:44:04] Jeff: Yeah, the good ones. So [00:44:06] Christina: uh, um, Sam Cole, um, and, um, Emmanuel Myberg. So yeah, really good people, uh, basically like the tech version of Defector. So, uh, happy, happy for them. Um, but yeah, it was, uh, it was very weird, very weird thing that happened to us last week, Brett. [00:44:23] Christina: Like, it was nice though. It Well, it was weird, too, because, like, we got, I got an email, I, I saw, like, Mike Schramm’s email about the 404 request before I even saw Jason’s email in my inbox. And I was like, you know, it was funny because we got, like, this, this kind of group email from people, you know, some people you have, I haven’t talked to in, like, 15 [00:44:40] Brett: Right. It [00:44:41] Christina: was kind of nice. It was. It was, it was, it was really, in a really terrible way, but it was also, like, glad everybody’s doing well, you know? [00:44:48] Jeff: Yeah, nice way to check in. [00:44:50] Macstock Reunion [00:44:50] Brett: of reunions, uh, last weekend was Macstock, um, [00:44:55] Christina: Tell us about that. [00:44:56] Brett: was not heavily attended, [00:45:00] um, but the people that were there were so great to connect with. Um, I actually had a really good connection with Dave Hamilton from our network, Backbeat Media. Um, I have a little Queerclick. Um, of like two gay guys and, uh, various other just like trans and queer people. [00:45:23] Brett: And I don’t, it wasn’t ever intentionally a queer click. Um, it just kind of, you know, you attract a certain type of person and you become. Um, but that’s super fun. And then like all the podcasters, uh, that I like were there and I gave a talk and right before my talk, like I had peppered some dad jokes into my talk as I am want to do, um, and right before my talk, Elle text me a real bad one. [00:45:55] Brett: So I decided to open with it before I said anything I said, [00:46:00] and I got full crowd participation on this. I said, knock, knock. [00:46:04] Christina: Who’s there? [00:46:06] Brett: Yoda Lady. [00:46:07] Christina: Yoda lady who? That’s funny. [00:46:10] Brett: and it, like, everyone did it. And then I just paused. And then there was great laughter. I was, I was amazed how well it went over. Um, my other ones were, uh, Where Do Bad Rainbows Go? [00:46:25] Brett: To Prism. It’s a, it’s a light, no, it’s a light sentence, but it gives them time to reflect. Um, and This Morning I Tried To Catch Fog, But I Missed. [00:46:37] Jeff: Oh man, [00:46:39] Brett: And then, you know, just a slight pause and then you just move on with your talk. It works well. It’s my, it’s my formula. [00:46:46] Christina: It’s your, it’s your dad, it’s your dad joke formula. [00:46:48] Brett: yeah, I have a dad joke formula. My first year, I actually had a slide that just said, um, pause for laughter after one of those jokes. [00:46:58] Brett: And then I just like moved on to the [00:47:00] next slide. Um, I, I, I do, I do funny presentations. I’m pretty good at funny. I also think like I covered a lot of stuff. My, my focus was smart mailboxes. Which, as usual, like the first year I did something kind of out there was I just did a deep dive on Spotlight. And I couldn’t believe the number of people who A, hadn’t used Spotlight, or B, didn’t realize like how powerful it was. [00:47:26] Brett: And this is five operating systems ago. And then I did one on tagging and nobody Nobody had, this is right after Finder tags, like after they Sherlocked OpenMeta. Um, I guess, is it Sherlocking if it was free software? Um, [00:47:46] Christina: absolutely. [00:47:47] Brett: yeah, so, so I did tagging and nobody, nobody had been using tagging. Um, and I still get people at MaxSoc coming up to me asking me questions about tags because they started using them after [00:48:00] my talk. [00:48:01] Brett: Um, yeah, it’s, it’s a blast. I, I love MaxSac. Like I said, I think there were a total of 150 people dead this [00:48:08] Christina: I mean, I still [00:48:08] Brett: but every Every one of them was super cool. We had so much fun. Um, the power went out in the hotel when we were all hanging out at the bar. Um, so it’s pitch black and I’m just walking around gently touching people’s butts so they think they’re being pickpocketed. Good times. It was just good times. [00:48:29] Christina: That’s cool. That’s awesome. I love that. [00:48:36] Brett: Yeah, [00:48:36] Jeff: the mall, [00:48:37] Brett: one of these years I’ll get, I’ll get one or both of you to come. Um, it’s not, it’s not a prestigious event like Christina is used to going [00:48:47] Christina: Oh, come on. It’s not a matter of that. It’s really more of a time of, like, finding, like, making sure I can, like, make the, like, [00:48:52] Brett: Yeah, it’s a longer trip for you than it is for us. Um, which I understand. Uh, and I brought Erin there [00:49:00] last year, two years ago. Um, my coworker Erin and she gave a talk and I felt bad for bringing her. Um, [00:49:10] Jeff: she should have been on the stage, like the show you and I saw two weeks ago. [00:49:15] Brett: right, oh my God. But the audience at MaxDocSkews, um, Like 70 year old white guy, um, which is not the demographic for a young trans woman to give a talk on, uh, logic. [00:49:31] Jeff: the demographic for your [00:49:33] Christina: What is her band? Isn’t her band called Genital Shame? [00:49:36] Jeff: Genital Shame. Yeah, did you talk Brett and I went to see Genital Shame. [00:49:40] Brett: I think we talked about it a bit last time, but yeah, it was outstanding. I, yeah, I’m a huge genital shame fan now, which is a weird sentence to say without context. Which I feel is the point of the band name, just to make it, uh, not [00:50:00] blatantly offensive, but awkward. It’s an awkward, it’s an awkward thing to [00:50:04] Jeff: Yeah, totally. It’s great. [00:50:06] Brett: Yeah. All right. [00:50:09] GrAPPtitude: App Recommendations [00:50:09] Brett: Um, should we get to GrAPPtitude? [00:50:11] Jeff: wa. [00:50:12] Christina: let’s do it. [00:50:13] Brett: Um, I’ll kick it off cause I have a, I have a new one. I learned about this app from Mike Schmitz at MacStack. [00:50:20] Christina: Nice. [00:50:22] Brett: I have not used it extensively yet, but I’ve used it enough that dropping the 80 for an individual license was kind of a no brainer. So it’s called ScreenStudio. [00:50:34] Brett: I’m sorry. I don’t have notifications turned off. Um, I had, it’s called, it’s from Dave Hamilton. Um, and I can only read the preview of it and I don’t know where it goes, but, um, so ScreenStudio is kind of like ScreenFlow automated. So all this stuff, so ScreenFlow is a screen recording app that can do, uh, full screen recordings and then you can [00:51:00] add callouts and focus windows and all that fun stuff to make it a fun, watchable video. [00:51:07] Brett: But, ScreenStudio can automate the whole idea of like focusing where you’re clicking, panning to it, making your mouse cursor bigger, and you can just kind of record your screen and it will automate the process of creating a truly informative screen recording out of it. And 100 percent worth 80 bucks. I mean, I think ScreenFlow costs 99 [00:51:37] Jeff: about every year, practically. [00:51:39] Christina: Yeah. I mean, I mean, that’s basically how it works. Yeah. I’ve, um, I haven’t bought ScreenStudio yet, but I have a lot of friends who have, and it’s, um, uh, people have talked about how great it is. So yeah, it, it, [00:51:48] Brett: much, it’s much bandied about. [00:51:50] Jeff: Much bandied about. I’m going to try this. That’s really awesome. [00:51:54] Christina: cause it really helps you do. [00:51:55] Brett: trial. You can give it a shot. [00:51:57] Christina: Yeah. Cause I think the thing that’s really nice about it is like, it makes it really [00:52:00] easy to do like the kind of the, the zooming effects and, and things like that, like to make it look really slick and, and the editing from what I understand is a lot faster. So a lot of my, a lot of my colleagues are really like it. [00:52:10] Brett: you don’t get all the multi track, uh, kind of power of Screen Studio or ScreenFlow. I love editing in ScreenFlow. Um, I will load in, if I just need to do cuts and fades on something rather than dealing with like DaVinci Resolve or. or Final Cut. I’ll just load it in ScreenFlow and do my quick edits and I have all the shortcuts set up on my, um, between my Stream Deck and my Shuttle Express. [00:52:42] Brett: I can flip through editing in seconds. Um, but, You do have decent editing and faster editing in ScreenStudio. And like you said, like, to add, uh, to make your cursor bigger in ScreenFlow, it’s a matter of selecting the [00:53:00] clip, um, and it doesn’t, if you’ve split the clip at any point, now you have to join clips, and then you add a callout, and then you set the settings for the cursor, blow it up to the size you want, add builds, add inouts, and by the time you’re done, it looks great, but you just spent. [00:53:17] Brett: Uh, three, four minutes blowing up your mouse [00:53:20] Jeff: It sounds like, okay, so let’s, let’s imagine a sort of flow chart here. So in a way it’s like you start with CleanShot to meet your initial screen, you know, screencast needs, right? Then maybe it’s, it’s the ScreenStudio, which is somewhere between ScreenShot And ScreenFlow. So you can, I can imagine the use for all of them [00:53:39] Brett: When you say screen, do you mean clean shot? [00:53:41] Jeff: CleanShot. Did I say ScreenShot? [00:53:42] Brett: You said screenshot, [00:53:44] Christina: But I understood what you were saying as, I understood what you were [00:53:46] Jeff: CleanShot, everybody. Yeah, that’s all I got. [00:53:51] Brett: clean shot to screen studio. Yeah. We could make one of those, which OS is best for you [00:53:56] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. [00:53:57] Christina: No, I mean, I think that, I think that’s exactly right. And I think for a lot of [00:54:00] people, like, I think like, again, like if you’re making a course, if you’re doing something where what is, what’s being published, you know, you need to really have like the power, like you said, the multi tracks and stuff, like something like ScreenFlow or Camtasia or frankly, even DaVinci Resolve or, or, you know, Final Cut or whatever is going to be better for you. [00:54:15] Christina: But, um, yeah. But, um, based on what my colleagues have said, like, ScreenStudio is really, really good. And I think it’s also nice, like, you can set, like, what the background of your stuff looks like. And I think just, like, it’s just, it’s, it’s been, you know, defined in a much more modern way. Which I [00:54:31] Brett: Yeah. And you can, you can save, you can save presets for doing like backgrounds on, uh, isolated windows or even like iPhone recordings and yeah. Um, Yeah, it [00:54:45] Jeff: I tell you a cautionary auto zoom story? [00:54:48] Brett: yes. [00:54:49] Jeff: So I was meeting with a client once and she was at her desk and they had, uh, they had one of those situations where you had like a camera that would auto zoom to you or whatever. And it was like a little [00:55:00] bit above her head, probably like eight or 10 inches. [00:55:03] Jeff: And it kept zooming in tight on her cleavage. And then zooming back. And I was, I had to turn off the video. I had to turn off the video. Cause I was like, I’m not going to say anything, but your cleavage has given off face vibes to your camera. I don’t know what, I don’t know what that means even, but you should know, but I’m not going to tell you. [00:55:21] Jeff: Uh, it was the most awkward, and it happened like five times in like 15 minutes. It just kept going. Anyway. [00:55:29] Brett: believe the correct sound effect is Awooga. [00:55:34] Jeff: Anyway. [00:55:35] Brett: Alright, who’s next? [00:55:37] Christina: Um, I’ll go. Um, so my pick is, uh, Kaleidoscope 5 and, uh, cause that just came out this week. And, uh, Kaleidoscope we’ve talked about before, um, is, uh, it’s a longtime Mac app, a diff app, a diff tool, uh, that has, uh, changed, um, ownership hands a number of times, but the current owners who bought it, I think probably two years ago have done a really, really good job, [00:56:00] I think, with like, uh, Like, like they not only did completely rewrite the app and, and kind of bring back like all the good things that with it, but they’ve improved it so much. [00:56:10] Brett: many of these apps change hands and then wither. And Kaleidoscope is, in the two years, I think they’ve been through two major version [00:56:19] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. They, they did move to a subscription model, but they’ve been adding things to it all the time, which I think is really great. And so Kaleidoscope 5 came out. Um, one of the main new features, which I really like is that they’ve integrated Git. They’d started doing that in, in the last month. [00:56:32] Christina: Releases, uh, with, with, with a, in and the for, uh, branch, but now it’s actually like built into kaleidoscope. So you can basically just like add in what gi repos you want and basically like as, as your, you know, as you can compare files that are in your, like your working directory. So you can compare like, okay, what are, you know, um, I, how can I compare the different, um, things between my working copy and this one, which I think is a really nice visual way of, of looking at stuff, um, and, and really, really good. [00:56:59] Christina: [00:57:00] Um, they’ve also had, um, you know, uh. Like they have like a change set feature, which is, which is like, um, connected, um, to, to the Git stuff. And so you can kind of like view your change set and your file history of things. Um, and they even have that like as, you know, integrated in with the other apps they integrate with, but yeah, they have integration with Xcode and with VS code and, and JetBrains and, and things like that. [00:57:24] Christina: And [00:57:24] Brett: they, they do all that integration with a service. I mean, like, so they’ve always had some kind of Xcode and even like Safari debugger and integration, but what they added was a service where you can just select a hash for a commit and load up, um, Kaleidoscope, you know, with a right click services or assign a keyboard shortcut to it. [00:57:47] Brett: And so any app that can display a hash for Any commit, uh, you can load that commit automatically in, uh, Kaleidoscope. And like you said, there’s like a full [00:58:00] repo browser, basically. You can, like, compare between branches, compare bet compare between commits. Um, it is, so I use Tower for most of my, uh, graphical Git management. [00:58:14] Brett: And And it does a decent job of branch comparisons, but it also integrates with Kaleidoscope. So I do most of that in Kaleidoscope. I do all of my Git merge conflicts in Kaleidoscope. It’s brilliant for that. But yeah, I love [00:58:31] Jeff: I love Kaleidoscope. [00:58:33] Christina: yeah, really good app. So yeah, version five just came out and I’m, I’m really happy, um, uh, for them. Like, like, again, like most, like Brett said, most apps, when they change hands, like it’s kind of a death spiral. And that certainly was the case with Kaleidoscope, which has changed hands a number of times. [00:58:47] Christina: Like it, you know, it had been like kind of this brilliant diff app. And like, I still like had it, but I was like, [00:58:52] Brett: Yeah, we were all still promoting it, but we’re like, eh, we don’t know its future. [00:58:56] Christina: Exactly. It’s like, this hasn’t been touched in a long time. We don’t know what’s going on. And like, they came [00:59:00] in and they, they did the really, really hard work of reviving it and making it better. And, um, um, so yeah, just huge, uh, huge fan. [00:59:11] Brett: Nice. What you got, Jeff? [00:59:13] Jeff: So I had a, we had someone over for dinner the other night. I’d never met him, him and his wife, and he’s a, he’s a singer and kind of a sound artist. And, um, he was telling me about a project he was working on. It’s really amazing, which is like, he was explaining how like robins, the birds, robins have like a vocabulary and, and they have their own kind of vocabulary that is different from other robins. [00:59:34] Jeff: And, and up to like, I think 30 or 40 individual sort of Let’s say words. And, and he was describing, he’s been recording them with a shotgun mic and, and sampling them. And he pulls up his phone to show me the, the, um, the samples. And it’s just this nice little, you know, soundboard, like nine buttons. And, and he’s, he’s pushing them, showing them, he set it to like half speed, whatever, and it was the most elegant. [00:59:58] Jeff: thing. And I was like, what app is this? [01:00:00] And it was this app called Koala, which is like a sampling app, like just super elegant, super low, like super quick, like, uh, learning curve. And so incredibly fun. And you can just start sampling your voice if you want. And, and this, so this. It gets me to a quiz. I have an 80s quiz for you because this happened to him and I, uh, we, we connected on something really special. [01:00:25] Jeff: I don’t, but here’s the thing. Did you ever watch, let’s call it the Huxtable show, [01:00:29] Christina: Yeah, [01:00:30] Jeff: Cosby show. Okay. So do you happen to remember the episode where the family visits Stevie Wonder in the studio? [01:00:37] Christina: Yeah, one of the best episodes ever. Yeah. [01:00:39] Jeff: Yeah, so basically there’s this moment, it’s iconic in my life and among my friend group and my bands. [01:00:46] Jeff: We’re all the same age and we all watched this episode when it aired in 1984, um, where Theo Huxtable, Stevie Wonder calls him over, Stevie Wonder invites him into the studio so he can show him all the cool shit he does. And it’s an amazing episode, it’s like as good as like a Mr. [01:01:00] Rogers episode basically because you actually learn and I actually learned I’d never heard of a sampler. [01:01:04] Jeff: And so he says to Theo Huxtable. Say something like, what would you say at a party? And Theo goes, jammin on the one. And then it’s instantly a sample, and Stevie Wonder’s on his keyboard going, jammin on the one, jammin on the one, right? Okay, so put that aside. I have never heard that in the wild in my life. [01:01:20] Jeff: So this guy has his sampler app in front of me, and I ask what it is, and he’s like, oh, let me show you how it works. He hits the thing, and we basically both go jammin on the one. And it was the most amazing thing. And what was just really super cool about it was that like for him, um, that was also his first time seeing into a studio and his first time seeing a sampler. [01:01:39] Jeff: And he’s someone who does sample stuff all the time now. So I just want to like shout out to the Huxtable show. Um, for just like creating that opportunity and, and actually I can only imagine that there are many, many people out there for whom this was also like a, uh, just like a sort of portal opening moment. [01:01:57] Jeff: So anyway, Koala is the, is the app. It’s [01:02:00] super awesome. Um, I’m working on pulling samples that I want to put into it now. Uh, and, and I, I love it so much. I already sampled some Mike Watt, uh, bass thumps with his voice, um, especially his song, Big Train. And that was thrilling. [01:02:16] Brett: Nice. [01:02:17] Jeff: So yeah, that’s what I got. [01:02:18] Brett: Cool. I should, I should play with this. I used to be, I used to own like hardware samplers. Um, I had so much fun, like walking around with a field recorder. I [01:02:28] Christina: Oh yeah, I bet. [01:02:30] Brett: music, Nits, Nitsareb kind of stuff. And like recording like grocery carts, smashing together and turning, turning it into a crash cymbal. [01:02:39] Jeff: And you can thousand percent do that here, right? Like it’s just anywhere you are, you just hit the button. It samples from your, from your mic. It’s fricking awesome. [01:02:46] Christina: That’s so [01:02:46] Brett: Love it. I’ll be playing with that. It’s been a long time. [01:02:50] Jeff: Jamming on the one. [01:02:52] Christina: Jammin on [01:02:52] Brett: Jamming on the one. Is that the episode title? [01:02:55] Jeff: the episode title it’s season two episode. I’ll put the link in right now. [01:03:00] Um, [01:03:00] Brett: I was talking about our episode, [01:03:01] Christina: the one. Yeah, I think [01:03:03] Brett: on right [01:03:03] Jeff: episode jamming on the one. Yeah, please. [01:03:05] Christina: on the one. Yeah, I [01:03:06] Brett: Unless it’s about toilets. [01:03:08] Christina: Is that her birthday brain? But I think Jammin on the One. [01:03:12] Jeff: Yeah, [01:03:12] Brett: I like it. [01:03:13] Jeff: I like [01:03:13] Brett: And people will listen all the way through [01:03:16] Jeff: And I’m putting that’s right, [01:03:18] Brett: one hour mark to [01:03:19] Jeff: come from? I’m gonna put the episode clip, the Stevie Wonder [01:03:23] Christina: Yes, please [01:03:24] Jeff: show notes now. [01:03:25] Christina: No, that, that episode is so funny. Uh, like, I think because, because they ran and rerun so much. So I was not really cognizant, like, when it first aired, but it was in, you know, syndication for so long. Like, that’s such a good episode of TV. And [01:03:37] Jeff: Oh, it’s amazing. [01:03:39] Christina: just, like, the, the, the kids, like, the, the, the kid actors, like, genuinely glee that you can see of them being with Stevie, you know, [01:03:46] Jeff: Yeah, like the actors themselves, [01:03:48] Christina: like Lisa Bonet and Malcolm Schmall Warner, like, you can tell they are just, like, besides themselves, because, I mean, which, who wouldn’t be, right? [01:03:56] Christina: But, yeah. [01:03:57] Jeff: Yep. Completely. Yeah. Totally amazing. I [01:04:00] loved that show so, so very much. [01:04:03] Christina: Yeah, it was a great show. It’s very disappointing that we have to, like, view it in a different context. Um, and, and I’ve, I’ve long been, like, a Lisa Bonet, like, wha So, I’ve, like, since probably 2005 or something, like, had, like, complicated feelings about the Cosby show even before all of his other stuff was more known. [01:04:21] Christina: Just because I was like, just because I was like, it was fucked up what you did to, like, the best character on the show, like, you, you guys did Denise Dirty, fuck off. But like, the show itself, like, I, I can separate those things, um, and, uh, yeah. Very, very good TV. And like, that’s just, that’s one of those great sitcom episodes. [01:04:38] Remembering Bob Newhart [01:04:38] Christina: Um, speaking of good sitcoms, and actually from people who are not problematic, um, Bob Newhart died, um, [01:04:45] Jeff: I know. Hi, Bob. I pulled up some Bob Newhart on YouTube [01:04:50] Brett: how, how many years did he make it without becoming problematic? [01:04:53] Jeff: I mean, 94. Yeah. [01:04:56] Brett: that’s a good [01:04:57] Jeff: And my brother, Daryl is my other brother, Daryl. [01:04:59] Brett: [01:05:00] And even had like a recurring and adorable part on the Big Bang [01:05:05] Christina: Yeah, [01:05:05] Jeff: Oh, I never saw him on that. I only see that show in the hotels. [01:05:08] Christina: And, and he was in Elf. And like, like, it’s funny, like, that’s [01:05:11] Jeff: Oh yeah. No. Incredible in [01:05:13] Christina: so good at Elf. Well, I mean, it was funny. Go [01:05:16] Jeff: Go ahead. No, no, you, you. [01:05:17] Christina: No, I was saying, I was having, I was explaining him to some, um, somebody yesterday who I was like, no, you know, if you saw him, you would know who he was. I’m like, I’m not saying that he invented deadpan humor, but I’m not not saying it either. [01:05:28] Jeff: Yeah, yeah. No, for sure. So, uh, can I just share, can we go out on an elf story? Um, so, uh, as my, as my wife said when she posted, uh, about this, like, there are two kinds of people in the world, those who think elf is hilarious and those who don’t. Um, and so she had just read an article and the article was like about the filming of the movie and of course James Caan’s in it. [01:05:53] Jeff: God, what an amazing person and what a bizarre place for him to be, but also [01:05:57] Christina: so good in it too. [01:05:58] Jeff: And, and the [01:06:00] bit was that, I don’t know who was, I don’t know if he was telling the story or Will Ferrell or someone else, but apparently in the, in the shooting of that movie, at some point he said to Will Ferrell, I just don’t think you’re funny. [01:06:09] Jeff: Like, I don’t get you. And, and like the end of it is great because apparently like while he was shooting it, he just could not figure out why this is funny, but saw the movie and realized this is incredible. And I think that the fact that that’s how he felt about Will Ferrell in that movie must contribute to how amazing he is as that father in [01:06:28] Christina: Absolutely. No, without a doubt, without a doubt. Um, also, fun fact about Bob Newhart, he won the Grammy in 1961 for Best New Artist and Best Album of the Year. [01:06:40] Jeff: Hell yeah. Go get him, Bobby. [01:06:43] Brett: he had an album. [01:06:44] Christina: we had a number of comedy albums, right? Like, so it was for a [01:06:46] Brett: Oh, sure, sure. Okay. [01:06:48] Christina: he also won, like, Best Comedy Performance Spoken, but like, that’s how crazy, like, that’s, that’s nuts to think about. Like, the Album of the Year in 1961 was not, like, Uh, a rock record or, you know, like jazz or anything else. [01:06:59] Christina: [01:07:00] It was fucking Bob Newhart. The button down mind of Bob Newhart, one album of the year, which is amazing. Yeah, no, they were very [01:07:08] Brett: that up. I’ve never heard his, his, I’ve never heard his recorded [01:07:12] Christina: I [01:07:12] Jeff: So, Deadpan [01:07:14] Brett: him from TV and that’s about it. [01:07:17] Jeff: and Elf. [01:07:17] Christina: And Elf. Elf. Elf. We love Elf. [01:07:20] Jeff: Well, I’m not going to get any sleep now because all I’m going to think about is Bob Newhart. I might have to watch a few, a few episodes tonight. [01:07:25] Christina: Yeah. [01:07:27] Brett: All right. I love you guys. [01:07:28] Jeff: Hey, love you back. Happy birthday, brother. Get some birthday sleep. [01:07:31] Christina: Get some sleep.

After a brief hiatus, Brett and Christina are back, juggling life’s chaos from sciatica distress and political uproar to mouthwatering taco discoveries and tech marvels. They dissect mental health struggles, modern politics, and the power of local action. Brett spills on his heartwarming mushroom taco experience and flaunts his shiny new iPhone 15 and Sonos Ace headphones, while Christina geeks out over iTerm2’s latest update. With witty banter and unfiltered thoughts, they tackle the iTerm2 AI drama, share their love for the open-source Home Assistant, and more. Plug in your earbuds for a rollercoaster of emotions, tech talk, and foodie fantasies. Sponsor Incognito mode doesn’t stop your network provider from seeing where you visit, but ExpressVPN does. Visit expressvpn.com/overtired to get an extra 3 months free. Highlights https://overtiredpod.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Highlight-Reel-of-Politics-Money-and-Tacos.mp4 Chapters 00:00 Introduction and Jeff’s Absence 00:46 Discussing Back Pain and Sciatica 01:52 Political Anxiety and Mental Health 07:13 Conference Experiences and AI 19:10 Financial Talk and 401k Loans 27:06 ExpressVPN Sponsorship 31:32 Reviewing Sonos Ace Headphones 38:29 New iPhone 15 and Switching Carriers 40:34 Exploring iPhone Camera Features 41:32 The Evolution of iPhones 43:31 Bluetooth and Headphone Technology 45:42 Bone Conductor Headphones 53:53 A Memorable Trip to Minneapolis 01:00:09 The Future of iThoughts 01:10:26 Grapptitude: iTerm2 and Home Assistant Show Links 401K loans Sonos Ace headphones iPhone 15 Genital Shame iThoughts iTerm 3.5.x Warp AI Brett and Christina on the iTerm thanks screen Join the Conversation Merch Come chat on Discord! Twitter/ovrtrd Instagram/ovrtrd Youtube Get the Newsletter Thanks! You’re downloading today’s show from CacheFly’s network BackBeat Media Podcast Network Check out more episodes at overtiredpod.com and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Find Brett as @ttscoff, Christina as @film_girl, Jeff as @jsguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Politics, Money, and Tacos [00:00:00] Introduction and Jeff’s Absence [00:00:00] [00:00:03] Brett: Welcome back to Overtired, couple weeks off, uh, it’s gonna be a little sporadic through the summer, but, uh, I’m Bret Terpstra, I am here with Christina Warren, Jeff is out this week, right before we recorded, he tweaked his back and now he is laying down and does not want to podcast laying down, uh, I guess, I get that. [00:00:26] Brett: Um, Christina, how are you? [00:00:29] Christina: I’m good. I’m good. I’m, I’m very, I, I feel for Jeff. Cause like, I know like back pain is like one of the worst things ever. So, um, and, and you know that, um, very well too. So, um, I, I’m, I’m, I’m, I’m fine, but I’m, I am, uh, worried about our comrade. [00:00:46] Discussing Back Pain and Sciatica [00:00:46] Brett: Have you ever had sciatica? [00:00:49] Christina: yes, I have, but usually what I get, um, cause I have, I have scoliosis, so my back pain is usually different, but I have had sciatica before. Not often though. [00:00:58] Brett: Yeah, I have [00:01:00] minor scoliosis. I always hated those checks in gym class. But, um, yes, sciatica wrecked me for like two weeks the first time I had it. Um, and I thought it was just lower back pain, but it’s actually in my, in your like upper thigh. Um, and the solution was massage. I went to like a sports therapist who massaged And it took 15 minutes and she basically fixed my sciatica with like a deep tissue massage. [00:01:33] Brett: But that’s, that’s, that’s irrelevant because that’s probably not what Jeff did in his paddle boat, uh, over the weekend. Um, happy 4th of July. I guess, happy treason day. [00:01:47] Christina: God, I don’t even know, man. Like I, I’m so, okay. [00:01:52] Political Anxiety and Mental Health [00:01:52] Christina: So we’re not even getting into the mental health corner yet, and this isn’t even really a mental health corner thing, but it’s kind of a, [00:02:00] except it kind of is. So I feel kind of like an asshole for saying this, but at the same time, this is genuinely like a protective thing that I need to do, like for my mental health and for other things. [00:02:12] Christina: But I, I can’t be bothered to be upset or care or get too like mad about this election that Biden is absolutely going to lose. Like, I’m, I’m so, I’m, I’m, I’m so upset by the prospect of another four years of Trump, don’t get me wrong, but like, I just don’t have the energy to either, to, to be engaged, outraged, or like, even like, I don’t even want to think about it. [00:02:40] Christina: You know what I mean? Right. [00:02:41] Brett: Yeah, I do. I know exactly what you mean. Um, like I have already lost hope and project 2025 is scary as shit. Um, and I can’t spend all day thinking about it. Um, what I have done is focus more [00:03:00] on local, um, politics and grassroots efforts, um, that really have nothing to do with. The presidential election, because like you said, it’s almost a lock. [00:03:12] Brett: Um, I, I, I will not go so far as to make a prediction, but in my, in my opinion, it is, it’s a lock for Trump and, and we are fucked and the Supreme Court is just, you know, Decision after decision that are, it’s the most activist court in history and I just can’t spend all day thinking about this. I limit myself to like 20 minutes of like news slash outrage a day and then I just move on. [00:03:43] Brett: Focus on things I can actually control and change and not lose hope. Because there’s no hope out there right now. It’s fucking, it’s fucked up. [00:03:55] Christina: No, that, that, that’s totally, I’m, I’m, I’m in a very similar thing because, [00:04:00] yeah, it’s, it’s so upsetting to think about, um, on so many levels. And it’s not that I’m wanting to be like, head in the sand, I don’t care. It’s, it’s almost kind of the inverse. It’s like, no, I care so much, but I know there’s nothing that I can do. [00:04:12] Christina: And, That’s exactly what it is. That’s exactly what it is. And, and honestly, it’s one of those things where I, you know, um, it, I don’t know if this is, if this is how people become apathetic, maybe it is. I, it feels different. It feels like usually people don’t go through the sorts of trauma that we as a society collectively have gone through since 2016, right? [00:04:32] Christina: With, you know, first Trump thing and then pandemic and everything else. But, um, because we were just so polarized because things are so bad because it’s just. Thing on top of thing on top of thing, the Supreme Court. You know, you think about like, when you think about like the ultimate like bad decisions, I mean, obviously, you know, people can be understandably upset about Ruth Bader Ginsburg and saying she should have left before she did, which maybe is true. [00:04:57] Christina: But at the same time, even if she had like [00:05:00] left with plenty of time, I, I don’t, I’m not convinced that, that Obama ever would have been able to get. The, um, you know, confirmation at the time, right? Like, I think that we were just kind of fucked because they weren’t playing hardball enough. Like, everybody just assumed, okay, well, 2016’s a lock, so we don’t have to push and, and have these Supreme Court appointments when they needed to really have them, you know, in, in 2016 when there was plenty of time, right? [00:05:24] Christina: When you would still potentially have a fucked court, but it wouldn’t be to the level that it is now. And it’s just like, that more than. Even like the election and other things are the things that are going to have these, you know, like carry on ramifications that are so upsetting. Exactly. Right. Because that’s the real thing. [00:05:41] Christina: Like, like the, the, the Supreme court stuff that, you know, like the, you know, the stuff that they, you know, keep rolling back. Um, and not even just on women’s rights, but on, on so many other levels, like it’s so disturbing and it’s so upsetting on so many, you know, issues that it’s like, that’s the thing that, you know, Yeah, we’ll have 30 plus [00:06:00] that, that we can’t unravel, right? [00:06:01] Christina: That even if we had a good candidate to run right now, which we don’t, um, like what’s going to happen, right? Because the, the, unfortunately the age of the justices that you need to get out, um, are, it doesn’t align, right? [00:06:16] Brett: I mean, there’s the option to expand the Supreme Court, [00:06:20] Christina: yeah, but not [00:06:21] Brett: its own lasting repercussions, [00:06:23] Christina: totally, but, but, but that’s not going to happen when we, when there’s, unless you have a super majority. in both houses. You won’t ever get that pass. And even then, that’s not even a guarantee, because there’s, that’s a risk, right? Like, so, okay, we, we, we expand the court for three more seats. [00:06:38] Christina: Great. Um, what does that mean, like, when powers shift again? Like, there’s, there’s very valid reasons why, why that sort of thing has not happened before. And it’s, I don’t know. Yeah. Um, yeah, but yeah, [00:06:55] Brett: absolutely a mental health corner. We have begun the mental health [00:06:59] Christina: We’ve begun the mental [00:07:00] health corner. Yeah. So that’s, I’ll just kind of start and kind of finish. [00:07:02] Christina: Like I I’m, I’m doing okay. Um, I had some stressful stuff, um, uh, last week, um, uh, work related, um, that I was able to get through, but it was, it was, it was a lot. [00:07:13] Conference Experiences and AI [00:07:13] Christina: I went to a conference in San Francisco. It was a really good event, but the lead up to the event, there was just a lot of stuff that was involved with it that came in, um, pretty hot, even hotter than usual. [00:07:22] Christina: And as, as. Um, much as like, ADHD is a superpower for, um, like tight deadlines, um, there are some things that, like, there just aren’t enough man, man hours for, and that, you know, can just be too much, but, but things, things went well, but, um, I was, uh, it was like the, the event ended on, um, Thursday, like the day of the debate, and I was, I was in a bar, I was in the hotel bar, like, all day. [00:07:49] Christina: While the debate was happening and like they, they had it on one of the TVs, but not even all of them and just watching, just even silence, like with, you know, without even any captions or [00:08:00] anything on, I was just like, filled with dread and I was like, okay, you know what? Executive decision. I’m not fucking with this. [00:08:06] Christina: I’m not opening Twitter. I’m not engaging. I caught up the next day and it was exactly as bad as I, I anticipated it would be. But I’m very glad I didn’t watch it in real time. Go on. [00:08:16] Brett: I’m just going to interject this. Um, in a poll, only 65 percent of respondents thought that Trump won the debate. I don’t understand how anyone doesn’t think Trump won the debate. [00:08:30] Christina: No, this is a Nixon Kennedy situation, right? [00:08:34] Brett: fact checking aside, but [00:08:36] Christina: Right, but, but who cared? Well, that was, that was the interesting thing from the polls, right? Was that I think anybody with eyes knew that, that, uh, you know, or, or any, so any level of cognition, um, greater than Joe Biden’s, which would, you know, I’m sorry that’s, but I had to, it’s right there. [00:08:53] Christina: But like anybody with like, uh, you know, just like a monochrome of any sort of cognition or, or any ability, I think knew he [00:09:00] won, but. Like the, the big thing is like that it didn’t, at least from what the initial polls I saw was, it was like, it didn’t change anybody’s opinions. Right. Like undecideds were still undecided. [00:09:11] Christina: And, and it’s so partisan at this point. Right. But, but the problem is, is that it’s, you know, and this is why there’s so many calls from inside the house being like, we got to replace them. And it’s like, it’s too late guys. Like that, that, that ship sailed. And a lot of people were trying to call for that months ago when they were, you know, pilloried and, and, and really attacked, um, by the establishment, by the way. [00:09:32] Christina: Some of the same people who are now like, man, we got to fix this. It’s like, yeah, kind of fucked. Um, but like, the, the, the worry is, is that people just aren’t going to show up to vote because, [00:09:44] Brett: because who gives a fuck anymore? [00:09:46] Christina: right. And also, what is it like? [00:09:50] Brett: That said, that said, I will absolutely show up to vote, and I will vote blue all the way down the ticket. Um, like, that’s [00:10:00] just, I think, I honestly think a majority in Congress would be More effective than like it, like they could stop Trump from causing some damage, although project 2025, basically. Gives all power to the executive branch and Congress can’t really stop basically populating all of government with, um, sycophants. [00:10:31] Brett: Yeah. It’s going to be a mess. Sorry. I didn’t mean to derail your, [00:10:35] Christina: No, it’s okay. [00:10:36] Brett: conferences have you been to this year? [00:10:38] Christina: A bunch, but this was just this, yeah, but this was just like a, a last minute kind of ask. And, um, but it was good. It was, it was, it was an AI conference. Um, the AI Engineer World’s Fair, it was kind of a crappy name, but actually a really good event. And, um, uh, I think it was a good mix of people, um, who, you know, varying levels of, of how much [00:11:00] they have awareness about, you know, what’s happening with generative AI and, and, you know, All those things. [00:11:04] Christina: Um, you know, some people are really actively involved. Some people, you know, are more, you know, peripheral. Some people kind of in between. Um, I, despite not having any sort of like CS, you know, like a traditional CS background and certainly not in, into the level of stuff that, you know, like the really good AI people are, are there for, like, I can’t do the low level shit, but I’ve been getting more and more into, you know, various APIs and, and playing with various models and stuff over the last, you know, couple of years. [00:11:33] Christina: And, [00:11:33] Brett: Has there been any good, has there been any good hackathon around, Generative AI. I haven’t seen news about one. [00:11:44] Christina: That I don’t know. Um, but that’s a good question. I bet there probably have been some, but I don’t know. But yeah, cause that would be a [00:11:50] Brett: could be pretty cool to see. Um, we at Oracle are, my team is doing a huge push on this AI hub [00:12:00] where we’re interfacing with all of the other teams at Oracle that are working with AI and they’re Well, like Oracle has its own, like, kind of LLM and, and generative AI service that obviously is inferior because it’s Oracle. [00:12:16] Brett: Um, but the teams that are making use of it are doing some really cool shit. Like, um, there’s one that uses drones to examine, um, construction projects. And reports failures. Uh, um, what are they called? Uh, potential failures. Like it can analyze, like say a beam is rusting, like it can pick that up and it can process the data and give you a full report on like, how many years will this last? [00:12:52] Brett: What is the extent of the damage? And it all, it uses AI. To process all of the images from the drone and it’s [00:13:00] cool and there’s there’s yeah I’ve done I’ve done five or six myself now and every time I’m like man, this is actually a Reason I give people a lot of shit about generative AI for the average person Who’s sending me emails written by AI that drive me nuts. [00:13:23] Brett: Um, I don’t know, people, people don’t give the second prompt to like make this sound, make this sound less like AI. Um, but when it comes to like industry and practical uses, it, it blows my mind and I would love to see a hackathon around it. [00:13:45] Christina: Yeah. I think that like when I was doing some kind of cursory searches while you were saying that, I think like some individual companies have been kind of doing things, but I don’t know of any like big ones, like more broader, like kind of community things. But, [00:14:00] um, [00:14:01] Brett: I should push for an Oracle. Hackathon, that could be really good on my, my yearly review. [00:14:08] Christina: Yeah, no, that’s, that’s how you get a promotion or like a raise or whatever. That’s how you show value. Try to get that off the ground and then, you know, write that up in your, in your, [00:14:17] Brett: Oracle doesn’t give raises anymore. I’m, I’m convin I won’t know what compensation I get until September, but I guarantee you there will be no raise. Which means, basically, our Pay is decreasing because it’s not keeping up with costs of living and [00:14:37] Christina: Right. [00:14:38] Brett: so they’re basically paying us less every year by not giving us even, like, a 5 percent raise. [00:14:46] Brett: They give me, like, a bonus that amounts to, like, 1%. of my yearly salary and it, it means nothing. It literally means nothing. Um, no, what’s [00:15:00] going to save me is my first year at Oracle. My bonus was, uh, 100, 000 [00:15:10] Christina: RSUs. [00:15:10] Brett: RSUs. And they vest yearly. So this year I’ll get a quarter of that. And Oracle stock is great right now. Um, and you know, I’ll take it. [00:15:22] Christina: Mm hmm. [00:15:23] Brett: That’s a good bonus. That’s like a four year bonus they gave me. [00:15:27] Christina: No, I mean, that’s amazing. No, when I joined Microsoft, um, my sign on amount of stock was, was actually really insulting in retrospect, but I didn’t know that and I didn’t know what to ask for and, and all of that. But because when I joined the company, the stock was like 65 at the time or something. [00:15:45] Christina: By the time, like the initial, I think it was a four year period or whatever, by the time it all vested, like, because it was one of those things where like, you know, annually, That the stock at that point had like 4X’d, so it wound up being like the total value that [00:16:00] I got out of it, you know, wound up being still not enough, but, um, but, but, but a lot better, you know, and, and I had, [00:16:08] Brett: Not as insulting as it was initially. [00:16:10] Christina: Exactly. And I’ve had a couple of special stock awards, um, that, you know, things they try to give you for retention and, and stuff like that in, in addition to like whatever, you know, I get as part of like my yearly compensation. Um, and one year, um, when they issued it, the, the stock was like 256 or something like that. [00:16:29] Christina: Which at the time was kind of like a high. And so I was like, okay, well, I don’t know if this is going to be like a thing that pays off or not. And at some point, like there were certain best periods where like, I, I would like be underwater, you know, with, with that amount. [00:16:39] Christina: But now, because the stock is like 460 or something like that, like even that, like the, the hard thing is going to be, and this is why I think like a lot of people like calling like for like, they really like employees especially, but like, I think a lot of people like they want the stock to split because it’s like getting close. [00:16:55] Christina: Yeah. Like as we’re recording this, [00:16:56] Brett: 460 a share? [00:16:58] Christina: 468. [00:17:00] Yeah. 468. Yeah. And when I got in, [00:17:03] Brett: need a new job. [00:17:04] Christina: yeah, when I, well, I wish that we could split because if they split the stock, it would still [00:17:09] Brett: that mean? What does that mean? [00:17:11] Christina: okay, so a stock split basically means that they will, um, uh, divide the number of available shares, um, in, in half. And so if you owned, so basically, um, to, to have a bigger offering so that you could have bring more people into it. [00:17:26] Christina: But what it also essentially does is that if you bought in, so like, let’s say like you bought in at 65, um, And now it is 468. If the stocks split and, and it became 234 a share, um, your number of, of outstanding shares would be doubled, but your cost average, if you, if you bought in like at 65 or whatever, would still potentially have more room for a run up. [00:17:54] Christina: See what I’m saying? [00:17:55] Brett: I, I don’t because I’m really bad at this kind of thing. I’m gonna [00:18:00] take your word for it. [00:18:01] Christina: Okay, so the idea would just be your total number of shares would double, so your value would be the same. But at that point, you have [00:18:08] Brett: Gotcha. Okay. [00:18:09] Christina: another run up, right? So whereas, you know, so, so, okay, so usually what happens, like, like Nvidia split a few weeks ago and, um, and, and so Nvidia had been, uh, and they’re one of the most valuable companies in the world right now, but like their stock had gone super, super high and it split a few weeks ago. [00:18:26] Christina: So what that does is that A allows. people who would otherwise not be able to buy in because it was too high to get in. But B, it means that there’s another opportunity, like if there’s another run up, right? So if it’s 127 right now, but let’s say it has like another rally and it goes to like 175 by the end of the year, then that means that people who, you know, owned it earlier could potentially like double their, their returns or not double, but like have, have, have higher returns. [00:18:56] Christina: Because they’re, they’re, the number of shares would be higher. [00:18:59] Brett: That, [00:19:00] okay. You’re making sense to me. I get this. I get this. I get this one concept. Um, this is now a money corner. [00:19:10] Financial Talk and 401k Loans [00:19:10] Brett: Um, so I just this week, um, took out a loan against my 401k. And I did a bunch of research before I did this, but I was able to take out enough money to pay off all my outstanding loans. Um, and at, uh, about 10%, Uh, interest rate, but on a 401k loan, you pay the interest to yourself because it’s your money. [00:19:41] Brett: Um, and so that sounds great to me. You’re not earning interest on all of the money you’ve withdrawn. But when I did, when I did my own number crunching to see like what I was going to lose in interest versus what I was [00:20:00] going to. Gain in the, in the total based on the extra interest I was paying in. Um, it, it just, it made good sense to me. [00:20:10] Brett: So I paid off all my other loans and came out with enough money for home improvement projects. Um, and now, and now my only loan is paid back to myself. So do you know, what do you know about 401k loans? I’m just kind of putting it out there. [00:20:28] Christina: I don’t know a lot about them except that I know that there are sometimes like penalties that can be involved. Um, like, like you can take them off for certain purposes and you can get them back for certain things. Like, so I know that there are ways that you can do it that could be more beneficial. I think usually, because I think usually the problem is like, like, because the interest rate, like the 10 percent or whatever, like that’s not that much, like that’s better than a credit card. [00:20:51] Christina: That’s, that’s probably going to be about the same. [00:20:53] Brett: was better than, it was, it was, uh, point, point three better [00:21:00] than my, my lowest interest rate. So it is my lowest interest rate loan. And you’re right. If you wanted to take out I think it’s 50 percent of your, of the value of your 401k. Then there are penalties unless it meets certain criteria. Um, it has, it’s like, I think it’s called a hardship loan and you have to provide paperwork that there is like you lost your job, whatever. [00:21:26] Brett: Um, but for the amount I took out, there are no tax penalties. There are no. Additional deductions made. Uh, so I took out basically the smallest amount you can take out without penalties. Which honestly, like I didn’t start building a, I had, when I left AOL, I had like, I think 30k in my retirement fund and I rolled it over and then over the [00:22:00] course of seven years as an in, as an unsuccessful indie developer, um, I basically withdrew most of it with penalties and paid all the tax penalties on it and by the end I had like in it, which I rolled over into, um, Oracle. [00:22:20] Brett: And since then I have been putting in like 15 percent of my paycheck and 6 percent of that is matched and add in my RSU value. And I actually. It’s not a great retirement fund. Like, honestly, and I’ve said this before, but I could afford a pretty nice car to live in at this point. Um, except I think San Francisco outlawed living in cars. [00:22:49] Brett: Um, but where I live, you could still live in a car and that’s my retirement plan. Me, me and Al living in, I don’t know, like, uh, it would probably [00:23:00] be a Nissan, like a higher end Nissan, nothing fancy, nothing fancy. Anyway, anyway, [00:23:08] Christina: I mean, look, you at least have a house. Like that’s the, that’s the real thing. Like you have like, at least like, you [00:23:14] Brett: L has a [00:23:15] Christina: well, L has a house, but you know, but like one of you has a house, [00:23:18] Brett: right? Right. Yeah. Even though, even though I basically pay the mortgage on it, my name is not on it at this point. Maybe I should change that. Maybe I would be more comfortable. Like right now I invest all the money for home improvement projects comes from me. But, if we broke up, there’s no legal reason she would have to, [00:23:44] Christina: Right. I [00:23:45] Brett: like, we have, we have agreements, about, like, if, if worse comes to worse, uh, uh, upon the sale of this house, you will be compensated for the investments you made in it. [00:23:56] Brett: But it’s not illegally binding. [00:24:00] Like, I trust El. I love El to death. Um, but I have no, like, legally binding, um, stake in, in this property. [00:24:09] Christina: mean, maybe that, maybe that should change, right? And it’s not because, like you said, like you don’t, there’s lack of trust or lack of love with them or anything, right? But it might make you feel more comfortable about how you go about things and, and also feel like, you know, like makes the investment feel maybe even like more real. [00:24:27] Christina: You know what I mean? [00:24:28] Brett: Yeah. Yeah, totally. Like, I get a little queasy dropping ten grand on new windows. Um, Like watching my, like, I have, I have my own savings and I like to keep it at a certain point. Like I feel like it gives me a sense of like wellbeing and comfort to have at X number of dollars in my savings account. [00:24:51] Brett: And in this case, in my Apple savings account, because holy shit, that is the best return rate out there right now. Um, but, [00:25:00] uh, anytime that gets, uh, like you take 10 grand out of it, And feel less mentally okay. Okay. It’s a mental health corner again. Money is mental health. Like, this is all mental health. Um, uh, comfort and, uh, stability and all of these things are heavily related to money, which is heavily related to privilege, obviously. [00:25:27] Brett: But, um, yeah, money is mental health. [00:25:32] Christina: I, yes, [00:25:33] Brett: And, and I have been broke. I have been destitute. I’ve been homeless. Like, I understand the psychological ramifications of not knowing if you can afford groceries. Um, and that is a place I never want to be again. Um, I want to hedge my bets all the time. I want a job at GitHub, but, um, I, [00:26:00] I don’t trust that I, I don’t trust that my job at Oracle will last forever. [00:26:06] Brett: But anyway, yep, this is still mental health. I feel like, I feel like I’ve done my mental health corner. [00:26:12] Christina: this is a weird one, but I feel like we both were able to get like our mental health corner like out of the way. It was kind of like a good like joint one. Like that was, that was, that was kind of weird. Like we’ve been doing this podcast for so long that we were able to do. Kind of a, a back and forth, like kind of, kind of shared like mental health corner, all about like politics and money. [00:26:31] Christina: The, the two things that everybody wants to think about, but that genuinely are mental health, right? They genuinely are. These are things that, at least for me, those are definitely two things that [00:26:39] Brett: The highest, the highest source of conflict in couples, politics and money. [00:26:45] Christina: totally. Totally. [00:26:47] Brett: Um, are we a couple? We’re kind of a couple. We’re a podcast. We’re like podcast couple. [00:26:53] Christina: totally. You’re, you’re, you’re definitely like my, my, my pod spouse for sure. [00:26:56] Brett: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right. So do you want [00:27:00] to do a quick sponsor break and then move on? [00:27:03] Christina: Yeah. Let’s do that. All right. [00:27:06] ExpressVPN Sponsorship [00:27:06] Christina: This episode is brought to you by ExpressVPN. All right, going online without ExpressVPN is like leaving your laptop unattended at the coffee shop while you run to the bathroom. Most of the time, in fact, almost all the time, you’re probably going to be fine. But what if one day you come out of the bathroom and your laptop is gone? [00:27:24] Christina: Side note, this happened to me once, although not at a coffee shop. It was, I left my laptop. At my office and I came back in the next day and it was gone and it was a pretty terrible feeling. So even though 99 percent of the time you’re going to be fine, ExpressVPN is a great thing to add to your arsenal, uh, when you’re going online because everybody does need a VPN of some sort. [00:27:47] Christina: When I’m at a hotel, for instance, having a VPN is a really good thing to have in your arsenal, whether you’re using it because you want to protect yourself. Um, if you’re, on weird wifi networks, say you’re in an airport or you’re at a hotel, or maybe you’re on some sort [00:28:00] of like, you know, like conference wifi, that’s a little bit sketch and you’re like, Hey, um, I know that most of the websites that I visit are encrypted, and that’s great. [00:28:07] Christina: So I’m not really worried about sending my passwords across, you know, in plain text. But I don’t know if I really like the fact that somebody is going to be logging everything that I’m doing while I’m on this network. A VPN, especially if you’re using a service like ExpressVPN where they don’t log, is really good because You’re not going to, A, have your information sold by data brokers, but B, um, you don’t need to worry about kind of people spying on what sort of activities or what sort of traffic is taking place on your network, because they’re not able to see it. [00:28:37] Christina: So, I think that ExpressVPN is a great VPN. I’ve used it for a really long time. One, um, it is very secure, so it would take a A hacker with a supercomputer over a billion years to get past ExpressVPN’s encryption. So it is encrypted in addition to, various other, uh, provisions they have placed. [00:28:55] Christina: Um, the other thing is that it’s really, really easy to use. You can get it, [00:29:00] um, up and running with just a click of a button to get protected. But the thing that I really appreciate about it is that it works. on all sorts of devices. So phones, laptops, tablets, you can even get it running on like a fire TV sticks and things like that. [00:29:14] Christina: So this is one of those services where a lot of times, some VPN services work better than others on multiple types of devices. ExpressVPN works everywhere. Really big fan of that. Um, I actually was at a hotel a few weeks ago that was being weird. Um, about the fact that I was running a BitTorrent daemon in the background and it didn’t want me to connect on their network. [00:29:35] Christina: So basically I had to stop the daemon, connect to the network, connect to ExpressVPN, and then I was able to load, you know, my protocol again and the the hotel Wi Fi couldn’t tell me what to do with it. With my information because it couldn’t see it, which is pretty great. So big fan of using VPNs for lots of reasons, including getting around onerous hotel wifi restrictions. [00:29:58] Christina: Secure your online data [00:30:00] today by visiting expressvpn. com slash Overtired. That’s E X P R E S S VPN. com slash Overtired. And you can get an extra three months free. That is expressvpn. com slash Overtired. [00:30:16] A Little More About VPNs [00:30:16] Brett: Nice job, Christina. So, side note, like, they made this, the notes for the read were all about online security, which Like, as you cleverly worked into the read, is not the primary use of VPNs anymore. Like, so much of the web is encrypted [00:30:41] Christina: All of it is. [00:30:43] Brett: and VPN, if you’re worried about your passwords, don’t. Like, just, it’s, most, I think all browsers will warn you now before entering a password on a non SSL encrypted site.[00:31:00] [00:31:00] Brett: Like, every, every browser has something in place, whether it’s a little lock bar or an actual pop up that says, Hey, [00:31:07] Christina: Yeah. No. [00:31:07] Brett: want to think twice about this. [00:31:09] Christina: Exactly. They’re like, are you really, really sure? Are you positive? And people who, cause there’s still a contingent of people who are like, very much, I will never encrypt my, my website. And this is just a scam from the certificate authorities. And it’s like, no, there, there’s nothing wrong with SSL, but that isn’t the only reason why you use a VPN because [00:31:25] Brett: Right, exactly. Exactly. And, and I, I like what, I like where you took that read. I appreciate that. [00:31:32] Reviewing Sonos Ace Headphones [00:31:32] Brett: Let’s talk about the Sonos Ace headphones. [00:31:36] Christina: Yeah. Because we both got them. [00:31:38] Brett: Our, our friend of the show, Brian Guffey got us a great deal on, on some Sonos Ace headphones, and I jumped on it because I am always looking for comfortable over the ear headphones. My ear canals just do not work for. I have bought multiple [00:32:00] iterations of, uh, AirPods that sound okay, but don’t fit my ears. [00:32:07] Brett: Or like, the one in my right ear always falls out no matter what cup size I choose for it. Um, so over the years, like, the only way to go for me. And Like, these headphones we’re using for these Sonys we use for the podcast, they’re comfy. I can wear them for, uh, two hours about before my ears start hurting. [00:32:29] Brett: I wanted a really good pair for, uh, watching TV, watching movies, and music listening. And so I jumped on this deal, and honestly, at the price you and I paid, they are fantastic headphones. [00:32:45] Christina: there, there are no brainers. They’re, they’re fantastic. Where it gets hard is that the MSRP is 450, which granted, it, it’s not that difficult for people to, you know, find certain sales or get discount codes if you, a lot of corporations [00:33:00] even will have some sort of, you know, like, like Sonos, you know, discount, um, uh, like, like, I know that, that. [00:33:06] Christina: Microsoft sends it by extension, GitHub does. But 450 is a lot of money for a pair of headphones. Um, and so at that price point you’re going up against, uh, Bose, Sony, and Apple, uh, the the Apple, um, the AirPods Max are 550. Um, I, you know, I don’t recommend anybody buy those right now because, unless the, the sale is really good because the, um, the rumors are that a new version with, with the USB C will be coming out. [00:33:34] Christina: Apparently they’re not going to be making many other changes, but, but that will be coming out. But the thing is, is that if you already have AirPods Max, I don’t, even if you were very deeply embedded in the Sonos ecosystem, I don’t think that you need to buy these headphones. If you are somebody who is looking for a pair, like you, like, like you are Brett, of like good over ear, um, you know, noise canceling headphones. [00:33:58] Christina: They are very, very comfortable. [00:34:00] They [00:34:00] Brett: The noise canceling, the noise canceling is insanely good. [00:34:04] Christina: It’s very good. It’s very, very good. Um, I used them last week on a plane and so I was able to give them like a real test. Like I actually left my AirPods at home and I just took the Sonos with me, which I thought was like a really good travel test to kind of compare, like, okay, how do these compare against these things that I’ve, I’ve worn? [00:34:20] Christina: Um, and, um, and really, really well, like the, I would say that the noise canceling is, is right up there, um, against, you know, uh, you know, Sony and Bose, who are kind of like the leader in that and then the transparency mode, um, where you can kind of hear background things coming in to, it’s pretty good, it’s not as good as on the AirPods Max, but it’s, it’s, or, or even the AirPods Pro 2, but it’s really, really solid, um, but the big thing for me is like, I, I don’t know what your experience has been like. [00:34:51] Christina: Incredibly comfortable. Like [00:34:53] Brett: Incredibly comfortable. And the, like, I don’t, I don’t have like the Sony or the AirPods [00:35:00] max to compare to, but the audio quality is the best I have in, and I own eight pairs of over the ear headphones of in various price ranges. Um, and the Sonos Ace. Trumps them all. Uh, they, it, it’s a, it’s a really good pair of headphones. [00:35:24] Brett: Like you said, like it’s a competitive market and I’m sure it depends. Like, like I said at the beginning, at the price you and [00:35:34] Christina: at the price that we got them at, it’s, it’s a no brainer. It’s amazing. It’s, it’s harder at MSRP. And the only reason I say that is that I feel like if you already have things in the Sonos ecosystem, because right now how I think that a lot of people envisioned how these would work would be that you would be able to wirelessly tune into any of your, your Sonos. [00:35:56] Christina: Speaker zones that are happening throughout your house. And if [00:36:00] that were the case at this price point at 450, that would be, I think, for a lot of people, like a kind of a no brainer, right? Because like, okay, I could, I could tune into, you know, this room where this thing is happening, or maybe this room where I have my turntable connected or something else. [00:36:13] Christina: Um, but that’s not the case. How it works right now is that they only work with. The Sonos ARC soundbar, although it apparently is going to be coming to some of the less expensive soundbars later this year. Um, and so anything that’s connected to that soundbar, so anything that’s connected to your TV, your video game consoles, you know, if you have, if you had a turntable connected to that or whatever, like that would all work, um, over, over Bluetooth and not over wireless, but that’s the only one that has the, the audio switching feature with right now. [00:36:42] Christina: Um, and so for, for the Sonos aspect of it, like. It’s hard for me to kind of say it. I guess it depends on how deeply embedded into the ecosystem you are. But I think that the real thing is that it’s like, if you’re, if you’re in that market for like a premium pair of noise [00:37:00] canceling headphones for travel and you take the Sonos part out of it, I think they’re really good. [00:37:05] Christina: But as you said, it is a competitive space. Um, I, I think Apple, if you’re in the Apple ecosystem, there are some things about AirPods that are just. better just because of the things they do with the H1 chip. I don’t think that the headphones are better overall. In fact, I’m annoyed by many aspects of things with AirPods Max, but the things that it does really well, like, you know, seamlessly switching between devices and, and some of the, the other stuff. [00:37:29] Christina: is just, no one matches that. So if you have a lot of things in the Apple ecosystem, and you already have AirPods Max, I don’t think you need to look at these. But for most people who aren’t in that class, I definitely think they’re worth looking into, especially if you can get them on sale. But I will say the hard thing is the Sony’s, I haven’t used the Lea’s Bose, although they’re apparently incredible, but like the Sony’s XM5s are very frequently on sale. [00:37:53] Christina: And so it’s hard to Kind of pit the two against one another, just MSRP. [00:38:00] Having said that, yeah, I mean, for a first round of headphones, I think they’ve done a really, really good job. And certainly, if you can get like a good deal on them, they’re really, really good. [00:38:09] Brett: So I can tie this into a secondary topic, but it fascinates me that headphones are not. A quote unquote mature tech where, uh, where like new iterations are actually significantly better. [00:38:29] New iPhone 15 and Switching Carriers [00:38:29] Brett: Um, if you look at iPhones, like, okay, so I just yesterday, Got an iPhone 15 Max Pro, and that was an upgrade from the iPhone 12 that I used for years, and I just never saw a reason to upgrade. [00:38:49] Brett: Uh, the cameras got better over time, uh, some features got better over time, but not enough to be like, I’m gonna trash this iPhone 12 that I already [00:39:00] have paid off and it’s been a trusty companion. Um, finally. Uh, I don’t even, like the buttons got less responsive, uh, battery life wore down, uh, so I finally upgraded to an iPhone 15 and switched my cell service from Verizon to Visible and now I pay a total. [00:39:27] Brett: Of 250 a year for using Verizon Towers. And yeah, it’s insanely cheap. And, and I pay 40 a month as part of a loan for this new iPhone. But I was paying 120 a month to Verizon after paying off my phone. And like that, the cost differences. I, I’m getting a whole year for what I would pay Verizon in two months. [00:39:56] Brett: Um, so anyway, like, I hope [00:40:00] someday again, Mint will sponsor this show. Uh, but basically any of those little, I don’t know what they’re called, baby bells. Um, That, that use, you know, T Mobile or Verizon towers and give you the same coverage, uh, for a fraction of the price. But anyway, the point of this is the iPhone 15, uh, is impressive. [00:40:28] Brett: I love that I can shoot any photo and it takes depth information. [00:40:34] Exploring iPhone Camera Features [00:40:34] Brett: In every, I mean, you can turn this off, but in every photo and you can turn any regular photo into a portrait and like, and fuzz the background, uh, or change the focus of any portrait mode. Like that’s cool. That’s, that’s not worth a thousand dollars, but it’s cool. [00:40:58] Brett: I, I dig, I dig that. I [00:41:00] dig. There are a few. The camera is very cool. [00:41:04] Christina: Yeah. The camera’s really good. And, and the, the Apple, the Apple intelligence stuff, um, is [00:41:10] Brett: Oh, I haven’t used that at [00:41:11] Christina: well, they don’t, it’s not available for anybody yet, [00:41:13] Brett: Is it in the Oh, it’s not in the beta? [00:41:15] Christina: No. But when it does come out, they’ve said that like basically the lowest level of phones that will be able to support it will be like the 15 and, and uh, like the 15 pro. [00:41:26] Christina: So, um, so you’ll actually be able to, to use that stuff. [00:41:32] The Evolution of iPhones [00:41:32] Brett: People on Macedon were razzing me about not waiting for the announcement. Um, but honestly, like I am always two or three, even four years behind, like I used to always have to have the new phone. I would be at this store the day it came out and I always had to have the latest thing. And I got on like the Verizon edge plan. [00:41:56] Brett: So I could always trade in my phone at any time. [00:42:00] And I just. I don’t, I think iPhones became mature tech and [00:42:06] Christina: agree with that. [00:42:07] Brett: the benefits, the improvements were incremental enough. I mean, Apple, all companies right now in the mobile phone industry are struggling to give people a reason to discard their old phone. [00:42:24] Brett: They’re no longer as discardable as they used to be. Uh, we’ve hit like, uh, A point where an iPhone 12 is still good in 2024. It’s a great phone. [00:42:38] Christina: It is a great phone. I, I still have an iPhone 12 that I use, um, uh, sometimes as like a continuity camera thing, like that, that I, that I just use, you know, as, as a webcam instead of using something else. Um, and, and it’s great for that, but yeah, you’re right. Like we’ve kind of reached that point where like phones are for a lot of people, even enthusiasts good enough. [00:42:56] Christina: Like I still buy one every year. I think the only year I didn’t [00:43:00] get a new phone in. 15 years or so it was, was the iPhone, um, 13. And that was because it was going to take them a long time to get it to me in the color I wanted. And by the time that happened, I was like, I don’t actually want the phone because there aren’t any real changes and, and I, I don’t need it. [00:43:16] Christina: Um, uh, and, and honestly, I could probably wait longer than that with other things, but I’m part of like, like you, I was either part of like the Verizon, like, like edge upgrade program, or I do like the Apple, you know, early upgrade thing and whatnot, but yeah, you’re not wrong. It’s pretty mature tech. [00:43:31] Bluetooth and Headphone Technology [00:43:31] Christina: And the thing is, headphones, a lot of it is mature, but what’s gotten better, especially if you haven’t been in the game for a long time, is that the noise cancelling has significantly improved, even in the last five or six years. [00:43:44] Christina: Like, it’s really, really good now. Um, there are still, you know, issues around Bluetooth, but like, they’re, they’re still able to do things, you know, with [00:43:54] Brett: But is that, is that a Bluetooth problem or is it a headphone hardware problem? [00:44:00] Like [00:44:00] Christina: both, but, but it is a Bluetooth [00:44:01] Brett: just seems a little buggy. [00:44:03] Christina: Yeah, it is. It is. I mean, it’s both, right? Like it’s, it’s a Bluetooth problem insofar as, um, the, the Bluetooth standard remains buggy and a problem and, and, you know, an issue when you’re trying to do certain things. And so the solution is either to fortify the standard and make Bluetooth better for everybody, uh, which, you know, is complicated and takes a long time or to do things like what Apple did, which is basically just creating their own custom chips to offload some of the things that the Bluetooth, you know, can’t do. [00:44:32] Christina: Um, Or, you know, like, and I think Sonos, um, people were expecting them to use like, why just have like, like Wi Fi, like wireless headphones? Like why, why can’t I just connect them, you know, to my existing speaker sets? The issue with that is actually a power one. Um, the, the processor power, uh, Um, I think it was the CEO of Sonos, but I’m not sure it was. [00:44:54] Christina: Someone high up said to the Verge, you know the basically the, the power that, um, even [00:45:00] in the latest headphones that are put out, like the, you know, the chips that are in them are not as powerful as what they’ve got on their speakers. And, um, Not to mention, you know, the, the fact that you still have to struggle with, okay, well, like, how do we balance, you know, like good battery life and battery sizes with making sure that these things are going to be lightweight on your head and like, won’t, you know, be too heavy and, and make that whole part of it bad. [00:45:19] Christina: It’s like, there are a lot of things you have to balance. Um, but, um, And you, there, there are like ebbs and flows where there are some years where it’s like, yeah, there really haven’t been any, there have not been any improvements. And then you have eras where you’re like, Oh, actually things have improved a whole lot. [00:45:36] Christina: So, um, yeah, but I’m, but I’m, but, but I totally understand what you’re saying. Sorry, go on. [00:45:42] Bone Conductor Headphones [00:45:42] Brett: no, the other solution I have for, um, my ear canals not working for earbuds is bone conductor headphones. [00:45:50] Christina: Yeah. How, yeah. How do you like this? [00:45:51] Brett: Oh my God. They’re. Amazing. Like it doesn’t have the richness of sound that a good, like a high [00:46:00] quality over the ear headphone has, but for like watching TV, watching movies, um, so Elle, my big, like, even my 32 inch TV is overwhelming, um, for, uh, over stimulating for them. [00:46:18] Brett: And I generally, we watch, if we’re watching together, we watch on an iPad. Um, it’s a small enough screen that it doesn’t, of course, they’re usually knitting. Anyway, and they just look up when, when there’s no vocals, but there’s audio that clearly indicates something’s happening visually. That’s when they look up to keep track. [00:46:42] Brett: Um, it always impresses me how they can do both at once, but when, when I’m watching alone, I usually need to keep it quiet. Um, and so I have a pair of Bluetooth bone conductor headphones that connect to my TV [00:47:00] and. I can’t believe, like, I’ll ask Elle, can you hear what’s happening right now? Because they feel like they’re like open back headphones. [00:47:12] Brett: And it’s, it fascinates me that I can have volume up and Elle can’t hear a thing. Like, it’s just conducting through my jaw and sounding really good. Um, I take them on walks. I have them connected to multiple devices, but the reason I bring it up is because Interestingly, they connect to every device they’ve ever connected to. [00:47:35] Brett: When I turn them on, I hear connected, connected, connected, and like it’s connecting to all these devices and whatever device is playing, they switch to. Um, it gets, it’s buggy as hell, because I’ll be watching TV and it’ll say, Disconnected. But the TV, like the sound doesn’t stop, so it disconnected from some [00:48:00] other device, and it’s, it’s disconcerting, like it works, but honestly, Bluetooth is just weird to me. [00:48:09] Brett: Uh, it seems, it honestly seems like we could have, like we could do better. I [00:48:15] Christina: Yeah, we could, I think the problem is, is it’s like, how do you make a standard? Right. Cause that’s, cause the thing is like, Bluetooth sucks, but. At the same time, like, it’s backward compatible with a lot of things, like, even if things, like, you know, like, multipoint, you know, only work for certain versions and, like, they’ve got to support, you know, a whole range of, of devices, you know, from, like, you know, old video game consoles to cars that people own. [00:48:37] Christina: You know, we’ll not be able to in many cases ever update anything with Bluetooth in, you know, to, you know, older phones, to all kinds of other devices. Like it’s, it’s a hard thing to make a standard like Bluetooth, um, that’s been around for as many years as it has and improve it. Um, but I agree with you. [00:48:54] Christina: We could have something better. [00:48:55] Brett: mean, USB, USB finally is good. [00:49:00] Like, by, USB C is a great protocol. It’s a great physical adapter. [00:49:05] Christina: Yeah. But it’s also really confusing. It’s, it’s finally good, but it’s also like, what, what, what version of US, what USB C cable do you need? Right? Like there’s like, that’s still kind of a cluster. [00:49:16] Brett: Yeah. I, the iPhone 15 has a USB C charger, um, which means that all of my little charging stations around the house, which are all lightning, um, all, all USB A to lightning setups. Now I need, um, Either USB A to USB C cables, or I need to replace the hubs with USB C hubs. So that’s going to take a little getting used to, but honestly, I mean, it’s the same when we went from 32 pin connectors, like everyone complained cause they had to replace all their, all their, um, adapters and everything. [00:49:56] Christina: this is much easier because we already have a bunch of USB C things, right? Like, at this [00:50:00] point, like, I, I even, like, when I got my iPhone 15, um, Pro Max or whatever, um, in September, I also bought, even though I didn’t need them, because I literally just bought them. Bought a second pair because I lost one pair, um, left them in a hotel and they were taken, which fine, my bad on that. [00:50:18] Christina: But I’d lost a pair of Airpods, um, Pro 2s, which are really, really good. And I had to buy a replacement pair because I needed them. And I was like, I can’t go This long without them. I didn’t know that they were going to come out with the USB C version. Um, like a month and a half later. And so I was able to rationalize buying them for myself by, uh, giving them to, uh, my colleague and friend who I was on a trip with. [00:50:43] Christina: And I was like, Erin doesn’t have AirPods and she needs AirPods. And, and, and I also, they were like 50 off, um, uh, through Amazon. Um, like the first, Week that they were like out, but one of the [00:50:56] Brett: very generous of you. [00:50:57] Christina: yes, but my, my, my [00:51:00] real selfish aspect of that was a, I do genuinely like to just like gift people things, you know, and, and so giving Aaron the, the, um, AirPods was great, but the bigger thing I was like, this will make the transition that much easier for me because now the only lightning thing that I use with any regularity. [00:51:18] Christina: Other than my, you know, um, Apple mouse and, and uh, Magic, you know, keyboard and Magic trackpad, or whatever, which, you know, I, I, I don’t, um, travel with those, so that’s not a big deal, will be my AirPods Max. That will be the only lightning thing that I really have. Everything else will be USB C. So I was, you know, uh, You know, incrementally I’d already kind of upgraded and switched a lot of things over. [00:51:39] Christina: So you’ll probably find that too. Um, I know for my parents, my mom has the iPhone 15 Pro Max, but my dad has an iPhone 14 plus. And so they are split. And so each of their cars I have, you know, kind of set things up. A, I’ve tried to get them more into using wireless charging since they both can. And [00:52:00] B, so I bought a number of, uh, the Belkin MagSafe 2, Um, uh, uh, pads, because they’re cheaper than, um, the, um, uh, Apple ones, but they are the exact same. [00:52:11] Christina: They’re the same, you know, charging speed or whatever. Um, and then, um, making sure that each of their cars, like, has, like, a lightning and a USB C. But then, you know, I try to switch my mom over to kind of, like, teachers, like, okay, this is, you know, it’s going to be a little bit annoying, but Two of your, you know, two pairs of your AirPods use one, you know, way to charge. [00:52:30] Christina: One, one of them uses another, but it’s the same as your phone. It’s going to be a few years until everybody’s switched over, but it’ll be nice. Like in, in a couple of years, everything will switch over. [00:52:41] Brett: there are cables that have, they’re USB C cables, but attached to the end is a little dongle, you can slip over it to make it lightning. Um, which, so basically you have one cable that can do both, and that’s, cause L’s on an iPhone [00:53:00] 13, uh, which is still lightning. So yeah, we have this, I have this little, um, charging station that like, I snaked a cable under our couch and brought it out to this just little, um, hub so that we don’t have cables running across, across the floor and we can charge all our devices from the couch. [00:53:19] Brett: Um, and having, now we have to have both USB C and, Lightning cables in what is a very small hub. Uh, but it is doable, but I like this idea of a cable that one cable that can do both cause we rarely need to charge at the same time. Okay. So we’re at an hour approximately. How much do you have a, an extra 20 minutes? [00:53:45] Christina: I do. [00:53:46] Brett: Okay, because I have two more topics I want to hit before we get to Graptitude. [00:53:51] Christina: got it. [00:53:53] A Memorable Trip to Minneapolis [00:53:53] Brett: first of all, and I should have mentioned this earlier, I saw Jeff this last weekend and together we [00:54:00] went to Palmers, uh, in Minneapolis and saw Erin Dawson, friend of the show, previous guest, co worker of mine, we saw her Black Metal Band play and I I had heard some of her solo recordings before, and I had told her, this is good, it’s just, it’s not my, it’s not my thing. [00:54:23] Brett: But when I saw, her band is called Genital Shame, and when I saw them play, I was blown away. It was so good, and she is a Fucking goddess of like metal guitar and it was, I was ecstatic. I, I loved it so much. It was so good. Um, and I, I bought a t shirt. I have a genital shame, shame t shirt. I will be supporting and her, her, her band, cause she’s, she is genital shame and she plays with A backing band. [00:54:57] Brett: Um, and the backing band [00:55:00] is actually another band in their own right, I think in Milwaukee. Um, but I got to meet all of them and they were super cool, uh, the drummer especially was obviously ADHD as well. 90 percent of drummers seem to be. Um, and like we, we clicked and we had so much fun and it was such a great night. [00:55:24] Brett: It was such a great trip. And on that trip, I went to this place called Awamni. And if you’re in Minneapolis for any reason, get a reservation and go to Awamni. It’s not expensive. Um, it’s, uh, uh, it’s native. Uh, Cuisine. So, it’s run by Native peoples, like First Nation peoples, and, um, and they only serve, they only use ingredients that are native to the area. [00:55:55] Brett: So, there’s no beef, there’s no wheat. Uh, it’s basically a [00:56:00] gluten free menu. Um, the meat they serve is like bison and duck. Uh, and, uh, Elk maybe? Um, I don’t eat meat, so I just had a mushroom taco on a corn tortilla that blew my fucking mind. Like, I cr I was crying at the table. I had a corn, uh, taco, and a mushroom taco, and it, like I, and a, a stout beer, and I got out of there for like a total of 40, and I’m sitting at the table, I went by myself, I couldn’t find anyone to have dinner with, so I went by myself, I’m alone at a table, tearing up, because I am so blown away, it was so, like, I was thinking lately, um, about happiness, about am I happy, and I feel like everyone does this, but Pretty regularly, but I was like, when am I happiest? [00:56:59] Brett: And [00:57:00] it’s always around food. I think, I think I might be a foodie because like this, this meal was just pure joy for me. And I swear, I, I have no hesitation saying anyone living or visiting Minneapolis really needs to go to a Omni. It’s so good. [00:57:22] Christina: Okay. Well, I, I, I put that on the list if I ever, um, go to Minneapolis. Um, but that’s really, really great to know. And also, um, uh, I’m glad that you were able to see Erin’s band and, uh, or Erin, you know, and her backing band, um, and, and see her, her rock so hard. Um, I sent, Sent, we were talking about, about drums I sent you, um, in our group chat, um, uh, videos. [00:57:46] Christina: But I, I hope both you and Jeff could watch, so we can talk about them in future, uh, episodes. For whatever reason, the YouTube algorithm served me this thing, which was mega death, uh, drummer playing. Uh, I’ve never heard Mr. [00:58:00] Brightside playing that for the same time. And, and, um, and, and is this guy, Dirk? He’s, he’s young, right? [00:58:06] Christina: So he like, he’s like one of the, the current mega death drummers. He’s not like going way back and whatnot, but he’s very, very good. And he somehow never heard Mr. Brightside. I don’t know how, but never heard that. He [00:58:17] Brett: great song. Great [00:58:19] Christina: amazing song, right? And it’s weird because he’s like, he’s like, I think he might even be younger than me. [00:58:23] Christina: I don’t even know. So like, I don’t know how he missed Mr. Brightside. The song, but he did, he missed it. Um, he’d also never heard, um, um, uh, Paramore, um, uh, Misery Business. And, um, they did a follow up with, with, with him on that, but, uh, this, I guess this drum, you know, online service or whatever, like they have a really good YouTube channel and I don’t know anything about drumming and whatnot, but the, basically how, what they do is they, they play. [00:58:47] Christina: People like a song they’ve never heard for the first time, but the song, the version that he hears doesn’t have the drum parts in it. All of that has been silenced. So he has to come up on the spot, like, okay, how would I play the drums in this? So he’s writing out, as [00:59:00] he’s listening to the song, he’s writing out like the song structure. [00:59:02] Christina: And then he can take as much time as he wants. And he’s a pro. So he usually like a real pro, like he, you know, we’ll usually just like jump in like after he’s heard it once and like, you know, put in the drums as, as. He kind of wrote out and then we’ll listen to the final version and it was really, really interesting to see like what he did, um, on, on both of those songs. [00:59:23] Christina: Um, and, uh, like just as somebody who is not a musician in that way, um, has never played the drums and wouldn’t be able to do that, like, but just watching, like his whole process, freaking Awesome. Like, incredibly cool. Like, incredibly cool. Like, I have to give, like, this, this Dromeo company or whatever, like, kudos. [00:59:42] Christina: Like, they figured out a really good genres of content for people and they probably do a good job pushing people to using, you know, their, their services or whatever it is that they’re, you know, trying to, trying to, like, shill for. But, um, uh, really cool concept. So, um, I think, I think that you’ll, um, [01:00:00] You’ll like that. [01:00:01] Brett: I’m looking forward to that. Uh, what was, oh, the other thing I wanted to talk about was, so I’m giving a talk at Backstock. [01:00:09] The Future of iThoughts [01:00:09] Brett: Uh, sign up using code ttscoff if you haven’t gotten tickets yet. Um, I’m I wrote my, as I always do, I wrote my whole presentation in a mind map, um, which is just, it’s how I think, it’s how I organize, and I wrote it in iThoughts, which is now discontinued, and that’s very sad, but I think it’ll work for a few years. [01:00:33] Brett: One of the features it has is Presentation Mode, and you can select nodes, in the map and add a slide for that node. And you can like, you can create, um, basically, builds, like one step at a time, like selecting each node off of a parent and like creating a slide for it. And [01:01:00] then when you go into presentation mode, you go full screen, you dim all non focused. [01:01:06] Brett: Um, Nodes, and then it like pans around the map and like zooms in on whatever you saved as a slide. And, It is, it’s way cooler than what I would have built in like Keynote. Um, with the right, uh, style for your map, which I have heavily customized, it is just amazing presentation software. Um, if, if you think in mind maps and you just want to go straight from mind map to presentation, uh, I thought can export into, um, PowerPoint format. [01:01:45] Brett: But it, it kind of sucks at it, um, it doesn’t make anything beautiful or usable out of it. Um, but this presentation mode, uh, slides focusing on specific nodes, so good, [01:02:00] and no other MindMap software that I know of can do this. And I sent an email to Craig yesterday, um, asking if he had considered handing off the code base to anyone else. [01:02:19] Brett: And I volunteered. To, [01:02:22] Christina: take it [01:02:23] Brett: to keep, to take. Yeah. Um, uh, Luke from Hook, mark asked me if I wanted to take over, uh, hook, hook mark, um, as he wanted to retire, and I gave that a lot of thought and decided it wasn’t. Uh, it’s a great app and I use it all the time, but I didn’t want to be responsible for the customer support on something that most people find very confusing. [01:02:54] Brett: Um, so, so I, I kind of passed on that, but I [01:03:00] thoughts. Dude, if you, if I could be like, I’m Brett Terpstra, I develop Marked, Envy Ultra, and iThoughts. If that came, if all of those came to fruition, I would, I would, I would, I would be a developer to contend with. But anywho, that was, that was a long spiel about iThoughts. [01:03:20] Brett: I’m sorry. Um, [01:03:22] Christina: No, I think that’s great. And I mean, honestly, like, if there’s a way, like, I don’t know how much it would cost for you to like, take it on. Like, I don’t know what, you know, like both to, you know, take it onward and also like, what would the cost would be, you know, to, you know, maintain it and all that stuff. [01:03:38] Christina: But that, that, that could be really cool. [01:03:43] Brett: I don’t, I don’t know what his current income off it is. It’s probably not selling a lot direct, but like transferring it to a subscription model, you would lose customers. [01:03:58] Christina: But I mean, [01:03:59] Brett: would [01:04:00] also get recurring income. And I, I offered him like percentage of future income, uh, uh, versus like buying the code base off him. [01:04:11] Brett: Um, I don’t have the liquid cash to buy what I think it’s worth. Anyhow, we’ll see what he says. I have no idea. Um, it would be, it would be cool. It would be fun. Do you remember tags? The app? [01:04:24] Christina: I do remember tags. I loved tags, as I recall. [01:04:28] Brett: I did inherit that app. Uh, at the time it was right when, um, Apple basically, uh, Sherlocked Open Meta [01:04:39] Christina: Yeah. [01:04:40] Brett: and, and made Finder Tags a thing. [01:04:44] Brett: And the developers of Tags wanted Tags to work with, uh, Apple’s implementation of K, KM user tags, whatever, which was an easy fix. Like, [01:05:00] they gave me the codebase, like, for free, and, um, I was supposed to keep it alive, but at the same time there was an OS upgrade that broke all of the Quartz graphic, uh, uh, API that they were using. Not like rewriting it from, from using open meta tags to finder tags. That’s like a 15 minute job. No problem. Rewriting all of the GUI that, that got real sticky for me. And it kind of, the app died in my hands. Like I watched like a heart slowly beating to death in my hands and I felt pretty bad about that. [01:05:50] Brett: Um, yeah, back to mental health corner, back to things I feel guilty and sad about. [01:05:58] Christina: Well, I mean, you did your best. I mean, that’s the thing is, [01:06:00] is that it’s, you know, you, okay. One thing was an easy fix, right? Okay. To get it, get it compatible with this new tagging system that, you know, was, was also kind of obsoleting aspects of the app. But then the other thing is that if there’s this, you know, significant OS update, that’s going to require a bunch of other things going on. [01:06:17] Christina: And like, sometimes that’s That’s not what you signed up for, right? Like, you’re like, okay, I can inherit this and do this one thing and I can have the best intentions. But, you know, you didn’t sign up to do a full app rewrite and [01:06:30] Brett: didn’t. I really didn’t. Um, it would be cool to try to revive it, but I, I really just want to get Envy Ultra out the door, and I had a Zoom with Fletcher yesterday, and we actually, the thing that’s been holding us up has been, uh, some store kit issues. Um, there have been like, Minor bugs that we fixed in, well, Fletcher has fixed in the [01:07:00] app itself. [01:07:01] Brett: But the biggest thing was we just, we couldn’t get it to work, uh, with the subscription model on the app store. Uh, and we’re still on StorKit V1 because we want to be compatible back to pre OS 13. Operating systems. Um, that’s important to Fletcher, less important to me. Uh, but I mean, Fletcher runs old enough hardware that up until like last week when he finally got a new MacBook, like he, he couldn’t even test on the latest version of Xcode, um, cause his machines were so outdated. [01:07:38] Brett: So it’s important to him to support older operating systems because I think he projects. His unwillingness to upgrade his hardware onto the general Mac community. Whereas like I get the analytics and [01:07:53] Christina: you’re able to see X number of people are already [01:07:56] Brett: OS 12, OS 12 is 1%. [01:08:00] Of my user base for Mark. Like it just isn’t like, it’s not worth supporting. [01:08:05] Brett: Um, and, and so I don’t, I support two operating systems in the rear view mirror, um, and then anything before that, sorry, no longer compatible. I provide older versions for them, [01:08:18] Christina: No, totally. Which, which, which is great. And, but, but it, but it’s hard and it’s, it’s great to do that. Like when you have an existing product that says, Hey, I’ll, I’ll provide an older version, not gonna get buck ’cause it’s not gonna get the latest updates, but you can still use this version of Mark back to whatever. [01:08:32] Christina: It’s harder when, I guess when you have a net new thing coming out and you’re, you’re looking at, okay, well how far back do we wanna go versus, you know, what do we not wanna do? Like, I, I like, you know, um. A number of apps, I mean, not, not, not, not a ton of them have made this decision, but an increasing number of apps are even making the decision, like, we’re not going to compile for Intel, right? [01:08:54] Christina: Like, even if we’re not using anything that would Make the, even if there’s nothing [01:09:00] about this app that [01:09:01] Brett: that’s, that would be ARM specific. [01:09:03] Christina: right, right. We’re just not going to bother with it because the latest, you know, APIs and other things, it’s not worth it. And it’s just, you know, an additional maintenance challenge. Right. And so I could see like, if I were building like a brand new app today, um, depending on who my target audience was, I might just be like, fuck it. [01:09:20] Christina: I’m not bothering with Intel. Um, I think for an app like, um, Um, uh, you know, Envy Ultra, I don’t think that’s, uh, something you can do, right? Because a lot of, a lot of your core base are going to be people who are going to still have older machines. Um, but how far back you want to go also, you know, is, is, is an open question. [01:09:41] Brett: I mean, we, we started NB Ultra so many years ago that it’s still in Objective C. So trying to incorporate, uh, new Swift libraries into it takes, it takes some extra work. Um, it is, um, It, the code [01:10:00] base is already outdated is what I’m saying. Um, so we have, we have, we have plans for a rewrite for a V2, um, but we are selling on subscription, which means we don’t have to go through the whole rigmarole of releasing a new version and demanding upgrade pricing and everything. [01:10:18] Brett: Um, yeah, so anyhow, anyhow, anyhow. Okay. That was a fun, I am talking so much. [01:10:26] Grapptitude: iTerm2 and Home Assistant [01:10:26] Brett: Let’s do Graptitude and let, let’s you start. [01:10:29] Christina: Sure. Okay. So, my Graptitude this week is iTerm2, um, which is, uh, an app I’m sure we’ve mentioned on previous Graptitudes, but this is one that, despite the fact that this has been my, you know, uh, basically default, like, terminal emulator for, I don’t even know how long, right? Like, I, I don’t even know. I have it in my dock on all of my machines. [01:10:51] Christina: It is one of the very first things I install on any new Mac. There’s nothing wrong with Terminal. app at all, but like iTerm2 is just fucking better. [01:10:59] Brett: and [01:11:00] Warp. Warp is a good app, but it’s really just trying to keep up with iTerm. [01:11:06] Christina: Yeah. [01:11:07] Brett: And iTerm is free. [01:11:10] Christina: iTerm is free in every sense of the word, right? Like it’s actually, um, Like, completely open source, like, I think, like, uh, GPL, like, V3, I think, even, like, and it’s [01:11:21] Brett: vibrant, with a vibrant community around it. [01:11:25] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. Well, this is actually kind of one of the reasons that I, that I wanted to, to, uh, bring it up. So, um, about a month ago, um, uh, I turned to introduce like a pretty big update, um, that had been in the works for, like, Some of the features have been in the works for years, but basically version 3. 5 came out and the one of the, I guess, kind of main, like, kind of like headline features was the fact that as an option, there was a new AI feature that was not enabled by default. [01:11:52] Christina: That if you wanted to go into your settings, you could add in, um, an open AI key, yeah, an open AI API key. And you could [01:12:00] basically, um, use, um, uh, Basically, like, kind of have kind of like a way to chat with your terminals. So, to bring in some features that are very similar, um, to some of the things that, um, you can do with, with Warp [01:12:12] Christina: so, so like there’s, there’s a fig which basically had like, you know, kind of like a, you know, generative AI kind of terminal, you know, Uh, you know, um, uh, command line thing. [01:12:21] Christina: There, there’s warp there. Like a lot of these tools that are adding these things in, um, so that, uh, the GitHub CLI, um, uh, has a, has a co pilot component. Um, it, it built into that now, um, that started out as a different extension. So you can basically use natural language in your terminal and, and get really good things back. [01:12:38] Christina: And this is a useful, uh, like case for, uh, for generative AI because like, Terminal man pages are really, really great with this. Like, like, I don’t have to think about like what, how, what’s the process of writing an FFmpeg script to do this or to do something else or use ImageMagick. Like, there are a lot of services that are really great just to be able to talk to your, um, [01:13:00] terminal about that. [01:13:00] Christina: And, um, so iTerm2 introduced this feature. I thought they did it in a pretty great way. It was certainly not installed by default and, and, you know, nothing was, was at risk. Um, Some very vocal members of the community, who I don’t even know how much these people actually used the application, to be honest, looking at some of the things, lost their shit. [01:13:22] Christina: Like, when, like, I, I, I get it. Maybe you don’t like AI stuff. Fine. That’s, that, that’s fine. Keep in mind, this is free software in every sense of the word. It is both open source and it is actually free as in gratis. That, you know, the, the, this guy who’s built this app that so many of us rely on, like. [01:13:36] Christina: Doesn’t, like, make direct money off of, um, you know, basically, you know, gets support contracts, or, you know, it’s from people like Brett and myself who are, uh, now donating, um, to, uh, to the cause. But people lost their fucking shit and were really gross and were saying, like, really negative things about the dev. [01:13:56] Christina: And, and it was ridiculous. And, and he was like, look, These [01:14:00] issues have been here, like I’ve been working on some of these features for like over two years, like this isn’t, wasn’t hidden from anybody, like You know, people were going to these ridiculous like links to the agreements. Oh, you’re in the inshittification of everything I’m like, you don’t even fucking know what the word means Like I get that everybody wants to say that everything’s been inshittified and I’m like, this is not an example of that, right? [01:14:19] Christina: Like Cory Dockrow would not agree with that. It’s really not. Um, [01:14:23] Brett: Or, or, uh, what’s his name with the Rot Economy? Uh, Edzeetron. Like, this does not apply. None of this applies. [01:14:30] Christina: not, not even remotely. Um, so what, what the developer did because of the backlash came forward and was like, fine, I’ll rip the feature out. I will release it as a separate plugin that you can install and enable. And once you have it installed and you put in your open AI, you know, API key, um, then you can, you know, put in kind of your prompt and, and you can, you know, choose your model and, and that’s fine. [01:14:53] Christina: Um, I actually think the feature is pretty cool. And it’s, it’s one of those things where you can write in natural language, but you can also kind [01:15:00] of have a preview of like what things would look like if you wanted your terminal to do it, um, you know, for you, which obviously most people aren’t going to trust, but it’s, you know, it’ll show you what needs to happen and, and you can talk in like natural language through a chat menu, like with, with your terminal, which I think is pretty fucking cool. [01:15:19] Christina: Um, but even, even without the AI stuff, um, I just, uh, what, what that whole drama kind of, um, highlighted for me, I was like, Oh, I get a tremendous amount of value from this app and I don’t pay for it. So I do now. I’m, I’m one of his GitHub sponsors. Um, and so I’m, I’m in the, the credits, um, of the app when you go to, you know, the about page. [01:15:45] Christina: Um, and, uh, [01:15:46] Brett: You can see both Christina and my name and a small screenshot of the, of the about page. I, I can’t believe there are only enough sponsors that can fit on an about[01:16:00] [01:16:00] Christina: I agree. [01:16:01] Brett: Like so many, so many more people. Yeah. So many more people should be paying for this. Um, have you seen what Warp did with AI? I’m going to drop a link. [01:16:11] Brett: Um, it like, It’s, it’s very similar, but it’s literally on the command line. It will recognize whether you’re typing a command or you’re typing in natural language. And you can just at the command line, ask it. You know, I want to see a Git log sorted in this way with these, um, these fields, and it will write the prompt for you, or yeah, it’ll write the command for you. [01:16:40] Brett: And it’s, I think it’s really well done, but I do appreciate, um, the kind of chat dialogue version that, that iTerm has, where you can kind of, and you can, if it gives you a command, like you said, you have the option to insert it directly into your terminal. Or you have the option to edit [01:17:00] it in place, and yeah. [01:17:02] Brett: Anyhow, good choice, good pick. [01:17:06] Christina: hmm It’s a great app and honestly like I’m giving a 10 a month like kind of recurring donation right now But and and I don’t know how long I’ll continue to do that But like I figure I do at least for a while because I’ve gotten tons of value of this app, you know for free over However long I’ve been using it [01:17:24] Brett: 10 bucks for about a year now. So I’ve, I’ve, I’ve donated over a hundred dollars to this term. I mean, it’s where I live. [01:17:34] Christina: Yeah, I was going to say, I was going to say, I increasingly do, and like, this is, like, I know that there’s some terminal apps, like Alacrity is apparently like a little bit faster at certain things, and Kiting and other things, and like, that’s great, but like, iTerm2 is like a fucking great Mac app, and it is, like, I think like, is the gold standard that everybody else holds themselves to. [01:17:51] Brett: well, everyone, like I said, everyone’s just trying to catch up. It’s like I term the, every version that comes out [01:18:00] new features that everyone else is eventually going to try to copy. [01:18:04] Christina: Totally, totally. They have it first. And I mean, um, I will say, um, I feel like this is okay to share, um, because it’s been several years. Well, it’s been a number of years, probably five years now since this has been the case. But, you know, Windows Terminal, which is one of my favorite apps on Windows, um, for a lot of reasons. [01:18:22] Christina: I love the people who work on that and it’s open source and it’s one of my favorite projects from people at Microsoft. But I talked to that team when Windows Terminal launched and like they told me very clearly their kind of bellwether of like what they want to, you know, achieve was iTerm2. [01:18:37] Christina: And that to me, like that’s how, that’s why I knew I was like, okay, this is why this is like, these are cool ass people. And like, why this is a project to pay attention to, because if that’s what they’re looking at, you know, it’s going to get as inspiration. Like to me, that’s That’s the right way to do it, right? [01:18:53] Christina: Like, you know, like maybe have more, be like, okay, the people who are going to be building this thing are, are people who will [01:19:00] understand why, you know, a well designed terminal is important. So yeah. Um, [01:19:05] Brett: I’m sure you’ve noticed this. Have you seen that you can focus the output of any command just by clicking it with the mouse? [01:19:13] Christina: Yes. [01:19:14] Brett: Like it used to be, you could hit command, shift A and select the full output output of the last command. Now you can scroll through your unlimited history, click any output, and it will focus it and, and like dim everything else and you can copy and re and reproduce commands and edit previous commands. [01:19:35] Brett: It’s so good. Anyhow, yes, I term, I term two, which is on version 3. [01:19:41] Christina: Yes, exactly. [01:19:43] Brett: I term two 3. 5. Um, my pick is, and I’ve been a home assistant. Like I want to talk about home assistant. Um, I’ve been using Indigo for Years, a decade, um, to work with all of my [01:20:00] Insteon and ZigBee and Z Wave devices. Um, and, and I, I like Insta, uh, I like Indigo. [01:20:07] Brett: Um, the web interface and the Python interface are pretty fantastic, but. I wanted to integrate better with things like Hue, um, and, and all of the other more Apple focused devices I have around my house that Indigo can’t. Uh, like my Govee lighting, um, which is You know, you can use it with Alexa, but there’s no way you’re going to get it to work with the Home app. [01:20:37] Brett: Um, so I’ve been meaning to install Home Assistant. I, I was going to do it on Raspberry Pi that I still haven’t even unpacked. And then I noticed that there was a Synology package. For Home Assistant Core. And so I installed that and the setup was so good. Uh, it detected all of the devices on my [01:21:00] network and I could just click it. [01:21:02] Brett: Uh, added a few options for each kind of device, assign it to a room. It’s Apple TV setup was fantastic. And [01:21:10] Christina: Home Assistant’s [01:21:11] Brett: can control, control my Apple TV through home control. Um, I’m very impressed with it as a free project. Again, I feel like we’re on an open source kick today, but Home Assistant, I don’t know if it’s full OSS, uh, but it is, it is free and it’s, it’s pretty fucking good. [01:21:33] Christina: And they’ve got a really, really, really vibrant community. Um, they have like, almost 70, 000 stars on GitHub, and they’re very active, um, with a lot of, with lots of people. Um, uh, we, um, they’re, they’re part of our maintainer program, and they’ve been, you know, part of, um, some of the, you know, various events and things that we’ve had. [01:21:51] Christina: So I’ve been able to interact with some members of their core team over the years, and they’re really, really great. Like, I, I think that just what, what Home [01:22:00] Assistant is doing, you know, um, is fantastic because it’s making it easy for all of these different things to work together. Um, like, these standards that we claim, you know, that for the better, for more than a decade at this point, like we’ve been promised like, oh, this stuff will make sense. [01:22:16] Christina: And, and they’re now like matter has been supposed to be the savior, you know, for the last few years. But like the matter support is, is garbage and, and getting things to work across different things is kind of annoying. And like, yeah, there’ve been things like Homebridge and other stuff, which is, which is great. [01:22:32] Christina: But no, but like Home Assistant is [01:22:33] Brett: Great, great, but flaky [01:22:35] Christina: but very flaky, to be [01:22:37] Brett: And I had such high hopes for Matter, and they’re not panning out, and yeah. [01:22:42] Christina: Totally. Uh, but I don’t even fuck with it. Like for my limited, um, smart home stuff in it, I don’t have a ton of it, but the stuff that I do have, I’ve been using similar to you, like Home Assistant running on a Synology package. Um, but then also just knowing that like, you can like run them on basically any type of [01:23:00] device that’s out there. [01:23:01] Christina: Um, and, and the community is really, really good. [01:23:05] Brett: All right. That was a fun Graptitude. [01:23:08] Christina: it was. [01:23:09] Brett: I wonder what Jeff would have picked. Um, anyhow, we’re at, we’re at almost an hour thirty, minus edits. Um, Christina, it’s been a lot of fun. [01:23:22] Christina: It’s been a great time, Brett. Get some sleep. [01:23:24] Brett: Get some sleep.

Overtired Goes Overtime with Sports, PTSD, and Coffee Controversies In this episode of Overtired, Brett and Christina are joined by guest Jay Miller for an impromptu sports-centric discussion that spans the globe from baseball to European soccer. Along the way, they dive into the logistics of crazy travel schedules, the trials of corporate events, and the importance of happy birthday attention. They also discuss the latest in Mac tools, including Launch Control, Ecamm Live, and the rising star, Mise. All this while periodically engaging in sidebar rants about loud tech conferences and the struggles of navigating evolving relationships during Father’s Day. Grab your AeroPress, sit back, and enjoy the tangents. Sponsor Travel better with better coffee. Head to aeropress.com/OVERTIRED and save 20% off your order! Thanks to AeroPress for sponsoring today’s episode! Chapters 00:00 Introduction and Host Welcome 00:29 Christina’s California Adventures 01:21 Travel Plans and Pet Dilemmas 04:54 MHC: Family Visits and Birthday Plans 10:32 MHC: Jay’s PTSD and Conference Experiences 25:17 MHC: Christina’s Week at DubDub and Pixar Visit 29:43 Balancing Work and Personal Events 30:53 Upcoming Speaking Engagements 31:39 Sponsor: AeroPress Go Plus 34:20 The Art of Coaching in Sports 35:26 The Fascination with Baseball Stats 41:05 The Journey of Baseball Players 43:20 The Culture of Baseball and Minor Leagues 54:10 grAPPtitude: Exploring Live Streaming Tools 58:35 grAPPtitude: Managing Development Environments 01:02:19 grAPPtitude: Launch Control for Mac 01:04:21 Concluding Thoughts and Future Topics Show Links Macstock (use code TTSCOFF) Black Python Devs LaunchControl Ecamm Live mise asdf comparison Highlights https://overtiredpod.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/Highlight-Reel-of-Weirdly-A-Sports-Episode.mp4 Join the Conversation Merch Come chat on Discord! Twitter/ovrtrd Instagram/ovrtrd Youtube Get the Newsletter Thanks! You’re downloading today’s show from CacheFly’s network BackBeat Media Podcast Network Check out more episodes at overtiredpod.com and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. Find Brett as @ttscoff, Christina as @film_girl, Jeff as @jsguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Weirdly, A Sports Episode [00:00:00] Introduction and Host Welcome [00:00:00] [00:00:02] Brett: Hey, you’re listening to Overtired. I am Brett Terpstra. I am here with Christina Warren. Jeff is out this week, but filling in, we have Jay Miller. Welcome to the show, Jay. [00:00:15] Jay: What’s up? It’s always good to be here. Also, sorry if I sound not like me. I’ve been, I’ve been conferencing a lot lately. So, [00:00:24] Christina: The voice, the voice goes out a little [00:00:25] Brett: good. You sound good. [00:00:27] Jay: the voice is always low. [00:00:29] Christina’s California Adventures [00:00:29] Brett: And Christina just got back from California. [00:00:32] Christina: I did. I did. And I’ll be back in California in a week. [00:00:37] Brett: That’s a lot of California. [00:00:38] Jay: That sounds like my July. [00:00:41] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. Um, this, this was not like an intended thing. Like, Christina thought that she was going to be in California. Last week, and then was asked to, well, thought that the ask was to be in California for maybe a day or two next week. [00:00:56] Christina: Turns out, no, I misinterpreted some things, or maybe some things are [00:01:00] misinterpreted to me. Regardless, I’ll be in San Francisco the week of the 24th through the 28th, so [00:01:07] Brett: started that in the third person and finished in the first person. That was a, [00:01:11] Jay: I love it. [00:01:12] Brett: that was a cool transition. [00:01:14] Jay: I, um, I made the, the concerted commitment with the job that I’m at to not travel a lot. And then after. [00:01:21] Travel Plans and Pet Dilemmas [00:01:21] Jay: Uh, my wife and my daughter are planning a month long trip, um, also to California and I’m staying home to do work. It was like, well, I could probably travel a little bit more. So the, the week of like July 8th, I’m going from New York, from New York to Toronto. [00:01:43] Jay: I’m back home for two days, then I fly back to New York, and then I’m there for another four more days. I get back, I’m back for a week, and then I fly to London for the Relay event. And I was just like, I did not realize how stupid I was in all of my [00:02:00] bookings. [00:02:00] Christina: right, right. Yeah, it totally, if you thought about that more, like, you probably would not have, like, gone back and forth between, like, Toronto and and home just to come back to New York, [00:02:11] Jay: Well, it’s like I have to, I would have to pay And like, our, our company was like, we’ll pay for the event plus a day before and after. So I was like, okay, that’s awesome. But that also means that I like fly home for three days and do nothing. And then like, do I even get my dogs out of like the pet hotel at that point? [00:02:34] Jay: Or like, do I just leave them in? [00:02:35] Brett: Of course you do. You gotta see your dogs. [00:02:39] Jay: I mean, they’re kind of dumb. I love them, but they’re kind of dumb. [00:02:44] Christina: Well, no, but that is like a hard thing to figure out like yeah Cuz you’re there like just long enough where you’re like, okay It does make sense for me to pick them up, but I’m gonna have to drop them back off Anyway, probably the day before I leave depending on when I’m leaving. So you’re like, okay So is it worth it for 24 [00:03:00] hours, right? [00:03:00] Christina: Like is it like yeah, that that that That’s a hard calculus. [00:03:04] Brett: I think it would take me like two weeks to miss my dog. Um, like she’s lovable in short bursts, but Man, like, give me a week away and I’m like, oh, man, I don’t miss that dog. [00:03:18] Jay: I feel like it’d be cool if I could just do visitation rights. Just like, Hey, can I just go to the pet hotel and be like, Hey, I see you. [00:03:24] Brett: There you go. [00:03:25] Jay: look [00:03:25] Christina: I mean, honestly, I mean, honestly, that would be the best thing. You’d be like, look, I’m going to continue to pay you continuously. But like, I would love to take, can I take the dog out? Can I take him out for a walk? [00:03:34] Brett: Yeah. You get all, you get all the fun, the visitation. You’re like the, the divorced dad who, who gets to like spoil his kids on weekends and then doesn’t have to do childcare the rest of the week. [00:03:49] Christina: Mom is so pissed. Mom in this case is, is, is, is the pet hotel. Although the pet hotel is getting [00:03:54] Jay: they’re getting paid. You’re getting, you’re getting dog support. Like, I feel like [00:03:57] Christina: to say [00:03:58] Brett: like alimony. [00:04:00] I’ve never been, I’ve never had kids. I don’t know what I’m talking about. [00:04:04] Christina: Yeah, I, same, but, but I was gonna say this is, this is gonna be like double alimony, right? This is like double child support. [00:04:09] Christina: You’re like, oh, mom, you get, you get this and the kids get stuff. So like, actually don’t be as much of a bitch about this, because I promise. [00:04:16] Jay: of a broken home, it tracks. [00:04:19] Brett: Oh, wow. I wonder how many people we just offended. Or, or hurt. Happy Father’s Day! [00:04:26] Christina: Yeah. [00:04:26] Jay: Yeah. [00:04:30] Christina: Oh my god. I have to, I have to call, I have to call my dad, [00:04:33] Brett: Yeah, I remembered, I remembered like an hour before this, I sent my dad a Amazon gift card. Um, which is what I do on stupid holidays like Father’s Day and Mother’s Day. I’ll show up for a birthday. [00:04:46] Jay: They called me, so I feel like, I feel like that was their hand of like, Oh, I should probably tell them Happy Father’s Day. I [00:04:54] MHC: Family Visits and Birthday Plans [00:04:54] Brett: Um, So yeah, if I could start a mental health corner, it’s actually kind of [00:05:00] related. Um, I went to breakfast with my parents, which I haven’t done for like a year because of the whole like religious trauma, complex PTSD thing, and I showed up and they had hidden all of their religious stuff. Uh, they took down like God is love stuff off the wall. [00:05:21] Brett: They took all the like, uh, they had like Newsmax magazines and stuff. Last time I visited and all of that was hidden. Everything that could trigger me was hidden away and it felt super respectful. And the conversation stayed on like family and work and. Nothing triggering, and it was actually a pretty good visit. [00:05:42] Brett: We decided we’ll try to do it monthly moving forward instead of weekly. But yeah, I was impressed. Yeah. Um, [00:05:51] Jay: feel like quarterly would have been my goal. Like, I, I, I love, like, Seeing my parents and then [00:06:00] having that space, like, I mean, this whole move out east was to be like in between my parents and my grandparents. And it was like, great, Thanksgiving comes around, Christmas comes around, birthdays, like [00:06:13] Brett: you have to, do they show up at your place in between? Do you have to host them? [00:06:18] Jay: Yeah, which I don’t mind, like, I mean, we have the space now. And like, honestly, the kitchen that we we grabbed, like, the big selling point was the double ovens. So that like, Cooking and doing the big, the big family get togethers is, it’s like, kind of like, you can do it. Um, and then they’ll bring stuff, so that’s always nice. [00:06:39] Jay: But yeah, instead of people complaining that, oh, it’s a five hour drive, or it’s a flight, it’s like, well, now it’s a two hour drive. And, um, Yeah, and I’ll make that like, I’ll go visit my mom for Mother’s Day or whatever, and then I’ll go up and visit my grandparents for their birthdays, and then, you know, at that point, I’m seeing someone once a quarter, and I’m like, this is good. [00:06:59] Jay: This [00:07:00] is, this is just enough [00:07:01] Brett: Yep. That sounds about right. Someday I’m going to get a real house that I can like host people in. Um, I don’t, I would have like a two day limit on anyone visiting. Um, back when I had a house with Aditi, like her parents would come for like a week and that it’s just too much time to share a house with your parents. [00:07:23] Brett: Um, So like two day, two day, maybe three days on special occasions. But like, I have a birthday coming up in July and I’m trying to organize a birthday party and we can comfortably host like four people at my house and I haven’t had a birthday party in, Um, I was supposed to do a hitchhiker’s themed party for my 42nd, but then COVID happened. [00:07:50] Brett: And so I just, I haven’t had a party and I really like my birthday. Like, uh, if. If I don’t get enough happy birthday [00:08:00] attention, I get depressed about it. Like, I crave that, like, it’s my special day and I’m not a guy who’s going to be like, it’s my birthday week and everyone has to celebrate me for a whole week, but for one day, one day show up, just say happy birthday. [00:08:15] Brett: Um, and, and I’m happy. I don’t need gifts. I don’t need any of that. I just need attention. So I’m throwing a party and I’ve invited 25 people. Six of them have confirmed that they are coming, and two maybes, and maybe the rest of my friends just don’t check Facebook that often, or they’re ignoring me, which I get, I get. [00:08:36] Brett: I invited some people that I know peripherally. [00:08:39] Christina: No, [00:08:39] Brett: Yeah, you think so? [00:08:40] Christina: I think, I think it’s the Facebook thing. You might need to find like an alternate way of inviting them. [00:08:45] Brett: It’s just the easiest way to put an event together, [00:08:48] Christina: You’re not wrong. You’re not wrong, but people don’t use Facebook anymore. [00:08:52] Brett: Yeah, [00:08:52] Jay: I’m, I’m just incredibly impressed that you have, like, friends that you didn’t meet on the internet. [00:08:58] Brett: I do. I have [00:09:00] like, I have like 25 people right here in, in town. [00:09:04] Christina: Yeah, that’s amazing. I have, I, I have 25 people I could invite to my birthday. They are not in Seattle. [00:09:10] Jay: Yeah, like, [00:09:12] Brett: I [00:09:12] Jay: my friends that are local I met on the internet. [00:09:15] Brett: I considered inviting people from Minneapolis, but I just don’t feel like my birthday is important enough to make that two and a half hour drive. So, you know. Okay, I’m gonna shut up. I, I watched, uh, uh, a guy, a city planner who reviews cities did a thing on YouTube about Minneapolis, and he was really impressed with like the neighborhoods, Dinky Town, Uptown, Sewer, uh, not sewer. [00:09:46] Brett: What is it called? [00:09:47] Jay: That’s a lovely [00:09:48] Brett: it sounds like soot, soot, sewer. Wow, I forgot the name of it. But anyway, um, he was really impressed with that. But downtown, because it’s, because it’s Minnesota, downtown is [00:10:00] all skyways. Um, like you can walk from like downtown to like Target State, Target. Stadium all in Skyways and you can navigate the whole city and never see street level. [00:10:15] Brett: So a lot of businesses are up on like the second story and it’s like one big strip mall and there’s really no like downtown walkable. It’s kind of a desolate lot of cars. I mean, there’s some bike paths, but anyway, I digress. [00:10:32] MHC: Jay’s PTSD and Conference Experiences [00:10:32] Brett: So Jay, how are you doing? [00:10:34] Jay: Um, I’m, I’m doing better. Um, I had to go back and figure out when was the last time I was here and it was in January. So I was like, okay, what’s happened since January? PTSD is what has happened since January. I’ve had a corporate offsite in Spain, which was great, except for it wasn’t because we were stuck on a like hotel, basically like the [00:11:00] hotel attached to an amusement park. [00:11:01] Jay: But if like the amusement park was like a discount Six Flags, [00:11:07] Brett: Okay. [00:11:07] Jay: And the actual event was planned by the amusement park staff, so they really didn’t want you leaving. [00:11:15] Christina: Oh no. So you, you, you’re instead of being like at a Disney resort, which could be annoying and frustrating, but at least it’d be a Disney resort. You’re at not even a Six Flags. [00:11:25] Jay: yeah, I was at like four flags. It was, it was great. Um, but eventually I just said screw that and then I snuck out and then actually went into like Tarragona, Spain and had an amazing time. Um, but the event was You know, your normal startup, corporate, you know, all hands get together. Flashing lights, loud noises, no visual sensitivity or photosensitivity warnings anywhere, the same food for five days. [00:11:57] Jay: You know, it’s, it’s what you expect. [00:12:00] Um, and yeah, since then I’ve been having these weird like anxiety attacks following like loud noises. And I, I got diagnosed with PTSD a while back, but I. Felt like it was more tied to like trauma and not like tied to bangs or anything. Like I’ve never, I’ve never been in a combat zone. [00:12:21] Jay: So like, it doesn’t make sense to, to have that. But there, there’s like a level of like, I don’t feel safe here, including with loud noises that have been triggering like really bad panic attacks. And, um, Yeah, that happened this past week at Render. Um, for those that don’t know who are listening, Render Atlanta is like this conference that I think was supposed to be one thing at one point, and then when they learned we can make a ton of money off of this, so now it’s slowly evolved into like South by Southeast. [00:12:54] Christina: They’re trying. [00:12:55] Jay: Yeah, that’s how they promote it. So [00:12:58] Christina: I’m curious what your [00:13:00] take was from the event, because I’ve been the last two or three years, I wasn’t able to be there this year, and yeah, I’m bothered by their attempt to call it a South by Southeast thing, because I’m like, you’re not South by Southwest, you don’t want to draw those comparisons right now, like, you’re not ready for that, like, which, [00:13:17] Jay: also don’t want to go to South by Southwest. [00:13:19] Christina: there’s that, but it’s also like, for me, like, it’s just, I’m kind of like, you had this really good thing. [00:13:24] Christina: You’re not actually ready to be in the conversation of a South by Southwest. You’re not actually there yet as, as an event. People will have, people will have expectations for, for what an event will be, and it’s not that. [00:13:36] Brett: our, our tourist center tried to make our town slogan keep it weird. [00:13:41] Christina: Oh [00:13:41] Brett: I was like, you, you can’t, you, we’re a, we’re a town of [00:13:45] Jay: It’s already taken. [00:13:46] Brett: Yeah. It’s a, it’s not, it’s not a comparison that we are, um, safe drawing. [00:13:52] Jay: Yeah. So like, the, the really good of Render is that everybody that I want to see except for Christina, who wasn’t there [00:14:00] this year, like, is there. Like, it, You have YouTubers, like someone, someone introduced themselves as like, Hi, I am a social media influencer on Instagram. Can I take a picture of your outfit? [00:14:13] Jay: And I was literally wearing like a company t shirt and like some cargo pants and like some clean, like brand new Adidas. And I was like, I mean, I guess. Like, I don’t, I didn’t, I didn’t think that I dressed up for this, but sure. [00:14:30] Brett: I would have said Define Influencer. [00:14:32] Jay: I mean, it’s, whatever. [00:14:34] Christina: trying to be nice. [00:14:35] Jay: yeah, if the company is happy and they want to keep paying for me to go to places, then like, you know, as long as it’s on, I have some say in it, then cool. [00:14:44] Jay: Um, but yeah, no, that was great. Like, I mean, Ashley was there, um, Emily Freeman. Like if you’re in the DevRel space, like all of the major people in DevRel were there, like across all [00:14:59] Christina: there. [00:15:00] I think like all my, all my friends were there and, and I was with my other friends who were in, you know, San Jose. It was like, it was very hard for me. I was like, I wanna be with all my friends at once. Why do they have to be the same week anyway? [00:15:12] Jay: and I, and I, I got to, I mean, I had several conversations with like Kelsey Hightower and like so many folks and I, it was, it was one of those things where a lot of people that I have spoken with online and that I look up to and that I talk to on a regular as like in kind of a mentor, mentee relationship with me being the mentee were like there, I got to, I got to let Ashley win her own, like her first pie raffle. [00:15:39] Jay: So I went to Pie Bar. Um, for those that don’t know, uh, Ashley Willis McNamara. Um, I can never remember which [00:15:47] Christina: It’s, it’s Will, will, will. Willis. Is Willis. Willis, but it used to be back in America, but Yes, but it’s Willis and she’s the [00:15:53] Jay: Um, but yeah, she would award, she would like, I think once a month or something, buy a [00:16:00] pie for a random, uh, one of her, her employees. And. Ashley and Christina were two of the people who interviewed me for my role at Microsoft. [00:16:12] Jay: And I, I had heard about this and one of the interview questions that when she’s like, Oh, do you have any questions for me? I was like, yeah, what pie do you like? Because I had seen this and I had heard about this. So like, you know, we had that conversation. So the last day of render, like I stopped at pie bar in Marietta on the way and like bought her a whole pie. [00:16:33] Jay: It was like, here. I was like, where are you? And she’s like, Oh, I’m outside the expo. I was like, all right, I’ll be right there. And I show up with like this, like grub hub order. And she’s like, Oh my God, is that a pie? And I was like, it is. It’s a pie. [00:16:45] Brett: we’re talking about actual edible [00:16:47] Christina: yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:16:48] Brett: I just assumed, I just assumed we were talking about raspberry [00:16:51] Christina: No, no, no, no, no. Although [00:16:53] Jay: this is a physical [00:16:54] Christina: although Ashley would also love raspberry pies to be clear. She would love those. She has them all over her office, but no, [00:16:59] Brett: ever buy like [00:17:00] gluten free pies for people? [00:17:01] Christina: would buy whatever pie they want. [00:17:03] Brett: Wow. [00:17:04] Christina: Like, like, I got, like, I got an amazing cherry pie or an apple pie or something, but it was freaking great. [00:17:08] Christina: Like, she’d get you whatever type you want. [00:17:10] Brett: That’s awesome. [00:17:11] Jay: but, but the, you know, the downside of that is this event is incredibly loud. It’s very well marketed and in my opinion, very poorly organized. And that is, that is just someone who spent several years trying to figure out how to put on my own conference and interacting with probably over a hundred conference organizers at this point across multiple like communities. [00:17:37] Jay: I think all of them would say that this was a poorly organized event. There were like six tracks with five other associative things going on all at the same time. There were talks during lunch, so like people have to choose, am I going to go to this talk or am I going to eat? And Basically, at the end, they were like, well, we [00:18:00] hired really big names to come and give like the closing key, like Shannon Sharp gave the closing keynote. [00:18:04] Jay: And I like, I was like, this is kind of cool. It also probably costs a ton of money. The speakers didn’t have a green room. The speakers didn’t have water, which I was like, that’s wild. Like the VIP, like they had like a VIP area, which they upcharged for people to be able to go to unless you were a speaker. [00:18:25] Jay: They were literally just tables. Like there was no, like no drinks, no snacks, like nothing. And I was just like, [00:18:33] Brett: What were the tables for? [00:18:35] Jay: I guess if people wanted to like get away and that’s what it seemed like is that you were paying for privacy. And I was like, this feels weird. Um, I don’t, I kind of don’t like that, but at the end I bumped into a friend who’s Dominican and I was like, yo, this is going to sound like kind of racist, but do you love baseball? [00:18:54] Jay: And he goes, why, because I’m Dominican? And I was like, yes. And he’s like, yes, I absolutely love baseball. [00:19:00] And I was like, how about we blow the keynote and just go to a Braves game instead? And then I proceeded to have like, one of my friends who I’ve known for years, which is why I was okay asking if they like baseball, even though I knew they were Dominican, they probably like baseball. [00:19:13] Jay: Um, but we went to like, probably one of the best games I’ve been to. And I’ve been to like 15 games in the last. So like, it felt absolutely amazing, and I know that that event was the reason that that happened, but at the same time, like, the event itself just put me in such a bad place, and I had like, I had a couple of PTSD events while I was there, which is like tying it all together. [00:19:41] Jay: Um, So yeah, like I’m better now now that the events over like me and my daughter hanging out this week we’re just like we’re just chillin my wife is away and Yeah, like I’m in a good spot now, but jeez last last week was It’s horrible.[00:20:00] [00:20:00] Christina: I’m so sorry to hear that and like and it sucks. I think you’re right Like I I’ve always really enjoyed render, but I felt the same way in terms of the organization to me It’s been one of those things where I’m like, I’m gonna put up with like the lack of Organizing stuff like because the the hallway track and stuff is so important and is so good that like that’s fine for me, but I’m glad to get your experience on that, but also that’s just like, that sucks, especially with your PTSD, you know, getting like triggered and [00:20:35] Brett: Not feeling safe. [00:20:36] Christina: not feeling good and not having, not having, you know, like not having like adequate rooms for speakers. [00:20:42] Christina: Right. Like that to me is, is like a, I can forgive a lot of stuff, but the thing is, is like Shannon Sharpe. You know that he had water, you know what I mean? You know that they, they, they, like, had, like, proper arrangements for him. Um, as they should, to be very clear. Like, he’s, he should absolutely [00:21:00] be given, like, all the things. [00:21:01] Christina: But, like, you, I don’t know, if you’re going to have a speaker like that there, you’re going to have, like, you need to have a decent VIP experience for all of your speakers, [00:21:12] Jay: And, and that was kind of like my biggest upset, like upset about the entire just situation was again, having talked to so many organizers, like we’ve had so many conferences in the Python ecosystem that are, that have shut down since COVID. Like, and a lot of it is just due to lack of sponsorship. And it’s not like people are asking for hundreds of thousands of dollars, like, Pi Ohio is a free event that’s like, one day, and it was held at, at Ohio State, now they’re having, they’re having to actually have it in like a different venue. [00:21:45] Jay: And like, 15, 000 is enough to probably fully fund that event. To like cover its operating costs, and they can’t find sponsors. Like, no one will sponsor, and this event’s been going on for almost a decade. So it’s just [00:22:00] like, It’s wild that, you know, PyCon US struggled with sponsors. You know, PyOhio and these small regional conferences are struggling with sponsors and events like PyTennessee and PyCarolinas and PyColorado have just shut down. [00:22:14] Jay: And, you know, I’m doing what I can to sponsor some of these events with, you know, Black Python devs and stuff now that we’re a non profit. But, I mean, we have a total operating budget of 20, 000. So like, we would go bankrupt sponsoring like one of these events outside of like what we’re like, what we’re promising them, which is like 600, 700. [00:22:37] Jay: But even then, like that is going miles for some of these organizers. And then when we look at like, What was the marketing budget for Render? I would have loved for Render to be able to like just sponsor some of these conferences out of their marketing budget and be like, Hey, come to Atlanta. And it would, it would do the thing that these conferences always promised to do, which is like [00:23:00] build the community, build up a healthy ecosystem of diverse developers all over the, you know, all over the U. [00:23:06] Jay: S. And It’s like, it’s, it’s really, it’s just a money making thing. And that’s where like, to me, I’m okay. I’m okay with them calling themselves, you know, South by Southeast or whatever, because what I think that’ll do is that will remove the idea of this is a technical conference for like developers. And it’s more of, this is an influencer event. [00:23:28] Christina: Yeah, I mean, if that’s what they want to do, I guess that’s what they need to do. I still feel like, um, I, and maybe it was different this year, but I know like last year, like, and they, and they, even the year before that, like, they’ve tried multiple times to like have additional music and other sorts of content alongside it. [00:23:41] Christina: And it’s, it has flopped. It has not been good. And so that’s part of the thing where I’m like. You can’t call yourself like this Omni Conference if you’re not like it’s a great meetup time and it’s a great space for people, you know, to get together and like, yeah, if you want to call it an influencer thing, that’s fine. [00:23:57] Christina: I just feel like you’ve got to be careful. Like South by Southwest [00:24:00] like has like a very like is an actual music festival is an actual film festival is an act, you know what I mean? Like has actual stuff for that. Like, Render does not. So if they want to be on that level and get the money that can go along with that, like, you know, to your, like, I think that they’ve been able to be really successful getting money because it’s been, you know, kind of a, a good place for, for a lot of like, uh, you know, tech people to come and, and, and tech companies to, to come and feel like they can, you know, hopefully, um, You know, like engage with like a community that frankly a lot of tech companies don’t engage with and, and, and all that stuff. [00:24:39] Christina: Um, but if you’re going to go like into this Omni thing, yeah, if it’s really going to bring in a lot of people. Um, I think you’re right. I think the organization in general probably just has to step up. But I’ve always had a really good time, but the people there are why you go. Um, you know, the, the event itself. [00:24:56] Christina: Maybe not so much, but it, but it’s disappointing that they didn’t have their shit [00:25:00] together, especially for, for speakers, you know, and that they didn’t have things like quiet spaces and stuff like that, like basic things that conferences who were way smaller do have their shit together on that. Like, that’s always, that, that, that’s always disappointing when there’s [00:25:14] Jay: that’s it for me. [00:25:15] Christina: Yeah, [00:25:17] MHC: Christina’s Week at DubDub and Pixar Visit [00:25:17] Brett: All right, Christina, how you doing? [00:25:19] Christina: I’m doing okay. Um, I was in San Jose this week, which was, which was great. So I was at DubDub while I was quote at, I wasn’t really, like, I didn’t get to go to the keynote. Um, but, um, I, I watched that with, with, um, some community members, but I did go to the talk show and I went to a bunch of other, um, kind of evening events and got to meet up with people who I haven’t seen in years and years, which was fantastic. [00:25:40] Christina: I also got to, um, uh, shout out to Colin Allen who invited me, Command Tab on, um, the various platforms who invited me over to Pixar on Friday. And so I, I went over to Emeryville and I got to see Pixar, um, which I’ve never been to before. And then I actually really coolly, I got to go see Inside Out 2 with, um, the Pixar systems [00:25:59] Brett: to see that. Don’t [00:26:00] don’t spoil it for [00:26:01] Christina: no, I’m not [00:26:01] Brett: but I’m so excited for that movie. [00:26:03] Christina: I’m not going to spoil anything except to say out there, it’s really, really good. Like, Pixar has needed a hit for a lot of reasons, and I haven’t really liked a lot of the last few Pixar films, if I’m being completely candid. Um, I hadn’t, I hadn’t kept up with anything on Inside Out 2 before I saw it. [00:26:18] Christina: It’s great. It’s really, really [00:26:20] Brett: I loved Inside Out 1, and I’m told Inside Out 2 is great for people with anxiety. [00:26:26] Christina: It definitely is. It definitely is. And I would say it like definitely like you’re not gonna cry the same way you would with like the the first one because it doesn’t have that like little kid kind of thing, but it it um, Uh, the only i’m not spoiling anything, but yeah, it’s great for people. The anxiety thing is a really good. [00:26:40] Christina: Um, uh, Kind of description of what that stuff is. Um, if you have been a teenage girl before, you are going to have some secondhand embarrassment in moments of it. That’s just a, that’s just a preparation thing. That’s not a spoiler. Um, but no, it’s, it’s, it was really, really good. And it was really cool to watch that with The [00:27:00] Pixar folks, but only enough, Jay, you’ll, you’ll appreciate this. [00:27:03] Christina: So I’m in Emeryville. I like, we walked from the Pixar campus to the AMC movie theater. I’m, um, a bunch of Pixar people, you know, got tickets and stuff for us. And I was, it was so kind of them to invite me along, like genuinely, like that was one of the highlights, like of my life to like watch a movie with like, a, you know, Theater full of Pixar people. [00:27:23] Christina: But in that theater, a guy walks up to me and taps me on the shoulder and says, Hey, how are you? And it was Brian Douglas. [00:27:30] Jay: Oh, [00:27:31] Christina: Brian Douglas happens, happens to live in the area and happened to be there with his kids. Um, they were in the show. It was, he’s the guy who, um, used to be my boss at GitHub and, and runs Open Sauce. [00:27:41] Christina: Fantastic guy, but, but, um, but Jay knows him as well. [00:27:43] Jay: I’ve known Brian for, I’ve known Brian as long as I’ve been in tech. [00:27:48] Christina: Brian’s fantastic, but it was just the smallest world ever. I’m like, I’m in Emeryville, like of all the places to be, like where I would run into somebody that I know. Yeah, I do too. I do too. It genuinely was like [00:28:00] freaking amazing because I was like, it was this very odd thing. I was explaining to like the, some of my new Pixar friends. [00:28:05] Christina: I was like, Oh yeah, no, I used, he used to be my boss. Like he, he has his own startup, um, you know, he’s doing great, but it was just a very funny small world. Um, so [00:28:16] Jay: for that opportunity to surprise Brett, just some random like encounter, like, Hey, I didn’t know that you were in the third floor of somewhere in Minneapolis today. [00:28:28] Christina: yeah, no, I would love that. [00:28:30] Brett: I will be, I will be in Minneapolis at a hotel for Aaron’s Black Metal show on the 29th. If you, if you are traveling through Minneapolis, look me up. Or if you live in [00:28:45] Jay: if the twins are playing. Maybe I’ll like, I’ll go to a baseball [00:28:49] Brett: after, after Christina is done and we have done a sponsor read, I really want to talk about sports, which is weird for me. [00:28:58] Christina: no, no, no. [00:29:00] No, I’m just going to finish up. So I had a great week with people. Um, it was really, really great to see folks. I am a little bit stressed about work right now because I have a bunch of stuff that I have to get done in a week. Um, that, um, is, is a whole lot. So I’m about to be under, like, it’s going to be one of those big tests for my ADHD to be like, okay, all right. [00:29:22] Christina: All right. Hyper focus skill, like come in handy, like save me. Um, So I’m a little bit stressed about that. Um, but, uh, and, and I’m, uh, not super enthused to be leaving town in a week from now for another week, but it, it, it’s okay. I’ll, I’ll, I’ll make it work. But, um, but no, overall, my mental health was good. [00:29:41] Christina: It was really nice to be around people. [00:29:43] Balancing Work and Personal Events [00:29:43] Christina: Like, um, It was, I was able to, unlike being at, I missed being at Render, but unlike being at Render, because I was working during the day, it was one of those nice things where I kind of had like a good separation, you know, between how much you have to be on and whatnot. [00:29:59] Christina: And I also have to [00:30:00] say selfishly, like, It was really nice being at an event that is not my event because then like the expectations that are on you are different, [00:30:08] Brett: would be way less stress, I [00:30:10] Christina: right? Well, and then also that, you know, that I’m not speaking at to that point too, right? And so it kind of reminds me why I do try to put at least one of those things on my calendar a year where it’s like, this is just a thing I’m doing for me that I’m not speaking at, that I don’t have a work obligation to like XOXO will be my next one. [00:30:27] Christina: And that’s going to be the last XOXO. Um, but like, it’s, it’s nice to just have those things Where you can be around people, but like, there’s not a work obligation. There’s not a speaking obligation. This isn’t a thing that I have to, you know, be on all the time for that. I can just go and enjoy people with, which, um, you know, it’s how normal people attend conferences, but that’s not how, um, you know, uh, we, we attend conferences. [00:30:51] Christina: So [00:30:53] Upcoming Speaking Engagements [00:30:53] Brett: Speaking of, um, I will be speaking at Macstock, a much smaller conference this year, [00:31:00] um, which has an illustrious panel of previous speakers, including Jay Miller. Um, I, uh, I, if you want to go, it’s July 12th through 14th. And if you use the code TTSCOFF, uh, when you buy your tickets, you get like 30 bucks off. [00:31:19] Brett: Um, which is the, the major cost of MACSOC is the hotel. Um, so if you can get an Airbnb cheap, then go for it, but [00:31:30] Jay: Like that and maybe a rental car. If you’re Like flying in. [00:31:35] Brett: yeah. Or taking a train in, which I’m considering doing. [00:31:39] Sponsor: AeroPress Go Plus [00:31:39] Brett: But yeah, so anyway, uh, quick sponsor read, uh, as usual, I’m very excited about this sponsor, so I will take it. Um, I don’t travel a ton, unlike my co hosts, but when I do, it seems like everywhere I go, the coffee is terrible. And when I’m attending conferences, going on vacations, et cetera, I’ve tried bringing [00:32:00] portable coffee makers or even fancy instant coffee with me, but they never taste great and they don’t travel well. [00:32:06] Brett: The only coffee maker that makes great travel coffee is AeroPress. And now they’ve introduced a complete travel system. Their newest innovation, the AeroPress Go Plus, is the first product that makes great tasting coffee using a brewing system that was designed for life on the go. It’s a travel coffee revelation. [00:32:26] Brett: The AeroPress Go Plus finally allows me to have great coffee while I’m traveling and it does it all in like two minutes. It’s the first time I feel like I can have great coffee wherever I go, no matter what I’m doing. And it’s very cool. Everything fits inside the mug with a folding stirrer and everything. [00:32:43] Brett: All you need is hot water to make an amazing cup of coffee Airbnb. AeroPress combines the best qualities of the most popular coffee brewing methods into one cup. A little French press, a little pour over, and a little espresso all in one cup. It’s [00:33:00] seriously the best cup of classic coffee you’ll ever drink. [00:33:02] Brett: Also, side note, you can get a espresso attachment for it and then use espresso grind coffee and make a pretty good coffee. Espresso with an Aeropress, um, we’ve got an incredible offer for our audience on the Go Plus. Visit aeropress. com slash overtired. That’s A E R O P R E S S dot com slash overtired and use the promo code overtired to save 20 percent off on your order. [00:33:31] Brett: That’s AeroPress. com slash Overtired, and be sure to use the code Overtired at checkout to save 20%. It’s time to say goodbye to crappy coffee and yes to better adventures fueled by better coffee. We thank AeroPress for sponsoring this show. I had this innovation, um, I think, you know how at the end of a sponsor read you have to say the URL like three times and, and spell it out? [00:33:57] Brett: I think it should be done. Like, you should [00:34:00] format it as a spelling bee. And one, one host should say, your word is aeropress. com slash overtired. And I would say aeropress. com slash overtired, A E. And I would spell it out. And I would finish by saying the word again. Problem solved. You’ve said it three times and you spelled it out. [00:34:17] Brett: And it’s kind of funny. [00:34:20] The Art of Coaching in Sports [00:34:20] Brett: Um, so next time maybe, but, um, can I, Can I just say real quick, and I want Jay’s input on this, um, so I’ve been watching Welcome to Wrexham, and like, I enjoy watching soccer, but I’ve never really seen the behind the scenes, the locker room stuff, uh, which you do in Welcome to Wrexham, and it’s made me realize that coaching soccer Is just a matter of telling your players to play harder. [00:34:48] Brett: There’s no strategy. There’s no like formations. It’s just like, you guys got to kick the ball more and, and like that’s coaching. And then you look at sports like baseball. [00:35:00] Where the only real strategy, as far as I can tell, is the pitching and maybe to some extent the batting. Otherwise, everyone’s doing the same thing all the time. [00:35:10] Brett: And then football, you have the strategy of like formations and plays and like, that’s a real, it’s more of a chess game than soccer is to me. Um, what do you like about baseball, Jay? [00:35:24] Jay: Baseball. [00:35:26] The Fascination with Baseball Stats [00:35:26] Jay: The way I explain it to non sports people who are in tech is baseball is an Excel spreadsheet done perfectly. Like when, when you are looking at baseball, like the biggest, the biggest thing, the biggest draw to baseball for the longest time was just the amount of like copious record keeping that ever existed. [00:35:46] Jay: And also shout out to the MLB for incorporating the Negro League stats, which the Negro Leagues were baseball for non white people until about the 1950s, [00:36:00] I believe, um, when they integrated with Jackie Robinson, crossing the color barrier and that. So, um, now that, now that the Negro League stats have been included, there are a lot of major league records that have changed hands. [00:36:15] Jay: And it’s wild because you see, like, the Atlanta great is Hank Aaron, all time home run, like career home runs, [00:36:23] Christina: my parents were at that game. [00:36:25] Jay: Oh, that’s amazing. Uh, that would be like fantastic. Um, I think the thing with baseball and now with the Statcast era since 2009, um, you can track how far the ball has moved both vertically and horizontally on every single pitch. [00:36:47] Jay: The record keepers. Like, record the escape velocity of every single ball that’s hit, as well as the launch angle to predict how far the ball [00:37:00] would have traveled. [00:37:00] Brett: So you like stats. That’s what you like about it. It’s stats. Okay. [00:37:04] Jay: but it’s like, it’s like an absurd amount of stats, like you’ll hear, an announcer will be like, Oh, this batter after May 30th for the past seven seasons, whenever batting against a left handed pitcher with two, like with one eye closed who blinks twice, like has an OPS of like 850. [00:37:26] Jay: And it’s just like, why, why do you have that? Hold on one second. [00:37:31] Brett: The Rexim team, um, incorporated these bras that the whole team wears and, and they track like how far a player moves, when a player moves, where the ball is. And like, they never show us what they do with that data though. Like I don’t, I don’t know. [00:37:48] Christina: mean, it’s probably for training [00:37:50] Brett: Well, sure. I, like, I assume that they’re doing. [00:37:53] Brett: Something strategy wise with that data, like maybe choosing what players to put in first, I [00:38:00] don’t know, but it’s, it’s nothing like baseball. [00:38:03] Christina: No, I mean, that is interesting though, um, what Jay’s talking about with the, all the record keeping with baseball. I hadn’t even thought about that, but I like, I do like statistics. I don’t know if that’s ever been why I like baseball. Uh, certainly like it, it definitely makes, I think it easier to jump in to learning things about it. [00:38:21] Brett: Well, it’s a simpler game than football, [00:38:23] Christina: it is. I mean, football is good with stats too, but football, they haven’t been as good of record keepers to Jay’s point. Um, but it definitely is an easier game and they don’t make this same number of rule changes. Like football will make rule changes like every few years. And you’re like, wait, what is this thing? [00:38:37] Christina: Yeah, because I’m, I’m not a big NFL person, but I did watch this past season because of the Taylor Swift of it all. And, um, I’ll admit it. And, and got like, there were things where I was like, Oh, I didn’t know about this rule. And then I would like learn. I’m like, I’m like, how, how out of this am I? Like, I thought that I, you know, as like a good, you know, raised in the South person who was forced to watch [00:39:00] football all the time. [00:39:00] Christina: Like I figured I knew Most of the rules of the game. And they’re like, no, this is a rule within like the last five years. So I’m like, the [00:39:06] Brett: Give me an, give me an example of like a new rule. [00:39:10] Christina: I’m too fried from from being out for too long, but there’s a certain thing where like if you’re like one if you were a couple of um, I guess um yards away from uh From making the touchdown and you and you were not able to get it on the completion play Like then basically like you’re not going to be able to kind of get the turnover um When, when things, there’s some sort of turnover rule, um, that, that’s happened where, where basically, like, it looks like if it had been a setup and it had been a few years ago, then, um, you could have, basically it’s preventing people from doing certain gamification things, I guess, to, to, to make it easier for them to [00:39:44] Jay: push from happening. [00:39:46] Christina: Essentially, yes. And, and there’s like a rule involved. Yes. And there’s a rule involved in that. I can’t remember what it’s called, but it like was introduced a couple of years ago. And like, I had no idea what it was until it happened in a Chiefs game. And then like the, the, the [00:40:00] very, uh, weirdly, um, not at all autistic Taylor Swift fangirls who’ve learned all the rules of football, uh, within 72 hours of her dating a football player. [00:40:10] Christina: Like, all were on it. No, I mean, genuinely, it was the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen, the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen in your life. Like, people who genuinely, like, don’t know anything about football, like, over the course of a few weeks, like, learning not only, like, the entire history of the game and all the rules, but also, like, all the stats for all the players that, uh, that Travis Kelsey will come into contact with. [00:40:30] Brett: I feel like my understanding of football is pretty rudimentary, and now I’m realizing it’s probably 20 years out of date. [00:40:36] Christina: Yeah, yeah, I can understand the stats appeal of something like baseball because it can make it easy for people to get sucked into it. Like, if you’re new to a team or new to a game, like, you have all the stats from all of history there that you can just kind of, you know, refer to. [00:40:52] Jay: It allows you to easily build like a reference point. And I think the second thing that, to me, that makes baseball so [00:41:00] compelling is that, and this is very much like soccer, um, at least soccer in the rest of the world. [00:41:05] The Journey of Baseball Players [00:41:05] Jay: I don’t think the U. S. has kind of the same setup, but they have like, there’s a farm system. [00:41:10] Jay: So in baseball, you get drafted. Sometimes like when you’re in high school, like you’ll be like 18, you’ll be drafted right out of high school. But that doesn’t mean that you go play in the majors that day. You go play rookie ball, and rookie ball is against all the other 18 year olds and you’re probably making 15, 000 a year. [00:41:28] Christina: that, yeah. [00:41:30] Jay: And, You get a, you’ll get like a big signing bonus, like if you actually go on, but that’ll be like hundreds of thousands of dollars. Or if you’re like drafted in the top five, like I think the top five rounds, you can get up to like a million, I think if it’s like the first or second round. Um, but then they’re most of most professional players don’t ever make it. [00:41:51] Jay: into the major league system because there’s somewhere between Ricky Ball, Hi A, Single A, Double A, [00:42:00] Triple A, and then you go, or sorry, Double A, and then you go to the majors. [00:42:04] Christina: then you go to the majors. Yeah, no, and then you even have people who will make it onto the majors and will be sent back down to, to, you know, the, um, the farm teams. You know, you’ll go back to minor league if you haven’t performed. [00:42:17] Jay: yeah, so contracts are incredibly like, it’s weird because like the, your, the team will basically control your contract for like the first seven years that you’re drafted, but that means that like if you were drafted at 17, You may not get to the majors until you’re like 22, 23. And you’ve been playing in this farm system making nothing. [00:42:37] Jay: And I think that that to me is kind of the thing that I forgive. I do think that some of the contracts like Shohei Ohtani making 600 million and the Dodgers pulling tax magic, like he’s, he’s deferred 97 percent of his contract until like his last few years so that they can like basically bring in a ton of really good people, win a champ, win like [00:43:00] two or three championships really quickly, and then figure out all the. [00:43:03] Jay: Tax implications down the road, but like a lot of players are hoping for that. Meanwhile, they’re working like doing Grubhub wherever they’re at while they’re traveling, playing like single A ball. [00:43:20] The Culture of Baseball and Minor Leagues [00:43:20] Jay: And it’s, it’s kind of cool because I think about that in terms of most careers, you know, especially in DevRel. [00:43:29] Jay: Like I know plenty of DevRel, like folks who are making three, 400, 000 a year. Most of us are not, um, and most people in tech are not. And there is like this level of Hey, where, where am I in the, the farm system of developer advocacy? Like I went from a company like Elastic, which was like a tech company, small tech company, and then all the way up to like Microsoft. [00:43:57] Jay: And then I opted to go to like the smaller [00:44:00] company that paid better. So like almost like going to play in like the Japanese league, um, where like the pay isn’t as good, but the fans absolutely love you and like they will, they celebrate their baseball players. Like they were like military heroes, um, the same for like Korean baseball, the same thing in like the Dominican. [00:44:17] Jay: And like baseball is a culture in a lot of these places where every game is like the most important game. And, and when you go to those games, it feels like that. I mean, like I said, the game that I went to two days ago was probably the best game that I went to, that I’ve been to probably in my entire life. [00:44:33] Jay: And it meant nothing in the grand scheme of things. It was the Braves versus the Tampa Bay Rays. And like, the game meant nothing, but I caught, like, they do, like, when they’re doing their warm ups in between innings, like, they’ll throw the ball out into the stands, and I caught one of the balls. And like, there was like, this little, like, five year old kid that, like, had this saddest look on his face, like, right down the aisle, and I just tossed him the ball. [00:44:56] Christina: Oh, good, [00:44:57] Jay: in that moment, like, you’re making [00:45:00] this kid’s, like, entire week. [00:45:02] Christina: No, you’re more than that, more than that. Like he’s going to remember that he like got a ball from like a Braves game. Like I would have at that age, like, um, I have to admit, I have not been to the new Braves stadium because I have many, many, many, many, many problems with the fact that the Atlanta Braves are no longer in Atlanta, like it pisses me the fuck off. [00:45:18] Christina: Like I’m not, I can’t, I can’t with it, but I have so many fond memories of being a child. Little, little kid, um, at Braves games, and when they were terrible, and then also when they were good, like my mom, like, checked us out of school to go downtown, actual downtown, for real downtown, to, to the Braves parade the first year that they, um, well, they, they lost against Minnesota, they lost to the World Series against, uh, the Twins, but the Braves have been terrible, and, and that 91 was the start of their, like, Assent for the next decade of being, like, the best team in the league. [00:45:52] Christina: Like, the Yankees won more, but, like, the Braves were, like, in the, um, um, National League, anyway, were, like, the best team [00:46:00] for, like, a solid decade. So, I, good on you for giving that kid that ball, because he’s going to remember that. Like, that’s going to be one of those things. Like, that’s so cool. [00:46:09] Brett: I won’t belabor this, but like, what you’re describing about culture and farming and all of this is true for soccer, or football, [00:46:18] Christina: Yeah, well, that’s what Jay [00:46:19] Brett: In, in, in Europe and in like South America, like you have all the teams, all the leagues and there’s relegation and promotion and players, players get called up between leagues based on like, you know, skill and affordability, um, for the, for the lower leagues before you get to like premier league, but yeah, like I, I can understand. [00:46:42] Brett: You have made baseball more interesting to me in the course of this conversation, and maybe, maybe I should be an American and get into baseball. [00:46:50] Christina: Well, just find a team. I mean, like I hadn’t been into it for a long time. And when the, um, when the Cubs won the World Series in [00:47:00] 2016, like I actually, like I watched almost every single post season game, like at a bar that year, like I was like, got really into it. And like, I don’t know, I mean, Jay might have different advice than me, but like, that’s if you’re interested in, this is with any sport I find, cause I’m not a huge sports person, but until I find a narrative, once I find a narrative that I can get into. [00:47:19] Christina: And, and for some people it might be stats, right? That might be the way that you get into it. For me, it’s usually like more like storyline driven. Like, you know, how long has it been since they’ve won? And like, what’s the story behind these players? And like, how much are they put upon? Like I need that sort of thing. [00:47:32] Christina: And, um, like you just, just find a team and like find the story and that, that’s how you can get into it if you want to like that. But that’s the only way I’ve ever gotten into any sport in my life. [00:47:43] Brett: I have an ex girlfriend who, with zero background with basketball, just suddenly found that storyline with like, uh, the, whatever the Minnesota team is. And now she finds herself at, like, games all the time, because she, like, latched onto this storyline and [00:48:00] Like, found out with, like, out of the blue, like, not a girl who’s into sports in general, um, suddenly, like, loving, like, the stadium atmosphere and the crowds and, and the game itself, and that was interesting to me, but yeah. [00:48:18] Jay: I thought I muted my, I like tried to mute my mic before I coughed. Um, I, I would say don’t even start at the major league level, start at the minor leagues, find a minor league team. I mean like the St. Paul Saints, like one, the tickets are going to be like 20 bucks [00:48:37] Christina: yeah. They’d be so [00:48:38] Jay: for like right at the baseline. [00:48:40] Jay: Um, again, you have people who are playing that are like trying to get into the major league. So they’re having like. They’re like playing their butts off. But then also the tickets are, like I said, the tickets are so cheap that you can go and there’s not going to be a ton of people there, but people are still going to be cheering. [00:48:58] Jay: People are still going to be excited. Every [00:49:00] time the ball gets hit, people are going to cheer when amazing catches happen. Like you have to, you almost have to like. Love that moment of a great thing happening. And like, it doesn’t take the balls in the air, the person caught it. Like, that’s amazing. The person dove and like barely caught it. [00:49:17] Jay: Like, Oh, that’s really cool. Um, the game that I went to, someone saved a home run ball while like, like scaling the wall and like catching it off the wall. Like that’s, that’s like an amazing thing that happens. Um, Someone calling the shot, like in the, in the stands, being like, oh, this next pitch is going to, it’s gonna be a home run. [00:49:36] Jay: And watching a ball go, like flying over your head and just being like, well, we called that. Like, you know, like obviously you had zero control in that happening. But like the, the magic that comes from doing these kinds of things and, and getting, and again, like the game coming down to like a single pitch and. [00:49:55] Jay: Like an amazing save that saved the game. Uh, and you know, and then your home [00:50:00] team, your team wins and everybody’s excited, everybody’s cheering. And I think that’s, what’s, that’s, what’s kind of cool. Like, especially in the South where like college sports are probably more popular. Like everybody is divided. [00:50:11] Jay: Like, you know, whether you have UGA folks or Georgia tech folks, like I’m from Knoxville, so I’m a UT person. Like when, when you go to the Braves, like they call it Braves country. And it’s like four states worth of people, people driving in from Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, parts of Florida, Alabama, like they all come in and everybody is cheering for the Braves. [00:50:36] Jay: And you just, you get like consumed by it, but you can get that same feeling on a smaller scale by going to a minor league game and like, Also, if you do go to a major league game, two choices, get nosebleed tickets, go to the bar, hang out at the bar, like you don’t even have to drink, like you can get a mocktail and just like watch from the bar, because it’s probably a better view, and your tickets are like 10 if they’re in like the [00:51:00] nosebleed sections, um, or you I like to get outfield seats because you can see everything happening. [00:51:06] Jay: You can see the entire game as it’s happening and you can like watch the balls flying out and you can start to like get a feel of you see a ball hit and you’re like, ah, that’s too short. Cause like you hear everybody cheer, the ball gets hit and everybody screams. It’s because it’s like coming from in front of them. [00:51:23] Jay: So they can’t. see how far the ball is actually going. But from the outfield, you actually have a perspective of like, if, if it was a good hit or not, and you know, we’ve, we almost sit in the exact same section. Every game we go to, except for the game I went to in Toronto. And then we got like third base, we got seats right above the dugout. [00:51:44] Jay: And like, that was just amazing. Like you can literally like. See how tall players are. Like, there are baseball players that I’m taller than and I’m like, that’s kind of weird But like you expect like athletes to be like these like adonises of people, but like no, it’s like five foot nine [00:52:00] guy like 215 pounds kind of stocky like goes up hits a home run everybody cheers And he takes him 45 seconds to like walk around the bases [00:52:11] Brett: That’s um, it, this is weirdly a sports episode. I think that’s the title. Weirdly a sports [00:52:17] Christina: a sports episode. Yeah. No, I agree with that. No and no and you’re right though about like Well, it depends on the stadium like where you want to sit But yeah, if you’re like a more modern stadium like like the the new brave stadium I assume yeah Like getting you know Like nosebleeds and then like hanging out some of those other areas because they make they’ve put money into making these stadiums really nice So, you know there are there it’s hard to find a bad seat Like if you’re willing to you know You know, just kind of hang out and, um, you know, the, the various viewing areas and stuff that they have. [00:52:46] Christina: I went to a Nationals, Nationals versus Braves game in, um, September, um, last year with a, with a girlfriend of mine. Um, she was cheering for the Nationals. I was cheering for the Braves, the Braves won. So I felt like pretty good about that. Um, and, and likewise, [00:53:00] like you can just, I don’t know, base, there’s something really fun about a, about, about a baseball game. [00:53:04] Christina: Um, and that I assume is, is similar to like European soccer games. Um, You know, where, yeah, you just, you have a lot of people who are just really committed to the, to the team. It’s, yeah. [00:53:17] Brett: All right. Well, thank you both of you for enlightening me. Um, I’ve always, I’ve always, Had a peripheral interest in sports, more about what you’re talking about, Jay. Like the idea of like being in the crowd and seeing something amazing happen. Uh, which is part of why I’ve always enjoyed soccer is it’s so fucking long between goals when it happens, the eruption of the crowd, even, even if they get in the box, there’s the cross and they miss the eruption of getting close. [00:53:49] Brett: It’s almost like, um, Tantric sex, where like, you finally, you finally get there, um, or you edge for a whole game and it’s a draw, [00:54:00] but, um, anyway, should we, should we Graptitude before we close out here? [00:54:05] Christina: Yeah, let’s gratitude. [00:54:06] Brett: Jay, I know you have something to say. [00:54:10] grAPPtitude: Exploring Live Streaming Tools [00:54:10] Jay: shout out to So this is an app that I used they’ve sponsored Terpstra I don’t know if they’ve sponsored Overtired or not, um, but it’s Ecamm live. Um, I have, I’ve been like teasing the idea of doing regular streams and it’s, it’s not even like because I want to be a streamer. It’s just because whenever I need to actually do like a coding project, um, If I have the camera watching me, I will sit down and do it versus like getting distracted and walking around and like not doing what I’m supposed to do. [00:54:45] Jay: Um, so I like, streamed a few times and in, even in like, not like non streaming situations, like if I’m doing, I do a meetup every Friday with black Python devs, and it’s more of just like a [00:55:00] check in with folks, but it’s so easy for someone to like, ask a question. And they’d be like, hey, I have a career question. [00:55:07] Jay: I’m like, okay, you know what? I’m going to record this really quick. So then I just like open Ecamm live. And it has like a really simple setup to where if I want a certain window, I just drag that window in and then like, boom, now that window is the main focus. My camera’s down at the bottom. I have like 8, 000 cameras so I can quickly switch between which camera I want pointed. [00:55:27] Jay: But they also added, uh, they just recently added like zoom support. So like you can do a lot of the, you know, super dynamic stuff within zoom. [00:55:37] Brett: Oh, that’s [00:55:38] Jay: But it also, like, if you’re live streaming a Zoom call, like, you know, some people do that, some meetups do that, you can, it integrates the Zoom chat with the actual chat of your, like, live stream. [00:55:52] Jay: So, like, people who are watching on YouTube have just as much, like, integration with the folks who are, like, in the Zoom [00:56:00] call. And as, like, messages that are public for everyone, like, those will, those can get pushed up. And you can even, like, Pull them up on the screen. Oh, this person asked this question and then have it like load up on your screen and everything. [00:56:11] Jay: So like, if it, if you’re familiar with StreamYard, it’s very similar to what StreamYard does, but it’s like on your system, so it can integrate with the application and the tools that you have on your system. And in my opinion, it’s. It’s just easier to use than StreamYard, but I definitely would look at it from like the I’m going to record a video or I’m going to do a live stream, uh, type thing. [00:56:34] Christina: Yeah, [00:56:35] Brett: be mistaken, but I think that’s who Doc Rock is [00:56:38] Jay: That is who DocRock [00:56:39] Christina: It is who Doc rocks with. Um, yeah, they do great stuff. It’s, I mean, it’s, it’s, it’s very similar to OBS, frankly, but it’s much better optimized for a Mac. So like if you, if you wanted to do OBS type of stuff, but like, because it’s Mac support is, I mean, it’s not primarily Mac application. Like I think that the, and I actually give money to the OBS developer every month because I [00:56:57] Brett: Yeah. I love OBS, but I’ve never [00:57:00] tried Ecamm. [00:57:00] Christina: Yeah. It’s good. They’ve had it for a long time, um, and, and they’ve kind of adopted, uh, adapted it over the years, but it, it, it’s good. I haven’t used it as much as, as Jay has, but, um, it’s, it’s good. It’s good stuff for sure. [00:57:13] Jay: Yeah. I think if you, if you’ve tempted, if you’re tempted to like try OBS and you like get to those screens and you’re like, I don’t know what to do now, or like, I don’t want to spend a bunch of time configuring them. And then you like go to StreamYard and you’re like, StreamYard’s kind of cool too, but I like a [00:57:29] Christina: Very cool. But yeah. Mm hmm. [00:57:31] Jay: Like Ecamm is that like perfect balance between not giving you every single configurable option like OBS does, but giving you a lot of them, but then also having some of the really nice features of like allowing guests to come in on a call if you pay for like a certain amount. Like that’s probably the one downside is that it is like a subscription based product, but. [00:57:51] Jay: I mean, I think, I think it was like a hundred dollars for the year. Um, and I get all the features except for the ability to bring [00:58:00] like people into the call, which now with zoom integration, like I don’t even need that, like I can just bring them into a zoom call and then do all the same things anyway. Um, but yeah, it’s, it’s like that perfect balance of more, more flexibility than StreamYard, but easier to use than like OBS on the Mac. [00:58:20] Jay: And all the other OBS forks just don’t work on Macs. Like, they never work on Macs. It’s always embarrassing how bad they are on a Mac. [00:58:29] Brett: All right. Cool. Cool, cool, cool, cool. Christina, do you have one you want to talk [00:58:34] Christina: I do. [00:58:35] grAPPtitude: Managing Development Environments [00:58:35] Christina: So, okay, I’ve been having to do some demo projects for, um, a thing that I’m going to have to do in, um, uh, eight days, and, um, I’ve been having to kind of, like, mess with my, like, uh, version, um, manager setup for a bunch of different tools, so things like Node, Python, stuff like that, and I’ve used various Node managers over the years. [00:58:55] Christina: Volta was what I was using for a long time as kind of, like, my in VM, um, Um, uh, [00:59:00] alternative, um, just as an easy way to quickly install or pin a version of Node or NPM, um, globally or per project. But, um, I needed something that could also work with Python. And I know that there are, and Jay can correct me about like all the many different like Python version manager things that are out there. [00:59:19] Christina: Um, but I was struggling and so I decided to try out an app called MISE, um, or I think it’s pronounced MISE, M I S E. It’s similar to ASDF, which is also kind of like [00:59:30] Brett: Yeah, I love ASDF. [00:59:31] Christina: MyEyes is like that and it’s compatible with, with ASDF plugins, but I like it a little bit better. Um, and so it, it has plugins. It’ll work with ASDF plugins out of the box, but it has support for more types of things too. [00:59:45] Christina: And I, and I just kind of like how it’s laid out a little bit more so, um, um, oh, and it’s Mee’s. I’m sorry. So [00:59:52] Jay: Yeah, it’s like mise en place, [00:59:54] Christina: Mise en place. Yes. Mise en [00:59:56] Jay: everything. Like, it’s a cooking thing where you get all your ingredients [01:00:00] out. [01:00:00] Christina: No, that makes sense. And because mise en scene, which is, which is the French cinema term. Um, okay. So mise, uh, apologies for saying that wrong, is, is my pick. [01:00:10] Christina: Um, yeah, like you can use like ASDF, like on the backend, if you want to use ASDF plugins, but it also works with, with, um, with Rust, uh, for Cargo and Go and, and NPM and things like that. And, um, it also works with, um, um, Uh, uh, uh, direct nev, uh, for, for, um, Python stuff. So, um, if you’ve, if you’ve struggled with managing, you know, versions for your dev tools, um, and, and you haven’t jumped on the A SDF bandwagon, or even if you have, if you’re interested in looking at something else, me is, uh, is my pick. [01:00:47] Brett: I’m watching the 30 second demo. I like the, uh, the very natural language subcommands it uses. [01:00:54] Christina: Yeah. I like that a lot too. Yeah. [01:00:55] Brett: I, yeah, I’m going to try this out, especially if it works with all my ASDF [01:01:00] plugins. [01:01:00] Christina: yeah. I mean, the developer is very, very active. Like, he’s, he’s great. And, um, like, that was one of the other things that kind of, like, Made me feel good about it because some of these tools, like, will start out really strong, like Volta is a great example, and then just kind of die, and then they don’t have any, you know, updates, and like, that can be okay, but like, then you’re like, okay, but I want Bund support, or I want Deno support, or whatever, and like, they never, people make patches, but they never get them, and so, um, I, I really, uh, I’m appreciative of, of this. [01:01:29] Christina: So, so Mise is my [01:01:30] Brett: Nice. I am, I am waffling on my pick. Um, I was going to talk about Affinity Tools, but I’m so concerned they’re going subscription after a recent acquisition. Um, [01:01:44] Christina: they say. Yeah. I don’t believe them. [01:01:46] Brett: Yeah. And then I was going to talk about my tool. How’s it probably repeated. Um, because it has been my most used, like I can go into any of my [01:02:00] project directories of which I have easily a hundred and I can just type, how’s it minus R deploy and no matter what the project is, whether it’s an Xcode project or a Ruby gem or a Python app that I’m working on, like it will Build and deploy that project. [01:02:19] grAPPtitude: Launch Control for Mac [01:02:19] Brett: And I don’t have to remember commands for everything, but what I actually want to talk about is this app called Launch Control for Mac, um, that gives you a very good graphical user interface. AKA GUI, um, to work with LaunchD on your Mac. Um, and if you’re not familiar with LaunchD, think about it as Cron for like sane people. [01:02:48] Brett: Um, and it offers all kinds of, it’s all done in a plist and you have all kinds of keys for like repeating a task. How often it repeats, whether it repeats after a [01:03:00] shutdown, like if it catches up after a system shutdown, um. You can do calendar timing, you can do interval timing, um, you can do, uh, you, you have, um, uh, process helpers so you can run as root. [01:03:15] Brett: And all of this in Launch Control is just drag and drop and you can build these LaunchD files and it gives you a, an overview of everything you have in your global daemons, daemons, uh, your, like, user, uh, specific. LaunchD Tasks. It’s awesome and it’s like I think nine bucks still and it is still being updated after years of existing and I, [01:03:44] Christina: now, but still, but, but, but that’s still a great, that’s still a great price. But yeah, but, but, but it’s, oh no, sorry. It might be less than that. It is, um, 18 was for Ammonite. For Launch Control 2, it is 21 for the personal license and then 15 if you needed to update, [01:04:00] but yeah, [01:04:00] Brett: I don’t know if Lingen, Lingen was kind of what I used before Launch Control and I think Lingen still exists, but it hasn’t been up active for a while. I don’t think. Um, but Launch Control is, I just got an update yesterday. It’s still It’s still improving. Love it. [01:04:18] Christina: Fantastic. [01:04:20] Jay: I [01:04:20] Brett: All right. [01:04:21] Concluding Thoughts and Future Topics [01:04:21] Brett: Well, thanks for the sports episode. [01:04:23] Brett: We were going to talk about Apple and AI. We were going to talk about, I was going to talk about record, uh, like Windows recording, everything you do and how I actually, Don’t, I don’t hate the idea of local recordings. There’s apps called Rewind and Limitless from the same dev that actually intrigue me, like they can give you, they can listen to your, your Zoom meetings and give you like meeting notes automatically. [01:04:51] Brett: And they even have like a dongle [01:04:53] Christina: Yeah, they have a pin now. Yeah, [01:04:54] Brett: record your conversations with other people and get like AI summaries. [01:05:00] And it’s intriguing to me. Um, I have, I don’t talk about confidential information and like the idea. Anyway, that’s, we’ll do that next [01:05:09] Christina: You do it and yeah, we’ll do it. We’ll do it next week because, uh, yeah, because they, they delayed recall. So, you know, they listened to the, to the massive shitstorm. Um, yeah, like they’re like, like, long story short, just my personal opinion, not representative of, uh, Microsoft or a Microsoft subsidiary. I think that this was This was a, an own goal, this was a failure of marketing and of, uh, of messaging, not, not a product, uh, or design failure to be completely honest. [01:05:37] Christina: I think this is, this is completely a, a you’ve told this story and what this is doing the wrong way thing. [01:05:42] Jay: This is, this is the, the kickstart of the, like, Metro Boomin future, we don’t trust you, like, rap beef to Drake and Microsoft is Drake in this instance. [01:05:54] Christina: Absolutely. And, and like, you don’t want to be Drake right now, right? Like, like, that, that’s, that’s like, that’s like a hard place to [01:06:00] be because like, everybody wanted to be Drake and now you’re like, oh no, oh no, what’s coming, right? Like, you, it, please, please do what Drake didn’t do and shut the fuck up because you don’t need like the, the, the, the three Kendrick, you know, um, uh, tracks in one weekend coming out. [01:06:16] Christina: Like, you really don’t need that. [01:06:19] Brett: All right. Well, thanks for being here, Jay. [01:06:23] Jay: Absolutely. Anytime. [01:06:25] Christina: We love you. Get some sleep, guys. [01:06:27] Jay: Get some sleep.

Dive into a reunion record with Geeky Giggles, Merch Madness, and mental health updates from Brett, Christina, and Jeff. From hotel misadventures to project management chaos, they discuss Carbon Copy Cloner 7, Taco Fancy GitHub, and tech tips. Get ready for an ultimate guide to tech, tacos, thongs, and more!

Topics covered in the podcast include outdoor experiences with mosquitoes and birds, weight loss drugs, mental health updates, challenges with Spotify, managing subscriptions and permissions, new technologies like Kino and Fish Shell, and entertainment preferences. The hosts also discuss TV show recommendations, the therapeutic power of stories, frustrations with GitHub repo creation, Spotify's Car Thing controversy, and celebrate useful tools and apps.