Overtired

Christina tells the epic tale of Taylor Swift, from early days to the middle of the night. Sponsor Meet Mindbloom. When it comes to mental health, sometimes you need something more to achieve a real and lasting breakthrough. Maybe it’s time to check out a guided ketamine therapy program — Mindbloom can help. After only 2 sessions, 87% of Mindbloom clients reported improvements in depression, and 85% reported improvements in anxiety. Right now, Mindbloom is offering Overtired listeners $100 off your first six-session program when you sign up at mindbloom.com/overtired and use promo code overtired at checkout. NordVPN It’s the price of a cup of coffee every month, a small price to pay for premium cyber-security and access to a vast amount of entertaining content from all over the world. Grab your EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal by going to nordvpn.com/overtired. Show Links Taylor Swift — Midnights, Rolling Stone Grapptitude TextBuddy/Boop Deckset Christina’s livestream with the Charm team VHS Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript The One About Taylor Swift [00:00:00] Christina: I don’t want [00:00:01] Jeffrey: Anybody else mean that? [00:00:04] Christina: I touch myself. [00:00:06] Jeffrey: Mm-hmm. [00:00:06] Brett: Mm-hmm. [00:00:07] Intro: Tired. So tired, Overtired. [00:00:11] Jeffrey: Hi everybody. This is the Overtired podcast. I’m here today with Brett Terpstra. Say hello, Brett [00:00:19] Brett: Hello, Jeff? [00:00:20] Jeffrey: I love, I love commanding hellos. [00:00:22] Brett: Wait. Hello, Brett? [00:00:24] Jeffrey: Christina Warren. Say hello [00:00:25] Christina: Hello. [00:00:26] Jeffrey: and our special guest, Taylor Swift. She’s not really here, but she’s here in spirit. We’ll talk all about her. Just get ready, start stretching. [00:00:35] Um, it’s good to see you all. I haven’t seen you. I guess it was only a week I took off, but it feels like longer for some reason. [00:00:41] Brett: Yeah. We miss you. [00:00:43] Jeffrey: Thank you. Glad [00:00:44] Brett: Yeah. You, you’ve had, uh, you’ve had some tooth trauma. What’s going on with your mouth? [00:00:49] Jeffrey: Mm, everybody loves to hear people’s dental problems. Uh, so I went into the, I had this horrible pain and I had it for a little while and I went into the dentist cause I was about to leave town, so some friends and I, we rented a little island with a cabin on it. And, uh, and I was gonna be living on an island in northern Minnesota for like four days, but I had all this tooth pain. [00:01:10] So I went in just to see if there was anything to be done or take a look at it. And they were like, Oh, this tooth is is like dying. It’s, and they, it’s called resorption. And the idea is basically that my, my body has targeted that tooth, uh, and is sort of, Sending all of its negative dark energy to the tooth, and the tooth was just like decaying from the inside. [00:01:32] It was just a really bizarre thing. I’ve never heard of it. And they’re like, This has to get pulled. And so just yesterday I went and got it pulled. I have very long roots. I’ve had this problem since I was a kid. When I get my teeth pulled, I already know what they’re gonna say before they say it, which is like, okay, this is gonna take a little extra time. [00:01:50] Right? And I may have to take this off in not two pieces, but four to six pieces, which is what happened yesterday. I was in the dentist chair for three hours. I was in it so long that other staff were coming in to say goodnight to the dentist [00:02:06] Christina: Oh my God. [00:02:08] Jeffrey: And there were definitely points where he. Exactly. Sure he was gonna be able to get everything out. [00:02:15] Um, but he remained, uh, comfortably confident, unlike some dentists who are just, I think, ridiculously confident. Um, and we got that. We got that thing out and now I have this like, massive hole and I hate, it’s a gap between my teeth. It was a big molar. And, uh, and I also now can say that pretty soon, six of my eight molars will be either crowns or in this case an implant. [00:02:41] So I’m, I’m not gonna em off one by one. [00:02:43] Brett: Wow. My, uh, my dentist looks for any, excuse not to use Novocaine. She’s always. [00:02:50] Jeffrey: I remember [00:02:51] Brett: always like, No, this will be e I barely have to drill it all. [00:02:54] Jeffrey: Oh [00:02:54] Brett: just gonna just, just, just hold on. It won’t take long. And I always end up crying because I get like super tense and then the pain starts, and then I’m just like, this combination of expectation and actual tooth pain, like a tear always runs on my cheek. [00:03:11] And I’m, I told her last time, I’m like, If you make me cry, I’m fucking switching dentists. And, and she still insisted that this one won’t require Novocaine. It’ll just be a quick, quick drill. [00:03:25] Jeffrey: so I’ve had a version of that where my dentist will say, I’m pretty sure you don’t need it. Let’s, How do you feel about moving forward? And if you think like you can’t handle it, we stop immediately and just start, get out the needles. But like the idea that she’s kind of suggesting that the correct [00:03:42] Brett: despite my protestation, she’s suggesting that I don’t need it. [00:03:47] Jeffrey: that’s not how you help people. [00:03:48] Brett: That’s [00:03:49] Jeffrey: That is actually how a lot of people help people, but it’s not how you should help people. Swears [00:03:52] Brett: So I swore in front of her, I said the FBO in front of her. I think I mentioned that on a show previously. Um, and, and she like called me out on it and, and it was like, don’t use that language in front of next visit. She leans over it, she’s telling a story to her, like, uh, her hygienist and she leans over and whispers something, fucking, something, uh, as if like in a solidarity kind of thing. [00:04:22] Christina: Hmm. [00:04:22] Brett: Like, she knows I’m down with it. So she’s like, eh, I’m gonna swear under my breath, um, to make me feel okay. I guess. I don’t know. But I mean, that’s the thing about swearing is it is a, it’s a social construct. Like you swear to test the waters and if someone’s okay with it, you swear within reason. If you swear too much, you’ve broken the social bond. [00:04:46] Um, like there’s, there’s a way to overdo it, even if someone’s comfortable with swearing, like you can still swear too much for that person. So it’s a constant give and take to figure out like how much swearing is okay, what words are okay. And if you don’t respond to it properly, you break the social contract. [00:05:05] And, and like you can really, you can really screw things up, . But I think she, I think she was making an effort to, to be social, like. [00:05:15] Christina: One of my favorite experiences ever. So at Gizmoto, one of the, when I moved from Mashable to Gizmoto, one of the biggest changes was obviously the amount of swearing you could do. Uh, I think Mashable now, they curse a little bit more, but at the time, [00:05:28] Brett: In writing. [00:05:30] Christina: in writing, I was the only person who would ever like successfully, I think other than maybe if there was a direct quote, um, for something. [00:05:38] I was like one of the only people who would ever. Been able to curse, like, at least with the fbam, like in like a, a, a lead sentence. Right? And, and I [00:05:48] Brett: but not a headline. [00:05:49] Christina: I almost got in, in a headline. It was approved as a headline and then it was changed at the last minute. And I was mad because the headline was so good. [00:05:55] It was when the Ashley Madison hack happened and I said, Ashley Madison is fucked, was my headline. And that, and that remained the, um, the slug and it was approved. I, I, I won approval for it. And then the, the [00:06:07] Jeffrey: a good seo. [00:06:08] Christina: it? Well, it, it would’ve, well actually this was the argument for why Chris Taylor, who I love, and he’s, he’s great. [00:06:15] Ended up changing it to Ashley Madison is so screwed. And he was probably right to do so. Um, it did better on Facebook. Um, and it got like shitloads of Facebook, um, uh, traffic and it. [00:06:26] Brett: you AB test this? Do [00:06:27] Christina: No, No, but, but, but Facebook, and I don’t know if they still do, but at the time they would not like, promote things that had like cursing and headlines. [00:06:35] Right? So in terms of, of, so, so in terms of like, if we share to our page the way it’s gonna be re-shared and, and other stuff like was, was, would be impacted. So it was ultimately probably the right move. But I was, was up, I mean, there was a part of me that died inside cuz I was like, God, it was such a good headline. [00:06:55] Um, and, and I, I successfully won it. So I go over to Gizmodo, Gizmodo, the Curse all the time is not a big deal. And my first month there, um, uh, Alex Dickinson, our deputy editor, great guy, um, sends out an email who ba basically saying, Look, You’re cussing too much. Like it’s fine. We, we wanna do it, but it’s losing its value because you’re, you’re doing it so much that it’s like, it, it’s, it’s, it’s losing its edge and it’s just coming across as just kind of crunchy. [00:07:27] And I was like, Man, I’m at the right place because this is the sort of emails we get, which is like, not don’t curse, just, you know, save it and use it better. Um, but, [00:07:39] Jeffrey: That’s just like, that’s interesting. Cause that’s just like, you know, Brent, what you were describing in social situations [00:07:45] Christina: exactly. No, you nailed [00:07:47] Jeffrey: can test the waters, but then it’s gonna get to the point where you’re like, Oh, okay. There’s a threshold I didn’t see coming. [00:07:52] Christina: Right. And, and, and in this case, the, the threshold wasn’t even so much like, Oh, we think this is socially distasteful. It’s just more like you’re, it’s eye roll inducing and it, and it’s not like, uh, the shock value and things that you think that you’re, you know, achieving aren’t there anymore. [00:08:06] Brett: like I was raised to believe that swearing was a sign of low intelligence. Um, people, people with good vocabularies don’t swear. And as I grew up and like became more literate, I began to realize that swearing absolutely has a place in language. Uh, like it can be very pointed and it can really underscore a sentiment. [00:08:31] I think there is absolutely a, I think a very intelligent, I think some of the most intelligent people know where to put an f bomb in a sentence and, and punctuate it, uh, and make it relatable without making it, uh, obscene. [00:08:48] Jeffrey: When I joined my wife’s family, both my mother-in-law and her grandmother, said privately to her, I don’t normally like it when people swear, but it doesn’t bug me the way Jeff does it And I’ve always thought of that as my skill, but man, sometimes now it with news articles or any kind of article, I always love it when a source gives a great quote with a swear word in it. [00:09:12] Cause like, you never, you never expect that. And, and I don’t mean like, I don’t mean that like dimly or thick, not like thick in the head or anything. I just mean like it can be, it can like take you by surprise, right? Um, except the one, my favorite example of that, I keep some very short soundbites of. Have done over the years, and one of the most bizarre, like obvious quotes I ever had was from Ian Mackay of Fugazi and Minor threat. [00:09:39] He says to me in the middle of the interview, I mean, I’m a fucking punk rocker . And I was like, Yeah, okay. I know . Like that’s your whole fucking deal. So I saved that to just play for people every once in a while. I’m a fucking punk rocker. [00:09:54] Brett: So, uh, sh sh Should we do a mental health corner? Mental Heatlh Corner [00:09:58] Christina: Very briefly, because we have to talk about Taylor Swift. This is very [00:10:00] Brett: We do. This is a Taylor Swift episode. Yeah. I’ll try to keep, I’ll try to keep mine short. So I, I found the definition of it’s Cyclothymia, or it’s C y c l o t h y m i a. Um, I dunno exactly how it’s pronounced, but the definition of it is, um, uh, hypomanic episodes alternating with light depression and, uh, without rapid cycling, uh, without a lot of stability in. [00:10:35] And that I, I think, I think that’s what I actually have instead of bipolar too. I think I have psycho imia emia. Um, I have not yet discussed it with my psychiatrist. Um, my therapist thought, Yeah, that makes perfect sense, but he, he’s not licensed to diagnose that kind of thing. So, um, I have yet to bring it up with my therapist, but man, I am absolutely realizing I don’t have an in between, between depression and mania. [00:11:11] Um, and I’m going through this thing, right? Like I have this very deep conviction right now. I will ultimately hurt everybody I love. And, uh, this, this feeling that when people say, I love you, like in my head I’m like, That’s awesome. I love you too, but you’re gonna get fucked on this deal. Um, that I will eventually hurt. [00:11:39] And, and like some people in my life have been very forgiving, uh, over time. But also I walked out of a, a marriage and I walked out of friendships and I get bored and I hurt people or I fuck up and I hurt people. And man, when I’m, when I’m not, man, and shit really weighs on my mind. [00:12:01] Jeffrey: Hmm. [00:12:01] Brett: You start to wonder like, would would the people I love be better off if I’d never been born? [00:12:06] I am not suicidal. Do not take this as me being [00:12:09] Jeffrey: we were heading there. Yeah. Right. And that’s not true. [00:12:12] Brett: But it, but it is what weighs on my mind in times like this. [00:12:17] Jeffrey: It’s a question that can only be answered falsely by you. [00:12:20] Christina: Yes. No, you’re right, you’re right though. That that’s the thing is, is that it is one of those things where, cuz I think a lot of us have that question a lot of times and, and it’s, and it’s upsetting. I’m sorry that you’re having it now. And I think that it is worth like, weighing on like those things that we do that like nag at us and like this is, um, like certainly these are the things that keep me up at night, right? [00:12:44] Like the self-loathing parts, like the things where you like question every decision you’ve ever made and, and decisions you haven’t made and, and, and how you are. And that can be really, um, debilitating. But to, to Jeff’s point, like it is one of those things where, You will, we can only answer it falsely, but the answer is definitively no. [00:13:07] People would not be better off like you provide value. Like there, look, there are some people, I’m not gonna like pretend like that there aren’t situations where, there are some people where I look back in my life and I’m like, I would’ve been better off if I had not known them and if I had not met them and if they had not been in my life. [00:13:21] Right? That’s just, that’s accurate I think for everyone. But like, that’s, that’s not the case with you, right? Like even the worst things you’ve ever done to people, like the, the good and other things that you’ve done with them outweigh that. And uh, you know, and I think that, that, like my, my father had like a pretty complicated relationship with his mother, and she’s one of those people where I think back, I’m like, nothing to value would’ve been lost if she was, if she had never been in my life, if I’d never known her or anything, like, nothing to value would be lost. [00:13:52] I’m not gonna say my life would’ve been better, but zero would’ve been lost. But I think that even him is debilitating and is like, Oppressive and as hard as that relationship was, um, in a lot of ways, if you were to ask him, would my life have been better off, if she had never been around, he would’ve a, he would, he would respond, No. [00:14:13] Right. Like he still got something there, which like, as an outsider, it’s hard for me to grab that. I’m like, Man, I would be like, if you could do, have a doover and have her not exist. Sure. [00:14:23] Brett: If this is still relevant in a future week, I will revisit it and, and offer my rebuttal. But we have Taylor to get you, so I’m gonna accept what you’re saying. Thank you. Thank you for your feedback. [00:14:37] Jeffrey: Um, my mental health check in is that, I, um, I went away with two other couples, my wife and I and two other couples. Their kids, our kids. Our kids have all been friends forever. It’s how we know each other as adults. And it is a, a relationship that has been really just getting tighter and tighter by the years. [00:15:00] We’ve done different vacations together. This time we rented an island, uh, in northern Minnesota with like the gnarliest, most delightful disaster of a pontoon boat ever, which had the name Leisure Island. Leisure Island, if you’re classy. Um, and you know, I just have this memory cuz I actually, the first night we were all there together, I had to bow out cause I had taken Tylenol with codeine from my tooth, which it turns out doesn’t play with lithium. [00:15:26] And so I was super nauseous and ultimately it was just like in there throwing up. It was awful. But from the other room, I could hear. All of these people, 10 people ranging from eighth grade to, I suppose I’m the oldest, I think. Um, but they’re all just like having a blast. And it was that kind of easy fun that you can have with people you’ve known for a while. [00:15:48] Um, and it was so cool cause all the kids were part of it, whatever, like, it just felt good. I don’t have a lot of friendships that are like newish. Um, and these are, you know, within 15 years or so. And, um, and it was just like really good for me to be in that space with those people. And fortunately I wasn’t throwing up the rest of the trip. [00:16:11] Um, just waking up onto a porch with, you know, four friends who are having coffee and staring at the lake and just talking about whatever comes. [00:16:20] Brett: That sounds nice. [00:16:21] Christina: Yeah. [00:16:22] Jeffrey: Without my wife, I don’t know that these things would happen to me. , she does a really good job of finding the good things and keeping them close, um, whereas I’m more likely to just wanna hide. [00:16:35] Uh, but it’s just lovely and wonderful. So that was, that was super nice. [00:16:39] Brett: That’s beautiful. [00:16:41] Jeffrey: Christina, how you doing? [00:16:42] Christina: I’m good. I’m, um, so I’m gonna be in San Francisco next week as usual. Work is often tied at times tied to my mental health because that’s me. Um, which is other stuff I probably need to, to deal with. But yeah, I’m, I’m, I’m, I’m doing well. Um, I, uh, if we have time to get into it, I’ve been pissing some people off on Twitter, which is always fun for me, so, [00:17:08] Jeffrey: just don’t worry. It’s all gonna be wiped clean in a couple days when Elon’s officially in charge. Um, actually he’s been firing people left and right, hasn’t he? [00:17:15] Christina: yeah, yeah, [00:17:16] Brett: is the core of what, what Christina piss people [00:17:19] Christina: yeah. That, that, that’s the core of what pissed them off because cuz I, I was. Basically like good riddens to, uh, Paraag Agarwal, the Twitter ceo, uh, who I think did a pretty shitty job. Um, uh, a large, uh, contingent of a, of a subcontinent. Did not agree with that. And, uh, and uh, yeah. So that was fun. Taylor Swift: A History (Part 1) [00:17:42] Jeffrey: Okay. Christina Taylor Swift has a new album, so much more than that to talk about in a way. Cuz she’s just like, talk about constellations. There’s like extra songs over here and there’s a video and there’s, you know, Um, Alright. I, I know that Brett and I had homework, but I think, and I want to hear from Brett. [00:18:03] I have nothing interesting to offer that is original of my own. I really enjoyed listening to the album. I listened to it a few times over and, uh, [00:18:13] Christina: Thank you. Thank you for doing the homework. Brett did not put that much into it, and he never does. So I, this is one of the reasons I’m [00:18:19] Brett: I gave it a full [00:18:20] Christina: I knew you did and I appreciate that. That is, [00:18:23] Brett: and I watched the music videos, [00:18:25] Christina: which again, I appreciate and, and I wanna be clear. That’s even more than I expect from you. [00:18:30] But to see this is why I love having Jeff on because he like genuinely goes like above and beyond and really gets into it. And here’s the thing. I love that you did it, Brett, but I know that you hated every second of it and that you didn’t wanna do it. Whereas like Jeff like was excited by like the [00:18:45] Brett: I did it thoughtfully. I did it and I thought, How do I feel about this? And I came to, I came to conclusions and I, and that, and then I would be like, Let’s listen to one more song and, and then see how I feel about it. And, and I did that and I got all the way through it and I did my homework. And you, you, you, I’m not an extra credit guy, I guess. [00:19:06] Jeffrey: so Christina, let’s like, let’s set the, let’s set this up a little bit. First of all, what number album is this for Taylor Swift? Number 10. First album came out. [00:19:16] Christina: is, uh, 2006. [00:19:18] Jeffrey: Okay, [00:19:19] Christina: And, and, and so it’s, it’s her 10th album, but she also did two full rerecord. So it’s, it, it could be number 12 if, if you, you know, wanted to count those. Um, but it, it’s the, the 10th original album. [00:19:32] Jeffrey: And will you tell me just briefly what is the deal with the rerecord? [00:19:36] Christina: So she, Okay, so, um, she was signed to a record label called Big Machine, um, Records in 2006, and they owned her masters, which is the case with almost all artists. She had wanted to get to the point where she could own her own masters and buy her old ones back, but they had basically been like, You will have to do a new album for us for. [00:19:58] Master recording you wanna get back. Basically like tying her into an even longer, um, uh, contract with them. And, and she, I guess, had some disputes with them about some other things. So when she left Big Machine and went to Republic, which is part of Universal in 2017, she, I think she did that in part because Scott Boesche, the owner of the label, had kind of made it clear that he wasn’t super interested in continuing to own the record label. [00:20:23] Kind of wanted to cash out what he wound up doing. I think they had, she claims that they made efforts to buy the, the, um, Masters back and that they were, uh, not allowed. Uh, they dispute this, it’s unclear, but he wound up selling. The company and by extent all of her masters to Scooter Bran. And Scooter Bran was someone that she’d previously had negative interactions with. [00:20:47] He’s, he’s a talent manager. Uh, he like most famous for discovering, uh, Justin Bieber. He also managed, uh, manages, uh, um, Ariana Grande and, and Demi Lovato and some others. But he and Taylor had, had, uh, past, uh, negative experiences. She did not want him to own her work. He was, frankly pretty dickish about it. [00:21:07] And kind of like once he, he bought, you know, the label and the whole reason you would buy Big Machine. To be very clear, the only reason you buy big machine is for the Taylor Swift catalog. Like that’s where all the value is. So, cuz there are some other artists that are signed there, but they’re incidental. [00:21:21] The whole reason you buy the label is, is for her. [00:21:24] Jeffrey: and so she was on, She was on big machine from day one. [00:21:27] Christina: Yes. Like Scott Rotta signed her. So like, she was 16, I think she was 15 when she maybe got the record deal. And, and, and he signed her. And to be clear, like he put a lot into her and made bets too. But she also very quickly took off and, and, and made the label right, because it was this indie label. And she also, in fairness to her, I mean like they, they helped each other. [00:21:47] I think they’re acrimony. It’s, it’s a big part of some of the songs, um, on, uh, uh, folklore. Um, and, and there are a couple of songs on midnights that allude to it too, but it’s clearly a very big, um, uh, you know, breakup for her, probably the biggest in her life. Um, but then where she felt betrayed was that not only was it the, the label sold, but she knew was going to happen, but it was sold to this person that she did not respect and that she did not like, who then started gloating about, Oh, I own this stuff now. [00:22:17] The problem was, and the, and this is where the rerecord stuff comes, Because she’s the songwriter on every single one of her songs. She’s the co-writer in some cases, but she is the songwriter on every single one of her songs. They cannot license the originals unless she also gives her her permission because she does, she, they, they own the master recording, but they don’t own the songwriter credits. [00:22:39] Um, and, and, and you need both if you wanna, wanna license something for mechanical use for film or television or advertisements, which is again, the reason why you would buy the back catalog wouldn’t just be for the royalties and streaming. No, she’s famously not licensed her music much. Um, but if someone else owns it, like they could license it, however, she has to still give her permission. [00:23:01] So what she did is she figured out, Oh, if I rerecord. The music then that will take away from the profit they can make off of streaming. And I can license the rerecord, but not license the originals. So basically, you know, in, in, in effect cutting down how much money they could get from it. Scooter bronze still wound up, he wound up flipping the catalog and sold it for like 300 and something million, um, to, uh, Abigail Disney, I think. [00:23:31] Um, and, and they’d had some, and they’d had some talks, uh, Taylor did about maybe being involved with them, but Scooter still was going to. Receive profits after the fact. And, and that was kind of a deal breaker for her. So she has proceeded with saying, Okay, I’m going to rerecord every album I made. And she’s done it in a very exacting process where, like the first two, anyway, like there are some minor differences, but they are basically sound alike. [00:23:58] And, and it’s, it’s been a very meticulous process. And she’s, you know, I think Prince and others have done similar things, but she’s certainly the first of this modern era to do this. And, and the whole reason was basically to, because she’s a petty bitch, which is again, a, a, a theme very common on midnights. [00:24:15] Jeffrey: Hmm. What do you mean? Why? Why? Cuz she’s a petty bitch. Oh, you’re saying, you’re saying this is a, This is a high five moment. [00:24:23] Christina: Yes. No, I’m, I’m saying, I’m, I’m saying like, I’m saying that No, no, I’m saying like, this is like a, I’m also saying, uh, this is like a core part for personality. Um, I want you to do the ad read. We’re gonna hear, uh, Jeff’s response, Jeff’s thoughts on, uh, midnights after, uh, our, our break from our sponsors. [00:24:44] Brett: Add time. Sponser: MindBloom [00:24:45] Christina: time. This episode is brought to you by Mind Bloom. You just need to take better care of yourself. Is not a response to mental health struggles. You know all too well you live with them. That’s also a tailor reference. Incidentally, sometimes you need something more to achieve a real and lasting breakthrough. [00:25:05] Maybe it’s time you check out a guided ketamine therapy program. Mind Bloom can help Mind. Bloom is the leader in at home ketamine therapy, offering a combination of science backed medicine with clinician and guide support for people looking to improve their mental health and wellbeing. Mind. Bloom connects patients to licensed psychiatric clinicians to help them achieve better outcomes with lower costs, greater convenience, and an artfully crafted experience. [00:25:32] To begin, Take Mind Bloom’s online assessment to determine if Mind Bloom is right for you. And if you’re approved, you’ll schedule a video consult with a licensed clinician where you’ll discuss your goals and expectations for mental health treatment. Mind. Blum will send you a kid in the mail complete with medicine treatment materials, and tips for getting the most out of your experience. [00:25:53] After only two sessions, 87% of mind bloom clients reported improvements in depression and 85% reported improvements and anxiety. It’s time to enter the next chapter in mental health and wellbeing. Let mind bloom guide you right now Mind Bloom is offering our listeners a hundred dollars off your first six session program when you sign up@mindbloom.com slash Overtired and use the promo code Overtired at checkout. [00:26:19] So go to mind blum.com/ Overtired and use the promo code Overtired for a hundred dollars off your first six session program today. That’s mind blob.com/ Overtired. Promo code Overtired. [00:26:32] Brett: I’m super bummed that mind Bloom isn’t available in Minnesota. Like I, I wanted to try this out and it was not available to me. [00:26:42] Christina: Yeah, that’s the one thing you need to check. Make sure it’s in your area. But if it is, this is like, I think a great option for a lot of people who have been failed by regular medication and, and normal therapies. [00:26:53] Brett: You will find out if it’s available very quickly when you@amindbloom.com slash Overtired. Um, I’m gonna get in trouble for this next ad read. I, uh, I, I, I tweaked it a little bit. [00:27:06] Christina: Okay. Sponsor: NordVPN [00:27:06] Brett: you missing out on your favorite show because it’s not available in your region trying to keep your private time private? [00:27:13] Well, let me introduce Nor dpn, if you’re into Norwegian blood sports the way I am, you’ve definitely dealt with the frustration of not being able to stream them here in the us. 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[00:28:18] A small price to pay for premium cybersecurity and access to a vast amount of entertaining content from all over the world. Note may not include blood sports. Grab your exclusive Nord VPN deal by going to nord vpn.com/overti to get a huge discount off your Nor VPN plan, plus four months for free. It’s completely risk free with nords 30 day money back guarantee. [00:28:43] That’s N O G vpn.com/ Overtired. Go grab this amazing deal and start surfing securely@norvpn.com slash Overtired. Taylor Swift: A History (Part 2) [00:28:56] Jeffrey: Bang, Splat. P Norwegian blood sports. Uh, one thing when people say the cost of a cup of coffee, one at a one at a time. What? What’s your dollar amount? Christina. [00:29:10] Christina: like five bucks. [00:29:11] Jeffrey: Okay, Brett. [00:29:13] Brett: 2 2 75. [00:29:15] Jeffrey: You’re doing that, you’re doing that, uh, diner coffee where they give you an early riser with no coffee, but then you pay two 50 for the coffee. [00:29:22] Brett: I’m doing a double espresso in Winona, Minnesota, cost me 2 [00:29:26] Jeffrey: seven. I mean, cuz I like, as my former colleague who was female, liked to say of me, I like those girly drinks. Um, [00:29:35] Christina: Yeah, I was gonna say at this point, I don’t even know what, because I, I don’t go to Starbucks all that often, so I don’t even like know what their pricing is. It’s probably gone up though, as everything has, and if you’re gonna get a larger size coffee Yeah. Probably is more than five at this point. [00:29:48] Jeffrey: yeah. [00:29:48] Brett: How much is aio? [00:29:50] Jeffrey: What’s a, what’s a dope? [00:29:53] Brett: That’s what Starbucks calls a double espresso. [00:29:57] Jeffrey: I thought that was a [00:29:58] Brett: Yeah. [00:29:58] Christina: that, so that’s so, so that’s cheaper than like the, the fancy drinks with the syrups and all the other stuff, But it’s still [00:30:05] Brett: saying for me that’s a cup of coffee [00:30:07] Christina: Yeah, that’s, but that’s, that, that’s, that’s not 2 75 though, at Starbucks. [00:30:12] Jeffrey: Now I don’t, if you don’t mind, I have a few more questions before even I have anything to say. Um, and, and I’m sorry that these are such rudimentary questions, but I bet there are people out there that share them with me. [00:30:25] Christina: Oh, I’m sure there are. [00:30:27] Jeffrey: you’ve just sort of bracketed, um, the period of her career where she’s with big machines, Right. [00:30:34] And that label [00:30:36] Christina: that was, that was two thou, That was 2006 to 2017. [00:30:39] Jeffrey: and what’s the first record outside of big machines? Is it a re-recording or is it a new [00:30:44] Christina: No, no, her, her first one was Lover, which came out in, in 2019, um, and is sonically similar to midnights, although I think midnights it improves on it, which that was, that was the first one on Universal. And that was in 2019. And then in 2020 she dropped, um, uh, a folklore, uh, during the pandemic when no one was expecting it. [00:31:04] And it took everything by storm. Then she dropped, um, uh, evermore as like the follow up, um, that, that, that she did basically between the, the times that they were released, like three months later. Then in, uh, I think in March of 2021, she did Fearless, which was her second album, but the first one to win album of the year at the Grammy’s. [00:31:26] Uh, she now has three of those. Um, and so that came out, So that was originally released in 2008. The re-release was in, in March, I think of, of 2021. And then in November of 2021, um, she did the Rerecord of Red, which was her, um, uh, Fourth album, um, and, uh, and, and the one that fans have a, a really strong liking to. [00:31:50] Uh, [00:31:51] Brett: I’m a huge fan of, I’m a [00:31:52] Christina: yeah, Red, Red is my favorite album. Red is my favorite Taylor album. Like, uh, so, so the, the chronology is, uh, debut Taylor Swift by Taylor Swift, Um, Fearless Speak now, which, uh, she wrote entirely herself. That’s gonna be the next rerecord. Uh, based on the, uh, various Easter eggs she put in, uh, one of the music videos that came out. [00:32:12] Um, so every song On, on Speak now was, is written only by her. And that was sort of a response to people who claim the only reason she won the Grammy Fur album of the year was because other people wrote her work for her. And she was basically like, even though she’d written all the [00:32:26] Brett: patently untrue as, as much as I might not be a die hard fan. That’s patently untrue. I know [00:32:32] Christina: It absolutely, it absolutely is. [00:32:33] But she was 19 years old and so at the time, she was the youngest album of the year when her, Billy Eilish has now surpassed that. But uh, at the time she was the youngest. And so there were a lot of people who were literally saying, The only reason you are anything is cuz you’re, you’re a puppet, basically. [00:32:47] So she wrote an album called Speak Now, which was basically telling them Go fuck yourselves. Then she did Red, which is my favorite. Then she did 1989, which is like the one when she switched from country music to full on pop. And that was like her crossover album. That it very good, like I think it one of the, probably one of the most defining albums of the, of the 2010s. [00:33:07] Um, uh, I think by, by any estimation, just in terms of cultural influence. Then she did reputation in 2017 and then Lover in 2019. And then, uh, yeah, we’re, we’re caught up. [00:33:19] Jeffrey: And then at what point in this whole thing is the, So for me, I knew of Taylor Swift when this happened, but when the whole Kanye thing happened, [00:33:29] Christina: That was, that was in 2009. [00:33:31] Jeffrey: That was 2009. Okay. [00:33:33] Christina: 2009. So, so, so the song that that was about was, You Belong With Me, which was off of her second album, Fearless. So this happens in, So the album, um, comes out in like November, 2008, but then that happened in August of 2009. Uh, she went on to then, uh, win the Grammy the following January. [00:33:54] Um, but by that time she’d already released her third album, Speak Now. Um, no, I, I’ve got that timing wrong. She’d already won the Grammy, I guess, for, for Album of the Year by in 2009. Okay. Um, or has she? I don’t know. I don’t remember. Anyway, so the Kanye thing happened in 2009, regardless, that happened in, in August of 2009 at the VMAs. [00:34:16] And that was the first thing that for a lot of people, Got her on their attention because she did that. And then she did, um, uh, Saturday Night Live, um, where she hosted and performed. And for a lot of people who didn’t listen to, to the radio or weren’t aware of things like that, was the president calling her a jackass was the thing that kind of like set her off and into becoming like, go, being like [00:34:40] Jeffrey: that’s [00:34:41] Christina: a best selling country artist into being like this, this much bigger like pop culture figure. [00:34:47] Brett: I did it. So I still wanted to just randomly interrupt your answer with an I’m a finish, I’m gonna let you finish line, and I didn’t. I held it in adhd, impulse [00:34:57] Jeffrey: I mean, did you hold it in though? In the end? What? [00:35:00] Christina: No, no, you did. [00:35:01] Brett: I waited. I waited. I waited for her to take a breath, and then I did it. And [00:35:05] Christina: No, you did. And I was done with my thought. I’m proud of [00:35:07] Brett: I feel it. [00:35:08] I feel it in my bones. I was holding that in [00:35:11] Jeffrey: you’ve come a long way. Thank you, Okay. So this is great. So that brings us, I mean, what what’s interesting to me and what’s helpful to me about what you’ve just shared is that it sounds like she’s still in the process of doing these rerecord, right? [00:35:25] Christina: Yes, Yes. She’s only done two of them, so she has a bunch more to do, [00:35:29] Jeffrey: it is stunning to me. So Def Leppard did that, but they did it like 30 years later, right? It’s stunning to me to think of, um, a pop star managing. One, all the bullshit around being a pop pop star, right? Um, two, just making new albums that are good or that you’re proud of. And three, in the midst of all of that, revisiting old work in the most intensive way and rerecording it like that is, that is like an incredible swirl of activity that must be almost a daily part of her life. [00:36:03] Every single bit of that, [00:36:06] Christina: Yeah, no, and, and she’s now started directing her own music videos. Like, so basically since, Yeah, the last, if you look at her career, like the last two years were really the last three, I guess, since since Lover, cuz I guess she already maybe started embark. I think she had to wait until a certain point to embark on the rerecord because it had to be five years. [00:36:26] Um, you know, uh, past a, a certain point, um, for, for some of the, the rerecord to start, like there was a, there was a timing thing involved, but like if you look at how prolific she’s been just since 2020, it’s unreal. Cuz again, uh, we’ve had three, so since 2019 we’ve had four actual albums and two rerecord and a bunch of music videos and a 10 minute short film and, yeah. Yeah. [00:36:52] Jeffrey: that’s, Oh, go [00:36:54] Brett: You’re eventually gonna hear my thoughts on midnights, uh, whether this week or later. But, but I just wanna say the music videos from Midnights are a delightful mix of indie filmmaking with high budget effects. Like, they don’t feel, they don’t feel at all produced. They’re just like, all of a sudden there’s this thing that could not ex, you could not do it with practical effects. [00:37:20] Like it’s just happening. And, and I really appreciate, uh, the music videos from midnights. [00:37:27] Christina: Well, I’m No, and I’m glad to hear you say that cuz um, I, I feel the same way. Um, she used to work with Joseph Conn a lot. He did a lot of her videos for, for 1989. And, um, he’s, uh, a, a very famous, kind of like for his direction, style of being, like having really big kind of like boisterous videos and his like really out there productions. [00:37:46] And I feel like she’s kind of taken the best aspects of some of the things he did, but then added more of that indie kind of flavor. I’ll be honest, I’m a huge fan of hers. I didn’t expect her to be a good director and I don’t know why I didn’t. I just, it wasn’t something I thought about her like excelling at, which is stupid because she’s director her whole career. [00:38:05] But that was [00:38:05] Brett: Yeah, for [00:38:06] Christina: that was just, that was just not like a, [00:38:09] Brett: if anything, if, if anything is demonstrated by her meticulous songwriting capabilities, it’s her ability to direct, like it’s, it’s all there. So that makes perfect [00:38:21] Christina: no, no. You’re right. It does. And I don’t know why. And it’s not like I expected her to be bad at it. It just, maybe I just never even thought about it. I think that she’s not a good actress. Um, and, uh, she’s, she’s not. And, uh, not to say that she couldn’t be, I think that she wishes she were, and that she’s casts in some small roles, cuz she’s beautiful, but she’s not a good actress. [00:38:40] Like, that’s not where her talent lies. Um, but she’s an, she’s an excellent director. [00:38:47] Jeffrey: that’s awesome. Okay, so this album, what did it mean to you? You’re the biggest tailored Swift fan I know by far. I know You buy all the, like is it a comic book term I’m using wrong, A variance of the [00:38:59] Christina: Oh yeah. Yeah. [00:39:00] Jeffrey: got some, you got some cassettes, if I’m not [00:39:03] Christina: Oh yeah. I, I got cassettes, I got, I got all the vinyl colors, like, Yeah, no, I, I, I gave, I give her so much money. It’s stupid. She doesn’t need it. Um, [00:39:11] Jeffrey: her patron, you know, uh, what is this record to you? [00:39:17] Christina: I think it’s a really good record and I was, I will, I will be totally honest. My first listen through, I wasn’t sure my, my, my priors here. I think that folklore and evermore are some of the best work she’s ever done. I think that red and the red rerecording, which added a bunch of extra tracks, which were just incredible. [00:39:35] I think red is, is her best work. Um, and, and will probably remain that way. Uh, not to say it’s perfect, like I think like 1989 is like a much like more perfect, pristine, pristine, precise package. But I think red is just like, for me, that’s the one that like hits me and like puts me in the feels. And so those three records having happened, I loved so much and it opened up this side of Taylor that I was not expecting. [00:39:59] Like I’m a huge fan of the national and I never expected. Like the two of them to work together. I’d never expected Bonaire and Taylor to do songs together. I love Bonaire. Cuz in my mind, those are the two different sides of my musical brain. Right? Like, I don’t put those things in the same category. Not that I don’t love Taylor, it’s just I don’t, I don’t put those in the same thing. [00:40:20] And, and when they did and it worked so well. I love that. So, so go on. [00:40:26] Brett: You, but you do put Bono Air, the National, and Lana Delray kind of in the same category. Right. So this feels like a tendency from Taylor Swift to collaborate with this particular genre of [00:40:40] Christina: Now it is. Now it is. But this, but up until 2020 it hadn’t been right. Like she collaborated with not those people. Right? Like I think that, um, uh, I think there was probably fear in her part, and she’s even expressed this, like she didn’t know if those people would want to collaborate with her, which, which seems ridiculous, but, but, you know, but you know, I think that, um, honestly, I’ll say this, I think up until, uh, a folklore, there was still a very strong part of like the music snob, kind of music critic part who dismissed her no matter how. [00:41:15] Like you didn’t Brett because you agreed like you knew how good her songwriting was. But there were a lot of people who completely dismissed her and didn’t see her as an artist and was just like, she’s just this thing. Then those albums come out and all of a sudden people wake up and they go, Oh, holy shit. [00:41:29] You are an artist. And, and so what’s, and you can work with these very celebrated, you know, musicians and songwriters as you should. Um, So for me it was a little bit jarring for her to go much more directionally similar to Lover, which is not my favorite album of hers. Some of the tracks on it are like, I think Cruel Summer is a great track. [00:41:50] I think The Archer is fantastic, but that’s not my favorite album of hers at all. And sonically Midnights is, is similar. So my first, listen, I was a little bit like, okay, well it’s good to have Pop Taylor back. You know? It was, it was, you know, we had a nice sojourn, but this is, this, I, I guess it’s good to hear it again. [00:42:08] Then I listen to the record. . And on the second, listen, I started like hearing more things and I started going, Okay, I think this is more interesting than I gave it credit for. And now I think the more I’ve listened to it, and this could change, you know, in, in, in six months, um, I think it, it’s definitely my top five tailor albums, which shifts 10 of them. [00:42:25] So, you know, it, it’s, it, it, I don’t think it’s in the top three because I think that that’s read evermore folklore, maybe 1989 replaces one of the, the folk mos. Um, but, but it, but it’s definitely in the top five and, and I think that it, um, I didn’t expect that. So that’s was kind of my response was that two things. [00:42:46] One, um, it’s a return to an old sound that she works with Jack Antonoff, um, who’s her longtime friend and, and collaborator. He produces all the tracks on the main version. Um, uh, Aaron Deser does do some stuff on the, uh, three, the 3M version, but it’s this return to pop, but it’s this return, I think. After she now has achieved this sort of credibility from basically everyone in the industry that they, they can’t diminish her again. [00:43:14] Right. So it’s almost like, it almost feels like listening to her and going through the process, it’s almost like she felt more free to just be like, No one is ever going to doubt my skills, whether they like the work or not. Right? Like, she’s now solidified as an artist. So I think that it’s, it’s interesting, like, and, and I like a lot of the songs. [00:43:33] Like, I think that a lot of the production things are interesting. I think a lot of the lyrics are really good. Um, I think it’s a really good record, but it, it was, it was hard for me at first. That’s my very overly long response. [00:43:44] Jeffrey: Yeah. Wait, will you quick, I may put this earlier, but will you state the sort of premise of this album and describe the 3:00 AM version [00:43:53] Christina: Yeah, so the premise is basically it’s, it’s stuff that keeps her up at night, which is why it’s, I call it the old retired album because she, she literally said that this is the things she would think about that would keep her up at night and, and the songs that she would write at midnight, and the thoughts going through her head and the stories, and they’re from various faces of her life. [00:44:10] So that’s the other, uh, big thing with this album is it is a return to the confessional songwriting that she’s famous for on evermore and folklore. She stepped out of that a little bit. There was some of that, but most of it, Just, you know, made up stories. This is back to that confessional songwriting from different eras of her life. [00:44:27] And then the 3:00 AM section were our seven additional tracks that didn’t fit thematically or for whatever reason on the album, but that she also recorded during those sessions. Many of them are very good. Um, and, and she’s famous for referencing like 2:00 AM or 3:00 AM in her song lyrics. So having them come out at 3:00 AM like that, that’s, you know, it can be a little coin. [00:44:50] I enjoy it, but I understand other people playing it coining. She does a lot of these Easter direct things, but she is nothing if not self-referential and, and if not, like, highly, highly meticulous about, you know, this stuff. And so, yeah, that, that’s the two things. So the core album is 13 tracks. Uh, 13 is her lucky number. [00:45:07] And, um, then there’s seven additional, um, 3:00 AM tracks, which, which, you know, uh, pat out the, the whole thing. [00:45:15] Jeffrey: Okay. Okay. Well, I, I will say that I, I loved, so this album just felt it’s an album that’s delivered lightly. Like it’s not, it doesn’t come in like trying to prove itself . Right. But at the same time, she, you know, when, when her like words and phrases as I’m working and listening to it, like sneak through, um, it’s always really like, I’m just like, Oh, I’m glad I heard that. [00:45:43] I’m glad, you know, like, although, I mean beginning with in Antihero, like it’s me. Hi, I’m the problem. It’s me. Like just the way she delivers that, um, it being a great line on its own, but just being, the way she delivers it is just fantastic. It doesn’t feel, it’s really nice when an artist can like be really, they’re really delivering something, right? [00:46:06] But they’re not. not all caught up in themselves delivering it. And that’s how that album feels to me for, from her, it just feels like exactly what it is. It feels like a 10th album feels like somebody who’s a few years out of a really shitty contract, Right? and someone who knows herself deeply, especially since she has to revisit herself in the most, you know, detailed manners. [00:46:30] Um, [00:46:30] Brett: feel like, I feel like my opinion might have been swayed by Christina in the opposite way intended. Like, [00:46:38] Christina: like it less [00:46:40] Brett: if somebody loves something too much, then I instinctively it’s, it’s not cool to also love that thing. [00:46:47] Jeffrey: let’s see. Even at the scale, even at the scale of a friend, not like a culture or a society, but like a friend, I remember to downplay that with no more gratitude. We’re just gonna like, be really like, well, I kind of, I guess I kind of like this app a little bit. And Brett’s gonna be like, what app? What app? [00:47:05] Brett: Like, I listened to this album, I, I listen and, and I listened, and anytime a lyric caught my attention, I would go back and I would read all of the lyrics. And like repeatedly I thought, Holy shit. She is a wordsmith and a, and a, an art artisanal songwriter. Like she crafts amazing songs. The fact was, I. [00:47:32] Feel anything the way I do when I listen to the music. I know I love, uh, like I feel something, I feel connected and I didn’t feel connected. Like I strong admiration, like it is a solid album. The songwriting is on point. The lyrics are pretty amazing, um, as far as pop lyrics go, but it didn’t, it didn’t connect with me on that deep level where I’m like, Oh my God, this person, I, I could have a beer with this person. [00:48:05] Uh, much way I could with George W. Bush. Just kidding. Um, but like, yeah, like, it didn’t, it didn’t connect in that deeper way, but I left it with a strong admiration as I always do. Like I have always known Taylor Swift as a, an artful song creator. Uh, just, I didn’t, it didn’t touch me. [00:48:30] Christina: No [00:48:30] Jeffrey: Oh, like the, like the Divines single. When I think about you, I touch myself, Brett. I wonder how many podcasts the Divines have even been mentioned on in the history of podcasts. Uh, [00:48:42] Christina: I don’t want anybody [00:48:45] Jeffrey: else mean nothing about you? [00:48:47] Christina: touch myself. [00:48:48] Jeffrey: Mm-hmm. [00:48:49] Brett: Mm-hmm. [00:48:52] Jeffrey: uh, also Taylor on this album, well placed cuss words per our earlier. [00:48:57] Brett: Yep. [00:48:58] Christina: She’s finally started doing that. That, that, that’s this, this, this is, and, and it’s, Gawker actually wrote a, a Kelly convo wrote a funny thing about how like, she’s finally, she’s 32 years old and she’s finally learned to curse almost convincingly. And, and I think that’s accurate. Cuz the first time she, she used some of the, that she would curse. [00:49:14] We were all like, Okay, this doesn’t, And you know, she curses in her real life, but it just, it didn’t feel right. It almost, I, I think that the Kelly convoy like, nailed it. Like it’s, they’re well placed. Yeah. [00:49:27] Jeffrey: Awesome. Well, tell me something. What else do you wanna know? What else do you wanna say rather about this album? Because [00:49:33] Christina: I, I, I mean, I wanna hear more from you. I mean, cuz I really, I really enjoyed it. Like I said, like it’s, it’s not, I think that, I don’t know, this was, this is a hard album to do in some ways because the last two were so great, Right? And, and brought in a whole new fan base. So in some ways I kind of do appreciate the risk a little bit of being like, you know, that you’re going to, they’re gonna be people like, like Brett who might have really connected with folklore and evermore, but are going to have admiration maybe for the art in this, but are not going to like, wanna listen to this record cuz they’re not gonna have the emotional connection. [00:50:04] Um, but I, I kind of, I kind of weirdly kind of respect that. Like there’s, you know, maybe like, I think there’s a lot of us would’ve just loved to hear like Taylor and Deser do more stuff together. I certainly would. but I, I, I, the one song that really got me, and this is, this is the only one I’d really wanna talk about, but I wanna hear your thoughts, is Mastermind, which is the, the final track, um, on, on the main version. [00:50:29] Um, and it’s track 13. And I think that it is, uh, it encapsulates, So I’ve, I’ve talked to before on this podcast, repeatedly, like I’ve done like psychoanalysis of her, which is unfair cause I’m not a doctor or anything. This is what we do. Um, where like it’s so clear that so many, like, she’s still so much of her psyche and things are wrapped up in like, the fact that she didn’t have friends when she was a kid. [00:50:54] And also the fact that like, she is a very calculating and very strategic person and she used to get really upset when people would say, Oh, she’s calculating, or she’s this or that. And like, she would almost like treat it like, like people were slurring her. And it’s like, Okay, but you are, And that’s what I love about her. [00:51:11] Like I love the fact that she’s. Not like, like Lana Del Ray is so cool and, and Phoebe bridgers are so cool and like they, it feels more effortless for him, you know, with Taylor that she’s never not tried a day in her life. Like she cares so deeply about everything, which. To me, part of the appeal with her, like she’s so type a, it, it, it’s, it’s endearing for me. [00:51:32] I understand foul. For other people it might not be, but for me it is. But to have the song Mastermind where she’s basically talking about how, uh, it’s presumably about her, her, her current, like long term, um, uh, partner who they’ve been together for like six years, who basically, she’s like, I, I saw you and I basically constructed this entire situation so that we would go home together because I wanted to fuck you. [00:51:55] And I put everything together so that it would happen. And you had, you know, thinking that you would have no idea that, that I put all these things into place. And then the, that, the final Stan is basically, he, he knew the whole time that, that she was doing all that and, and still kind of went along with it. [00:52:12] But there is, um, a, a, a bridge, um, that I, that I think just like. It reformed every head can I’ve ever had about her, which is no one wanted to play with me as a little kid. So I’ve been scheming like a criminal ever since to make them love me and make it seem effortless. This is the first time I felt the need to confess, and I swear I’m only cryptic and maccabean cuz I care. [00:52:36] Jeffrey: I am interested that there’s no, we’re talking about, you know, the, uh, the issue with the anti hero video, um, and her stepping on a scale that says fat and her, the judging self next to her kind of wagging a finger at her. You know, as of when we’re recording, that’s been edited out, the little clip, uh, where you [00:52:54] Christina: That the fat part has been edited out. Yeah, [00:52:57] Jeffrey: Um, in and in response to people going, Hey, that’s kind of a messed up way to use that. Um, we do not know yet if she will have a statement on this. Right. She has not had a statement. It may just be that kind of subtle removal of [00:53:12] Christina: It’ll probably be that she, she, she almost never addresses things like that. Um, especially now, like she used to maybe be a little more comic, but she’s basically, she does very few interviews now. She doesn’t give statements like that. It’ll be interesting. She recorded Graham Norton, um, a couple days ago and, and I don’t know if he would bring it up or not. [00:53:35] Um, you know, he might have had to agree not to. I have no idea. [00:53:38] Jeffrey: So in her, in your experience of her, like she’s not someone who you’d be waiting, unlike a tweet storm, uh, from her, or an apology or a defense or whatever. [00:53:48] Christina: Um, not anymore. [00:53:50] Jeffrey: Yeah, so the comment is the edit, which is not nothing. I mean, it’s, it was gone by the [00:53:57] Christina: It’s, it’s, it is, Yeah. I was gonna say, it’s a capitulation, right? Like, I mean, I, I know we have a good gratitude, but were there any standout tracks for you that like you found yourself listening to, um, more frequent. [00:54:09] Jeffrey: I mean, not to be boring but fucking anti-hero, like it’s a great song like that. I have been walking around with that song in my head for days now. [00:54:18] Brett: Yep. That’s the one. [00:54:20] Jeffrey: Yep. [00:54:20] Christina: No, I, I and I, she is notorious for not choosing good singles. That’s her first single. And, uh, she, she broke it this time. Like, she definitely, like, I, I agree. I think think she nailed it. Like I think the songs, the song’s a hit is a smash. [00:54:36] Jeffrey: great. And then I’m embarrassed. I have not tracked the name on this cuz I have been listening to it just around the house, which is the one where she so nicely drops the F-bombs. [00:54:47] Christina: Um, [00:54:48] Jeffrey: Maybe you’re on your own kid. I can’t, I’m. [00:54:50] Christina: yeah. Yeah, you’re on your own kid, uh, which is a track vibe, which is really good. Um, it might be on, um, uh, vigilante shit. [00:55:00] Jeffrey: Yeah, it’s one of those two. I like both those songs a lot. Oh wait, we got to ease. I’m looking at it now. We got question vigilante, shit, Karma and snow on the beach, whatever that means. [00:55:11] Christina: Oh, still on the beach is, is weird, but fucking beautiful. Um, so, so that, that, [00:55:16] Brett: Lana Del Ray. [00:55:17] Christina: with Lana Delray, which is a great song. [00:55:19] Jeffrey: that’s, that’s the one I think I’m thinking of. [00:55:21] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Yeah, I love that. [00:55:23] Jeffrey: Yeah. Awesome. Um, alright, well that was fun. I also like the, I like iTunes as little like motion album covers now and she’s got her little [00:55:34] Christina: Yeah, I like that too. [00:55:35] Jeffrey: It’s a nice touch. [00:55:36] Christina: Yeah, I like that too. I like it too. Um, uh, and, and for any, uh, listeners out there, if you, the lyric videos that, that she did like this time around are, are pretty good. Um, she, [00:55:46] Brett: Yeah, they really are. Yeah. [00:55:48] Christina: the, the production, like it’s actually even higher than they were for, uh, um, folklore or evermore. [00:55:53] But yeah, the lyric [00:55:53] Brett: Did she make those lyric videos? [00:55:56] Christina: I mean, she or her team does. Yeah. [00:55:58] Brett: Okay, cool. Yeah, they are good. They were some of the best PowerPoint transitions I’ve ever seen. [00:56:05] Christina: Oh, that’s what I’m saying. Like, like, like I look at it, I’m like, these are really freaking good. Like, like, like you’ve done good drone footage. I don’t like, I mean, I’m sure she doesn’t actually do it, but she, she art directs everything. Like, she’s like, Yeah. So thank you for ex for, for indulging us, Brett to talk way, way too long about Taylor. [00:56:23] I appreciate it. [00:56:24] Brett: this, this was the Taylor episode. You, you agreed, you agreed tacitly that we were no longer a Taylor [00:56:32] Christina: I do, [00:56:33] Brett: if we got to come back for major album releases. And this, this matters, this, this is a Taylor episode and, and I believe the title should be, This is Taylor Swift Grapptitude [00:56:48] Jeffrey: Noted. That’s awesome. All right. Gratitude, grip, gratitude. Who wants to go first? [00:56:56] Brett: Oh, oh, I’m [00:56:58] Jeffrey: You ready? Go do it. Come on. [00:56:59] Brett: I’m on this text buddy. Um, Tyler Hall made this app called Text Buddy that you can use as a service or you can load it up and pace text into it. And it basically just performs all kinds of transformations on your text. Uppercase, lowercase, snake case, Uh, and you can write your own custom converters for it. [00:57:23] Uh, I have one that you can paste an entire objective c header file into it. Uh, and, and it will output, eh, nobody cares. But anyway. [00:57:37] Christina: no, we care. Come on. [00:57:39] Brett: Well, so, okay, so I made, you can, you can pace objective C method definitions into it, and it will output the header file code for you that you can just paste into the header file. [00:57:51] And if you use it as a service, you can just select your methods in X code, hit the hit your shortcut for the service, and then switch your header, file and paste in the new method definitions. It’s simple, it’s easy, uh, it’s easy to write extensions for. It can do. I, I do not know offhand exactly how many conversions are built in, but it’s gotta be 50 plus. [00:58:17] Um, as an honorable mention, and this came up in our discord, uh, Boo is a Mac app store app that is very similar. Uh, does text transformations personally, I’m a text buddy guy, but uh, I will link boo, uh, for anyone curious, anyone who works with text regularly and needs to, you know, sentence case or snake case something, uh, just on the fly. [00:58:49] Uh, both of these apps will, will do the trick. Nicely. [00:58:53] Jeffrey: Awesome. Um, who goes next? [00:59:00] Christina: Are you ready? [00:59:01] Brett: oh, oh. Can I, let me, let me say, let me say one thing. Uh, uh, set up, set up just announced a new app called Curio, and it is not the curio we talked about last week. It is a news aggregation app, and I’m pissed. I’m pissed that they took the name Curio. And now if you Google setup curio, you get something that is not the curio that has when we, like last week when we talked about curio, it was within days of Curios 20th anniversary. [00:59:40] Like, uh, like George went indie and started developing curio full-time 20 years ago. If anyone deserves the name curio, it’s George Browning. But, [00:59:53] Jeffrey: there’s also a, there’s also a 3D printing design app called Curio, [00:59:58] Brett: yeah, it’s a different space. There’s, that’s not gonna be on set app, like Set App focuses on Mac apps. And I, and I wish that they respected a 20 year veteran enough to not have a naming conflict, [01:00:13] Christina: Who, who is the, who’s the developer behind it? Because I think that like [01:00:16] Brett: uh, of a new app. [01:00:18] Christina: Yeah. [01:00:19] Brett: Let’s find out. [01:00:21] Christina: Cause they’re the ones I, I, I fault more than set [01:00:23] Brett: Curio set app silhouette 1 0 1. [01:00:31] Christina: Yeah. Uh, [01:00:32] Brett: That’s the printer. Okay, hold on. Journalism narrated is by, [01:00:43] Christina: Oh, I know this. Okay. Yeah, so, so this is, this is a service. This is basically one app for all the news. This is like a, um, they, they claim they’re gonna, it’s sort of like Autumn, which the New York time spot where like, they, they read, um, uh, the news for you [01:00:58] Brett: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don’t, At curio.io is the company behind it. [01:01:07] Christina: right? So, so this started out, I think as like a web service iOS app. So I’ll give them a little bit of a pass. I didn’t realize that there was, um, uh, yeah, there’s not a Mac app. I mean, it, I didn’t, I didn’t know it was in setup because that’s clearly gonna be, um, Some conflict, but I think that when this app was created, it was probably like, not like they were like, [01:01:30] Brett: in a different realm. Yes. [01:01:32] Christina: Yeah. Cuz this is, I, I subscribe to Autumn, which is very similar, but I think better actually. Um, cuz I’ve, I’ve tested curio before and, and the, the readers that Autumn has are just better. Um, but, uh, but I didn’t realize this was part of setup now, which is, which is interesting. Cool. [01:01:52] Jeffrey: Awesome. [01:01:54] Christina: Uh, Jeff, do you are ready to go? [01:01:56] Jeffrey: Yeah. I could go, I, I can’t remember if this has been used before or not, but, um, deck set, which is [01:02:04] Christina: Oh yeah. We, we, we’ve talked about it, but not, Yeah, we, No, but, but it’s been years. We haven’t talked about it in years, so, so definitely please make it hasn’t been gratitude, so. Absolutely. Tell us more about Deck, uh, deck set. Cuz Brett and I are both fans. [01:02:18] Jeffrey: deck set and there’s another app that does this. Brett, you might remember better than me, that you, because I think you’ve talked to me about [01:02:24] Brett: there’s another app that does it not as well with the very job-like Interface Tech said is the more elegant version, [01:02:31] Jeffrey: deck set is essentially just a way of, um, creating presentations like PowerPoint style with a markdown file. Um, and I have loved it for a long time. Um, I love, I mean, it’s exactly why you like, you know, if you like writing markdown or writing text files, it’s exactly why you like that. You don’t want to be distracted by design, which, like, , I just watched my wife put together a PowerPoint presentation and like the shit that she’d just be like, if I could only get it to do this one simple thing, I’d be done. [01:03:03] Right? Like it’s, you know, it doesn’t have nearly as many features as PowerPoint, which I don’t fully. Um, but as someone, as someone who really, as much as possible, needs to not get caught up in how things look while I’m creating, um, , which is a big thing for me, it’s just beautiful. And you can make really good looking slideshow. [01:03:26] There’s, there’s nice little templates you put your images in. Anything you wanna do, you can do. And, um, and the other thing is I’ve been going through and kind of archiving a, a project that I’ve been working on for about five years, just archiving some of the. Bits and pieces that are officially ready to be retired. [01:03:43] And some of those are like presentations we gave to our funder or whatever. And as an example, I have one, uh, PowerPoint where I, I, you know, dragged in some photos and some images that were very large. Somehow this PowerPoint got to be, you know, two gigabytes, large and the same thing, uh, done in, in deck set where I’ve just got a folder with images that I’m calling, right, is obviously it’s just a text file and it’s a lot easier to kind of go back and revisit the past. [01:04:13] It’s like future proof, right? Um, in ways that PowerPoint just can’t be. So I don’t know if I’ve done a good job of explaining it, but I really love it. [01:04:22] Brett: here’s my deck set story. Um, I was at the Command D conference at Salsa Sego in, uh, of Apple Script, uh, fame and automator fame put on, and I was there as like a last minute volunteer ticket taker, um, like working my, working to pay off my ticket. And the keynote speaker canceled, uh, on the second day, or first day, maybe it was only a one day conference. [01:04:53] Either way, the keynote speaker canceled and they asked me to fill in same day the keynote speaker spot, and. . And so I’m there with my laptop and I have maybe two hours to put together a presentation, uh, to try to wrap up the Command D Festival conference. And, uh, yeah, so I wrote it in markdown. I used deck set. [01:05:23] I output a deck. I presented it using deck set on the, uh, on the projector. And it was a breeze, like for, for a quick and dirty, very good looking presentation written in with the simplicity of markdown syntax, uh, without any fiddling with font sizes or, or image placement or anything. Everything was just a breeze and, and I pulled it off. [01:05:57] I think I made a pretty good presentation. Uh, but it was all thanks to deck set. [01:06:02] Jeffrey: What, what got me to deck set was that like I, I was writing my PowerPoints in text files just to make sure that I had, or like a kind of a grasp on what it was. I was trying to say that it wasn’t too long and it was like, surely this can just become a PowerPoint presentation. And that’s where it, where it came in for me is like, so I also just recommended as an exercise, just try making a presentation with deck set and see what it’s like to actually just write out a little document and how much more for me, how much more concise. [01:06:34] I was succinct, like all that stuff. It was just way, way better. I wanna also just add that they have a beta um, deck set for iOS that is [01:06:45] Christina: Oh, nice. That I didn’t know about. Okay, cool. [01:06:47] Jeffrey: yeah, [01:06:49] Christina: That’s great. Yeah. So my, my experience with it has been, so for work I have to use Keynote or PowerPoint for a lot of things that I do just because there are like, um, either, uh, like requirements for style or other stuff. So for certain conferences you have to do that. [01:07:04] But if I’m doing something that can be more low key, especially if I’m doing a lot of code with it, Dex said is great because it really does make inserting code blocks like that look good. One of the best ways you can do that. And, and, um, and that, that for me is, was, was kind of like the thing that kind of got me into it, um, was, uh, and then I remember bringing it to Brett, I think on this podcast and he was like, Oh yeah, I’ve known about this for years. [01:07:28] I was like, Oh, I was brand new to it. But for me, the big thing was honestly beyond just kind of like the quick and dirty and like being. As you said, it is a great way of thinking more simply in a document, but for me it is way easier to embed, um, uh, syntax highlighted code samples with it than, than it is with Keynote or PowerPoint, where you have to do, you know, like a, the screenshot process and, and all that stuff. [01:07:55] Like, it’s just, it’s a lot easier. And then if you need to make a change to the code, you’ve gotta redo another screenshot and all that stuff, which makes things complicated, which interestingly enough does is a, is a perfect segue to my gratitude, which is a new CLI tool from Charm, um, who we’ve talked about before, like they do gum and they do like the, the, the charm libraries. [01:08:15] Um, like, like a bubble tea and other, and lip gloss. Like that help. Basically it’s, it’s a bunch of go library stuff that, um, make. Look, do really good looking cli um, tooling. Um, it makes stuff really pretty, but they just released this thing called vhs, which lets you generate terminal, uh, gyps or um, uh, movie files, um, with code. [01:08:36] And so it is, um, it is great. So there’s this thing called schema, which. We’ll basically capture your output from a terminal in, um, like a high resolution kind of, uh, specialty format, um, that you can then share. You can either self host it or do their own thing. But the problem with schema is a, sometimes I actually need the video file and getting a video file from there format is a pain in the fucking ass. [01:09:02] The same thing with trying to turn it into a gif. The other thing is that is fine if you’re wanting to actually type out everything yourself and capture it like it’s great, this is a little bit different. And then what it’s doing is you’re writing a script that is basically, they have this thing that they’re calling like dot tape, which is, which is like their, their, um, generative file. [01:09:22] But you’re basically writing a script that is going to say, This is what I want. This text output and this recording to do so, I want it to, you know, this is the code that I want typed, This is how long I wanna pause. This is the response that I’m, I’m looking for, this is how I wanna interact with the response. [01:09:38] You can customize the font. You can customize like the, um, the, um, refresh rate, you can customize like colors. Um, I, it’s been out for 24 hours, so I haven’t had a chance to play [01:09:48] Jeffrey: This is [01:09:48] Christina: totally in depth. But for a lot of the coding stuff that I have to do, like a lot for presentations or for demos or for videos, this is going to save me so much time. [01:10:00] So, so vh it’s called vhs. [01:10:03] Jeffrey: It’s amazing. And also in that kind of, obviously like thinking in terms of future proof, right? Or like, how can I revisit this in 15 years? Like maybe I’ve still got the gif, but in here you’ve got, you’ve written like essentially a little script, right? [01:10:19] Christina: Yep, exactly right. Which, which exactly the point of like with Deck said is like, okay, cuz if I need to make a, a change now I just change that script. Whereas I don’t have to go back and rerecord the whole thing. I don’t have to recapture the whole thing. And what I don’t think will, uh, have talked about enough, and this is like the problem that they announced it yesterday and, um, I know their team a little bit because of, um, my previous shoutouts and, and I did a, um, actually a, a, a twitch stream with them, um, last week or week before last. [01:10:46] Um, about, um, uh, sustainability and open source. And they’re really good people, but like, I think a lot of people don’t like understand like capturing terminal output is way more complex than it should be if you want it to be high resolution in like the right frame rate. Like I’ve gotten it down to a science. [01:11:03] But it’s not easy if you want it to be big enough or if you want it, like to, to have everything work, right? Like, it’s not as easy. Oh, just, just use like a screen capture tool. Like, it’s like, no, there’s, there’s more involved than that. And so this, uh, is, is really gonna be great. [01:11:20] Brett: When, when, Most of the times if I’m making a screencast for any, um, marketing purposes, I script it and, and it’s a pain in the ass to script it with, with Apple Script or whatever tool you’re using. Uh, so this kinda tool would be [01:11:37] Christina: Yeah, you’re gonna love this. You’re gonna love using this for market and marketing stuff is really what this is designed for, right? Like, I would not do a full demo in this, obviously. Um, uh, this is not what it’s for, but if you need like, uh, like, like an animated j or, or even like a video, you know, kind of like of a few lines of code, but you want it to be high quality. [01:11:55] You want it to be, you know, um, in other things. You can even [01:11:59] Brett: smooth and without a lot of backspacing and pauses. Yeah. [01:12:04] Christina: Plus, plus. What’s nice about this too, your output, not only can you output in GIF or mp4, you can also output as like frames in p and g. So, so I think what it’s doing under the hood is that it’s like using like a web scraper like Chrome and then basically doing kind of like, like generating the code based on your scripting and then kind of doing a recording in on that. [01:12:24] So it’s automating, like you were probably doing something very similar, Brett, with the way you were scripting things with Apple Script. Um, I never got that involved. I was like, I’ll use Schema and I’ll do, you know, have some presets in, in screen flow, but I never like, did what you’re doing. But this is like, I, I think that this is, uh, this is pretty. [01:12:46] Jeffrey: That’s awesome. I love it. Also, just love all of their stuff. [01:12:49] Christina: Yeah, me too. I, I, I, I think that they’re branding everything about them. Like they’re, they’re really cool. I’m, I’m actually gonna meet them, um, uh, at a GitHub universe. [01:12:58] Jeffrey: Oh, nice. [01:12:59] Brett: so jealous. [01:13:00] Christina: Yeah, I know. I wish you could be there. [01:13:01] Jeffrey: Hey, that, that Twitch, uh, is it recorded somewhere? [01:13:06] Christina: Yes. I will. I will find it in, link it in, uh, in, in the show notes. [01:13:10] Jeffrey: Great. Awesome. [01:13:13] Brett: I, I, I ran search link on VHS charm and it literally gave me a VHS charm bracelet like thing. I don’t think that’s what we want. [01:13:29] Jeffrey: I don’t think so. [01:13:30] Brett: find the right link. [01:13:32] Jeffrey: Ugh. I’ll edit that. Yawn out. Sorry, Awesome. This was fun. [01:13:40] Christina: Yeah. [01:13:42] Jeffrey: All right. People get some sleep though. [01:13:46] Brett: Get some sleep, Jeff. [01:13:48] Jeffrey: I’ll give my [01:13:48] Christina: Get some sleep. Uh, Brett and Jeff [01:13:51] Jeffrey: Get some sleep. Christina and Brett, we got it. [01:13:54] Outro: The is going down low.

Brett and Christina are, get this, tired. Brett because of mental health stuff, Christina because of a new Taylor Swift drop, but they pull it together to make one hell of an episode. Hang on to your butts. Mental Health, debating the Midwest, and some Mac apps you should definitely try. Sponsor ZocDoc lets you choose a doctor using real patient ratings, and book appointments (live or telehealth) in minutes. No more waiting on hold. Take your healthcare seriously and visit zocdoc.com/OVERTIRED. SimpliSafe has everything you need to keep your home safe — from entry and motion sensors to indoor and outdoor cameras. Visit simplisafe.com/overtired and claim a free indoor security camera plus 40% off your order. Show Links Ellen Forney GitHub Universe Curio MenuBarX Quinn Nelson Join the Conversation 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 This One’s Not About Taylor Swift. That’s Next Week. [00:00:00] Brett: Hey everybody, this is Brett Terpstra. I’ve been up since 2:00 AM um, just working to make Overtired as tired as possible. I am here as always, with Christina Warren, Jeff Severances. Gunzel has the week off. Christina, this is gonna be a weird episode. [00:00:21] Christina: It is gonna be weird episode, but I have to say, I’m super excited for Jeff to be on, um, next episode because You and Jeff both will have homework you will have to do, which is to listen to Taylor Swift’s midnights. But you’ve been up since 2:00 AM for a reason. I’ve, I went to bed late because Taylor Swift’s new album about the things that keep her up at night. [00:00:41] That’s like, literally like what, what the, what the album kind of is about. Uh. [00:00:46] Brett: obligated. You felt maybe you should stay up all night and listen to the things that keep Taylor up at night. [00:00:51] Christina: Right. But also, I mean, I, I did go to bed at like 2:00 AM but like, um, two or three. But, um, the thing is, is that [00:01:00] this is like the Overtired Taylor album, and since we are a Taylor Swift podcast, it does almost feel fitting that it is just like you and I like for this. Like, I, like I said, I can’t wait for Jeff to join us for like a full, like, deep dive and, um, and, and, and get into it all, especially since he’s even less of a fan than you are. [00:01:19] But, um, we are a Taylor Swift podcast and it’s a Taylor Swift pop album, [00:01:24] Brett: I wanna add some clarity here. Um, uh, we have moved away from being a Taylor Swift podcast because, uh, we have become a mental health podcast. And then I believe in the tagline it says, Anne Taylor Swift for some fucking reason. Um, so yes, she’s still gonna come up, but I refuse to call it the Taylor Swift podcast anymore. [00:01:49] The joke, the joke got old for me. [00:01:51] Christina: Well, that’s fine. But, but, [00:01:53] Brett: But we are a pop culture. I mean, we are absolutely a pop culture podcast, so, [00:01:57] Christina: we are, but also we have to go back to the old [00:02:00] tagline, at least for one week, because she released an album Brett, about shit that keeps her up at night. [00:02:04] Brett: All right. That’ll be the, the episode will be titled Something to do with Taylor Swift. We will make a huge week long Taylor Swift extravaganza next week. [00:02:16] Christina: Excellent. Excellent. But it’s, it’s so, so, so you’re, you’re tired for real reasons. Um, I’m, And you’re in your grouchy and, um, I’m a [00:02:29] Brett: Yeah, I might be. Um, [00:02:33] Christina: Yeah. Yeah, a little bit. Um, and. [00:02:36] Brett: a God Taylor Swift podcast. God damn. [00:02:39] Christina: I’m tired of this joke. It’s been eight years. Christina. I’m fucking tired of this joke, Christina. No. Um, but, uh, yeah, so, um, how are you doing? [00:02:53] Mental Health Corner [00:02:53] Brett: I am, like I said up since two. I might, I’m like mania. I might be starting a little [00:03:00] manic episode. Um, should we, can we segue mental [00:03:04] Christina: No, let’s just, I was just gonna say, let’s just go into the mental health corner. [00:03:08] Brett: so I think I talked last week. If I didn’t, I was just talking to my therapist and. Didn’t talk about it here, but, um, I’m really curious as to whether what I have considered stable in the past with my bipolar, uh, whether it’s actually been just like low grade depression, uh, because like I get so bored and unmotivated when I am what I’ve always called stable. [00:03:35] Um, and I like dream about the mania when I’m in those states and I’ve begun to realize through talking to my therapist and going to a talk with Ellen Forney that maybe I don’t know what stable is and maybe there is. A stable I can find where I can still be creative and productive and like a fucking [00:04:00] normal person with some energy. [00:04:02] And, um, so I bought, I bought Ellen Forney’s two books, um, Marbles, which is kind of her like, she’s a, she’s a graphic artist, uh, a comic. Um, and she, not a, not a comedian, but she, she draws comics. Um, [00:04:20] Christina: She’s a, yeah, she’s a graphic novelist, I guess. [00:04:23] Brett: yeah, there you go. And Marbles is her kind of like story of her bipolar, uh, with a little bit of advice woven into it. But then as a result of the feedback to Marbles, she wrote a book called Brock Study, which is nothing but like, How she stays stable, like what’s important and like, I’m, so, I started reading rock study. [00:04:50] I haven’t gotten marbles yet, but I feel like rock study is the more useful one. And I’m really hoping to find the secret. Like I’ve been up since two. I’m not positive, [00:05:00] I’m manic, but, um, I have been coding a lot. And what I’m realizing is if I knew what to do when, when a manic episode starts to prevent it from going full swing, and I could just get that like one morning of super productive coding and then fucking like chill and sleep the next night. [00:05:21] Um, that would be kind of an ideal situation for me. I don’t need 10 days of hypomania. I just need that one first morning. Um, but anyway, that’s, that’s where I’m at. I’ll link Ellen Forney in the show notes for anyone who’s curious. Uh, the books are really good. Seeing her talk was just inspiring. I, I learned a lot. [00:05:43] Christina: That’s awesome. Did you get to talk to her at all? [00:05:45] Brett: Um, I got into the q and a, I was doing it over Zoom. [00:05:49] Christina: Oh, gotcha. Okay. [00:05:50] Brett: but I got to, I got to drop some questions into the q and a and interact with her a little bit. Um, didn’t, didn’t get to meet her personally though. [00:05:59] Christina: Nice. [00:06:00] Oh, so she lives in Seattle actually. That’s cool. Um, as a visual artist, she created two permanent large scale porcelain enamel murals for Sound Transits Capital Hill Light rail station in Seattle. I live in Capital Hill. That’s cool. Um, no, I’m glad you gotta see her talk. Yeah. You mentioned last week a little bit of this, about how like you thought that maybe what you’d always classified as, you always thought you had bipolar. [00:06:24] Brett: Yeah. Yeah. And there’s some other, I have, I still haven’t found the name of it, but some other, some something with the word cycle in it. [00:06:32] Christina: Right. Well, it’s like rapid cycling. Is that what it is? [00:06:35] Brett: well, that’s type two. [00:06:36] Christina: That’s type two. [00:06:37] Brett: Um, uh, there’s a, there’s another type that never hits, like full on depression. Like, I don’t get like suicidally depressed. Um, I just get unmotivated and, and lackluster. [00:06:53] Christina: Right. [00:06:53] Brett: And the idea that maybe there’s a word for going between [00:07:00] hypomania and, and, uh, lackluster minor depression, uh, rapidly and never finding stable in between. Like, that’s, that seems like me. [00:07:13] Christina: Yeah, no. [00:07:14] Brett: I will finish my research on that and come back and if I decided to fit for me, um, I’ll talk to therapist slash psychiatrist about it and if that’s the case, I will come back and make a definitive declaration and actually remember the word for what it is. [00:07:30] Christina: Yeah. No, but I mean, I think that that’s, that’s definitely like interesting to to think about when we were talking about that last week about you, like figuring that out. It would be good to know, because maybe that would change how you could be treated and maybe you could find a better middle ground between the two. [00:07:43] Right. Um, because, but, but I will say like, at least, um, the, uh, at least like you don’t have the suicidal depression because that would be if you had, if you were going like, okay, if you were like cycling between those states, between like a [00:08:00] suicidal depression and the mania that I, I’m gonna be honest with you, I, I, I don’t know if that would be [00:08:05] Brett: Yeah. That was my uncle. It wasn’t cool. It wasn’t cool. [00:08:09] Christina: no. Like I don’t wanna. No, I’m not gonna say what I’m actually thinking because that’s too dark, but, um [00:08:17] Brett: My, my worst impression means that I think that everyone’s mad at me or, or everyone’s laughing at me. Um, and, and I get very anxious and concerned, but not like, harm myself or, or do anything like that. [00:08:34] Christina: right. Which, which to be clear, that’s still like, not at all, like, uh, a good thing, but. At all. Like that’s, that’s, that’s in no way, like, I, I don’t want you to like discount that. Um, my worst suppression, um, I mean, it, it’s rarely gone into like self-harm things because A, I don’t find anything therapeutic about that. [00:08:52] And b, the one time I did like overdose on pills, I immediately like, thought better, but I was like, You fucking [00:09:00] idiot, you’re probably just going to make yourself brain dead and that’s gonna be worse. So I had to call 9 1 1 and then go get my stomach pumped and all that shit, and it was a whole pain in the ass. [00:09:09] And then like some fucking like, um, some bitch who had like masters and social workers, some shit came to like talk to me and I’m like, My mom has more qualifications than you get the fuck away from me. I have an actual psychiatrist. I was such a bitch, but I was also like, I was also like 20 years old. [00:09:26] Brett: You see this brand on my arm. [00:09:28] Christina: I can. [00:09:29] Brett: That was the result of one of my early in my, uh, twenties after getting clean off of drugs, which make it really hard to tell, you know what? [00:09:39] Christina: Oh yeah, [00:09:40] Brett: is like, um, and also apparently could have caused bipolar. [00:09:43] Christina: yeah, I’ve heard that. I’ve heard that, that that can like trigger something. Well, I don’t know if it’s so much that it causes it, like maybe it could change something in your brain or if it like could just be the proceeding fact, the precipitating factor that like wakes it up. I don’t know. I’ve [00:09:57] Brett: but I didn’t, I didn’t know [00:10:00] how to get myself. I didn’t, I wasn’t diagnosed bipolar yet. All I knew is that I had gotten clean off of heroin and I was, uh, living at home and I didn’t have a job and I was dating a crazy, crazy girl. Um, and, and nothing seemed to be going quite right and I didn’t know what to do. [00:10:23] And I like branded myself just to just so the searing pain would like snap me out of it. And it worked for like a day. I was like, I felt normal. Uh, but that’s the only self-harm I’ve ever really partaken. [00:10:39] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. So, which, which I get, I’m glad at least that A wasn’t continued b, that like it did at least snap you out of it. Yeah, I had one, and again, like, I don’t wanna call it a suicide attempt because again, I thought better of it immediately after it happened. And I was like, again, I was like, you didn’t, you didn’t do this right. [00:10:58] These drugs are literally [00:11:00] just going to maybe put you into like a vegetative state and that would be worse. Or do something that would like environmentally. So, you know, it was okay. Um, and, and that was also what we kinda had to tell the hospital so that I wouldn’t be sent on a 51 50 hold, which everybody agreed. [00:11:15] They were like, Don’t do that. Um, but I’ve definitely had like moments where I wanted, I’ve been deeply suicidal. I just haven’t like, actually done the self-harm thing. But yeah, my worst depression has been like, literally can’t get out of bed and like, wanting to die all the time. And, and that I think like if I, if it was a cycle between that and mania, that’s what I’m saying, like that, that would be, I think an untenable situation to be completely honest. [00:11:42] Like, I don’t know. Yeah. I, I, I, like, I, I, I don’t even know what it, I wouldn’t have any advice for that. I wouldn’t have any professional, I mean, I’m [00:11:49] Brett: Yeah. When I, [00:11:50] Christina: but I don’t even know how, what to do. [00:11:52] Brett: when I first started seeing my therapist, um, he was very concerned about how I handled depression. [00:12:00] Um, and, and it wasn’t until we had talked a couple of times that he realized that my version of bipolar depression, uh, was not as deep as some of the people he had worked with before. Uh, that it’s, is there such a thing as hypo depression [00:12:19] Christina: Probably, yeah, probably where you could go into like a major depression and like a major bad of media one, three the other, and that would, I would think would be really concerning. So I’m glad you don’t have that because we, I mean, realistically we wouldn’t be able to do a podcast. Like you wouldn’t be able to function, you know what I mean? [00:12:34] Like it would be um, it would be [00:12:37] Brett: Podcasts only when Brett is manic and then everything goes off the rails. [00:12:41] Christina: Right. But also, yeah. I mean, God, I can’t even imagine. [00:12:43] Brett: If I was having, if I was having the kind of mania that I saw my uncle have, um, I also wouldn’t be podcasting like he was, he was not someone who would sit down and have a sane conversa. He would call you at two in the morning [00:13:00] and tell you all about how he was gonna buy like a new semi trailer at like a, a, a truck and it was gonna be bright silver and he was gonna drive it all over the country and he was gonna be a traveling, um, chaplain and yeah. [00:13:19] Christina: Yeah. Um, a, a person I was in a relationship with, um, in college, that, that was the situation. It was similar to that. And, uh, and, um, Ted Turner, um, who’s famously bipolar, used to call my father at two o’clock in the morning to talk about things like that. Yeah. [00:13:35] Brett: I, [00:13:36] Christina: randomly call him. And, uh, and my dad had finally gotta the point. [00:13:39] My dad was like, I can’t keep taking these calls from Ted when he is not medicated. [00:13:44] Brett: Yeah. My, my mania results in coding and my depression results in watching tv, and it’s pretty, pretty mild swings. Uh, both affect my productivity, but [00:13:58] Christina: Of course, and, and both affect like your [00:14:00] personal and your, and your relationships and, and other things. Um, but I’m just glad that neither of them are swung in either direction so much that like, and that’s honestly, but it’s probably why it’s difficult to diagnose. It’s probably why you’ve been called type two, even though these cycles happen really quickly. [00:14:16] Um, it might be this, this other thing they don’t know because they’re like, Well, I guess that’s what this is, just because neither of the swings are, are so bad. And also for some people, like, we never talked about this. Um, and I know that we should be getting to my mental health corner, but frankly I don’t have that much to add. [00:14:33] But, but I did wanna ask you like how, I don’t know if we ever talked about how you were diagnosed with, with bipolar. You, you mentioned that, that it, the, the drug coming off the drugs might have precipitated it. Was it the incident where, where you branded yourself? Was that the thing that maybe got you to a hospital or, or how were you diagnosed? [00:14:52] Brett: no, that didn’t get me to a hospital. Um, I went to the hospital after, um, basically [00:15:00] being. Depressed. Um, like I wanted to get off my ass and get a job and, uh, I wanted to get outta my parents’ home. And, uh, I just didn’t feel like it was working. So I, I signed up. My mom, I think probably, um, got me an appointment with a psychiatrist and I just kind of explained what was happening and he was like, Oh yeah, you’re bipolar. [00:15:26] Um, and there were clear signs back before I was on heroin, but definitely after I had started drug use. So that absolutely could have been a contributing factor. Um, so yeah, I think, I think my mom got me in there. Um, and I started immediately on Seroquel and, oh, there was some other drug that it turned out my doctor was getting like major kickbacks for prescribing. [00:15:54] Christina: Yeah, I had that incident. Mm-hmm. [00:15:56] Brett: It wasn’t, it wasn’t an ideal drug. [00:16:00] Um, I can’t remember the whole story. I just remember finding out that oh, yeah, he literally prescribed that to every one of his patients with any, any similar symptoms, um, regardless of their specific needs. And [00:16:16] Christina: Yeah, that, that was actually how I was incorrectly diagnosed as being bipolar. [00:16:20] Brett: yeah, [00:16:21] Christina: I think I’ve told you that story. I’ve probably told this on the podcast. [00:16:23] Brett: someone wanted the kickback from the diagnosis. [00:16:26] Christina: No, actually, what happened was she was mad that I called her out on the fact that she was getting a kickback. and she thought that my rapid thought in speaking quickly and just ability to just like fucking zone in and call her out because much like Taylor Swift, I do have the ability to zero in and I’m not proud of this. [00:16:45] Um, and it’s not a good thing. Um, and, and it’s, I I’ve gotten a lot better with it, but I can usually pick out people’s weaknesses pretty quickly and I can say something that could just like level you, right? Like, [00:17:00] and um, I was, she put me on Wellbutrin because Wellbutrin was something she was getting kickbacks from and it had helped at first, it helped my depression a lot at first, and then it didn’t. [00:17:11] And then like I was, I was in an, I was in this situation where I was both depressed and incredibly adhd and then I was stressed out cuz I was like, Look, I’m 15, like. I actually have to care about my grades and shit. Like I have to, you know, be able to, to focus and do stuff. And this was, I think this is before, this was, uh, this was shortly before I was, I was put on, um, Dexedrine for the first time. [00:17:35] But, um, I didn’t have an official ADHD diagnosis then, although it was obvious now that I clearly was, but also the depression, like the Wellbutrin, it worked great for six weeks and then it just stopped working. And then I was not only like incredibly depressed, but ADHD and all these things were happening. [00:17:50] And she kept insisting, No, no, no, you have to be on this. You have to be on this. And I’m like, It’s not working. And then she was also being weird about some other stuff, like [00:18:00] wanting to talk to me about my sex life and stuff. That was like not at all appropriate. We didn’t have that kind of relationship. [00:18:06] And my dad was potentially going to see her, and I think she was also gonna, she was trying to shove both. You turned down his throat and it clicked me. I was like, You’re getting fucking paybacks. Like, like kickbacks from the pharmaceutical companies, aren’t you? And she, she tried to kind of hedge off. I was like, No, you are. [00:18:21] I was like, And that’s the only reason you say this. You don’t actually give a shit about me. You don’t care about anything else. I know what this is. I know what you’re doing. You’re a fraud, whatever. And then she was like, Well, you are bipolar and put me on lithium and I’m not [00:18:38] Brett: Ouch. No. And lithium sucks no matter what. [00:18:41] Christina: does, No, I was having shakes. [00:18:43] It was shitty. It was like one, And then that honestly, that then kicked off one of the worst major depressive episodes of my life where because of all that like that, like that was the first time I got to like the truly debilitating state. Um, and um, [00:19:00] and then it, it took me finding like some doctors, like, what did one doctor who only wanted to do cognitive behavioral therapy And my mom was like, Look, I understand that this is useful, but she can’t. [00:19:13] Get out of bed, we need something. And he was like not willing to give me any medication at all, really. And, uh, because he was only about wanting to, to do the, the, the C B T at first. And then we finally found Dr. Baker, who, um, was just like appalled with everything that had happened. And I was able to [00:19:34] Brett: Isn’t it nice when you find a doctor that is as frustrated with your history as you are [00:19:39] Christina: Yes, it is. Which is one of the reasons why, like, I still see my doctor, even though it’s inconvenient and expensive, because I don’t wanna go. I’m like, and he’s gonna retire soon. And I’m, I don’t know what I’m gonna do, like, [00:19:52] Brett: This would be a perfect segue into our Zocdoc sponsorship, but first I wanna hear how you’re doing. [00:19:58] Christina: Yeah, I’m doing okay. [00:20:00] I, um, I, um, I’m still having those digestive issues, uh, with a, I think from looking it up online, it, it seems like I, I, it’s some sort of reflux thing, but all the symptoms I have, it seems like I might have a hiatal hernia. The issue is, um, I don’t have any of the weight problems that are almost exclusively associated with that stuff, but the symptoms are like dead on. [00:20:24] Like if I have anything that has alcohol, if I have anything that has, um, even the, the least amount of like acid, like even tomato sauce or whatnot, like I will wind up throwing up stomach acid. Um, and uh, and, and. [00:20:39] Brett: gotta hurt. [00:20:39] Christina: It does. And it’s like not great cuz I’m, I’m limited in terms of what things I can find myself to eat. [00:20:45] I need to go to a gastroenterologist. The reality is I’m too fucking busy. I have too much work to do. I can’t do it. So where my mental health is, is that I’m having like, fit. And some of this also can be a manifestation of anxiety and um, and stress. But I’m literally at [00:21:00] the point where I am like, too, I’ve got too much shit to do that I cannot take care of my, like actual health. [00:21:07] So [00:21:08] Brett: you explained this to the people you work with? [00:21:11] Christina: I have look, they’d [00:21:13] Brett: Like, cuz it seems like, it seems like the kind of thing that they would be like, No, your health comes first. We’ll take this off your plate. You get this figured out. That just seems [00:21:25] Christina: Well, yes and no, you’re not crazy. But it’s also, I mean, look, if I, There’s also a part of it where like if I sell them that then I don’t wanna like lose the opportunities and the things that I’m going to do. Like I really wanna host GitHub universe and we’re prepared for. [00:21:39] Brett: But your fucking health, [00:21:40] Christina: Yeah, but like my health, I can deal with like, I can deal with it after the [00:21:44] Brett: you’re throwing up stomach acid on the regular. This isn’t, you’re, you can’t continue like this. You gotta, you gotta, you gotta pause [00:21:54] Christina: I can continue for a couple, I can continue for a couple of weeks. I can continue for a couple of weeks. [00:22:00] I’m not gonna go beyond that. Yes, Yes. As soon as, as soon as Universe is over, I will, I will get it taken care of. I will continue for a couple of weeks. In retrospect, I should not have agreed to also do Microsoft Ignite, which was so close to Universe. [00:22:14] That was too much. Um, I thought [00:22:18] Brett: be too much, even if you weren’t throwing up Stomach acid [00:22:21] Christina: No, you’re not wrong. Uh, [00:22:23] Brett: That’s a lot of, that’s a lot of being on a hole in a. [00:22:26] Christina: it’s a lot of being on and, and it was, uh, a lot of, um, meetings and stuff around it and juggling the two and, um, Yeah. Uh, they’re too close together. Um, I, I, I underestimated, like I overestimated my ability to do both cuz I was like, oh, well I’ve done so many of these hosting things that doing two of them their month apart. [00:22:54] That’s [00:22:54] Brett: do ’em in my sleep. [00:22:56] Christina: Right. Because I, I, there was a time when I was doing [00:23:00] a lot of these things, I think even like, probably in some cases a month apart. Um, cuz I think that I did, uh, build one year and then we had something. It was definitely, it was within the same period of time later, but in that case it was, it was, What was that? [00:23:14] Was that Inspire? It was tech. I don’t remember what it was, but it was one of those types of events and um, and so I just kind of was like, Oh yeah, I can totally do this. What I didn’t anticipate was, Just the level of involvement I would need for every facet of it, which makes sense. I just underestimated my ability to do it, and I should have said no. [00:23:34] Um, but, uh, [00:23:36] Brett: Overestimated your ability, [00:23:38] Christina: yes. Sorry, I overestimated ability, I under, I underestimated the amount of work it would be and I [00:23:42] Brett: I, I underestimate, I underestimate your ability all the time. And then you, you blow me away with what you can fucking accomplish and, and handle, um, in a day. Uh, but you overestimated your abilities. So, [00:23:57] Christina: And, and, and you, I am always blown away [00:24:00] by like what you do, whether you’re manic or not, like you’re one of the most creative and incisive and productive and talented people I’ve ever met, but, [00:24:08] Brett: thank you. [00:24:09] Christina: But, uh, yeah, so, so, no, but my mental health is, is okay. Um, I’ve just, I’ve been busy. I was in San Francisco this week, um, for a couple of days doing some prep stuff. [00:24:19] Um, and, and, uh, for, for universe, which, uh, which we’ll talk about after our sponsor break, but, um, because it’s gonna be good. But, um, I was, um, I was there. Seattle, right now, the weather, and this does impact my mental health, which is why I’m mentioning that we’ve had like, god awful levels of smoke. Like, um, like the air quality in some areas. [00:24:46] It, I was out of town, but, and, and it wasn’t this bad where I was like, but yesterday, where I live, it was a hundred points higher than Beijing. The air quality was like a hundred points worse. And, and Beijing is bad, so it was very, [00:25:00] very bad. Like, like, like you, you go outside, you’re wearing an N 95 mask, and you can still taste like, The air, right? [00:25:08] Yeah. Um, but somebody who, um, uh, I, I, uh, was talking to on Twitter, wherever they are in Washington State, it was like four 50, which to, to put that into perspective is again, that’s like, that’s like more than double as bad as Beijing, Right. Maybe closer to, Sorry, go [00:25:27] Brett: someone on my feed posted a picture, I’m pretty sure it was from Northern California or maybe farther up the coast. And they said that the air quality index was 500. Um, and like it made for some good pictures cuz it looked like a nice foggy morning, [00:25:48] Christina: Right. That’s the thing. No, it looks like, it looks like fog when I landed in the airport on, um, Wednesday. Like, you know, it looked like fog and it wasn’t, it was smoke. And then there was this [00:26:00] haze when I was, So the way that the um, Seattle airport works is that if you wanna get like an Uber or something, they have like this underground parking lot and of course it’s a little bit open, but, but not that much. [00:26:10] Right. You know, cuz cars can drive in, but it’s underground. And so you get underground and there’s this haze of just smoke that’s been caught up underground. Right. And it’s getting your eyes and everything. The whole thing is just terrible. But you know, the guy that, um, that I was saying on Twitter, he’s at his house. [00:26:27] He was like, even indoors, it was feeling like it was four 50. He was like, it’s just, you know, untenable. Because at that point, even if you have like a bunch of Dysons and air filters and stuff, like you’re, nothing’s, nothing’s working. I don’t even know what the solution there is. Like my solution when it gets hot here, because we don’t have Central Air because it’s fucking cheap ass building people luxury building my ass. [00:26:48] Anyway, they um, My solution there is just to run a hotel room. But in a case like this, I don’t even know, like would you, do you drive someplace? Like what, what do you [00:27:00] do? Like, I, I don’t know, but, um, [00:27:03] Brett: to Minnesota. [00:27:04] Christina: Yeah, [00:27:05] Brett: Nothing’s on fire here. As much as I, as much as I love the idea of living in California, uh, if I could afford it, um, the, the earthquakes and the fires and, and you know, the occasional flooding, we just don’t see that here in the Midwest. And we just, I don’t know, man. [00:27:29] Christina: you have really bad winters. But, [00:27:30] Brett: me wanna stay [00:27:31] Christina: no, I was gonna say you have really, really bad winters, but that’s about it, right? Like you don’t have the other [00:27:37] Brett: you can just make a fire and get cozy. It’s not, not the end of the world. [00:27:42] Christina: Well, I, I, I dunno. [00:27:44] Brett: disasters are [00:27:45] Christina: That’s true. I think, I think a lot of people though, would just have a hard time. Like I, I grew up, you know, I lived in New York for a long time and New York winners can be brutal, but, but they’re, but they’re not like 20 below where that can be the case, you know, in, in, um, in like Minnesota and [00:28:00] North [00:28:00] Brett: What is this? The Bahamas? We get 50 below [00:28:04] Christina: you know what I mean? Cause like, uh, my, my, my dad, um, he grew up all over the place, but he, like a lot of his formative years he spent in, um, North Dakota and, um, that was always like his favorite. I think like that also was probably like one of the only stable periods of kind of his childhood. And so I think he relates to that for a lot of reasons. [00:28:22] But this is, uh, but, but he always like, you know, whenever it would get cold, whenever it would snow in Georgia, like he’s like the most excited person in the world because, and it’s, it’s not even close to like, anything that you would experience, you know, [00:28:36] Brett: Well, I, I have nieces in Georgia and they get just ecstatic with like one to three inches of snow. And if they come to Minnesota to visit and it hasn’t snowed, they get super bummed. Like their ideal vacation is to come to Minnesota and have at least a foot of snow on the ground and they will make [00:29:00] snowmen [00:29:00] Christina: yeah. No, cuz it’s amazing when you’re not, when you have no concept of it, when it’s like an occasional thing. Like it really is like a nice treat. Um, but, uh, but yeah, no, I mean, look, I I, I, I rag on the, the Midwest a lot just because I don’t know why, honestly. Um, [00:29:17] Brett: Oh, it’s easy to do. [00:29:19] Christina: right. It is, it’s lazy, [00:29:21] Brett: I mean, in comparison to the East Coast and the West coast, the Midwest is, is boring. It’s, uh, passive aggressive. It’s cold there. It’s not a hub of any kind of tech or, or commerce. I mean, Minneapolis is home to what Target. And, and we have like Cray supercomputers Best Buy, but we don’t have any [00:29:49] Christina: and Best Buy is in Eden. So I don’t even know like how far away that is from Minneapolis, but I know it’s in Minnesota. But [00:29:55] Brett: I mean, I mean headquarters, like Target is headquartered in [00:30:00] Minneapolis. [00:30:00] Christina: no, I know, and I’m talking about Best Buys is like headquartered. [00:30:03] Brett: Okay. Yeah. Um, [00:30:05] Christina: I re I remember this from, from my years of indoctrination, uh, working there. [00:30:12] Brett: but 90% of the companies you care about are in California or New York, and there’s just then the flyover states, But I gotta say, I’m happy here and, [00:30:27] Christina: I’m glad you are. [00:30:28] Brett: it’s so cheap to live here. [00:30:30] Christina: Yeah, well see, this is, this is the problem, problem. The one part of the Midwest that I could see myself living in, the only part would be Chicago. [00:30:38] Brett: I could, Chicago’s. Alright. My mom has watched enough Fox news that she is convinced that Chicago is just a crime-ridden hellhole now, like an anarchist burnt out city [00:30:51] Christina: No, [00:30:52] Brett: amazing. It’s amazing. She’s also convinced that California is like all satanists and, [00:31:00] and it’s like the most evil state. Um, Fox News has done a number on her [00:31:05] Christina: Yeah. My, my, um, my shrink is deeply concerned about me living in Seattle because of all the Fox new stuff he saw about my neighborhood, actually. And the thing is, is that I was like, before the shootings and some of the other, like, before the, like, anarchists, like, like, uh, the, the, the fucking like occupy Wall Street, like, like fucking assholes kind of took over. [00:31:25] Brett: zone. [00:31:26] Christina: Well, right. Well, well, at first that was okay. And then when the fucking Occupy Wall Street, like fuckers took over and, and made it all about their bullshit. Yeah. Then I was kind of like, actually, yeah, this isn’t great. Um, so, so he’s concerned and, but he doesn’t need to be as concerned as he is, but he’s often, frequently concerned. [00:31:46] He’s like, Are you sure you’re safe? And I’m like, You never cared when I was in New York. Right. Like, which is the hilarious thing. Um, and to be clear, I actually did feel safer in New York than I do in my own neighborhood. Sometimes I’ll, I’ll [00:32:00] be honest. Yeah. More people, more eyes. There’s a certain sense, like, not to say there aren’t parts of New York where you wouldn’t feel deeply unsafe, but I think for the [00:32:09] Brett: that’s true. Like I, like there were definitely moments in New York where I felt, um, Like I was about to die, like, like death was imminent, but for the most part, there’s always someone you can reach out to for a hand. [00:32:27] Christina: there, that there’s a comfort in that. There’s, there, there’s a comfort in that. And, and I think that, that, that’s the thing where like, because Seattle, even though the neighborhood I live in is starting to pick back up again, especially during the pandemic, there were some times when literally the only people that were out were people that like, are, you know, uh, struggle with like mental health issues. [00:32:46] And, and, and, and drugs tend to be violent, right? Like that because of [00:32:51] Brett: walk down the street and see a lot of people that appear to be having like a conversation on their Bluetooth phone, uh, their Bluetooth [00:33:00] headset, and then you realize they don’t have a headset and they’re just conversing with that, That freaks me out. Like I see that even in the Midwest. Like you walk through Minneapolis, you’re gonna see that. [00:33:11] Um, but I, I remember, uh, New York my times in, uh, some of the uh, uh, Southern California smaller cities just had an excess of people having conversations loudly as they walked down the street. Um, and, and it, it, it makes me very nervous cuz I don’t know what to say to those people. I don’t want to interrupt them. [00:33:37] Christina: right? Well, right. I mean, [00:33:39] Brett: but then suddenly they’re talking to you and you’re like, No, go back to whoever you were talking to before. [00:33:46] Christina: right. Yeah. No, it, it can be unsettling and, and at night and it can be, especially sometimes people can be erratic and uh, and there can be like feelings where you’re just like, I don’t know, but I didn’t have in New York again, like it’s just, there’s always people around. So even if [00:34:00] you have that, There’s, it’s not just that. [00:34:03] And so there’s something that, that feels safer. Um, but, uh, it’s weird. Um, but yeah, but we should, uh, yeah. So anyway, that’s, that’s kinda my mental health update slash tangent. But we should [00:34:16] Brett: of finding doctors, [00:34:20] Christina: If, uh, [00:34:21] Brett: I wrote you a brand new intro for the ZO Doc. Read. You ready? [00:34:25] Christina: I, I am [00:34:26] Brett: Do it. Do it cold. [00:34:28] Sponsor: Zocdoc [00:34:28] Christina: alright. If you’re a fan of it, sushi’s incredible. But gas station sushi not so much. Finding the right sushi makes all the difference. And the same goes for finding the right doctor. 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You can read, verify patient reviews from real people who made real appointments. [00:35:28] And now when you walk into that doctor’s office, you’re all set to see someone in your network who gets you. So go to oc doc.com to find the doctor that is right for you and book an appointment in person or remotely that works for your schedule every month. Millions of people use OC Doc. I’m one of them. [00:35:45] I’ve been using them for well over a decade, is the way that I go to find doctors and, um, it, it’s, it’s great. So you can go to zocdoc.com/ Overtired and download the zocdoc app free. Then start your [00:36:00] search for a top rated doctor today mini are available within 24 hours. That’s zocdoc.com/ Overtired zocdoc.com/ Overtired. [00:36:12] Brett: Speaking of feeling safe in New York, [00:36:15] Christina: Yes. 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[00:38:05] It’s a GitHub Universe [00:38:05] Brett: So, yeah, I, I do want to hear what, uh, so right now, uh, Oracle Cloud World is wrapping up and I didn’t have to go, uh, friend of the show, Victor was, uh, there all week with the world’s largest pie cluster. Um, but I was, if I had gone, I would’ve had to help present topics that I wasn’t super comfortable with. [00:38:31] Um, and I also am, I’m so bummed about my current, like, physical shape that like, the idea of getting up in front of people is very nerve-wracking for me. Um, so anyway, I was glad not to have gone. I watched it from afar. I ran ground support for my team, uh, did all the blogging and everything, and Aaron did most of it, I’ll be honest. [00:38:57] Um, but, uh, [00:39:00] but it just was not. It was not super well attended. It was not super exciting. I had no reason to put up with Vegas in order to go, but GitHub universe, I think might be more my speed. So tell me what, what, what’s going on with GitHub Universe? [00:39:22] Christina: Yeah. So it sounds like Oracle, um, cloud world was a hybrid event. [00:39:27] Brett: Yeah. [00:39:27] Christina: that accurate? Okay, cool. So the GitHub universe is gonna be a hybrid event as well. Um, and, uh, this is the first time that GitHub has done a hybrid event, Microsoft Ignite, which I, I did a week before last. Um, or no, was it la It was last week. [00:39:40] It was last week. Um, was also a, um, hybrid event. But, um, the, um, uh, the way that this is gonna work is that we will be in person, um, in San Francisco. We are gonna be at the Europe Buena, uh, Center for the Arts, which is right across the street from Moscone. So it’s a [00:40:00] smaller space, the Moscone, which I think is good because especially our first year back, uh, Philly Moscone would be difficult and, and that. [00:40:07] Brett: a tea garden in there that I love. Yes. [00:40:10] Christina: Yeah. So we’re gonna be at the, the Europe of Awareness Center for the Arts, um, which is across the street, and we’re gonna be actually in a lot of that space. Um, we, uh, I, part of that thing I was kind of, uh, doing while I was there was getting, um, kind of a preview of what some of, what the layout is going to be and how things are going to look. [00:40:28] But we’re going to have a bunch of different installations. I can’t spoil too much about the physical experience. Um, if people wanna buy tickets, they’re still available. It’s November 9th and 10th, um, and. Uh, there’s gonna be like an outdoor stage, uh, that we’re calling the, like the garden stage where, where me and my, uh, uh, one of my co-hosts and one will be, uh, MCing the event and introducing different sessions and tracks and stuff. [00:40:52] And, um, uh, my, uh, my pal Damian is also going to be one of our roaming hosts. And then we’ve got a bunch of different [00:41:00] sessions that are happening across five different tracks. So, um, there’s, you know, uh, the, the schedule is online right now. It’s at GitHub universe.com where you can see what’s going to be happening. [00:41:10] But we’ve got like our, kind of our main track and then there’s, um, different tracks on cloud, security, AI, and community. And so, There are gonna be things like, uh, you know, stuff about, you know, using, uh, code spaces, um, and, uh, GitHub co-pilot, GitHub actions. Um, stuff about, um, you know, using, uh, ai, which obviously co-pilot is, is involved with, um, you know, how, how GitHub builds GitHub, which I actually think is that, that’s a cool session that I’m actually really looking forward to watching because, uh, I think that’s cool. [00:41:46] There’s also one on how GitHub uses GitHub to secure GitHub. I love all the inception stuff. Um, there’s like a bunch of stuff about like community and, and open source and sustainability and kind of, um, Thinking about what we [00:42:00] can do both like as Skid hub, but also as just people in the ecosystem to make things better for maintainers. [00:42:07] And um, uh, you know, there, there are workshops as well, um, for people who wanna get like more in depth training on things. So, uh, but the cool thing is, is that if you can’t be there in person, and I think in person, they’re one of the main benefits is that you get to like, meet people and like, have conversations. [00:42:25] Like it’s not just the content, all of the. It can be great in seeing people live can be fun. I think the big thing for me always is like getting to actually have those similar to like those things you have at Mac stock, right? Where it’s like having the call, the hallway conversations, being able to run into people and have those experiences can be really, really good. [00:42:43] But everything will be streamed@githubuniverse.com. So, um, you know, go there, register, you should not get too many like marketing spammy emails. Uh, but, uh, they do want people registered to be able to view all the content and then everything of course will be on [00:43:00] demand later. But, um, I’m, I’m super, super stoked. [00:43:03] The, just the stuff I can, I can say I can, I don’t wanna ruin too much, but I can say like the, the mockups and the things I’ve seen of what the event space is going to look like is awesome. And, and they’ve, they’ve really outdone themselves and that’s that shit that, that, uh, that is exciting. [00:43:21] I would love to see you there and I think [00:43:23] Brett: I would get to hang out with Christina Warren. Maybe I’ll bring a, I’ll bring a mic set up and we can do a live podcast from GitHub Universe. [00:43:33] Christina: Okay. That we could. And that would be amazing. And, um, at least a segment. Right? Not a full thing. Um, or at the very least we could do it from the hotel. But yeah, I, um, I, um, I’m super excited. It’s gonna be a really good event. I had such a good time at Get Merge last month and I’m really, really excited about this just to be able to meet people in the community. [00:43:56] I did a live stream cuz. Um, have you guys been doing anything with, with [00:44:00] Hack Tober Fest? Um, at. [00:44:03] Brett: Not, no, I, No. [00:44:05] Christina: Okay, so Oktoberfest is, is, um, a month in, um, it’s October. It takes place every October. And Digital Ocean sponsors that. It’s a digital ocean thing that’s basically dedicated to trying to like, you know, um, bring awareness and, and get people to contribute more to open source. And they do that by like giving, like, giving people opportunity to like win a t-shirt and stuff like that. [00:44:26] And there, there’s been drama in the past because what people used to do is they’d be like, Hey, if you wanna get a free, you know, t-shirt, just make this really shitty pull request to these open source projects. You know, like for a typo or something. And, and, and, and you’ll get a t-shirt. And then, you know, maintainers are like, you say that this is supposed. [00:44:48] Better for us all. And you’re, you’re, you’re ruining our lives. So, so, um, we worked out a thing a couple years ago where basically like only projects that tag themselves, you know, [00:45:00] as, as being, you know, uh, Hack Tober Fest eligible, um, would be eligible for the T-shirt. But I’ve been doing, you know, we’ve been doing some C live streams and talks up that they’re people and, um, uh, are you, are you familiar with the charm? [00:45:13] I’ve talked about them on the, on the pod before? Yeah. So I, I did a, a livestream yesterday with some members of the charm team and also, um, uh, te, who’s one of the Neo Im, um, core, uh, contributors. And, um, we were talking about sustainability and open source. It was a really fun conversation, and that got me really hype for Universe because I know that it’s gonna. [00:45:34] More opportunities to talk to people like that. And I don’t know, like the thing that makes me the most excited about my job, not just, I love where I work and I, I love the stuff that we’d build, but beyond that is just like getting to meet other people who work on such cool shit, you know, [00:45:50] Brett: Yeah. Yeah. [00:45:51] Christina: Like, I love that. Yeah. And, and those, those are people who will be at Universe, right? Like it’s, it’s really, I don’t know. I’m, [00:46:00] I’m, I’m stoked. [00:46:01] Brett: That was always my absolute favorite part of Mac World, uh, was meeting the indie developers and meeting the people. I’ve used your app. Holy shit. I’m meeting you in person. Like the first time I met Fletcher Penny, like the creator of multi markdown. I was, I felt like starstruck. Uh, like now we’re friends, now we’re working together [00:46:25] Christina: Now you’re working together on a [00:46:26] Brett: then I was like, holy shit. [00:46:28] The guy who made multi markdown is having a beer with me. [00:46:32] Christina: When I met Cable and Steven from Panic for the first time, I mean, I was starstruck. I, I, I’ve, and, and I’ve said this to people before and people think I’m crazy, but it’s true. I’ve met big fucking deal celebrities, right? I’ve interviewed them and, and it’s nice and I’ve been starstruck a few times, but I, I don’t know if I’ve ever been quite as like Stars Shark as when I meet people who make the shit that I use and that I love, right. [00:46:58] Like that to me. [00:47:00] I’m a weirdo, I guess, but like, to me, like that’s even, and I love pop culture and like, not to say that if I met Taylor Swift in person, I wouldn’t fucking die. And I did. And I will say the most star struck I’ve ever been in my life was when I cried, when I met Big Bird. When I met, um, um, Harold Spinney. [00:47:15] Um, he was, he was, uh, doing a, an Oscar the Grouch thing. And it was amazing. And he was so kind. And I, I fucking sobbed like, like a baby because my childhood, I did the same thing when I met the current Burt. But like, I, uh, when meeting people who make the stuff that you use, there’s just, it’s awesome. [00:47:35] Brett: Speaking of idle worshiping indie developers, uh, you ready to do some gratitude? [00:47:41] Christina: I’m ready to do some Capt. [00:47:43] Brett: So this week I’m picking curio, uh, from Zen Gobi. Uh, I met George, uh, years ago at a Mac world. And, and it was one of those things where I felt, um, [00:48:00] Curio is such a crazy in-depth app, uh, that it really, it speaks to the way that I create things where I just, I want it to, once it can do one thing, I want it to do another thing. [00:48:14] And, and then I just try to build it as elegantly as possible. Uh, just make it do everything. And Curio is one of those apps that, um, it lets you create these spaces that. Visual, almost like idea boards where you can combine, mind maps and lists and preview documents and, and I embed emails and, add free form text and add, tasks and lists and project management stuff. [00:48:47] All in this kind of like visual space. And then you can easily search and jump between and use like, uh, unified project management tools across all your spaces. And [00:49:00] it is, it’s kind of insane what it can do. And every time it comes out with an update, which is pretty much yearly at this point, um, he does something that makes me say, Holy shit, that’s awesome. [00:49:15] I don’t use curio every day, but when I am putting together an idea or a larger project, curio is one of my favorite ways to organize all of the inputs, all of the, uh, various, uh, like when you’re researching something and you just wanna co compile like a bunch of different websites, a bunch of different, uh, like markdown texts and a bunch of different lists, uh, it’s a super great way. [00:49:42] And, um, you can actually preview a curio space in marked so you can convert your curio space and all of its, all of its markdown and, and mind map content into like a single [00:50:00] unified document that you can then like read through in a very left to right top to bottom fashion. Uh, whereas curio is, you can spread stuff in any direction all over the space. [00:50:10] Um, But it’s super easy to export it as, uh, usable documents of other types. So yeah, I pick, I pick curio from Zen Gobi. That is, it’s an insanely cool India. [00:50:26] Christina: Yeah, no, this looks great. I, um, I’m, I’m gonna like check this out. Um, which one do you use? Because I’m seeing that there are like three different options. There’s core, there’s standard, and then there’s, uh, professional. Which one do you use? [00:50:38] Brett: I’m a friend of the developer. I get professional for free. [00:50:43] Christina: Nice. Okay. Um, cuz I was just trying to figure out like, like what, uh, what option would be best. I, I’m probably just gonna download the trial and. [00:50:52] Brett: you what, friend of the show, I’ll get you a, a pro license. No problem. I got, I got the connect. [00:50:58] Christina: You got the connect. [00:51:00] I love it. No, but I’m actually, I’m really, really looking forward to trying this out cuz um, I use, uh, obsidian for some stuff like this, but I think for a lot of things like where you need a lot of different types of stuff. Like, again, like I, I probably wouldn’t use this every day, but when starting on a big project. [00:51:17] Brett: for text, but if you want anything more than text, curio is just the bomb. [00:51:23] Christina: what I’m saying. Like, and the thing is, is that again, if I can have my markdown stuff, like, you know Yeah. The fact that I can bring in PDFs and multimedia and all that, No, this looks great. This looks kind of like what I wish, in some ways OneNote was cuz OneNote’s not bad. Like OneNote’s not terrible. [00:51:39] I actually have to say like a for in terms of like, I actually had this, Sorry, go on. [00:51:43] Brett: the only problem with one notice, the lock in, like stuff is not easily, uh, portable to other, other types of, of software. [00:51:54] Christina: Agreed. Agreed. And, and it also looks like this is, has like, you know, it has some [00:52:00] CanBan style things and other stuff like that. You don’t get those options in in OneNote and OneNote. Like at this point I think OneNote is way better than, um, than Evernote, right? Like, sorry, not sorry. Like, like Evernote is shit, the bed a long time ago. [00:52:13] And, and, and one note is significantly better. It’s free for most use cases than if you have a, an office account at all. Um, it’s, uh, you, you get. You know, even more stuff I guess, or whatnot, but, but OneNote is awesome, but this looks like this could take things to the next level, which I really, really could get some use out of. [00:52:33] Um, so my pick, so I’m checking that out. Thank you very much for, uh, hooking me up on that. So my pick is menu bar X, and this is one that I, I will be honest, I, it’s, it’s part of setup. I’d never used it and it was probably one that I would’ve dismissed. And then I was watching a video from, uh, from Quinn Nelson Snaq, and he was doing like something on like top, like free, like something about Mac apps or something like that. [00:52:59] And, and I [00:53:00] was like, I watched the video, then I was like, I’m probably not gonna see anything that I haven’t seen before. And then I did, uh, because Quinn makes great content. And so the idea between Menu Bar X is, um, it’s, it’s available, like I said, in set up. It’s also available directly from, um, the developer, which I believe is, is Sixx Studio, but it’s at Menu bar. [00:53:21] x.apple have the links in the show [00:53:23] Brett: Also Mac App Store. [00:53:25] Christina: Yeah. It’s also in the Mac app store. Um, so what’s cool about it is it basically creates like a, a web app or PWA progressive web app, um, in your menu bar so that you can then, um, quickly access that from anywhere. So for instance, I’ll say this, I still occasionally have to deal with some Microsoft stuff, um, on some of my machines. [00:53:51] Um, even though I, I don’t work for Microsoft Property anymore, and, and GitHub uses completely different tooling. There are still times when I need to [00:54:00] log into those systems. The problem is I don’t always want to have the, the apps installed because they’re not always well optimized and I would need to have stuff, um, you know, like always running in the background. [00:54:12] Dropbox actually is a good example of this too, because Dropbox, even though. It’s gotten better. Uh, it’s still sort of a resource hog and I don’t love it and I don’t use it the way that I used to. So you can have these things running in the background for just kind of occasional use cases. Like I’ve got one for my personal OneDrive account because I access that occasionally, and I can just access the, the, the, the web view in my menu bar with, with a menu bar X. [00:54:38] You could also do things like YouTube or Instagram or TikTok or whatever. But the thing that got me on it was I was like, Oh no, I can actually use this for file sharing services. Like, like One Drive. I could have my work, one drive for the few times that I need to use that a week. I don’t wanna have it running all the time when I’m only interacting with it sparingly. [00:54:56] And, um, and, and Menu Barx is really great for that. So [00:55:00] that’s my pick because, uh, it’s a really good way of being able to just kind of like, create, you know, little web app things and your menu bar. Um, it’s, it’s slick and it works really [00:55:14] Brett: I, uh, I just, while you were talking, I installed it, it won’t let me log into SoundCloud. It says there’s an ad locker that’s stopping it, but, um, like it was like one click to add a SoundCloud single site browser to my menu bar. Uh, if I can get it to let me log in, that’ll be awesome. Um, yeah, this is great. [00:55:36] Like I love single site browsers. I love them for. Uh, corralling cookie usage. Um, I love them for easy accessibility. If like, I have one that I, I have my own single site browser for Messenger cuz I refuse to use their desktop app. Um, and, and, uh, uh, bunch can actually [00:56:00] create single site browsers. Um, you can add just a command to a bunch file that’ll automatically create an SSB for any site. [00:56:09] Uh, but this is, this is snazzy. Do you remember Fluid? [00:56:13] Christina: Yeah, fluid was amazing. I loved fluid so much. Flu fluid was [00:56:16] Brett: And, and Fluid had a pin to menu bar option. So you could create a single site browser, pin it to the menu bar. It could run a bunch of like, uh, user scripts and, and [00:56:28] Christina: that, that’s what I, [00:56:29] Brett: and everything. [00:56:29] Christina: that’s what I loved about fluid because, uh, I would have user script stuff and you could do notifications and like fluid was, was really great. And I don’t think this gets that in depth, but sometimes for the, for the, for my use case for like, what I would be like using it with, I, I didn’t, I wouldn’t want that. [00:56:43] Right. Like, I just need something in the menu bar and, um, and, and I, Yeah. But fluid is amazing. There’s also, what is it? Is it, uh, is it unite? There’s like [00:56:52] Brett: yeah. Unite, Coherence and Unite are from the same company. Um, I, [00:57:00] they, they make great little SSBs and you can load all of your Chrome plugins, uh, selectively in the ssb. But I’ve had this problem where I create like a Unite browser. For a site and then a month later it just stops being able to launch and I have to recreate it from scratch. [00:57:20] I have to delete it and recreate it. And, and I have ne I’ve never filed a bug report cuz it’s never been super important to me. Um, I have like, they’re good apps. I, I have had some frustration. Um, the, I’m gonna give menu bar x a shot, uh, for anyone on Set app. It takes five seconds to install and another 10 seconds to build your first menu bar browser. [00:57:47] So this is pretty cool. [00:57:48] Christina: Yeah, and what’s nice about it too is that it has a really easy option to then just like open it in a web browser if you want. It’s, it’s. So like, that’s really nice. So if you did wanna [00:58:00] like, have something and you’re like, Hey, I do actually wanna like open this in, um, you know, my, my browser window, like you can do that. [00:58:07] Uh, and which, which, which is like, you can also change the view port style, like the user agent and stuff in terms of like what it’s going to, to show you. And you can even detach the window if you wanna do that. So there’s, there’s a lot of options, you know, around, but I, uh, shout to Quinn Nelson for, uh, sharing that with me. [00:58:26] But then I tried it on, I was like, Oh no, this is actually really useful. So yeah, give this a shot because I miss flew it all the time. And that was definitely like the, the, the greatest of all time. But, um, this, uh, this I think is, at least for kind of the ways I’ve, I’ve been using it, it’s been really good so far. [00:58:43] So [00:58:44] Brett: Why have I forgotten the name of the guy who made fluid? Like he’s another person. I’m Todd Todd. Um, [00:58:50] Christina: D [00:58:52] Brett: um, Ditch Endorf, [00:58:53] Christina: Dish. Endorf. [00:58:54] Brett: wasn’t it? Yeah. Um, I met him at, uh, Mac, Mac [00:59:00] World as well, and it was, uh, one of those experiences. Yes. [00:59:06] Christina: Same. Same. [00:59:08] Brett: Quinn Nelson, digital content creator in the show notes. [00:59:11] Christina: Yeah. We love, we love Snazzy q his, his videos are really good. Uh, yeah. So, so that’s, that’s my gratitude. [00:59:19] Brett: Awesome. Well, that wasn’t as weird an episode as I thought it would be at the outset. [00:59:24] Christina: No, no, it, its [00:59:26] Brett: was a, it was pretty sane. [00:59:28] Christina: Yeah, it’s pretty sane. It’s pretty good. Um, everybody should, should watch, uh, Taylor Swift’s new video, Anti-Hero. Um, we’re gonna have a whole Taylor Swift episode next week, but, uh, the anti-hero music video, um, Maria, Elizabeth, uh, Ellis or whatever, what’s her face? The, the, the waitress from Always Sunny is, is in the video. [00:59:46] Brett: Nice. Yeah. Um, Oh, that is who that was. Yes. Okay. Yeah, that was a weird little, uh, break at the end of that video [00:59:56] Christina: there’s a weird little, There’s a, there’s a, [00:59:59] Brett: apparently Taylor Swift [01:00:00] is everyone’s mother [01:00:01] Christina: Yeah, I guess so. Yeah, I guess. But yeah, cuz the song, uh, is, the song is pretty great, I have to say. And, uh, it, it’s one of my favorites. Um, and, uh, she’s like, Hi, I’m the problem. It’s me. Um, which is, which is pretty fucking great. Uh, and, uh, I, I’m, I’m a big, big, big fan of that. Um, but there’s an interlude, well there’s, there’s a thing where she’s like, I have like this like dream where like my, my daughter-in-law kills me to steal my money. [01:00:29] And then like, you know, I’m, I’m screaming, Fuck you from the grave, Or, or you know, from the ground, you know, from um, uh, you know, from, from hell or whatever. And, uh, then there’s like this very funny sequence that, uh, yeah, [01:00:45] Brett: We will. I I will, I will watch it again before next week. We’ll, we will force Jeff into this madness and, and we will, Next week will be a Taylor Swift Happy episode. It [01:01:00] won’t be all Taylor’s [01:01:01] Christina: No, it won’t be all Taylor. It won’t be all Taylor Swift, but we, well, we have to talk about it because there’s, there’s a song at the end that’s, it’s the final one and it’s called Mastermind and we have to talk about it. Um, it, because Brett like, it confirms many of the theories that I’ve spent hours of our podcast overanalyzing analyzing about Taylor. [01:01:20] So we have to talk about it, but also it’s a fun album. So, uh, stream, Stream Mastermind or midnights, whatever. Um, I’m, see now, now I’m tired. [01:01:31] Brett: Let’s do a quick recap for the socials today. We talked about, we had a great discussion of, uh, of bipolar as we often do, but we talked about Ellen Forney and, and some of my hopes and dreams for the future. Uh, we talked about GitHub Universe and why Brett wants to go to GitHub Universe. Uh, we got some amazing, uh, uh, Mac app picks.[01:02:00] [01:02:00] Uh, we got Kario and your menu bar X, so if you wanna learn more about those, make sure you tune in. Um, of course I say that as if people currently listening to the podcast haven’t already tuned in. I’m sorry, I got, I got into like social media mode there, but, um, yeah, anything you want to add? [01:02:19] Christina: Yeah, no, great, great Mac outs. GitHub universe. Good mental health Corner. I think it’s a, it’s a solid opposite. A little bit of Taylor Swift. Not enough, but not enough, but a little bit of Taylor Swift. [01:02:30] Brett: More soon. All right, Christina, Get some sleep. [01:02:36] Christina: Get some sleep right.

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Show Links Reboot Heartbreak High The Perks of Being a Wallflower and movie Derry Girls Sex Education Grapptitude Choosy Velja Obsidian Shortcat Paletro Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript High Content/Low Energy [00:00:00] Intro: Tired. So tired, Overtired. [00:00:04] Christina: You’re listening to Overtired. I’m Christina Warren, joined as always by my good friends. Jeffrey Severance, Gunzel and Brett Terpstra Boys. How are ya? [00:00:15] Brett: So good. [00:00:16] Jeff: Hello. [00:00:16] Christina: Hi. So we are recording this a little bit later than we usually do in the week, uh, ironically, because we’ve all had kind of things going on and, um, all of us are, if this is gonna maybe be a little bit of kind of a low energy show, but not low content, uh, just because we are all tired, [00:00:37] Brett: same amount of content, just slower [00:00:40] Jeff: No, I think we got a new, that’s a new like tagline. High content, low energy. [00:00:44] Christina: Okay. I don’t hate that. I don’t hate that at all. [00:00:47] Jeff: I can see the shirt. [00:00:49] Brett: like that’s a drink. White Russian, high content, low energy. [00:00:56] Jeff: Oh man, I used to, I was never a heavy drinker, but when I was in a band and playing a lot, playing shows a lot, I realized that if I had a white Russian and two green belt beers, which for non Minnesotans is just pick your piss beer. But we’re loyal to it. If I had that combination of drink, I would go into the show without having to stretch cuz that’d just be a little looser. [00:01:20] generally. And by the time the show was over, I was no longer drunk and, or it buzzed or whatever. And I really, I got like science, it was a scientific thing, a white Russian, and two grain belt premiums. And I’d go into the show, a barrel of laughs, and come out pretty sober and ready to go to sleep. [00:01:39] Brett: Yeah, my first time in a bar I was like, I think 17. Maybe 18. And I didn’t, I didn’t know any drinks to order. Like I had no experience with this. And white Russian was the only drink I had ever heard of and that was the night I discovered there’s also a black Russian, [00:02:01] Jeff: Oh yeah, [00:02:02] Brett: in a black Russian, but I liked it better. [00:02:05] Jeff: They make canned white Russians. I mean, they like make a lot of canned cocktails, but there’s the mental health check in right there Mental Health Corner [00:02:17] Brett: So should we roll into a, a mental health corner? Are we, are we high enough energy to do that? [00:02:22] Christina: Totally do that. [00:02:23] Brett: Okay. Who wants to start [00:02:25] Jeff: Uh, I can start. [00:02:26] Brett: to it please. [00:02:28] Jeff: Um, my family had a medical emergency over the last week and I spent some time in the, um, In the hospital in like the nicest hospital room. It was amazing. They had a we, [00:02:39] Christina: Oh my God. [00:02:39] Jeff: if you wanted an Xbox or a PlayStation, you could get that instead. Um, and they had like a blue-ray player and a giant TV that was really high quality. [00:02:50] There were actually three TVs in the room. It was the craziest thing ever saw. Um, I know when I, when my mom was my mom, Was in a coma in the ICU for a couple weeks, two years ago, maybe three years ago, and I, the entire time she was there for two weeks, I couldn’t get a folding chair, but this hospital room had a couch that turned into a bed, a recliner, two regular chairs. [00:03:13] It was like, Oh, like wow. It’s just like such a crapshoot. It’s amazing. Anyway, but the, we was kind of amazing. Um, my, so it’s always strange to be in and out of a hospital room over the course of a week. It definitely causes me to lose the ground from under my feet. Um, and, uh, and so that’s, that’s pretty much how I am feeling is, uh, without any ground under my feet. [00:03:39] Um, and it also is like my brain is trying to kind of figure out where to sort some hard news out of this family emergency. Um, and it’s just, it’s like, it feels like two things at once. It feels. brain can’t sort it, but it also feels like, I know that there’s a part of me that’s very emotional about this, like, but I can’t quite get through the membrane to get my hands on it. [00:04:11] Um, and so it just feels like, like I’m at a distance from the kind of true feelings of the thing. And that always scares me a little bit because I can, I can, I’m someone who can easily get kind of disembodied where like I feel a lot of my stress in my head, but I don’t really feel anything else in the rest of my body. [00:04:29] It’s like, everything’s just like, it’s like so symbolically perfect cuz I’m in my head and, and all of the discomfort is also in my head. And I think when I’m, when I think of settling things, settling in, I literally think of him like trickling down from my head into the rest of my body. And that’s something I’m struggling with right now after just getting some hard news this week. [00:04:51] So. So that’s it. [00:04:54] Brett: so I, I saw a therapist this week and I saw my psychiatrist this week. And, um, I have come to believe that what I, you know, how I check in is stable sometimes, but I’m fucking bored. Um, and, and not, not doing great like, like stable, what I’ve called stable has never been great for me. Um, I also saw a talk from a bipolar cartoonist this last week who came to speak at a local college. [00:05:27] Um, and. I realized maybe like, so there’s bipolar one, bipolar two, then there’s this other thing that starts with C Y C L, Cyclo EMIA or something like that. And I realized that might be me. Like I might not be bipolar two, as I had always assumed I may be this thing that alternates between hypomania and depression and rapid succession and never sees like a real stable in between. [00:05:59] So what I’ve always called stable might be depression. and like, So my new goal after talking to psychiatrist and therapist is to find out what stable actually can be and like to reframe. Like, I’ve always been scared of finding stability because in my experience, stability had been something just infinitely boring and without any creative, uh, or productivity, like, just not the way I wanted to live. [00:06:34] Uh, but that might be depression for me and I might be able to find a stable where I’m actually happy, where I experience like normal human happiness, not like manic euphoria. Just like, uh, an interest in doing, like going for a hike, going for, uh, a good dinner, um, and really finding pleasure in those things without having to be manic. [00:07:04] Um, and so that’s kind of, that’s rocked my worldview, if you will, um, to, to realize maybe there’s something that I haven’t experienced that I could strive for. Uh, so we started looking into ways that I can. Reach that stability, uh, without losing all of the things I love about hypomania, uh, without losing my creativity, my, my drive to create new things. [00:07:36] Um, to maybe find that and be stable because this, this bipolar cartoonist, um, I would have to look up her name ho give me one second, uh, edit. Um, she wrote a book called Marbles and one called Rock Steady, and her name is Ellen Forney. Um, and she was, she was an excellent presenter. It was like going, Do you guys know who the blog is? [00:08:07] Is. Um, she is a, uh, a blogger who is, I can’t remember exactly what her neuro divergence is, but her level of anxiety and, uh, sarcasm combines to make really amazing, Like she’s written a couple books, uh, and, and she has always spoken to me as, as a neuro divergent person. But, uh, Ellen Forney, like really when she presented, uh, she did it so humbly, uh, well, basically saying like, I have suffered through. [00:08:48] Extreme mania and extreme depression. And I’ve come out as this, this is what I’ve produced, this is what I’ve learned from the process. And it was, I cried a little listening to her just because I related and I could feel like the pain of what she had gone through and, and the fact that she had come out on the other end and had found stability and had been able to continue creating as a stable person was like joyous to me. [00:09:23] And it’s given me something new to strive for. [00:09:26] Christina: That’s really great. [00:09:28] Jeff: I feel like you’re, you’re in the, there’s this whole category of experience when something changes in your life or when or when something is removed, um, either by choice or or not. And you ask yourself the question, What am I without X? Right? [00:09:46] Christina: Mm-hmm. [00:09:47] Jeff: it seems like you’ve been, you’ve been asking that question and what you just described sounds like it’s like a pathway to an answer, which is awesome. [00:09:53] Brett: Yeah, my therapist described it as like, so you’re sitting in a room and your mania is sitting in this chair and your depression is sitting in this chair, and they are your old friends like you. You need to choose whether you’re gonna say goodbye to them or whether you’re going to manage them, or like how you’re going to define this relationship with these external beings. [00:10:19] And that, that kind of ranked true for me, like this idea that my mania was almost this external thing that I associated with, that I related to, uh, that I, I wanted in my life. So I, yeah, I have some shit to figure out, uh, as far as this relationship goes with my bipolar. Um, but yeah, this new idea of maybe happiness, instability, that could be, that could be cool. [00:10:50] Jeff: Yeah, [00:10:52] Christina: I think that’s, that’s, I think that could be amazing actually. [00:10:54] Brett: I’ll keep you posted. Okay. [00:10:58] Christina: So for me, mine, um, I mean I’ve been, so I, I was hosting, uh, Microsoft at night this week and we might talk a little bit about some of the stuff that was announced there. Cause some of it was, was actually interesting. A lot of it is just like enterprise. Kind of stuff that’ll appeal to a certain segment of our audience, but not most of it. But, um, but that was, it was, it was fun. I haven’t, um, done, um, a hosting thing like with Microsoft since I left Microsoft. And, um, you know, I’m, I’m, I’m, I’m still, you know, part of kind of like the, the family so to speak. [00:11:28] You know, I work at GitHub and so I’m doing universe next month, which, uh, November 9th and 10th in, uh, uh, San Francisco. So if you are there and you see me obviously say hello, uh, we have a rule on a rocket where if we see listeners in real life, I buy them a drink. But that also applies to Overtired listeners, and it does not need to be an alcoholic drink. [00:11:49] I’ll buy you, you know, smoothie or coffee or whatever the case may be. Um, but uh, just throwing that out there, I’m very low probability that anyone who listens to this podcast will be at GitHub Universe, but you never know. Um, also, uh, register and join us online for free. That’s end of my plugging. And, um, So, but no, but I was doing that and it was, it was fun, but it was also kind of weird. [00:12:11] I was like kind of back, you know, in this, in this world a little bit that I hadn’t been in. And, um, I had been a little bit disconnected from a lot of the process of actually, uh, you know, kind of the, the day to day stuff of like, I didn’t really know what content was gonna be involved and I wasn’t super involved in the script writing. [00:12:28] And so I really was kind of, Hired talent who wasn’t, you know, paid. Um, the, the guy that, um, so we had, it was a hybrid event, so there were people in, um, Seattle at the Seattle Convention Center, which is incidentally like a five or six minute walk from my apartment. Uh, I had to go, you know, half an hour away to Redmond, the Microsoft campus, the studios record there. [00:12:51] But we did have a bunch of people in person doing stuff. Um, and then there were some local events happening at the same time in, in various parts of the world. Uh, but it was me and this guy Brian Tong, who’s a, uh, YouTuber, used to work at cnet. Now he has his own YouTube channel and he’s an independent guy. [00:13:07] We were the two people hosting. From, um, uh, main studios and we had, we did some interviews and some other stuff, but a lot of it was just kind of introducing packages and going to the next, you know, bits of segments and things like that. But, um, it was fun. I, I got to see some people, um, who came out, you know, for the event in person at, at, um, like kind of a community kind of meet meetup thing that was in my neighborhood. [00:13:31] Um, I was not able to go in person to see anything because I was too far away and I was literally on air the whole time that everything was happening. But it was, uh, my mental health is, is good. I guess. It was, it was, it was weird though. It was like, you know, you go back and I, it’s almost like, you know, when you go back and you like visit like a school after you’ve graduated or left and you see, you know, people and I certainly like, it wasn’t the same thing cuz I was still like doing, you know, a job and was, was hosting and whatnot. [00:14:01] But, you know, it’s, it’s like not my, my life anymore really. Right. Like, it might be for a couple weeks out of the year, but, You know, I, I was coming in, you know, as, as kind of like somebody who was disconnected from the normal process. And because work is so entwined with my identity in a lot of ways, kind of what you were talking about a little bit, Brett, um, uh, you know, I, for me, it’s not anything to do with my, my, my mental health or, or my neuro, but work has for better or worse been like a, a big definer of, of how I kind of see myself. [00:14:35] Um, probably for worse, to be honest. It was, it was interesting to be back in kind of a, a place and be like, Oh, this isn’t necessarily my identity anymore. Um, but you know, you still have like this muscle memory of being able to kind of jump in and, and do it and, uh, you know, um, bullshit and ask some of the, the questions if you need to about stuff that, like, I don’t think about every day anymore, right? [00:15:01] Uh [00:15:02] Brett: is it muscle memory? Cause I, I watch some of the stuff you [00:15:06] Christina: mm-hmm. [00:15:07] Brett: and like, when we do this podcast, if we’re having a rough day, we can come on and we can say, I’m having a rough day. It’s gonna be, it’s gonna be slow. Um, I’m super tired. You don’t get to do that when you are [00:15:20] Christina: no, no, no. [00:15:22] Brett: to just flip a switch and just be on, Cause I, I have trouble imagining that for myself. [00:15:28] Christina: yeah. I, I am And that actually, that’s actually, Thank you for bringing it back for the mental health thing. That is a struggle because, and this is what I think people don’t understand sometimes about those types of roles, because you have to be on, and not only are you on when the camera’s on, you need to be on, when you’re not on, you know, because you need to be nice to the crew and the execs. [00:15:50] And then if you’re going to the community meetups and the other things that are happening around these things, you have to be on there too. Like I was commiserating with them, a former colleague of mine, I know we were talking about like a lot of people are like, Oh, you know, your spouse would never go on these trips with you. [00:16:03] And I’m like, Well, it’s not a vacation. Right? Like if, if he came at the end of the trip on his own dime and then we, I took time off and we stayed a few extra days in the city. Sure. But when you go to these things, yeah, you might have a day or two that you can get around to do site scene, but it is not a vacation. [00:16:23] And beyond that, even when you have those little pockets you can carve out for yourself, you still have to be on at all times. And it can be really draining. And I consider myself a social person, right? Like I consider myself an extrovert, but it can still be really draining. And then a scenario like this, when you’re doing the hosting stuff, we are live, there are some pre-records, um, but even those, they like to do them in one shot. [00:16:47] But we are live. And, and you have like a camera crew and you can’t just mess up. If you do, you’ve gotta kind of joke at yourself and then move on. But like, it is the same as doing like live television, where you’ve gotta be on, you’ve gotta have the energy. It doesn’t matter that you, you know, woke up at four 30 in the morning and have been there since, you know, 6:00 AM and um, this is your third day in a row of doing a 12 hour day and you’re exhausted. [00:17:12] Like you’ve gotta, you’ve gotta look and have the energy and bring it on and, and do this stuff, and you don’t have any way to not do it. And so I think a lot of people, they think, Oh, it must be so easy just reading off a teleprompter. And it’s like, no, it’s actually not. It’s both emotionally and mentally. [00:17:28] There’s a lot that goes into it. And then beyond that, like not everybody has the personality type for it. Uh, and, and, and not everybody would enjoy doing it. And I do enjoy doing it, but when I do it, like days like this, like a day after, I’m coming off of like a three day bender where I’m just like, Fuck. [00:17:45] You know, I’m, after we finish doing Overtired, like, and I finish uploading the latest episode to the download to, uh, to YouTube and, and get that up. Like, I’m just gonna like, take an edible and like piece out for the rest of the weekend. [00:17:59] Brett: Have you seen the show, uh, reboot? [00:18:02] Christina: No. [00:18:03] Brett: Um, it’s, it’s got Keegan Michael Key in it. I [00:18:07] Christina: Oh, okay. Love him. [00:18:08] Brett: actors, but you would know all of them. Uh, it’s got the jackass dude, uh, [00:18:13] Christina: Johnny Knoxville. Johnny Knoxville? Yeah. [00:18:16] Brett: Um, and there’s just, there’s a moment where she has just received like very troubling personal news and then they call. Like she’s on and she has to walk from, It’s about, it’s about a TV show. It’s about a Hulu, Hulu TV show. And like she’s backstage and all of a sudden it’s her, it’s her time for a line. And she has to drop from this like, extremely emotional moment, like, of like anger and sadness and just smile and walk out into a sitcom television set and deliver her line. [00:18:53] And I’m like that, that remind, It made me think of you, Christina, because I know you go through some shit. I know like life is not perfect for you, but when you get in front of the camera you have to smile and you gotta be on and, And I thought of you. [00:19:09] Christina: Yeah. No, I want, I mean, it was, it was, I mean, I, I would not look and, and I’ll fair, I would not have been able to do this if, if it had been like my own, um, uh, you know, uh, parent or father or anything. But like, I was, um, I had just, um, arrived in Paris I think when, um, my, uh, my husband’s father, when my father-in-law died. [00:19:29] Like I had just arrived and, and he, he’d been sick. He had cancer. Grant was with him, and I literally just arrived and that happened. And I was not in a position where I could fly back. It was not one of those things where I, I, you know, it just, it wasn’t like it. I was not in a position where I could do that. [00:19:44] And then like, you have to go and give a talk and, and be hanging out with people forgetting about the fact that like, you have all these other stresses happening in your life and at home and these personal things. And it can’t matter. It’s exactly like you said. Like you, you know, you, you could be feeling really sick. [00:19:59] You could be feeling whatnot. Like, I, I passed out on stage once my blood sugar got bad and I fainted on stage with, and that was really fucking embarrassing. And then you have to like, build it up and go on and then pretend like, like, No, no, don’t make anything about me. I think people gave me really good review marks because they felt bad for me, but that was, uh, still like, you know, humiliating on a lot of levels. [00:20:18] It was not great. Um, but yeah, that’s, you’re exactly right. It’s, it’s, it’s, um, yeah. It can be a lot. And, and I think that that’s why I, after I do a lot of these things, when I did them more frequently, it was easier to kind of figure out how to kind of like modulate, you know, and kind of get through it. But then when it’s like been a while and like I haven’t done one of these all day things in quite some time. [00:20:43] Like I, I was at, um, get merge, but that was an in person thing. And it’s just, it’s not the same as on camera. It’s not the same. And, um, [00:20:51] Jeff: uh, [00:20:52] Christina: you know, it’s not the same as when you literally have like a full production studio and like a jib coming at you in four cameras and instructions in your years of where you need to turn and what you need to do and reading off the prompter. [00:21:03] And you’ve gotta get in at this timeline and oh, now you’re being told that you have to actually extend two minutes because they need to fill time. And so you’re talking to someone and you’re like, All right, let’s, we’re, we’re, we’re gonna have to like, come up with an extra talking point. Yeah. Which I can do. [00:21:18] But the, the problem is, is that sometimes the person you’re ramping with doesn’t know they have to va. Like I was doing a, an interview live yesterday. About some security stuff. And the girl was great, but we’d rehearsed a lot and she was wanting to be very specific and, and very scripted in what she did, which I totally get because for people who don’t do this for a living, like they feel much more comfortable when they have it all out there. [00:21:38] Um, but it needed to be five minutes. And originally when we’d practiced it was like seven, so we needed to cut two minutes. Well, we cut too much or she cut too much. Um, and so we had a minute to go and so we’re done. And I need to be kind of wrapping up and she and I hadn’t talked about this before, but I was like, Okay, I have, I have, you know, literally I have, I have 65 seconds I need to fill, so I have to like come up on the fly with another question. [00:22:01] She handled it great, she gave some great tips, it was fine. And then I was able to get us out. I think we might have still been about 10 seconds early, but we were, you know, close enough. But yeah, you’re right, like those things happen and it’s just like, okay, that’s that, that’s it. And you have to forget about all the other shit that might be going on in the back of your mind. [00:22:19] And I’m sorry that was a rant, but I’m very tired, [00:22:22] Brett: No, that was [00:22:23] Jeff: But it sounds exhausting. [00:22:25] Brett: Yeah, for real. [00:22:26] Christina: It. No, it is, It is. Sponsor: Amazon Pharmacy [00:22:29] Brett: gonna, I would like to tell you about Amazon Pharmacy, though. [00:22:32] Jeff: Oh, thanks. [00:22:33] Christina: That’s actually [00:22:34] Brett: like, I feel like it’s a good segue after mental health, we all, we all get meds, we all have to go to the drugstore. So when I need to go to the drugstore, I always seem to wait until the last minute hoping they’ll be open or I get stuck in a line. [00:22:49] Right? Or both. And that’s why I love Amazon Pharmacy. 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[00:23:53] That’s amazon.com/ Overtired. Average savings based on usage inside RX data as compared to cash prices, Average savings for all generics are 78%, 37%. For select brand medications, restrictions apply. That’s amazon.com/ Overtired. Thanks, Amazon. I, Those are words I, I’m not used to uttering. Thanks, Amazon [00:24:20] Christina: For real. [00:24:22] Jeff: Was there anything in the ad script that indicated how you were supposed to say the words Yes. That. [00:24:30] Brett: Yes, [00:24:32] Christina: Selma that Amazon. Do we wanna go ahead and do our, our next, uh, a too, Just go ahead and, and, uh, get ’em over. Sponsor: NordVPN [00:24:39] Christina: Brett, you had mentioned reboot, um, and I’m not sure what network that’s on. Um, if that’s a, if that’s Hulu or Netflix or, Okay. It’s a Hulu show. Okay. Well that’s actually interesting. I mean, at this point Hulu is more available internationally. [00:24:51] However, there are some weird differences. Like if you’re in the uk, like it might be part of Disney plus, if you’re like in other things, it might, may or may not work. We also see things, uh, you know, we were just talking about that Amazon and some Amazon Prime stuff varies country by country. The same with with Netflix stuff and, uh, You know, if you’re ever in that scenario where like you’re really excited to watch this show or film and then you find out it’s not available in your country, and that’s really frustrating. [00:25:16] Um, and in, uh, into four times when I used to travel all the time, that was always frustrating. But with Nord vpn, I can switch my virtual location on my device with one click and I can access streaming services from over 60 countries at no extra cost. And that opens up a Pandora’s box of entertaining content that I wouldn’t be able to access without Nord vpn, which is really great. [00:25:39] And, uh, certainly it’s also, I point out if you’re in your home country and you wanna enjoy foreign content in some of those regions, a lot of times it’s really good and really weird, and that’s a fun thing to do. So you’ve probably heard that VPNs are great for online protection, but they slow down your internet speed. [00:25:56] And that is honestly like a, a common complaint, uh, with, uh, with VPNs is that like the latency between where the note is and where you are can, can mean that stuff is slow. However, Nord VPN is the fastest VPN in the world. Um, I don’t even notice when it’s running, and I’m actually saying that genuinely I’ve used it. [00:26:13] And, uh, you, the, the latency is actually remarkably, uh, good. And, um, so you can stream and browse online with no buffering or lagging. That’s especially important with online video because that is delivering, you know, a lot of data to you. So if it’s gonna be throttling or laggy, then it’s not a great experience. 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Heartbreak High [00:27:33] Brett: Have you guys seen Heartbreak High? [00:27:35] Christina: No. Tell us about it. [00:27:37] Brett: You know, you know, I have a thing for young adult stuff. Some of my favorite books are classified as ye [00:27:46] Christina: Okay. Yo, why, for sure. That’s, that’s different though, but yeah. [00:27:50] Brett: Well, yeah, and this is, and it’s not, I think I might be emotionally stunted from years of, of Addiction. Um, but I really, I really enjoy why stuff, but l who does not have my history with addiction, also enjoys this show called Heartbreak High on Netflix. [00:28:10] And it is astounding. It is like, if you are queer or neuro divergent in any way, this show has something for you. [00:28:20] Christina: Ooh. And it’s a reboot. [00:28:22] Brett: Is it really [00:28:23] Christina: is apparently I’m, it was an Australian program. It that, that also aired on the bbc, um, from 97 to 99. [00:28:32] Brett: takes place in Australia. [00:28:34] Christina: Yeah. Well, no, that makes sense because it’d be weird for them to like reboot it otherwise, but yeah, it was on, it was on Network 10, um, and um, and then it was on BBC two, but yeah, it was, it was So was an Australian show. [00:28:46] It was, Oh, it’s a spinoff of the 1993 Australian feature film. The Heartbreak Kid. Um, [00:28:52] Brett: the original now, because this show is [00:28:54] Christina: Tell us about it. [00:28:56] Brett: Um, like you, like the, the main characters are, there’s one girl who, who’s basically neurotypical, uh, has no idea what’s going on in her friend’s lives. Um, like she’s very surface level, but then her friends include like, uh, a non-binary queer. [00:29:18] Like, uh, like cis male, um, who is in love with this guy who’s caught up in this like, uh, world of crime where he basically is scared to deviate because he’ll get the ship beat outta him. You got an autistic girl and, and he’s best friends with the autistic girl and is like an amazing friend to a high school girl with autism. [00:29:44] And there’s uh, uh, you got a girl who goes through a near sexual assault and then her father is also insane. I don’t know in what way, but basically her life is in danger at home because her father, her single father is just fucking nuts. And like all of this comes together. It is the most dramatic. High school center. [00:30:15] It’s like if 9 0 2 and oh had a lot more just insanity and neuro divergence to it, [00:30:23] Christina: Okay, so, so, so, so is Australia and Degrassi is what you’re saying? [00:30:29] Brett: I, I don’t actually relate to that, that analogy, but I’m gonna, I’m gonna let it, I’m gonna accept that that’s probably [00:30:36] Christina: Okay. So, so, so, so Degrassi and then there was Degrassi. So there’s Degrassi, Junior High, Degrassi High. Then there was Degrassi, the Next Generation, and then they did a Netflix one, and I don’t fucking know what that’s called. And they might be doing another one, but it’s like this Canadian soap, teen soap thing that has gone on for generations that, uh, that’s where we got Drake from, to be honest. [00:30:59] Brett: Okay. [00:31:00] Christina: Because Drake was on the next generation. He was, he was, uh, Jimmy Brooks who got shot and then, uh, crippled. He was a basketball player who was shot in a school shooting thing and, and then, uh, couldn’t use his legs anymore. And, um, and they ver they let him rap occasionally, but you didn’t ever actually hear any of his stuff. [00:31:16] Then he was always kind of doing it on the down low, um, under his, uh, his Drake, uh, moniker. But, uh, it, it sounds a lot like Heartbreak High, seems like Australian Degrassi, which as a big fan of Degrassi, um, I’m here for, So that’s fun. [00:31:31] Brett: I, I re I don’t think, I don’t think it’s, it’s specifically for people who enjoy young adult stuff. I think it’s for anyone who is neuro divergent or queer in any way that wants characters that can relate to you because they do an amazing [00:31:52] Christina: Mm-hmm. [00:31:53] Brett: of representing different types of people. Um, it’s, it’s really like, it’s really moving. [00:32:01] I recommend it for everyone. [00:32:03] Christina: That’s cool. Yeah. And actually, it turns out some of the characters that I’m just looking at here, some of the, the recurring and notable guest stars, um, were from the original. So, um, I wonder [00:32:12] Brett: didn’t know that [00:32:13] Christina: Yeah, no, again, so again, I’m, I’m just being real, like, and I’m into watching this because I was unaware of this show, but this does completely scream to me. [00:32:21] And in, in fact, I bet even when it was created, cuz Degrassi had already happened in Canada, um, at, I totally bet that somebody was just like, let’s just do an Australian version of Degrassi. Uh, and, uh, which genius, You should totally do that. And now the reboot, um, is referencing old things like Degrassi did. [00:32:39] So I’m, I’m gonna watch this. And I, I think to your point, I think it’s great that they show like these different types of people, but I also feel. Whether you’re emotionally stunted or not. And I love your thoughts on this, Jeff, because you’re, you know, you have, um, teenagers, but I feel like there’s something kind of for a lot, for some people, not everybody, but for some people, there’s something that is like always going to be fun and relatable and you know, like you can dig, jump into things that are either take place at that time in people’s lives or um, you know, things that may or may not be classified as ye just because even though whether you’re emotionally centered or not, once you get past that, we can always, I think a lot of us anyway can like go back and like remember what that time was like and, and that’s just like a, it can be very compelling is all I’m saying. [00:33:25] Like I think whether or not you, cuz I don’t consider myself emotionally stunted the way that, that you might read, but I’ve loved teen shows since before I was a teenager. Long after I was a teen. You know, I like why stuff. Um, but I also think that sometimes it can also be a really good way, as you were mentioning, to showcase people with, with different backgrounds and, um, you know, um, uh, you know, who are different because it’s a lot easier to kind of show that kind of coming of age stuff in a coming of age setting than it is in like an adult workplace thing where, you know, it’s like people, like even the most, uh, uh, you know, understanding and, and and whatnot amongst us, like, you might not give the same sort of understanding or care as much about the journey if it’s like watching like a, a workplace, you know, drama of somebody in their forties and going through these things as if you’re seeing like the self discovery and, and, and whatnot, you know? [00:34:24] Brett: that moment, that chrysalis. When, uh, when things like neuro divergence become like the most important in your life, uh, the th the times when they affect your life the most, like everyone who grew up, uh, you know, uh, bipolar, autistic, adhd, We all remember [00:34:45] Christina: Depressed. [00:34:46] Brett: we remember what high school was like, uh, those times when it became the forefront of our lives. [00:34:53] Uh, and I think everybody, no matter where they’re at, can remember those moments. [00:34:59] Christina: I agree. [00:34:59] Brett: I feel like high school dramas, uh, they, they work [00:35:04] Christina: They do, they do high school dramas, young adult things. I mean, I think that’s why like some of the best films and some of those things, like I consider the graduate like one of like the best films of all time, right? And, and, um, based on a book, but like Mark Mike Nichols, like what he did with that. Like that is like the, the kind of quintessential of that era coming of age thing. [00:35:23] It’s also sort of an allegory for the end of that decade of the sixties. Right. And um, and I think, you know, you see that with a lot of, a lot of content and, and that I think is why stuff is read at this point more by adults. Than than young adults. Right? Like, if anything, I [00:35:39] Brett: better. [00:35:40] Christina: No, no, no. This has been the trend for at least a decade. [00:35:42] Like, it, it, it like, like Twilight was definitely part of the kickoff for sure. But then like Hunger Games I think was really, I mean, Harry Potter, honestly, we really wanna go back, but that I don’t consider Harry Potter y I think those are children’s books, um, that happen to just be very good. But then you had Twilight and then you really had Hunger Games cuz Hunger Games, the books were fucking good. [00:36:04] And it wasn’t just like a book that you would be like, Oh, these are just things that kids read. It was like, No, this is actually like a good series. And then the movies were really fucking good. Like the, the movies were better than they had any right to be. Right. And, and that kicked off. I think this whole resurgence of, um, writers, especially from different backgrounds writing for frankly adult audiences, but using the YE themes. [00:36:28] And I’m sorry, I’m, I’m rambling cuz I’m [00:36:29] Brett: No, I feel like that’s totally true. Like I, those books are not, like, they’re not stupid. Like they’re not written to children. They are written to adults. Uh, and they might be about themes that maybe a high schooler can relate to, but, but I’m, I’m not a stupid [00:36:49] Christina: No, no, you’re not [00:36:51] Brett: books. [00:36:51] I’m very literate and I read these books and like they speak to me. Maybe not in the way that, like a Tom Robbins book speaks to me. But, uh, but I never feel like it’s being dumbed down or like I’m reading something for children. Like they are, they’re written for adults about, about themes that honestly we’ve all been through and we can relate [00:37:14] Christina: Totally. Did either of you ever read, um, the Parks of Wallflower? [00:37:19] Jeff: No. [00:37:20] Christina: Okay. So it’s a great film too. Um, and, and Steven, um, Chapski, can’t pronounce his last name or can’t think of it, but he, um, I think he wrote the screenplay as well as, uh, the book, which for, for me, like made it really good. But it, it, so it was published in 1999. [00:37:35] I was in high school. I was like the, the age, it was really kind of designed for, um, I’d read Catcher in the Rye. Right before I read that and, and that actually was gonna be one of the examples I used too. Catch on Therye is a fucking y novel. It’s a coming of age novel, Right. But it’s also widely considered one of the greatest books of all time. [00:37:52] And it is, Right. But, but that is like one of those, But per subpoena wallflower, um, it takes place, It’s written through letters to this kind of anonymous person, and it takes place in I think like 1991. Um, and, um, uh, which was an interesting device even to use then, because for the generation, like my generation who read it, like I kind of knew some of the references, but I didn’t know The Smiths. [00:38:15] Like I was, I’ll be completely honest, I was introduced to the Smiths through the perks of Being a Wallflower because in the book, he, he talks about getting these tapes and, and listening to the song, um, um, you know, Asleep and um, and things like that. And like that introduced me to, to The Smiths. Um, and then I remember going, using Napster to like, download songs that were in the, in the, um, book. [00:38:37] And then later in the movie, Yeah. But, but that is one of those, like, I was just, I would just put it out there for anybody who likes this sort of stuff. It’s a fantastic book. The film is great too. The film has, um, Emma Watson and um, um, Ezra Miller, uh, who they are, you know, controversial, but they were very good actors in it. [00:38:54] And, um, Logan Luman, it’s, it’s, uh, it was, um, adapted in 2012 and was, uh, very well received, um, as, as a film. But the, the book is, I still think back in my mind as like, yeah, it would be probably my top 10 books as like, like weird as that is for a fucking MTV book because it was under MTV’s imprint, which was brand new then. [00:39:17] Yeah, it was, MTV Books was brand new then it was under their imprint. And I remember even reading the, the reviews, like, I don’t remember what was The Times or, or, you know, things like that. But it, you know, it was written up in, in some of like the things other than Kirks who were. Oh, this is actually good. [00:39:33] And you know, it came out on paperback. It was one of those like great just books and anyway, it just makes me think of that cuz you’re right, those things are like forever whatnot. And I was the age, um, that I needed to be when that came out. But as an adult I could still think like people could read that and watch the film and totally be like, this shit works. [00:39:54] And then it’s interesting cuz the film, what I liked about it, they didn’t, um, adjust the timeline. It still took place in the early 1990s. So even though at that point it was, it was 20 years later or 30 years later. 20 years later. Yeah, [00:40:07] Jeff: Hmm, [00:40:07] Brett: Can you drop that in the show [00:40:09] Christina: I will absolutely put that in the show notes. [00:40:11] Brett: Veni? [00:40:12] Jeff: I can, I throw two shows into that mix, which is, uh, Dairy Girls and Sex [00:40:17] Christina: Yes. I love dairy girls. [00:40:19] Jeff: Ugh. [00:40:20] Brett: I love sex education and I’m so excited there’s another season coming. That’s such a great [00:40:25] Jeff: So fantastic. I know it’s like [00:40:27] Brett: I just restarted Dairy girls, uh, this week too. [00:40:30] Jeff: Oh, nice. We’ve started season three, uh, which just came out. [00:40:35] Brett: Yeah, that’s why I restarted. I had to like, I had to start from the beginning, so I get season three in, but yeah. Great shows. [00:40:42] Jeff: so delightful. You know, one of a man who was kind of a boy who was kind of a bully in my high school, uh, kind of stated something once to me. That to me is like, explains my attraction to any kind of media that takes us back into our sort of mid to late adolescence. And he said to me, and this guy was such a jerk, he, he used to punch me at the bus stop once we were in the computer lab and he balled up a bunch of clay from, from, uh, pottery class, and he threw it at the back of my neck as hard as he could. [00:41:15] And he is such a dick. And then one day he says to me, he’s like, You know what? You know what high school is? This is all high school. It’s high school. It’s just a microcosm of the rest of the world. And I went, Where do you get off dropping fucking wisdom on me. Like you’ve been like, [00:41:30] Christina: He’s completely accurate. [00:41:32] Jeff: and I’ve thought of that motherfucker ever since [00:41:35] It’s just like, but it’s true. Like, you know, it’s like for me also, like there’s always a, a film projector playing, like, uh, you know, not quite in focus reels of my high school experience inside my head. You know, like we’re always, I feel like we’re always living there a little bit. Um, and, and so I think to be able to like, touch it through literature and TV is just awesome. [00:41:59] Sex education for me especially was one of those [00:42:01] Christina: Yeah, I, Yes, actually chicken is great. Sorry, go on. [00:42:04] Jeff: Oh, [00:42:04] Brett: really, I thought Christina was saying perks. Sini Wallflower. And I’m just looking at the show notes and realizing [00:42:13] Jeff: that’s her password. That’s her, that’s her [00:42:15] Christina: That’s my password. Indeed. [00:42:17] Brett: The Perks of Being a Wallflower, which I have actually heard of. That’s way less foreign to me. [00:42:22] Christina: Okay. Yeah. Cause I was a little bit surprised. I was like, Perk Sabina Wallflower. The, the movie and the, the book, I mean, the book is, is, um, is, is fairly acclaimed and I was especially, I I was like, it was written by like a late era Gen Xer, like a guy, you know, about your age. Um, Brett, uh, uh, because he, he wrote it based on like, when he was in high school and, um, and so I, you know, um, yeah. [00:42:49] Anyway, it’s a, it’s, it’s, it’s a, it’s a great book. Um, great movie too. Sex expectation is great too. [00:42:56] Brett: S uh, Scully is amazing in sex education. [00:43:00] Jeff: Scully . Jillian Anderson. Jillian Anderson. [00:43:04] Christina: Yeah, she’s amazing. [00:43:05] Jeff: If, if nobody’s seen it, it’s the, [00:43:08] Brett: and her lover, the Lars, or whatever [00:43:10] Jeff: Yes. [00:43:11] Brett: he, It’s such a great relationship. [00:43:14] Jeff: Just the idea that you’ve got a high school kid. His mom is a, is a sex therapist. He has, he has all the possible repression issues and he ends up being a counselor to people in his school in a secret spot to help them with their most, most intimate sexual problems. [00:43:31] And it’s like, and I just think what a beautiful premise in the first place, but just the way it unfolds is just amazing. Amazing. Anyway, love [00:43:42] Brett: uh, should we do some gratitude before we wrap up? [00:43:45] Christina: Yeah. Grapptitude [00:43:46] Brett: I’m gonna go with choosy this week. There are, there are multiple apps like, so basically when you click a link, it opens your default browser. Uh, but if you have choosy set as your default browser instead of your default browser, you get a window, a little like popup where you can choose like Safari or Chrome or Firefox or Edge or whatever, whatever browsers you have installed, and you can pick which, which, uh, app to open any Lincoln. [00:44:21] What I love about Choosy and Choosy is, Honestly, it’s the oldest one I know that still exists. It’s been around for a while and it’s still updated. Um, what I love is that it has a whole, uh, rules system where you can say, if this is true, then open and this browser, or offer me a selection of these particular browsers. [00:44:45] And you [00:44:46] Jeff: I need that [00:44:47] Brett: default browsers for certain types of links. If I hold on the option key and click a link in an email, it’ll ask me which browser to open it in. Uh, if it’s an Oracle specific link that I know is going to require the vpn, I send it to Safari. I don’t have to think about it. It just automatically opens in Safari where my VPN works better. [00:45:08] Um, and just like all of these things that as the problem arises, I just add a new rule and I never have to think about it again. And Choosy, Choosy is perfect for it. [00:45:18] Christina: Yeah, I, I will, plus one that I’ll also say, uh, csi, um, George, who is the, the developer of csi, he actually works at GitHub, which, um, I, uh, realized slash remembered a few months, um, after I joined and I like reached out to him and I was like, Oh my gosh. You know, cuz we, we’ve been Twitter mutuals, but I, I, uh, never really talked to him that much and I was like, Oh, that’s awesome. [00:45:37] That we’re both at, at GitHub. Um, and, uh, I, I, So it’s funny, So I use Sui on I think two of my machines. I have been trying one called, I think it’s pronounced Velha. It’s V E l j a. And that’s from, um, um, and that’s from CiDRA. Sohu, who’s a, a very, uh, we’ve talked about a lot of, um, uh, his apps before. That one’s in the App store. [00:46:00] It’s free. Choosy is good. [00:46:02] Brett: open source. [00:46:03] Christina: And open source. Yes. Choo is good because I think that it’s a little bit more customizable in terms of some of the rules you can do. And in terms of, um, like, like you said, like getting like specific apps and like if you want like, to really get granular with your rules, it’s awesome. [00:46:18] Um, I, I, I love, hoo, The one thing I will say, if you’re using a browser that has, uh, different profiles, like Chrome has profiles, but so does Edge, so does like Chrome, beta whatnot. If you’re, if you use like a bunch of the, those different types of things and you wanna open specific sites and a specific profile, Choosy right now doesn’t do that for all of the, um, uh, various like versions of, of the browser. [00:46:44] So you might wanna look at, at Velha. But, um, in general, I totally agree with you. Like it’s such a great app and, and it’s one of those that I paid for a million years ago. I remember when it was a preference pain and then it became like zone app and it’s so, it’s so good. Like I can’t, I can’t not use those things. [00:46:59] Cuz for me, I’m similar to you, right? Like if, if I’m doing work stuff and I even have like a rule set up, like in choosing whatnot, like if I’m opening something up in GitHub, it needs to be in my work profile in Chrome because that’s where all my stuff is and that’s where I’m authenticated through like Octa in terms of like my fingerprint key because I only have so many of them and I, you know, can send everything there. [00:47:23] But for other stuff it might be like, No, I wanna use Edge, or I wanna use Safari, or, you know, Firefox or whatever the case may be. [00:47:29] Brett: the, uh, I have the choosy plugin installed in Firefox, Chrome and Safari, where if I’m viewing a webpage in one browser and I like as a web developer, I wanna see how this page looks in another browser. I just click the choosy button and the toolbar and pick a different browser and it opens the same page in a different, Or if I go to something like Riverside where we record our podcast and I forget which browser I’m in, I can just click the button and switch to Chrome, which it requires. [00:48:02] Um, I’ve also played with browser ferry, but honestly, Choosy is, Choosy is my choice. I choose choosy. [00:48:09] Christina: Yeah, I would say I, I, I like Choosy and I, I like, um, Veja, but yeah, Choosy is, is, is great and it’s well designed and, and George is, uh, good work. And, uh, also, you know, shout out to another GitHub coworker, but I’ve been using it for, I don’t even know how long, but yeah. Great. Great. Pick. [00:48:27] Brett: All right, that’s it for me. Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait. One thing, do you know I added Chrome Pro profiles to bunch? [00:48:34] Christina: No. Ooh, tell us about that because that’s awesome. [00:48:37] Jeff: Yeah. [00:48:38] Brett: bunch, in bunch, you can open a link specifically in Chrome just by typing Chrome Colon and then putting the url. Now, if you type Chrome, and then in square brackets you specify a profile, uh, and it’s case insensitive, it’ll take the first match. [00:48:57] Um, and you can specify any profile and Bunch will open that link automatically in that specific profile. It only works with Chrome and Canary right now. Um, I haven’t played with Edge, uh, incorporating it there, but, but you can, you can do specific Chrome profiles in bunch. [00:49:20] Christina: Very [00:49:20] Jeff: about, um, like Firefox, um, containers? Do those have an API attached to them at all? [00:49:26] Brett: I’ve not figured that out yet. [00:49:27] Jeff: Okay. Okay. I’ll be right here when you, Do you wanna go Christina? [00:49:35] Christina: All right. So, um, the one I’m gonna mention, um, there are a bunch of, uh, these types of apps and, and, and, uh, I know that like we talk a lot about note taking things, and Brett obviously is working on his own thing, but, um, you know, the second brain kind of like, uh, era of apps, you know, has been a thing for a few years. [00:49:52] Like, there’s log sec, there’s room research, and there’s obsidian and obsidian. One point. Just came out like they just hit one auto and they actually had a, a pretty decent redesign. I think that, I think the app looks a lot better and um, although I do wish that it were maybe open source, most of the, um, plugins are, and so there is like a really, um, great ecosystem. [00:50:14] They have a way that you can pay either one off or if you wanna do the subscription. I don’t do any of their subscriptions cuz I don’t care anything about publishing from them. There are other ways you could do it too. And, and the syncing through iCloud uh, works, uh, perfectly fine for me. But I think that in terms of like the, so the idea of this is, it’s not just like a Notes app cuz you could have any notes app, it’s like a notes app and a mind mapper and you can grab things from other sources. [00:50:38] Like you can get plugins with, you know, different reading sources or, you know, um, different things you can send to and it can extract stuff from images and, and tweets and other files and, and really, um, make it so that you kind of have your own personal wiki to then be able to search through and find things really easily. [00:50:57] Brett: I have multiple things to say about obsidian. Uh, first of all, early in their development, they contacted me, uh, for advice on some various markdown kinds of things. And they said, We don’t see this as a, as a competitor to the, the NV Ultra app that you’ve announced that you’re working on and have been for fucking years now. [00:51:20] Um, I’m like, Absolutely it is, [00:51:23] Christina: Of course it [00:51:24] Brett: I, I 100% wanna help you out because, you know, this is the community we work in. Um, and absolutely it [00:51:31] Christina: Of course it is. Absolutely it [00:51:33] Brett: hundred percent competitor to NV Ultra, and it is a fantastic application. Um, the things that can do the extensibility of it, the, the way it can do these like mind map node connections of all your notes. [00:51:48] I can’t remember what they call it, but it’s, it’s outstanding. Um, there are you, they have a url. Handler and, uh, you can create like I have incorporated obsidian into gather my tool for Mark down defying any [00:52:07] Jeff: Oh, you did. [00:52:09] Brett: Um, not, So basically I incorporated Gather with NVI Ultra and then realized I could just create, uh, a way to generate URL handlers for any application, uh, with it, with obsidian in mind. [00:52:27] But I made it more flexible so you could make it work with any URL handler. Uh, but if you go to the, the Gather Wiki, uh, basically I made it so you can take any webpage and mark down a fight. It’s straight to an obsidian note [00:52:42] Christina: Oh, that’s badass. [00:52:43] Brett: it into your Wiki, [00:52:45] Christina: Hell yeah. [00:52:46] Brett: click, using a shortcut. Um, yeah, obsidian is outstanding. [00:52:50] It’s just like I can’t compete with obsidian. It’s so good. [00:52:54] Jeff: amazing. I use it, actually, the way I use it is I have a single folder of my text files and it’s also an obsidian vault and it’s also the default folder that NV Ultra goes to. Um, it’s also the, [00:53:08] Brett: the beauty of [00:53:09] Christina: That is the beauty of [00:53:10] Jeff: yeah, it’s also where, speaking of Brett tools, it’s also where all of my quick question, uh, text files are. [00:53:17] And, and, and that helps a great deal cuz I still, it is a competitor clearly, but I see why they would, why they would believe maybe more strongly than they ought to, that it’s not because, [00:53:28] Brett: You can use them in [00:53:30] Christina: You can, [00:53:30] Brett: are [00:53:31] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. That I’ve always said, I know I’ve said that to you a hundred times when we talk about upsetting, it’s like, well, I actually kind of use ’em both, [00:53:36] Christina: No. Oh, I was gonna say, and I use them differently, right. And like, they, they are absolutely competitors, but I think what’s great about this stuff and, and the knowledge, I mean, and you know this better than anybody, Brett, these things are so specific and personal. Like you cannot make this the sort of thing where like you can’t design programs like this, in my opinion anyway, and be like, this is gonna be the one app that everyone is going to use, [00:53:59] Brett: Or you shouldn’t, you shouldn’t think that [00:54:02] Christina: Well, you shouldn’t think that way. And if you do think that way, it, it will not be successful with the, the, the nerdy, like very granular, customizable audience, right? Like, if, if you wanna do a general Notes app, that’s fine, but that’s not gonna have all these types of features and so, [00:54:15] Brett: if you wanna make a craft, if you wanna become your own ecosystem, sure, go [00:54:20] Christina: Sure. Or [00:54:21] Brett: if you wanna appeal to the envy, ultra obsidian customers, you need to be open format. Yeah. [00:54:26] Christina: Absolutely. Right. And so that’s what I do like about obsidian is that even though, like, it’s not open source, like the vaults, like you said, it’s just flat markdown files, so you can use them together. And a lot of people do, like I, I frequently use multiple things together and, and, and, and because there are certain use cases where it’s better, right? [00:54:43] Like I think in terms of ingesting certain data, like obsidian because of its plug and ecosystem is better. But if I was trying to do, maybe I wanted to get really great markdown formatting and, and, and do kind of different types of writing, right? Like, like in alt would be. [00:54:56] Brett: access to quick take. A quick note. Yeah. That’s where MD Ultra fits in, but as far as like linking your notes [00:55:04] Christina: Right. That’s not really [00:55:05] Brett: all of that, that’s, that’s beyond scope for MB Ultra and Perfect for obsidian. They’ve done such a good job with it [00:55:12] Christina: exactly. But, but like you said, you can use them together. But yes, obviously they are competitors, Right? Obviously they’re, I think the core most active user base will use more than one, but Yeah. You know what I mean? Like if you’re going after kind the general person, Yeah. Obviously they’re, they’re, they’re a confederate, but I’m really glad that you added all those features and, uh, anyway, I just wanted to them on, on 1.0. [00:55:37] Jeff: pick is. The is an app I used for like years ago and just picked back up just short Cat and what Short Cat does. [00:55:47] Brett: I haven’t heard that. I haven’t heard [00:55:49] Jeff: Is this. It essentially, it essentially allows you with a sheet keyboard shortcut to basically select any UI function, [00:55:59] Christina: Oh yeah. [00:56:01] Jeff: select any UI function in the app you’re in. Um, many more features in a browser, but like if I’m, you know, I, the thing I think of is that Brett has the misfortune of having to sometimes talk me through something I’m doing on a screen share and, and he’ll be like, No, no, I told you no, it’s update. [00:56:19] No, it’s up, it’s, it’s up upper left up further over. Um, and what you can do is shortcut, cut shortcut is just hit your, you know, global shortcut and, uh, type in the thing he said I was supposed to be hitting, and then you can even click from there. Um, it’s just a really, I, I don’t even know, like, uh, it’s, it’s totally, uh, has great functionality that I don’t use very often, but it is one of those things when I first discovered this app that kind of made me understand how. [00:56:50] How you are able to interface with your computer in ways that are invisible to you. Um, and the fact that you could be in an app and just start typing and it would, it would show you functionality that you can’t even see. [00:57:02] Brett: Right. Yeah. It’s deep access. It’s deep access to mac o s accessibility, um, features, and it uses accessibility to be able to access any control you can see on screen, um, and provide keyboard shortcuts to it. It’s, it’s an outstanding, I just haven’t heard about it for years. [00:57:21] Christina: Well, [00:57:21] Jeff: Right. No, same. I [00:57:22] Christina: it was, it was rewritten. It looks like, um, a big rewrite happened in like June or July, so now there’s been, Yeah, so, so this is what happened. Yeah, so I’m, because I just, I had, I heard of it, but I forgot all about it. So I looked this up and in, um, June 27th, 2022, first release from scratch rewrite with improved architecture, and I. [00:57:43] Requires Mac S 11 plus some workflows of change, new ui, and then they’ve started adding. It’s been actively developed like a, like a new release [00:57:51] Jeff: Do you think they, did they rewrite it in Swift? Did they rewrite it in Swift, you [00:57:55] Christina: I don’t know, [00:57:57] Jeff: Okay. [00:57:58] Christina: but, but I, but I, but I don’t know. [00:58:00] Jeff: the funny thing is, the reason it came up for me was not bad. It was that, um, I’m, I’m trying to just like deal with the garbage pile that my sonology is of all of my old files, cuz I dumped ’em all in there and I was just trying to see if I could find, make some sense of it. [00:58:16] And I found a folder that had on my apps from a backup from like 20, I don’t know what I mean, I think I, I might be crazy, but I’m pretty sure Short Cat came into my life before 2010, but I could be wrong. It was a long [00:58:30] Christina: Yeah, no, no, I know. Yeah, no, I look back at it. I think, I think it, I think the first one that I see, but this was not, the first version on their page goes back to 2012. And so, and that was, uh, version zero 2.3, but that means before 2010 probably does make sense. Right? So, but that, just that, But, but no, cuz I, I vaguely remembered the app that I didn’t, I hadn’t thought about it in a long time. [00:58:53] I don’t know if I ever used it, but yeah, I just got a significant rewrite and now it looks like it is actually under much more active development, which is really cool. [00:59:01] Jeff: yeah. It’s awesome. It’s fun for not using your mouse [00:59:05] Brett: I think I’ve mentioned it on the show before, but have you guys seen Polero? [00:59:09] Jeff: No. [00:59:10] Christina: I think I, you. [00:59:11] Brett: through Set app. [00:59:12] Christina: Right. Yeah. You’ve told me about this one before, [00:59:15] Brett: So if you’re familiar with the command shift, p pallet in, in sublime or vs code, if you have sublime shortcuts, um, it gives you access to every menu item in an application just by hitting command shift p in any app. [00:59:32] Uh, so you can like command shift Pete, and then just like fuzzy matching of any menu item, uh, hit return. Next time you pop it up, it will default to the last, uh, menu item you triggered. So it makes it really easy to repeat functionality. Uh, I’m gonna add it to the show notes. Just [00:59:52] Christina: Absolutely. [00:59:54] Brett: bonus pick. [00:59:55] Christina: Bonus pick. Yeah, I actually, it’s funny because I looked at this, I just pulled up setup, I didn’t have it install on this computer, but I have it starred, so I clearly have it installed someplace, but I might not have used it. You know how those things go. But, um, but, but like all, no meaning I haven’t like, used it regularly all the time, but I do remember this now cuz you told me about it and that’s awesome. [01:00:14] Jeff: Yeah. it’s got the most adorable. [01:00:19] Brett: I, [01:00:21] Jeff: It’s a little kitten with a with a computer mouse in its mouth. [01:00:25] Brett: Oh, you’re talking about, um, uh, [01:00:28] Christina: Short, Yeah, [01:00:29] Brett: Yeah. Notcher, is that [01:00:31] Jeff: Sorry. Not [01:00:33] Christina: yeah, I was gonna say, but yeah, Shortcuts icon is super, super cute, but, uh, yeah, PLE Roses is, is a little more normal. Um, not, not super cute, but sounds like a great app. So yeah, add that as a bonus, but yeah. Short Cat, thank you for that. I’m gonna play with this. [01:00:46] Jeff: Yeah. Super fun. All right. Get some sleep. [01:00:50] Brett: Jeff, I, I wish you the best of luck [01:00:53] Christina: For real, Jeff. We [01:00:55] Brett: all of the things that are going on in your life [01:00:57] Jeff: Thank you. Appreciate it. [01:00:59] Christina: Seriously. Jeff, Like we love you. Thank you for, for being on the show today and contributing and everything and uh, um, yeah. Uh, YouTube, Right. I’m glad working through the stuff you’re working through and I’m, I, I love you both and I guess, uh, everybody should get some sleep, right? But I do, I do [01:01:14] Brett: too. [01:01:15] Jeff: Yeah, awesome. [01:01:17] Brett: some sleep. [01:01:17] Christina: get some sleep. [01:01:18] Outro: The. [01:01:25] Stinger: Hey, there are good people. Before you go, we have a bunch of new places where you can interact with us. Please check out our Instagram feed, our YouTube channel, Twitter of course, and sign up for the Overtired newsletter, which will sort of pick up where the show leaves off with expanded show notes, uh, a little bit of what the three of us get up to between episodes. [01:01:48] And let’s face it, there’ll be some musings. How can you resist musings? You’ll find details for all the ways to interact with us in the show notes and at Overtired dot com. And thank you. Thank you. Thank you as always for listening.

Video surfaces of Brett’s 1990s punk band Onward to Mayhem. Jeff gets soaked in mace, cuffed, and taken downtown for the crime of rock ‘n roll. Christina reveals an amazing coulda-woulda with a rising-star emo band. Brett has a new Synology and its fast like ’90s hardcore! Sponsor SimpliSafe has everything you need to keep your home safe — from entry and motion sensors to indoor and outdoor cameras. Visit simplisafe.com/overtired and claim a free indoor security camera plus 20% off with Interactive Monitoring. Show Links Paradise City Up the Drunx Saves the Day Copwatch Saves the Day Synology DS1520+ Ludum Dare Apple Store Time Machine Posterino Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Brett Terpstra Time Machine [00:00:00] Intro: Tired. So tired, Overtired. [00:00:04] Brett: Hey, people, people listening to podcasts. This is, uh, this is Brett Terpstra. You’re listening to Overtired. I am here as always with my esteemed cohost, Christina Warren and Jeff Severance. Gunzel. Uh, how you guys doing? [00:00:20] Jeffrey: Good [00:00:21] Christina: Oh, good. I’m tired. But other than that, I’m good. [00:00:25] Brett: You just, you just woke up. [00:00:27] Christina: I did just wake up, which is like bad of me, but I just, it’s been a, I’ve had an incredibly like, busy like long week and next week is gonna be even worse. And I just, it was completely, and I feel guilty saying this because we’ll talk about it cuz you were the one who actually got sick. [00:00:42] But I’ve just been like, I’m like, I’m so dead to the world. [00:00:46] Jeffrey: Yeah, you described your couple of weeks coming up at some point, maybe even on the episode last week, and it sounds. Something you’ll be happy to be through [00:00:55] Christina: Yes, 100%. [00:00:56] Brett: a. R for sure. I, uh, I can tell I’ve recovered from Covid because I have been up since 1:00 AM. Um, not manic. I was sleeping really well there for a little bit. Uh, I was sleeping till like 8:00 AM which is insane for me. Um, but yeah, this morning I woke up at one and just like tossed and turned until 6:00 AM and then just got up. [00:01:20] But yeah, I’m tired. So I, I went to Minneapolis as previously discussed. Uh, had some great dinners, saw some great people, uh, got home, uh, couple days later, Got very tired. and uh, my girlfriend was like, You should test. And so I tested and sure enough I had covid. Um, I know I did not have covid going to the cities cuz I had tested and I pretty much isolate by default. [00:01:53] Um, the only person I had seen for a week before I left was, was l and she, she was not sick. Um, I think if I had to guess, I got it from the tow truck driver that I spent 20 minutes in a, in an enclosed cab with on the way to the cities. Um, [00:02:15] Jeffrey: And those tow truck drivers, I could just tell you from experience, they can talk. [00:02:19] Brett: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, he, he had stories about his, like, ex step son-in-law was suing him. He was on the, he was on the phone with his lawyer when I got into the cab, and then he, then he had to explain the whole situation. So I checked with everyone that I visited. No one else has tested positive, so I don’t think I spread it anywhere. [00:02:45] Um, No one else has had any symptoms at all, so it’s just me. I did get l sick. Um, so l and I have had covid this week. Uh, I am fully recovered at this point, and I think l may have another day left before she’s back to a hundred. But yeah, after, after two and a half years, I finally decided to see what this whole Covid thing was. [00:03:09] Christina: And, uh, what, what’s the consensus from your perspective? [00:03:13] Brett: Like, I enjoyed the days off. I, I love sick days because I don’t feel obligated to do anything. I get to just be and like, just deal with the sickness. I can just watch TV all day and it doesn’t matter. And that’s kind of, that’s freeing. So I don’t hate sick days. Um, and honestly, like aside from being super drained with a lot of like phlegm, it wasn’t the worst thing in the world and it only lasted two days. [00:03:46] Christina: Had you guys, I don’t remember, like had you had like the, the newest booster yet, or [00:03:50] Jeffrey: I have, [00:03:51] Brett: I have had, I have two, two vaccines in one booster. I had, I had not gotten the second booster yet. Um, and now I have to wait three weeks before I can get it. But I do think that vaccination was why my symptoms only lasted two days and weren’t severe, [00:04:08] Christina: Oh yeah. No, without a doubt. No, I was just curious because the, the reason I was asking is I also, I recently like, like Jeff got the new booster and I’ve been like wanting to have like a listen, like to people. Like has that actually helped, like in terms of how quickly people either A, recover or B, like if you actually get it or not. [00:04:26] Jeffrey: Well, I’m glad you’re [00:04:27] Christina: Very glad you’re better. [00:04:29] Brett: So I sent you guys some videos. Um, [00:04:33] Christina: Love this. This is so good. [00:04:35] Brett: The drummer in my, in the band I was in, in my. Early twenties, late teens, early twenties, onward to mayhem. He, he apparently, and I had no memory of this, but apparently there was video taken all through our East Coast tour, um, and. And he sent me a couple gigabytes of, it’s, you know, it’s the video you could shoot in 1999. [00:05:01] It wasn’t like high res or anything, uh, but the sound quality is surprisingly good for a, a handheld video camera in 1999. [00:05:11] Christina: Yeah, totally, [00:05:12] Brett: I won’t say the music was surprisingly good, but the sound quality was. Um, and I, I clipped a couple songs out, uh, one of them being a horribly drunken cover of Paradise City by Guns and Roses, Um, punk rock style, super fast, super fun and, and me being a total asshole on stage. [00:05:35] But, uh, but that it was a rush of memories. Man, that was crazy to see. [00:05:41] Jeffrey: I bet it was. How long was the tour? [00:05:44] Brett: Um, a month maybe. [00:05:46] Jeffrey: That’s a long time. [00:05:47] Brett: I have such blurry memories of the whole thing. Um, I, I was, I was trying, I was addicted to heroin and trying to score from city to city. Uh, I remember I was able to score in Baltimore, in New York, in Philadelphia. But I think other than those three, I was pretty much sick every time we took stage and was just like drinking to like get through it. [00:06:18] Um, so I was, I was not, I was not a, like I was, I thought I was being funny, but I was just being an asshole. Um, and. [00:06:29] Jeffrey: lesson [00:06:29] Brett: And talking over, talking over everyone else, like just I, I would not have wanted to be in a band with me, but I also would not have wanted to be in a band with our lead singer. Um, I don’t think I could have handled him his personality without heroin and alcohol. [00:06:50] Uh, our drummer who shared the video was straight Edge at the time. May still be, uh, I don’t know how he did it. I asked him, he said, I don’t know how he did it either. [00:07:01] Jeffrey: Hitting things every night. [00:07:02] Christina: Yeah, maybe. [00:07:03] Brett: What I realized though, is right, just beating on things, um, I wasn. Political as I remember being, I was just, I was a drunk punk, just out for the, the punk points, I guess. [00:07:18] Christina: Right, Which makes sense. Well, yeah, I was gonna say cuz one of the guys in your band had like an A, C, A B, like it looked like a tattoo, but it probably wasn’t a real tattoo. [00:07:26] Brett: No, it was a real [00:07:27] Christina: I was real tattoo and I was like, I was like, I was like, this is like 98 or 99. I was like, okay, that’s, that’s pretty badass. But like also, you know, that’s 23 years ago, so not what I was like, that definitely wasn’t a term that I knew back then, but I was also like 15 years old, so, you know, um, and lived in the suburbs, so, you know, we were like, fuck the cops, but mostly because they would pull us over and like, give us tickets. [00:07:56] Right. [00:07:56] Brett: were an, they were an inconvenience [00:08:00] Christina: Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. It was, it was completely, because it was inconvenience, it was like nothing to do with like actual, like systemic like violence or anything else like that, because like, [00:08:10] Brett: we used to have this thing called cop watch in Minneapolis. It may still be a thing, but I’m curious because Jeff has a better memory of cop watch than I do. Uh, how would you describe Cop Watch? [00:08:23] Jeffrey: Cop watch was a bunch of drunk punks walking around looking for police who have pulled people over so that they can watch them, and it was a, it. [00:08:34] Brett: with video [00:08:35] Jeffrey: With video cameras and the people I knew who were in cop watch, which on the face of it is a, is a perfectly, you know, reasonable and, and, and, you know, admirable sort of cause, uh, Especially in Minneapolis because what we know about Minneapolis now is, has been true for a very long time. [00:08:54] Um, but cop watch were like punks that got together. I mean, I kind of admired him a little bit, but then when I started to get to know the cop watch guys, I was like, Oh, you guys just get drunk and, and yell at the cops with your video cameras on. Like, [00:09:06] Christina: Right. [00:09:06] Jeffrey: really my, it’s not my jam. [00:09:09] Christina: not very punk actually. [00:09:10] Brett: I remember feeling very noble. It seemed very noble at the time, A night in jail [00:09:14] Jeffrey: it did. It seemed, No, I know. I got really fucked by Cop watch because, um, we were playing a benefit show for Cop Watch and a house at a house party, and it was actually a going away party for one of the kind of. Most sort of involved members who was moving to like California or something. And, um, and the police by this point, the Minneapolis police had, you know, they, they were just looking for an opportunity to fuck with the cop, watch people if they had it. [00:09:41] And, and this was a, and this was a known, this house my brother lived in, a bunch of people lived in it, but it was also known to. You know, like cop watch leaders in it and cop watch meetings in it and whatever. So we were playing a show. We were the only band playing. We played the basement, um, which is a place we had played before. [00:09:56] Cause my brother lived in the house and you know, sometimes the skinheads would come and steal the keg and, you know, it was kind of that kind of scene. Um, but we had a policy, if we were playing house shows, if the police came to just close our eyes. For like plausible deniability, like we didn’t know there were police here and we just keep going with it. [00:10:15] And then they would eventually [00:10:16] Christina: that worked completely. [00:10:18] Jeffrey: the way it would, it bought us a minute or so. And uh, and it was thrilling to do, if I’m being honest. It was just kind of like, Oh my God, I’m just gonna close my eyes and I have no idea what the fuck’s gonna happen. Um, but they would cut the power, cut the lights or whatever, and then we’d get out. [00:10:31] But it, so that was a normal thing. But in this case, when the noise complaint came in, They were ready. Like they, So basically they came in and they were just like, Everybody out. Everybody out. And when we got out to the front of the house, there were five or six squad cars and a police helicopter. [00:10:47] Brett: Which in Minneapolis was known as the Ghetto Bird, which Code 13 had a song. [00:10:52] Jeffrey: Right. Uh, and they were just grabbing people and throwing ’em in squad cars, like very randomly, like, you know, like kind of young. I remember seeing a young girl get kind of grabbed and, you know, and, um, and, and I noticed that my cousin who had, who had been drinking a lot was like in a sort of verbal altercation with the police, and they like took him down and I, I rushed over there, um, yelling at them to let him go and, They stood up and pointed, just like pulled out the mace and pointed it at me and they’re like, Get away, get back. [00:11:28] And I wasn’t a big drinker, didn’t do drugs. I am just the kind of person who thought at that moment to say, You can’t mace me. I’m a rock and roll drummer. [00:11:39] Christina: Oh my God, [00:11:40] Jeffrey: And at which 0.3 police like emptied their fucking [00:11:45] Brett: Turns out. [00:11:46] Christina: Turns out. [00:11:47] Jeffrey: and cuffed, and cuffed me and threw me in the back of a car. And then they, they squeezed two other people next to me so that they had to like, kind of breathe in. [00:11:55] I was just like, I was like emanating, you know, tear gas or whatever, pepper spray. And, um, and they took me in a bunch of other people downtown and, and as they handed me off, they, it was an underground jail at this point. It was in our old city hall, so I had no idea that was there. They’d drive us like underground. [00:12:11] I’m like, I don’t know what the fuck’s gonna happen. Like I had had a friend. Uh, a singer in a band of mine when I was in high school told me that he was once taken by Minneapolis Police down to a specific point on a riverbank, and they threw leather jacket over him and started beating him. And so I knew they had like spots, but I’m like, there’s no way the basement of city Hall’s one of their spots. [00:12:31] Brett: Catacombs, [00:12:32] Jeffrey: So outcome some other police. And when they hand me. The guy goes, Watch out. This one’s a mean one. And I was like, I’m not mean . Like, I just didn’t like that you were beaten on my cousin. Like I’m, I’m a rock and roll drummer. I’m not mean, uh, [00:12:48] Christina: not mean. I’m, I’m, I’m just a dumb enough guy to like yell at the cops and [00:12:53] Jeffrey: Well, my brother recently, yeah, my brother was the singer in the band, and he recently reminded me a part I had forgotten, which is after they maced me, my response was to yell, I. [00:13:07] Christina: So they think you’re high too. They’re like, [00:13:10] Jeffrey: Right. And I’m totally not like, [00:13:11] Christina: not. Right. [00:13:12] Jeffrey: I’ve had that problem, I’ve had that problem my whole life where friends or whatever I’ve had inter, I had an intervention in junior high where three of my friends sat me down in the cafeteria and they’re like, Hey, we’re, we know you’re doing speed. And, you know, and I’m like, I’m like, No, this is just me. [00:13:27] Like, I’m not, I’m just, I’m only in like second gear right now. But anyway, the like, crazy thing about that, I re, I went back a couple years ago. To get my mugshots from that time. Cause it’s a long time ago. This is like 96 probably. And uh, and as a reporter, I had been down to get documents from the police all the time. [00:13:46] And I went in and I said, I’m looking for a mugshot. They’re like, Okay, what was the name? Jeffrey Gunzel birth, date of birth. Give him my date of birth. They come back like, all we have it. Um, What’s your name? Like Jeffrey Goel. . Like, I am just here getting my own mugshot from 20 years ago or whatever. The close of that, cuz Brett, I don’t mean to like take your punk rock story too far. [00:14:09] Uh, [00:14:10] Brett: exactly what I wanted from this. [00:14:12] Jeffrey: is, um, so we spent the night in jail, which was really, was a experience for me that I, um, draw upon constantly because it is the case that even a night in jail, I had a friend who did. Uh, five or six years in jail and, and had asked if I’d ever been arrested in jail. I said, Well, I did an overnight. And, and she was like, That counts. [00:14:37] And the, the experience was, it was so packed that night that I was wedged next to a toilet, um, which was just an open space and, and people would come over. And p and it would splash on me and I couldn’t move. And the other thing I remembered, which is very Minneapolis, very America, but very Minneapolis, is that one half of this room was black, the other half was white. [00:15:01] Like everyone was perfectly segregated. And I don’t, I don’t remember noticing anybody else, anybody Hispanic, anybody, you know, like whatever. But like one half was black, one half was, was. And, um, and then I will never forget, they, they brought in after hours and hours of being in there, they brought us, um, like shrink wrapped apples. [00:15:21] And, and I’m sitting next to a toilet with my shrink crafted apple. I’m super fucking hungry, but I’m not. Anyway, the entire experience was like really powerful. It’s just powerful to know you’re in a place you can’t leave. Like it, it’s really, I’ve visited prisons many times and I remember once I used to visit people on death row, um, as part of a volunteer thing I did. [00:15:41] And I remember counting all of the locked doors as they locked behind me, as I went towards the, you know, Death row area and, and what an intense feeling it was to know that like I am in a place, in that case, I could ask to leave, which everyone else can’t, but like, I can’t just leave. Like there’s so much between me and the outside. [00:16:01] And, and even in that overnight it was, that was such a, Intensely strong feeling of, of the control and power they had over me. Right. Uh, and, and I’m, I’m glad I had that experience, uh, because it, it, it, even though it was like a micro, micro version of what it’s like to go to jail for longer or whatever, it’s not, it’s not nothing [00:16:22] Christina: No, you got, you had to, You gotta actually experience, but also like that, that’s, It’s, I it’s funny cuz it’s like, it is kind of punk to, to get to, I mean, it’s for a hilarious reason. Like you had a party, so it’s like the least punk reason to, to get like arrested, [00:16:39] Jeffrey: Right [00:16:40] Christina: but, [00:16:41] Brett: My only overnights were after protests, so they were also packed. But I can tell you, um, as far as that like idea of not being able to leave, uh, if you think junk sick sounds bad, imagine getting junk sick in the middle of the night in a room you can’t leave. That is an awful feeling. [00:17:02] Jeffrey: I bet. I bet. [00:17:04] Brett: It makes you hate everybody. [00:17:06] Jeffrey: I’m sure Well, okay, so that story closes with us going to court. Uh, three of us. The three that were in the car, the two that were in the car with me and they, the police had behaved so incredibly. Um, Wrong and, and, and against law and order, um, that it was clear our case was gonna be dropped, but our attorney, which was an illegal aid attorney, had to go in and make that argument to the judge. [00:17:31] It’s like, you know, look, this, what the police did that night was really messed up. You can either have that be a thing we talk about for a long time, or you can let these guys go. And before the lawyer went into the, he’s like, Okay, who’s, who’s Sean? Right? Who’s Michael? Who’s Jeff? Right. And, and who is it that. [00:17:48] You can’t mace me. I’m a rock and roll drummer. . I was like that. That was me, sir. just like, Oh my God. Anyway, Cop watch . Sorry, Brett. Brett’s. I wanna describe Brett’s video quickly, which is, That was amazing about Brett’s video is Brett had hair first of (Young) Brett Terpstra fit check [00:18:07] Christina: I wanted to bring this up. I was like, Brett [00:18:09] Jeffrey: Yes. Describe, Describe him. Fit. [00:18:12] Check. Describe him [00:18:13] Christina: Yeah, no, So, so the, the, the, like, the great like head of like blonde hair, you know, is just like, like a good hairline too, which I was looking at. I was like, I’m surprised you went as bald as you went because like your hairline was good then. [00:18:29] Like did it just, And I am curious, like did it just, like, was it a, a pretty quick thing that your, your hairline just kind of like fucked up? [00:18:37] Brett: I had a widows peak as a kid. Um, like I always had like Eddie Munster, Widows Peak. [00:18:43] Christina: Sure. [00:18:44] Brett: But yeah, like when I turned, I think about 25, I started getting the bald spot in the back and my hairline started receding. And within a year I just shaved my head and I’ve had it shaved ever since. Uh, or buzzed. [00:19:00] Christina: Which is the right, which is, Yeah, no, which is, which is the move, like if you can’t get on the Propecia early, like you can get on Propecia. Um, me and uh, Justin Williams are both obsessed with hairlines, and we talk to each other about this a lot because we’re like, If [00:19:12] Brett: Williams, a software developer. Okay, [00:19:16] Christina: Yeah. Justin Williams software developer who’s also. [00:19:20] The male version of me, if anyone is unaware of this, if anyone knows who he is, he and I are like, genuinely like the male female version of one another. We’re like twins. It’s very bizarre. Um, our personalities are remarkably similar, but yeah. If, if this is happening, like you can get on Propecia, if you have the, um, you know, the Elon or the, the Jeremy Watson space money to get like the, the good like transplant surgery, you can do that, you know, Propecia. [00:19:47] But the thing with Propecia, like you have to start it early. Like you can’t start it late, right? Like, [00:19:52] Brett: I gotta say waking up in the morning and not having to worry about your hair. [00:19:57] Christina: Oh yeah. Bet’s great. No. Well, the thing is, like, I was gonna say though, but this is what I appreciate about you. Like, if you’re not gonna do the preventative stuff, and if you’re not gonna do like the, you know, um, the, the Alan and the Jeremy, fuck, what is his last name? The guy from Entourage, last name starts with a p. [00:20:16] Brett: I would not know the [00:20:18] Jeffrey: Oh, Jeremy’s spoken class [00:20:19] Christina: Jeremy pn. Jeremy pn. Jeremy pn who was fucking bald. No, he like had bad, like he like was fucking bald. He has like one of the best hair transplants. Jude Law is another one. Great, great. Like uh, natural hair transplant work. If you’re not gonna do that, and if you’re not gonna get on the Propecia, then you gotta just, you gotta embrace it. [00:20:37] You just gotta shave it. Right? Like, which I really appreciate that you did like the right thing cuz there’s nothing that is sadder than like somebody who you know is bald. and then they’re just like hanging on to every little thing. It’s like, no, dude, you, you gotta shave the head. [00:20:52] Brett: My dad. My dad went balded pretty young and four years not, It’s not a comb over when you, when when you don’t have enough hair to actually cover anything up. You just have the like wisp that you like comb into place and four years for, for decades. My dad just had. A little bit of hair, and he grew out what he could, and he like combed it over. [00:21:20] Uh, finally at the age of like 70, he started buzzing his hair and it looks great. He looks good. I, it looks a lot less sad [00:21:32] Christina: have done, he should have done it 30 years earlier. Yeah. [00:21:35] Brett: You know, those, you know, those middle school band teachers that like, they’re balled on top, but they have the ponytail. That’s a horrible look. I feel like the Simpsons epitomized that pretty well in cartoon [00:21:48] Christina: Yeah. The, The Simpsons and King of the hill. The king of the hill, I think. Um, too. Yeah. But, but 100%. [00:21:53] Brett: I feel like it’s a trope. I feel like everyone has had like one band teacher or one music teacher that had the ponytail in the bald spot. [00:22:05] Jeffrey: Well, [00:22:06] Brett: So, so, so the takeaway from those concert videos was the hair. Is that, is that safe to say? [00:22:13] Jeffrey: uh, I have a takeaway. Um, you guys, uh, you know, Doing Paradise City, um, which we’ve since learned was a faithful enough cover that you got a YouTube, uh, [00:22:28] Brett: you two put a [00:22:29] Jeffrey: Copyright. Yeah. . But it’s funny, I don’t know why I’ve been, I’ve been in sort of a guns and Roses phase and thinking about those guys. Um, Just thinking about their sort of really weird history and how there’s a whole phase where, you know, the guitarist bucket head is the slash of Guns and roses and like it’s all so interesting. [00:22:50] But anyway, um, that song, its components are so fucking solid that you guys could just basically make it up cuz you were just like, Yeah, let’s try it. Well, the drummer did, drummer claims he didn’t remember. That was his way of hoping not to have to play [00:23:06] Brett: He remembered the [00:23:08] Jeffrey: No. He remembered everything. He had just, he told your, your singer’s like, Should we do the cover? [00:23:13] What do you think everybody? And he’s like, I forgot it. It was like, nobody forgot Paradise [00:23:17] Brett: me and Dego loved doing that song. Maddie and, And Clay did. They hated playing [00:23:24] Jeffrey: Well, so here’s the thing. Here’s the thing. When that song kicks into, right, like it is all, each of the components of that song are so solid that they can be mishandled terribly. Right. Um, [00:23:40] Christina: It’s like, it’s like a well written like song. Yeah. [00:23:42] Jeffrey: like it still rocks, [00:23:46] Christina: Well, no, cuz because that’s, that’s the thing about them, right? I think that’s why they were like, like the one kind of like band of that era that like actually did still sustain into like 91, like in the grunge thing. Like they still had hits because they had solid songs. Whereas like, and again, this is like you guys’ oi way more than mine cuz I was a small child and this was also not my music, but this. [00:24:09] Like for, from what I understand, what, what my, going back and listening to like the reason that the other bands of that era didn’t really transcend, in addition to just the whole look thing, not, not matching with what people were wanting to do and, and Axle being able to be much more like fit into, into that realm. [00:24:27] I think the songs were just better. Like, they were more solid like songs where you could be like, Dammit, I hate this whole scene, but all right, that’s a good ass song. Fuck it, you. [00:24:37] Brett: Guns and Roses had an anger to them that a band like Rat or Poison just never did. Um, and I feel like that that played to their, uh, their popularity. [00:24:51] Christina: No, I think you’re right. [00:24:52] Brett: I put these videos up on YouTube as unlisted videos. I am dropping links to them in the show notes. So if anyone is curious what Brett was doing at the age of 20, [00:25:04] Christina: It was [00:25:04] Jeffrey: It’s a fun, It’s really fun to watch. [00:25:08] Brett: Yeah. Um, , it was fun for me. Yeah. Christina and the Coulda Wouldas [00:25:13] Christina: No, it was really, it was really great to see and, and like it looked like you guys were having a great time and I was, I was looking at it and I was like, Oh man, you guys must have gotten so laid. Because, because like you had like a good look and, and like, I was like, I, you know, because I, I was, I mean, it was emo bands, but like, I would, I, you know, not, not that far as first from that era. [00:25:33] Like I would go to a lot of shows and stuff and like stalk guys and bands and like, I was like, Yeah, you guys must have been so late, like, [00:25:41] Brett: So you would think and, and there were definitely, like, I offended off advances. Like I had a steady girlfriend that I was pretty damn committed to, and uh, Deo was the only one in the band who would cheat on his girlfriend, who was with us on tour. Um, [00:26:03] Jeffrey: Whoa, that’s, that’s next level. [00:26:06] Brett: Mattie Mattie had very little interest in girls, and I don’t, I don’t remember Clay’s situation, but yeah, basically there, there was not a lot of sex on that tour. [00:26:17] Um, I remember being drunk in basements and pushing girls off of me. Um, I had a girl tell me, I had a girl tell me she had taken the picture from our seven inch and blown it up and put it over her bed. , which that’s, that’s weird. Yeah, that’s weird. That’s weird. [00:26:42] Christina: I, I would never have shared that, but I understand like the impulse to do that. I never [00:26:45] Jeffrey: Oh, I understand that. I understand the impulse. A thousand percent. [00:26:49] Christina: I just pasted in the chat the band that I stalked when I was like 15, 16 years old and, uh, no, I went, No, we’ll talk about that cuz Wow. That’s some good drama. No, this, this is a band called Saves the Day. [00:27:02] And uh, and [00:27:04] Jeffrey: photo. [00:27:05] Christina: yeah, so I’m just saying like if those guys were, were getting like, yeah. Yeah. Than you guys who totally like had a much more masculine, much more like, you know what I mean? Like a much more, kind of a better like vibe, like their, their debut albums called Through Being Cool, [00:27:25] Jeffrey: Awesome, [00:27:26] Christina: which [00:27:27] Jeffrey: awesome. [00:27:28] Christina: thought they were, they were not, but we really thought they were. [00:27:32] Um, My, uh, my, my friends Melissa and Cat and I would follow ’em all over the southeast and then, uh, and they all had girlfriends, which of course then Melissa, and we would make out with them because now they were not dumb enough to travel, like with the girl, like tour with the girlfriends and then cheat on their girlfriends. [00:27:48] But of course, they’re all gonna like, you know, m with other girls and like, I’m aware of this. I’m like, I know you have girlfriends. I know that I’m making out with you and you do not care anything about me. I absolutely know the score. Cat and Melissa apparently never got the message and like got into fights on the message boards with the girlfriends, and then we were like, it became awkward and I was kind of like, I can never go to these shows again. [00:28:09] And then like two years later, they’re on fucking Kona O’Brien. And I’m like, Are you kidding me? Like they really actually blew up. And I was like, Those bitches. Not being like, chill completely ruined my ability to like maybe actually fuck a rockstar. Like I will, I will never forgive them for that. [00:28:28] Brett: None of my girlfriends have ever cared about my music. It has always been like an external thing. Oh, and then also he plays, I was just a bass player who cares about bass players? [00:28:41] Christina: I dunno. The bass player was, Who was the, was that the, was that the guy that like didn’t have a name in? Um, that thing you do. Was that? Yeah, that was the bass player. This is a movie that only I have seen. I now realize [00:28:51] Brett: sis, my sister loved that movie so much. My sister had poster from that movie. I cannot remember it at all. [00:28:57] Christina: Yeah, that, that was one with Live Tyler. And, uh, uh, what was it, something Ian, a three name guy. Um, it was Tom Hanks’. Uh, I think he directed it, or it was definitely his, his production company that made it. But it was about kind of like the, the band, uh, like, kind of like a sixties band sort of thing. Um, and, uh, it was that, that was a great movie. Tom, Tom Everett. Scott. There we go. Tom Everett. Scott. [00:29:26] Jeffrey: Tom Hanks’ son once sat in my lap. [00:29:29] Christina: Oh, wow. Which one? [00:29:30] Jeffrey: Colin Hanks. [00:29:31] Christina: Okay, Colin. Hank. So, I was gonna say not, not yet. Not, not, not the, not the problematic one. I mean, [00:29:36] Jeffrey: I didn’t know. I didn’t know who he was. and I told, and I told him to sit in my lap. I, the context is my band had a reunion show and, and a friend of mine here, Is friends with him and he brought him to the show and we were backstage after the show and I was sitting on a chair and I was kind of sweaty and, and my friend says, Hey guys, this is Colin. [00:30:00] He’s like, Colin, here they are your new favorite band. He’s like, You guys are great. And I’m like, Come here. Sit on my lap. I sat on my lap and I just said, I appreciate you. And he got up and then I later I was like, That was Tom, he’s son. That’s funny. [00:30:14] Brett: Did you ever see life in pieces? [00:30:16] Jeffrey: No. [00:30:17] Christina: Yes. That that was the show he was in, right? Or one of the shows he was in. Yeah, [00:30:21] Brett: show. I have watched that entire show a couple times through and through, uh, really, really good situational comedy. Fun-fact attack [00:30:30] Christina: Yeah, he was also in, in the movie Orange County, which not the same as the, the, the, the much superior television show, the oc, but Orange County, which had Jack Black in it, but Fun Fact, California by Fandom Planet. Uh, the theme song of the OC was actually on the Orange County soundtrack, and so they almost didn’t [00:30:50] Jeffrey: you’re bringing the fun facts [00:30:51] Christina: I know, so they almost didn’t choose it as the theme song for the oc, and it’s. Other than, I don’t wanna wait by Paula Cole, probably like the most iconic like, teen theme song ever. Right? Like, like, like, like, like those two songs. Cuz they were actual, you know, songs are like intertwined. Like you hear it, you hear the opening notes of the OC theme song and you’re like fuck Know it. [00:31:13] Right? And like they almost, that almost wasn’t the theme song because it was in this movie that no one saw. And fortunately they were like, No one saw the movie, didn’t do anything. We can go ahead and put, you know, uh, Sophia Coppola’s cousins band on, on, Make it the theme song. We, we can go ahead and do that. [00:31:34] Brett: I’m gonna ask Erin to write, uh, a little Diddy that we can play after this kind of thing where we can be like, and this has been deep cuts with Christina Warren. [00:31:46] Jeffrey: I was gonna say, I appreciate your level of fandom so much cuz I share it, but we’re just in when we have it in totally different places and uh, and so I ha when you’re talking. About these things I’m taking in the content, but I’m also just appreciating the level of like weird facts. Cuz I, I, I do this to my friends all the time and they’re just like, Now where the fuck could you learn that? [00:32:09] Like, I think I recently did we talk about how Pat Smear was late to a Fu fighter show in Minneapolis and why have we talked [00:32:16] Christina: No, we haven’t. We should talk about it. [00:32:17] Jeffrey: in 1996, I went to see the Foo Fighters was the second time in that year that they played at, at, uh, First Avenue. And. It was when they had their drummer before Taylor, Taylor Hawkins, who was truly terrible as a fit. [00:32:31] Uh, I mean like really. I went back and listened to a boot leg of that show in 1996 and it’s just, that band actually sounds terrible. Um, anyway, so I go to see the poo fighters and, and um, they’re late going on and it’s like, get kind of used to that. In those days there was just a lot of junkie bands. In that era, you know, when we’re going to see Allison Chains at First Avenue and dude like showed up about 20 minutes late and then their first song, the drummer, the drummer jumped from his kit and and tackled Lane Staley punched him, and then the whole band was done. [00:33:05] Christina: God. [00:33:06] Jeffrey: Um, but anyway, uh, so the food fighters are late and I recently was reading a some piece about that tour that was written way back then. The reason they were late is because Pat Smear, who had been in the legendary punk rock band, the germs, like the most uncontrollable possible kind of band with Darby Crash, their singer just a mess of a band. [00:33:25] So you’re assuming if you hear that Pat Smear is late, that it’s junky stuff. Right. [00:33:30] Christina: Right. [00:33:31] Jeffrey: He lost track of time watching a Matlock marathon in the hotel. [00:33:36] Christina: That is amazing. That’s, that’s the fucking best. The guy from the germs is like, it’s, it’s not junky. I mean, it might have been junky shit. I don’t know. But that, that actually sounds more like ADHD shit. Like that sounds like a reason that I would not go to college would be like, I was watching like an ER marathon, [00:33:51] Jeffrey: Yeah. [00:33:52] Christina: also a Malo marathon. [00:33:53] I can totally see it. You get sucked in and you’re like, But Andy Griffith is gonna solve the case and it’s [00:33:59] Jeffrey: I gotta know what [00:34:00] Christina: I gotta know what happens. I gotta see the lawyer scene. Right. [00:34:03] Jeffrey: Fucking a amazing, um, anyway, that’s, that, that’s an example of my level of fandom is I just love those little tidbits are just so remarkable. That was a fun, that was an amazing show in the sense that listening back to the, um, bootleg of it, they, they basically played the first album except for one song, which, which Dave Girl introduced as something they had written a couple weeks ago. [00:34:26] And it was my hero, [00:34:28] Christina: Right. Which is, [00:34:28] Jeffrey: which like becomes like the. [00:34:30] Christina: the, I was gonna say cuz it was my hero and it was big. Me and, and a couple others from that sec. Yeah. Well, ever long. But that was the third album I think. But [00:34:38] Jeffrey: That’s true. Yeah. Oh, right. You’re talking in that, Yeah, [00:34:41] Christina: Because, I mean cuz it was the second album that they really like blew up, right? [00:34:45] Because cuz I remember obviously my hero was big, but I also remember, like I remember the Ever, I remember the big me music video, like they spoofed the Mintos ads. Do you guys remember [00:34:53] Jeffrey: yeah. The Mentos ads. That’s right. Yeah. [00:34:55] Christina: Yeah. Uh, and, and it was, it was one of those things where like, and he had, uh, it, it was just a great music video and it was one of those things where we were at least people my age. [00:35:05] We knew Nirvana obviously. Um, but we mostly were really aware of Nirvana, like post Kurt’s death. But, you know, MTV would air the, the Unplugged like. [00:35:18] Jeffrey: All the time. [00:35:19] Christina: on on repeats. So for a lot of us, like we, we knew him and, and I think we weren’t alone in this, like certainly people my age, but, but I think even people older, I think even like guys your age, like you maybe knew the, knew the band members more, but a lot of us, like we just knew Dave as like the drummer, right? [00:35:34] We just knew him as the drummer of Nirvana. And so that’s what you associate him with. And I think especially you see him all the time on MTV playing the drums. In that unplug setting right? Where, you know, which, where he has to hold back the turtleneck where he is having to hold back and like, and, and he’s having to kind of like very, kind of slowly play the drums in certain segments and whatnot. [00:35:55] And like you, and you know that, and then all of a sudden, like he has this very different band and he’s the singer, he’s not the drummer. And you’re like, What the fuck? Right? Um, and it was really good. Right? And then, [00:36:06] Jeffrey: especially those first two albums. I, I love, I don’t get with anything else. I don’t, I’m not against it, but I just don’t get [00:36:12] Christina: No, no, no. But I think, I think, um, I think actually I would say up through like, what was it? Uh, you know, uh, the first two albums were really good. And then I would say the third one too, right? The one like, uh, learned to Fly, like, I would say like probably like, like the, the first three, um, are, are really solid. [00:36:29] I saw them in, uh, last October with depth cap for cutie. They opened a, a brand new, um, uh, venue in, um, in Seattle, The, the Climate Change Arena, which is the most bullshit name for a, a [00:36:42] Jeffrey: Is that where you go to change the. [00:36:44] Christina: Well, and it’s so stupid. They’re like, Oh, we care so much about carbon control this. And then I’m like, No, you fucking don’t. [00:36:49] Like it’s the most, This is the sort of woke shit that I can’t stand because it’s so performative and it’s so [00:36:54] Jeffrey: change arena? I don’t believe it. [00:36:57] Christina: No, and it’s not. And they’re like, I’m, I’m like, Well, but you’re, you’re, It’s an, it’s a rock arena. You’re clearly not gonna be doing a whole lot for climate change. [00:37:06] You know what I mean? Like, there’s gonna be a whole lot of, of stuff that goes into this is such a fucking stupid name and such a performative. Stuff. Anyway, that opened and Food Fighters were the first, um, uh, band to play and then Death Cap, um, opened for them and I was able to get tickets and I’m so glad I got to go. [00:37:23] I was sick. I was not feeling good. We had to actually leave early, which kills me now, but, I saw most of the, the, the really big hits, which look, let’s, let’s face it. Like that’s why you go to a fu fighter show, right? Like, you know, at this point, like you’re not going to see like all the new shit. Like, and they knew that they were amazing live and, and I, like Taylor was great and I remember I was commenting to Grant, I was like, they have this sort of star power. [00:37:48] Especially for rock stars that you almost never see today of people who just have like a complete command of the audience and, and a large audience. Right. You know, this is decent sized arena. Not a stadium, but a decent sized arena. And they, you know, had like the whole command of everything. They knew what they were doing. [00:38:03] It was really, really good. And it’s just, you know, now I’m really glad I gotta see that show even as sick as I was because, um, That’s the last time. We’ll, you know, I, I ever got to see the band actually, you know, intact together. But, but that is funny that, that, that Taylor Hawkins, you said that he was not like that. [00:38:23] It didn’t work. That’s really, really funny. [00:38:26] Jeffrey: Oh yeah, the guy. Okay, let me just, let me, [00:38:31] Brett: at the end of the window. Go ahead, [00:38:33] Jeffrey: I’ll say this, which is just the guy, the guy that was the first drummer just was, it was an awful fit and, and it’s, uh, sorry for him that he lost that gig, but it, when I listened back to the tape of that show, I was like, this doesn’t even sound like a good band. [00:38:48] that’s how much the drummer sort of [00:38:49] Christina: He was not it. And, and then they, and then, and they get a lot of more sets, like session drummer and they’re like, Here we. [00:38:54] Jeffrey: Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Sponsor: Simplisafe [00:38:56] Brett: So here’s a question. Is there anything that matters more than the safety of you and your loved ones? Of course not. So isn’t it strange that many home security companies don’t act that way? This is why we use and trust simply save home security. 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Plus 20% off with interactive monitoring that go to simply safe.com/ Overtired. That’s S I M P L I S A e.com/ Overtired. [00:40:24] Jeffrey: Crap. I’m still chewing my Grano bar. [00:40:26] Brett: Oh, man, that was, that was your segue to handle right there. Promo Swap: Weirds of a Feather [00:40:31] Brett: Um, so before, before we go on, I think we we’re doing, we’re doing promo swaps with some other podcasts that are, uh, related to what we talk about. And there’s one called, uh, Weirds of a Feather [00:40:48] Christina: Yup. [00:40:49] Brett: that really, uh, very, it focuses on ADHD and, and I feel like it’s a good mix, good match for us. Christina, do you want to tell us about, weirdly a [00:41:01] Christina: Uh, definitely. So if you were all cut up with Overtired and you’re looking for more random yet informative discussions, flock over to Weirds of a Feather, which is an ADHD adjacent podcast. Cohost and childhood friends, Grace Bore and Kristen Stan. Hope will take you on a journey through the beautiful, chaotic experience of life with adhd. [00:41:22] Some describe weirds of a feather as the Puppy Bowl for any serious ADHD podcast, Super Bowl. I love that. While others feel like they are hanging out with their two neuro divergent ants, Weekly episodes are jam packed with an effort rotating schedule of segments, such as the ADHD learning corner, hobby collectors. [00:41:39] Little accomplishments and a leading favorite quote. I’m so quirky. If you are looking for a unique podcast that encourages you to embrace your weirdness, this is the one. Check out weirds of a feather today, wherever you listen to podcasts. Brett’s new Synology [00:41:53] Brett: So let’s do a little tech talk. I, uh, so my sonology started resetting and it has a faulty reset button. Um, And instead of trying to deal with repair, I just ordered a new analogy. I got the, uh, DS 1520 plus, um, and I put, I put 2 2, 400 gigabyte Ss d. Cash cards into it, poured all of my hard drives over, Added an extra hot swap drive because I went from four bays to five bays and holy shit, everything is so much faster than my 4 8 19 4. [00:42:36] Forts. I don’t even remember what I had before. Uh, it was, it was slow. Compared to this, I’m, I’m very impressed with the speed of my new DS 1520 plus. I’m having a blast with it. [00:42:50] Christina: That’s fantastic. I’m really, I’m really glad to hear that, like you’re having a good experience with it. Um, and, and that this is one, you got the one like with still with an Intel, so you can still do the, the Plex stuff, right. [00:43:01] Brett: Right. It can still, it can still video incode. [00:43:04] Christina: Yeah, cuz you were saying that’s the thing with the new ones is that they’re AMD and I guess for whatever reason, they don’t have, um, like an onboard, you know, video thing. So I guess they probably can still encode, but they’d have to do it with CPU wise, so it’d be, uh, slower. So, um, That’s awesome. I’m glad that, that, uh, that you’re enjoying it. [00:43:21] I need to, I needed to get a new, So I’ve been looking into my options and so this is, um, Helpful for me. I was curious because you’re using the, the NVMe cash, um, which I haven’t used on, on any of mine over the years. Ha. Have you found that that’s sped up your operations just in terms of like accessing smaller things? [00:43:40] Brett: So I put the N V MA drives into it from the GetGo, so I have no. I have no grounds for comparing what this particular model would be like without the cash drive. So I don’t, I don’t know exactly what benefit it is providing me. Um, they offer, if you turn on, you can analyze your cash and it takes like a month. [00:44:05] And it, it basically, at the end of a month of running this analysis, it will tell you like exactly what size, cash you should specify and, and how well your cash is performing. And I’ve only had this for a few days, so I. I haven’t run that yet. But, uh, in general, I have to assume, given the speed at which the dsm, not the DSM six, the, the, uh, interface that, uh, Sonology provides for their, uh, for all the software on this machine, um, uh, the speed at which it loads. [00:44:49] 10 times faster than what I had without any [00:44:53] Christina: Right, Which I have to imagine, like, obviously it’s a, it’s a faster machine, but I have to imagine the big part of that is the cash. And, and that definitely is awesome. I have to say, like that’s the big thing that I’ve, I’ve looked at Qnap, I’ve looked at some other solutions, would look at like building my own. [00:45:06] Um, but the thing I think that’s gonna keep me with ology is, I love dsm. Like that’s just, it’s really good software, right? Like, like their interface for managing everything is, is in my opinion, just kind of like top notch. You know? Like it’s just if, if you’re gonna pick one of those systems, it’s really the best. [00:45:26] Brett: again, I have nothing to compare to cuz I’ve never used anything similar before. Uh, I will say that, yeah, I’m constantly impressed with it and, uh, no, no complaints. I know that Jeff has an even better analogy than I do. Um, Have you, Jeff, did you have any Sonology? Did you have one prior to that? [00:45:49] Jeffrey: No, this was my first sonology and it’s also with the cash and lots of cash and . It’s a lovely machine, but I’ve barely used it for, I barely used it for anything beyond just storage. Uh, it brought, you know that, cause I’ve sent you pictures prior to getting the sonology, I, I had a collection of probably 20 external hard drives just over the years that had kind of filled up with stuff. [00:46:13] And I’d be like, I’ll start that later. And. The furthest I’ve even gotten with that Sonology is getting all that stuff onto the sonology. [00:46:21] Brett: I will say that I, I had my concerns. You know, multiple terabytes of data, uh, going from one analogy to another, as long as you put the drives in, in order, uh, even after all of the resetting and, and failures that I had had, all of my data was safe. I didn’t lose anything. Um, I use my son analogy to run private GI server. [00:46:48] Um, so all of my like coding projects that I’m not opensourcing and putting on GitHub, Uh, are all on GI repos on the sinology, and I didn’t lose any of them. I reinstalled the GI server and everything just hooked back up. Uh, grateful that it was so easy, but yeah. Should we, Grapptitude [00:47:13] Christina: Let’s do some gratitude. [00:47:14] Jeffrey: Sheila [00:47:17] Brett: I can’t wait till we have theme music. I just gotta, I just gotta get with Aaron about exactly what we want for our segue here, just imagine if you [00:47:28] Jeffrey: a world [00:47:29] Brett: an amazing, an amazing, very short, like five second segue that let you know this is [00:47:36] Jeffrey: you know what diamond is. Let’s you know to shut off the faucet if you’re doing the dishes and pay attention. [00:47:40] Brett: All right, Jeff, go ahead. [00:47:41] Jeffrey: This is a sort of, it’s, it’s not exactly gratitude, but it is. Uh, so my 16 year old is, um, loves to do like game dev stuff in Unity, um, and. Has been learning it for the last year and a half or so, maybe even since, kind of midway through the, the shutdown year of the pandemic. [00:48:04] And, um, and they have a challenge. There’s a challenge called Luum Dare, which is this like, you know, Friday through Monday challenge to develop a game on a theme. So they announced the theme and you just go to work. And people do it individually, they do it, um, in pairs. My son did it in pairs with a friend of his who lives in Chicago, and it was so cool to watch. [00:48:27] Like he was just, I mean, not that this is good practice or good thing to teach kids, uh, but he was at his computer, um, doing coding and doing some blender, like 3D rendering stuff from Friday through Monday, uh, morning when he went to. And, um, and he was on the, on a Discord chat with his friend, and they, they, so here’s, here’s what was so amazing about it. [00:48:52] So my gratitude is that is the, is for the whole Unity community in this case, at least in the, the way that he’s experienced it. Um, they had a theme, which was every 10 seconds. That was the theme. And so he and his friend developed a game where essentially there’s a level and you are alive for 10 seconds. [00:49:10] And you die and come back with a new power, and you have just enough time to figure out what that power is to try to get you through the level before the 10 seconds runs up and you die and you come back with another new power. Um, and, and it was just really cool. I’ve never, this is the first time I’ve seen him in a real, like dev state basically. [00:49:27] And it was just super cool to see. Like I I, I loved watching it. I loved how much fun he had and they have the best, This is what I love, is that once you’re done, all of the people who, um, made games, Depending on, So if you’re a developer, you made a game. If you play five games, your game won’t end up getting recommended that much in the algorithm. [00:49:48] But if you play. 20 games that other people developed, or a hundred games that other people developed. Your game shows up more in the algorithm when people are searching for games from the challenge to play. And so by participating with other people’s work, your work gets more out there, um, which I thought was just such a cool. [00:50:06] Just a cool rule. So anyway, just, um, loving that he’s found a sort of home to learn coding and, and, and modeling and all of that stuff in, and just gra gratitude. I got nothing but gratitude for it. It’s fun to watch. I was jealous too. I wanna make a [00:50:23] Brett: Crap. Did [00:50:23] Christina: Yeah, totally. [00:50:26] Jeffrey: anyway. All right. Who else? [00:50:28] Christina: I, I can actually go, or if you’re, Are you ready Brett? Okay. So I don’t think we ever talked about this one. If we did then correct me, but the, you talking about Unity and your son making games actually made me think of, uh, this, cuz I don’t think we talked about this. It’s called, uh, the Apple Store time machine. [00:50:43] And it was, uh, a Unity thing that was created by, uh, Michael Siper, who, um, basically taught himself steeper, sorry, Michael Seber, who basically taught him. Unity and are, Have either of you seen this? [00:50:56] Jeffrey: No, I’m looking it up [00:50:57] Christina: Okay, so this came out, uh, I think at the end of July. It got a lot of links on the blogs. We didn’t talk about it, but it’s actually awesome. [00:51:05] It is, uh, a works on, on, um, Apple, Silicon and on Intel, and it is basically like a, a history, like a walkthrough of the Apple Store at certain iconic times in history. So like, and it’s like, and, and what he’s done is he’s basically gone through and gotten the layouts of certain stores at certain. And recreated in unity in 3d exactly what those stores looked back, looked like on their opening day. [00:51:33] So you have the, the Tyson store, uh, Tyson’s Corner store, which was the very first Apple store, uh, from 2001. There’s like one in, in a, a mini store inside a Stanford shopping mall. There’s the Fifth Avenue store from 2006, and then the Infinite Loop Company store from 2015. And the level of detail that is in this, [00:51:55] Jeffrey: This is amazing. There’s emax, emax, [00:51:58] Christina: Eax. Not only that, but like, like every level of detail, like the software packages, like if you go in through the Fifth Avenue store in 2006, like you see like every like piece of software that was, you know, that he basically went through photographs and he recreated them all in unity. And um, you can even do things like turn on some of the eax, like they’re a little, um, like, uh, like Easter eggs, uh, within these things. [00:52:20] And it is completely like era appropriate. It is. So, it’s such a trip to basically, Walk through memory lane, like seeing the old software boxes was like a real trip for [00:52:30] Jeffrey: Yeah, The softer boxes, [00:52:33] Christina: And, and, and it’s like you can zoom in enough and you can actually see like, this is like what, like the, the apps were and what was on display. [00:52:39] And like in 2001, I’d forgotten how much, um, because, you know, at the time Apple didn’t have a bunch of stuff to sell. So like, they didn’t even have the iPod yet. So like a lot of what they had like on display is they had like the Nomad and they had other non, uh, you know, Apple music things, but they had a ton of consumer electronics. [00:52:58] Like there was [00:52:58] Jeffrey: Oh my God. Toast [00:53:00] Christina: Yeah. But, but there, there, there’s like a shitload of. Can MiniDV cameras and stuff, you know, on display, because again, they didn’t have much to sell. Right. So, you know, it, it, it was Power Books and iBooks and, and Eax and imax and like, that was, that was kind of it. And uh, anyway, it’s an incredible. [00:53:19] L uh, labor of, of love and attention to detail. Um, it’s free. You can download to, to, uh, you can donate to him on, on Gum Road. Um, he’s also like, open for work, but this is just one of like the most incredible, um, like apps that I’ve seen, um, that somebody kind of create. And it, you talked about Unity reminded me of that because that was sort of his impetus. [00:53:42] Like he wanted to learn unity and he did. And it’s amazing. [00:53:46] Jeffrey: I, I am amazed. I mean, I’m surprised. I loved the idea as you described it, but as I, I pulled up the website and it’s got the sort of walkthroughs already. I was amazed at how much I, like my hormones were releasing . I [00:53:58] Christina: Yes. Yes. [00:54:03] Jeffrey: Oh, it’s awesome. Thank you, Brett. Brett Strip. [00:54:09] Christina: Hm. [00:54:10] Brett: All right. I was, I was gonna talk about na, which is my own project I’ve been consumed with lately, but, I, I’m actually gonna mention post Reno. Um, so it’s a, it’s a photo collaging app. Uh, let me drop a link in here for you guys. Um, there are very few times. That I actually need to collage photos, but, uh, say a pet’s birthday or the death of a pet, I often wanna make a photo collage of, of the best photos available. [00:54:46] Um, , these are in, in, in memory. These are the times that I want a photo collage app. And there are not a lot of good option options for Mac, uh, for easily making. Cool looking photo collages and post Reno fits the bill. I’m currently on the beta for the upcoming version, uh, which is why it’s top of mind for me. [00:55:09] Uh, the new version, uh, at Apple Silicon support full, uh, Ventura support all of this, uh, plus a few new features and, uh, it. It’s suit like you can make a great looking photo, colage in under five minutes. Uh, just dragging a bunch of photos onto a layout and it’ll, it’ll collage them all automatically. And then you can go in, you can individually crop and, and rotate and position, uh, different elements. [00:55:40] You can do like grids, you can do scatters, you can do circular, uh, you can change the frame on each individual image. And like if you, One of my favorite things is if you create a layout, uh, of any, you know, scatter or grid or whatever, select all and then drag one image onto the selection, it will scatter that image so that all of the little photos together make up the big [00:56:10] Jeffrey: Awesome. [00:56:11] Brett: I can’t remember what he calls that, but it, you can make some really cool looking. Images out of that and it, you know, you don’t always need a photo collage app, but when you do post, Reno is one of the best available [00:56:25] Christina: No, that’s awesome. Um, and, and can you, can you print these two or or is it primarily Okay. Cuz I was thinking, I was like, this would be awesome for things for my nephew and, um, you know, I, I like created a photo book for his first birthday in christening. But this would be great, like as an additional thing. [00:56:42] Brett: I, I think you have, I think you have to buy the pro version to print straight from post Reno. Um, and I don’t know what, I think the beta indicates there’s going to be a new, like a subscription model for pro. Access, which, like I said, I use it, you know, twice a year depending on how many pets die. Um, so I, I don’t know if I would go for a pro subscription or not. [00:57:09] Uh, but I’m not sure what the pricing model’s gonna be yet. Um, uh, you can however, output to any dpi, uh, PNG [00:57:19] Christina: Which, which, which, which would be, which would be fine cuz I was just thinking, I was like, oh, you could combine this with like, some of the photo services and whatnot. Cause like, I don’t have the ability to print what I would wanna do anyway. You know what I mean? Like, to print directly from it. Like, if I can output it to like, you know, uh, p and g or jpeg or, or even pdf, then like, I’m fine. [00:57:38] Brett: Yeah, [00:57:38] Christina: That’s cool. [00:57:40] Jeffrey: Awesome. [00:57:40] Brett: Yep. That’s my pick. [00:57:43] Jeffrey: Well, good talking [00:57:45] Brett: Well, well, and then that’s when you pat your legs in the Midwest. You pat your legs, you say, Well, and then it’s time to go. Um, [00:57:54] Jeffrey: get some sleep. [00:57:55] Christina: Get some sleep. [00:57:57] Brett: Get some sleep. [00:57:58] Outro: The. [00:58:04] Stinger: Hey, there are good people. Before you go, we have a bunch of new places where you can interact with us. Please check out our Instagram feed our. Channel Twitter, of course, and sign up for the Overtired newsletter, which will sort of pick up where the show leaves off with expanded show notes, Uh, a little bit of what the three of us get up to between episodes. [00:58:28] And let’s face it, there’ll be some musings. How can you resist musings? You’ll find details for all the ways to interact with us in the show notes and at Overtired dot com. And thank you. Thank you. Thank you as always for listening.

It’s episode 300! But not 300 episodes. We explain. Also, Brett visits Minneapolis, secrets of the public radio interview, and lots of complaining about expensive Apple gear. All aboard! Sponsor Meet Mindbloom. When it comes to mental health, sometimes you need something more to achieve a real and lasting breakthrough. Maybe it’s time to check out a guided ketamine therapy program — Mindbloom can help. After only 2 sessions, 87% of Mindbloom clients reported improvements in depression, and 85% reported improvements in anxiety. Right now, Mindbloom is offering Overtired listeners $100 off your first six-session program when you sign up at mindbloom.com/overtired and use promo code overtired at checkout. Show Links Vegan soul food in Minneapolis Snazzy Labs videos on the broken iMac Pro Old school tape splicing techniques Arduino IDE 2.0 Charm iTerm Warp Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Episode 300! [00:00:00] Intro: Tired. So tired, Overtired. [00:00:04] Christina: You are listening to Overtired. I’m Christina Warren and I’m back, and I’m joined by my good friends, Brett Terpstra and Jeff Severance. Gunzel. Guys, I’m back. [00:00:15] Jeff: Welcome back, [00:00:16] Christina: Three’s back together. No, this is actually exciting. We haven’t, the three of us haven’t recorded in a few weeks and I’ve, I’ve missed you guys. I’ve missed the pod. [00:00:23] Jeff: Yeah. We’ve missed you [00:00:24] Brett: Yeah. Here’s what I figured out. This podcast got like significantly better when Jeff joined us, Um, and not just because now one of us can disappear and the show can go on, but because like Jeff is like a foil. Between like Christina’s tendency to info dump and my tendency to just ramble and like Jeff can like ask the questions that actually get deeper into a topic. [00:00:50] And he does it with a very, like a calm approach that really tempers the two of us. And I love the dynamic and I have heard now every combination, just like me and Christina, Jeff and Christina, me and Jeff, and uh, it’s never been as good as it has been with the three of us. [00:01:08] Jeff: Yeah, I [00:01:09] Christina: Yeah, no, I totally, I I’m with you. Uh, yeah. Think the three of us balance each out. Well, actually, here’s what it is. Jeff balances me and Brett out, and then like, I balance Jeff and, uh, Brett and, and Brett, uh, balances, uh, Christina and, and [00:01:25] Brett: We all have our quirks that need tempering. [00:01:27] Christina: Right? That’s what I’m saying. Like we all like fit into like, [00:01:30] Jeff: Yeah, I was gonna say I’m not, I’m not typically described as a balancing [00:01:34] Brett: You. Okay. So your interview skills though, like the way that you ask such thoughtful questions leads to, especially when we have guests, but even when it’s just the three of us, or even like that episode you and I did where you, you interviewed me, like the questions, you, I’ve been on a ton of podcasts and I’ve been interviewed by a ton of people and it’s always been basically the same questions. [00:01:58] And uh, like they always approach me as like some productivity guru, uh, that I don’t, that I don’t really believe is a thing. Um, [00:02:07] Jeff: hurt people. [00:02:09] Brett: yeah, they’re all fake. Like nobody has the answers. Don’t, don’t look to me. But you asked questions that actually were fun to talk about and really, I felt actually revealed something about like the way I work and what I do that was. [00:02:24] Jeff: Cool. Well, it’s fun to do. I like you people. We should do a podcast. [00:02:28] Christina: should do a podcast. [00:02:29] Jeff: You know what? Let’s start with episode 300. [00:02:33] Christina: Season three, baby. [00:02:33] Brett: Oh my God. Season three we’re just, so we went to season two. We, there was a, my, a small jump in episode numbers. We took a, a long hiatus. It took us five years to get 79 episodes out. [00:02:48] Christina: Mm-hmm. [00:02:48] Brett: Um, and [00:02:50] Christina: know what? I’m proud of us for actually not giving up. [00:02:52] Jeff: Yeah. That’s awesome. [00:02:54] Christina: podcasts, once they’d lost the consistency of weekly and then biweekly and then monthly and then bi month. I think that at a certain point they’d be like, Yeah, you know what? This is never coming back. [00:03:03] But we, [00:03:04] Brett: we just, we kept showing up every six months and putting out an episode to increasingly, increasingly fewer listeners. Um, but then we jumped to episode 200, uh, and, and announced season two. And we have put out in. [00:03:20] Christina: like two years, I guess. [00:03:21] Brett: We have, we have put out 100 actual episodes without skipping any numbers. And, and we have just hit with this episode. [00:03:30] This is episode 300, not the 300th episode. [00:03:34] Jeff: episode 300, [00:03:35] Brett: It does, it does officially harken, uh, season three. [00:03:40] Christina: Yeah. I [00:03:41] Jeff: Season three, you know, and the Internet’s been going crazy dissecting our season three trailer. What does it [00:03:46] Christina: have, [00:03:47] Jeff: Um, but we’re just gonna do, we’re not gonna, we’re not gonna think about the fans. We’re not gonna think about fan expectations. We’re just gonna forward. [00:03:56] Brett: Okay. What do we have in store for season three? What’s, what’s, what’s the hook? [00:04:02] Christina: Yeah. What is gonna be the hook? Is there a mystery? Is there like something we’re trying to uncover? [00:04:07] Jeff: Mm. [00:04:07] Brett: announce a whole new segment where we review, we review talkies like. [00:04:16] Christina: reviewed talkies. [00:04:19] Jeff: Well, we’re releasing our own brand of microwave popcorn to go along with that, [00:04:22] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. [00:04:23] Jeff: I don’t think I’m spoiling anything. . The talkies, the Nickelodeon, The pictures. Silent movies were the worst [00:04:29] Brett: movies were the worst. Not that [00:04:32] Jeff: Yeah, Like did you hate that part of your youth? always had to watch the Goonies on mute. [00:04:38] Brett: No, I mean, I gotta assume that in their, in their era, they were super exciting. Like the idea of motion pictures had to be fucking mind blowing. Um, and, but like knowing what I know today, the idea of sitting through a silent movie just seems just too tedious. [00:04:55] Christina: Well, it wasn’t completely silent like you usually had live accompaniment. [00:04:59] Brett: piano player. [00:05:00] Christina: Right. And then, and then at one point, then the, before the jazz singer, which was the, the first film to have synchronized sound and, um, like music. Um, I think that you then had like an era where there was some synchronized, like music that might have been recorded. [00:05:16] Um, but, but you didn’t have like the, the, the voice stuff. [00:05:20] Jeff: It is astonishing to think about all that happens behind the scenes to make a movie. Even in the simplest scene, I’d be like, What is the project management system that whoever has to manage all of this is using? Right? Like what could sustain it? [00:05:36] Brett: In college, I went to art school and um, I worked grip for some of the film majors, uh, working on, you know, senior projects or whatever, and yeah. Holy shit. Even in a, a college student production movie, there is so much going on. [00:05:54] Christina: So much. Well, and it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s interesting. I wonder like what it’s like now because, you know, I, I was in college, um, during like the, the, the digital film revolution. So like, you know, you had like, like micro DV or mini DV rather and, and then, you know, some other of the digital formats and so that, that changed how quickly you could edit versus, you know, even just a couple of years earlier, everybody was shooting on film, which would, would take a lot longer and would do things. [00:06:18] Brett: If you ever used an ab deck, uh, to mix like two magnetic tape reels together, the idea of doing all of your movie production in something like Final Cut or what’s the Adobe version of Final Cut, to have that be your main tool set, because back then, if you wanted to make a real movie, a movie that people would enjoy, you made it on film because video looked like [00:06:46] Christina: Because it looked like shit until digital. Yeah. And until, until DV and, and then like hdv and whatnot, like, right. Like it, it was bad. And then like the, the digital camera starting around like 2000, 2001, you started to get these decent sensors and then it got better. But yeah, you’re exactly right. But even then it was like a lot of people still, like I, I think I did one project on 16 millimeter because my university, we had, at the time, it was like one of the most advanced in, in the country. [00:07:12] Like we had a, um, a, a digital conversion lab, um, at, at our university where like you could, you. Scan in the film and digitize it. And that was actually really fucking fascinating. And that, that was great. But like, I came of age only, like digital, Right. Or, or vhs. But there was that cut, you’re right, there was that amazing thing about you had to use film and, and cuts had to be a lot more precise. [00:07:36] You know, You, you had like, it was, you know, you could make copies of, of, of your film obviously, but like, you know, there was a lot less room for, for error. [00:07:46] Brett: I think everyone who is getting into filmmaking should have to make one movie on film because so much of what is modern software is based on the ideas that come from film editing and. It’s like using wax boards when you’re getting into graphic design to understand why quirk and InDesign work the way they do. [00:08:07] Uh, it helps to really, like, you don’t have to make a good movie, you just have to have the experience. [00:08:11] Christina: No, I, I, I, I feel the same way cuz it was one of those things where, um, you, when you’re describing the AB thing, I was like, I don’t have any experience with that, but I do obviously know those paradigms because of using mixing software. Right. And um, even like one of the first in LS that I ever used was actually something that was based off of an Amiga system, but it was this thing that my high school had, this was be before our RG three max. [00:08:34] Um, you know, uh, you know, before we got like final cut and stuff on them. Um, It was this, this like amica based thing. It wasn’t a video toaster, but it, it used video toaster like stuff, but it was kind of like an all in one box where you would basically insert one VHS tape and then you would, because this is how bad it was, you could technically, I guess you could get one where you could plug in a higher end camera, but have one VHS tape that you pull in. [00:08:57] Then you’d have, you know, the other VHS tape that it would record back to. And then it took hard drives. Like there were these hard drive sleds and it would basically digitize the VHS footage. And then you had this kind of rudimentary, like where you could, you know, do you know, move stuff around and then when you were done, rather than just like exporting the digitization that’s already on the hard drive to some sort of digital format, it would just like analog record back [00:09:24] Brett: Yeah, and it would be, it would be nice to skip that shit. Like I say, I say start with film [00:09:30] Christina: I agree with that. I agree. Do do the actual splicing. [00:09:33] Brett: and learn to do the soundtrack on magnetic tape. Like, like do an actual film, but then jump straight to modern technology and just appreciate how fucking great it [00:09:44] Christina: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, film is interesting too. I mean, audio, I don’t, I don’t, I don’t have any experience with that stuff. But like film, I think one of the things there too is uh, you know, the way that that exposure works because I did a lot of like film photography before I did like anything with 16 millimeter and it is so different. [00:10:00] And that is the one weird thing is that now I do wonder obviously, like, uh, film photography has come back and vogue again, but the way that captures are shadows are captured and the way that light works is so different on that medium that it is, I think it would be a good challenge, but it would also be one of those things cuz the way you light a film, that shot on film versus something shot on video are very different. [00:10:23] Brett: Well, like, like, [00:10:24] Christina: but that’s also important to know. [00:10:26] Brett: yeah, like knowing iso, knowing f stops, knowing focal lengths, like all that stuff. If you have that experience from film, uh, those tools do still exist in, in like modern camera software. It’s great to not have to think about them though, [00:10:42] Christina: Right. It is, But I’m, But I’m even saying like, the way that you light something that’s being recorded, like with, you know, a a a, a digital camera, like digital video camera is different because the way that it picks up is different. And at least with digital, we have instant playback, which, you know, we did not have in, in, in film. [00:11:01] Especially if you’re doing student 16 millimeter films. [00:11:03] Brett: no. You had, you had one week later playback after you got the film developed and realized it was all fucked up. [00:11:10] Christina: Yeah. And you’re like, you’re like, you’re like, this is completely unusable because it’s lit so poorly. Yeah. [00:11:15] Jeff: My brother would make these short 16 millimeter films and he could shoot when he had enough money to buy a little bit of film, and then there would be some time, and then there was money to buy. Some more film and there’d be another shoot. You know, like that to me is, is one of the things that just, when I say that out loud, I feel like I’m a hundred years old. [00:11:37] Christina: No, but it’s cool. [00:11:38] Jeff: It’s super cool. And, and even like, you know, um, Jim Jarou, the filmmaker, you know, his second film Strangers in Paradise, Stranger Then Paradise, I forget, which is all single shot and then just hard cuts from scene to scene. Cuz he could only afford one camera [00:11:55] Brett: Yeah. [00:11:55] Christina: right [00:11:56] Jeff: you know, [00:11:56] Christina: now, that’s the [00:11:57] Jeff: and it established for him a pacing that is still in his movies. [00:12:01] Like it’s just, But anyway, I loved all that. The other thing he made me think about with the audio is when I worked in public radio, there was a um, like a first aid cabinet in the break room. And I remember somebody telling me like, cause I open it and there was like just nothing in it. And they’re like, you know, this thing used to be tended to better because back in the tape days we were constantly cutting tape and cutting our fingers. [00:12:22] And so we were constantly coming to the first aid cabinet. [00:12:25] Christina: When, when you worked in in public radio, were they already post tape or, or were they [00:12:29] Jeff: Yeah, there were post tape, but like in the, in, in the booths where I would go to record my pieces, they have these just amazing at Minnesota Public Radio, they have like a, like three or four just amazing small individual booths, and you could just go in there and make radio. It’s like just incredible. Um, all the gears. [00:12:46] Ready for you. It’s totally silent. Like it’s so cool. Anyway, that I had a, a friend there described like the wall in that, in that booth would’ve been just covered in cuts that were taped up. [00:12:57] Brett: Do you know? Do you know how you cross fade on tape, [00:13:01] Jeff: Do you cut an angle? [00:13:02] Brett: You cut an angle, you cut a diagonal, and then you like find the, you bring the audio in and then cut the other angle and tape it back together, and that’s how you make a cross fade. [00:13:13] Christina: amazing. [00:13:14] Jeff: That’s amazing. Mental Health Corner [00:13:16] Brett: Here’s my segue to the mental health corner. I, uh, I’ve, I’ve been working in my office all day and there’s been a fly torturing me, and I’ve not been able to kill it until right before this podcast. I had a Starbucks bottle empty on my desk, [00:13:35] Christina: Oh, [00:13:36] Brett: flew in there and I immediately captured it. So now I’m watching it fly around and just laughing. [00:13:41] After all of the torture it gave me, it says, vengeance, [00:13:46] Jeff: Not today, Satan. That’s amazing. I’m really happy for you, Brett. I think that’s a good way to start season three of Victory Brett, you had to visit to Minneapolis, in which I saw you face to face for only the second time in my life. [00:14:02] Brett: Like, we know each other so well. That I didn’t even think about it when we sat down for tacos. Like it just seemed like this is just a thing we do. And it didn’t dawn on me until halfway through the meal that, that was literally the only, the second time I’d ever met you in person. [00:14:21] Christina: So funny, [00:14:22] Jeff: It’s weird. And also when I picked you up in my car, it was so fucked up for that entire like first 10 minutes of driving. I just felt like my headphones were broken and I was only hearing you in my right ear. so strange. Anyway, how did it [00:14:36] Brett: Okay, so this is mental health corner now, right? We’re we’re mental health cornering. [00:14:42] Christina: we’re mental health corner. [00:14:43] Jeff: we’re cornering you. [00:14:45] Brett: I, uh, I had, so like, I, I think last time we talked I was starting to have some rough sleep, um, that I predicted was going to lead to a manic episode. Um, and it did and it kicked in, uh, in Minneapolis. Um, my first night in Minneapolis. [00:15:04] I. Got like four hours of sleep and was awake for half the night. And, uh, yes, I was coding on a MacBook Pro at a desk in a hotel, and it kind of ruined most of Saturday for me. I, I had low enough sleep that I didn’t feel safe driving anywhere and I didn’t wanna spend all my money on Uber. So I rearranged my schedule to try to find places to eat that were within walking distance. [00:15:33] And it’s, I was in a part of town that does not, There are parts of Minneapolis that have amazing, amazing food on every block. This was not one of them, [00:15:46] Christina: one of them. [00:15:47] Brett: but I was [00:15:48] Jeff: Yeah, you were in a little Minneapolis neighborhood called downtown, which is dead to the world. [00:15:54] Brett: like Ette Mall, not Ette, Eat Street. And a Saturday night though, Jeff came and picked me up at the hotel. He drove. We went, we went, we went to go to a really cool black owned vegan soul food place, but they were closed. Um, but we had, we had some great tacos. We had a good time. And we went to a, like a hipster bar with like girls in cardigans playing. [00:16:20] What’s that game with the board? [00:16:22] Christina: Yeah. [00:16:23] Brett: Cribbage? Yeah. It was, it was a weird bar, but beers were like $5, which is pretty fucking crazy good for this day and age. Um, anyway, I drank enough that night. I may have had one beer too many, uh, because I did manage to sleep. On Saturday night, and then Sunday was a fucking blast. [00:16:45] I had a great, I met my high school girlfriend for breakfast and, and you know, I’m a little manic, like the conversation is all over the place and she’s like, This is nothing new. Like, I knew you 25 years ago and this is nothing new. Like, I, I understand this and I’m like, Yeah, it makes sense that like you wouldn’t that, that it’s been going on that long. [00:17:09] But we connected and it was so, uh, it was just great. It was awesome. Then I met friend of the show, Patrick Rome and his, and our friend Jason Remus for lunch at Pizza Lure, and I did not realize there’s a pizza place in Minneapolis with like five locations that will serve everything with vegan and gluten-free options. [00:17:32] Almost everything on the menu you can get vegan and gluten-free and it’s [00:17:37] Christina: it any good? [00:17:38] Jeff: it’s super good. [00:17:39] Christina: Okay. [00:17:40] Brett: I, I, I had a vegan, gluten free, uh, like devil went down to Georgia Pizza with like sweet chili lime sauce and it was so good. Can I just add one thing [00:17:53] Christina: Yeah, please. [00:17:54] Brett: on my way up on Friday night, I was supposed to meet other friend of the show. [00:17:59] Harold, Chris Harold, and I got a flat tire on the freeway and it cost me $500 to get back on the road. And enough time that we, we couldn’t meet for dinner anymore And I ended up eating in the hotel restaurant that night and then got a shitty night’s sleep and thought the trip was ruined. I thought like it was all gonna be a waste of time, but it really turned around [00:18:23] Jeff: That’s awesome. Yeah, I remember I felt a lot of pressure on, on Saturday, cuz you had had just pretty much a shitty time and it was kind of like, all right, well now you, uh, now you give me, So let’s see how this [00:18:34] Brett: fixed it. You were amazing. Thank you so much. But I want to hear from you guys. [00:18:39] Jeff: Christina, you wanna go? [00:18:41] Christina: Yeah. So, um, I’m, I’m back. I, uh, was in Chicago and then last week, I don’t remember what, Oh, I, uh, I had the, I had the, got my Covid booster, um, and uh, it cake. My ass. So when, when we needed to flake and record, I just, I couldn’t do it. Um, so, um, I’m still having some of the stomach problems. It is what it is. [00:19:02] I’m really busy with work, which is a challenge. So I’m having a hard time like getting like my physical health, like in like fixed, because I’m genuinely at crunch time for a bunch of work things that, um, I am kind of crucial to. So I, it’s one of those things where like I, I, I can’t like, you know, like miss out on things. [00:19:23] So, We’ll, we’ll see how that’s going. I, um, I talked to, uh, my shrink, uh, today, which was, um, uh, good, although it was, I, I’m not really sure I got. I basically went on a long tangent about nothing really related to me. Um, uh, when we were talking based on a tangent that he went on, he was telling me about some of the, uh, advances that are happening in, in ADHD meds that are non amphetamine based. [00:19:51] So some of them are whatever the type of thing that Ritalin is, which is not an amphetamine, it’s like some other type. And then there’s, uh, a new class of drugs that are not controlled substances that there’s been some interesting, um, like research and, and, and good feedback on. So we’re gonna talk about one of them to potentially add as like, you know, in addition to my, my Dxa dream, which I obviously enjoy and need very much so. [00:20:18] Jeff: That’s cool. [00:20:20] Christina: Yeah, I’ll keep you guys updated cuz it was, it was interesting. He was, cuz my, my shrink keep was like telling me before I went off on my tangent, that derailed us. He was telling me about some of the, about a conference he went to, um, in, uh, New Orleans where he was learning about some of the advances and some of the, the different, you know, research and things that are happening in, in drugs to treat adhd. [00:20:38] And I was like, Yes. Talk to me about this. This is actually interesting, not just for me, but also for my podcast. I actually thought of you two. I was like, oh, this would probably be good podcast stuff. [00:20:48] Jeff: That’s interesting. Um, I don’t have much to report. I’m, uh, you know, I’m, Oh, actually what’s really wonderful right now is it’s autumn and it means that we are getting cool weather and I have a living room full of windows and a big old couch that we just got. We waited, I think eight months for it to be delivered. [00:21:10] And so I can take little like mini naps there with my cat, with the breeze coming in, and it is like the best way to chill me out. It’s wonderful. So I’m just, you know, experimenting with naps. [00:21:23] Brett: Let’s take a, let’s take a sponsor break and, uh, Christina, why don’t you tell us about Mind Bloom? Sponsor: Mindbloom [00:21:29] Christina: Yeah, this episode is brought to you by Mind Bloom. You just need to take better care of yourself is not a response to mental health struggles. As we’ve discussed many times on this podcast, you know all too well you live with them. Sometimes you need something more to achieve a real and lasting breakthrough. [00:21:46] Maybe it’s time you check out a guided ketamine therapy program. Mind Bloom can help Mind. Bloom is a leader in at home ketamine therapy, offering a combination of science backed medicine with clinician and guide support for people who are looking to improve their mental health and wellbeing. Mind. 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Mind Bloom is offering our listeners $100 off your first six session program when you sign up@mindbloom.com slash Overtired and use the promo code Overtired at checkout. Go to mind bloom.com/ Overtired promo code Overtired for a hundred dollars off your first six session program today. [00:23:08] That’s mind bloom.com/ Overtired. Promo code Overtired. Thank you. Mind bloom Scripted [00:23:15] Brett: Yeah, that was almost a flawless ad read [00:23:17] Jeff: Yeah. Cold. [00:23:19] Brett: people. People won’t know there was a minor edit at the end, but I’m really impressed that was cold for you, [00:23:24] Christina: Yeah, that was completely cool. No, I, I literally was reading it for the first time as I was reading it out loud. [00:23:29] Brett: Very nice. I’m very [00:23:30] Christina: You, you almost, you would almost think that I kind of do this, like reading off a teleprompter shit for a living. [00:23:36] Jeff: That’s awesome. Yeah. It’s funny, scripted stuff for me is it’s like it either works or it doesn’t. Like I, a lot of people don’t realize that like on public radio when the sort of, when your local, like all things considered Host is talking to a reporter about something, they’re just done, right? They’re not playing a story, They’re talking to the reporter that the reporter has typically written that whole q and a. [00:23:57] Right. And it’s, it’s why they can sometimes sound really stiff and, um, there was a reporter, he is no longer there [00:24:03] Brett: written The Q or the A? [00:24:05] Jeff: both. [00:24:06] Brett: Really? This is news to me. Okay. [00:24:09] Jeff: Yeah. So especially in afternoon stuff, you know, if you’re hearing in our case the wonderful Tom Cran, um, talk to, or Steven John talk to a reporter about something they’ve just sort of dug up or whatever. [00:24:21] For the most part, those are, those are scripted out. Okay. Sometimes, you know, recorded ahead of time. So there used to be a reporter at, um, and a host at, at Minnesota Public Radio, Tom Weber, who loved, he was great. He had to leave when his wife became, um, a candidate for Lieutenant Governor. And anyway, once he, I had done a story like that and I had written the thing or whatever, and he and I were in a booth trying to do this and he would ask the questions and I’d start responding from my script. [00:24:48] And there was just this moment that was just not working. And there’s this sweet moment where he just stopped the, stopped the recorder and he just gently grabbed the script from my hands and took it out and laid it on the floor. And then we did the thing and it was fine. [00:25:01] Christina: Aw, [00:25:02] Jeff: It’s just so many there. It’s, it was incredible. [00:25:04] It’s goes back to our conversation about film. It’s just incredible how many unseen, uh, things are happening, um, you know, behind the scenes with these things. It sounds like a cliche almost, but it [00:25:16] Christina: No, but you’re right. No, and I think, I think at least like from what I understand about public radio, and again, I’ve never worked in it, but like editing there is such a huge thing, right? Like the edit is, is such a massive part. But also like to those points, if you’re doing the, the local pickups and whatnot, getting the person comfortable and, and making sure it sounds good, making sure you have the sound bite so that you can edit it into something meaningful. [00:25:40] I don’t know. [00:25:41] Jeff: Yeah, totally. And then how do you even make an interviewee? You do so much of interviewing people who aren’t normally interviewed in public radio. Like I, I still remember like my first week at Minnesota Public Radio and I was, I was sitting in on an interview that this reporter Jeff Jones was doing, and I still have the note page I filled just on what he said to that person in the five minutes before recording. [00:26:05] I mean, there’s all this stuff that I’d never thought I do. I do it in every interview now, things like, Hey, you know, I’m gonna ask you some questions and I might ask you a question and you’ll feel like I already answered that and like, just go ahead and answer it anyhow. It’s okay. We don’t have to, you know, we’re just gonna kind explore a little bit, you know, Or he did this thing like where he’d. [00:26:23] I am not going to, I’m not gonna do a lot of the normal things someone does in a conversation. I’m not gonna go uhhuh. Mm-hmm. , uhhuh, I’m not gonna laugh necessarily. Doesn’t mean that I’m not present. It’s just trying to kind of preserve your voice on the tape. You know, all these things that I just thought, man, such a, there’s such a way, and I’m sure there are reporters that don’t do any of those things, but there are so many ways to sort of hold the process and hold the person in the process. [00:26:47] Um, that I just, I love that shit. Love it. [00:26:50] Christina: Well, and you’re so good at it. I mean, uh, we, we were talking, uh, we were talking earlier about how you’re so good, like, uh, at bringing things out of, of Brett and I, when you talk and like your interview skills are so good, and I think that’s where it has to come from, right? Because you’ve gotten so used to having to interview people. [00:27:05] And record them who are not used to doing that, and make them comfortable and know the right things to bring the right things out. It’s such an incredible skill. I’m so always in awe and like impressed with that. Cause that’s always something I wanna improve myself and, and I That’s that’s really cool. [00:27:21] Jeff: Well, what that same reporter Jeff Jones taught me was you are a stand in for the listener. Like you have to try, you have to be the reporter and the listener at the same time while you’re doing the work. Right. Podcasts are like that too. It’s like we’ve all done that. We’ve all had to catch something and kind of like bring it back for a minute to make sure it all makes sense or, Yeah. [00:27:40] Christina: All right, so, um, before I took us into this digression, which look I’m very ADHD today. Um, Brett is recovering from some things. I don’t know what my deal is [00:27:49] Jeff: I love a good digression, Bitchin’ Apple [00:27:51] Christina: Um, but I was gonna say we wanna get into our, into our apple bitching, uh, segment because we had some really good stuff pre, uh, Prepo, uh, Jeff, uh, bitched to us a a about your, your apple wo. [00:28:04] Jeff: Well, the one here, I’m gonna start with one that I didn’t mention. So I own an iMac Pro, which, you know, up until these latest M one max came out, it was like my favorite computer ever. Um, and, and I had, it was a work computer, so it was, you know, I, I went all the way with it. It’s expensive, you know, somewhere around like five grand or maybe six, I can’t remember. [00:28:26] Um, just a wonderful computer. Um, and a few months back, or maybe a year back, I wanted to put it on a monitor arm. So I had to buy the, like, what is it? Visa? Visa? [00:28:37] Christina: Yeah. You had to get the base of After Kit. Oh [00:28:40] Jeff: Yeah. Which is just, it’s a little square on the, So basically you take the standout, you put the square in the place, $80 to, to buy this thing. [00:28:47] It’s beautiful. I [00:28:48] Christina: And it’s a, but it’s a piece of shit kit. [00:28:51] Jeff: It’s not a great kit. And, and so I, I put that on and then I, I retired it for a little while. Just let it, I let it have a season off this whole computer, right? So I probably haven’t used it in six or seven months. And I realized I wanted it to be running some, just some, uh, file processing stuff, um, processing like a hundred thousand PDFs for investigative project. [00:29:12] And I just wanted it to be over there working. So I’ll put the stand back on it. Okay, so first of all, this is so tedious, but I’m just gonna bring a lot of emotion to it and hope that it makes it less tedious, first of all, just to get the stand off. So if you can picture, it’s, I mean, you guys know, it’s like, it looks like a monitor and then it’s just got a little l stand on it. [00:29:31] L stand goes into the back. If you were to look at it from the back, it’s a beautiful transition. God damn it, you know, great work. You can’t see the screws or how it hooks up or anything. And it turns out that to get it out, you have to use like a credit card or a business card, and you kind of jam it in, in the most like, In elegant way, right? [00:29:50] Like this, this elegant machine that you’re already setting this like $6,000 machine down on its face. You just don’t wanna be doing a lot at that point, right? And so you, you stick a little card in and it pops out just enough so you can remove something like eight of the tiniest screws you’ve ever seen in your life. [00:30:08] And again, it comes out, it’s got all these little holes. It’s beautiful. I mean, for, as a person who likes to make things and even likes to make things with metal, like it’s just, it’s gorgeous, right? But it’s a huge fucking pain in the ass. And so I get the thing out and I go, Well, I hope I never have to put that stand back in. [00:30:24] Spoiler. I had to put that stand back in this weekend. And I thought I, I had all the screws on, I screwed them in just like I had unscrewed ’em. I watched a video, everything, and I get a little card stick in there so I can stick it in and then glide the stand all the way in. And in the course of doing that, I sheer off the heads of all eight of the screws. The screws are now stuck inside of this little mounting bracket without a way to get them out. I try to get those screws out, but I end up nicking up the, the metal, you know, and, and I’m, [00:30:58] Christina: there, there’s, there are these really terrible, um, uh, quality screws of, uh, Quinn from SNA Labs made a video four years ago, uh, called the Apple Storage Genius Bar. Broke my $5,000 [00:31:10] Jeff: I found that after I broke mine. [00:31:12] Christina: Yep. I was gonna say, if you, he’s active on Twitter, you might wanna reach out to him and [00:31:16] Jeff: Maybe I will. Yeah, that’s a [00:31:18] Christina: see if you can get some advice or something. [00:31:19] But also if you took it to the Apple Store, even if you’re out of warranty, they might have to do something for you. But I know that that would mean then you’re, and I don’t have the computer, [00:31:28] Jeff: Well, I wasn’t using the computer anyhow, so I’m I’ll do that. You know what’s crazy is if this, I mean, I don’t know if it’s free, that’s no problem. But if it’s not, if this wasn’t a work computer, I’d be freaking out. Cause like I, this is expensive computer and I, I gummed it all up now. The metal’s all [00:31:45] Christina: Oh yeah, no, totally. Yeah. So, so, so, so, uh, listeners, we’ve got in the show notes links to, uh, Quinn’s two videos because that whole thing, like the way that kit worked, it was really great that they had like a VA kit that you could buy so that you didn’t have to choose at the time. Like my iMac that I’m recording this on, I bought the Vasa version because you have to choose when you, when you buy it. [00:32:07] And so mine is on, um, a stand. The same thing with my studio display is also, I got, I got the base version, uh, because Apple, for whatever reason, Doesn’t let you choose unless you either bought the iMac Pro where they then sold a kit that they sold that had these terrible quality screws. Or, um, you know, if you get like the, the, um, whatever the Apple display is, uh, the, the XDR display, that one you can spend a couple hundred dollars to also get a, a basic hit for. [00:32:36] But um, yeah, like the fact that you, you buy this thing, you know, and it has these, it’s, you know, it’s not even a cheap tool that, as you said, it’s kind of difficult to get on and off, and then the quality of the screws, like they break off and they break off inside the thing, like it’s just terrible. [00:32:52] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. It was crazy. And for me, it’s just one in a, in a line of things like this, where it’s like, I know I’m, I’m, I’m the guy that’s deciding to spend this much money on my computing, uh, you know, passion . But like the other thing that’s happened to me is I have an M one MacBook Pro, which is awesome. [00:33:13] I love it. Love it to death. And I got the cow digit, what is it called? The thunder. [00:33:19] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. The, the TS four, The Thunder Bowl four doc. [00:33:22] Jeff: four doc because like even though thank you Apple, you added a few fucking ports to the computer. I’m really grateful to you. Uh, I still need more. And so I, I waited it out until this cow digit thing was in stock, and now there’s a bug with that thing where it just automatically ejects my, my, uh, fucking drives or it just resets my screens or whatever. [00:33:44] And I’m just like, What world am I living in? I’m definitely not living in a world where I spend 5,000 on machines. Like, [00:33:51] Brett: quick, quick quest. Quick question. When it ejects your drives, does it also remount them? [00:33:56] Jeff: yeah. [00:33:57] Brett: Because I get these, I get all these notifications. You, you’ve unsafely ejected this external drive. But then I go to find her and it’s still connected. Like I just, It like flick flickers. Yeah. [00:34:11] Jeff: Yeah. And then I mean, just add to that, while I’m complaining and I, I really, really understand that I am blessed to have a job that buys me these lovely computers. Um, but I also am someone who feels like when you spend a lot of money, like it should be really worth it. And, and little things like this shouldn’t be the problem. [00:34:29] I also am a user of the Apple Superdrive. [00:34:31] Christina: Mm-hmm. . Oh my God. Yeah. [00:34:33] Jeff: like it. You cannot run that unless you’ve plugged it directly into the computer, but the cow digit does actually have like firmware or a driver rather, that you can do this. It’s like I just have all of these needs that I’m starting to feel crazy. [00:34:47] Christina: Well, no, I mean that, that’s the thing there too, right? Like the Superdrive is kind of a great example. I mean, I don’t think they sell it anymore. It’s an old product. But also there are people who still need to fucking use like, you know, digital media, like especially for the sort of work you do. Like people will often give you things on that sort [00:35:03] Jeff: Yeah, totally. [00:35:04] Christina: and um, [00:35:05] Jeff: do make data backups onto DVDs. [00:35:08] Christina: Yeah, totally. [00:35:10] Jeff: Yeah. [00:35:10] Christina: I’m with you, Jeff. Like I’ll give Apple a pass on a lot of things. Where I won’t is when you spend so much money on the products, like part of the reason you spend the money is because, and people are like, Oh, well, don’t spend it if you don’t have it. No. Part of the thing is, and I say this to somebody who buys expensive things a lot, part of the whole. [00:35:32] Rationale there is that you get to have, you were get an expectation of a higher level of service and a higher level of finish. That is, that is part of the implicit agreement when you do that, right? Because if you didn’t care, then you could have bought any computer, right? Or you could buy any car or any other, you know, any type of like thing, like part of it honestly. [00:35:50] And, and people pay for it. Like my mom is definitely like this, Like one of the reasons you buy things typically from Apple or historically anyway, you know, it’s you, you do it because you know that it’s going to work a certain way and it’s supposed to have a certain level of finish when it doesn’t have that. [00:36:03] And when, if anything, it has like a lesser level of finish, like the basic hit, which is it, it’s not just poor it. Objectively worse than a mon, than, than like a computer that had, you know, vasa thing that anybody would have that, that would cost a fraction of what you paid. Right? So it’s not just that it, that, that it’s not up to like super high standards. [00:36:25] It’s that it is worse than like a hun a hundred dollars monitor that you would get. Right? Like, it, it is worse than that. I, I think that, you know, we are right to be frustrated and, and, um, the same thing I think sometimes with some of the, the software things too is like, okay, I, I, we spent all this money to be in this ecosystem and then things. [00:36:43] Bugs are not solved after, you know, beta is fine, but there are still bugs that are outstanding from, from Monterey, right? Like, there are things that like, haven’t been picked up on. So it’s like, okay, how, how long are we supposed to lay, supposed to wait? Um, the Thunderbolt stuff is, is especially frustrating because, you know, um, cow digit and, and o wc, uh, are, are two of the bigger, more respected like thunderbolt dock makers and the firmware for some of those things because they have to write the drivers themselves, like the software themselves because they’re, you know, these, these chip sets that, that don’t have, you know, drivers typically for, for Mac. [00:37:19] Um, Even though Apple is like partially responsible for the spec, because their things don’t adhere exactly the way they should, there are problems. And then you’re in a weird situation where like, okay, you spent $300 or however much the, the cow digit dock is, um, on a dock, Which again, like you’re blessed to get, but you need it for your work and you buy the dock, to be completely honest, in large part, because the, the computer that you spent $5,000 on didn’t have the necessary reports you needed to do your shop. [00:37:46] So, so you have to buy this third party accessory and then that accessory to maybe, you know, get rid of like the, the disconnect issue and some of those other things needs a firmware update. And the firmware update can only be done from a Windows machine. [00:38:01] Jeff: right, right, [00:38:02] Christina: you know, and, and the company, you know, you know, and like they’re working on, they will have a Mac driver and whatnot, but like, even like, you know, o wc, which their URL is Mac sales, some of their docs, like, it’s the same thing like you have to use, In the past I’ve had to use Windows machines to update the firmware. [00:38:17] It’s not about like, I’m not gonna blame. You know, in some ways, like the, the people who’ve, you know, bought the, the kind of commodity hardware and made this product that, that you need, I’m not gonna blame them completely for this. When Apple, if they cared about this, could either A, offer more ports, uh, b you know, give people more access to people to write the driver for stuff, Right? [00:38:37] Or, or, or c you know, like sell a fucking dock themselves. Right? Like, although I think even if they sold one themselves, you probably still have this shit because you have issues with like fricking superdrive, which doesn’t work with docking stations, which is a problem if you’re trying to use a superdrive with any computer. [00:38:55] You know, that’s not a, that’s not an iMac made sense, you know, uh, 2016 because it doesn’t have a freaking USBC port. So like, you’re gonna have [00:39:03] Jeff: And just to say to all the people out there going, you can, you can get one of the other drives in the world. The thing I love about the super drive is it’s built in such a way, I think it has like a ballast on it or something because it does not vibrate my whole desk. And I, and if I’m, I just like that. [00:39:17] Um, you know, what you’re making me think too is like the, an undercurrent for me in all of this is, is the right to repair stuff where it’s like we all come from a time where you could open your mac up and you could do any number of things to it without removing eight other things. You would open it up and there it all was. [00:39:37] I just recently, I was at the dump and there was a, there was an old iac, like way old, like when it was about three inches thick. Right. And I brought it home just to take it apart and see, and I open it up and I’m like, Man, with a single Phillip screwdriver, I was able to basically like get at everything. [00:39:53] Yeah. Yeah. [00:39:55] Brett: Yeah. Like those old G five s, you could do anything with those old G five s [00:39:59] Jeff: And so this was one of the things about the iMac that was making me so upset was like, I am happy to open that computer up, but, but I looked at the tear down. And in order to get to that hinge [00:40:11] Brett: eight different screwdrivers. [00:40:13] Jeff: Yeah. But in order to get to that hinge, I have to remove many vital pieces of that computer, which has never gone badly for me, but might go badly this time. [00:40:23] And so that’s, [00:40:24] Christina: and, and, and it’s a 27 inch, you know, uh, thing that has a, a heavy piece of paint of glass on top of it. So not, not only do you have to take that off, which will require two people, because if you’ve ever taken those things off, like, I mean, you may one person might be able to do it, I wouldn’t do [00:40:39] Jeff: Yeah, they’re [00:40:39] Christina: Um, there, there are intense and then again, yeah, the pro, this was another reason I was glad I didn’t get the pro, because you can’t upgrade the ram unless you take the whole thing apart. Um, yeah, you basically have to [00:40:49] Jeff: Which by the way, I’m definitely gonna do, [00:40:51] Christina: Yeah, if you, if you’re taking it apart, you might as well upgrade the ram 100%. But it’s like, yeah, you’ve gotta open up every aspect of it and potentially damage this machine, Touch all these like vital parts just so you can fix something that frankly was, in this case, a design problem that Apple made. [00:41:06] Right? Like they, they, they made, they made a shitty decision to cheap out on cheap screws for their, you know, uh, expensive add-on thing and, and like, yeah, I think that that’s, if we were easy to repair then, then it’d be one thing, but they make it so difficult. Yeah. [00:41:23] Jeff: truly listeners, the cheap square you would if you saw how this broke, you would look at it and think it was some cheap ass thing I [00:41:30] Brett: Yeah, like that’s out of all of the complaints that have come up here. The cheap screws are the ones that, to me, are the most egregious because [00:41:38] Jeff: There’s zinc. There’s [00:41:39] Brett: how much are you saving on screws? Like how many pennies, like good screws can’t be that expensive when you’re buying [00:41:48] Jeff: they also know that we’ll pay, they know we’ll pay for the good screws. [00:41:52] Christina: I was gonna say, that’s the thing. It literally, [00:41:54] Brett: the price. [00:41:55] Christina: literally, it’s pennies, but they could add $10 to the price, Right. [00:41:58] Jeff: I assumed I was paying for good screws, frankly, at $80. [00:42:02] Christina: I, I, I agree with you. $80 for a freaking basis after win if, you know, it maybe wouldn’t look as pretty or, or whatever. Although again, fuck it. [00:42:11] Like it’s the back of your computer. If you made, if you made the design outta the box so that you could actually use a vasa thing. Right. Or remove the stand more, more naturally. Like the fact that I had to spend more money on my iMac and, and it was fine, but like, you know, it was, it was an extra charge to get the model that had, uh, the vasa adapter and that if I ever sell this computer, I’m gonna have a harder time selling it. [00:42:33] I’m gonna have to include either the arm, which. Several hundred dollars. Like it’s because it’s, you know, 20 pounds. So I’m using a $300, uh, Tron hx. Right. You know, I’m using, I’m using like one of the, the, the $300 tron, um, uh, arms. Um, you know, I’ll either have to include that or I’ll have to like buy a stand to sell to somebody and they’ll be like, Oh wait, this doesn’t match. [00:42:56] And I’m like, Yeah, but otherwise my alternative would be I [00:43:00] Jeff: C, episode 300. [00:43:02] Christina: Exactly. Otherwise I can’t adjust, you know, the height of, of my, my thing, the same thing with my monitor. I spent $1,600 on this monitor. Um, I’m just gonna continue bitching and then we’ll move on. I’m very sorry, Brett. I spent $1,600 on this [00:43:12] Brett: I have complaints too. I’m waiting. I’m waiting my. [00:43:15] Christina: Okay. [00:43:16] Jeff: You’re in the lobby. [00:43:17] Christina: I spent $1,600 on the studio display. I like it. It’s fine. It is prettier than the LG one that I had earlier. And it works better with some types of machines that I have that are, that are not Max, um, weirdly, although again, still doesn’t have fucking display for it out of the box, which is stupid for $1,600 monitor, but whatever. [00:43:37] But the, the freaking camera on it, the webcam on it is hot garbage. It is so bad. Like the one on my iMac, which is two years older, uh, as a machine is 10 80 p That’s what we’re recording with now. It’s fine. Right. Um, I’m gonna, I don’t know if I can, if I can do this in, um, I don’t think I can change my camera, um, for, for you guys to see it cuz uh, even though I don’t think we’re recording video, but the um, uh, the quality is so terrible for the $1,600 thing that again, I had to buy. [00:44:12] When I made the decision to buy it, I had to, you know, get it without, um, the, with the VAA thing, without the, you know, the stand. Or I could have paid a few extra a hundred dollars more to get an adjustable stand where I still couldn’t turn the monitor. So I’m like, Well, fuck you. I’m buying it with the visa, and then I still have to spend, you know, $200 on, um, a based arm. [00:44:32] Right? So it’s like, I, I spend all this money on this thing that’s marginally better than a product that came out five years earlier that, uh, was cheaper. [00:44:43] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. [00:44:44] Christina: know, part of this is on me, but, but at the same time, I also feel like, okay. But if I’m going to spend all this money on this monitor for this experience and whatnot, could the camera not be hot garbage? [00:44:54] Could you have even put the camera that was in, like the seven 20 P camera that was in the previous gin MacBook would’ve been better than the camera that’s in this thing, let alone the 10 80 p camera. That’s in the new ones. But frankly, why could you not just put the one that’s in the iMac? Make it slightly thicker. [00:45:12] I don’t fucking care. Right. Like if you actually care. [00:45:15] Brett: Didn’t they make a big deal out of the camera in the studio like it was supposed to be. [00:45:21] Christina: It’s, it’s, it’s awful. It, it’s, it’s, it’s so bad. Um, [00:45:25] Brett: because Apple knows cameras, like iPhone cameras are outstanding. [00:45:28] Christina: what they did is they used, they used an iPad camera and, and then, and oh, this is the shittiest part too. They use an iPad camera and they have the, the stupid, um, like a, what is it that the stage, um, mode, whatever the mode is where like, like, like, like centers [00:45:43] Brett: Follows you around. [00:45:44] Christina: Yeah, yeah. Which, which is, which is terrible. So that’s what they’re doing. And because of that, there’s an M one chip, M one chip in this monitor. That means that if you, anytime you need to update it or anything, you have to like update firmware on the monitor, but you have to install it on your Mac and there’s no power off button. [00:46:02] There’s [00:46:02] Jeff: of the iPod. [00:46:03] Christina: there, there’s, there’s no way to turn this off. So, um, what I did, I, I took, uh, I took a cue from John Gruber where I bought, um, uh, like an Alexa and, and um, home kit powered, uh, plug and plugged my monitor into that. And then I can use a switch if I need to turn the monitor off. But otherwise, literally, if you wanna power cycle the monitor, you have to fucking unplug it. [00:46:25] There’s no power button. [00:46:27] Brett: Huh. [00:46:28] Jeff: It’s almost as if we arrived in the, in the current day from the past, and we’re just trying to make sense of what new technology is out there these days. [00:46:37] Christina: Well, it’s almost like, you know, we spend a lot of money on products and we expect a certain experience, and again, I’m getting a shitty experience compared to something that would cost, you know, a, a, a fifth of what I’ve paid. Anyway, I’m, I’m done with my rant. Brett. Please rant on [00:46:51] Brett: I will keep it short. We’re, we are over [00:46:53] Christina: way over. I’m very sorry. [00:46:55] Brett: and, and maybe at this point Jeff has kindly edited out some of, especially like my rants. [00:47:00] Jeff: Are you talking to me in the future right [00:47:02] Brett: yes, You in the future. Anything I said up until this point, feel free to edit. Also this like, you can cut me outta this episode entirely. Um, [00:47:10] Christina: You can cut a shitload of my stuff out. To be completely honest, I don’t care. [00:47:13] Brett: My sonology, uh, is a replacement. I was two months past warranty when the reset button on it failed and it started resetting, and they were kind enough to forgive me and replace it for free. Um, yeah, great. Guess what’s happening right now? [00:47:33] Christina: It’s the reset button’s not working [00:47:35] Brett: The reset button is faulty, and now I am a year out of warranty, and there’s no help for me. [00:47:41] So I’m like, All right. I, I wanted a faster model with, uh, like nme, ssd, Overhead CAEs. Um, so I’ve been wanting to do that anyway, and I wanted a model that could run Docker, which my model can’t. Um, so this is like, I was ready to make this purchase. But now I am going until October 11th with no access to my Sonology, um, and no access to Plex, which means all of my comfort shows that I have carefully ripped. [00:48:11] I cannot, I have to pay iTunes 30 bucks to watch Big Bang now. Um, and, and it’s, it’s a little frustrating that it’s the exact same problem that I had before. And here’s the kicker. The, the newest analogies are AMD chips that cannot transcode video. So you can’t run a plex [00:48:34] Christina: Right, [00:48:35] Jeff: Are you serious? [00:48:36] Brett: so I had to buy the 2020 version of the Five Bay, uh, because they, moving forward, they have no plans to enable video transcoding, [00:48:49] Jeff: Oh my God, [00:48:49] Christina: I mean, you [00:48:50] Jeff: There goes half their [00:48:51] Christina: No, you can still transcode. It’s just, it’s a lot slower. [00:48:54] Brett: Um, so what I’m thinking of doing is I have a couple extra Mac Minis, including an M one Mac Mini that needs to be wiped. Um, I could use that as a front end. Use this analogy for storage and use a Mac as a front end. [00:49:10] Christina: Yeah. We’re not, we’re not, we’re, we’re not. We’re not using a Mac for that, but we’re using like a, another computer end because our sonology is from like 2012 or 2013, so it’s really old. So at this point we couldn’t do anything off of it. So it’s just a storage array. And then, um, just using like the front end, you know, to do the transcoding and the other stuff. [00:49:30] So we’ve got like a server on the closet that’s, that’s handling that stuff. So yeah. That, that would work. But that’s unfortunate about that. I, I, I knew that they, the AMD thing was a problem. I, because I wanna get a new Sonology system. I really like Sonology, yet, I haven’t wanted to switch brands, but I’ve actually been looking at Qnap and, and some of the other [00:49:48] Brett: We talked about that a while back. Yeah. [00:49:50] Christina: did. [00:49:51] Um, but yeah, that’s, that’s, that’s unfortunate. And I’m sorry that it broke again. Um, and I assumed that like they don’t have any sort of, um, like, um, [00:50:01] Brett: They told me they wouldn’t even be able to service it even if I wanted to pay for it. [00:50:07] Christina: fuck. [00:50:08] Brett: It’s, they’re just done with this model cuz it’s like a 2015 and apparently that’s ancient tech for them. They’re, they’ve already moved on, They move on apparent like by yearly. [00:50:19] Christina: they do. But that’s still unfortunate. [00:50:22] Brett: they sunset products pretty damn fast for what they cost. [00:50:26] I feel like they should have a longer serviceable. [00:50:30] Christina: No, I totally agree with that. Because the, the thing is, is that like theology, especially, especially the one like the five or the eight bay ones are in this weird category where because of how much they cost, like it is, you could use it in a home, but a lot of people who are gonna be using it are like smaller businesses, right? [00:50:46] Like, it’s gonna be like more, which to me indicates, okay, well then you should at least have some sort of enterprise support thing. And if you were to say, you know, this, this storage device for a Naza whatnot is only gonna have, you know, five years of, of support, um, People who spend many times the amount that, so costs would like laugh in their face. [00:51:07] Right. Because that’s just not the expectation. And, and so are expensive. So that’s it. It’s, it’s weird to me that they, they don’t do that, you know? [00:51:16] Brett: saving, the saving grace. Like I got burned by Drobo. I lost a few terabytes of my life to Drobo. Um, but uh, with analogy, if you get the right raid controller, [00:51:29] Christina: Mm-hmm. [00:51:30] Brett: You can plug in your, your sayta drives from your sonology and you can recover your data. Even if sonology were to close up shop and disappear like that data, I can’t remember which rate it is and it uses a special file system, but, uh, it is possible. [00:51:48] I know that with a couple hundred dollars for a controller, you can recover your data. [00:51:55] Brett 2: So I have a new sonology on the way. I got the NME SSD drive. It already. I, I spent, you know, well over a thousand dollars to, to fix the situation and I can only pray that the fucking reset button doesn’t go faulty after a year. [00:52:13] Jeff: a silly thing to have to pray for [00:52:15] Brett 2: Yeah, [00:52:15] Christina: real. I mean, I mean, you could, I mean, [00:52:18] Brett 2: like shitty [00:52:18] Christina: depending on what credit card you bought it on, like you could maybe like get like a two year warranty or something, but that still doesn’t solve like the underlying problem, which is when this is your backup system, you don’t want the reset button to break. [00:52:29] Right. Because then it’s like, I can’t trust [00:52:31] Brett 2: That seems like a pretty, a pretty simple, like, especially if it’s a known issue, which clearly it is, they, they should have solved it. And I, I can only hope that on the newer models they have taken care of this obviously repeat issue. [00:52:45] Christina: Yeah. I hope so. Grapptitude! [00:52:47] Brett 2: Are we gonna fit in a gratitude? This is gonna be a, this is gonna be pretty rapid fire. [00:52:51] Christina: Yep. [00:52:52] Jeff: so for me, I’m, I’m choosing the Arduino i d e. So, um, you know, back to the, the thousand dollars, many thousand dollars computers. I also really like to play with $30 Microcontrollers, um, and, uh, and Arduinos, for anybody that doesn’t know, are just really simple little, essentially little tiny computers that can allow you to, you know, build projects. [00:53:16] Uh, people build robots, people build sensors, uh, weather stations, whatever, a million different things. And, um, and I’ve always loved them, but the ide. Really just about, since I got into our, do we know like seven or eight years ago or more, Uh, has been a little, has felt just outta date. It just doesn’t, the resolution’s a little goofy and they just updated their ide and, and just to give you an idea of like how, like long and overdue, some really annoying fixes were, these are some of the highlights. [00:53:47] So they added auto complete so that when you’re coding your code can auto complete and a lot of people had ditched, including Mia ditched they Arduino IDE for like, you know, Visual Studio Code can, has a, you know, Arduino package and [00:54:01] Christina: Yeah, I was gonna say I was, I used, I’ve been using VS code with it. I didn’t even know they had an ide to be honest with [00:54:06] Jeff: So yeah, so they added auto complete, they added a debugging tool and the serial monitor, which is like when you’re doing our DOO stuff, you wanna be seeing what’s going on through a serial monitor. But it’s always been a popup and there was no other way to have it. And now it’s like integrated into the ide. [00:54:23] So it’s like, these are silly thing. Oh, a dark mode [00:54:27] Christina: Nice. [00:54:28] Jeff: Um, it, but it is, I mean, so I don’t mean to give them shit really because they did a really great job, um, with this new version and [00:54:35] Brett 2: it is your gratitude pick. So [00:54:37] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. And I’m excited to work with it. And while we’re talking about apps taking way too long for dark mode, last night I opened up the New York Times in bed. We have just instituted dark mode. I was like, Are you fucking kidding me? I don’t read it at night. Cause like it’s too bright. It’s like it took this long, new times. You can’t mode [00:54:55] Christina: I was gonna say, I was gonna say, New York Times, New York fucking times. The only media company to successfully not only transition to digital, like fucking kill every other digital company. They’ve grown, right? Like, like they’re, they make so much money. Their, their digital enterprise is great. [00:55:08] And then they’re like, Oh yeah, finally dark mode. And we’re like, [00:55:11] Jeff: Dark mode. I was like, Oh my God, you gotta be fucking kidding me. Anyway, uh, so that’s but gratitude, gratitude for dark mode in the New York Times app as well. Um, and all love to everybody over there, [00:55:25] Brett 2: If you ever need a dark mode hat for a website and you’re willing to run like a Grease Monkey plugin, I’ll fix it for you. [00:55:32] Jeff: Oh, yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. That really sounded, uh, really sounded like we just made some kind of shady deal. [00:55:38] Brett 2: Some kind of back room deal. Yeah. I could fix this for you, but it’ll cost you [00:55:43] Jeff: Yeah. Who’s next? [00:55:45] Brett 2: what you got. [00:55:46] Christina: All right, so my pick is Lot Terminal, which is a, um, a brand new iOS app from Miguel Deza and, uh, Joseph, uh, Hall, uh, Joseph Hill, sorry. Um, who, um, is, uh, you know, Miguel is the creator, Ofo and, uh, Mono, which was like the, you know, open source implementation of, um, do. And, uh, he created Zin, which, you know, was one of the first kind of like big popular, like multi-platform like, uh, you know, tools to do things. [00:56:17] He’s also a longtime Mac fan. He created Midnight Commander back in the day, which was [00:56:20] Brett 2: Oh [00:56:21] Christina: open source thing of, of, you know, Norton Commander, you know, he’s, he’s Miguel is, is is a amazing guy. And, um, uh, we used to work together. Uh, and, and he’s, uh, he left Microsoft, uh, not that long ago, but, uh, I think right before I did. [00:56:35] But he, um, you know, is like a true like OG hacker, right? Like the guy created fucking goodo, right? And, um, he created this app called The Terminal, which is an iOS terminal ator. And it is awesome. It is a really great experience for, uh, you know, uh, iPhones and iPads. It’s based. A, uh, a swift term, which is a, a package that he built and open sourced, um, uh, and it’s on GitHub. [00:57:00] Uh, that’s the basis for a lot of the stuff that he has. Um, but, uh, the law terminal has some other kind of niceties. It has like iCloud support. It’s, um, you know, has like secure enclaves. So you can create SSH keys using the secure enclave on it. Um, and you can, um, like you can do things like have live backgrounds and inline graphics and you know, you can choose which sort of font you want. [00:57:23] There are themes built in. It works great. I love it. It works really well with, uh, with, with tail scale. So if you’re wanting to like remotely log into machines that are on that, you can do it. Um, it’s great. So I, uh, this is my pick, uh, law terminal. We’ve got links in the show notes. It’s free and it is, um, it’s lovely. [00:57:42] It’s just, it’s a really well made app and it’s also just like, uh, you know, kind of a love letter to everything that Miguel has kind of built his whole career. So, props to Miguel and, and props to Joseph for building it and for opensourcing, like, you know, swift term, which is like the underlying, um, uh, you know, stuff underneath it. [00:58:00] And, um, just, yeah, just like [00:58:03] Jeff: Awesome. Yeah, it’s got snippets. I love the like single button key generations, like it’s very fun. [00:58:10] Brett 2: All right. I am gonna keep it short. Um, I term, if you use terminal like every, every week when we do this, I look at what I’ve been using most that week and I have been. Terminal nonstop for the last few days. And I term is a pleasure and it is so handy, powerful and flexible that I became a GitHub supporter of it. [00:58:35] I pay a subscription fee to use. I term, My name shows up. If you go to the About panel, my name’s in there. Um, I’m, I’m, I’m pretty proud to be a, an eye term supporter. Um, but really what, what is there to say? Anyone who knows Terminal knows, eye term, runner up, pick Warp. I, [00:58:55] Christina: a. [00:58:56] Brett 2: I’ve actually been doing a little writing for the Warp Team, um, side gig. [00:59:02] Uh, and, uh, so in the process of needing screenshots, I’ve needed to use Warp and. It misses the mark on a lot of the things I love about I term, but it nails some new technologies, like in terminal, uh, notes, markdown notes that you can execute the way, how it does. Um, like that my tool has it, um, uh, blocks like you can jump through the output of your recent commands with single key strokes. [00:59:35] Um, and you can share those blocks with other people. You can share entire terminal sessions. Uh, it’s, it’s, it’s pretty hot. So that’s my runner up pick is warp. [00:59:45] Christina: Yeah, Warp is great. Um, [00:59:47] Brett 2: worth checking out and free right now. [00:59:49] Christina: yeah, I, I think that their model is, I think they’re gonna like charge for teams. I think. [00:59:53] Brett 2: They, yeah, they wanna charge for enterprise and like, I actually, I had applied just to see what would happen with them, um, for [01:00:02] Christina: Yeah. I, I get, [01:00:03] Brett 2: position. [01:00:04] Christina: I was gonna say, I referred you for that job. [01:00:06] Brett 2: Yeah. Yeah. You pointed me to this in the, [01:00:08] Christina: No, but I also sent them an email. I also sent them an email as a referral. [01:00:12] Brett 2: Oh, I didn’t know that. Um, but [01:00:16] Christina: they had a thing where they were like, Refer someone. Yeah. [01:00:18] Brett 2: came down to brass tax, they have like a four year runway. [01:00:22] And I don’t have a lot of faith that even a top notch terminal program can make a profit as an enterprise solution when there are so many, so much competition in the market. Um, so I didn’t, I didn’t leave my cush Oracle job to go work for a strappy startup. [01:00:43] Christina: I think they’re an acquisition target. Like I would think that they would be the sort of thing where if you, if you turn this into service whatnot, like if, if you’re an aws, if you’re a GitHub, if you’re a, a JetBrains or you know what I mean? Like I could see, I could see somebody buying it. Um, because it is a really cool product. [01:01:00] I agree with you. Like I, I, I, like, I still, it’s so funny cuz I still typically use I term two for almost everything, but I really do like warp. Um, [01:01:09] Brett 2: Yeah, I’ve been running them side by side. It’s actually, it actually, it comes pretty close to competing with I [01:01:16] Christina: it really does. And, and which I never thought I’d say, have you used Fig? [01:01:21] Brett 2: Um, yeah, I, I tried figure out, but it felt too invasive and like it didn’t immediately click for me, and then I felt like I had too much shit running and, and I gave up on it. I feel like there’s a lot of potential there. Um, and in when I was interviewing with Warp, like we talked about fig, because what FIG is doing absolutely makes sense for something like Warp to, to [01:01:48] Christina: No. Yeah. Yeah. So, so for people who aren’t familiar, FIG is basically, it’s, it does some of the similar things to Warp, not quite as, as advances and have like the notes and whatnot, but it, it does it inside the terminal that you’re already using. So it, it’s kind of like a service that sits on top of it. [01:02:03] There can be some latency and there can be, I’m with you Brett. Like, there have been some things where I’m just like, it takes just a little bit too long or feels too heavy for maybe what I want, but I love what it’s doing. So it’s kind of like, in a lot of ways, I think like Fig is better than doing a lot of like the, oh my Osh like setups that people do where they overload it with plugins and that’s really slows if you wanna talk about shit that’s gonna slow down your, your terminal, that’s gonna fucking bring it to its [01:02:28] Jeff: Yeah, I don’t do, I don’t do the, Oh, my ssh. [01:02:30] Christina: Yeah. Well, I. [01:02:31] Jeff: It’s too much. I like it actually, but [01:02:34] Christina: like it too. I, I, I’ve found some that are, are like really like low, you know, like small number of, of plugins that, but, but FIG does gets you a lot of that shit out of the box and, and, and is more performance. So I like, it’s kind of one of those things where you, you can envision like a world where you could have like something like Warp, but with like, you know, but package like, like fig, you know what I mean? [01:02:57] Jeff: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Terminals. [01:02:59] Brett 2: everyone could just make command line tools easier to use. [01:03:02] Christina: Yeah. Actually, uh, AC [01:03:04] Brett 2: So we would, we wouldn’t need a hundred tools to make them work. [01:03:07] Christina: yeah, actually I’m gonna be doing a live stream with, uh, the team from Charm, um, in a couple weeks. Um, and, uh, if anybody’s familiar with the charm dot, if you’re talking about wanting to build command line tools, make look glamorous, it’s, it’s a bunch of, uh, Ruby libraries, or not Ruby, a bunch of go libraries that are really, really good. [01:03:26] Um, and, uh, uh, I think I’ve mentioned them on, um, The, I think I’ve mentioned charm on, on gratitude before, but if not, um, that’s another one. But yeah, the, I, I’m with you Brett. Like everybody can make like better command line tools, but, uh, so everybody should, should, should adopt a charm. [01:03:44] Jeff: Well, it’s great to see y’all here for number 300, not number 300. Yeah, number [01:03:48] Christina: Yeah. Number 300. Yeah. [01:03:50] Jeff: Not the 300th episode, but [01:03:51] Christina: But it is number 300. Exactly. [01:03:53] Jeff: Uh, you guys get some sleep [01:03:56] Brett 2: Get some sleep, Jeff. [01:03:57] Christina: Get some sleep. Jeff and Brett. [01:03:59] Brett 2: Get some sleep. Christina. [01:04:03] Jeff: Mm [01:04:03] Outtro: The system is. [01:04:09] Stinger: Hey, there are good people Before you go, we have a bunch of new places where you can. Act with us. Please check out our Instagram feed, our YouTube channel, Twitter of course, and sign up for the Overtired newsletter, which will sort of pick up where the show leaves off with expanded show notes, Uh, a little bit of what the three of us get up to between episodes. [01:04:32] And let’s face it, there’ll be some musings. How can you resist musings? You’ll find details for all the ways to interact with us in the show notes and at Overtired dot com. And thank you. Thank you. Thank you as always for listening.

Rabbi Eric Linder joins Brett and Jeff to talk band names, frameworks of understanding, spiritual atheism, and some real good apps. Sponsor ZocDoc lets you choose a doctor using real patient ratings, and book appointments (live or telehealth) in minutes. No more waiting on hold. Take your healthcare seriously and visit zocdoc.com/OVERTIRED. Show Links Rabbi Eric Linder Klezmer Local 42 Max Richter — Sleep Helen, Georgia GoVee Lighting howzit MailMate Preside PDFExpert Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript An Invitation to the In-Between Brett: [00:00:00] Hello. I am Brett Terpstra. You are listening to Overtired. I, it was in a tribute to, to the queen. I just, I figured, I figured I’d do a, a Python, a Python tribute to the, to the queen. Um, jeffrey_merged: Yeah. Very slowly. Silently. Exactly. Brett: I’m, I’m Brett Terpstra. You’re listening to Overtired. I am here as always with Jeff Severns Guntzel. Uh, Christina Warren has the week off. She got her vaccine and is recovering, uh, from a couple nights of insomnia that I think we can all relate to. We have a special guest this week. We are joined by rabbi Eric out of Athens, Georgia home of REM. How’s it going, Eric? jeffrey_merged: good to, and I’m, I’m meeting you for the first time. I’ve heard you [00:01:00] on Brett’s podcast, but Naming bands is hard Eric: And nice to meet you, Jeff I and, uh, and, the B 50 twos and KLAS local 42, my jeffrey_merged: The Brett: Yes. Eric is in a band called KLAS local. Is it 42 or Eric: 42. Brett: What does the 42 refer Eric: It’s just the uh, the lead of the band wanted a name that sounded like a labor union. So he just jeffrey_merged: What was the band thinking? Fellers union, uh, back from the nineties, there was another band Brett: Street sweepers. No. jeffrey_merged: That’s a great name. It’s a great name. Eric: Oh, I have a, I have a, I have a, note, uh, filled with band titles. Like jeffrey_merged: oh yeah, Eric: I, I, have like dozens, dozens. Brett: That is the hardest part jeffrey_merged: thing in the world. That’s like, it’s amazing. Any band survives naming itself? Brett: so I had a band in high school that was called Moom man auto, which isn’t a horrible name, but it, it came about because we had spent weeks. [00:02:00] Arguing over what we should call our band. And eventually we had a chemistry book and the authors of the book were Moom man and Otto, and we’re like, fuck it. We’re that’s, that’s our name? jeffrey_merged: like an academic paper reference. Brett: with two man with two ends. And we kept that. We kept it like straight up Moom man auto jeffrey_merged: That’s amazing. That’s good. Like, um, my wife and I were, were reminiscing of the, the heyday of the very long band name. Like, um, I love you, but I have chosen darkness or there was a band in, which is an amazing name. There was a band in Minneapolis called Siegels screaming. Kiss her, kiss her Normalize sleeping at shows Brett: or God speed. You black Eric: I That’s the one I was just thinking of. Yep. jeffrey_merged: Yeah. I mean Brett: felt I fell asleep at that show. jeffrey_merged: Well, that’s actually nice sleeping music in my Brett: it is, it is. I got those, uh, the, the seats at front row behind the glass up by the bar.[00:03:00] jeffrey_merged: Ooh. Brett: Uh, what did I did I say at first a jeffrey_merged: yeah, yeah. Brett: first a that, that sounded weird in my head. jeffrey_merged: didn’t say a club. I don’t think, but I could be Brett: at first Ave up, uh, behind the plexiglass on the, on the, on the balcony level. Um, and I just sat there in a bar stool and fell asleep and it was a pleasant nap. I, I can’t complain. I like, I like got speed. Just jeffrey_merged: the, the idea of like napping at shows is really, we’ve really missed a chance culturally, to make that a norm. Like, I just feel like I’ve fallen asleep. I love going to see classical music and I will often fall asleep at some point. And it’s the nicest little nap in the world. Eric: An expensive one, but I jeffrey_merged: super expensive. Well, I’m awake for most of it, you know, but they always play a couple things. You didn’t come for, you know, like any band Brett: it’s PLE it’s pleasant to wake up and realize you’re in the middle of a, a, show you wanted to see. It’s a, it’s a great way to wake. jeffrey_merged: that [00:04:00] is max Richter has a, the composer has an album called sleep. That’s a, that’s the actual composition is like 24 hours long and Eric: Oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah. jeffrey_merged: And the idea is you do go and you sleep to it. Um, which is just like, awesome. Eric: I feel like it’s in an app literally called sleep. I could jeffrey_merged: there is actually an app for it. Yeah, totally. Brett: we need to add this show. No, it’s max Richter. jeffrey_merged: Max Richter sleep. Yeah. I mean, I actually was just, I just took a, uh, late morning nap to it cause I was feeling a little under the weather. It’s my napping. Totally. My napping music. Anyway, Eric, um, people who have listened to Brett podcasts have, have met you before, but I was wondering if you could kind of introduce yourself, Meet Rabbi Eric Linder (again) Eric: Yeah. So, uh, I’m a rabbi in Athens, Georgia. I’ve been here 10 years, uh, decided to be a rabbi. The, the, the joke I tell people is when I realized I would not be the saxophonist for James Brown, I decided to be a rabbi, but, uh, jeffrey_merged: so, [00:05:00] Eric: right. It was one or the other, no, nothing else. Uh, I started college as a music major on saxophone. And, um, you know, I grew up what I’ll call fairly mainline reform Judaism. So reform Judaism is a, is a denomination of Judaism that, uh, leans more to the liberal side. And I was active in youth group. And I, I, I made friends in Hebrew school. I went to undergrad at university of Florida and got involved in some Jewish activities there with Hillel and other things like that. But it was really when I went to a summer camp, which is actually just about an hour from Athens in near a small town called Helen Georgia. Have either of you been there by chance? jeffrey_merged: no. Eric: It’s a weird little town. It’s a very touristy, it’s like a, it looks like a Bulgarian. Dollhouse has come to life and you’re walking around in it, like Google pictures of Helen, Georgia. You’ll jeffrey_merged: Okay. Okay. Eric: Um, and lots of like fudge places and funnel cakes and jeffrey_merged: Yeah. [00:06:00] Okay. I get it. I get it. I’m starting to a, picture’s starting to form. Eric: you go. Um, and so there’s a Jewish summer camp, uh, very close to there that I went to as a counselor. And that kind of started this journey for me. And now I’ve been a rabbi 16 years, I think. jeffrey_merged: 16 years. Eric: yeah, it’s crazy. Uh, started in Omaha, Nebraska at a synagogue. There had a wonderful jeffrey_merged: way I, I have, most of my working life is spent in Omaha. Eric: Oh, funny. jeffrey_merged: you where we’re in Omaha. Eric: Oh, right. I mean right in the heart of it, I was, uh, in Dundee. jeffrey_merged: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Eric: and still have lots of good friends there and, uh, keep in touch with folks. And then I moved here to Athens and like two weeks after I moved here, I met the woman. That would be my wife, which is hysterical because I, Athens is the smallest Jewish community I’ve ever lived in. So like, it, it is, I mean, I, I went to rabbinical school in New York, New York city, and then Omaha is about 5,000 Jews. And then [00:07:00] Athens, nobody, if you don’t count students, it’s probably 500 or so. I mean, nobody really knows, of course. And you know, I had this vision of being on J date and like driving to Atlanta, you know, once or twice a week, going on these blind dates and was not excited about that prospect. And, you know, I met Emily, uh, through a congregant at a retirement party and now we have two kids and that That’s it, jeffrey_merged: That’s Brett: Was it, one of those, you, you need to meet my, my neighbor or my daughter kind of Eric: No. She walked into this party and I was, and I asked, um, the person who retired his wife, I said, Lauren, do you know who this woman is? She said, yes. And she’s recently single and Jewish and stereotypically, my wife does not present as looking Jewish. She’s tall blonde hair, blue eyes. So, um, jeffrey_merged: Yeah. Awesome. So you’re like, yes. Okay. Yes, the signals were not there, but now I know. Where, where did [00:08:00] you go to school? In New York. Eric: It’s so it’s called Hebrew union college is the seminary and it’s right by NYU, downtown fourth and Broadway jeffrey_merged: My, um, My, wife went to union theological seminary up near Columbia Eric: sure. jeffrey_merged: and, uh, and took some classes across the street. Um, at the what, what is the school across Eric: J JTS. jeffrey_merged: the JTS. Yeah. Jewish theological Eric: what did, what did she take there? Like what jeffrey_merged: She, um, well she was studying theologies of evil and, uh, and also feminist theology. Uh she’s like she likes to party, you know, Eric: Well, it’s like my wife’s specialty is PTSD and sexual trauma. It’s jeffrey_merged: See. Yeah. Yeah. So I can picture already the books that lay around the house. Like that was, I remember when she, we had our first child living in New York city when she was still in school. And, um, and, and it was almost like he was waiting for her to finish this paper on evil. It was just literally just a paper on evil. And, um, and she had a book laying [00:09:00] around that. Just the biggest word you could see on it was just evil, you know, and she’s like waiting for this baby to come. And it was like, as soon as she handed in that paper, she started going into labor and within hours we were in a taxi going to the hospital. I was like, just needed that, that evil paper Eric: That’s right. Just get it out. Get it. jeffrey_merged: don’t wanna bring that into the whole labor process. Anyhow. That’s awesome. Eric: the Odyssey is one of my favorite Tencent words that, you know, jeffrey_merged: a good tenent word, that’s a 25% word, but you, okay. So you’re a rabbi and I’m looking at you and, and like Brett, you have framed black and white pictures in musical instruments behind you. Um, so can you tell, tell me, tell us a little bit about that. Eric: Yeah. So, you know, music has always been huge for me. I mean, I, I, honest to God, remember when I was in sixth grade and going to like the, some open house for people interested in band, and I picked out the saxophone purely because it had a lot of buttons and I just, I liked the mechanics of it. And, [00:10:00] um, I’ve always found joy in listening to music, learning about music, certainly playing it. Uh, it’s a huge part of what draws me to Judaism, what both drew me in and in terms of, I guess, how I present Judaism, if that makes sense, you know, through music and, and through musical teachings. Um, so yeah, I have this studio in my basement. It’s it’s, as my wife likes to make fun. It’s one of my man caves that she’s allowed me. Um, but yeah, it’s a lot of fun down here. A lot of electronic keyboards and drums and, and stuff jeffrey_merged: Yeah. What’s the other cave. Eric: So the other cave is, yeah, well, so next to it is, well, it, it could be my study. It’s, it’s, it’s become a bourbon room just to my left that uh, that’s it’s the combination of pandemic and children somehow that. Um, and then I have a, a whole video game. Well, it’s, it’s the general playroom, but, [00:11:00] um, jeffrey_merged: all right, hold on. Let’s just, let’s talk about that. Let’s talk about the video game room. Brett: I wanna, I wanna point out one thing because nobody can see it, but the lighting in the man cave, you’re currently in with all the musical instruments, you have some like maybe Scots lighting going on. It’s gorgeous. you have the best jeffrey_merged: It’s true. It’s true. Brett: ever seen. Eric: that you say that Brett, because it’s because a lot of bulbs are they’re all BR 30, like flood lights. But literally there’s only three on, because they’re all burned out. The electrician was here last week. Brett: It looks beautiful. Eric: speaking of like stereotypical Jewish guy that doesn’t know anything about, you know, electronics. I have the electrician here thinking like it’s some complicated mistake with wiring. He’s like, these bulbs are bad. jeffrey_merged: Oh, right, Eric: Here’s $150 to tell me that. Thank you. jeffrey_merged: That’s amazing. And a little bourbon. That’s incredible. Okay. So you have a, a video game room. It is. It is. How old are your kids? Eric: at two and a half in six [00:12:00] months. jeffrey_merged: So this is truly your video game room. Let’s hear about it. Eric: but it will be theirs. It will. jeffrey_merged: sure. Of course. That’s why That’s uh, it’s it’s under that, that you, uh, build it, right? Like, yeah. Yeah. I build this future for my children. Um, so what’s the what’s what’s what would I see if I walk in Eric: Oh yeah. I mean, Xbox PlayStation. Um, I’ve been playing with, uh, you know, about the Phillips hubs. So I have a sync box. So if I’m really feeling geeky, I can sync the lights to the TV and the jeffrey_merged: Nice, nice. That’s awesome. Do you have the, do you have the PlayStation five or do you have me too, but nobody else it’s like my, my poor teenagers are like, I wanna play with people on this thing, but nobody has it. Eric: Yeah. So we’re, we’re in Jeff. Let, let, jeffrey_merged: yes. do it. You gotta get got lucky. Got lucky. Um, do you do any, do you mess with any vintage video game stuff? Eric: like, like jeffrey_merged: gaming either? Just like, yeah. Any, any [00:13:00] interpretation of Eric: yeah, so I have emulators, I actually have an arcade cabinet that I, I got from myself. Um, Brett: the question right there is, do you have an arcade Eric: or something. Yeah. jeffrey_merged: yeah. I, um, hold on. I’m gonna grab something, Eric: Yeah. Tell me everything. Brett: while, while he’s running off, have you seen the go V lighting stuff? Eric: No. Brett: It’s super affordable compared to hu. And you can like hook it up to a microphone and have like rope lights and, and back lights, all like dance to music. It’s actually really good. Eric: Go V. Brett: G O V Eric: Okay, look, look it up. jeffrey_merged: So I built this for my kids out of a like ancient electronics project box, uh, that I got at this amazing surplus store called Axman in town. And everybody I’m just holding up like kind of a joy, it’s a joystick with a bunch of bunch of buttons and it actually has a. Eric: fighter. Uh, jeffrey_merged: has [00:14:00] that look. And it has like a seven inch screen that, uh, is actually normally hooked up to it. But I’m upgrading it. Brett: to a 10 inch. jeffrey_merged: uh, no, I’m upgrading the electronics inside and, and putting speakers in and Eric: so is it a raspberry pie or jeffrey_merged: yeah, it has a raspberry pie in it. I’m totally obsessed, um, with them anyway. Well, you have a lot of fun rooms in your house. Um, that’s great. Eric: yes. So that’s something else that right when I got here, um, met now a very dear friend, who’s the one of the, uh, heads of our band and found out I played sex and I sat in with the band and, and it’s great, cuz there’s obviously overlap culturally with Judaism, but you know, a lot of congregants come to our shows and it’s just a nice way to integrate with the community and, and be involved in the music scene and all that stuff jeffrey_merged: That’s awesome. So how did you and Brett meet. Eric: we met because I annoyed him on Twitter. I think I just had Brett: sounds about right. Eric: OmniFocus questions, [00:15:00] automation, Brett: Yeah. You hired Eric: apple script. Brett: you, you you hired me as a consultant for some of your crazier scripting stuff. And eventually, like, it got to a point where I was like attending your temple services and I wasn’t charging you anymore. Eric: Yeah, Jeff, be careful. well, yeah, I mean, I think I was asking you all these questions and you were so nice and responding and I just, I was like, you know what, rather than like one at a time and, you know, ignoring you at all hours, can I hire you for an hour and, you know, pay you for this expertise is jeffrey_merged: I basically did the same thing. Brett: is the way you worm your way into Brett’s life is, uh, jeffrey_merged: That’s how you end up on his podcast. I also like the idea that apple script is like the gateway to converting to Judaism. I mean, you all know how someone says they’re doing apple script, you know what they mean? Eric: that’s somewhere jeffrey_merged: yeah, that’s right. That’s right. [00:16:00] Well, should we do, uh, should we do our mental health corner? Brett: Yeah, let’s let’s let’s do that. And then we’ll, we’ll hit a sponsor then, then I kind of wanna talk about like an atheist attending temple. Mental Health Corner jeffrey_merged: perfect. Sounds good. Um, it’s a, it doesn’t have to be, how is your mental health? It can be a mental health checking of any sort. Uh, you, you wanna start you, are you feeling, are you feeling really brave? Eric? Eric: I mean, I, I could start, I I’ve listened to you all a few times. I, I. um, I have a sense of what’s happening even regardless of my mental health. Um, so we’re actually, it’s a, we’re actually in a, a super interesting time in the Jewish calendar. Um, we’re right before our Jewish high holidays of Han and Kippur Han actually starts Sunday. And the month prior to Rohan, it’s called Elul is meant as a time for introspection and really kind of thinking about your life and your [00:17:00] priorities and what a lot of people do. My myself included is try and have either a meditation or reading for everyday of Elul that either focuses on an aspect of introspection or forgiveness, which is another huge theme. And so in many ways, mental health, you know, in kind of capital letters is what this month is about. Um, at the, as a rabbi though, I don’t know that my mental health is as balanced as Judaism kind of would want it to be because I’m, you know, I’m trying to promote, it’s like a physician healed myself kind of situation where I’m, you know, giving it to the congregation hopefully, but not necessarily always taking it for myself. And so I’ve really been, especially as Roshan comes closer and closer, I’ve really tried to kind of take those themes to heart. Um, and it’s different with kids too, like just thinking about time and how, [00:18:00] you know, we’re, we’re always in a rush to get to the next thing, or certainly I am. And like my two and a half year old, if he wants to jump, doesn’t matter that dad has an appointment or, you know, or it’s lunchtime or whatever. So, um, that’s kind of, uh, where I am. And, and what I’ve been thinking about in terms of, uh, mental health lately. Brett: Yeah, jeffrey_merged: to have a framework. Eric: It is. And the other thing too, is like, without a framework, people don’t do it. Like, that’s why there’s apps. That’s why there’s like all of these methodologies, because we, it, it helps. jeffrey_merged: Yeah. Yeah, For sure. For sure. It’s funny. You mentioned the kids like I, so I have two teenage boys. Um, but when I, when the first home was born, I remember having this just in those hours after having this distinct feeling that I could see further and, and, uh, and almost like this opening of a, of a void or something, like avoid sounds like a negative connotation, but like, I felt like I could see [00:19:00] further beyond just whatever kind of shortsightedness I had been living my, my life with up until having a child. Right. But then really Brett: heard that description. jeffrey_merged: but really quickly it becomes you can’t see past your fucking nose. Right? Like, like And I think that’s such a funny, such a funny ju Eric: Absolutely. That’s a great, yeah. Brett: like, it’ll, it’ll never happen to me. I’ve taken surgical, uh, precautions to ensure that I never become a father. But when I hear people talk about like the perspective change that happens when you have a kid, uh, like I find myself very curious, like I’ve always considered myself too selfish to have children. Um, I am too obsessed with like figuring out my own life that I, I don’t feel qualified to, um, inflict my, uh, insecurities, I guess, uh, my, my lack of direction onto another [00:20:00] life form. Uh, but the response I get from people who are happy, parents is often like none of that matters. Once you have the kid, like everything changes, your, your perspective changes your, your, what you thought was selfishness then gets directed towards a new life form. I, I, that’s curious. I, believe that could be, uh, a situation. jeffrey_merged: Yeah, 10 years of 10 years of high triage will definitely the selfishness out of you. Eric: And, and to flip it too. I mean, I think there is a, not in a negative way. I, I have a whole thing on selfishness gets a bad rap sometimes, but, um, in, in a way it, your children is extension of your, of yourself. So it, it, it, it almost like it’s selfishness in that way too. Like, they are a part of you, so it’s not like you’re giving up something to be with them. Like it it’s like, it’s the same thing in a.[00:21:00] jeffrey_merged: a nice way to put it. That’s a nice way to put it. Yeah. Yeah. Having kids can also be the ultimate selfish act, right. Like Eric: I mean, yeah. I mean, like, look at, you know, overpopulation and the planet and the world. I jeffrey_merged: right, Eric: don’t, I don’t want our mental health to now go down thinking of Brett: if, if, if you want a list of all the reasons not to have kids, we can do Eric: AB it’s very easy. Very, jeffrey_merged: too late for me. Um, uh, I can, I can go. I, you know, I, um, I am just, uh, really benefiting from, uh, probably my eighth or ninth week with a new therapist. And, um, after having one for the same therapist for probably three years, she retired and I’ve mentioned this on the show before, but I, um, it is an incredible thing to generally in life. It’s an incredible thing to watch a good professional, do what they do, but it’s a really incredible thing to be held by the [00:22:00] sort of skills of a professional in the case of therapy in a way that, um, Uh, that I, in, in this case, I just, I’m noticing after years after decades of kind of circling around some of the same things, all of a sudden, I feel like I’m standing somewhere different with those things. I’m not, I haven’t healed from any issues. Not that healing is a final state. Right. But like, but, um, but I’ve just been so grateful, uh, to have this particular therapist at this particular time in my life and, um, and is a great argument for why, why we try so hard to find the right therapist in the first place, cuz it doesn’t always work. Um, I’ve had to, you know, I’ve had to let one go before, but, but it just is an amazing thing. Now that said she only does, uh, online therapy and I realized that after eight weeks or so, it is strange to not have been in a physical space with a person that you’ve shared this much with, you know [00:23:00] Eric: My therapist, I is online as well. And that’s the only way I know him. Yeah, jeffrey_merged: yeah, yeah. yeah. And, and like she’s technically savvy. Thank God. My, my retired, uh, therapist, the first, probably four to six appointments of COVID. I was doing tech support for 20 minutes of the hour and I was not actually in a good place. So I was just like, can we, can you figure this out some other fucking time Eric: Oh my God. I jeffrey_merged: can you figure this out? Uh, you know, she’s like, well, I’m just not hearing it now. And I’m, and then she got a kitten at the same time and the kitten was jumping on. It was just like, it was insane. Anyway, just grateful for that. And, and as always recommending, you know, if you feel like you’ve never been to therapy or like it’s been too long, uh, it’s so worth, it’s so worth looking into it and trying to find a match. So Brett: Oh, I can follow that up. jeffrey_merged: All right. Hit me. Brett: So, okay. My, I, I recently got a new therapist. I got a therapist. This is my [00:24:00] first real therapist. Um, and if you had talked to me last week after my weekly, like right now, I’m, I’m going every week. Um, and if you had talked to me last week, I would’ve been a lot more skeptical because I went to see him in person. Like I have the option to do either telehealth or in person visits. So I was like, I’m gonna try it in person. And I showed up and the session ended up being like, mostly we talked. Like, uh, media, uh, our favorite movies and, uh, Neil Gaman and adaptations of, of comic books into movies. And it was an intriguing conversation, but it’s not what I ever thought therapy would be about. And, and he was like, yeah, no, it’s good to just, you know, establish a, a personal base, uh, like groundwork, uh, to get to know each other. So I was like, all right, I’m, I’m gonna let this one [00:25:00] go. I’ll, I’ll pay for a, a shoot the shit session with this guy. And, and we’ll see what happens. And then this week, uh, I went back to telehealth just due to schedule and holy shit, like we, I learned so much. This week, like my therapist, he, he, he, he likes to explain things. Um, like I expected to spend a lot more time talking about myself, um, and have him nod and writing a notebook, uh, just based on what I’ve seen of therapy in movies. Um, but he, he has a lot of input on what I’m feeling and what I’m going through. And he’s actually given he’s younger than me. Uh, he actually has a lot, especially when it comes to bipolar, uh, ADHD, religious trauma, like he, he knows his shit and he proved that this last week, um, the big takeaway for me [00:26:00] was, uh, he suggested, so I quit drinking, uh, officially two years ago, had some relapses, um, and I was framing them as failures. Uh, Like just the term relapse in and of itself is a loaded term. And like with heroin, I have good reason not to do heroin. Like I ruined people’s lives with my heroin addiction. Uh, alcohol I’ve never hurt anybody. Like maybe I got in a fight once when I was a teenager. Um, cuz I was drunk, but I’ve never hurt anybody. I’ve never stolen from anybody. I’ve never, I’ve never even like emotionally injured as far as I know someone because I was drunk. So I don’t have this strong, like I can never drink again. It will hurt people. Uh, I just, I, I shouldn’t drink again because I know I’m not super [00:27:00] responsible with it and, and it’s not healthy. Like it’s, it’s bad for my teeth. It’s bad for my, my liver or whatever. And, uh, and so he, he wants me to attempt to reframe my relationship with alcohol and like the times that I have quote unquote relapsed, uh, I’ve been like, I’ve had a bottle of whiskey in the basement and, and I sneak it and I use some mouthwash and go about my life. Um, and maybe don’t sneak alcohol in the basement, maybe join my girlfriend for a glass of wine when she’s having a glass of wine and maybe, uh, attempt to drink socially and responsibly and not, not hide a bottle of whiskey in the basement. So it was a, it was a great conversation. Like we’re, we’re, I’m gonna attempt a new, a new paradigm. If it doesn’t work out, if it proves that I just cannot be responsible, then we [00:28:00] look at more drastic, like, uh, complete abstinence, but it was like, he, he. Saw me in a way that, like, if you go to a 12 step program, uh, you, you go in, you just, by showing up there, you’re admitting you have a problem. And the only option is a hundred percent abstinence. Uh, and he, and the way it’s framed is not necessarily, uh, helpful to people that might be in more of a gray area. So it was, it was enlightening. Um, I’m, I’m, I’m looking forward to this reframing of my relationship with alcohol as an attempt maybe, maybe, maybe AA is right. Maybe I don’t have a, a chance in hell of ever drinking responsibly. Maybe. Uh, gonna find out, gonna gonna test the waters. So all this to say, like the [00:29:00] guy has really, he proved himself to me in the last session that he sees me as a person, he understands where I’m coming from. And yeah, I’m really looking forward to my next session with him. Eric: that’s awesome. Yeah, that’s great. jeffrey_merged: That is so good. Brett: Yeah. jeffrey_merged: Yeah. Failure. I feel like it’s like a good, a good therapist. Helps. At least in my case, my therapists, when they’ve been good, have always been so good at stopping me when I I’m clocking myself upside the head and making me kind of open the fists and you know Brett: So, he asks me what’s the antonym of shame. And, and my answer was pride. Like the opposite of shame is pride, but he’s like, no, it’s compassion. The opposite of shame is compassion. and and I was like, holy shit. Yeah. Like the things that I have figured out, especially in relationship to my ADHD, uh, is compassion, like [00:30:00] understanding myself in a way that lets me, uh, feel compassion for that kid. You know, like to look back and say, this is life was rough for this kid. And I feel compassion for him. He wasn’t, he wasn’t lazy. He wasn’t a failure. He, he deserves compassion and, and same with like religious trauma and all of the shit that I’ve gone through with that, uh, compassion like that. That’s kind of the, the keyword. From my last session, it’s just compassion, especially self-compassion, but that translates to compassion for others. Like how can you possibly exist in the world? If you paint everyone in black and white terms, good and evil and have, have no compassion for, for people’s stories for, for where people are coming from. So that was actually a, that was kind of a, an eyeopening thing for me. Eric: Yeah. And that, that goes so much toward, uh, Jewish teaching too. Especially during this [00:31:00] time. I mean, it really does. And again, not trying to convert anyone, but just the resonance there of, you know, the, the Judaism and I mean, the high holidays as a microcosm of that is all about us moving forward. And you know, my wife, uh, we were talking before the show, she’s a therapist. Her specialty is, uh, cognitive behavioral. So like your therapist, Brett, a lot of talking, you know, it’s not the Freudian of like, yes. Tell me about yours. Brett: And how does that make you feel? Eric: Right. Exactly. But you know, the, the, I, one thing that she, her and I talk about all the time when I have, we, we, I have what we coin on. We sometimes where it’s just like the middle of the day and like, I’ll have a few hours free and I just don’t feel like doing anything and, or, or I’ll feel regret that I’m not doing anything. And, you know, we talk about all the time that like you go down that rabbit hole where then you just feel regretful or shame and, and to use your word, when you feel [00:32:00] compassion, you’re motivated maybe to do something productive or good in the world. And that’s, I mean, that’s what Judaism is all about is taking our mistakes or what seemed like failures or places where we didn’t hit the mark. And rather than beat ourselves up about it, just do better just starting today. Just do better. Brett: As a bit of backstory. Um, Eric and I, uh, we started a podcast called an atheist and a rabbi, uh, something, something, I forget exactly what the title was, but, um, Eric has always accepted that I am an atheist and has never attempted to convince me that God exists, but has offered me like what, what wisdom he can from a Jewish perspective. And he has invited me to temple and I have attended with like, as an atheist, I have attended temple and have learned from what Eric, [00:33:00] uh, I don’t, it’s not preaching. What, what is it you do at temple? Eric: I mean, if I give a preaching sermonizing Brett: It’s a sermon. It’s a sermon. Yeah, but it’s it’s you don’t have to accept God. To, to take something away from, from Eric’s temple or probably from most Jewish temples. Like, I, I don’t have a lot of experience, but like, uh, there’s been a, there’s been an understanding and I think if I’m not mistaken, you have atheist in your congregation, do you not? Eric: Oh 100% and that’s not atypical in Jewish communities either. And you know, the, the way, the, the way I frame it, I mean, I, I could go on for hours about this. I, I’m not, I promise, uh, to all the listeners, this is gonna be very short, but you, if you picture a Venn diagram with religion being one circle and God being one circle, there’s definitely an [00:34:00] overlap, but they are absolutely not the same Brett: yeah. jeffrey_merged: Yeah. That’s nicely put, Brett: What’s the, is it a lo Aloha, ALO Heim. What’s the Jewish word for God Elohim Eric: Elohim is, is one name there’s there’s many, but that’s Yeah. Brett: Yeah. I come from the church of yawe jeffrey_merged: I heard of that, dude. Um, I truly hate to do this, but we have to read a sponsor. Brett: Yes, let’s do it jeffrey_merged: minutes in Brett: Oh, man. jeffrey_merged: call it 30. Sponsor: ZocDoc Brett: So this episode is brought to you by Zoc before you book any brunch, you pour over lists and lists of reviews. So why not do the same when you’re booking a doctor’s appointment with Zoc, you can see real verified patient reviews to help find the right doctor in your network and in your neighborhood. After all finding the right doctor is just as, if not more important than finding the right [00:35:00] plate of eggs. Benedict Zoc is a free app that shows you doctors who are patient reviewed, take your insurance and, or available when you need them on Zoc. You can find every specialist under the sun when you’re trying to straighten those teeth, teeth, fixing achy back, get that mole checked out or anything else Zoc has you covered. 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Thanks. jeffrey_merged: Ding D ding, Bearing witness to ourselves jeffrey_merged: ding, you know, something that I think is really amazing about finding, being able to have compassion, especially as you were talking about it, Brett, like towards like your younger, younger self, is that when you can do that, when you find yourself able to have that compassion, you’re also bearing witness in, in a way that almost nobody else could, like, if you’re thinking I’ve had this experience recently looking at things when I was younger and, and finding some compassion for myself and understanding, or kind of making room for understanding what that [00:37:00] experience was like for me also ends up being that I serve as sort of a witness to it. Brett: define this term for define, define, bearing witness, cuz for me, that’s a loaded term coming from a fundamentalist background. jeffrey_merged: It comes from, I mean, it’s absolutely rooted in, uh, in a theological sense, right. Because it’s the idea of bearing witness to suffering, bearing witness to, you know, what, what is true about somebody, um, that maybe that person can’t see or bearing witness to a system that is, that is doing something to people that, you know, so it really does have its roots. Cuz the idea is like if it’s seen then all that, all that needs to happen can happen once it’s seen. Right? Brett: Yeah. Yeah. jeffrey_merged: It’s my sermon for the day. Eric: That’s a good one. No it is. And you know, people forget too, forgiving yourself is as important as forgiving others. Brett: That, that I have [00:38:00] definitely learned, like the thing that has allowed me to move forward, um, like getting ADHD and bipolar diagnoses were huge for me. Um, they gave me an understanding of why my life has gone the way it’s gone. Um, but the process of forgiving myself, the process, like even day to day, like, like you were talking about, like you have some free time and you feel guilty about all the things you don’t feel like doing and being able to forgive yourself, being able to find that compassion. Is what leads to actually doing something worthwhile. Um, and from, so from like a, a grand scheme of things, forgiving childhood me to like forgiving me for not feeling like doing this, this thing that maybe needs to be done. Maybe it’s just an idea that I wish I could bring to fruition. Uh, but I just don’t have the [00:39:00] motivation and finding that forgiveness really leads to actual like productivity. Eric: And all, you know, I, I also, I, I, I think I’m hearing my wife in my ear too. Like, it doesn’t mean anything we do is okay. And like, you know, just like you could do anything and you’re just like, it’s okay. Just forgive yourself. But don’t let that mistake be kind of, you know, is a biblical phrase, uh, from the Torah, uh, be a stumbling block for the blind. Like don’t let that mistake stop you from then doing the right thing or doing better. And that’s really the, the key, I think. Brett: Yeah, Eric: Which of course is easier to say than to do. I mean, I, I say, you know, rabbis often write the sermons that like they need to hear, and that is 100% true for me as, so I’m by no means. Am I like preaching to you here? Brett: I can tell you, my girlfriend is a yoga instructor and she often leads the class that she needs [00:40:00] for her body at that Brett’s weekend plans (including dinner with Jeff!) Brett: time. Um, can I tell you about my weekend plans? jeffrey_merged: Of course Eric: Sure. Brett: So, so I’ve decided to start taking like foodie trips. Um, I watch enough food shows it’s become like my new porn, uh, is to watch like Hulu and Netflix food shows and. And to, to really explore my palette. And I live in a small town. We have very few restaurant choices. We have some actually amazing sushi considering we’re in like landlocked fucking Midwest. Um, the, like the, we have two great sushi restaurants in a town of 30,000 people, but we don’t have much else. And, uh, so, and I have a lot of dietary restrictions. Like I am sensitive to gluten and dairy and uh, if I eat [00:41:00] either of those things, I end up, I, I pay for it. I won’t go into details, but I pay for it. Um, and I have decided to take like weekend vacations where I ignore my dietary restrictions and just plan to pay for them in the next week and go to cities with like a lot of food options and. Eat and just for two days, just breakfast, lunch, and dinner, just find the best restaurants available and, and eat the food that I want to eat. I have some savings, like I’ve been working a corporate job for over a year now. I’ve, I’ve saved up some cash and I feel like eating is what makes me happiest. Uh, I appreciate a good meal in a way that is almost religious. And, uh, so, so my first trip this weekend, uh, I leave, I leave today. I’m headed to [00:42:00] Minneapolis. Um, I have, I have dates set up for. Friday dinner, Saturday lunch, Saturday dinner, Sunday, breakfast and Sunday lunch. I’m still looking for a date for Saturday breakfast. Uh, but one of my, one of my stops will be Mr. Jeff severances. Gunzel uh, we have a, we have a dinner date on Saturday and, and I am very much looking forward to just like, I basically, I put it on, on Twitter. Like if I came to your city, where would you take me? and and I got a lot of feedback from, from people that are like, uh, so I’m gonna go to Portland. I think my next trip is to Portland because, because I am vegetarian. And Portland is considered the most like vegan friendly city for culinary arts in the country. And, and I could go to [00:43:00] Portland and eat. like gluten free vegan the whole weekend and, and, and always have great food. But, um, I’m finding even Minneapolis, which is just a two hour drive for me, uh, is full of, is full of jeffrey_merged: we got your vegans buddy. Brett: Well, jeffrey_merged: they, Dr. They, they ride really tall bikes, just like in Portland. Brett: I’m, gonna be honest. I’m willing to cheat, like I’ve already decided I’m not gonna worry about gluten and dairy. I’m I’m gonna pay the price for that. And when it comes to, if, if, if there is a Cuban pork sandwich that is calling my name, I’m gonna fucking eat it. These Eric: one for you in Athens, Georgia, Brett. Brett: these, these weekends are, are guilt free eat, good food and, and good food may include meat. And I’m willing, I’m willing to cheat just on these weekends, which will not be [00:44:00] a regular thing. And I would always prefer to eat meat that is ethically sourced, but that said like these weekends are a free for all for me. jeffrey_merged: I’ll tell you where I’m taking you, because you say you don’t mind, like in your words, cheating, but if you’re, I don’t wanna be part of putting meat in you, if it doesn’t make you feel good. So there’s a, there’s actually this place called trio plant based and it’s a black run vegan soul food place. And I say black run because in this town, if it’s vegan soul food, it was likely to be white up Brett: Right? Sure. jeffrey_merged: but it’s just an, it is incredible. I’m not vegan. I was back in the day. I’m not vegan. I love this place. Brett: All right. I’m in. jeffrey_merged: you’re gonna love it. Brett: That sounds amazing. There’s a, there souled in Chicago was the first, first vegan soul food I ever had. And it was before I was even vegan. I had souled in Chicago and was like, holy shit. jeffrey_merged: I love a vegan restaurant where, where I’m like, oh, I’ll go eat there [00:45:00] anytime. I don’t even think about the fact that it’s vegan. No offense. It’s all. It’s cool, man. Vegan’s cool. Eric: Yeah, jeffrey_merged: don’t, Brett: I am I, jeffrey_merged: ride with it anymore, but Brett: so I am pescatarian. I just wanna be totally honest. I eat eggs and cheese and I will eat fish. Um, so I am far from vegan. I am, I am three points away from being an actual vegan, but given my, uh, my allergy to gluten and dairy, it’s easiest to just say I’m vegan. Um, cuz that automatically excludes dairy and there’s a lot of gluten free vegan available. Um, but yes, uh, there’s a, there’s a breakfast joint in Minneapolis that I’ve forgotten it’s on the west bank earth, something earth. Uh, but they, it was the first place they ever had like a vegan omelet jeffrey_merged: Oh, I know what you’re thinking of. and the name is totally escaping me, but yeah, I Brett: [00:46:00] and they, you, you can give any name you want to, um, and they will call it over this little loud speaker system they have set up and I would always give my name as you and the bushes. jeffrey_merged: It’s because , Hey you in the bushes, uh it’s. You’re thinking of their dish, the like whole green Brett: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. jeffrey_merged: why I can’t, you know, friend of the show Danny glamor worked there, Brett: Oh really? That makes sense. jeffrey_merged: Back in the day. um, yeah, that’s a good place for vegan and also not Brett: Wait. It may be where I go Saturday morning sands jeffrey_merged: right. Yeah. Maybe, maybe we could talk Daniel into it. Um, alright. Eric: get someone to run services I’ll I’ll come to jeffrey_merged: You’ll come. You’ll come. This is gotta get a sub Brett: So Eric, Eric is coming to Minneapolis in December and we will, I will actually, I will absolutely be coming to meet him and, and we will get a meal. Uh, but I’m also willing to visit Athens Georgia. I’ve [00:47:00] I’ve had some great food in Georgia. Like my brother went to college in Savannah Eric: Oh, yeah. Brett: currently lives in Atlanta and every time I’ve been there, I’ve had great food. Um, is Athens near the coast? Eric: No, no. And the, the Savannah is actually one of the closest beaches, which is like six hours away. Brett: Okay. Okay. jeffrey_merged: from the coast. That’s right. I forget. Eric: I know it’s weird. My geography is horrible. I just know that that’s how long it took GPS to take us to Savannah. jeffrey_merged: right, right, right. well, Brett, I think that sounds like an exciting, uh, what sounds like a year you’re gonna have, uh, going places and Brett: I’m, I’m I’m gonna keep saving up money. I’m I’m gonna try not to dip too far into my savings to do this. Uh, but flying is expensive these days. Um, even trains are expensive these days, so I gotta kinda gotta kinda figure out the best way to stretch my [00:48:00] budget, to eat the best food possible without, you know, digging into my, my retirement fund, I guess. Grapptitude (with a pre-game) jeffrey_merged: Brett, can I do a pre GRAT tube gratitude Brett: Yeah. jeffrey_merged: it’s to you? Um, I have finally started creating how it build notes in all of my repositories, um, and in a few other places on my computer. And it’s all been part of this effort. Brett knows this well that I’ve had this kind of, it’s almost like a nervous Twitch that causes me to clean install my computer once every couple, few months. Um, and usually what happens is I, I just, I don’t know what it is. I like going through the process of just kind of building things back up. I usually build some new system in the process, whatever, but it’s very destructive overall, um, to do this. And I think, and I believe connected to my now medicated, bipolar. Um, so I haven’t, this one was totally different, right. [00:49:00] So I did the, like the reinstall, but I’m building everything so mindfully, so Brett has this. I don’t know, called a utility, which called it. Brett: tool a tool, a TT tool, jeffrey_merged: a TT tool, um, it called house it, and it’s just, you know, Brett classic, Brett style. It’s a plain text file that you put into some repository where that involves you. You know, like say I imagine it like this. It’s a, it’s a, it’s a folder. It’s a project that I, I, I go to maybe every few months and every time I go to it, I have to remember some sequence of events, uh, to kind of get it running again, especially with the repository, you know, I gotta make sure the environment is ready and have I, do I have everything installed that needs to be installed and have I configured, you know, where I need to configure. And that can really, really freeze me up when it comes time to revisit. Um, a project, especially something like that lives in a repository, something that’s sort of code based, command based, that kind of thing. And so this time, Brett, when I [00:50:00] rebuilt my system, I just paused everything. Once I had all my repos in and, you know, I had successfully kind of gone through, you know, I, I have web scrapers that run from my investigative work and stuff like that. So I kind of touched everything. And then I was like, all right, no further, I’m writing a house. It file for each of these. So that the next time I blow up my computer system, if I decide to, I can at least get to this point very quickly. Um, and generally what I’m doing, because I don’t believe that I can stop myself from wanting to. Clean install my computer. I don’t know what it is. Uh, I’m I’ve decided instead to just make sure that as I rebuild it every time I sort of systematize it so that I kind of defeat, um, this part of me that wants to just like knock all the Legos over, you know, and , and I can just kind of build it back up, uh, again, as needed. And then assuming that I can beat this thing where I’m constantly, you know, knocking the Legos over, it just becomes useful and meaningful because it will be three months between touching a certain repository [00:51:00] or whatever. And so the ability to have through a text file create a sort of interaction, which is like, what part do you wanna do? Do you wanna set the environment? Do you wanna run the script? Do you wanna clean up after the script? Right? It’s just been it’s Brett: The jeffrey_merged: as always. Brett: yeah. Yeah. The time, the time that I write the most build notes is that first time I come after three months and touch a project and cannot remember how, how it works and, and immediately I’ll figure it out. And as I figure it out, I’ll document it in a build notes file for how’s it in the future. But yeah, like you have to, you have to forget once before you realize how important it is to document, and then in the process of figuring it back out, you document what you figured out and then you never have to do it again in, jeffrey_merged: Yep. Yeah. And it’s nice. Cuz like my process is I, I open up a build file and I just make a bulleted list of everything I needed to do. And [00:52:00] then I just start writing it in. You’re incredibly simple syntax. Um, it’s beautiful. Brett: I’m glad. I’m glad to hear. I’m glad to hear it. Serving someone else as well to serve me. jeffrey_merged: Oh my God. How’s it. I love it. That’s my deal. Eric: It’s like two standard deviations above my comprehension. The markdown tools, breast markdown tools are about my, my speed. jeffrey_merged: yes, no. I, I relate to that. Like I’ve only in the last year, uh, is this something that I’m even able to handle? You know what I mean? Like, so I’ve always like, groked Brett’s tools, but been like, uh, I wish I was doing the kind of project where I could use that. but slowly but surely I’m getting there. Brett: should we, uh, should we segue into your aptitude jeffrey_merged: absolutely. Brett: first? We have another sponsor. jeffrey_merged: Oh, we do. Oh, you’re making this up. You make a Brett: I’m just making this up. This episode is brought to you by atheist Judaism. jeffrey_merged: Hmm. [00:53:00] I have Eric: There’s another joke in there. Something will come to me. Brett: Do you believe in God? No. Try atheist Judaism. jeffrey_merged: You know, in my world of, you know, my wife went to seminary, so lots of friends who became pastors and, and the like, um, and then I come from sort of Minneapolis, punk rocks. So a lot of atheists in the, in the house, I I’m gonna make an, an observation that I don’t think is all that, um, Wild, but I was thinking about it as you were speaking with Eric Brett about atheist and the congregation, is that in my experience, if I am sitting with an atheist, I feel far further from that person who is, you know, maybe preaching in a pulpit than I do from, from the atheist, if I’m sitting next to the preacher of the pulpit. Um, I, I think that sometimes the, the construct of atheism, [00:54:00] which can be, I think in sometimes some cases very protective in nature, right. Especially if you’ve had religious trauma and I am not saying this is what happened to you. I don’t know. Right. But I think it can sometimes make it feel that there’s a thicker wall than there is. And I say that as somebody who is. Any more comfortable saying, I believe in God than I am saying. I don’t believe in God, so I’m not coming. I’m coming. Literally. I find myself in the middle of atheists and, and believers of some form or another all the time. And that’s how it always feels. It just feels like sometimes the wall is a little higher because my friends who are atheist and it had, they got to it after much harm. Brett: yeah. jeffrey_merged: and, and so they’ve built this fortress called atheism that is fully understandable, right? Brett: that’s the thing is like my initial, like atheism absolutely was a protection. Uh, it, when it started for me, like basically this, [00:55:00] this idea of God has hurt me enough has caused me. Uh, pain in my life that I refuse to believe in it. And over time it has become a far more intellectual thing. Um, like I, I refuse to believe without evidence and, and for fantastic claims, you need fantastic evidence and, and it has become more, it has become more scholarly, but yeah, absolutely. It was, it was a defense mechanism at first and, uh, in the process, like over the years, I have found great connection with people like Eric, uh, and as well as like even Baptist preachers, like every kind of denomination, the clergy are the people who have actually questioned. This shit and, and have, have come up with their own [00:56:00] answers and their own justifications for believing. And I have always been able to have a conversation with clergy in a way that I cannot with the average parishioner. Um, and, and it’s, it’s, um, like I, I can’t connect with someone unless they have truly questioned the existence of God, uh, the validity of religion. And, and if they have, and they have come to their own conclusions, I’m in, let’s talk. Let’s let’s, we don’t have to debate, like, you’re not gonna change my mind. I’m not gonna change your mind, but let’s talk about experiences and that’s always been fruitful for. Eric: And, you know, I have so much to say about this would be, I guess it would be weird if I didn’t. Right. But you know, the first thing is, you know, Jeff, what, what you really beautifully describe? It reminds me of. You know, in [00:57:00] many ways the, the power that clergy has and in many ways, destructive, I mean, I, I hear stories from people who want to convert to Judaism. You know, oftentimes it’s, it’s purely from a theological kind of, um, intellectual, spiritual place, but, but other times it is from, you know, they came out as gay and got kicked out of the church or, you know, all things like that. Um, and so I wouldn’t say it was a motivating factor in me becoming a rabbi because thankfully I, I did have positive experiences. I mean, certainly nothing traumatic. Um, But it, I I’m reminded of that all of the time of kind of the power of clergy, especially with younger people and things like that. The other thing too, I think about a lot with atheism is, you know, for me, this kind of litmus test, I think of the movie contact, you know, when Jodi foster is not allowed because she doesn’t believe in God, like [00:58:00] first, like you have to define God to even make it a meaningful question. Like to say, I believe in God and be like, Ooh, thank goodness. They believe in God. Like what does that even mean? Brett: Who who’s God. Eric: yeah. And you know, something I do with kids a lot and frankly, adults too, is I ask the question, what kind of God do you believe in? And what kind of God don’t you believe in? Because when I talk to people that, you know, will describe themselves as atheists or die hard atheists or something like that, I’ll say, well, what kind of God, don’t you believe in? And more often than not, that’s the same kind of God, I don’t believe in. And then the, and then, um, the, the last thing I’ll say is, you know, I, I respect Richard Dawkins a lot. I, I read a lot of, you know, some of his science books before he became kind of this, the, you know, the atheist spokesperson, Brett: Poster boy. Yeah, Eric: But, you know, I, I, I call this new crop of atheists and this might be a [00:59:00] little bit tongue in cheek, but angry atheists. Right. And Brad, I don’t see you as an angry atheist. And I, as a matter of fact, I didn’t coin this term. I, I heard, uh, Jennifer, Michael, heck, who’s an incredible poet and author jeffrey_merged: Oh Eric: it. Um, you know, like you can be a spiritual atheist. Without even question. Like, I don’t think that I don’t describe myself that way, but I absolutely think one can be, and one can find joy in religion and meaning in religion. And again, that, that separation sometimes of religion and God, and, you know, Judaism specifically, there’s a, without giving a full blown sermon right now that in the Tom mode, there’s this quote that’s attributed to God that says better. They follow my laws than, than believe in me. And it’s like, that says it right there. And it’s, you know, it’s that it it’s a little bit of a gross metaphor, but there is some truth in it. Otherwise it wouldn’t exist of, you know, Christianity is a religion of creed, whereas Judaism is a [01:00:00] religion of deed. Again, there’s so much to unpack there, but there’s something to it. Brett: So to, to any atheist of my ilk is technically an agnostic. Um, we, we require evidence. We, we are willing to change our opinions based on evidence. We cannot disprove the existence of God. We just cannot prove the existence of God. So we refuse to accept what we cannot prove, but we do not discount the idea that if the correct evidence were presented, we might believe in a God, whether we worship that God is, you know, a question that remains to be seen. It depends on the qualities of that, God, but we are, we are technically a, uh, agnostic and we, we’re not angry atheist. We are simply people who require, [01:01:00] uh, fantastic evidence for fantastic claims. Um, yeah. jeffrey_merged: There’s a, I don’t normally just pull out Jewish theologian quotes, but there happens to be one that I, that I’ve loved forever from Joshua Heshel. And it’s the, the high something that the higher point of spiritual living is not to AMA a wealth of information, but to face sacred moments. And I love that because it, for me that pulls me right out of the muck of like, of my own muck of what is God and what is, you know, whatever. And it’s just kind of like that, that idea of like reentering yourself around sacred moments and whatever that similar to you. Like, you define it, you define what a sacred, you know, for yourself, you define what a sacred moment is. And I like that as a sort of, I like those kinds of, um, those kinds of invitations into the, in between spaces. Eric: Yeah, absolutely. And Heschel’s very good. Uh, for anyone listening, he’s eminently [01:02:00] readable whether you’re Jewish or not, whatever your belief system is. And Yeah. jeffrey_merged: yeah, I think that book was the Sabbath. I Eric: Yeah. I would imagine it is, which is also very short, jeffrey_merged: yeah. Super. I know exactly right. That’s why it’s the one I know. I mean that, that’s the, the great thing about my wife being both a therapist and having gone to seminary is she leaves great books laying around Eric: I love that Brett: I think you found the episode title invitations to the, in between. jeffrey_merged: that’s right. That’s right. Eric: also. Good band name. jeffrey_merged: that is a good band name, actually. Brett: Put that one in the notebook. jeffrey_merged: yeah, exactly. Allt. Who wants to go first? Brett: go first. I’m jeffrey_merged: All right. Brett: MailMate so there are so many email programs out there these days. Uh, you got your air mail and you got your spark and you got like every possible and they’re so many of them are beautiful. They’re just like. Aesthetic pleasures to use, but if you want actual power, if you [01:03:00] want actual smart folders, if you want actual filters, if you want actual keyboard shortcuts that are truly configurable MailMate is the way to go. And I am not only an owner of MailMate like I paid the one time fee, but I enjoy it so much that I became a MailMate patron and pay a monthly subscription fee. In addition, you can purchase it one time and you own it and, and you can actually use it for free without purchasing it. It, he has very lax standards as to what a supporter is. Uh, but I am all in on mail mate and, and I pay, I pay monthly. Uh, just to support the power. It’s not pretty, it’s not a pretty application. Um, it is, it’s very much like if you imagine a Java app from like, uh, maybe 2015, uh, it kind of feels like that it, it is, it’s [01:04:00] not a Java app. It is, it uses all it’s, it’s a cocoa app, but, uh, but if you are, you know, into the airmail kind of aesthetic, you’re not gonna be pleased with it. Um, but, but like the trade off for the power, it provides the kind of smart mailboxes you can set up using this app. The kind of filtering you can set up is above and beyond any other email application available. So my pick is MailMate. jeffrey_merged: Can Eric: to open their webpage and it’s hanging maybe. So is everybody else? jeffrey_merged: It’s that Java, uh, two things I really love about MailMate as a user. One is just an instant thing you notice by accident, which is if you click on a subject, um, in an email, uh, in just the list of emails, it will immediately pop up a, a. Sub sort of folder of all of the emails with that, um, subject line. And same, [01:05:00] if you, if you just like double click on a person’s name, you just get all their emails. It’s like, it’s really, it’s a really fast way to kind of get through the muck. And the other thing I do, which may make people choke out there is about once a year I go through and MailMate has a way that I can just download all attachments from all mail. And I put it into a folder that’s very clearly labeled all attachments. And I have found that that has saved me so many times when I’m like trying to come up with something at the, I knew was in my email like six months ago, you know, but I’m not quick enough in a meeting to search it. I can, I can count on this weird folder that I should just have not indexed, you know, Brett: right. Eric: and. Brett: has extensions. It has bundles. Like if you, if you were ever a text bank, user, you’re familiar with bundles and it ha it has a whole bundle architecture. I built my own, plus it has integrations with like Adam busy, Cal calendar, E filer, fantastical lighthouse, macve [01:06:00] sublime, OmniFocus pigments, uh, for syntax highlighting, uh, vs code. Like it can do it, it integrates with everything and it’s it’s so much fun. Eric: And it doesn’t bother you that it’s not on iOS Brett: Um, so I use spark on iOS. Eric: without a keyboard. Brett: So I don’t use Eric: Brett. And I had this whole text chain spark doesn’t auto complete email addresses. If you’re using a keyboard jeffrey_merged: oh my God. Brett: like you have to tap the screen. It’s jeffrey_merged: Wow. Brett: ideal, jeffrey_merged: Wow. Brett: but I don’t use a keyboard with iOS. Like I barely use my iPad. Um, I, I need the spark on iOS. I can, again, with a little fining, integrate it with the way that I use, uh, MailMate on my Mac and, and it suits my purposes. If I were [01:07:00] primarily an iOS person, it would be a lot more grading, but iOS is kind of an afterthought for me. Um, I’m, I’m mostly Mac and I do most of my correspondence on Mac and, and, and that’s, MailMate fits the bill. If you are an iOS heavy person and you do most of your correspondence on iOS MailMate is probably not for you. And you’re better off getting into an ecosystem like spark or airmail, uh, something that, Eric: I’ve been begrudgingly using airmail, very jeffrey_merged: You have you have? Yeah, I have, I used it a long time ago, but I haven’t tried it Eric: but I really wanna switch to something, but I, I there’s nothing. And in apple mail doesn’t work for me either, even with the latest upgrades in Iowas 16. I’m not jeffrey_merged: like there’s everything and there’s nothing. Brett: there, there’s an iOS, uh, preside, have you seen preside? jeffrey_merged: no, Brett: It is a very, it’s, it’s [01:08:00] an iOS version of mail mate. Uh, totally different. Like I just mean as far as like severity of aesthetic goes, jeffrey_merged: that’s the new bar I’m looking for. Severity of aesthetic. Brett: It, but, but it offers, it offers a lot of like, uh, extra power that you don’t get from other apps, but it doesn’t work with my outlook 360 account that I need for work. So I haven’t gotten into it, jeffrey_merged: Painful. What about you, Eric? Brett: will add it as a subtopic jeffrey_merged: Sure. Brett: in the show notes anyway. Okay. That’s me. Yeah. Eric: mine’s boring, but it’s what I’ve been spending most of my time in it’s PDF expert by, is it jeffrey_merged: yes. Not boring. Not boring. Eric: Um, and I also like they’re from Ukraine and I just kind of appreciate their messaging the past few months and everything. And, um, even though spark frustrates me PDF [01:09:00] expert, you know, for the high holiday, is it, it’s a combination of, we have a choir, we have a cantorial soloist. I have announcements, I have page numbers. I have readers. And I just took a photocopy of every page of the prayer book. It’s, it’s a scanned PDF. It’s in there. I use my apple pencil on my iPad. I’m writing it up, who’s reading what, and it just, it makes me feel so much more at ease about the services coming up. And, you know, I imagine there’s so many use cases where, you know, people having a PDF and being able to insert notes and things is just super useful and yeah, it’s great. jeffrey_merged: it’s so great. You can export your notes, like whatever you have highlighted and yeah, I’ve used it forever. I love it. It is boring. It’s it’s the best kind of boring. It’s Eric: That’s. jeffrey_merged: it just is really sturdy. Hardy, dependable. Eric: Yeah. I even bought the, the Mac one, which is, I mean, it’s expensive. It jeffrey_merged: I just did the same. I just did the same. Yeah, it is expensive. Eric: But yeah. And you know, I love that. It, [01:10:00] it, you know, goes right into iCloud everything’s synced it’s. jeffrey_merged: Yes, definitely, man. That’s awesome. Um, mine is a command line utility called Rex G R E X. It is for regular expressions, which is not something I’m good with. Um, but because I deal with a lot of data and a lot of like bulk text files in my investigative work, um, I always am looking for ways into the data and what’s cool about this and I haven’t found anything else or I haven’t encountered anything else that does it. So basically you. If I wanted to borrow the band name, Siegel’s screaming, kiss her, kiss her. If I wanted to come up with the regs kind of statement that would capture both that one and flock of Siegels, I would put those two things in quotes, uh, and just write Rex at the beginning of the command. And it would show me. What regular expression would capture both of those [01:11:00] things. So if I also wanted to put, you know, I have a name, I have like a hyphenated last name, sometimes it’s Jeff severance. Gunzel sometimes Jeff Gunzel. So I have Jeffrey Gunzel if I wanted to make sure I caught all of those, I would just type ’em on the command line with GRX at the top. And, uh, and it would actually feed out what the regular expression is that I would need now, as Brett knows, it doesn’t always get me all the way, cuz I sometimes part of my contracting with Brett is like 10 minute, uh, regular expressions challenges so it doesn’t always get me all the way there, but it’s just, it’s a fun thing actually just to play with and, and helps me a little bit to understand regular expressions better. So G R E X, you can, you can brew, install it from home brew if that’s your, if that’s your, uh, Brett: it’s, it’s a, it’s a great way to start. Um, Like, if you, if you know a little bit about red XX, you can take the patterns that it gives you and really make them truly [01:12:00] flexible. Like it’s great. It’s great at matching exactly the pattern or like the text you give it. Uh, but if you wanna expand it to match, uh, a more flexible pattern, you need to know a little bit, but yeah, it it’s a, it’s a good, it’s a jeffrey_merged: Yeah. For, For, me what I can do, here’s the, here’s the actual order I can, I can start there. Then I take it into there’s a couple of web web apps that you can use that there’s something called expressions as a Mac app that you can use to like put in text and then above it, type in your REDX to see if it captures it. So it’s going the other direction. And so like, I can go from there to a thing where I’m kind of tweaking it to try to capture text that I put in. And then from there I go to Brett, like I’m starting to realize. Eric: downloadable as part of a home brew install. Not yet. Anyway. jeffrey_merged: this week. Yeah. Brew installed Brett Terpstra. Um, the, this past week I must have spent an hour and a half on this stupid thing. And finally I’m like, why am I I’m like I bill by the hour, you know, [01:13:00] I’m like, I should just really give it to the guy that can do it in 10 minutes. So anyway, Eric: And you know, I I’m like a one on a one to 10 scale of, but of expressions, but you know, people don’t non-programmers don’t realize like you’re searching email or, you know, Brett turned me onto Huda spot to find files on my Mac. jeffrey_merged: to spot? Eric: like, so Rex might be up my alley. I had not heard of that, but I, it, jeffrey_merged: That’s like, for me, I’m like you like, and in that I’m, I’m, I’m zero to one at this, but it’s like, I, I know what it can do. That’s like , that’s, that’s the first step of being dangerous is knowing what it can do. Eric: So true. jeffrey_merged: anyway, this was super fun. Eric: Yeah. Thank you guys so much. I, I hope Christina’s feeling better, but, uh, I really appreciate, uh, being on here. Brett: Yeah, it’s been a blast. We’ll have you back, Eric: would love it. And, uh, Jeff, we’re gonna have to change a plate or trade PlayStation, gamer tags. And, jeffrey_merged: Yes, exactly. That sounds good. [01:14:00] awesome. Brett: do you know how we close out? Eric: I don’t remember Brett: All right. Eric: because I, I have too much high holiday on the brain. Brett: Just, play along. You’re ready. Eric: I’m ready. Brett: get some sleep? guys. Oh, I do know how jeffrey_merged: get some sleep?[01:15:00]

Christina is off this week. Jeff interviews Brett about why and how he builds the tools he builds. Sponsor SimpliSafe has everything you need to keep your home safe — from entry and motion sensors to indoor and outdoor cameras. Visit simplisafe.com/overtired and claim a free indoor security camera plus 20% off with Interactive Monitoring. Show Links Brett’s new EP! Quick Question: Remember the illusive answer to a persistant question doing: Remember what I was doing or feeling and when bunch: Remember how I like my computer environment to be set up in countless contexts Howzit: Remember how I built or configured a thing Tag Filer: Remember where my documents go podtagger: Remember how to do podcast metadata Cheaters: Remember my keyboard shortcuts and commands Markdown service tools: Remember Markdown syntax and apply it na: Remember what my next steps are in this directory/project Peek TaskPaper Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Why Brett Builds What He Builds Jeffrey: [00:00:00] Hello everybody. And welcome to another episode of Overtired. It’s me, Jeff. I’m here with Brett we’re alone. Christina could not be here this week. She’s traveling. Uh, she’s in Chicago. I believe so. Brett, it’s just you and me. How do you feel about that? Brett: I’m I’m, you know, I love you. I always, I miss Christina, miss Christina, I feel like the three of us have a, a really good thing going, but you know, the beauty of having three co-hosts is if one person needs a week off, the show can go on Jeffrey: That’s true. The show must go on. You could say that probably. Um, and, and in, in this case, the show is going on, despite the fact that your face is completely, uh, uh, ripped up and bloodied. What, what happened to you? Brett: So I, I was on my hands and knees working on my Sonology. Um, had, I had just, I had just unwrapped [00:01:00] a 16 terabyte, hard drive and. What I meant to do was sit up and what happened was I went forward and I don’t know exactly. All I know is like, instead of coming eye to eye with the Sonology on the networking shelf, I suddenly was seeing stars. And I had plowed my face into the carpet. I have like a throw rug down around this. And, and I just face first into the throw rug, took a chunk outta my nose, scraped up my forehead, ripped up my elbow. It was, and then I sat up and I’m, I had no idea what had happened. Like, it was very confusing to me. And I looked down and there’s like blood all over my hand. And I wa like in a days, wandered upstairs and I was like, oh my God, what happened? And like, well, I kind of just faceplanted into the carpet for no apparent reason. So she [00:02:00] wants me to go to the doctor now. Which I, I will do out of respect. Uh, if Jeffrey: Uh, out of concern for the why or out of concern Brett: the why? Jeffrey: a rug destroyed Brett: No, no. Out of the why, like why did you go down instead of up when, when, when you sent the signal to stand up, why did you instead ke forward? Jeffrey: Is it one of those things where you were, you were seated and in order to get up, you had to kind of lean forward to get a little momentum to get up, and then you just didn’t do the other steps, Brett: I, I just, I skip some steps. Jeffrey: bad program, Brett: Yeah. Yeah. Jeffrey: I’m sorry. Well, I support as, as a, as a co-host and I know I speak for Christina as well. We support you, uh, at going into the doctor. We agree with L uh, maybe it was like a blood pressure thing. Right? Who Brett: could be, yeah. Could be medication related. I have a lot of meds that affect my balance and woo. And. Jeffrey: Wow. Um, I really wish [00:03:00] Sonology was a sponsor. So somehow we could wrap this up into a sponsor read, and then maybe go to like Z doc. Um, I mean, I really feel like we’re living into a possible sponsor situation here. Brett: Bunch of bunch of corporate tie-ins for this one, Jeffrey: We’re gonna have to get everybody on the fifth floor on that. Um, let’s see if they can, they can work on it up there in sales. Um, well I’m glad you’re okay. That’s crazy. Oh, I see your cat. So we’re gonna do a little more, Brett. It is the 19th birthday of the everlasting cat. Yeti, who has just, I wouldn’t say marched into the screen. Brett: I said to knock on wood, cuz you went and jinx it. Jeffrey: What happened? Everlasting? Brett: said everlasting cat. I, I guarantee you. He is not everlasting. The day will. Jeffrey: Oh man. Okay. So 19 years old though, Yeti is a part of. Brett: yet. Yeah, yet he is, I, other than a couple like brief trips out of town, I have seen Yeti every day for 19 years. [00:04:00] And like, I’ve had him from the day of his birth. Uh, his mom had FIV and we had to take her kittens away and she got euthanized and we, we raised the kittens and, uh, yeah, it was, it was, uh, be born of tragedy, but we immediately like, and I honestly like when there was a litter of six kittens and I wanted the tuxedo one, um, because I had recently lost my cat trouble to a pit bull, a pit bull had. Jeffrey: That’s not funny, but you did just say I lost my cat trouble to a pit bull. It sounds like the lyrics to a song. I don’t want to hear. Brett: She, she had, she had unbeknownst to me, had a litter of kittens in the closet, um, because I was a young irresponsible person who didn’t spay their cat. And she, I lived in a, will say a less than sanitary living situation. And she [00:05:00] would escape through a broken window at night and she got pregnant and gave birth and I was oblivious to the whole thing. Um, but then she ends up trying to defend her litter against a pit bull that was visiting our house. And she lost that fight. And that kind of fucked me up for a while. So when I’m faced with this litter of kittens and there’s one tuxedo kitten in the litter and I, that was the one that I was gonna take. Um, and my. My, at that point, fiance’s mom convinced me to take the one that looked like Eddie Munster. Um, and, and over the course of the next couple years, Yeti, Eddie Munster, Yeti Munster, um, Yeti became my cat, just, we just bonded. And like he would fetch, I could throw a toy and he would run down the [00:06:00] hall and come back going and like, bring me the, bring me like the foil ball back. And we would play fetch and, and he slept with me and we just, we became inseparable. Jeffrey: well, and I I’ve, I’ve experienced not just in recording this podcast on video, but also in, in our many, many, many zoom meetings together, Yeti can just kind of walk up on your desk and just start staring at you and I’ll see the back of his head. And yet he’s just staring at you. Brett: yeah. Jeffrey: Now I have to ask this was Minneapolis with the, with the cat trouble and the pit. So there’s a, there’s a pit bull in a house with a, with a broken window. I gotta say it. What that tells me is you were living with crusty punks. Brett: I was well, okay, wait, no, actually, actually I take that back. I had moved out of the crusty punk house and I was living with a bunch of junkies who were also models. Jeffrey: Wow. Models. Like what hand models? Body models. Brett: body [00:07:00] models. We’re talking, we’re talking Abercrombie and Fitch type of models, not Abercrombie and Fitch. They were doing smaller time stuff, but like they would get makeup to cover up their track marks. And, and it was actually a very different living situation than the punk house. Um, but we were all severely addicted to heroin and, uh, that kind of ran that the house was kind of built around heroin a. Jeffrey: Yeah. Yeah. So funny. I lived in houses like that in Minneapolis in the day, but I never was doing any drugs at all, but everyone around me was doing those drugs. I remember I lived in a house where I had a roommate who had an AK 47 with no safety that just laid, uh, against the wall next to his bed. Brett: Yeah, we, we did not have Jeffrey: at one point, and this, I bet you’ll relate to. At one point in the living room of this house, we were in, this was a house that was in like a permanent state of foreclosure that a, a friend of mine [00:08:00] kind of got hold of. And, and we were paying like almost nothing, no utilities or anything. It was over by MCAT or by the, the art art Institute in the art school. Brett: That’s where I was living on Jeffrey: was it, we surely we ran into each other, but there was a point where there was about seven of us living in this place. I kind of like hid in my room all day, uh, working on my, my super radical politics zine called wake up, wake up. Um, but outside me, like I remember one day we spilled a five gallon bucket of paint that we had for reasons I don’t understand. And we were also eating taco bell. And for the rest of the time I lived in that house, there was a spilled thing of paint with taco bell, wrappers stuck in it. And I, I still wonder to this day, I’m like, okay, so you weren’t, you weren’t a junkie you didn’t know drugs at all. Like how did you find yourself in these situations? Jeff? Cause that one, woo. There are some stories and that was like a famous, not famous. It was a, it was a barely known, um, punk [00:09:00] rock house where like the first time green day came through town, they slept on the floor of Brett: wasn’t not castle chaos, right? Jeffrey: Oh, my God. I think that’s what it was. It’s got the turret, the turret on top. Yeah. That’s it. Castle chaos. I didn’t know it when it was castle Brett: I’ve been to basement shows there Jeffrey: Oh my God. See, we only had the second and third floor of castle chaos. And so wait a minute, wait a minute. Wait a minute. This is crazy. So I moved in at basically after castle chaos, as it was known ended. The next scenario was this scenario. I was in with the guy with the AK 47 and we had a meth dealer who also did shitty tattoos. Um, his name was lips, which we called them. It was short for apocalypse, which was the smell of his feet. Um, and he would and he would give tattoos for, for Brett: face tattoos. Jeffrey: no face tattoos in his case, maybe he would give them, he didn’t have them. Brett: I knew multiple people from castle chaos that had full face tattoos. Jeffrey: Oh, my [00:10:00] God castle chaos. Okay. So just for my own sake, because this house enters my dreams really, honestly, a few times a year, it was a, it was a strange, magical portal of a place. Um, and it was called a castle because it had this like turret or this almost like Rapunzel Brett: Uhhuh. Jeffrey: Um, and, and, and it was so unique and it was so, so stunning of a house, but it was a total piece of shit. Brett: Yes. Jeffrey: I mean, for God’s sake, it was called castle chaos for how many years. So what, how did you enter castle chaos? Brett: uh, punk rock. Like I was in a punk rock band and it was just kind of a, it was a mainstay of the punk rock scene, like parties and the occasional basement show. And, and you just, you knew like you see the face tattoos and you’d be like, Hey, castle, chaos. Yep. Castle chaos. Jeffrey: Yeah. Cause they, cuz you could get your face tattoos there. Brett: I, I don’t know where all the face tattoos came from, but these are the people that worked at like Sunnyside up, uh, the breakfast [00:11:00] joint with all the punk rockers Jeffrey: Yep. Brett: um, yeah. Jeffrey: Wow. That’s amazing. That’s amazing. Well, I loved living there and what I thought about the reason I even brought it up is my, my roommate there had two cats, one cat was named yo and the other cat was named Corma and we call them Yagi and corny. And at one point, the ceiling in my room gave way and my room flooded. And, um, and, and once we cleaned it all up, it was still a completely destroyed ceiling, but the water was cleaned up. Cause the part of living there for almost free was that no, one’s gonna come and help you when the ceiling explodes. Right. But then the cats disappeared for a while, but they would appear every once in a while when I was sleeping, they would just show up in the ceiling, above my head and look down at me, you know, just like, let me know they’re okay. But I could totally imagine them having a litter of cats in the, in the ceiling of this place. Brett: before I lived, before I lived on Clinton avenue, I lived on east Hennepin and we had a house where the landlord had. [00:12:00] Basically, let us move in. We were renting the whole house for about a thousand dollars a month. Um, and there were, I think, eight of us. And, um, I was the only person in the group who held on a job. So to this day, everyone owes me thousands of dollars, but, uh, but he basically told us that when we moved out, he was gonna tear it down and he did not give a shit what we did to that house. Jeffrey: Yeah. We had a similar situation. Brett: paint, everywhere. We would like we would have parties where people would literally go through walls and we just, that place was demolished. By the time we left Jeffrey: Yeah. Yeah. Oh man. I don’t know how many, how many of our listeners start listening and going? Oh, I relate. Brett: relatable. Jeffrey: relatable. Um, yeah. Okay. Okay. That was fun. Um, I mean, I’m just delighted that we shared some history of that space together. Um, okay. Why don’t we, why don’t we [00:13:00] do a little mental health corner? I would love to hear how you are doing, and then, uh, I am going to, I’m gonna interview Brett for this episode. I already started in a way, except it ended up being such a shared history, shared history of complete fuckery episode title. Mental Health Corner Jeffrey: Anyway, how you doing? Brett: I’m I’m stable. I’m in that, that kind of stable spot where I’m starting to get like bored, but grateful that I’m sleeping well. And, um, just kind of emotionally at rest, uh, kind of getting worked on. I’m still BA I’m on the depressed side of stable still. Um, but it was a pretty light depression this time around, um, I did last night have trouble sleeping and had to take some, uh, over the counter sleeping meds. Uh, which worries me because last, my [00:14:00] last manic episode, which was a little more intense than it had been, uh, started with 10 days of kind of shitty sleep. Uh, and then all of a sudden it like clicked and I was manic and, and off to the races and learning swift and writing Jeffrey: Yeah, right. I was and, and posting a blog post every 45 minutes. Brett: Right. Um, and, and it started with, with getting completely worn down by just waking up at three or 4:00 AM every morning and not like staying in bed, not getting up and coding like I do when I’m manic. Uh, but just staying in bed and tossing and turning for hours. And then like finally getting up at six and, and drinking coffee and going about my day. But, uh, this is how it began and I’m trying to figure out if there’s something I can do now, I have a therapy appointment today and my therapist is pretty [00:15:00] damn well versed in bipolar. So I’m gonna talk to him and see if there’s something I can do at this point. Well, before I manic to try to, uh, control it a little bit, try to keep it manageable. Jeffrey: Yeah, Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: it’s so awesome. You have somebody Brett: thanks. Yeah, it took me, took me long enough to find a therapist, but yeah, I think he’s good. Jeffrey: yeah. That’s how it goes. Takes people long enough, Brett: I’m going, I’m going in for the in person. So far, we’ve only known videos. So today I get to, I get to meet him in person and, and I’ll let you know how that goes. Jeffrey: man. I, my therapist only does, um, telehealth and I’m getting to a point where I wish I could do in person Brett: Yeah. Well, I’m curious, I’m curious what the difference is. Like, like he’s hybrid, he’ll do whatever works best for his clients. Um, but I was very curious to like, just [00:16:00] see what the difference is like in person, in someone else’s environment. Um, I just, I’m curious how I will react to opening up in an unfamiliar space instead of in my very cozy office where I feel very at home. Uh, maybe it’ll be better. Maybe it’ll be worse. Uh, we’re gonna find out. Jeffrey: Yeah. I personally find it easier Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: Yeah. Especially if the therapist has put some, some care into the, the room and the, and the appearance and the feeling of the place. And so that there are just plenty of signals that you are in, you are in a therapeutic space. Your only job is to be here at this time now, Brett: Yeah. Well, it’s kind of Jeffrey: see the other cues in your room. Brett: I haven’t been to a yoga class in person for a couple years now. Um, and my therapist actually suggested I try going in person again. Now that that’s an option. [00:17:00] Um, cuz it wasn’t, I mean pandemic for a while there, everything was zoom based. Um, but then, uh, L my, my girlfriend, who’s also my favorite yoga instructor. Um, she started doing classes at the studio again, but also zooming them. Um, and I just stuck with zoom cuz I gained weight, not because of the pandemic. I just, I gained weight. I was feeling not very confident about my body. Um, and it was easier for me just to be on zoom with the video off and just do the, do the class on my own. But I, I do think there would be a benefit to, uh, like when I’m zooming yoga on my own. There’s a pretty good chance. I check my email in the middle of class Jeffrey: Yeah. Brett: in person in a zoo, in a like live studio, yoga class. I would never check my email and, and [00:18:00] it would be better for me. I would get more out of yoga if I didn’t stop to check my email. How’s how’s your mental health, Jeff. Jeffrey: Um, I’m, I’m doing all right. I, one thing I’ve been really not focusing on that I need to, uh, is, so I take, um, I take medication that helps me sleep. I also take medication that, um, helps me to not have horrible, uh, nightmares, which has been a problem of mine for some time. And, um, and this medication works beautifully for that every once in a while, one breaks through and I wake up and I’m just like, damn it. How did you get through and why? Um, and the, how did you get through and why is something I’m working on right now, which is mostly, looks like me thinking about not acting yet, but thinking about, um, my transition to sleep, because I have a tendency to just sort of. Collapse into [00:19:00] sleep, basically from the day, there’s not much of a transition at all. There’s like a pile of clothes by the side of the bed and, and, uh, and an iPad on top of that when I’m, when I’m done reading or whatever. Um, and, uh, and so I’m trying to work on, uh, sort of long longish set of sort of signals to my brain that it’s time to time to go to sleep, time to rest. Um, and one thing that I know I shouldn’t do is work on configuring shit on my laptop until I’m ready to go to bed and leave my laptop next to me, cuz that makes it, that always makes for a bad sleep night, cuz my brain wants to keep solving problems. Um, and uh, and it just knows that the computer’s right there. So like an example is I know to not have my laptop near my bed and have it downstairs. Um, but anyway, I’m just kind of working on that because you know, my sleep’s been great ever since we sort of dialed in. What I needed medication wise, but there’s, you know, there are things that [00:20:00] medication can’t solve alone and, and that’s what I’m sort of putting my attention to. So, which, I mean, and to say, like, I went so long, really almost from the beginning of the pandemic until about four or five months ago, six months ago, I was waking up multiple times at night, often waking up on the hour at night, not like exactly on the hour, like public radio style, but like inside of every hour, basically. And man did that do a number on me. And so I am every day grateful when I wake up, when I realized I only woke up once and I slept really, really good. So anyway, sleep, sleep. Brett: And you’re back on your ADHD meds now. How’s that gone? Jeffrey: I am. I’m taking my Viva again. Um, that’s going well. I haven’t really, I I’m trying to figure out the sweet spot for taking it. Like sometimes I take it right after breakfast. Sometimes I take it just before lunch. [00:21:00] I have taken it in the early afternoon. Brett: Oh, Jesus. Jeffrey: which has isn’t bad for, well, it should be part of my sleep, uh, factoring. Shouldn’t it. Um, but Brett: it has like, it has like a 16 hour, half life. Jeffrey: I know mostly I take it before 11:00 AM, but I haven’t found like a sweet spot for it, Brett: For me for me, it’s seven. Am I take it religiously? Seven? Am I take my meds at 7:00 AM and 7:00 PM and, and yeah, 7:00 AM is the sweet spot for me, for sure. With five minutes, if I want, cuz I go to bed at like 9:00 PM. Jeffrey: Yeah. Brett: I’m an early, I’m an early to bed guy. Um, and, and, uh, taking it at 7:00 AM means I’m winding down by 9:00 PM. Jeffrey: right. Yeah. That’s smart. Yeah. Yeah. I need to dial that in, but I mean, the good thing is it’s, it’s working out for me. I I’m on a very low dose, which is what I need. And, and, [00:22:00] um, for anybody who’s considering something like an ADHD drug, just, just be so mindful of, of does this dose feel right? Cause I’ve had so many friends who, who were given a higher dose and probably they should right away or were bumped up significantly after starting at a low dose. Brett: So because I recommend Vivance to so many people newly diagnosed with ADHD. Tell me what a low dose is. Jeffrey: 20 milligrams Brett: 20. Okay. Jeffrey: I’ve had, I’ve taken as much as 60. Brett: yeah, I take 60. It, it goes up to 70, 60 is kind of where I found my sweet spot. Um, but yeah, like as far as ADHD, medication goes, five is in my experience, the most mellow, um, it, and to, to, to that end, it’s the least effective for me, but with my bipolar, it’s the one that plays the [00:23:00] nicest, um, that if it, if it weren’t for Vivance, I probably wouldn’t be able to be on any ADHD meds right now because everything else is so prone to triggering manic episodes for me. Um, and Vivance just kind of fits the bill for that. Uh, some people like you react strongly to it and, and it’s all they need at 20 milligrams. Vivance works great. Uh, for me, 60 milligrams is still like, um, I’m still scattered and have trouble with motivation, uh, which I, I don’t on a drug like Focalin or Adderall. Uh, motivation is fine for me. Uh, Vivance does not solve that issue. Um, but it also, it doesn’t cause me other problems. So it’s kind of a, a good drug for that. Jeffrey: Right, right. Yeah, man. Yeah. Medications um, [00:24:00] alright, Brett Terpstra. Brett: by the way, um, Jeffrey: read. Brett: I talked to, I talked to a friend of the show, Erin Dawson and she is totally down to make us some theme music. For, for like mental health corner and gratitude that we can, Jeffrey: Awesome. Brett: we can play in. We can we can, we can break up our segments with a little theme music. Uh, she just, she just wants some idea where to begin with it, uh, some, some direction and, uh, and we can make this happen. Jeffrey: Awesome. That’s Brett: coming, coming soon to a podcast near you. So, uh, yeah, here’s a question. Jeffrey: Yeah. Sponsor: SimpliSafe Brett: Is there anything that matters more than the safety of you and your loved ones? Jeffrey: Well, hold on. That’s the rest of the podcast right there. Oh, sorry. Sponsor Reid. Go ahead. Brett: of course not. So isn’t it strange then that many home security companies don’t act that way. This is why we use and [00:25:00] trust simply safe home security. Their advanced security technology helps us sleep at night and they always put our family’s safety first. Here’s why I love it with 24 7 professional monitoring. Simply save agents, call you the moment of threats, detected and dispatch police, or first responders in an emergency. Even if you’re not home or can’t be reached simply safes monitoring agents truly care about your wellbeing and are highly trained to help you keep calm and safe during stressful situations. Staying on the line with you until help arrives. Simply saves customer first policies. Make sure that you are taken care of with affordable plan starting at less than a dollar a day and no long term contract or hidden fees, because feeling safe at home shouldn’t break the bank. Customize the perfect system for your home and just a few minutes@simplysafe.com slash Overtired. That’s S I M P L I S a e.com/ Overtired. [00:26:00] Go today and claim a free indoor security camera. Plus 20% off with interactive monitoring. Go to simply safe.com/ Overtired. I have, I have over the course of having simply safe as a sponsor. I have really gotten better at saying the word monitoring. Jeffrey: Oh, Brett: that is a really hard word for me because my brain wants to go monitoring, monitoring, Jeffrey: Monitoring word becomes the sound Brett: I over enunciate it, but out of necessity Jeffrey: well, I’m glad to see your growth in that area. Brett: thanks, man. Promo: Soul Forge Brett: Let’s talk about another podcast. Jeffrey: So forge podcast, what is that? It is the ultimate source for learning to live your best life episodes have covered heartbreak, dementia, suicide, and transgender issues. And there are episodes on sex, tattoos, collecting, road trips and puppies, [00:27:00] exclamation point. You never know what the next episode will bring. So come on and forge your soul with the soul forge podcast. It’s everywhere you find podcasts. Brett’s New Song Drops! Brett: I put out music every once in a while. and it gets zero traction. Like I have dad jokes that get more response than the music I put out, which really leads me to Jeffrey: you just put music out? Brett: I did just put, uh, a cover of the kinks. Um, not like everybody else. Um, and yeah, and, and I really enjoyed doing a, uh, fun cover of it. But man, like my SoundCloud, I get like nine listens. I’ll like, I’ll like tweet about it. I’ll Facebook about it, you know, and I’ve got a fair number of followers and nine people will go check it out and, and they, Jeffrey: 10. I Brett: and they, and they won’t say anything like I’ll get zero comments about it. And I’ll just [00:28:00] assume Jeffrey: feels good. Brett: I’ll assume it was so bad that people listened to it and just like embarrassed for me. You ever been at a party where like the host, like corners you in his bedroom and makes you listen to his demo tape? Jeffrey: Uh, be less specific. Brett: it’s happened to me more than once. That’s why I consider this a generality. Jeffrey: Uh, got it. Brett: like when I was touring with a band and we’d go to like, after show parties, so frequently would like a, a host of, of whatever house we were at. Be like, Hey, come here, come here, come here. You gotta hear this. You gotta hear my one man. Four track demo tape. And then for like 30 minutes would like pumble you with sounds you just could not get excited about. Jeffrey: I, um, I did two things to prevent [00:29:00] that kind of thing from happening to me on tour. one is I played drums in a way that I I’ve come to learn scared people and the other is. I slept in the van, no matter what the fuck we were doing, I was like, I am not going in there. I am not going through that portal in fucking Missoula, Montana. like, I have no idea what’s gonna happen in there. I want nothing to do with it. I sleep in the van. Brett: so what you’re saying is I played bass too approachable. Jeffrey: yeah, you play face too approachable. I’m always, oh, people say I’m nice guy, but get this that I’m scary. Brett: I used, I often people would tell me when they first met me, they thought I was gonna punch them. And I have never once met someone and thought I was gonna punch Jeffrey: Yeah, Brett: Um, well, okay. It I’m sure it has happened, but for the most part, I’m super into meeting people. And, uh, [00:30:00] I guess I used to come off as very intense. Um, and I it’s still to this day, I don’t know what that’s about, but I apparently it’s gotten better because people tell me I’m a God like these days. Jeffrey: Ah, sucks, except for whoever punched you in the face. Oh, wait, that was your carpet. Brett: yeah, we, we have a history now. Why Brett Makes the Tools He Makes Jeffrey: Um, okay. I wanna talk to you about something and we’re, we’ve, we’ve gone pretty deep into the episode, but I want to try it anyhow. Um, and see, so I’ve been, I, I have used so many of your tools, Brett. It’s how I came to be a guest on your podcast. Systematic way, way, way back in the day was I followed your blog and you put out a call, uh, for guests or guest suggestions. And one of my colleagues submitted me. I jokingly call the collection of tools that I use your collection of tools that I use Terpstra OS. [00:31:00] Um, and I’ve been sort of revisiting some of them. Recently just cuz you have, you know, in the last couple years you’ve added a lot to, a lot of the things that I like to use. Um, but I wanted to talk to you about something that just struck me so hard. So the thing that I love about your tools is that they allow me to forget. They give me confidence that I can remember. Um, and for me not remembering is an extreme source of anxiety and can be a source of panic. And knowing that I can forget, therefore brings me a sense of peace and ease. I listed this list here. I listed your apps that I used and your tools that I use. And then I made a remembering statement next to them. Cause I was so struck by this. So I’m just gonna go through this. It’s bear with me. All right. Brett: [00:32:00] Yeah, Jeffrey: First one quick question. Remember the elusive answer to a persistent question doing, remember what I was doing or feeling, and when bunch, remember how I like my computer environment to be set up in countless contexts? How’s it remember how I built or configured a thing. Tag filer, which doesn’t get talked about much. Brett: it. Doesn’t. Jeffrey: remember where my documents go. Pod Tager. Remember how to do podcast metadata, cheaters. Oh, cheaters. Remember my keyboard shortcuts and commands and, and various little bits about my apps. And then markdown service tools, remember markdown syntax and apply it, right. It leaves out your writing stuff. NV, NV, ultra marked gather for gathering up markdown from a webpage, you know, mark down, editing for sublime text, which you don’t control anymore, but which [00:33:00] you wrote. And I still use, I think you still use it. Right. Um, but it’s so intense to me and it’s intense how easy it is to make a remember statement for all your tools. When I read that list, what, what do you think? Brett: So I, I would like to, okay. I, I have multiple things, but, uh, first of all, uh, uh, I like Terpstra OS. Jay Miller came up with the term TT tools, Jeffrey: Ooh. Brett: which I, I like cuz my name is B R E TT. And my handle is TT scoff and we just go with TT tools. Um, I, when I realized it came up on my calendar that it was Yeti’s birthday, but I could not remember how old he was. And I remembered that I had had this question in years past and all I had to do in my terminal was type QQ. Yeti’s how old is Yeti QQ? How old is Yeti? [00:34:00] And my, my computer was able to immediately tell me what year he was born and, and extrapolate from there. Um, and that absolutely memory. I have a, I have a shit memory. I have an ADHD person’s memory, uh, that has been affected by drug use and, and the meds I take. Um, I was on like, uh, stuff like, uh, what’s shoot, um, sleeping pills, uh, ambient type of pills for a long time, which just decimated my memory. And a lot of the tools I make are very much about being able to answer my own questions. Um, when I Google for the answer to a problem, there’s a 50% chance I get my own blog back as a response. And that’s where [00:35:00] search link came from. Like Jeffrey: Search link. Oh, right. Search link. Yeah. Brett: search search link was a way for me to, to find answers on my own blog without constantly switching to a web browser and yeah. Memory, it, it you’re, you are a hundred percent correct. So many of my tools are just about being able to remember and being able to feel confident because it is, uh, it is very it’s disconcerting and, and anxiety producing to, to, to know that you figure something out, but that you will forget it. Um, and in my case, I’ll forget it in a week. It’s not a matter of like a year later it’s it’s a week or less that I will forget that I found the answer to something and, and that produces anxiety. And just having ways, uh, goes back to like, when I first read, uh, GT D by David Allen, this whole idea of mine, like water and being able to [00:36:00] have a trusted, a trusted bucket where you could dump the things you needed to do. And know that you wouldn’t forget them, that you would be able to find them and that you would be able to get them done. And, and my brain extrapolated that to, I need a trusted bucket for literally everything. I learn everything. I figure out everything that I do. I need a way to have some faith that I will be able to rediscover this in the future. Um, and yeah, things like QQ and, and doing definitely are like, that’s a core principle of them. Jeffrey: Wait. I remember you had a, I don’t know if it was a bookmarklet or it was a tool that, um, helped to, uh, that helped to sort of document your stack overflow queries. What was that? Describe that. Brett: so, and, and that’s what gather has become now. Um, uh, I had [00:37:00] bullseye. Which when I, when I found an answer it, and it worked with Marky, the mark down to fire, which was the web API version of gather. Um, and it would basically, you would, you would click on a stack overflow solution page. You would just click inside the answer you wanted to save, and it would create a markdown version for you that you could pop right into envy or into envy ultra, um, and marking the markdown. A fire has fallen by the wayside, uh, but gather the tool I most recently updated, uh, in a manic episode, um, can, it has special handling built in for stack overflow pages. So if you, and, and it has options, you can choose to only save the accepted answer. you can choose to include or exclude comments because a lot of times the answer you want, the [00:38:00] actual answer will be in the comments to the answer. Like someone will say, this didn’t work. Why and someone else will say do it this way. Um, so there are times that I do or, or don’t want to include the comments. Um, and all of that is now built into gather as options and basically can save any time. I find what I’m looking for in stack overflow, which is the most common place I find programming answers. Um, I can save it as a markdown file, easily searchable, instantly indexed in NVI ultra. Jeffrey: I remember once you, when we first started working together, I mean, just for people’s background, you started working with me really as a consultant on workflows and, um, things related to my investigative work and, and that kind of grew into some real meaningful tool building. We first started working together. I was . I remember [00:39:00] I, I wrote you and I said, oh my God, I just dove into bunch, but here’s the thing off the record. Are you gonna be developing this thing for a while? Because I’m about to go deep, right? Cause it had been kinda left alone for a while and you’re like, no, no, it’s it’s there, it’s there. And so I said, will you send me just a couple of your own bunch files so I can get a feel for it? And what I learned and have learned from you since is that often your tools, which have a million wonderful tentacles, you’re only really employing. A handful of them. Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: Is that the case with most of your tools? Brett: It, when I first started programming, I was only coding for myself. I was solving problems like it started like my first programming was basic. And then, uh, like I moved on to Pascal and did a bunch of like game programming in high school. Uh, but most of where I really got into creative programming was with like VB script in an old app called [00:40:00] home sea, uh, which was a home automation app on PC. And, uh, Jeffrey: like around what year-ish Brett: this would’ve been like 97, 98, no, Jeffrey: was being automated. Brett: no, 2000, 2000, 2001. Um, X, 10 X, 10 home appliance automation. Um, but. I, I didn’t, I had never released, I had never shared any of these automations. They were just for me and I wasn’t active on like the message boards or anything. And it wasn’t until I got a Mac, uh, that I actually made something worth sharing or that I considered like maybe other people would want this. And the thing I learned very quickly is that everyone has their own needs. And as someone who eventually became part of, kind of the software ecosystem for [00:41:00] max, uh, which didn’t start for me until 2000, um, uh, I, I, I learned that there’s kind of a standard number of features that make things generally usable. And I be, I over time got really good at predicting what people, what feature requests were gonna come in. So, so it can do this, but here’s what I need to do. Um, and, and I learned how to build something that had more general appeal, uh, than just solving my problem and to make something that could solve other people’s problems. And that’s kind of the core of everything I do is I made this to solve a problem I had, but I understood that my problems might not be universal. So I made it more general, uh, so that it could solve other pre other people’s problems as [00:42:00] well. Jeffrey: And well, and in doing so you, one of the other sort of tenants of everything you build is it gives the user such a sense of control, um, that would otherwise, like you have to have a little bit of literacy to get. To get deep into any of your tools, but only a little bit and, and having a little bit, and then having your tools like it’s a to use a military analogy, it’s a force multiplier. It’s like, I can’t believe, I mean, uh, bunch is such a great example, right? I can write a text file and bunch that had, I tried to do this without bunch. Would’ve been a really complex script that would’ve had to spend a year studying a language to do. Brett: Well, and the beauty of bunch is nobody does the same thing with it. No two people are using it to do the exact same thing. And you can share bunches with people as kind of an example. Here’s what you can do, but it is 100% you [00:43:00] customize it to your specific needs and it is built to, to handle the most esoteric of, of requirements. Uh, the first, the first app, the first editor I used on Mac OS was text made. it blew me away. Having spent a lifetime using windows and, and kind of limited apps that you had to have a, a higher level of proficiency in order to customize, uh, than I had at the time. Um, I started using text mate and I learned Ruby just to write text mad extensions, uh, but it provided, it provided this framework that I could make it do anything, any, any text editing tool I wanted, I could just make, and it was worth learning a new programming language just to be able to extend this app and the [00:44:00] extensibility of, of text mate. It leads to problems for developers because not only are you supporting your own software, now you’re supporting everything your users wanna do with your software. um, and it’s, you’re opening up a whole can of worms, but like it’s the reason I built custom processors into marked. Uh, so people could make it work with pan doc or ask EOC or whatever processor they wanted to preview their, their text files with was all kind of this text BA mentality of extensibility that the user should be able to extend what you’ve done. Jeffrey: Well, then it’s interesting that you bring up the, you had said, you know, in, in, in developing something like text mate, the developers had to support their app and all the things people wanted to do with it. You kind of walk this line where you make your tools. It almost seems like as extensible as possible, but you do stop [00:45:00] short of making it so that everyone’s making their own plugins. For instance, is that intentional? Brett: Um, so part of that is a lack of skill on my, on my part, um, doing is the first app I’ve ever written that allows, uh, truly has a plugin architecture. Um, and, and I don’t think I, to this day, I don’t think anyone’s attempted to use it yet, but these Jeffrey: I was even aware of the Brett: yeah, these days when I add a new feature to doing I U I do it through a plugin architecture, uh, where each feature exists as, as a plugin that you can add and remove and doing even has built in commands for adding and removing its own sub Jeffrey: Yes. Okay. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Brett: So, so I built a true plugin architecture for doing, um, you, you could look at custom [00:46:00] processors in marked as, as plugins, but really you’re just, you’re giving it a shell command to run. Um, and that shell command can be a custom script and you can go nuts with it, but it doesn’t have a direct plugin architecture with its own, like API and SDK, uh, with which to interface. And I’m only now learning like exactly how, how to engineer, something like that. Uh, and, and I, I couldn’t, I, I don’t think I have the skill yet to do that with something like marked, uh, using objective C, but, um, I could see doing it with swift, uh, creating like a JavaScript API for it. Um, And, and adding that kind of extensibility, but it hasn’t been for it hasn’t been because I didn’t want to do the customer support, like some of my favorite apps, like, uh, keyboard Myro for example, uh, [00:47:00] have an, a full SDK, uh, that you can tap into, uh, even launch bar has, has a JavaScript SDK and an AppleScript SDK that you can, you can build your extensions off of. And, and yeah, I wanna offer that it hasn’t been out of fear of doing the customer support. It’s been really a lack of, uh, experience in doing that. Jeffrey: Interesting. I always just assumed it was just a matter of like here, I’m gonna, I’m gonna do everything I can to make this thing as usable as possible. But like, especially now at this point in your life, you’ve got a full-time job. So it’s like, you can’t necessarily handle all Brett: I’m not the genius I’m giving credit for being. Like I’m, I’m just figuring this shit out. Like everybody else, I just happen to have a creative mind that, um, that can take a problem. And I have enough of a foundation to come up with a solution, but there’s always room for improvement in everything I do. And I’m [00:48:00] constantly learning new things and I’m not like I, I, I worship at the feet of some of the, like the developers in the community, uh, Daniel Jka, Andreas Hackenberg, uh, rich Siegel. Like these people can do so much more than I can do and have so much more skill. And I learn, I learn stuff from them every day. Jeffrey: What about, okay. So when I, when I talked about how so many of your tools have this thread of remembering you, it was very easy for you to connect it to your own life and your own sort of you were able to make an existential connection right away. What about when it comes to this other feature of all your tools, which is just. Empowering people giving not, I don’t mean that. I don’t mean that to sound trite, but like giving people power over their machine, um, in ways that would otherwise take a whole different, like a huge set of knowledge. Like why, why do you do that?[00:49:00] Brett: because Jeffrey: don’t, you don’t, you don’t, you don’t, uh, you don’t reign in it at all. You’re just like, here’s everything you might need this. I don’t know. Try it. You gotta try it. Brett: okay. So that’s part of the beauty of, of Mac OS. Um, at least historically is it has given users these tools, uh, to, to build their own experience. And I found them extremely gratifying and fulfilling, and I basically realized that a lot of people just didn’t have the building. To make use of tools like automator and apple script and, uh, the, the basic things that came with Mac OS. So when I would create a tool using these tools, like the markdown service tools, for example, um, I would find ways to publish them so that people who didn’t have those building blocks to start with could [00:50:00] still experience the power that Mac O S provided. Um, and this is, this is the thing that I never found on windows. And it’s, it’s what sold beyond max was the, the kind of power to the people that it offered. Um, and, and I just like, I, I got so much fulfillment from it and I get so much fulfillment from solving problems for other people. Like, I really find a lot of meaning in providing tools to people to do. Things that they aren’t, they need to do, but don’t have the tools set themselves. So like, it’s, it’s a fulfilling, um, endeavor for me to kind of bridge that gap between here are the tools that you’re given and here’s what you can do with them. And here’s the tool that you can now customize to do what you need to do with Jeffrey: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That’s a nice way [00:51:00] of, of describing what you make. Um, I’m curious, like in a given day, um, in a given day for you, what tools of yours are you using? Not, not hacking on that building, but using, uh, Brett: oh man. Okay. So search link and doing are constant for me, NA, um, which is, is short for next action. Uh, anytime I CD into a project directory, it will tell me. I need to do next. Um, just, it like pops up above my prompt and says, these are the things that last time you were here, you determined were going to be your next actions. Uh, so just as I CD around my computer, um, I use bunch frequently. Um, I use some custom MailMate commands that some of which I’ve published some I haven’t. Um, I use the markdown service tools all the time. Uh, I use search link more than the markdown service tools, [00:52:00] but, uh, yeah, Jeffrey: what’s running in the background all the same, like tag filer, Brett: tag, father’s always running. Uh, I have some, uh, uh, there’s another one I use called I think I just called it image Optim, cuz it uses image Optim, but like for, for preparing all of my images for. It’s a Hazel script that runs, um, I have a bunch of Hazel scripts that things just happen on my machine that I don’t have to think about. They’re not forefront in my mind. Jeffrey: right, right. Not one of your tools, but kind of something that you’ve cobbled together, your own mini tools inside of. Brett: and how’s, it is integral to everything I do. Like how’s it. I use how’s it minus R, which runs a topic, uh, executes, whatever executable code I put into a topic. Um, quick, quick explanation. How’s it basically you create a markdown file [00:53:00] that explains that reminds you how you do different things like build and deploy and edit. Um, so I can include code in like the deploy topic in the markdown file. I can include a code. That will run the deploy and, you know, like whether that’s AJE build and an R sync, or whether it’s a swift compile or an objective C uh, like, uh, an Xcode build command, I can put them all into a topic called deploy. And so no matter what project I’m in, I can type how’s it minus our deploy and it will deploy it using whatever, like a make file kind of thing. Uh, it just automates everything. And I alias that in Phish. And so I type BLD, D E P L, and I can deploy any project. Um, and that is, that’s a constant for me, so many of these [00:54:00] tools and it’s it. Like I use mark once in a while. Uh, it’s it doesn’t, I don’t have a daily need for mark when I’m, when I’m doing editing for work. And I, I wanna see like where I repeated a word too many times marked is great. And, uh, and because our entire workflow is, is GitHub and marked down based, uh, it’s handy, but it’s not this constant driver. The way a lot of my smaller utilities are, Jeffrey: and Phish too, is something where you’ve written about just stuff that you’ve Brett: I’ve written a lot of stuff for Phish and I’m on the verge of switching to Z show. Um, I, I have that ADHD boredom setting in Jeffrey: Yeah. Yeah. You’ve you’ve done Phish. Brett: I’ve done Phish. Um, like I still love Phish it’s it’s, it’s still, you know, it’s, it’s what I live in right now, but, uh, but I, I, I, I pop open a, an I term profile that loads up Z shell, uh, with, oh my Z shell and all the plugins I’m playing with. And, and I’m like, oh [00:55:00] man, Z, Shell’s pretty fucking great. Jeffrey: That’s great. That’s great. As a Z shell, I, I speak on, I speak on behalf of all Z shell users. We’re excited. You might be diving in. Um, I I’m wondering, well, first of all, let me just say for anybody who doesn’t know this, and I’m sure most of you do, Brent has a section on his website. Just called projects. And, uh, you can go and look at, look up any of these projects cuz we’re kind of mentioning them very quickly, but you know, it’s, it’s interesting as you’re talking, I’m realizing again, I’m gonna look at this list. Like so many of these things, these tools are just built on highly readable text files, right? Like how’s it, how’s it a file is, is a, is a very readable, simple text file. A bunch file is a very readable, simple text file. Um, you know, like even like something a quick question, which I love so much where you just can get on the command line and say, you know, like, this is the question and this is the answer. And it creates a text file where you know, the name of the text file is the [00:56:00] question and inside is the answer. And what quick question, lets you do is sort of query that basically, but it’s all Brett: and doing an NA both work work with task paper, format files. Jeffrey: yes. Doing and yeah, exactly. It’s just, this is something that’s so, so striking to me about your work. And I think why those of us who use your stuff and get excited about anything you’re doing it, the reason it’s exciting is it kind of feels like the world ought to be this way. Right. Like it, it, it really does feel like, um, something like a direction the world could have gone that it didn’t go Brett: well, there’s, there is, there’s a movement that’s been going on for 10 years. This like plain text. Plain text revival. I mean, it’s where, it’s where it all started. Like the first days of Unix, everything was text files and then people started building WordStar and word. Perfect. And all these formats that eventually went by the wayside, leaving all of your documents [00:57:00] inaccessible, but the thing you could still access was your text files. Your, your readme files were still perfectly readable and people have realized that there’s no, there’s no format. Even a pages document from five years ago requires conversion to open now and Jeffrey: Or, or in some cases, not pages, but certain word. Perfect. You might need an ator to Brett: oh Jeffrey: we, we have a computer running windows 95 here. So like an actual old computer for fun. And I actually popped in all my discs that I thought were dead cuz they weren’t working. When I went through an emulator, I’m like, oh my God, all my files are here. Brett: Yeah, but, but your text file, no one’s ever had a problem opening a text file. So my, if I’m going to have that faith that I’m going to remember something, and that it’s going to be accessible. It has to be in plain text because that is the one format that will out survive every other format. [00:58:00] Uh, and the stuff that I record now and back up to my Sonology and back up to glacier, uh, like these files will persist and I will always have this information. Jeffrey: Yeah, it’s a beautiful, elegant thing. I mean, I’ve, I’ve actually what I did this year was started to make sure I have like, kinda like an archive directory, but in it is the text filet thing I could come to as an archive of my Twitter. Uh, my full like history of tweets, my, all of my WhatsApp conversations, um, all of my messages, conversations, like all these things are in sort of some version of a text file, whether it’s like a CSV or a, you know, and, and I know that it’s become a memory bank for me. Like I’m starting to use it. I’m not that old, but I’m getting to a point in my life where I realize I really need to have a little, you know, grab bag I can reach into and pull out what I. Rather than having to try to search around my computer and figure out did [00:59:00] I write a document about that or whatever, anyway, that again, plain text, right? Like CSV files, um, markdown files, whatever. Yeah. Beautiful scripts, right? Like scripts are a way of remembering like, oh, this is how I wrote this Brett: well, that is totally automation like that is automation is great for time saving, but that’s only half the story. Like if you automate something, you are basically creating a permanent record of how to do something properly and you’re going to do it consistently and you’re not gonna miss steps. And it basically, it sets in stone a process, uh, and it may, it might take you four hours to write an automation that only takes 30 seconds to run. Um, but for me, like when I come back to that a month later and can’t remember what the commands were or what the sequence was or what, what things had to happen in the process. Um, and that’s part of when I built house it, like it [01:00:00] doesn’t, it doesn’t just run things. You can also include notes that will come up to say, here’s the step you need to do before this Jeffrey: how I use it. Yeah. Brett: here’s, here’s the step you need to do after it runs. Like these are things that can’t be automated, but I can record them and I can have them come up in an automated way to remind me like about processes and yeah. It’s memory. It’s all memory Jeffrey: This reminds me of, um, Uh, okay, so this is something I wanted to talk to you about, which is actual documentation of tools because, um, your documentation is, is really excellent and, you know, clearly written and, and very, very sort of like geared towards the reader. Like you’re speaking to the reader as the person doing the documentation, rather than like, I don’t know what you would call the voice of most documentation, but I don’t know who the fuck it’s talking to. It’s it’s like a machine person they’re talking to. Um, but your documentation [01:01:00] is so crisp and clear. And I wondered if, um, I wondered if the process of writing documentation happens, uh, you know, sort of isolated way when you’re done with something or if it’s actually part of creating a tool, like, are you writing a little bit and going, oh, this makes me realize I should add this to the tool and then you’re programming and then you’re writing. How does it, how does it happen for Brett: So the initial, like the initial creation of a tool is a flurry of coding and there’s not a lot of pausing. Um, just like, oh, and I can, it can do this and it can do this and it can do this and it, oh. And I’ll like, rewind, restart, get it done. Then I’ll sit back and be like, how would I explain to this, to somebody? Um, this thing that I just put 14 hours into, how would I, how would I convey my own excitement about this? And I sit down and I write the initial documentation from that point on every time I add a feature, I immediately. Add it to the [01:02:00] documentation, uh, with something like bunch, like every time I add a new feature, the first thing I do is write about it. And like the bunch documentation is some of the best documentation I’ve written to date. Uh, it’s literally a whole website full of, of explanations and, and step by step, uh, procedures. Um, and, and documenting it also helps me find bugs. So it becomes part of the workflow. Uh, I say, this is what it should do. And then I go test it and it doesn’t do that. And, and so then I will revise the code to. Jeffrey: Fact checking. Brett: Yeah, exactly. The fastest way to find bugs is to make a screencast about something you Jeffrey: Oh, totally. Totally. Brett: wrong will Jeffrey: Yes. Brett: But yeah, so like there’s, there’s an initial flurry of coding and then documentation, but from that point on, yeah. Documentation is part of the [01:03:00] development process Jeffrey: Yeah. Yeah. That thing about screen casting. Helping to find bugs. It’s almost like, I’m sure you’ve had this experience. You, you go on a stack overflow and you’re about three sentences done from posting your question and you’re like, oh, I know the answer. Brett: yeah, totally, totally. Jeffrey: needed to write about it first. Brett: Yep. Yeah. Jeffrey: that’s awesome. Um, oh Brett: out, writing things out in, in plain English or whatever your native language is. Um, definitely is a problem solving step. Jeffrey: yeah. Yeah, for sure. Well, let me ask you this last question. I know that when you were. Making changes to gather recently, it was your first time really diving into swift. Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: And I have a two part question to close this out. one is, do you ever have a sort of roadmap in your mind for what you want to do next? And I don’t mean what you want to add to an existing [01:04:00] tool, but like, are there, are there ever tools that are just in your head that you want to build or is it, are you reactionary enough in terms of like, holy shit, I need this now I’m gonna build it. Now that doesn’t happen. That’s my first question. Brett: So usually like a tool, like gather, which was actually a revision of multiple tools before it, but like, it’ll be something. Is an idea in the back of my head for a while before I actually sit down and start coding on it. Um, it’ll be a cool thing that I think could happen, but there, like no one has published yet. Um, so like I’ll first, I’ll go Google and if someone’s already done it great. I will gladly use other people’s tools. But, um, yeah, like then I’ll, I’ll start to code. It’s not reactionary, uh, so much as, it is exploratory. Um, Jeffrey: yeah, yeah, yeah, Brett: and then like [01:05:00] feature additions are often due to responses from after I publish something. Someone will say that’s cool, but can it do, and I will make a judgment call. Yeah. That actually fits with the original mission statement. And it should be able to do that or. That’s out of scope. Um, you know, that’s, that’s another tool you’re thinking of and, and, and I will choose to, or not to add a feature. Um, but the initial it’s always just exploratory to begin with. Jeffrey: mm-hmm . And so, and so do you have a sense, is there something banging around in your head or that’s a, that’s a awful, uh, is there something kind of, uh, in your head now that you’re thinking, like, if I ever, if I build another app, like an actual app, like a marked or, or an NV alter or something, which I know is still in progress, like, do you have a sense of what that would be? You don’t have to say it. Yeah. Brett: yeah, I don’t like right now. Right. Like right [01:06:00] now, what my mind obsesses about is getting NV ultra. Up and out. Uh, and I think about the things that I need it to do and that I, that I want it to do. Um, and I’m, I’m focused on the tools that I have in progress right now. I don’t currently have anything in mind for an app that needs to be built. It will come, you know, Jeffrey: yeah. Brett: give it a little time and there’ll be something else that I need to tackle. Um, but no, I don’t like I’ve built as of this moment. I’ve built everything that’s on my mind. Jeffrey: So the last, the second part of the two part question, and then we’ll do gratitude for sure. Just running a little long. I think that’s fine. Um, is now that you’ve gone into swift, you know, I was thinking about, you were saying you learned Ruby really as a way of, um, customizing text made. Right. Uh, and, and Ruby’s just not like a language that [01:07:00] it, people are seem to be like picking up now. Right. I’m not, I’m not making fun of it Brett: not the new kid on the block. Jeffrey: no. And I, and I’m not even playing that game. Like, I, I, I don’t like that kind of discussion too much because I actually don’t know Ruby, but I find it a pretty beautiful language when I, when I do explore it or especially when you write something and I just kind of, for me, that I have to look through or whatever. Um, but do you imagine yourself. In five years thinking of yourself as a swift person, rather than a Ruby person, Brett: Yes. Um, Jeffrey: bash person. You’re a fucking bash person. My brother Brett: I, I was, I haven’t written a bash script for, I don’t know how long, like I learning swift was extremely. I was very grateful, uh, that I found it in me to learn a new language because there have been a few languages on my list, go rust swift, um, that I have known if I was going to keep up my [01:08:00] coding skills I needed to learn. Um, and I was worried that I’d gotten to an age where I just wasn’t able to pick up new languages anymore. Um, and so the, the flurry of coding that led to, uh, developing enough basics in swift to write a small app, uh, was just so grateful to know that my brain can still do that. Um, and I hope that five years from now I’m well versed in swift and I’ve also picked up rust and. Jeffrey: Mm-hmm Brett: and Scala and like really like gotten myself into modern, modern programming languages. Uh, I, I hope, I hope well into will say my seventies, uh, that, that I continue to learn. Jeffrey: yeah, you can always go back to basic. Did you have the book? Did you have the, the [01:09:00] binder in the slip Brett: I did. I did with that 10, that 10 neural cover. Jeffrey: And beautifully designed by the way. Brett: I actually am working, uh, at work right now. We’re working on a Twitter based compiler language. Uh, that people can send tweets that will cause a massive raspberry pie cluster to perform different functionality. Um, so as a part of doing this, I have to dig into the literally the basics of compiler theory. And, and it is, it’s like going back to basic because it’s, it’s, it’s the basics of compiler theory because we want us a, a concise language with very simple, uh, outputs and yeah, it reminds me a lot of working in basic Jeffrey: That’s amazing. I love it. Basic, you know, I [01:10:00] recently got a TRS 80, Brett: yeah. Trash Jeffrey: yeah, the trash 80, but it’s like the handheld version. It was from a, a friend used it as a reporter for the start to be, Brett: no way. Jeffrey: on like a Southeast Asia trip in the eighties. Brett: Oh, wow. That’s amazing. Jeffrey: great. And I’m thinking of just, I want to, he had programmed, uh, a space invaders game in there, but it’s not there anymore, you know, by Brett: Was this, did this have like a, like an 80 character wide by, by eight pixels, tall little screen on Jeffrey: Yep. Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: Yep. Wonderful keyboard works like a charm still fucking works. Brett: that’s awesome. Jeffrey: and the best part is that he gave me the custom documentation that the star Tribune used, which is the, uh, Minnesota or the twin cities paper. And they actually said instructions for using the trash ad at the top. It was amazing. Um, alright, let’s do some gratitude and thanks for talking to me, uh, about, about, uh, about you. That was super interesting. Brett: for the delightful questions. That was really fun. I, I, [01:11:00] I had been, I had been hoping for the Jeff treatment. Jeffrey: I feel like now you guys Brett: your interview with Christina, Jeffrey: Yeah. If one of you is gone, the other one’s gonna get interviewed. Um, do you wanna go first? You want me to Grapptitude Brett: Sure sure. I, uh, I’m actually picking task paper this week. Uh, task paper, uh, Jesse Gross, Jean created a very simple, uh, text based format for creating to-do lists and, and adding some basic tagging and due dates and things like that. All with just text files you could read in any editor, and then he built a, an app, uh, to streamline working with, uh, these text based files where you could, you know, have keyboard shortcuts for completing tasks or moving them around between projects. And, uh, and there’s a whole query syntax, uh, that you can use to, uh, you [01:12:00] can take a huge. Task paper file and query out just the, the things you need, for example, your next actions, things that don’t have, or that have a start date that is current and aren’t finished yet. Like you can, you can get a list of those things and, and batch add tags to them. And, um, it’s not a complex program. Uh, it is a very elegant, uh, very easy to use way to accomplish a lot of what you would do in like something like OmniFocus, uh, but using all plain text. And I love it. And as mentioned, uh, a lot of the apps and tools that I’ve written work directly with the task paper format, because it is a universal text based format that it just, it works. Jeffrey: Do it, your, your tool doing calls for a task paper. Brett: Yep. Jeffrey: And NA [01:13:00] awesome. I love that. You know, I, I recently found, I, I used to, I was doing a, um, research project about five years ago and it involved interviewing a ton of teachers and asking ’em basically the same set of questions. And, um, the, the way that my list of questions went is there were a couple of questions that had to get asked. I had to ask these to every single person, cuz it was a research project and the rest were like sort of a menu of options. And I was able to work with custom styles and task paper where I made, um, a list of questions for an interview. And when I would finish a question, I would, I would click it and it wouldn’t like strike it out. It would. I’m trying to kind of light gray. So it was kind of there, but in the background, cause some reason the striking it out was just noisy to me as I was looking at the transcript and then it was actually able to show me like, Hey, you forgot this, you forgot that. You know, these are one of the important questions you’ve been rambling on. You have to answer this question before this interview is done. Like it’s one of those things that’s just super extensible. Um, and Brett: actually, I. Jeffrey: as it is. Brett: I use [01:14:00] custom themes, that color, uh, tasks, uh, based on tags. I, I use priority tags at priority one through at priority five. And I have, I have little scripts that let me with keyboard shortcuts assign a priority very quickly. Uh, and then the tasks, the background color of the task changes based on its priority. So I can see at a glance, like what is high priority at any given time? Jeffrey: and there’s a developer who, I mean, I remember listening to an interview with him on Systematic. Is a lot like you and, and really has as his value, a sort of, you know, when you open up an app, are you able to just comfortably calmly start working? Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: You know, and I love that. I love that idea and, and task paper is certainly one of those. Um, my app is peak P E E K by big Z labs. You know, this one, Brett. [01:15:00] So it’s a, it’s a paid app through an eight bucks. And it’s a quick look extension for your Mac. And it’s a wild, quick look extension. It will change your life. First of all, it works with more than 500 file extensions. So I know, you know, if anybody’s ever been in that situation where you, you know, you’ve got your in finder and you hit the space bar a quick look and all you get is the icon like that is almost not happening to me anymore, but more incredible. Is that you can do, like if you’re looking at code, you can jump to lines, you can copy, uh, text. It does scroll restoring. Um, it does syntax highlighting. Uh, it’s just, it’s the most beautiful thing. It’s everything that I always want to be able to do. When I quick look something I don’t want to have to open it. I just want to grab this one piece out of it. Brett: and markdown preview. Jeffrey: And the markdown preview is really nice. Really Brett: with, with [01:16:00] automatic table of contents Jeffrey: yes. With a sidebar that has your main headers. I mean, it’s just, Brett: And that copy paste is so handy and it works in forklift and Pathfinder too. Jeffrey: Yeah. That’s right. That’s right. Yeah. So, so good. Yep. Oh wait. Did, does my forklift do that because of Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: I was like, oh, forklift does this too. Brett: Yeah. Jeffrey: I’ve just started reacquainting myself with forklift after. Reacquainting myself with Pathfinder and deciding I still didn’t want to be in that universe. Brett: yeah, no. Uh, after it was just this year, I think, um, forklift directly integrated peak into the preview, um, also integrates with Huda spot Jeffrey: And kaleidoscope Brett: yeah, yeah, Jeffrey: You just, you click two files in the split finder window and, and there’s a button there and you get kaleidoscope for diff uh, for D [01:17:00] display. Brett: Good stuff. Jeffrey: yes. All right, Brett, it’s been a pleasure. Brett: Hey, thank you. Thank you for a fun interview episode. Jeffrey: Yeah, it was fun. Get some sleep. Brett: Get some sleep.

Buzz-free version! Bryan Guffey returns to talk about therapy as a commodity, Brenden Fraser in a fat suit (and the ethics of fat suits in the first place), good doctors, and a bunch of random stuff in-between! Show Links Harlan Band’s Descent Started With an Easy Online Adderall Prescription Brendan Fraser Hoped He’d Be ‘Unrecognizable’ in ‘The Whale’ Transformation Taylor Swift: Midnights Columbia House craft.io Homebrew Table Flip Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript The Many Returns of Bryan Guffey Tired. So tired Overtired. Jeff: Hello people. This is Jeff Severns gunzel this is the Overtired podcast. We have a special guest today. First. I want to introduce my cohosts. Christina Warren. Hello, Christina Christina: Hello. Jeff: and Brett Terpstra. Hello, Brett. Brett: Oh, hi, Jeff: Brett has a beard. He’s thinking of shaving, but we won’t get into that Um, unless he actually starts to shave it in on the episode. Brett: That’s terrible radio. Jeff: and our very special guest Brian Guffy, uh, is here, been here many times before. Hello, Brian. Welcome back. Bryan: Hello. Hello. Glad to be here. Very excited and very caffeinated. Christina: Yay. Jeff: good. Christina: That is very. Jeff: What type of caffeinated? Like too much coffee or too much red bull. Bryan: Starbucks cold brew. Brett: Man. I got this stuff from this company called wandering bear. They ship you like winery in a box except it’s coffee. So I have this like tap in my fridge that I can just pour out a full glass of cold brew. Anytime I want to. It’s dangerous. And I’m on a subscription plan. It just constantly refills itself. It’s like magic. Jeff: Wandering bear. That could be my street name. Bryan: honestly, I feel you Brett: I feel like that given, given your heterosexuality that might give the wrong impression to some people. Bryan: haven’t been wandering enough lately. So that’s my problem is I would be like stagnant bear. Jeff: so listen, I know you’ve been on a bunch of times, but do you want to give a little introduction to Brian Guffy before we start talking about things? Bryan: Sure I can do a real quick thing. Um, so let’s see. I host, uh, the podcast’s unsolicited fatties talkback and, um that’s with Deshaun Harrison, Mikey Mercedes, and Caleb Luna and Jordan Underwood, where we just talk about, basically we take advice, columns designed for fat people or about fat people and reinterpret them from a fat liberation lens. And then I do this other really fun podcast called, um, technically queer, which is four trans people with ADHD and other mental health, uh, challenges, trying to make a podcast and get it out on a regular basis. And to tell you how successful we are. We have four episodes out we’ve recorded another five that we have just forgotten to release. Christina: So there’s like your lost episodes. Bryan: Yeah, exactly. Like we’re gonna release them. We just keep forgetting to put them up and hit published. Jeff: You know, I, I actually can see how that would happen because there are times when I just enjoy the conversation and like, can forget that something’s gonna come of it. Bryan: Yeah, absolutely. And I don’t know which one of us is the most responsible. It really changes week to week. Except it’s never Alex Cox. I love Alex, but they’ll tell you, like, they’re not the one that’s gonna get the thing posted. Brett: Hi, Alex. Christina: Hi, Alex, we love you. When therapy becomes commodity Jeff: All right. So we have some topics that we’ve kind of previewed when we were all kind of talking before we started recording. And one we’ve been sort of kicking down the road and I’m, I’m actually really glad that it lands here. Um, a couple of episodes ago, before we started recording, I went on the Overtired Twitter and just said, does anybody have anything they wanna hear us talk about or follow up on? And there’s a podcast called pod therapy. And one of the hosts of pod therapy wrote in with this question, he said, what are your views on the appification of mental health? Is the examples like Headspace better help cerebral. We could probably add the sponsor, uh, that we brought on last week. Um, mind bloom and awkwardly would just, just add a sponsor into this conversation. Um, and, and he said, Brett: better, better help has also been a Jeff: that’s true. That’s Brett: gonna, we’re gonna speak honestly. Jeff: And he said, do you think the tech industry and venture capital can do this well? So that’s the question that we’re gonna like look at now, before we get really started. I wanna also just point out that Christina had circulated an article to all of us from the wall street journal. Um, Christina, why don’t you take a stab at summarizing that article? Christina: Yeah, so it’s, it’s a really good, uh, read it’s it’s, it’s a, it’s a long read, um, uh, but we’ll have a link to it in, in the show notes. Um, and it’s, it’s, um, one of the stories that it kind of centers on is, um, this guy, Harland band, who, was living in a sober house. He’d been diagnosed as a kid with ADHD, but, he’d had, you know, his struggles with, um, I guess substance abuse, um, but, using, done, which is one of the, uh, various services that advertises on, on TikTok and Instagram and, and YouTube and things like that. He was able to connect with the doctor and basically get, within about 10 minutes, you know, get a, uh, appointment with. Who was then able to prescribe from Adderall. And that, I think it was actually not even a doctor was a nurse practitioner, but someone who had the ability to, prescribe medication and that kind of set him off on, a relapse. And, uh, it was the, the entire, uh, story, I think it opens up this, this question of a couple of things, one, which is sort of the culpability of what these services have in terms of, you know, prescribing medication to people and trying to kind of balance, you know, on the one hand we talk about how there’s lack of access to a lot of people who have mental health problems and, and they don’t have access to doctors. And this was especially true during the pandemic. And I think we’ve all, uh, all of us on this pod we’ve benefited from, um, you know, like telehealth services, but kind of trying to, to balance that with okay, Do the people who are, are issuing these prescriptions, how much do they actually know about their patients and, and how much are they actually, how much due diligence are they doing? Because in this case, you know, this was somebody who was able to kind of answer the right question, say the right things. And in a, in 10 minutes, get a prescription, you know, for, for a, a schedule to narcotic, mailed to his house, uh, which then set him off on, um, a, uh, a relapse. Whereas. Not to say this couldn’t have happened in person, but in person there would maybe be other, uh, um, barriers to, to prevent that. And I think beyond that, it’s saying, you know, uh, one, one of the things the article goes into, and, and there are some other articles that the, the same reporter for the journal had written about is the, I think the pressure that the, um, either the doctors or nurse practitioners or whoever are working for these services have to turn over patients as quickly as possible. So it’s not just that you don’t get a lot of time with people it’s that they themselves are under pressure and are basically encouraged to kind of turn people over as quickly as possible, but also to prescribe as much medication as possible because you need to have higher satisfaction rates. And so what does that do? Um, you know, uh, ultimately to, to treating mental health and, and does this, you know, create more problems than, than it potentially. Jeff: Has anybody has, have any of you used any of these services? It’s kind of weird to have head. There, but I, I, I think it’s fine, but beyond Headspace, anything that would be actual one-on-one mental health treatment. Brett: I tried out better help. Um, I had a pretty good experience with better help. Uh, didn’t ultimately feel like I connected with my therapist there and let it go. But, um, it, I didn’t try again, like you have the option with better help to continue. Jeff: And how did that, how, what was that like, how did that kind of get started? What was it like to, to log on? Did it feel, um, like sort of a commodifying of mental health or did it Brett: no, it actually. Jeff: I just don’t click with this. Brett: It actually felt really good. And I say full disclosure, they were a sponsor of ours. Uh, they have been in the past. Um, I honestly don’t have anything bad to say about better help. They’re not prescribing medications. Um, I feel like they’re Christina: That’s a very Brett: from right. But, uh, it did. It felt like they, they connected me with someone that checked off all the boxes that I, I said, these are the things that are important to me and a therapist. They found someone, uh, that matched as best they could. Um, I guess I had requested someone who was, uh, well versed in ADHD. And when I talked to my therapist there, uh, she did not actually have any experience with ADHD. So I guess they kind of failed in that regard. Uh, but I did have the option to, to switch therapists and I just didn’t follow through on it. So I don’t know if it would’ve gotten. If I would’ve gotten better results, if I tried. Christina: Yeah. And I can just say, um, my mom, who is, who is a licensed, uh, you know, uh, therapist and counselor, she has been contacted, she’s contacted by them probably, you know, a couple times a month asking, you know, if she wants to work for better health. Um, and for her, you know, she’s retired. It probably, I’m not sure how much they pay per hour from what I’ve looked. It looks between probably like 35 and $45 an hour for her as a retired person. It might make sense if she were to work, you know, 20 hours a week or something, um, as just something to do. Right. Um, not, not as her primary income or anything else, but I do like one of my concerns with, with services, like better health, even though I, I agree with Brett, like I think that, you know, you can get good people out of it, uh, but that you can get, you know, maybe not good people too. It just kind of depends on, on who you’re doing. One of my concerns with better health, more than anything else is the fact that it’s like the amount of money that they are paying, that the counselors is, in my opinion, going to necessitate one of two things, either people who are, um, you might have people like my mom who are retired and are qualifi. And I’ve been doing this for a long time, but you might also have people who are fresh out of school and can’t get jobs other ways and might be doing this in addition to other things. And, you know, maybe don’t have the experience that you would want, especially since frankly, when you look at the price of the service, it’s, it can be less expensive than, you know, like weekly therapy without insurance, but it’s not cheap, right? Like Bryan: No at all. Christina: couple, it’s a couple hundred dollars a month, which again, you know, like my, my psychiatrist who does therapy with me, he does not take insurance. That’s always been his thing. He’s about $400 an hour. Um, but so, you know, I see him once a month, but if I saw more than that, obviously something like better health will be less expensive, but better health is still several hundred dollars a month. And, um, I think that unless you find somebody who you can really connect with, it’s kind of a crapshoot, at least that’s been what I’ve kind of picked up on from talking to people. Who’ve used it. Bryan: Yeah. I think one of the things that I, so I’ve used modern health, I mean, Christina and I we’ve talked about modern health before they do EAPs for a lot of companies and Christina: we, yeah, we have moderate. I haven’t used them, but I have access to them. Bryan: Yeah. And so I got an, I got a specific ADHD counselor through there, not for any med, like I was just looking at their website and they don’t do, they don’t prescribe, uh, restricted, uh, like scheduled medication. They don’t do that because, uh, probably is my guess of this exact thing. But, um, you know, my experience was also like the ADHD therapist I got was like fine, but I definitely like stayed with her longer for that specific thing, because it was free, you know, like I got so many sessions involved or included. Um, but I also wanna say that I think one of the problems with therapy in general, as I know you just went through, like Brett is therapy is a crap shoot, finding the right therapist, period is a crap shoot. And one of the things that I actually think. Is a bit frustrating to me with better help. And some of these other services is the reason they exist is because of how expensive it is to get treatment period. Especially if you’re UN specifically if you’re uninsured. Christina: right, right. No, you’re exactly Bryan: thinking I can, yeah, I can go to done and I can get an ADHD prescription really easily. And we can all probably talk to how hard it can be to get a diagnosis for things and how much money you can spend. Um, you know, that’s the reason these things exist. Um, at least partially, Jeff: Or how easy to get the wrong diagnosis. Bryan: oh yeah. Christina: No, but I think you’re right. I mean, I think this is what one of the, the struggles is, is that this is obviously an area where I think that you can disrupt it with technology. Like I, I’m not willing to say that. I don’t think that there’s any role for VC in this, because I do think that technology can disrupt healthcare. I think that I, I, I think you can disrupt, uh, this field. I think it is open to that. And, and Brian and I, we we’ve discussed some of the advancements that have happened even kind of in the app space around insurance, which I think has been really positive. I think that the disconnect is how do you make sure that you’re not disrupting it in a way that could be harmful actively to, to the people where, where, you know, you go into typical like VC mode where you’re thinking I’m just gonna go for the Moom and we need to do pure growth. And you’re not taking into consideration that this is still people’s. Brett: Yeah, the, the main, the main problem is the same problem. Is you see throughout the healthcare industry is profit motive. Um, it’s right. It’s right for disruption. But when that disruption comes at the price where, where everything has to make a profit, uh, when you turn mental health into a commodity, uh, which is exactly what will happen with, with VC, uh, you turn it into a commodity. You’re not gonna get the best for the patient. You’re gonna get the best for the investor. Jeff: Yeah. And it’s like the nurse, the nurse practitioner in that wall street journal story. It’s super interesting because you know, this, this guy having gotten the Adderall prescription, went down a dark road into old addictions. And this person when interviewed by the wall street journal reporter, not surprisingly has no memory of him, right. Like, because she was in a machine and, and processing people. Brett: you had a 30 minute appointment to do all this. Jeff: Exactly. And, and I thought that, that, that was one of those times actually, when it’s very powerful to have gone to this person. Cause I wouldn’t honestly reading the article. I’m thinking I don’t have anything to learn from this person about this guy. They’re not gonna remember. Right. But that’s the point and that’s the problem that can exist with, like you said, uh, Christina, the pure profit approach. Christina: And, and, and, and to be clear though, that could also be the case if, if this was like a regular doctor, right? Like, like my, my mom, um, she was recently went through some heinous stuff with, with, um, her like her primary care doctor and, and with actually with a cardiologist. And we could talk about the, the ridiculous amount of, um, like ageism that exists in medicine, but that’s a whole separate topic, but, you know, these are these massive healthcare centers that are, you know, like huge buildings that are, that are not HMOs, but are, you know, just the, these huge practices that these corporations own, where doctors see, you know, hundreds of patients and, and you don’t know, like how much are they going to remember, you know, one person to the next, other than their charts, right? Because it’s, it’s all, it does become a, an assembly line and becomes a. Bryan: Yeah. And I’m, you know, I’m just not sure. Um, if there, there’s also something about the virtual aspect, if you’re not, if all you’re doing is virtual stuff, right. If all you’re ever doing is virtual, if that’s the way you enter as a practitioner, particularly, I think there can be an issue with seeing the person as quite the same as you would see somebody that you met in person, just in terms of like the way we treat people from a humanity perspective. We know for a fact that like, Computers, all of this technology is like a substitute, but it’s not a perfect one for being in person with people, for connecting with people, for taking the time, the minute the person is off the screen, you know, in a, in a regular session, like you’re still in your office, you know that you have another person coming in. There’s time set aside for you to take notes. You know, all of those things are allowed because you’re in a physical space, which may not be the case. If you are in a virtual space, the Mach again, the program might just pop somebody else up on your screen. Jeff: right. Bryan: know, how much is it like a call center? Jeff: Yeah. Here’s a whole nother human. On the other hand, like I, I have friends who are therapists, who, um, who really believed during the pandemic, if there were patients that came to them because they wouldn’t have to come in person. Bryan: Oh yeah. Christina: I think that’s the challenge, right? Is, is that these things, if you were to do it the right way without that profit motive, which I think you’re exactly right, right. Like that’s the problem with this. If you were able to do, to take on some of this disruption, without it being about how can we exact as much profit out of this as possible, then I think that some of this tech could be really good and could lead to better care, but that’s not how we think about the system in this country. Like we, we think about it literally as how much money can we extract and, and how much like, like what’s, what’s our best option. And the problem with that, I think, especially when you start talking about like, when you’re now talking about schedule two drugs and, and mailing them to people after a 10 minute meeting, you know, O over a zoom call, That’s a problem because, you know, look, this guy who this story’s about, he was not upfront with a therapist or with a doctor, nurse practitioner or whatever he was not upfront did not share his history. Um, and there’s no telling that he would’ve been honest in person. Right. He might have been able to get drugs in person as well, but I also have to think that in person, when you’re not on kind of a 10 minute thing, somebody might have asked some questions, like, have you had, do you have any history of substance abuse? Do you have, you know, what was your past experience with these things? And that might have led to a, a slightly different, um, you know, outcome. I, you know, there, there’s no telling if it would’ve or would not have, but it definitely does. I, I definitely have to say as someone who is in favor of more people having access to medication, I’m equally uncomfortable with people having. Unfettered access in some ways to these types of drugs when there’s not a lot of due diligence happening on, on behalf of, of the people who are prescribing them. Like that, that to me, I think is really scary because these are things that, that could fuck people up in really serious ways. Bryan: Well, and the particular thing that I think we have to look at with done is done is basically to be very clear, they markets themselves, as you can get your ADHD meds in 30 minutes, right? This is not some normal run of the mill psychiatrist or therapist. Who’s there to give you therapy. They’re literally there to write you a prescription. That’s why they exist, you know? And that’s like, that’s the purpose of the company, which again, like one of the things that I think about in all of this is how, in some ways it is the entire insurance, like. The whole medical system in the United States sets us up for this because why do therapists charge so much money? Uh, because insurance, um, because insurance often will screw a therapist in terms of the money that they get. Like they can’t, and it’ll take them forever to get money back, you know, in reimbursements and everything. Uh, it’s almost impossible for any individual therapists to go out on their own and take insurance because of the amount of paperwork it requires in all of this, you know? And so we put all of these barriers into allowing cuz it’s not just about profit. It’s about sort of like. Astronomical profit. Right? We want people to be able to live, right. We want therapists to be able to provide services and give good money and like, and get, uh, have a decent living in exchange. But they can’t do that with the way the system is set up right now without like charging exorbitant amounts of money. That’s a lot of people can’t afford. Um, or, and then, so then you get on the other side of this, a thing like done, which charges you very little money and gives you a prescription really quick, because that’s the way that’s like, there’s those two options for people. And one for people is inaccessible. Jeff: And as we’ve talked about so much on this podcast and privately with friends, like the thing I thought about, you know, putting aside some of the particulars of the, the man’s story and the wall street journal story, like just starting ADHD meds, starting Adderall, there are so many questions. There’s so many questions you have about why does my body feel like this? Is it the drug? Or is it the drug’s interaction with something? Is it neither? Am I just nervous? Am I stressed? Because I’m putting this thing in my body. Right? That’s if you’ve never had experience with such a thing, right? Like even if you’ve had experience, sometimes you can get a higher, you know, dosage than you probably should get just. As people feel like, oh, you you’ve done this before. Right. And so for me, like I’ve found with, especially with Vivance, which is the only ADHD med I’ve taken, um, I’ve had such a road with that particular drug that the idea of just having a quick, Hey, you know, yeah, you can get this and here’s how, and here’s your meds and you’re often running and, you know, no real follow up, uh, no promise of follow up that really scares me cuz of what it can do to your body and to your mind. Um, especially if you’re not used to sort of paying attention to your body and your mind as it sort of changes day to day, Christina: Yeah, 100%. And I think that Brian made a really great point. Is that done, um, you know, would advertise itself specifically as this is the easy way to get your, your, your ADHD meds in 30 minutes, which attracts a very different audience type than somebody who’s looking to solve a problem. I mean, what you’re doing there and just be explicit about it. You’re going after college kids and you’re going after people who are looking to abuse drugs and get it, get it cheaply and get it without, without having to go through barriers. That’s what you’re doing. Bryan: Or people who are already so fed up with the system, right. Christina: I mean, potentially. Yeah, potentially. Yeah. I’m just saying, I think that the way they advertise it, not to say other people couldn’t use it, but the way they advertise it is very clearly for drug seekers. Brett: So there was like a two year period of my life where, um, I like, I was cut off from my ADHD meds by a system that. Just like wrote me off because I had drug abuse in my history and there was like no chance I would ever get, uh, ADHD meds again. Um, and like a service, like dun could’ve saved. Like, I mean, my life fell apart. Uh, I I’m, I got divorced. I lost, or I gave up my job. Uh, and I couldn’t find new work. Like I went broke, um, like things did not go well. And, and, and, and I started abusing alcohol again, uh, because one of the things that being treated for ADHD is actually good for addicts. Uh, if your ADHD is treated, you are far less impulsive in your use of drugs. So the idea that an addict should never get an ADHD medication, uh, is, is errant. Um, but like a service like done could have saved me from a lot of heart. Christina: 100. Brett: But you’re right. Like, what’s the difference between me and a college kid who wants Adderall to take their finals? You know, like no, no one could determine that in a 30 minute or less conversation over, over the phone. Bryan: Yeah. That’s the thing. Yeah, Christina: I was gonna say, I think that’s the problem, right? Like I, Bryan: it flattens you, it flattens them. Christina: exactly, and, and to the, to this point, because now I think that the, the pharmacies see it as a liability, um, uh, Walmart and CVS were two of the, the biggest pharmacy changed in the us will not fill prescriptions from done. And, and it has to be because of this sort of thing. And that’s unfortunate because again, like, I do feel like to your point, like Brett, like you’re not the only one who could have been saved and had really good benefits from this. Like, I, I was reading about the service and at first I was really sympathetic to the service because I was like, I think that what, what they’re trying to solve is an important thing. And then though I think about it though, and I’m like, God, but. This is still some serious stuff. Like there has to be a checks and balances here. And I guess the more I was kind of reading, especially about done with their CEO and whatnot, the fact that a big red flag for me is zero background in, in healthcare or, or medicine, um, or, or, or, you know, bioengineering, anything like that, right. Is, is to be like, which I’m sorry. I think does a little bit preclude you from starting a startup like this, right? Like at least have a co-founder who’s a doctor. Right. But if you don’t have anybody on your founding team who comes from this world and you just see this as an area to, you know, create a middle man opportunity for yourself and speed things up and be efficient. I don’t have a lot of trust that you’re going to do things the right way. And, and in that case, you could potentially my big fear with a lot of this is that this ends up because when people have been overprescribed and have been overdiagnosed in my opinion, and I think that that leads to people, not taking people who have the actual. Diagnoses and need help. Seriously. I, I genuinely believe that. And I think that it, it leads to this thing where, uh, it, there could be, uh, like a pendulum swing where it would be very difficult for all of us, like on, on this and many people who listen to this podcast to actually get their medications. And that, that, that’s a thing that scares me because of, of how these services work and, and just kind of this culture of, yeah, we’ll give anybody a diagnosis if you happen to be of a certain class and happen to have access to certain things and, and, and say the right, you know, phrase, then we’re gonna give you your Adderall. Like, I don’t wanna not be able to get my dexo drain because you know, the, the Congress decides that they need to have more stringent guidelines, you know, because, because of this sort of thing, that that’s, I have to be completely like selfish and say, that’s one of my fear. Brett: Well sure. That’s that’s every, every, everyone who is successfully treated for ADHD, that’s a constant fear we have to live with Bryan: Yeah. I mean, yeah. It’s, I mean, they have this new advisor, uh, yeah. They just hired a new advisor probably after all of this stuff happening is why they did this. Um, Steven Stahl. Who’s actually a guy I’ve read about before, who has a lot of experience treating HD ADHD, but like fundamentally 30 minutes and a one minute assessment is not enough. Like they promote a one minute assessment. There’s a reason why the ADHD assessments take a while. Like there’s so many things Brett: Can’t assess something in one minute. Jeff: it’s the ADHD assessment for ADHD. Christina: really Brett: Right. Bryan: a joke or my boyfriend told me was if you wanna test somebody for ADHD, just have them pack a suitcase for a trip. Christina: Yeah. a good one actually. Brendon Fraser in a fat suit Jeff: uh, we actually have like a couple of pop culture topics. And I’m wondering how you feel about transitioning. Brett: do. Bryan: Yeah. Pop Jeff: All right. Well it’s I was thinking it, Brian came in saying it Brendan Frazier in a fat suit. Everybody. Do you wanna do the summary first, Brian? Bryan: Sure. So. Honestly who doesn’t love Brendan Fraser, Brendan Fraser in the mummy, Brendan Fraser in all sorts of great movies as a kid, you know, George of the jungle, like we loved Brendan Fraser in the nineties and the two thousands then Brendan Fraser disappeared. And in 2018 he came back and, you know, there was an article in GQ where he talked about, um, being blacklisted by the film industry, after speaking out about being sexually assaulted, um, you know, he has started to see, you know, more, more career, more, uh, more roles and things. And so this September, there was a big movie that was, you know, high profile called the whale, which is also a play that was, um, by Darren Aoki. Um, It’s like it’s Oscar bat, but it’s Oscar bat in which Brendan Fraser wears a fat suit. I should also note that most of us who remember Brendan Fraser, remember him as a thin, very muscular hot person. Typically Haun person, Brett: And oh man. That’s how I remember bringing Bryan: Brendan Fraser himself is fat now. And so I think that’s important to understand as well, a little bit about this movie, just a quick background. This is a movie about a man who, um, is struggling. It’s about a 600 pound gay man struggling to connect with is estranged daughter before his compulsive binge eating kills him. Um, you know, and it got him a six minute standing ovation at the Venice film festival and yeah, I mean, so this Christina: based on, based on a, Bryan: Based on a play. Christina: play. Yeah. Bryan: A pretty successful play. And like for me straight up, I’ll start the story. I don’t think, I don’t think people should be wearing fat suits. I don’t think that I don’t think that people’s bodies are costumes to put on and take off personally. Um, uh, I have a, I have a personal problem with this. I think this movie also is sympathy porn for fat people for like thin people to be like, oh, here’s a reason for me to care about a really fat person. When oftentimes what we do is we ridicule them in shows like my 600 pound life and all of those sorts of things, instead of seeing them as whole people. Um, I’m also like personally, like really struggling with the fact that Brendan Frazier as a fat person who I hope will have started to realize what it is like to live in a fat body will then choose to put a fat suit on, on top of. But I also recognize the flip side of this is that I want to think about the fact that here is Brendan Frazier. Who’s been blacklisted from the film industry for a very long time, finally getting opportunities. Um, and they come to him with this, you know, and here’s an opportunity for him to do something in a, in a movie that, you know, to me is a lot like movies about drug addicts, right. Where we’re trying to like, you know, empathize with the drug addicts. So we tell a story of a drug addict who like goes through this inspiring thing and I just really struggle with it because, um, why don’t we care about drug addicts normally, right. Why do we have to tell inspiring stories about them? Jeff: For me, it really fit in not directly, but it fit in with this tradition of often, um, very sort of trim Hollywood, male actors gaining 60 to 80 pounds for a role, I think like Robert de Niro and raging bull and like a million of those examples. Right. And like, they are praised. Yes, they are praised and placed in a very special category almost as if look what you did to your beautiful self, you made yourself this thing, just so you could act for us, you know, and it’s a very, and you’re doing violence to your body, anyhow, cuz you’re doing you’re gaining and then losing it really fast, right? Bryan: it’s really bad for your body. It’s really bad. Brett: This episode brought to you by fatness. Bryan: it’s awesome. It’s just like thinness. They’re all part of the natural human spectrum. Christina: Yeah. I mean, I struggle with this because on the one hand, I do think again, to your point, like we have this history for whether it’s a good, or it’s a bad thing. It is a history of, of people, you know, transforming their bodies for roles and, um, people, you know, um, being moved by it and, and I’ve definitely been moved by those performances, like by Christian BA’s performances, by, uh, Robert Janero and raging bull by, um, you know, uh, uh, the elephant man and, um, um, uh, Daniel de Lewis in my left foot. Like these are really fantastic performances that I, I don’t, uh, look at them as, as being like negative, um, uh, in most cases or, or like, uh, Pejoratives in certain ways. Um, ones that I find a little ridiculous, although not discounting, what, what she, the work she went into it, but like, you know, um, the fact that like Renee Zeiger, you know, the weight she gained for, um, Bridget Jones, I think that the people like Laing, that was ridiculous because she became like the, the sides of like a normal person, but I’m not going to discount ha having been someone who is very thin and then gained weight, I’m not going to discount. Uh, and then lost it again. I’m not going to discount like the actual toll and what it does to your body when your body changes that way. Like, I’m not gonna, I’m not gonna discount that, but I feel, I I’m, I’m, I’m sort of conflicted because on the one hand I’m I’m with you, I’m like, I, I don’t think that we should, you know, be using like, uh, fat suits and. Although there’s a part of that says, okay, but what’s different about one prosthetic versus another, right. We use prosthetics in so many other ways. So are we going to say that one type of prosthetic is allowed on another isn’t um, and if you wanna have a conversation about the nuances that I’m happy to, but, but I think that’s important thing to put out. But the other thing though, is that I do fear and, and this is I’m sorry, but I’m just gonna be honest here. If we were to make a rule that says that people can’t use prosthetics or fat suits, then I do think that you would not see any stories that people of size told not because, because a, the number of actors who would be available to do it, but B like. This film is getting attention because it’s Darren Aronofski and it’s Brenna Fraser. If they actually cast an actual 600 pound actor in this, no one would care and it wouldn’t get funding and it’s it’s show business, right? Like, like people were really upset. Again, Renee Zevier with the thing about Pam, I understand that. Here’s the thing. If the Oscar winner is not attached to that project, it doesn’t get made. So sometimes I think you have to like opening up to, to, to the rest of you, but like have to say like, do you, do we want stories told or do we not? Cuz sometimes I think it really does come down to that. Jeff: What about Coda? I feel like Coda is a, is a film that kind of makes the, the sort of other. Christina: Yeah. But that’s a small film, right? Like you can do that for sure. I’m just saying like, you’re not going to get like Coda, didn’t go to the Venice film festival, right? Like it was, it was purchased at Sundance by apple TV. And they, you know, a really good Oscar campaign, but also in fairness here coulda had the attachment of an, of an academy award winner, right. That had had Marley Matlin. If you didn’t have her attached to it, who is unfortunately the on she’s been the face of, of, of deaf of people in acting for her entire career. Right. And because she won an Oscar when she was, you know, 21 or whatever, like she’s been the one person there, if she was not attached to that film, that film doesn’t even get its, its small amount of funding. Right. Let alone getting picked up. So like it’s a pipeline problem. I hate to be like that, you know, but that is part of it. But it just, I, I wonder if like if we can even open with a pipeline more, if you don’t have any of these roles done. Like, like if, if it’s, if it’s, so if people are so like at the point where they, they don’t even feel like they can tell any stories like about drug addicts or about people of size. Or about, you know, deaf people, like what, what, what do you do? Like I do think I do agree. In most cases you should have the people who are those things playing those roles. But I also understand that, like, it, it’s a it’s show business and it’s gonna be about who you can, you know, attach to it, to actually get funding, you know? And, and if it’s a, if it’s a matter of the film of the story, getting told and not getting told I’m, I’m a little more conflicted there. Bryan: I don’t think this story needed to be told. Christina: And that’s Bryan: I think just like, yeah, I think, yeah, I think that’s the problem for me. Um, I don’t know why we need a, like we don’t, I guess, and I don’t know why we need stories about a 600 pound man. Who’s apparently decided he’s going to die because of a compulsive eating disorder. Um, like I’m not sure that that’s the story that needed to be told. Um, I also think, yeah, absolutely. I also think you could have told it with like a 400 pound person or a 300 pound person, which like Brendan Frazier already was we already, I think like it, what’s weird about it for me is like the. Excessive, like, let me just say this. People think that 300 pound people are gonna die already. People think all like so many, like the stereotype is the fat people. You’re just, we’re all gonna drop dead of heart attacks. And so it seems like it really does seem like they used the fatness as an opportunity to make it a bigger deal than it was. And you could have told the story otherwise, Brett: Do you feel like you might have to amplify it though for, for people to sympathize Bryan: well, right. Brett: for the average person Bryan: but that’s the problem, right? Like, yeah. Now, now we’re saying that we, you, we don’t care about fat people unless they’re 600 pounds. And then we care about them in a really weird way. know, which is that we only care about them if they lose weight or they’re going to die, not if they’re just like normally living people. Um, and I think the last thing was you talk about prosthetics, Christina. I would just say, I think, as you said, the nuances here, I think the biggest one is like some prosthetics change the human body in a way to align with stereotypes and those, you know, like, I don’t just as like mainly it’s like, I don’t think, I don’t think men should play women. Either, you know, like, I don’t think that, you know, like when, when Jared Leto played a trans woman, like, I think it was Jared Leto. Like, no, not like cast a trans woman. And part of the reason why they’re not casting these people is because we’re not in the industry. And the reason we’re not in the industry is because they decided they’d rather cast thin people and have them wear fat suits or prosthetics. So I think the question is, you know, we have to, like, there are probably great actors out there who are fat and they just don’t know Christina: Sure. No, and I don’t disagree with that at all. And, and, and look, it’s a chicken and an egg thing. You’re, you’re not wrong. I’m just saying like, we have to accept the industry reality, which is for instance, with, with JTO right. That film does not get made unless it is starring Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto, that film does not get made. And so, like, that’s just a fact. And, and so, you know, especially then now you might have a better chance you would still need to have Matthew McConaughy. You would never be able to, to make that film without it. Um, you know, I, I wasn’t in favor of the Scarlet Johansen, you know, film where she was going to be playing a transman. However, that film fell apart after she left the project, they could not get funding. So it, it does like people are retroactively angry at, at like Hillary Swank being in, in boys don’t cry, which I think is bullshit because I think in that time, That, that was the, she was perfect casting and, and that was an indie film made with, with very little money. And I think it fit the, the, the nuance of that story incredibly well. So I actually have a big problem with people retroactively being angry with that, but I can understand not wanting to, to CA like wanting to cast trans people over S I get that. I just also like, think that we have to acknowledge, this is a, this is a business, fundamentally, this is a business. And, you know, for a lot of people, the question would then become like, do we like, do we tell the stories or not? I think that there’s a valid comment to say, does this story, this play need to be told, does this need to be a film? And I, I get that, but I, I think that the more broadly you have to, like, for instance, Shirley’s th who absolutely deserved her Oscar for monster, and it’s still, to me, one of the, like, most amazing performances ever, she gained weight, they modified her face. She was in makeup for hours and hours a day. They could have cast an ugly person, right. I don’t think that you can make the argument, at least to me, cuz cuz like pretty privilege is, is, is a very real thing. And, and obviously most people who are on screen are going to have pretty privilege, but like, I, I, I, I, and I know this, isn’t what you’re saying. I’m just saying people could take this to, to its other place where they’re like, well, we, we couldn’t have cast Charlie’s Thoran in that role because we should have cast, you know, someone who actually, you know, uh, didn’t need to modify their body that way. And, and, and I think that there are nuances to, to be clear. I know you’re not saying that. I just think that sometimes the conversation becomes flat to the point where I have a hard time sometimes engaging with it because it’s like a it’s art and, and you know, a lot of people, their process is modification, but B. This is, this is a, this is a business and it’s about who you can market to and, and who you can, you know, what name you can attach so that you can get people willing to put millions and millions of dollars on the line. Cuz it, these projects, it’s not like it’s, you know, a small amount of money. It means you’re talking about, you know, like hundreds of thousands, millions of dollars. And, and you know, that’s, that’s gonna be difficult to, to do for somebody who doesn’t have a, a reputation or a name. Bryan: Yeah, I think the question, I mean, which, which goes back, I mean, what we’re pointing at at the end of the day here is that there are large systemic problems that, that cause us to be in the reality that, that we are here. I think the question is when do you decide to start focusing on the systemic problem versus worrying about or versus saying, oh, well we can’t make this now. And maybe that’s okay if we can’t make this now maybe we have to wait until we have the better people to do it, you know? And, but once again, it goes back to what did we talking about earlier profit, right? Like we wanna make this movie now because we wanna tell this story now, because we think it’s gonna be a hit, which is both, it’s a good story maybe, and it will make money, you know, and it’s. Christina: Although, although, I mean, the only thing I’ll say is like, let’s not ever pretend like the film industry. I mean, the one thing I will say like about it, it’s always been upfront that it’s a business, right? Like, like if you’re an artist and you’re somebody who can find somebody to fund you and you wanna not be seen, that’s fine. And you can get grants and what on you can do your work that way. But like, it, it it’s the whole point is to have people see your work and for it to make money and, and to do that. So I think that, unfortunately just there’s, there’s always going to be a push pull about that for certain things. But I do think you’re exactly right. Like we have to maybe have the conversation is not okay to tell these stories. I guess the only thing I would say is if we say that, then I think maybe we have to like, let people know these are the stories you’re missing out on. If that makes any sense. We’re not telling these stories, not because we don’t want to, but because we don’t have a way to do it that fits in with this system. And maybe that’s the only way you can get the system to, to, to adapt. But you have to be willing to let the stories not be told. And at the same time, not, you know, like be very angry when the stories aren’t told, like you’ve gotta almost like, Bryan: Oh, agreed. Christina: you know, Bryan: Yeah. Brett: If I can put a positive spin on trans people in, uh, television and movies, you guys watched the umbrella club. Bryan: Umbrella academy. Jeff: No, Brett: Umbrella academy. Sorry. Yeah. Umbrella academy. They actually wrote in Elliot page’s transition into the script and changed the, the credit sequence after the, after the character, just after the character, on the, on the TV series. Transitioned. Bryan: Yeah. And trans people in film, film, and TV are a great example of where we’ve started to see things change, you know, and, and that is both because of pressure that’s been put on like social pressure and more trans people have felt able to be in the industry to come as themselves to the industry. And like, and Elliot is a great example. I mean, Elliot is probably the first major movie star to transition publicly and to go well. Yeah. You know, we’re not there yet with fat people. Jeff: Well, no, I’m in a transition. That’s. On, um, I’m gonna transition right now. Brett: on Bryan: Oh, wow. Congratulations. Jeff: unless if there’s anything anyone wants to say wrapping that up, I wanna transition into pop culture topic. Number two, Brett: I just wanna point out we skipped the mental health corner and that’s part of why Brian is here. Jeff: do we have sponsors? Brett: No, actually we don’t, this, this, this episode is brought to you by whoever you want it to be brought to you by. Mental health corner Jeff: Do you wanna just do a, like a, a late check-in and I, I mean, and I know, you know this Brian, but there are no rules. It doesn’t have to be long or short or any kind of depth or, or anything. It’s just what you’re feeling like. You want to check in with. Bryan: Oh yeah. I mean, I’m happy to kick it off. I’ll just say, um, so. I a line up to being fat, right? Like this is actually, it ties in really well. So I recently got a new doctor and I got this new doctor because my previous doctor, when I told him that I didn’t wanna talk about weight loss said to me, well, then I won’t be your doctor anymore. Christina: Oh, fuck Bryan: Um, yeah, absolutely. It was, uh, luckily, um, the, I, I complained the medical director contacted me and she turned out to be a health at every size certified practitioner. So I’m now seeing her. And I just had my first appointment with her, um, health at every size is a framework that was started really to begin the conversation around the fact that like, Being fat is not fundamentally unhealthy. There are. Um, and there’s a longer conversation to say we should, we value people based on their health, which I would say no, but, um, this was the first step of like the, the past the fat liberation, which is like, um, you know, studies show that like being fat does not automat there’s no, I’m gonna say this. Nobody has yet proven causation for being fat, making you unhealthy. They have shown correlation, but not causation. And so many people forget that that’s a really important thing in science. Um, but anyway, so I went to this doctor, um, I’ve had some concerns recently about my, uh, my blood pressure. Um, I’ve been on Adderall, I’m on blood pressure pills. Um, but. I had a period where like, I was just like, my heart was beating a lot faster when doing a lot less than I thought it would need to. Um, and if it’s kind of gone away, but I was still kind of nervous about it. And so I see this new doctor, you know, um, she was really great. Like she didn’t, she said, if you wanna weigh yourself, you’re welcome to there’s no requirement. That was really cool. The first time I’ve ever had that experience, my blood pressure was fabulous. Also a wonderful thing. So, you know, great appointment and everything. But then the day after I get my labs back and there are some things that are high and this is the first time I’ve ever had labs that showed abnormalities. Um, and so my doctor was very nice. You, you all may know these days, doctors will share things at the same. Like you get the lab result at the same time your doctor does this part. Right. And so I was freaking out y’all. I was freaking out about what these numbers meant. Um, Turns out. I, so I had to follow up with my doctor today, but my doctor was like, don’t freak out. We’ll meet. I probably have hyperthyroidism. Christina: Okay. Bryan: Um, which turns out is not hard to treat Christina: Nope. You take a. Bryan: and yeah, like I found that out from a lot of people, but I was in a rollercoaster this weekend. Like Friday, I was ready to believe that I was gonna die. You know, um, I have really bad illness. Anxiety is like one of my types of anxiety that I have. Um, but you know, had a lot of friends like step up and share with me their experiences with their thyroids and everything. And help me understand that it wasn’t like a, like, you know, an end of the world thing. And, and also that it was probably, um, You know, unrelated again, to being fat. I had a, I think we may have talked about this before, but I had a friend in last December pass away, big sort of like iconic person in the fat liberation movement. I was working with her on the fat studies conference that happens every year or every two years. Really. We do it and she passed away suddenly. Um, her name was cat PAE. She’s really like one of the founders of the fat studies movement from an academic perspective. And she passed away suddenly. And you know, one, when that happens to somebody who is fat, you worry, you worry a lot. And I had been worrying until I went and saw my doctor, you know, so I was like this rollercoaster of wow, clean bill of health. Oh, wow. Maybe not there’s something going on. But then I met with my doctor today and she’s like, all of these labs, like, it’s, we just wanna figure out what’s going on with this thyroid. And it’s not super urgent. You know, all of those things are really good to hear, but it has been a Rocky weekend. Like. Like big time. My mental health was like sort of up and down and all over the Brett: Yeah. Jeff: Yeah. Bryan: otherwise, you know, I’m doing better now, so that’s good. Christina: That is really good. I’m, I’m glad, I’m glad that you are like, feeling calmer about that. And, and, and I hope that if I say this, this, this doesn’t like come across the wrong way, but. If, if this is something with your thyroid, you might find that your weight might change, like naturally because of that, which, which could, you know, lead to maybe like other, you know what I mean? Like, I’m not trying to say like, oh, maybe this will help you like lose weight. Cause that’s not what I’m trying to say, but like, I, I I’ve, I’ve had thyroid problems and, and it has an absolute effect on, on, on, on your weight, um, which, which, you know, so I’m, I’m glad that they’re, they’re looking into this and getting this checked out. Bryan: Yeah, it’s a very interesting thing to consider inside of fat liberation. I have already begun, like there was a period where I lost some weight cuz I was just exercising more. And like I had to start to think about how I feel about felt about losing weight in a different way, which is really interesting. Um, you know yeah, Brett: I have that thing where my heart beats loud and fast when I’m not doing anything and it scares the shit out me. I’ve gone to the emergency room before, uh, only to have them run hours of tests on me to say, you’re fine, everything’s fine. Maybe you’re constipated or something who knows. And it’s, it’s, it’s very disconcerting though. When you can hear your heart throbbing in your ears and you can’t fall asleep, you know, it’s awful. Yeah, Bryan: terrifying. Brett: yeah, yeah. I’ll go next. Uh, pretty, pretty good actually, um, sleeping too much. Uh, I think like I’m hitting that like post, uh, post mania, depression, but I’m not like I’m not down. Um, I’m doing I’m I’m, I’m, I’m being very social and, um, I’m not, I’m not scared that you guys all hate me right now. Jeff: Uh, Brett: sure I’m pretty sure we’re all cool. I feel like we’re all cool. Um, and, and, and I’m, I can, I could drop and take a nap time of the day right now, which is weird for me, but, uh, but other than that, uh, just kinda stable. I have an appointment with my therapist. My third appointment with my therapist is tomorrow. Um, looking forward to, uh, seeing him when I am not manic. Jeff: Is that in person or Brett: think it’s in person. I can’t remember what we scheduled. I have to check the calendar. Um, if it’s not in person, then the next one will be in person next week. Um, I will, I will be, I will be trying both versions, both flavors of this therapist to see what I actually like better. Um, but last time we talked, I was still manic and the conversation was pretty much entirely about mania and I have so many other things I wanna get into. So I’m kind of looking forward to that. Uh, we’ll see what happens. Jeff: That’s great. Bryan: That’s really awesome. I totally feel you on the, oh my gosh, everybody hates me thing just random, random days. I’ll get it for different people. Brett: real. Jeff: Yep. I had to ask, we had a, we had really good friends over like the kinds of friends that I’m super comfortable with and they get me, they know me, uh, and we had about, it was two couples over for dinner and I was just on like, super, super on the whole time, which I get when I really like the people that I’m with, but I sort of lose myself a little bit and I can’t really tell how on I was and I spend the next two days. Yeah. I spend the next two days just being like, oh my God, was that a disaster? Like people seem to be enjoying my company. Brett: We’ve had episodes where I feel like I was really gone and then we get done and I’m like, oh my God, was I the asshole? Bryan: no, the answer is Christina and I are always the assholes and it’s totally Christina: say I’m always the asshole. I think. Thank you, Brian. I, I, I, I was, I was gonna, I would’ve added that, but yeah. Bryan: Listen, we both have very strong contrarian streaks, Christina. Christina: We do, which is why I appreciate you so much because I, I, I like like being able to like, have more like, robust discussions about things. Bryan: Yeah. Uh, how are you, Jeff or Christina? Yeah. Jeff: I can go. You want me to go Christina? Okay. Um, I am, uh, you know, I was reading a book this morning called the face a time code and it’s, um, it’s by this, um, Japanese American writer who actually, I had never encountered before Ruth Ozeki or Ozeki, um, it’s actually a pen name. Um, but this is, um, what she did for this book was she, she took inspiration from a, a Harvard art professor who’s, uh, who. Whose article or like the transcript of her talk, I will put into the show notes. It’s incredible. This is an art, um, history teacher who has her students each year, pick a painting and go sit in front of that painting for three hours, knowing that that’s insane. Like, you know, she’s not just like, you’ll find your space, right? She’s like, that is uncomfortably long. And maybe even physically uncomfortably wrong, Bryan: fall. Jeff: like you can get up, you can stand whatever. And the idea being that like, you know, by the end journal the whole time, just like the things you, you know, start to see, and she had this great. Thing about how, you know, just seeing is not seeing right. Not having access to something is not the same as seeing it. Right. And so anyhow, this, this woman, um, who wrote this book, the face very short book, wanted to do this, where she put a mirror up and she was gonna stare at her own fucking face for three hours. And the book is half time coded journal and half more considered memoir. And she goes through all the stuff you can just imagine going through over that, you, the things you hate about your face, the things you are curious about in your face, the things that used to bother you, but don’t anymore things that used to be true, but aren’t true. And the way that she, um, The way that she wrote this thing was just incredible and, and beautiful. And I, and what happened to me? I read it this morning and I actually, so my, the background of this is this is the first day that my wife and my kids are all back at school. My wife works at the university, so I’m home alone and I can just have a nice slow morning. And so I’m just like laying on the couch, reading this very slow book about a very slow thing, looking at your face for three hours. Right. And I felt so good. Just be reading and not be reading exactly like story or anything. You know how sometimes like you can reading is great, but it can kind of activate parts of you, either trauma or too much joy or whatever. Right. Like it can bring you into places that you don’t mean to be. And this just kind of like hovered with me in a way that was just really. Really powerful, but she, she opens up by asking this question or writing this question. That’s, it’s, it’s a Buddhist coin, which is kind of like a, a thought puzzle. They’re like these single questions that, um, that you ask yourself and they’re meant to how she put it is they’re meant for you to like break your brain over them basically. Right. And the question that she writes is what did your face look like before your parents were born? And I loved that. So goddamn much in part, because I’m in this phase of therapy, which is also known as therapy, um, Where parent stuff is like super present. And I see myself through the lens, uh, of the son of these two people. Right. And, and more than I would like to what doesn’t say anything, that’s, that’s a neutral statement more than I would like to. Right. I would like to see myself or, or feel myself as being something more sort of detached and individual. And there was something about this question. What did your face look like before your parents were born? That like took me to that place for just a second. I just felt like a different kind of being or a different kind of presence. So, no, I’m not high, even though my co-op now sells tht THC gummies because the Minnesota state legislature made a mistake and accidentally legalized them. That’s a whole nother topic. Christina: Oh my God. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. So, so, so, so gummies are legal, but, but not anything Brett: Yeah, they act, they accidentally legalize small amounts of, of edibles. Jeff: because the Republican on the committee. Read it just a little wrong and, and so was like, yeah. Okay. That’s fine. And then all of a sudden, I was like, you just legalized gummies. Thank you. Christina: like, Bryan: that’s Christina: like the, oh my God, this is amazing. Jeff: literally my fucking co-op now sells gummies. Like it’s just like it’s Christina: do. Cause it’s Jeff: so what I need to do to close out my check in is go take a bunch of gummies and go. What did your face look like before your parents were born? all right, Christina, that was I, I took us all over the place. You wanna Christina: did. Yeah. Okay. So I’m still, um, unfortunately dealing with of my, uh, uh, like issues with, with my digestive system, which means like, I’ve been having a hard time, like with, uh, like my esophagus, like, I’ve been it it’s, it’s not the gross digestive stuff. It’s like, there it’s an ulcer something, I don’t know. I’ve got an appointment, but I’m not gonna be able to be in for a couple. So I’ve been dealing with that and that has not been fun at all. Like it’s, it’s been pretty shitty I’m I’m not gonna lie. So that, that’s kind of where I’m at right now. Jeff: I’m sorry, I’m sorry. That’s the kind of thing. That’s like tooth pain. It’s like, it’s just there. Christina: no, E exactly. And it’s just like, it’s not, it’s just not good. Um, but I’m, I’m trying, and, uh, you know, my mom is freaking out obviously because a as frequent listeners of this show know, like my mom is, is like the stereotypical helicopter mom and, and it doesn’t matter how old I am or how old she is. Like, she will never not worry about these things. So, uh, yeah. But, uh, but yeah, no, it’s pretty bad this weekend. Um, and, uh, but hopefully that will, I can at least get things under control until I can get to a doctor and then have, you know, full, uh, you know, upper GI and, and all that stuff. Maybe if they’re scope me, they have to scope me, but that’s fine. Um, but yeah. I mean, I’ve had it done before, so it’s, Jeff: Yeah. No, it’s Brett: Scoping as in like colonoscopy. Christina: Yeah. Potentially or endoscopy, it would be either one I’ve I’ve maybe both ends. Maybe I’ll get lucky and I’ll, I’ll get the, I’ll get I’ll get both. Brett: Ooh. And they can meet in the middle, Christina: God, fuck. Yeah, no, I really don’t want that, but yeah, that would be, Bryan: Oh, my gosh, absolutely not in the middle. I just think about going back. I, Christina, I just think about going back. I can go all the way back to 2007. No, 2003. When I no, 2004, again, can’t do dates. But when I got diagnosed with IBS Christina: mm. Bryan: and the, and like the lead up to dealing with that, like to figuring out what was going on and just the pain, I could still remember the pain, like, uh, Brett: IBS basically means we couldn’t figure out what was going on. Cuz I went through $10,000 out of pocket, worth of colonoscopies and checkups and check-ins and dietary, uh, discovery. And ultimately they’re like, yeah, you have IBS, which means you don’t have diverticulitis. And we don’t find any other issues. Other than you have clear symptoms that we can explain. So you, you have IBS and I have lived with that ever since. Bryan: My doctor was the doctor that I, and I was a different doctor. Cause I was in the middle of nowhere. I was at it like, uh, summer theater doing summer stock theater. And he was like, yeah, I think you have IBS. And I was like, okay. And I mean, I have never, I have never challenged that the things that I’ve done have worked. So, Brett: Yeah, Bryan: uh, Brett: can I, can I complain about one thing before we get to gratitude? Christina: Please. Brett: So Y do you guys remember simple the banking Christina: Uh, Brett: company? Simple. So I, Christina: R I P Brett: yeah, I signed up for simple and they, they closed. I was like, whatever. I had like 30 bucks in my account, they sold my account to PNC bank. and, um, and I, I thought, whatever, you know, it’s, it’s in perpetuity, I’ll have $30, but they started charging service fees. And I got an email. I I’ve been getting emails every 12 hours for the last three days saying that my account was in low balance mode, meaning I was 18 cents overdrawn. Uh, in, this is an account I have not touched in a decade. I do not have an account number. I do not have a card. Jeff: Well, you clearly bought a gumball. Brett: I do not. I do not have anything related to this account. I have no login. I have, I have no way to modify the situation. I’m talking to them and they’re like, oh, all you have to do is show up at a PNC location with a photo ID. I live in fucking bum, fuck Minnesota. I have no PNC location within the state. Let alone near me. Bryan: Oh, my gosh. Brett: So basically I have until 10:00 PM Eastern tonight to rectify this situation before they start charging me overdraft fees on an account, I haven’t touched in a Bryan: Oh, Jeff: Christ. Brett: they’re not giving me. And they’re like, oh, we’ll escalate this issue. Give us your phone number. So I’m waiting for a call Christina: Oh, fuck Brett: Yeah. Christina: Oh my God. What a Brett: just, just close the account. I’ll pay you 18 cents to close my account and just leave me the fuck alone anyway. Okay. So I promised my mother, I would take her for a hike in the Wisconsin wetlands, um, in, I’m supposed to pick her up in seven minutes. So if we could, if we could, if we had roll on into gratitude, I’m sorry. Oh my God. We were gonna talk about Taylor swift for the first time in like how many weeks Grapptitude Christina: Look the whole reason. This is my gratitude. It’s usually an app. It’s gonna be Taylor swift this time. Bryan: perfect. Brett: fair Christina: Okay. So, so Taylor swift, I feel like has written an album. Her next album is called midnight. So it’ll be out in October. I feel like it is in many ways, a complete acknowledgement of this podcast Overtired, because the whole thing is about the things that keep her up at night. Jeff: Nice. Brett: Shout out you Overtired. Bryan: Honestly, I’m down with it. Jeff: Awesome. Yeah, she put a little something in the acknowledgements. I saw, I got a promo of the CD, which probably doesn’t even happen anymore. People get promos of CDs Christina: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Brett: I still get my, uh, my Columbia house, Christina: Columbia house, Brett: every Jeff: God, what a fucking wonderful time. That was. Bryan: Oh my God. Christina: man. I rip, I ripped them off so much. Bryan: my same Christina. Oh my gosh. Oh, Columbia house and BMG. Jeff: if you were under 18, you could. There’s nothing they could Christina: You could. Bryan: could, my parents would just call and say, sorry. Jeff: Oh Christina: Yeah. I, I had accounts on the dog’s name. I’m like, you’re the one who set it up an account for shadow warrant. Like, what is, what is wrong with you? Like Bryan: get so mad at me for doing it again and again, Christina: I didn’t, I didn’t even hide it. Like. Bryan: so many CDs. Jeff: all right. Should we do gratitude? Jesus. I could have gone down that rabbit hole for the next five hours. Uh, Brian, do you have a gratitude? Bryan: Yo, of course I have a gratitude. I’m ready. Honestly, my gratitude is, uh, going to be a is going to be the app craft. Did we do craft already? Christina: No, we haven’t, but I like craft a lot, so, yes. Great, great, great pick Bryan: I love craft. I love craft craft is craft came up at the same time that obsidian did, but it’s very like craft is a prettier Christina: it’s obsidian without having to be all the Bryan: obsidian. Yeah, no, you don’t need to deal with a markdown stuff. Brett: Yeah, I was gonna say, it’s not a, it’s not based on markdown tax files. So we have a, we have a difference of Jeff: Brett, Brett, this is about gratitude. Brett: Right, right. Sorry, this isn’t me. This isn’t mine. Christina: No, what I’m trying to say is obsidian is like for Brett, right? Like, like craft is for like normies. Bryan: Yeah. I got like, I couldn’t keep remembering all of them. My problem with markdown is that I can’t remember the markdown syntax, cuz I haven’t probably used it enough. So craft is great. It’s so pretty. Uh, they’ve been doing so many things. They updated and they have a whole web F now it’s really running so you can use it on the web. They’re also, I mean, we’re gonna give a shout out to all of the teachers and students craft is giving you 50% off Christina: Nice. Bryan: for back to school. Uh, this is, they’re not a sponsor, but they should, um, Yeah, it’s really pretty. It works really well. Um, and they’ve built their own workflows into stuff too, which I really love. So I’m just really loving craft is the place that I can try to remember to go, to, to put things in, because I have the problem of like, where are you putting things, Brian, which of the 15,000 places are you putting things? And craft is on all of the places right now, so I can try to make a craft be the thing. Jeff: Oh, it’s always so nice when you feel like even for a little bit, this is the place. Brett: We could do a whole episode on that. Christina: We really could, Brett: We won’t, cause that’s not what this show is. That that’s what the, that’s what this segment of this show is. Bryan: I mean, Brett, what we could say is that’s the Patreon. Jeff: Hmm. Brett: you can just, you can just listen to Brett opine about note taking methods Bryan: I mean, people would Christina: they would, I’m saying, I’m saying like I Bryan: ready for the Overtired Patreon, cuz I’m signing up. Brett: that said craft is truly beautiful. Like I hit, I hit up, I hit up against limitations. I personally, uh, didn’t like almost immediately, but I could easily see how someone willing to invest in this little craft ecosystem could be like very well served by craft. I think it’s a great app. Christina: Yeah. I, I like it a lot better than notion personally. Jeff: Brett, Brett: Okay. So I’m cheating. I’m going meta. Jeff: you’re choosing meta Brett: my pick meta. No. Bryan: choosing better. Wow. Bold choice, Brett. Brett: My pick this week is home brew. Um, the, the package manager, uh, people old enough to remember Mac ports will understand the concept. Um, anyone younger than that will just understand that if you are willing to install X code, you never actually have to use it, but you get a package manager that from the command line, you can install any command line utility available. And with casks, like the whole thing is beer base. So if you, if you have casks, you can install most Mac apps, especially free ones, uh, using brew. You can dump out a brew file. And when you open up a, a new com a new Mac, you can, you can run a brew. Install that installs all of your favorite packages, all of your favorite apps. It is. It’s just an easy way to, you can type brew, upgrade and upgrade everything on your system all at once. It is just the ultimate package manager. I love it. Bryan: Did you know that you can install Ruby gems using brew? Brett: I did. I knew, I knew it’s possible, even though they specifically said we don’t handle things like pick PIP packages and Ruby gems, you can actually make a formula to install Ruby gems. Bryan: There’s a they’ve. So somebody already has a PA basically a formula to install called Ruby gems, which lets you then install gems Brett: you can, you can tell like brew, gem install, and then, then manage your, your gems through brew. Yeah, I did see that Bryan: Which is how I’m going to install doing on my computer today. Speak. Yeah. Christina: Nice. Jeff: Um, Bryan: Which I’m going to call feeling based on last week’s conversation. Christina: I like. Bryan: about journaling and doing Jeff: All right. Mine is an app called table flip by Christian TES. It’s been out for a while. It’s been out for a few years and, um, what it is. So it’s like a wonderfully simple app for building tables in markdown, but it is also just its own little table building interface that. You can just work with so quickly, like anybody who writes primarily in markdown you’d know the woes of making a table, like you only make a table in markdown when you fucking know you have to, right. But with table flip, like you open this app, you can really quickly kind of go it’s this many rows, this many, whatever you can just do all sorts of really quick movements and start filling out a table that you then copy and paste or export into markdown. And as much as I, I use table flip for making tables that go into markdown documents, I actually use it more often as a thinking and planning tool, sort of how I use mind maps as a thinking tool. So like with table flip, I can just, or open it up and start typing. Um, Kristen Tets is someone I’ve I’ve really, I’ve really loved for a long time. He also made an app called the archive, which is a note taking app. Brett: He was integral in the creation of NV. Jeff: Uh, I did not know that Brett: I used, I used code from divine dominion back in Jeff: I had no idea. He also wrote an app that I love called word counter, which like, it just lives in your menu bar. And you can just say count words in these apps. And then it’ll just tell you, like you just, you just typed 30 words in, you know, Quip, um, or in Firefox or whatever. He just writes these really simple, but like, oh my God, I need these kind of utilities. Brett: he’s a man after my own heart. One thing I would add on about table flip is it does, you can open a markdown file and table flip and have like two-way communication. So you edit the table in table flip and it will automatically update that table in your markdown file. And that’s, that’s the selling Bryan: Oh, wow. Christina: Yes. Brett: you can send a table back and forth between the two. Jeff: That that shows you how much I use this as a thinking tool, because I don’t do that, but that is totally the selling point. And also like people talk a lot about the zeal Caston style of note taking now, like obsidian is all about that and Rome and all this stuff. But like I learned about all that stuff from Christian’s blog and his ability to write about that is just fantastic. So just go check out Christian stuff. Generally, the apps are about 10 bucks each. He’s got other apps besides one we’ve talked about, but just a developer that like, obviously we’re all on board with here. So that’s me. All right. Hey Brian, it was awesome to meet you. Bryan: Friends. This is wonderful. Absolutely. I, this is so great to be with all of you and to see all your faces, Brett: Do you wanna say it, Brian, Bryan: some sleep. Brett: get some sleep. Christina: Get Jeff: some sleep. Track 5: The.

We all know that journaling can be so good for us. Why is it so hard? We talked about what works for us and why. Then Brett tells us about the resurrection of his tool Gather. Have you heard the Good News? Sponsor Meet Mindbloom. When it comes to mental health, sometimes you need something more to achieve a real and lasting breakthrough. Maybe it’s time to check out a guided ketamine therapy program — Mindbloom can help. After only 2 sessions, 87% of Mindbloom clients reported improvements in depression, and 85% reported improvements in anxiety. Right now, Mindbloom is offering Overtired listeners $100 off your first six-session program when you sign up at mindbloom.com/overtired and use promo code overtired at checkout. Show Links exist.io The Artist’s Way Gather Homebrew NSHipster: Swift Program Distribution with Homebrew Welcome to Wrexham Always Sunny Podcast Always Sunny in Philadelphia All That Unicode Orion Opera Arc Anki Join the Conversation 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 @jeffreyguntzel, and follow Overtired at @ovrtrd on Twitter. Transcript Thought Bubbles in the Brain Matrix [00:00:00] Brett: [00:00:01] Welcome to Overtired. I am Brett Terpstra. I am here with Christina Warren and Jeff Severns Guntzel. How’s it going, Christina? [00:00:12] Christina: Pretty good. Pretty good. [00:00:14] Brett: And Jeff, how are you? [00:00:15] Jeff: I’m good. [00:00:16] Brett: I tried something new this week, instead of just saying how you guys doing and expecting the two of you to vye for dibs. I split it up. I learned that from Jeff. Uh, when, one time when we had multiple people on, I noticed that he very specifically like duck, duck, goosed people into talking. Jeff is a professional interviewer. [00:00:40] Title First, Episode Second [00:00:40] Brett: I have a lot to learn from him. Um, so I wanna start off by just saying that I really wanna title this episode, thought bubbles in the brain matrix. And I would like to tell you why. Um, so my girlfriend Elle uh, she sometimes [00:01:00] has trouble remembering words. I don’t know if related to ASD or just a personality quirk, but she can put together like pictures of the things she wants to say. [00:01:11] And she was trying to ask me about mind mapping, but she couldn’t remember the word mind mapping. And what she came up with by way of explanation was “thought bubbles in the brain matrix.” And, and I was able to put that together. I got that. I understood it. So here by explaining that I now I’ve now given us a reason to call the episode “thought bubbles in the brain matrix,” and immediately explained it to listeners who like maybe tuned in, because it was such a great title. [00:01:41] Jeff: That’s great. This happens to me all the time. It’s like, I, the way I describe it is like I reach into the word bag and I just grab the wrong fucking word. So I just say whatever comes to mind, like “heffleprint”, like what it’s like, there are times when I’ll ask for something and I’ll just say that. [00:01:58] And, and, and my [00:02:00] wife’s at the point where she can just be like, oh, you mean a spoon? Yeah, exactly. [00:02:04] Brett: Well, [00:02:04] Christina: That’s awesome. [00:02:05] Brett: It’s interesting because I, it’s probably true of everybody, but I know that between Elle and I, and this is, uh, the first time I’ve ever had such clear communication with a partner. Um, but we have very different needs in the way things are said to us. Um, and we try to accommodate each other’s need, like, I, for example, if I, if I offer an idea and your first response is here’s what’s wrong with it. [00:02:35] I hear that as like a no, instead of like, uh, that’s a good idea. Let’s see what we could do with it. I, I just hear that as a no. So I need like the first thing out of your mouth to be like, oh, that’s a great idea here’s a problem we might run into instead of jumping straight to the here’s, what’s wrong with the idea, uh, which is that’s the way Elle thinks, like she just accepts that, okay this is the idea we’re [00:03:00] working with, let’s start figuring out how to do it. [00:03:03] Jeff: Not a shocker, Brett your love language is “yes, and.” [00:03:09] Brett: Not a shocker. Yeah. Do you guys wanna do some mental health? [00:03:15] Christina: Definitely. [00:03:16] What are people for? (Mental Health Corner) [00:03:16] Jeff: Hey man, you guys wanna go in the back room and do some mental? [00:03:18] Christina: I like it. [00:03:19] Brett: I got the good stuff. I got the [00:03:20] Christina: I got the good stuff. Yeah. [00:03:21] Brett: Who wants to start? [00:03:23] Jeff: I could start. I have been just over the last week. There’s been just a lot going on. So we, we went to a video game convention, my boys and I, and their friends. I rented a couple of hotel rooms, using points. And so we stayed in the hotel where the convention was. It’s kinda like a 24-hour thing. [00:03:42] I get outta that is being able to go downstairs at like 11 o’clock and play whatever pinball machines I want for a long time, for free, which is really wonderful. But also I was like responsible for, you know, like I, I would set up like a sandwich buffet for these kids, like every day, a couple times a day. [00:03:57] And like just generally tracking these [00:04:00] two age groups around 13 and around 16. And, um, it was wonderful. And it was like, it was a lot to do, which was, but it was totally great. And then that was three days. And then the next day we went to the State Fair here in Minnesota for the whole day. Um, and then yesterday was like my first day back and I remembered I had scheduled with a good friend to take a walk. [00:04:23] And, uh, I did that thing that happens to me all the time where I’m just like, oh man, I’m not ready for this right now. And I like came so close to canceling so many times, but I’ve been challenging myself lately to say yes, more often and trust that. Yes in general on balance, uh, makes me happier than no. [00:04:45] And so I, I just decided not to cancel, which he didn’t even know was a yes, cuz it was already planned, you know, but that is, that is my way. And we had just a lovely night, we had a lovely dinner and a lovely walk in this nature reserve around here. And [00:05:00] then at the same time, a neighbor of ours who we are really close friends with, we have something called the border bar. [00:05:05] It’s at our fence between our two houses. We meet there even in the winter when it’s really cold and, and we just kind of call it like it’s border bar time and we bring some drinks, you know, if someone’s not drinking, we bring some bubbly water. Otherwise someone makes cocktails whatever. And uh, and so they had invited us, uh, over for drinks in the hangout. [00:05:23] And I wanted to say no, cause I was like Ahaha, but I was like, no, say yes, say yes. And, uh, anyway, so I’m just like, I find that when I say yes, I really never regret it. Like I might end up a little more tired than I would’ve liked to be. But when I say yes, even though I think I’d rather be alone is actually like the thinking I’d rather be alone is usually an indicator that probably I could use to hang out with some people, like when those people are like safe people, right. [00:05:50] Like, you know, it’s gonna be pleasant. Like if anything, you’ll just have to leave earlier, then maybe they would want you to, or whatever. So anyway, I’m kind of playing with [00:06:00] I’m, I’m reminding myself of that. I go through phases of this or remind myself like yeah, just say yes. Just say yes. It’s probably gonna be good. [00:06:06] Brett: heard the exact opposite from people who habitually say yes, who have to practice saying no. Um, and I’m a person like it took me until I was maybe 35 years old before I realized that if someone asked me to do something, even if it sounded cool, I was allowed to say no, uh, and conserve my energy and my time, because I would take on like every project, every crazy idea someone came to me with, I’m like, yeah, we can do that. Let’s fucking figure it out. Um, and, and I wore myself very thin doing that, which is, I guess, different than like saying yes to a social engagement, which I could probably do more of. [00:06:47] Jeff: Yeah, no, I mean, where you’re at is more like that really important thing where you have to recognize that when you say yes, you’re saying yes to one thing, you’re saying no to a bunch of things. And often those things are your own peace of mind, [00:07:00] relationships, you know, things that are good for you. [00:07:02] But for me, it’s almost comically, not that problem. It’s really just about like, when I say yes, what I’m saying no to is like essentially hiding. I am someone who for the most part will never be plagued by the problem of saying yes, too much. [00:07:19] Brett: I have no one to say yes to. I have after 44 years I have essentially whittled away everyone who asks me to do social things. I can’t remember the last time that I had a yes or no to offer because no one invites me to do anything anymore. And I’m kind of okay with that. I’m, I’m very okay with that, but maybe I should get out. [00:07:44] Christina: I was gonna say, I think that like that, cuz, cuz I think you’re exactly right. Like there’s the difference between agreeing, you know, to take on work stuff and the social things and to your point, like I I’m with you, Jeff. I’m somebody who I’m social and I go out with people, but I also have a tendency sometimes, especially the last two [00:08:00] years, cuz last two years have been terrible for all of us to like put off. You’re like, oh, you know, I can’t do it right now. Let let’s, we’re definitely gonna get together in the future, you know, to just like find an excuse to not do something. And I find like for my mental health, it’s actually really important for me to get out and do things because as you noted, Brett, like what’ll happen is, is if you say no too many times, people just stop asking and, and that, you know, is, is not great. [00:08:25] So for me, this is something that I, I discovered, you know, that I wasn’t like, you know, as a younger kid, you know, younger teenager, it wasn’t something that I recognize as being really important to me, like being social is something that’s actually really important for my mental health and having actual time with other people. [00:08:44] So, but it [00:08:45] Brett: Like face-to-face time, not just Twitter time. [00:08:47] Christina: Exactly. And Twitter time helps too, but really face to face time, [00:08:50] Brett: I’m really good. At the Twitter time. Face-to-face. I don’t see anybody. [00:08:54] Christina: My mental health, I find. Really is improved when, when I have like a more active in-person kind of social life. [00:09:00] And when you’re married and, you know, older, like it’s harder to make friends. And a lot of times, like, you know, the person you spend the most time with is your partner and that’s not great because at least for, for me, like, I can’t just have like just one person that, you know, I, I see all the time, like it’s actually really important for me – and I find that I, I do better in a lot of regards when I’m around other people. And so I have to similar to you, Jeff, I have to like, remind myself, like, no say yes, do these things go out because you might have some anxiety around it, you might have some other things, but it’s actually fundamentally really important to do, you know, that your overall mental health is gonna be a lot better. And, and it’s just, you know, once you do it, like you’ll appreciate it. And then it’ll like be easier to like, understand, okay, well, what are the things that I need to say no to and what are the things that, you know, I, I can, that’ll actually be really good if I go ahead and do. [00:09:51] Jeff: Yeah, for sure. I also have this thing where like I get feedback from people that they enjoy being around me and, [00:10:00] and I don’t always believe that that could be true. And I think that there’s this. There’s this sort of weird, um, self-compassion chess move in, actually going out and, and giving of myself as well as receiving from people that is like, oh, it’s okay. I, I, I like to be seen, I like to be appreciated. I like to be able to offer up whatever it is I can offer up in relationship with this person. Um, just as much as I, I love receiving from them what they have to offer, and it’s kind of a silly kind of upside down thing, but I’ve, I’ve sometimes thought like I’ve played it out and like, you know, if I only stayed home and if, if everybody that tries to get me out completely gave up, which some people have I would, I think I would just like, I would not be on a good path. [00:10:59] Brett: Yeah, [00:11:00] I feel attacked. To be honest, like there are a couple people in this town that I enjoy, um, as, as conversationalists. Um, but nobody that I feel as close to as some of my online friends, uh, friends that I see maybe once a year there’s, there’s nobody in like driving distance that I really crave seeing, or when I see them feel like I’ve really uh, spent my time well, and I know what that feels like. I know what it feels like to have a satisfying social encounter and to feel very enriched by that. I don’t currently have any friends and that’s not to say there’s nobody cool in this town, cuz there really are. I’ve just, I haven’t forged the relationships and as Christina noted, uh, once you’re older and married, it’s hard to make new friends. Um, [00:12:00] I know they’re out there. I know I’ve had good conversations. Since I quit drinking again it’s been harder to like most of the good conversations I’ve had in this town have been not drunken conversations, but have happened in bars and have happened around alcohol. [00:12:17] And there’s a new bar in town, uh, like a hipster bar, uh, opened by old people. And I think it would be like a hipster bar for old people, [00:12:26] Jeff: like us, [00:12:27] Brett: but it looks like the kind of place that I would be totally comfortable going, ordering a seltzer water or a Heineken Zero Zero, and just sitting and being social with people. Uh, without it feeling like the darker a bar is the more I need to drink. If it’s a well lit bar it’s basically a coffee house and, and I can, I can totally sit there. [00:12:51] So I’m, I’m kind of curious to try reviving that, but yeah, there, there’s just nobody here [00:13:00] that is truly rewarding for me to hang out with. [00:13:04] Jeff: I know one from Winona. [00:13:06] Brett: Is he in Winona though? [00:13:07] Jeff: No he’s from Winona. [00:13:10] Brett: All the good people leave. There’s a guy here named Kalin Kalin Larson, who is an awesome guy, super smart. Um, he he’s a hacker. He makes crazy cool stuff. Um, he got obsessed with, uh, label printers and turned it into like a full-time business writing software because all label printer software sucks. [00:13:36] Jeff: it’s terrible. [00:13:37] Brett: It’s awful. And he fixed it. He like made, uh, like boutique label printer software that he sells for a hefty price, to people who actually wanna use their label printers. Um, and he’s, he’s, he’s brilliant. He’s one of my favorite people. He really is. I just, I’m not good at, I, I [00:14:00] really only make friends with other ADHD, people who converse the way that I do and who just mirror my quirks in a way that’s very comfortable for me. Um, and I don’t always realize that I’m talking to an ADHD person, but I will realize later that is why I got along very well with them. [00:14:21] Um, yeah. Anyway, this, how did this become about me? This is [00:14:25] Jeff: Well, I just want, but that’s fine. I just wanna wrap it unless anybody has anything else to say by saying that I, I don’t want to be suggesting that the only meaningful way to connect is in-person. In fact, I thank the gods that’s not the case because like, most of my social life happens, whether it’s like connecting on Zoom, if only because most of my friends are spread out across the country or the world or whatever, like it would be, you know, for one thing, super ableist to just be like, yeah, no, if I can’t get to the bar, I can’t go out on a walk. It doesn’t matter. [00:15:00] So it doesn’t count. Right. But like, so I really wanna be really super clear about that, that I know there are so many ways it’s really very much just me. It’s about me struggling to do in-person contact and about me saying yes to in-person contact. That’s the, that’s my that’s my personal challenge. [00:15:21] Brett: I see my therapist in person tomorrow. Um, [00:15:25] Jeff: oh yeah. Cuz last time it was online. [00:15:26] Brett: Yeah, I will let you know. I will report back, uh, how that, how that, uh, differs for me. [00:15:33] Jeff: Sounds good. That’s great. What about you, Christina? How you been? [00:15:37] Christina: I’ve been fine, nothing really new to kind of updates since like our last episode, I’ve been fine. Um, like you, I totally agree. Like I love my online friendships and, and like interactions and whatnot. I’m just saying like, Seeing people is good. [00:15:51] And I’m actually gonna see a bunch of people this weekend, because there are two parties I’m going to, I’m going to a, a, a weird hybrid birthday party. That’s gonna be a lot of fun that my friends are [00:16:00] having for their two kids who are very different ages. So that’ll be a lot of fun. And, um, then my, uh, my other friend, he is finally, the next day he’s having, um, a birthday party. [00:16:09] His birthday was in may, but he had to reschedule. So, uh, barring any other things we’re gonna be getting together and I’m finally gonna see his new house. So I’m actually really excited about this because I, like I said, I, I do actually get a lot from being out and seeing people and like being social. [00:16:27] And that’s the thing I think that I miss the that’s been the most different about my life now versus two and a half years ago is that, you know, I used to see people face-to-face every single day reliably. And now I work from home, which is fine. Um, I, I go into a studio once a week, but like, it’s, it’s, you know, I, but I don’t actually see any of my coworkers because we’re all remote and that’s, that’s great. [00:16:51] Like, I love that we have that, but I do miss that, like interaction and, and stuff that I get with like actual [00:17:00] humans. Like, I, I, I, there could be too much of it, but I thrive off of it. And, and it’s something that has definitely made my life worse, not having. So I’m glad that, that I have that. [00:17:09] Jeff: Awesome. House tours and cake. That’s in your future. [00:17:12] Christina: Yep. [00:17:14] Brett: I, uh, so I will, I will say, uh, cuz this is been a thread here, um, like going to MacStock, uh, this year it was a smaller MacStock and um, I really focused my attention on two new friends that I made. Uh, one, one I had met before, but with my ADHD brain, when he contacted me on Twitter to ask what I was up to this year, I was like, who the fuck is this? [00:17:42] Um, and, and Elle was like, oh, that’s Shane. He, he’s a really good guy. You had a good time with him. I’m like, okay. So anyway, we end up hanging out with Shane and, and another friend that I met because we were, we were at a table [00:18:00] expecting, um, Dan, uh, from Agile to show up and he has a beard and he’s bald and a guy walks in matching his profile exactly and I just instinctively like, wave him over. It’s not Dan though. It’s this other guy that I’ve never met before. And he realizes very quickly that. It was a mistake, but asks if he can sit down anyway, becomes like our best friend for the weekend. And, uh, and we had some really cool, really fun conversations and I came home feeling much healthier for the social interaction. [00:18:38] So I’m not immune to this. And I don’t mean to imply that I am, and I should also say I was every year I have a birthday party and the friends that I do actually connect with get invited and it got put off this year for various reasons and I haven’t had it yet and I do miss it. And, and [00:19:00] there are, there are people here that actually do connect with, but I never see on Zoom. Like I see them once a year and I forget about them until that time rolls around. So, uh, scratch what I said before about there being nobody here, there are at least four people in this town that I like. [00:19:17] Jeff: And also just to note everybody, if you are a bald white bearded, man, Brett is gonna have you bring it in [00:19:24] Brett: Yeah, Bring it in. [00:19:28] Sponsor: Mindbloom [00:19:28] Brett: You know when a podcaster record their sponsor reads and posts, and then injects them into weird spots in the episode. Yeah, I’m sorry, but I’m doing that. 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[00:21:27] [00:21:27] Journaling while manic (and otherwise) [00:21:27] Brett: I heard from a bunch of people, I shouldn’t say a bunch. I heard from four different people, um, after our last episode about how they were also bipolar and they, they loved manic episodes loved and hated manic episodes, but they understood like where I was come coming from with like my actual desire for mania when I don’t have it, but then maybe regret when I do have it. [00:21:55] Um, so that’s been, that’s been interesting and I’m, I’m, I’m gonna talk more [00:22:00] about it with my therapist, cuz I have that now. Um, but uh, Friday I started. Uh, a, a manic episode that got pretty intense and, uh, it’s Wednesday now. Um, I started sleeping, uh, Tuesday night, uh, Monday night and Tuesday night. I slept both nights, and got caught back up. [00:22:23] It was just a couple days, but holy shit, I made so much stuff in a couple days. Um, and oh my God, Elle is such a trooper. It’s hard. I, when I get manic, I get very, like, I just wanna hide in code and I, it’s a very, it’s a safe mania. Like I don’t hurt anybody. I don’t, I don’t spend a lot of money. I don’t set a lot of tweets. I don’t do outrageous things. I, I write and I code and, and it’s, it’s overall, [00:23:00] uh, very productive, but it comes at the, the costs of like, uh, interpersonal relationships. And with my ex-wife, like I was having manic episodes that would last 10, 12 days. And I would basically never see her and I would ditch her. And I swore never to do that again. So I make my manic episodes are way less serious or intense now than they were. um, and I make an effort to like, be part of the family and to join, but Elle a is really good. [00:23:37] She’s fine on her own. Like, she doesn’t mind having the house to herself while I disappear to my office for hours on end. Uh, but also she looks out for me, like she does what she can to kind of pave the way for me to just get through it, uh, kind of pain free because I immediately start worrying, like, how am I fucking in my [00:24:00] relationship? [00:24:00] Like, I’m, I’m focused, I’m obsessed with this piece of code that I’m working on, but in the back of my mind, how am I fucking up my relationship, uh, right now. And, and she, she, she does her best to make it okay. Not in a codependent way, just in way that says, Hey, I know what you’re going through. And. I’m not mad at you. [00:24:24] And she’ll like, say out loud, I’m not mad at you, which is helpful, but yeah, it’s, I’m, I’m coming down still. You can tell I’m a little bit, uh, we’ll say frazzled, but, um, I am looking forward to going to see my therapist tomorrow . Having had enough sleep. Oh. And I journaled through this whole episode, like he told me he wanted, he wanted documentation of my manic episodes. [00:24:53] And I was like, just look at my GitHub chart. you can tell where, where, when and where my manic [00:25:00] episodes happened based on my GitHub activity. Uh, and he was pretty impressed by that, but I figured I’d go the extra mile and I started journaling as soon as I realized I was. And I’ve journaled every day through the process. [00:25:13] And that first day, holy shit, I wrote four pages. It just pours out. And then today I wrote a paragraph. It waned off after a couple nights without sleep, [00:25:26] Jeff: Have you ever journaled through a episode before? [00:25:29] Brett: no, the closest I’ve gotten is blogging about like, I did a, a couple of blog posts. I did one during the mania and then forced myself during depression to do a follow up. [00:25:42] Like, this is what the other side is like. Uh, which is really hard for me. I typically don’t write when I’m depressed. Uh, after, after a, you know, a week of putting out a blog post every day, then there’ll be like two weeks where I don’t post at all. Um, [00:26:00] but, uh, that’s the closest I’ve ever gotten to actually putting into words what was happening. [00:26:06] Uh, so this time I have, I have some documentation. [00:26:10] Jeff: I’m not asking you to be specific, but I’m curious, um, we can get so sort of stuck in our stories about our mental health or about how we experience this thing or that thing. Right. Cause we kind of tell it the same way over and over for me, the way that stuff breaks is when I can journal that’s when things like become that’s when I get surprised is what I’m trying to [00:26:31] say. Um yeah. You know, and, and [00:26:34] Christina: you to like re-remember or like re-experience and, and recontextualize, oh, Right its not just this loop that I’ve been replaying that I’ve told myself. It’s it’s maybe these other things. [00:26:44] Jeff: And it’s like truly, truly, truly not for an audience, right? Like not in any way, shape or form. Um, and Brett, I was just curious if anything, about the journaling, not that I’m expecting it should have surprised you. I’m just curious if it did [00:26:55] surprise [00:26:56] Brett: Totally totally like when I’m manic, [00:27:00] I can start chaining together. Thoughts in ways that normally I would hit a logical conclusion very quickly. Uh, but when I’m manic, like I, one thing makes me realize another thing in succession and journaling in that state actually proved to be very, um, in depth. Like I discovered things in the process that I hadn’t previously realized, and they were things that I was excited to talk to my therapist about. And you’re right. It is very different than writing for an audience because I’m in that I am, I’m mentally curating what I share. Uh, when I’m journaling, I took out all the filters and I’m, I’m, I’m honest with people, but I don’t dig. I don’t dig the way I did in that journaling. So yeah, I [00:27:53] Jeff: I don’t feel like it’s about being honest or not honest. I think that when you share about yourself in public, you are, you are [00:28:00] crafting a self in the truest sense and, and you’re crafting a self that is, I mean, hopefully you’re able to craft a self that is, that is safe being that self out in the world. Right. And which no doubt means you’re leaving parts out as you should. Right. Cause it’s like [00:28:16] Christina: Yeah. [00:28:19] Brett: Yeah, there’s very little. I leave out. Um, yeah, no, I guess there are things I leave out just for people’s sanity. [00:28:27] Christina: Well right. Cuz that’s that’s the thing is like, I. So it’s funny because for me, I, the first time, and really like the only time I was ever able to consistently journal and, and I kind of wish I could get back on it. Ironically was when I had a live journal starting in high school and then in college. And, and what I liked about that is that yes, there was that public aspect, which. Yes, you, you can censor, even if you’re not trying to censor, like it just, as you were saying, you, you, there’s a different craft. There’s, there’s a different thing. But what was great about live journal is you could also have completely private posts, right. That [00:29:00] were only for yourself and, and that, that you could have there. [00:29:03] And so, you know, like I, I appreciated that like motif, cuz I was like, I can do the thing that I’m used to doing that I’ve kind of made a habit of mine, which was good for me, but I can also be like really honest in a way that, that I, I wouldn’t feel comfortable even like if you’re not trying to hide things, you’re not trying to lie. [00:29:20] It’s just like, there’s stuff that, not anybody else’s business, there’s personal writing, you know, I could still do that in that space. And I always like having kind of that dual thing, but I think you’re right. Like it’s very different, at least for me, even if we’re, we tend to be more honest about how we do things about if you’re just journaling for yourself, You don’t ever expect anybody to read it. [00:29:41] Maybe you don’t even want anybody to read it. Right? Because that, that’s not how you’re doing it versus knowing that someone could read it. [00:29:49] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. [00:29:51] Brett: I did this journal. I wrote to my therapist, um, I didn’t write dear diary. Like in [00:30:00] my head, I was like, these are things I want my therapist to know. [00:30:03] Christina: That’s really smart. [00:30:05] Brett: I don’t know if that’s smart or if that made me censor it a little bit because, um, like I barely know the guy at this point. Uh, I, [00:30:14] Christina: that’s a good thing too, right? Like when you don’t know somebody like you don’t like, you don’t have any of that built ups of like, am I [00:30:20] Brett: I suppose, yeah, [00:30:21] Christina: am they gonna judge me in a way? It’s like, I don’t know this person who [00:30:24] Brett: like it’s very important to me. If I’m gonna make therapy work, it’s very important to me that I don’t lie and manipulate. Um, and so I, I approached it with that consideration in mind. Uh, but basically everything I wrote was stuff that I wanted him to read. Uh, not the deep I I’ve read. I’ve snuck in, in read girlfriend’s journals in the past, um, which is a super shitty thing to do. [00:30:53] And if you’re young and dumb, don’t even [00:30:56] Christina: fucking do [00:30:57] Brett: don’t fucking do it [00:30:58] Christina: You a, you don’t [00:30:59] wanna do it [00:31:00] a, a, you don’t wanna do [00:31:00] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah, [00:31:01] Christina: because nothing you learn is going to make you feel good. There’s only possibility you’ll feel bad. And you were violating like the most intimate trust you could ever have [00:31:09] Brett: such a violation. And then, and then you feel compelled to like confront them about this thing that, that got under your skin, but then you have to admit that they, that you read their journal and then holy shit, that, yeah, you, it is a world of hurt. It’s a world of pain. Never, ever, ever read someone else’s journal. [00:31:31] Just take it from a guy who’s been young and dumb and jealous and stupid. Uh, just don’t read anyone’s journal, but I will say what I learned from that is that people who actually know how to journal, they don’t, they don’t filter. They just pour it all out. And, and that’s maybe something I, I think I filter everything on the fly. [00:31:57] I don’t think I know how to actually [00:32:00] journal. I’m always, always writing for an audience. Even when I’m writing for myself, [00:32:05] Jeff: have you ever heard of the, I mean, this dates me, cuz this is forever old. Um, the book, “The Artist’s Way” by Julie Cameron, [00:32:15] Brett: vaguely familiar. Don’t know [00:32:17] what it is. [00:32:18] Jeff: um, it’s, it’s a book about, it’s just a book about creativity. It’s a book about how to sort of, um, claim your creativity and your, your creative self essentially. Um, and I read it, it’s like a workbook kind of, I read it, uh, back in 2000, maybe 1999. [00:32:37] Um, but the thing that stuck with me and I don’t do it all the time, but it gets right to, this is there’s a practice she encourages you to do early on throughout the period that you’re working through this workbook, which is like the couple months and she calls it the Morning Pages. And the idea is that you just open up a journal or you grab three pieces of printer paper, and you just write, you write three pages, you just write straight through. You don’t – you’re not trying to sound [00:33:00] smart. Um, you’re doing what you can do to make yourself feel safe, that nobody would ever read this thing. [00:33:06] Right. And it’s just three pages. You don’t write more. You just go it’s, you can write big, you can write small, whatever it is, but you just like let it all flow out. First thing in the morning is sort of the primary idea. And, um, what I have found when I’m doing that and I I’ve done it, the longest period I did, it was like something 170 days or something. [00:33:26] I remember the, I remember counting, um, you know, you can, one way she has you do it is just put those three pages in a sealed envelope when you’re done and put it in a file cabinet. You you’re not supposed to even reread. ’em it’s just like the idea is, and you’re not going back to this nothing. Right. Um, what I have found when I do that is that after a few days, I am surprised every day. [00:33:50] So I find it annoying to do. Sometimes I’m not in the mood to do it. Sometimes I write really big so I can get through my three pages quickly. But if I do it [00:34:00] every day, there is some little surprise in there. And little surprise, nothing big, nothing mind blowing. That makes me think. I’m really glad I did that today. [00:34:08] And, um, the fact of, you know, this idea that it’s just three pages and nobody’s ever gonna read this and I am not trying to sound smart. I am not trying to get complete thoughts out. Um, you know, I’m not trying to explain something to myself, which is sometimes what can happen in journaling. Uh, I just find that to be an amazing practice and I highly recommend it. [00:34:27] Brett: What do, why, why in the morning versus in the evening, like, what do you write about in the morning? Like in the evening I would write about my day here’s, here’s what I experienced. Here’s how I felt about it. What do you write first thing in the morning? [00:34:43] Jeff: so for me, why it works well in the morning and I’ve tried it all different points in the day is that in the morning, I’m kind of putting myself on like, you know, like I’m, I’m dressing in me. Um, and I actually find the transition from [00:35:00] sleeping and dreaming. I’m, I’m a very intense dreamer. So I find that transition from that point into breakfast, into work, to be actually really difficult and, and in need of some sort of ritual. [00:35:11] Um, and, and this stops me when I’m doing it. And it’s not just that I need that ritual and I need it there more than any place else. I could also use a ritual at the end of the day, for sure. Like leaving work and going into family stuff. But like, it’s actually, it’s a ritual, not just to transition myself, um, physically into a new space, but it’s like, I just come to find when I’m doing it in the morning that I have some leftover thoughts from the day before I have some worries about the day. [00:35:39] Um, I have some things that have been just sort of passing through my head, but I haven’t really grabbed them and acknowledged that they’re there. And, uh, and I find that I, I need to sort that stuff. I mean, I find, sorry that it’s super useful to sort that stuff in the morning before I enter into my day, um, through these morning pages, whereas the end of the day, it’s just like, [00:36:00] I’m more kind of exhausted and it’s just more of a yeah. [00:36:03] And this and this and this and this and this. Whereas in the morning, it’s like, I’m a little more open to the universe. And like, I haven’t quite like, I haven’t quite solidified into like who I am for the day yet. And so it feels like there’s an opening there just to get a little metaphysical. [00:36:18] Brett: All right. I I’m gonna have to give it a try. See what happens. Like I like, I, I like the idea of jo… I’ve always liked the idea of journaling, but now that I started, um, I’m definitely curious to see. What else I can do with it. Cause like I have all these tools that track what I’m doing and, and how it’s going. [00:36:39] Uh, like I can see my productivity. I can, I can remember what I was working on, but my feelings have always been kind of ignored. [00:36:52] Jeff: Yeah, [00:36:53] Brett: so [00:36:54] Jeff: You don’t get those in GitHub unless you’re a really good commentor. [00:36:55] A GitHub activity chart for my feelings [00:36:55] Brett: Right, like a GitHub, a GitHub activity chart for my [00:37:00] feelings, which I, you guys remember exist. exist.io. Um, it is, uh, it’s a web service web app. I don’t anyway, um, it, you, at its core, you rate your mood from like one to 10 every day and you write a little status update, but you can write as much as you want, and you can add all kinds of tags, uh, at various signs throughout the day. [00:37:29] And you can, and it can automatically pull in data from other like social media sites and every week it sent you a summary of like how you did that week. Like, how were you feeling? What was your mood? And it’s pretty basic. It’s just, it’s a mood tracking app and I’ve kind of followed them from their inception like 10 years ago. And I used it pretty frequently for almost two years. Uh, and then like in my head [00:38:00] I was capturing data that would be useful to me. Um, and ultimately having years worth of mood data was not, it didn’t help me make any decisions and I kinda lost the drive to do it, but, uh, I think it kind of serves the same purpose as, as, as journaling. [00:38:24] Christina: Definitely. I think like if, what you’re wanting to get out of the journaling is to kind of track that sort of thing. I think it can, like for, for me, journaling is about getting my thoughts and my feelings out even if I never look at it again, just so I can work through my emotions so that I’m not bottling it up and carrying it forward and making things bad, like by, by, by having some explosion later on, because I never got my feelings out. Like that’s what it is for me. I don’t, I can’t say that for everybody else, but for me, [00:38:51] Jeff: pressure release. [00:38:51] Christina: Yeah, well, not even that, but just to be like, acknowledge that things happen and just write about stuff and just get my feelings out and just like, now I can, I’ve worked [00:39:00] through things because I’ve, I’ve been able to talk about some someplace I’ve been able to like, do, do what I needed to do. [00:39:04] Right. Like that, that becomes like a big thing. So yeah. [00:39:09] Brett: I would, uh, [00:39:11] Jeff: I’m curious just generally for you, does that take a lot of journaling or a little journaling? I’m always surprised by how much can be done in a little bit, [00:39:19] but you just described sounded like a lot of work, but it doesn’t not for you. [00:39:23] Christina: Well, I mean, it can, and again, I haven’t done this regularly in a really long time and I should get back to it again. It could just be small things, right. It could be small things. And in some ways, to be honest with you, I kind of treat Twitter in some ways as, as a journal, a little bit, I kind of Chronicle things as they’re happening. [00:39:37] And like, if I’m frustrated with something, then I’m like tweeting through my frustration. Like maybe not the same way that I would like journal it, but I’m like, wow, this is really annoying. And I’m doing this. And that’s, that’s like a really good thing for me. [00:39:48] Brett: That that’s why I built Slogger like, so I started using Day One and I was journaling a little bit in Day One and I realized most of what I was journaling was stuff that I already tweeted. [00:40:00] And so I built Slogger for anyone who doesn’t know, it stands for social logger, which it was a horrible name. But it ran on a cron job or a, a launchd job. [00:40:12] And it would basically bring in all of your tweets, all of your Instagram posts, all of your Facebook posts and just like create a Day One journal of your social media, which in effect what, like what, what you’re talking about, Christina, it basically automated the process of journaling for me. uh, but only the stuff I was willing to share public. [00:40:37] Christina: Right. That’s the thing. Right. And, and, and that’s why sometimes I have to like, get myself back into that mindset where I’m like, okay, if I, I really, really need to do more personal journaling. And for me, like having it be in a web database and having the ability to kind of pick and choose what could be public and what could be private like that, especially that time in my life. [00:40:54] Right. Like that was, you know, when I was, like 17, you know, 18, through , like [00:41:00] early twenties, like that was like a really formative, time, cuz you know, your body’s changing, you have a lot of emotions. Like you’re going through a lot of life changes. Like that’s like a really formative time for a lot of people. [00:41:10] Um, and, and so I think that that worked really well for me, but I’m I’m with you, it, it, it doesn’t bring in the stuff that you would do privately. And for me, like journaling, cuz I, I tried a bunch of ways before. Like I always tried to keep a diary or keep like a word document or, or other things and it’s like, I needed. [00:41:28] Almost like, I it’s almost like I needed that social interaction to make it a habit where I could then do like the, the personal writing stuff. If that makes any sense, like I needed some sort of carrot, some sort of thing to pull me in, live journal was great, man. Live journal was great. [00:41:43] Brett: So you guys have heard of doing my little command line tool for like, you can absolutely use that for journaling. You can add a note to any doing entry and you can open up an entry in your text editor [00:42:00] and you can just like, as thoughts occur to you, as problems happen, as things like it’s a very personal log file, that can keep track of, you know, what you’ve committed to GitHub and what you’ve tweeted, but also like you can add all kinds of personal notes to that. [00:42:17] And I’m, I’ve started doing that, um, just over the last few days, which is now I have a searchable archivable version of my journal. I like. [00:42:28] Jeff: Actually I wanna start using that. Um, I use doing off and on. I love doing, um, I have a friend who just does, uh, like essentially like what you would do to kind of comment out in bash as a command and uses that to log what he’s working on in thinking. And then he just like makes it so that his bash history is, is infinite. [00:42:50] And he can just kind of grep it basically, which is genius. actually, he told me this when [00:42:58] Brett: do [00:42:58] Jeff: I, what? [00:42:58] Brett: Do comments get [00:43:00] saved to your history? [00:43:00] Jeff: yeah. Anything, any command you type in, gets saved to your history? [00:43:04] Brett: I didn’t know that. [00:43:06] Jeff: Yeah. He told me that either after I told him about doing or before I told him about doing, I’m not sure which, but anyway, I, when I’ve really got my shit together, I keep a document open and called the distraction dump. [00:43:17] And so if I have this like thing where I want to go Google something, I just type what I wanted to Google into that document. I realize that would be a great use of doing cause you don’t even, I mean, I could just [00:43:27] Brett: And you could tag it with at Google and [00:43:30] Jeff: totally. I’m gonna about that. I’ll check back in. [00:43:35] Gather Redux! (With a loving nod to Aaron Schwartz) [00:43:35] Brett: if I can, if I can segue this into, um, well, shit, like, I wanna talk about what I did during this manic episode, but also I’m suddenly finding it, not that interesting. Uh, okay. Let I’ll, I’ll [00:43:52] Christina: the one who gets to choose that. So [00:43:54] Jeff: Yeah. You don’t get to choose [00:43:56] Brett: I’ll summarize. Okay. History. I [00:44:00] used to have a tool called Gather. It was a cocoa app for Mac that you could pace a, uh, URL into and it would give you a Markdown version after running it through Readability and Aaron Schwartz’s html2text it, it, it requires Python. Um, as all of my, all of my markdownifying scripts require Python. And as of the last two, OSs, Apple has stopped shipping Python by default. So all of my scripts only work. If you are savvy enough to have installed like the command line tools or your, your own versions of Ruby and Python and Perl. [00:44:44] And so I was looking for an alternative and it, I, it turned out that, a guy who I had shared my original, like I modified over the years, I’ve modified, [00:45:00] html2text to handle more modern markup and to output, uh, more multimarkdown syntax. Um, so I had shared that with this guy and, when I tweeted that I couldn’t find a Swift or Objective C version of this he’s like, oh yeah, I converted your scripts to Swift long time ago. And he sent me the repos and, and they were in Swift and I dug into them and knowing that it would solve my problem, that I could now release Swift or compiled versions of the scripts. I decided I was gonna learn Swift. So between last Friday and this Wednesday, I have learned enough Swift to be dangerous. I’ve learned, I’ve learned by hacking, but then I also went back and loaded up the most recent version of Apples Swift, uh, their book on [00:46:00] books.app. I had the original like swift 1.0 version, and it’s just a it’s updated itself over time. [00:46:07] Christina: Yeah, I was gonna say it keeps updating itself, which I both like, and don’t like, like, I appreciate that it updates itself, but I’m also kind of like, okay, but I’d like to see a diff of this because [00:46:15] Brett: Well, dude, I’ve watched the changes in Swift over the last five versions and it has been enough to dissuade me from learning Swift because like core things are changing [00:46:29] Christina: Same, same. Because, because I like got excited, I was like, oh, I’m gonna get really into Swift. And then like every major version, I’m like, oh, so this is completely different. And I, I can’t rely on this. Like, I feel like, you know, like objective C and cocoa and stuff. It’s like, they added new features, but it wasn’t like if they deprecated [00:46:44] Brett: didn’t, it wasn’t breaking it. They weren’t breaking changes. [00:46:48] Christina: Whereas now it’s like, it feels like, and I know this isn’t true, but it feels like every year. They make some sort of massive breaking change where, where, where if you’ve done something, you can’t do it. And so, I [00:47:00] don’t know, like I have a, this is my own personal, like, rant that I’ll go on. I think that that’s really hurt the adoption outside of people who write iOS apps and certain macOS apps. [00:47:09] Right. Because there are still a lot of macOS apps that people still write in objective C for reasons like we’re saying, because they’ve either existed for a long time or they need to do certain things that Swift and the various Swift kits can’t do. And I’m like, yeah, it’s great to have updates, but it’s not great to like maybe make you have to refactor everything you’re [00:47:30] Brett: I’m. [00:47:30] Christina: doing. [00:47:31] Brett: The detriment is it’s a constantly expanding language. So if you wanna, you could lock into a version of the compiler and, and your code would continue to work. But if you want to take advantage [00:47:48] Christina: That’s what I [00:47:48] Brett: added each year, then you have to adapt. [00:47:51] Christina: That’s what I mean. If you look at something like .net – .net has had a bunch of variations, had a bunch of shit over the years and whatnot, but[00:48:00] if you wanna add in some of the new features, they have gone out of their way to make it possible to add those things without having to adopt the whole new set. Now they went through their own – there was like .net and .net core and, and, and all these other like iterations and all these other things. And like, they went through a bunch of stuff. Now they’re actually solidified on one base that runs multi-platforms and whatnot. And they’re adding things back, but it felt like, you know, basically I think probably because they knew that that Windows devs were, are not like Mac devs and that they will, you know, adopt the newest thing, no matter how much work it is for them, because Apple said so, and, and, you know, the users will demand it. [00:48:38] You know, the, the, the Windows devs are kind of like, fuck you. Like, we’re gonna do whatever we need to do. Um, but, um, like we’re, we’re, we’re gonna adopt our own thing. And if anything, we’re going to hold things back because you didn’t make the new thing work with our old workflow. All I’m saying is I think that this is one of those things that if you look at this thing, it can keep people from wanting to jump in, just cuz you [00:49:00] know that if you wanna cont, if you wanna adopt new things, you wanna keep up with things. You’re gonna have to be on this running treadmill forever. [00:49:07] Brett: me from wanting to jump in for like five years. I watched all of the tribulations that developers who immediately adopted Swift went through, I will say now that I’m into the thick of it it is a way more fun language than objective C way more fun. Everything about it makes more sense. Everything about it is far more reasonable than objective C. Like if you wanna concatenate two strings, you can use, uh, like plus equals you can use like an additive operator and in objective C you’d have to do like string by appending string. And that it’s, it’s ridiculous. So it’s a better language. I love it. [00:49:52] I’m really into it. Um, and I got like, I was able to update html2text, uh, the [00:50:00] Swift version with all of the new features I wanted to add. And I also, it, it also uses, uh, a port of Arc90’s Readability. Uh, if you guys remember that, that I modernized for, modern markup. Basically it finds the actual content in a webpage, it extracts or removes sidebars and headers and advertisements and comments and all of those things. [00:50:26] Uh, and then I built special handling for – any Stack Exchange question gets special handling so that you get the question and the answers. And there are flags on the app that let you include comments or exclude comments or only include their accepted answer, or only include answers that have so many up votes and then special handling for, developer, forums on Apple etcetera. Anyway, I, I got crazy with it. I made a tool that you could basically embed into a shortcut or an [00:51:00] Automator workflow or any script you are working on and, and have full power of, Marky markdownification. And, uh, I just, before this podcast added, um, the ability to clip directly into an nvUltra or nvAlt note, uh, you can add a flag and it will markdownify the page and create a new note in one step, which now I have that in a Launch Bar action and I can, I can turn any webpage I’m reading into a Markdown note in nvUltra with, with a keystroke. Um, [00:51:39] Jeff: I love it. [00:51:40] Brett: yeah, it got it got crazy. It did. It got crazy. Yeah. But oh, so I go to release it – I compile it as a binary and it’s the first time I’ve ever released a single binary, um, not a script [00:52:00] and not an app, but a binary. And I code sign it. I zip it. And I put it up on the web, you know, it runs fine for me. And then I hear immediately from someone who’s like, I get a malicious software warning when I try to install [00:52:16] Jeff: boy. [00:52:17] Brett: And it turns out you can’t code sign, you can’t notarize a single binary. You can only notarize a package. So then I go through this rabbit hole and I finally figure out the only way to distribute it is to create a PKG file that I, I, I send to Apple’s notary service. I get notarized and then publish that PKG file, which is then an installer and then you can only install it to one location. And it’s not ideal, but I’m like, okay, I can work with it. And then I figure most of the people who would actually use this have Homebrew installed, and I really need to figure out how to build a Homebrew formula. [00:53:00] And I go to Homebrew home brew’s formula documentation is fucking intense. [00:53:05] It’s so long. [00:53:07] Christina: But, very good. [00:53:09] Brett: it’s very good, but I’m going through it, trying to figure out what the little bit of it that I [00:53:14] Christina: No, no, no, no. I understand. I’m just saying cuz [00:53:16] Brett: impossible. [00:53:17] Christina: cuz I’ve had to package fonts before, like, [00:53:20] Brett: my. [00:53:20] Christina: or I had tried to package a fonts, on Homebrew and it was, was like, not mine, but I was just gonna be like the packager and, so yeah, it’s a whole thing. Yeah. [00:53:27] Brett: I eventually found after, after going through several tutorials that were outdated because Homebrew’s formula has changed. Um, I found an NShipster article that I’ll link in the show notes for anyone who does care about this. Um, it took me five minutes once I understood the, the few things I actually needed. Uh, now you can just type “brew tap ttscoff/thelab”, and then “brew install gather-cli” [00:54:00] and, and you’re good to go. You have a, a copy compiled on your own system so you don’t have to worry about notarization or anything. And. [00:54:09] Christina: is great. Yeah. Although there is a certain irony that the whole reason you went through this process was that you didn’t want people to have to install Xcode tools, to be able to run these things. [00:54:19] Right. But. I mean, that was the whole reason you did this, but of course, in order to have Homebrew installed, you still have to have Xcode tools installed. So there is a certain irony in this, right? Uh, that, that you went through this entire process to avoid something that is still going, people are still going to have to do anyway. [00:54:34] But, [00:54:34] Brett: in my, in my manic, in my manic frazzled state. I hadn’t even considered that [00:54:39] Jeff: awesome, Christina. I love it. [00:54:48] Christina: [00:54:48] But in fairness, once they’ve gone through it, this will make updating it much easier, right? [00:54:52] Brett: If you don’t already have Homebrew up and running and you use a Mac and you’re any kind of nerd, you really should get it up and [00:55:00] running, like you should already have that working. Um, which is probably a, a fair assumption that most of the scripts I share are going to people who already have all of the processors, but it’s a, it’s a principle. [00:55:14] It’s the principle of the thing. Um, but yeah, Homebrew is amazing and it like, it has surpassed all other package managers. And now that it can install like ever since casks showed up and, and now you can create a Brewfile that automatically installs all of your apps and your command line utilities, [00:55:37] Jeff: How love my Brewfile. [00:55:39] Christina: me too. [00:55:40] Brett: Homebrew… [00:55:42] Christina: a ton of time with Mike McQuaid who’s like the main maintainer, uh, of, of Homebrew, at our, um, little mini summit a couple months ago. And, I might have fangirled a little bit to be completely [00:55:53] Brett: Yeah, hobnobbing with the stars. [00:55:55] Christina: because I was like, I was like, no, you don’t understand. I’m such a huge [00:56:00] fan. I’ve been such a huge fan for such a long time. And I really appreciate what Homebrew does and the fact that it works on Linux now. And like, you know what I mean? Like, like which, which I get I’m like, well, there are a million other package managers. Yes. I understand that. I like Homebrew fuck off. [00:56:14] Brett: Oh, that makes me want, that makes me want a Docker image that installs Homebrew on Linux that I can just use “brew” to install all of the packages I need “apt get” as a pain in the ass sometimes. Um, anyway. Okay. I didn’t want to go too in depth about Gather, uh, I built a tool. It markdownifies webpages. [00:56:38] You can incorporate the scripts. It was a blast. And I, I did it all in a weekend and I’m really happy with it. And that’s all I’m gonna say. [00:56:48] AD: TextExpander [00:56:48] okay. It’s time to talk about text expander, get your team communicating faster so they can focus on what’s most important with text expander. [00:56:57] Your team’s knowledge is that their fingertip. 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And actually, I am gonna say more, you [00:58:00] know, how I’ve used text expander that’s relevant to this episode, we’ve talked so much about journaling. [00:58:05] I used to keep a, a daily journal template in text expander, and it was essentially just, I open up a text file. I, I typed my shortcut and a whole template of prompts and, and, and various ways into journaling came before me. Uh, it was magical and it helped me a lot. Um, because before I even knew what I was doing, I was journaling. [00:58:28] So anyway, text expander, friends. [00:58:33] Welcome to Wrexham [00:58:33] Brett: Do you guys have time for one TV show? Um, so, [00:58:37] Christina: time. [00:58:39] Brett: uh, have you seen “Welcome to Wrexham”? [00:58:42] Jeff: No. [00:58:44] Brett: is it’s Ryan Reynolds and Rob, and I never say his [00:58:48] Jeff: Oh, I, I. [00:58:49] Brett: Rob me from sunny [00:58:52] Christina: Um, yeah. Yeah. Okay. McElhenney. Yeah. Yeah. [00:58:55] Brett: buy, they buy a, a football, a soccer let’s, let’s be American about it. They buy a [00:59:00] soccer team, uh, they’re currently in like the third tier league and so they buy, they buy basically a loser soccer team in, in Wales and it’s a documentary that’s tracking like maybe how they turned this team around, but it’s only, there are only two episodes out. [00:59:22] Christina: So it’s like Ted Lasso but, like, real life. [00:59:24] Brett: Yeah. This is documentary. [00:59:27] Christina: was gonna say, I remember now hearing that Ryan Reynolds had bought like a, um, a club, but I didn’t realize that that that Mac, bought the club with him. [00:59:36] This is amazing. And I’m like very into this because [00:59:39] Brett: and they had never met before this. [00:59:42] Christina: So that makes it even better. So real quick pivot do either of you watch the Always Sunny in Philadelphia podcast. [00:59:51] Jeff: No. [00:59:51] Christina: Okay. You have to it’s like one of those recap pop podcasts, except they completely dismiss of any idea that they’re bothering with recapping the episodes at [01:00:00] all. [01:00:00] Like they’ll show, share memories about stuff, but honestly, it’s just the three of them talking the shit and occasionally bringing in, you know, other guests and people from, the show and whatnot. It is the Always Sunny podcast is everything that you like love about always sunny, but you actually get to see like the people like the guys, like you really get a feeling like it’s just like kind of the three of them, like talking the shooting the shit and like having a good time. [01:00:24] But, but the podcast is, is great. Highly recommended to anybody who watches the show and likes the show. Um, cuz it’s all three of them are brilliant and that show’s gonna fucking pass the honeymoons. If it hasn’t already like it’s it’s gonna it’s no, it’s gonna pass Gun Smoke. That’s what it’s it’s gonna fucking pass Gun Smoke. [01:00:40] It’s gonna become like the longest running televised, like, like live action show of all time, which is insane. Like it’s, it’s gonna like fucking, Always Sunny in Philadelphia that and Grey’s Anatomy, those are the two that are gonna fucking beat Gun Smoke, man, which is insane. [01:00:55] Brett: In the first episode of Welcome to Wrexham, , Mac is like, so I have [01:01:00] TV, star money. But if I wanna do this, I need movie star money So he brings in Ryan Reynolds and honestly, I can listen to Ryan Reynolds just riff all day. [01:01:14] Grapptitude! [01:01:14] Brett: So should we do some gratitude before it gets too long? [01:01:17] Jeff: Let’s grappta grappta grapptitude. [01:01:19] Brett: I’ll start off. I can go first. Um, I have an app called All That Unicode it’s a cool app that basically just gives you access to every Unicode character through different, like there’s a picker and you can go through categories and there’s a finder to search by name and description. [01:01:40] And for anyone, writing code who wants to include a Unicode character, whether it’s an emoji or, you know, like a Cyrillic “R” symbol or whatever, it it’s a perfect. For web devs, [01:02:00] too. Who, who need to know the, the Unicode code to insert a character in a webpage? It it’s, it’s a perfect little app. It does exactly what it needs to do. [01:02:11] I, uh, I’ve been very impressed with it. I use it a bunch of times today. That’s my pick for the day. [01:02:19] Jeff: Awesome. What do you got Christina? [01:02:21] Christina: Um, okay. I think I’m gonna talk about a more general kind of thing. And I wanna dive into this maybe as a topic in a future episode. So I’ve been spending a lot of time kind of looking at, at alternative web browsers. [01:02:32] So getting away from just using, you know, like, like Safari, Firefox, Edge, um, you know, uh, Chrome, and looking at some other ones out there, and obviously most of them are using the chromium, uh, rendering engine, but there’s one notably that, that doesn’t, but I’ve been playing around with, um, Opera, which, you know, I think Chinese own it now, but it’s sort of interesting Vivaldi, which also. [01:02:53] Brett: Old school. [01:02:55] Christina: which, but they’ve been keeping them updated, which is interesting. They’re kind of like at the Brave school, but they do some interesting [01:03:00] things. There’s one called Arc. Arc is, uh, from a browser company, which is really about like making, like your work stuff more productive Arc is interesting, but the one I’m gonna mention arc. [01:03:12] Yeah. I, I think that like you still to sign up it’s it’s like, it’s like browser.company, I think is the website. Um, but I think, um, or no, it’s the browser.company I think. Um, you have to get on a waiting list for it. Um, but, uh, I I’m a fan. The one I’m gonna talk about is Orion, which I don’t know if I’ve mentioned before. [01:03:32] I think I might have so Orion. [01:03:35] Jeff: but I, I [01:03:35] Christina: So Orion’s in public beta now. So you don’t have to sign up on, on a form like you used to. It is interesting because it is using WebKit under the hood. So this is a Mac app, so it’s using WebKit under the hood, but they have it so that it’s working with most Chrome extensions and, um, also making some other changes in niceties and things that frankly Safari doesn’t do. [01:03:57] So there’s, it’s kind of like, in [01:04:00] some ways, if I think of this, we’re able to be maintained well, it’s kind of the best of both worlds because you get the performance and like the battery impact and, and resource stuff of Safari, but all the stuff that you can’t get with Safari, you know, like, the extension situation and , some other, you know, kind of like niceties and the, the developer tools I think are, yeah I mean, they’re basically crumbs, but they’re, uh, you know, but at this point, safari are basically crumbs too. So it’s from a company called Kagi or Kagi. [01:04:29] Brett: Kagi. Old school company [01:04:31] Christina: no, no. That company went, that company went outta business. They bought the domain. Yeah. Yeah. So that company, that company is gone and, and this is a new guy. [01:04:41] He was somebody who he sold something and got money off of it. His, I think the whole play on this is there’s gonna be like a paid search engine, which is supposed to be like privacy focused. I have no idea, but, um, you know, I’m not really necessarily gonna be into paying $10 a month for, for a search engine. [01:04:57] Google has all my information anyway, but [01:05:00] the browser is definitely worth checking out. Uh, it doesn’t work super well with 1Password, um, which is frustrating. So I can’t, I would never use it as a daily driver, but I think that it’s one that I definitely think is worth checking out. And I’ll say this, even if it’s not something that you wanna use, like all the time. [01:05:15] I’m glad that we’re seeing people like playing around with and having new takes on browsers again. And it’s nice to see an actual WebKit derived one rather than just a [01:05:24] Brett: Yeah, right. Does another Chromium browser. [01:05:27] Christina: right. [01:05:28] Jeff: Awesome. That’s cool. That sounds fun to play with. Um, mine is, uh, this app. I don’t know if it’s pronounced Anki or Anki it’s A N K I it’s a flashcards app. It’s like a [01:05:41] Christina: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. [01:05:42] Jeff: around forever and, and it looks like it. I mean, like it’s, it’s one of those things that’s just stayed steady. [01:05:48] The design hasn’t changed. I mean, you can do things to create themes and whatnot. I’ve been using it. It just does a really nice job of helping you create a hierarchy of cards in, in real [01:06:00] time as you’re doing the flashcards. Um, and just a wonderful job of guiding you and just kind of bite size study. [01:06:07] And there’s tons of flashcard sets that exist or decks that exist already out there. Anyway, I had used it years ago. I use it just to like, keep certain commands that are like just outside my everyday use, fresh in my head. Cause it’s kind of fun for me. Um, I’ve been doing it with Git actually, cause there’s so many weird ass Git commands that you never use. [01:06:28] And I just like being aware of them, but anyway, I’ve been using it to build up some decks or some stuff I’m trying to know better. And, and it’s awesome. And it’s also in terms of the community that uses this thing. It’s such a fucking crazy, peak into the world of medical school because it’s primarily like has a user base of medical students and those people are fucking bananas and the ways in which they use this thing, like there’s a, , there’s one, repo that helps you use your Nintendo Switch controllers, your [01:07:00] Joycons to like zip through your flashcards. [01:07:03] And like, I don’t even understand what they’re doing, cuz it’s just like, so beyond my use case. So there’s just like this really like nutty community of mostly medical students and that alone is just kind of fun to figure out how deep into that shit they have to [01:07:19] Brett: can I get flashcards on my Oculus? Cuz I would do that [01:07:22] Jeff: know what, um, that is a great idea for the Oculus. I also, my kids bought an Oculus and I was thinking how great it would be to build a memory palace in an Oculus. Um, you know, like, and there’s one app that kind of does it, [01:07:36] Brett: there’s an app. You can mirror a windows, desktop to Oculus and use your computer in a virtual space, which I love the idea of, I just needed to be for Mac and that doesn’t exist. [01:07:50] Christina: no, [01:07:50] Jeff: you can do it with Firefox though. You can, which is different, but like Firefox has a little bit of an environment that’s just beyond the browser that you can play with, but I haven’t tried it yet. [01:08:00] So [01:08:00] Brett: Anyway, sorry, sorry. Sorry to hijack your, [01:08:03] Jeff: that’s not hijacking shit. [01:08:05] Christina: No, I love this. Uh, also the, I will hijack slightly, but we should maybe talk about this more. I bought a, I bought a Oculus Quest 2, [01:08:12] Jeff: Oh, you have one too. We just did [01:08:13] Christina: Yeah. So I, I got it before the price went up and so [01:08:16] Jeff: Yep. Same. [01:08:16] Christina: so, so, so, so, so, okay. So, alright. So this is a future topic. All three of us need to talk about, about our experiences, uh, with the, with the metaverse since, um, we bought into it before the price went up. [01:08:27] Brett: have you guys found sky box yet? [01:08:29] Jeff: Not yet. [01:08:30] Brett: Plex for [01:08:31] Christina: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. [01:08:32] Brett: Any, any movie file you have on your Mac? You can play to your Oculus without any special connectors or. [01:08:40] Jeff: not as satisfying as you want. The first thing I did in the Oculus Quest 2, was pull up Netflix and watch a Richard Pryor performance. [01:08:47] Brett: watching Netflix on my Oculus [01:08:49] Jeff: did not like it. I thought it would be the best thing in the world. Yeah. [01:08:52] Brett: Oh my God. I [01:08:53] love it. I would [01:08:54] Jeff: just have an [01:08:55] Brett: yeah, we should have an Oculus episode. [01:08:56] Jeff: we’ll meet in the, in the metaverse.[01:09:00] [01:09:00] Brett: This, episode title will be not the Oculus episode. Um, Anki man, I remember Anki from, someone asked me to incorporate it with some piece of software. I wrote like 10 years ago. It’s been around for a while effective though. [01:09:19] Jeff: Yeah. There’s definitely room for Terpstra. Yes-anding in it for sure. all right, everybody, you all [01:09:27] get some [01:09:27] Brett: call it. [01:09:28] Christina: We should definitely [01:09:29] Brett: Yeah, you get some sleep. [01:09:30] Jeff: Bye. [01:09:31] Christina: Bye. [01:09:37] Jeff: Hey, there are good people before you go. We have a bunch of new places where you can interact with us. Please check out our Instagram feed, our YouTube channel Twitter, of course, and sign up for the Overtired newsletter, which will sort of pick up where the show leaves off with expanded show notes. Uh, a little bit of what the three of us get up [01:10:00] to between episodes and let’s face it. [01:10:02] There’ll be some musing. How can you resist musings? You’ll find details for all the ways to interact with us in the show notes and at overtired pod dot com . And And thank you. Thank you. Thank you as always for listening.

Is there any such thing as a neurotypical? Our intrepid hosts discuss. Conversation styles, quality of presence, plus finding a therapist, tracking GitHub stars, and how to build the ultimate Markdown editor. Show Links It’s All All Gone Pete Tong Psychology Today Therapist Directory K.Flay — Inside Voices/Outside Voices (Spotify, Apple Music) I’m Glad My Mom Died LaunchBar (or Alfred, Raycast, what have you) Astral Little Star Canva Byword My Ultimate Markdown Editor Wishlist Join the Conversation 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 That Particular Monster [00:00:00] Christina: [00:00:02] You’re listening to Overtired. I’m Christina Warren and I am joined as always by Jeff Severns Guntzel and Brett Terpstra guys. How are you? [00:00:14] Jeff: Hido hi, episode 2 95. [00:00:16] New Teeth? [00:00:16] Brett: I got new teeth. You? Nope. Okay. So our listeners, we don’t, we’re not doing video, but for the last year I had the four teeth in the bottom, right back of my mouth got pulled. So I haven’t been able to chew on the right side of my mouth for [00:00:32] Christina: Oh, wow. [00:00:33] Brett: Um, and I just got used to it. I, I got used to having all that extra space from my tongue. [00:00:38] Uh, and you, you, your, your brain just accommodates, you know, you just start chewing with one side of your mouth. So now I have to like force myself to chew, but they put these teeth in, I got this bridge, this implant, and for, for people listening, I just like pulled my cheek back and [00:00:54] Jeff: no, you did like the old comedy, like fish hook and the [00:00:56] Brett: Yep. [00:00:57] Yeah. And, and the teeth [00:01:00] they put in this implant, they put in is bigger than the teeth that were taken out. Um, I don’t know if you can see, but it comes in like almost a quarter inch further than the normal teeth [00:01:13] Jeff: oh, jeez. [00:01:14] Christina: Ooh, weird. So, okay. Now was that an accident or is that just like how they work or like. [00:01:20] Brett: I complained about it and they explained to me that because of the way, cuz there’s two, uh, like whatever, screw posts, whatever they’re called implants, I guess. Um, and the way that they have to create a bridge that spans across these two posts, it has to be in a straight line instead of curved the way a, a set of teeth normally would be. [00:01:42] Um, so I guess it’s unavoidable. I’m gonna give it a couple weeks and if it, if I can’t stop biting my tongue, like I I’m having to retrain the way I speak. Um, I’m, I, I, I tend to li [00:02:00] now if I’m not paying close attention, because my tongue is kind of like jammed towards the center of my mouth and it’s, it’s nice to be able to chew on the right side of my mouth. [00:02:10] But honestly, I, I kind of miss not having teeth there at this point. , I’m getting, uh, as the days go by, I’ve only had ’em for two days. So I feel like I’m getting more used to them every day. Uh, we’ll see. Maybe I’ll just, maybe my brain will just adjust to this. No reality. Now, [00:02:29] Christina: I think it probably eventually will. Um, they might have to do a thing where like they shave some of it down or whatever. I don’t know. [00:02:36] Brett: if that’s an option, I’m all for [00:02:38] Christina: I mean, they might be able to, I’m just, I, the reason I’m saying this is like, I know that they can shave regular teeth down, so I don’t understand why they couldn’t shave like an implant or something. [00:02:44] Brett: Yeah. We’ll see what, [00:02:47] Jeff: I went to the dentist for a crown and they gave me a 3d print of my teeth. [00:02:51] Brett: oh, geez. What are you gonna do with ’em Halloween’s coming up. [00:02:55] Christina: That is cool. [00:02:56] Jeff: Well, my fucking family’s sick of seeing them. Uh, I had it on [00:03:00] my bedside table for a while. [00:03:02] Christina: Oh [00:03:02] Brett: my family’s like my family’s like that with the gallstones I got taken [00:03:06] Christina: your wife is like, you put that in the house first. You get that off the bedside table. [00:03:12] Jeff: it’s fascinating to look at. You never see it’s like a for, for those again, for this visual episode where retired, I have a full 3d printed version of my mouth and, uh, and I can just look at it and it’s like looking at me, uh, or at least part of me. And it’s like, where I know there’s bigger gaps in my teeth. [00:03:29] I can locate him on the side. And like, it’s just amazing [00:03:32] Brett: do you look at it while you’re flossing? So you can [00:03:35] Jeff: Well, no, but it’s actually facing me. I I’m looking at it. It’s up on top of my monitor on a little tray. So they they’re staring at me all the time. [00:03:43] Brett: So one of the benefits I was looking forward to with this whole quarter of my mouth being fake now was that I can’t get cavities there. What I didn’t realize is with a bridge like this, you have to floss underneath it. [00:04:00] So it’s not that I have a core of my mouth being, uh, like maintenance free it’s that I have a quarter of my mouth that requires different maintenance than the rest of my mouth, which I’m pretty disappointed about. [00:04:12] Jeff: What is that? You bring the floss back to the back and you go under the teeth. [00:04:16] Brett: there’s two posts in it. So you can’t just like scoop under it. Uh, you get this thing called, I think it’s called a bridge thread. And it’s like, it’s just a wire and you have to like get it between and around the post and like poke through at the bottom of your teeth [00:04:33] Jeff: Wow. [00:04:34] Brett: instead of going between the teeth, cuz it’s one solid piece. [00:04:36] So you can’t just like floss down and into it. You have to dig underneath it. And I’m not excited about that. [00:04:43] Jeff: A, uh, a, a elderly British friend of mine told me that it used to be custom on the island, uh, for a wedding gift in rural parts of the country to give the husband or the husband and the wife, uh, to give them, uh, fake [00:05:00] teeth for their wedding, present a set of full set, full set of [00:05:04] Brett: planning for the future. [00:05:05] Jeff: I guess. So I don’t understand it. [00:05:08] I didn’t fact check it. This lady’s generally very reliable, [00:05:12] Brett: everyone should have at least one elderly British friend. [00:05:15] Jeff: mm, this is the best. [00:05:16] Brett: Everyone should have at least two Austrian mates. Sorry. That’s a reference to a movie that neither of you will ever see, but it’s all gone. Pete Tong is a fucking classic and everyone should watch it. At least once [00:05:29] Christina: Okay. [00:05:30] Jeff: all right. [00:05:30] Brett: I’m adding, it’s been in here before, but I’m adding Pete Tong to our show notes right now, [00:05:35] Jeff: Okay. He is. Can you hear him clicking? He’s not bullshitting. [00:05:38] Brett: all gone Pete to such a good movie. [00:05:41] Jeff: Spelled like it sounds, [00:05:42] Brett: It’s a great movie. I’m telling you His girlfriend, his girlfriend tells him he should maybe write a book about his life and he says, oh yeah, that’s brilliant. Wait, that’s a lot, maybe a pamphlet or a brochure. I get that. I, I feel you all right. [00:05:59] Mental Health Corner [00:05:59] Brett: Should we do some mental.[00:06:00] [00:06:00] Jeff: I guess so. [00:06:01] Brett: Feel like we segued [00:06:02] Christina: I, I, I think, I definitely think we segued into it. [00:06:05] Brett: Who’s up first. [00:06:08] Christina: go first. Uh, because mine is not massive. I, uh, so I mentioned this ironically in an Adri last week that I’ve been like having some indigestion and I, I think I have an ulcer is basically what I think it is. And so this isn’t really mental health per se, but it is like my health, which affects my mental health. [00:06:27] So, so like the last few weeks, this has been a weird thing where I’ve never really had this where I have like, um, like really bad, like all day, like indigestion. So how it started was I’d been at a friend’s house. I hadn’t had much to eat that day. I ate some stuff. I had some wine and then I woke up like eight hours later and I threw up and, but I didn’t throw up, you know, because I was like drunk or anything. [00:06:52] Like it was. That thing where sometimes I don’t know if you’ve ever, either of you ever had this, but sometimes you do get like indigestion where like all [00:07:00] of a sudden you wake up and like, your mouth is full of saliva. And you’re like, I have to throw up because there’s gas or something in my stomach and that happened. [00:07:09] But then it continued to happen for like three more days and I really couldn’t eat anything. I couldn’t keep anything down. I just felt terrible. And I felt like, you know, it was like, like lower than normal indigestion, but not like a stomach ache. And it’s, it’s continued and it got better, but now it’s like worse. [00:07:26] Like I’ve had a lot of Tums I’ve been taking like over the counter things and whatnot, but, um, and things were better. I had one instance at my parents’ house for one day, but, um, then it, uh, was, was better after I was, I was taking some like, uh, some Pepsi or something, but I ran outta pep, so I have to get more pep and it’s like back and it is. [00:07:47] Not great. Like, I, I, I I’ve forgotten, like, it’s been a while since I’ve had any sort of like physical health problem, almost all my problems have been like hidden. So I, you know, like mental and, and so [00:08:00] I’m like, God damn, this sucks. So I’m gonna have to find a, a, a gastro, um, to, to go to and like get checked out. [00:08:07] But it’s one of those things that, that can make you tired and like, make you not feel good. Like otherwise when like your body like, feels like it’s, you know, [00:08:15] Brett: Right. And, and I think, I think that’s under underrecognized is that chronic pain of any kind, even short term has a major effect on, because it affects your sleep. It affects your diet, it affects your overall pain level, uh, which all affects your mental health. And that absolutely is a valid part of the mental health corner. [00:08:37] Uh, any kind people who are like, uh, deal with like extensive chronic pain or chronic fatigue. Yeah. That’s that takes a real toll on the mental health. [00:08:48] Christina: Yeah, no, and, and it, it, it doesn’t like, and obviously mine is, is, is very minor compared to those things, but it does. But I think that that’s a great point, Brad, and that, that I think was what it kind of got me thinking about, which is that a lot of times, [00:09:00] I do think sometimes like, if you’re your other health is not good, then that’s going to make everything else better worse. [00:09:07] And, and I think on the flip side, right, like they’re almost, they’re these terrible self, like fulfilling things is that if you have like, your mental health is not good, then you’re less likely to take care of your physical health. And like, it’s this, it’s this terrible, like self perpetuating motion [00:09:21] Brett: Yeah. And may maybe even vice versa. [00:09:23] Christina: Yeah, exactly. So that’s [00:09:25] Brett: Yeah. Yeah. Um, So I had, I had, I had, I had an additional thought for this and I lost it. I lost it because I was working really hard to actively pay attention to what you were saying, which is a problem I have, like, I will start thinking about my response and the, the person I’m talking to will continue on with their story. [00:09:47] But meanwhile, I got stuck on this, this part I wanted to respond to and I missed. And when I edit our podcast, I always realized that I’ve done that. Like you’ve gone on, you’ve gone on and shared something important, [00:10:00] relevant, uh, noteworthy. But I got stuck on something. You said like two minutes earlier. [00:10:06] And that’s what I respond to when I like derail the conversation. And it drives me nuts to hear like my own habits when I’m, when I’m editing this show. So I apologize for all the times I’ve done that and probably will do it in the future. [00:10:19] Christina: Hey, that’s okay. I mean, I, I, I actually, I, for one, like, appreciate the, uh, the self-awareness there because I think most of us probably do that. I think that’s one of those truisms. Um, again, I, last week I quoted something from, um, invisible monsters, my, one of my favorite books, which has not aged particularly well in certain aspects, but I still love it, uh, where, like, you know, the postcards they send out, which are, are, again, these, these sort of trite things, but, but some of them are, are good. [00:10:45] Like one of my favorite quotes, but there’s one where it’s like people, you know, ask you how your day is so that they can tell you about theirs. [00:10:52] Brett: Yeah, [00:10:53] Christina: And there’s, there is a certain truth to that. I think where a lot of times we are thinking about our responses and our own things, or waiting to say our next thing and not [00:11:00] always like active listening. [00:11:01] This is my short, my, my long-winded sorry, this is my long-winded way of saying that yes, active listening can be difficult, but it’s especially difficult when you’re trying to think about what you said next. Did you, did you remember what you were gonna say? [00:11:12] Brett: No, but I saw, I saw, uh, an Instagram meme the other day that, that basically, uh, to paraphrase the conversation between neuro two neuro divergent people is basically just a series of that reminds me of the time where none of it relates to the story. The person just told, it’s just like a constant, like, well, that reminds me of, and I’m like, yeah, that is, that’s how I actually prefer to converse. [00:11:38] I feel like there’s a lot of, there’s a lot communicated when you share personal stories and some people feel, they look at that as like, oh, you’re making it all about you, but actually that’s how I relate to what you’re saying. It’s I find a connection that I can latch onto. And if my connection. Offend you [00:12:00] or it’s wrong, then I want to hear why your experience is different. [00:12:04] Like that’s, I put it out there for the purpose of like, trying to communicate, it’s my way of saying, is this what you mean? Um, and, and some people don’t deal with that. Some people like L my girlfriend, um, have learned to communicate with me in that way, uh, to hear it the way that, I mean it, uh, but, but yeah, when you’re, when you’re talking to a neurotypical that can, that can sometimes not go so well. [00:12:29] Christina: Yeah. Although I think that most neurotypical people are like that too. I mean, I don’t know. I mean, like, I I’m I’m at this point now, I don’t know if anybody is neurotypical to be completely [00:12:37] Jeff: Yeah, I was gonna say, I don’t know if I even believe in the, the, that particular monster. [00:12:42] Christina: yeah, because I think that most people, uh, are, are that way. And I, I think that what you just described, if anything, I would actually describe that as a fairly common response to say that you relate to people by being able to, you know, make comparisons in your own experiences and. [00:12:58] Brett: if that’s true. I don’t know if [00:13:00] that’s true. I can’t prove it either way. All I know is what’s true for me and, and it’s true for me, so, [00:13:05] Christina: that that’s, I think that that’s true for me largely is not universally true, but like, I think that a lot of times, like one of my first instincts, especially when talking to people is to try to find a thing I can relate to if only, not so much for myself, but, but oftentimes for them to be like, oh, you know, I, I, I know what you’re saying. [00:13:22] I have empathy or whatever. Right. Like, whereas I would think that if I, I think that, so again, like, I, I, I think terms like neurotypical and a neurotypical are, are not necessarily even helpful at this point. But, um, but I do wonder like, if, if, if you were going to go on that spectrum, I think that if people who have a hard time with empathy, that might not be a thing that might even be aware of, if that makes any sense where they could even make that connection of this is similar to this thing with. [00:13:54] Brett: So maybe, and, and maybe your life is similar to mine in that you [00:14:00] have attracted and curated people in your life who can relate to you in those ways. Um, there is a world out there that was designed by neurotypicals. Um, that is why those of us who are neuro divergent often have trouble. I mean, it’s, it’s what makes us, it’s what makes school hard for us? [00:14:24] It’s what makes work hard for us. We have extra challenges because this neurotypical world was not designed for us. Um, and this is especially true with like autism, but, but ADHD, for sure. Um, like there, there, those people do exist though. [00:14:42] Christina: oh, no, I know they do. I, I, I [00:14:43] Brett: we self-select out of those [00:14:45] Christina: Well, no, and I know they exist. I’m not trying to say that. What I’m saying is my experiences, and this is why I, I, I guess I am neuro diversion, but I’ve never identified that way because for most of my life and, and even now, like I could I’ve existed [00:15:00] in, in primarily neurotypical spaces where I’ve worked with a lot of neuro diversion people, obviously, but I’ve also been in very neurotypical spaces that are very common and like excelled in those spaces. [00:15:11] Right? Like, like I think I have, [00:15:13] Brett: at masking. [00:15:14] Christina: well, not just masking, but I think I’m actually good to be completely honest. I think I’m good at understanding social cues and social scenarios, regardless of what person I’m with. I don’t think that’s masking. I think that’s like, if anything, like, I, I just understand instantly what the social dynamic of something is. [00:15:30] Brett: You info dump though, which is not a neurotypical thing. That is an atypical thing to [00:15:38] Christina: Oh, sure. [00:15:39] Brett: you know, something about something it’s a it’s and in your case, like, you know, so much about so many things, like someone hits a topic, you know about, and you will dump, you will, you will info dump and, and it can make neurotypical people uncomfortable. [00:15:54] It can make ADHD, people like me lose focus, but, [00:15:58] Christina: good. No, totally. No, no. And [00:16:00] I’m again, like I’m not, I’m not claiming that I’m like not normal. So what I’m saying is [00:16:03] Brett: and I’m not claiming to give you therapy. [00:16:05] Christina: well, I’m, I’m just saying like, in these, in these situations, like I think what you were describing as trying to find like similarities, I actually think that’s a fairly common neuro neurotypical skill to try to find common commonalities. [00:16:18] Brett: So there’s this line. We can, we, we won’t drive this into the ground, but there’s a difference, like for me, someone will tell me a meaningful story. And instead of me, I believe the neurotypical response would just be to say, I hear you. That’s, that’s really rough, or that’s really meaningful in its way. [00:16:41] And my response instead is to say, yeah, one time when I was, you know, 25, this happened to me and it’s not, uh, just in a pure, conversational, uh, as a gambit, it doesn’t really indicate, [00:17:00] necessarily understanding, especially if what I say isn’t. Obviously correlated. Uh, I found people like Jeff here. Uh, they hear me do that and he rolls with it. [00:17:15] Like I think he understands, I think he speaks the way I do. Uh, but people like my mother, uh, will, will worry that I’m making the conversation about me when they just told me something that was meaningful to them. And my way of acknowledging that it was meaningful was to find a personal story that relates. [00:17:35] But, uh, but for my mom, it, and if anyone’s neurotypical, it’s my mother. And that’s why like, life has been rough. Uh, cuz she does not understand like what I go through and uh, and, and she sees it as me making it about. [00:17:51] Christina: Yeah. Okay. I can understand. I can actually see both of those things and I guess, yeah, this is, this would be the difference. I think that, I guess [00:18:00] I, I, I, I think that most people do actually act like you, nor even people like your mother, where they would in their mind find a similar situation. They might not share it at that moment because that might not be the right response. [00:18:15] If that makes sense. [00:18:17] Brett: Yes, I appreciate that. You think, you know how neurotypical people [00:18:21] Christina: Well, I I’ve spent a [00:18:22] Brett: as neurotypical? [00:18:23] Christina: I mean, I’m not neurotypical, but I’ve, but I’ve been around enough neurotypical people and I’ve, I’ve. I do feel like I understand how neurotypical people act, cuz I’ve been, that’s been my primary existence. Like my, my, my family is completely neurotypical, so, so I know, I know the response [00:18:39] Brett: up against it. Yeah. [00:18:40] Christina: Yeah. And, and, and I don’t like, I know I’m, I’m neuro diversion, but I’m, but I’m like, but I, I understand that this is what I’m trying to say. Like, I understand the social scenario where if you say what you’re feeling, how they’re going to react and why they would react that way. I also completely understand why they would react that way.[00:19:00] [00:19:00] Brett: and to be fair, like I can get along fine at a party these days less. So when I was younger, but yeah, I’ve gotten really good at existing in a more neurotypical, typical space. I’m not like handicapped. It’s not like everything I do comes across as like, uh, disabled in any way. Like I can be social. [00:19:21] I can be well liked. Um, I can, I can even have deep conversations with people that aren’t like me. So it’s, I’m not saying it’s not possible. Um, it’s just, there are differences in the way we naturally communicate. [00:19:35] Christina: Yeah, I guess all I was gonna say, and this will be my final thing, and we’ve gone way too long on this and you can edit out any, you can edit out any or most of [00:19:42] Brett: Nope. It all stays. [00:19:43] Christina: uh, is I think that most people, this is what I was going say. Maybe not for the reasons that you do, but I think that most people do cuz this is a truism and this is like a known like, like truism or afro. Right? This is, this is one of those things, which is that. Usually the [00:20:00] whole time someone else is talking, people are waiting and thinking about what they wanna say rather than listening to the next thing to say, like that is a truism and that is a, that is a neurotypical truism. [00:20:09] So that’s all I was gonna say is that many people I think are, are thinking about their own experiences or their own relation thing while someone else is talking, they might not share that the way you did, but most people aren’t actively listening. [00:20:21] Brett: And this will be the last thing I say on the topic, cuz yeah, it’s gone on. But um, that, that is probably one of those things that everyone can relate to. Every, everybody like has that for ADHD people in particular, it’s hard to, uh, circumvent that it’s hard to, it’s hard to bring yourself back. Um, I think it’s harder for ADHD people to, uh, to like see that that’s happening and, and do something about it. [00:20:54] Anyway, Jeff, how’s your mental health? [00:20:58] Jeff: Well, I it’s [00:21:00] interesting cuz I, uh, my mental health is, is it is what it is, but I’ve, I’ve really been thinking a lot about, um, the quality of presence. And um, thinking about that again, as you’re talking, uh, for me, quality of presence in the sense of like, I’ve just, I’ve done a lot of it over recent years, COVID excluded. [00:21:23] Um, I’ve done some experimenting with myself in social situations where, um, where I actually. You know, work to not do the thing where that you’re describing, which is like, oh, that makes me think of a story, cuz I really, I actually quite love like story trading and I think that in certain relationships I have, that’s a norm and it’s, and it’s just lovely. [00:21:48] Um, and I’ve found in many, many other situations that, um, I think I’m hitting the mark and I’ve probably missed it. And, and in missing it, my quality of presence [00:22:00] has, has degraded significantly in that conversation. And, um, and so I’ve experimented with kind of letting stories just end without me having, um, something to share about it, but in finding some meaningful and natural way to sort of mirror or, or just register that I’m, I’ve taken this in. [00:22:22] Um, and I, and whatever, whatever sort of appropriate level of, of indicating, you know, I, I feel that the gravity of this or the hilarity of this or whatever it is, um, I actually, for me, the reason that’s difficult is because I, I am like, it’s like in my DNA, on my dad’s side, like. I get antsy in silences. Um, my dad and my grandmother, his mother always did. [00:22:50] And, and always does, um, make sounds in silence whistle or Hmm. Or my, my grandma used to always go, oh, golly. [00:23:00] You know, like in any fucking silence, right. Including in really serious conversations when the silence felt meaningful, right. Like generative. Um, and so I , I learned this incredible lesson when I was working with my reporting partner, Samara Freemark for, um, American public media on a project. [00:23:19] And we were interviewing a bunch of veterans. She was holding the, um, the shotgun mic, uh, because she could actually hold it without moving her fingers constantly and causing the audio to be completely terrible. And I was doing a lot of the question asking in the beginning of our, um, of our project. And after like one interview, she’s like gun. [00:23:44] You do not leave any silence. Like you have to learn to just pause and see what happens. I’m like, okay, I’m in. I’m in, well, what do we do? And she’s like, I’m holding the microphone, which is always like very close to the source. Right. She’s like, after you ask a [00:24:00] question or after an answer, seems like it’s done, I’m gonna raise my finger. [00:24:05] And until my finger goes back down, you’re not gonna say anything. I’m like, got it. Right. Like, awesome. And it was incredible. Like what I learned about, about gathering stories and, and what can happen when you actually, this is like classic. Like we would, you believe I’m a CIS white male, um, that when you actually leave space, um, what can happen even though it’s initially awkward? [00:24:29] Is actually like transformative and, and magical, and actually does leave room for that person who just finished a story to go somewhere entirely different and that applies to conversations. Um, and so I’ve really tried and I’m not always good at it, but I really try to just leave space after someone tells me something, even though it triggers. [00:24:47] And I really want to tell ’em this fucking story, cause this such a good story and they’ll know a little bit more about me and like, you know, whatever else, like, um, I’m really practicing that kind of quality of presence. So anyway, I was already gonna talk about quality of [00:25:00] presence, but what you both were talking about really raised that for me. [00:25:04] And so I’m, I’m really just, I’m answering the question. How is my mental health by just saying that like, I. Thinking a lot about quality of presence and the ways in which my quality of presence can, can be degraded. Um, the ways in which I may feel it’s good and it’s actually not good. Is this really funny story from when, uh, my wife was pregnant with our first son, we were living in New York and we went to a, uh, we were part of a, a group, like a, a group of people that were about to have babies. [00:25:32] Right. It was like a parent. Fucking club or whatever. And we were learning different lessons about, you know, the actual birthing process. And they did this thing where it was all men and women. It was all like straight couples where, um, the women were supposed to kind of just sit in a chair and the men were supposed to come behind them and, and put their hand on their back. [00:25:51] And just, and just the, the instructions were just to be like, as loving and supportive, as you can, like send all that loving and supportive [00:26:00] energy through your hand, into their back. And we did the exercise and when it was done, it was time for the women in the group to share out. And one, after another they’re like, felt really oppressive. So, you know, we’re all going, like support, love, light babies, you know, and they’re just like, fuck, get this hand off of me. And that taught me a lot and I continue learning about quality of presence. So that’s my answer. [00:26:25] On Interrupting Women [00:26:25] Brett: I will say it was really hard for me to not interrupt you while you were talking, uh, to talk about how common it is for ADHD people to interrupt in a conversation. Um, And I’m like, I would just be illustrating the point and my conversation with Christina before you went Jeff, like I interrupted her so many times because I couldn’t like not say what was on my mind. [00:26:50] Um, and, and I feel like shit about that. And, and honestly, it is easier for me to interrupt women than it is men. And that sucks. Like it [00:27:00] it’s like I [00:27:00] Christina: That does suck. That is shitty. Honestly, that’s really fucked [00:27:04] Brett: really is. And I’ve noticed this about myself. Like if I have something I think is important to say, I’m willing to cut a woman off where I will give a guy a little more time to finish his, his speech. [00:27:18] And like, at least that’s what it seems to me in, in anecdotal situations. Like, and it’s something that I, I work on. Um, but, uh, it is a common trait for ADHD people to interrupt. And, and that is something that I could really use someone holding up their finger. And just like, just that signal would be like, okay, all right. [00:27:42] Back down. We’re we’re just gonna keep listening. Um, maybe what I have to say right now might not even be relevant by the time they finish talking and that’s okay. Like, I need to learn to deal with [00:27:54] Jeff: Well, and in the case of what you’re describing of interrupting women, more than men like to, to have [00:28:00] a bigger finger, um, that, that is up for longer, um, in those cases, I mean, that is something I think it’s really important. You’ve got that self-awareness and I think you just figure out like what, it’s just what you do on your computer, right? [00:28:12] Like what’s the hack, what can I do to make sure that, um, and it, and I don’t, I have no shame in having to like, mechanize me, shutting the fuck up, like, you know, the idea of that finger or whatever else, like, because what happens is it quickly feels like something other than mechanized, it just feels like spaciousness, you know? [00:28:34] And you know, , that’s the biggest thing in the world. Right? [00:28:39] Brett: Suddenly, I feel physically bad now about admitting that I cut women off in conversation, I’m gonna leave it in the podcast because it’s fucking true. Like, it’s just, it’s true. But I feel, I feel physically bad now. Um, [00:28:56] Christina: I’m sorry, you feel physically bad, but I’m glad that you admitted that. Right? Like I think that that’s [00:29:00] cuz honestly, like it’s one of those things, like I think that it’s a good thing to kind of like be aware of. Right. Like I [00:29:04] Brett: oh [00:29:05] Christina: that, you know, like, like I’m glad that you have that self-awareness to at least even say that, like, I think that’s really good. [00:29:11] Brett: How am I ever gonna fix it? If I don’t acknowledge. [00:29:14] Christina: Well, that’s exactly it. And which I think goes to what, what Jeff was saying, which is like, I think, and I’ve done something similar to Jeff, um, where I’ve also like tried to be more present. So I really appreciate what you were saying about that, because that encourages me to continue to do that because I, I, with, I think that silences can be beautiful, but like you, I also kind of have a hard time, like letting things be that way. [00:29:37] Um, but like, but, but I think what Jeff was was saying, and, and this is my, maybe me completely undoing. What I was just proclaiming to do is I think applicable to even like what you were saying, Brad, about like you, you noticed that you are more open to interrupting women. Like you’re aware of these things. [00:29:57] And if you can be conscious of it, [00:30:00] even if it’s hard and even if it takes time, even if you don’t have that, that physical cue of the hand going up, you can make changes in your behavior. Right. And then those BA, and then those changes, the more you do them, the more common, like the more, the easier it is to continue to do them. [00:30:17] And the more they become habits. So, you know, just like, yes, it’s, it’s harder for ADHD people, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. And it doesn’t mean that, that, like, you know, like, you know what I mean? Like, like our, our, our, our, our mental, um, you know, challenges are, are, are not like crutches. They’re not excuses for us to act certain ways. [00:30:38] They’re just not. So if that’s something you really wanna change, you can take the steps, which starts with acknowledging what happens to recognize it. And then, you know, think about it. Not feel actively bad, but to be like, okay, well, in the future, I’m going to be aware of this and stop myself when, when I, when I even, even if I, since it’s happening, stop myself, when I start to do it [00:31:00] so that, you know, the habit becomes something that you just do. [00:31:03] Brett: Sure. Yeah. And, and, and I’ve been aware of this for a little while now. It’s I feel physically bad. Having publicly admitted it to thousands of people. , that’s just, that’s a, that’s a, you know, I’ll be, I’ll be very aware of it now. Um, so. So guess what? Uh, after, after months of talking about how I needed to find a therapist, I found a therapist. [00:31:30] You Need a Therapist [00:31:30] Jeff: Woo. [00:31:31] Christina: Woohoo. [00:31:31] Brett: first session a couple days ago. Um, like we, we did a meet and greet, uh, just kind of like an interview is this guy didn’t work for me. And, and I wasn’t sure, like he checked all the boxes, all the questions I had lined up. Uh, he had answers that were satisfactory. At the end of a little like 20 minute, uh, let’s just, let’s just chat kind of thing. [00:31:57] I didn’t feel like he was smarter than me [00:32:00] and I really want someone smarter than me that can call me on bullshit. Um, cuz I’m, I’m a, I’m, I’m a smart guy. I’m also an addict. I’m very adept at deception and uh, in manipulation for sure. And like I need someone smart enough to just be like, Nope, that’s not right. [00:32:22] That’s not true. What do you actually think about this? What are you actually feeling? What actually happened in that situation? And, and I wasn’t sure he could be that guy for me. Um, and I didn’t know if I wanted a male or a female therapist, so I, I put unspecified when I did the psychology today, search, um, But this guy came up and, and he has experience with religious trauma. [00:32:50] He has experience with addiction. He has experience with bipolar and ADHD. And during our first session, he, like, he explained things about my bipolar [00:33:00] specifically. Like he listened to, um, me explain what my like, manic episodes were like and everything. And he was able to tell me things about my condition that I didn’t know before and that I double check to verify. [00:33:15] And he knows what he’s talking about. It was, it was impressive. Um, he’s worked with, uh, with, uh, alcohol abuse and, and at like, uh, dual diagnosis clinic, um, in Minnesota. And, uh, he’s, he. He’s worked with seven day Adventists and some, some cult members that needed deconversion and yeah, so like he, he like, he immediately, when I talked about, um, my fundamentalist upbringing and he, without prompting was like, that’s abuse, you were abused. [00:33:56] And I’m like, I needed to hear that from him. I needed a [00:34:00] therapist who understood that while outwardly appearing like a, leave it to beaver Cleaver home, my upbringing was terrifying. Um, and I wasn’t physically abused in any way. It wasn’t sexually abused, but I was emotionally abused and, and it affects me to this day. [00:34:21] And, and I feel like this guy, I feel like he hit all the right buttons. Um, I, I. I’m no longer concerned about his intelligence level. He’s, he’s a smart enough guy. He’s at least as smart as I am. Maybe not smarter, but he’s, he’s smart enough. And I feel like this is gonna work. So I signed up to do weekly sessions for the next six weeks and we’ll see how things go. [00:34:47] It’ll be the first time I’ve actually given therapy a chance. [00:34:51] Christina: I’m I’m so, I’m so glad to hear that. And I’m so glad, like you gave him a second chance and that you didn’t just go on that kind of like initial gut feeling of, you know, he’s not [00:35:00] smart enough. [00:35:01] Brett: Right? Well, I realized like I could probably shoot down therapists for the rest of time. [00:35:06] Christina: Yeah, I was gonna say, I was gonna say, you’re probably not gonna find a therapist who smart than you to be completely honest. [00:35:12] Brett: Well, and, and, and the thing is like, that’s a very subjective, like, no one’s sharing their IQ scores with me. And I don’t even know how much faith I put in the idea of a, of an IQ test. Like what he, he met all the requirements on paper that I could think of that I could possibly come up with. And this idea of like, is he smarter than me? [00:35:36] It’s subjective. And I could use that to shoot down anybody. So I had to ignore that one and just accept that he met all the other requirements and give him a shot. And yeah, I think it’s gonna work out [00:35:48] Jeff: For me, it’s not, it’s not smart. I mean, like generally speaking. Important that somebody be smart and, you know, a little wise even, right. Um, or w but clear eye is [00:36:00] actually what, for me, what matters the most is like the thing that you said where he was able to sort of reflect back at you, what, what you already knew, but you needed to hear, which is that your, your religious upbringing was traumatic, right? Clear eye enough, to be able to kind of see you in these, these ways that you’re presenting yourself, as you get to know each other. Um, it takes smarts for sure, but I think you can have the smartest therapist in the world and they might not see you, you know, [00:36:29] Brett: we, uh, we, our, our first session was, uh, telehealth. Um, I will be meeting with him in person for our second session, just so I can get a feel for like the difference between a video session and an office session. Uh, but at the beginning of the telehealth appointment, he like stretched back, put. Fingers behind his head and like raised his arms up. [00:36:53] And like, it was clearly to display that he had half sleeves on both arms, uh, tattoos [00:37:00] and, and it felt like I’m like, that is a weird flex for your first session with somebody to be like, yep. Look at me. I’m a tattooed, I’m a young tattooed guy. give me your faith and trust. And, um, that, that threw me a little bit, but, uh, I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t ask him about his ink. [00:37:19] Uh, I feel like he, he probably would’ve had a lot to say about the meaningfulness. Like apparently he grew up on a reservation and, and like North Dakota, but he’s very white. I don’t, I don’t know the story there. I didn’t ask. Uh, maybe we’ll get into that at some point, [00:37:36] Christina: I mean, maybe he’s not as white as you think. Like maybe he is like, you know what I mean? Like. [00:37:40] Brett: maybe he is one of those people who actually is one 16th native, [00:37:44] Christina: That’s what I’m saying? Like you never, or, or maybe even more than that, you don’t know, like people like race is race is a weird thing in terms of how much like it, you know, people look certain ways. [00:37:54] Brett: I was told as a kid, I was one 16th native American. [00:37:57] Christina: were all told that Brett, [00:37:59] Brett: yeah, I [00:38:00] feel like that’s. And I began to realize that everyone around me thought that as well, and everyone was getting their DNA results [00:38:06] Christina: I was gonna say, and we all realized it was lie. We all had that one. Great, great uncle who was, was native American. Like we all had that Cherokee or something. We all [00:38:14] Brett: In my, yep, exactly. In my memory, I met my great grandmother who was Sue, um, and like Missouri Sue and, and I remembered that I’m like, yep, I’m definitely one 16th. Cause the math works out now. I’m not even sure that memory is real. Her name was ha, but that might have just been like a white trash nickname she had, I don’t, I don’t even know. [00:38:40] I’m scared to ask, [00:38:41] Jeff: I’m thinking of hoo-ha [00:38:42] Brett: telling I’ve stopped. I’ve stopped telling anyone that I have any native American in my blood. [00:38:49] Christina: Yeah, no, I mean, I think, I think the Elizabeth Warren thing should have all been like signed to all of us. You know what I mean? Cuz I think that was the perfect encapsulation of like that’s what happens when you believe that? And then you go to [00:39:00] school and [00:39:00] Jeff: that was brittle. [00:39:01] Christina: and it was, and then you get the stuff back. [00:39:02] And like, because I, I don’t think that she was like intentionally trying to like fuck over the system. Like I really do think that she thought that she had that stuff and that she could claim those things and it’s like, mm, no, no. But [00:39:15] Jeff: Yeah. [00:39:16] Brett: All right. So we have a couple of subtopics in our mental health corner. First, I was gonna mention, like, I haven’t been manic for the last week, but I have gotten shitty sleep. I’ve been waking up between 12 and three every morning. And like aligned from a song will be looping in my head. I won’t be worrying. [00:39:36] I won’t be stressed, but like my brain will just be latched onto a line. Like I’ve had Kayleigh’s new album running through my head, like nonstop and like just one or two lines. Sometimes an entire verse will just get looped in my brain and I wouldn’t call them racing thoughts. I would just call it my brain. [00:39:55] Won’t stop latching onto this thing and fall asleep and I end. [00:40:00] Tossing and turning until like six in the morning when I finally get up. So I’m not like up all night coding. Like I would be if I were manic, but I am not sleeping. Well, [00:40:10] Jeff: sorry. Sucks. [00:40:11] Brett: also Kaya’s new album is fucking great inside voices, outside voices, if anybody cares, [00:40:18] Jeff: I’m scared. I’m scared of the internet was the song [00:40:20] Brett: Yeah. Yeah. [00:40:21] Jeff: I delighted me. [00:40:23] Christina: Yeah. I, I, I haven’t listened to it in depth. I’m still listening to a lot of Beyonce, but, uh, I did like give it one kind of go through and I really liked it. So, and because of you and because of this pod, I’m a okay. For this land. So [00:40:34] Brett: So T T G I F is a song she does with Tom Morelo from rage against the machine and, and it, apparently she had the line in it at the, in the first verse. She says, I wanna rage against the fucking machine. And that was in there before they brought Tom. [00:40:51] Christina: that’s nice. [00:40:52] Brett: Uh, which is like, that was the song that like, yeah, you could tie into this one. [00:40:56] And the whole thing uses like rage style, like weird guitar sounds and [00:41:00] everything. Uh, but the muck is the one that gets stuck in my head at night. Um, stuck in the muck, like, and it, it just loops in my brain and that song is a banger. Weirdo is an Anthem, but the muck that’s, that’s my pick for best track on the album anyway. [00:41:20] All right. So someone just added book rec, I’m glad my mom died. What, what is that? [00:41:24] Christina: It’s a okay. [00:41:25] Jeff: Oh, I saw [00:41:26] I’m Glad My Mom Died [00:41:26] Christina: While you were talking, um, about, uh, your like experiences and, and needing to hear that you’d experienced abuse. And I’d actually meant to bring this I’m meant to put this on the list anyway. So I just finished reading a book called I’m glad my mom died. And it’s by Jeanette McCarty, who was a Nickelodeon actress in like the, the late, uh, odds. [00:41:46] And, uh, she was on a show called I Carly. And then she was on a show with, uh, future pop star, Ariana Grande called salmon cat, which was like a spinoff of two shows, not great. Like these are like, you know, kids sitcoms, right. [00:42:00] And, uh, she quit acting. Um, and although she, she might, she says she might go back to it, but she, she quit acting and was doing this one woman show a couple years ago called I’m glad my mom died, which great title really fucking like, like that’s gonna get attention. [00:42:18] Uh, but she wrote the book and it’s a memoir and. Look, I’m a little bit too old for the shows that she was on. I’m like aware of them, but I’m, I’m too old to really know much about that. So I went into this, reading it, and then I actually got the audible version, like listening to it, not with a ton of familiarity, the way that some people would buy a celebrity memoir where they’re like, oh, I remember, you know, this, this C actress from my, my childhood. [00:42:41] Like, I don’t really have that relationship. And neither of you would have that relationship. So I think that this would be a good wreck and I still thought it was a really, really good memoir. Um, she basically talks about like her relationship with her mom who died of cancer when she. Like 21. Um, and how her mom had been the one who had pushed her into acting to [00:43:00] begin with, which she’d never really wanted to do when she was six years old and really was living vicariously through her. [00:43:05] Her mom basically like started her on, uh, you know, having an eating disorder and, and encouraging, um, that sort of thing, um, at she thinks is maybe a way of control and some other stuff. And, and just some other really fucked up things that while she was growing up, like she would’ve said like my mom’s the best, she’s the most important person in my life. [00:43:24] But then as she became like an adult and had to deal with things, she had to kind of like face the reality that she did kind of grow up in more of an abusive environment and in a really fucked up a lot of scenarios, but it’s, it’s a really, really good memoir. Like, I, I was shocked because. Usually these types of memoirs are like the Jamie Lynn Spears variety, which I did not buy, but I did pirate and was hot garbage. [00:43:45] And I don’t say that because like, I’m like more team Britney than team other ones, like I’m team. That whole family is, is like white trash and sucks. But like, this was actually really, really good. And, um, I I’m gonna wreck it [00:44:00] for people to, to read or listen to, even if you have no idea who she is, it was a really good memoir of, you know, somebody who’s kind of gone through a lot of stuff, um, kind of the weird fame cycle, but also like grappling with their mental health and, and coming to terms with a childhood that was not what they thought that it was. [00:44:16] Jeff: I don’t know exactly where this thing goes, but I, I, I do often think about how it’s not, it’s not one of the experiences that is, is like, is like, uh, socially appropriate to discuss, which is a relief. When a parent dies, a parent that’s been been, uh, complex, um, you know, uh, impact on, on your life as a child. [00:44:39] Um, and that it doesn’t mean that you wished them dead, uh, but that maybe, um, there’s some relief from them [00:44:47] Christina: Yeah, no, she talked about that in some of her interviews, because obviously she she’s been like, she’s done, you know, like the, like the press junk around this now that it’s like top of the best seller list, that’s probably only going to continue. Um, but people have asked, they’re [00:45:00] like, okay, so what about the title? [00:45:01] Like, you know, and she’s like, look, it’s it’s I really mean it like a, yes, it’s provocative and it’s gonna get people to pay attention, which is true. She’s like, but is also accurate. And, and I think that I’ve earned the title. Like, I, I, I heard her say one interview that, and I was like, that’s really, I like that. [00:45:16] I like her saying, I feel like I, my, my lived experience I’ve earned the title, but she also, George stuffs asked her on good morning America. He was like, well, what would your mom think of the title? Would, would you name that? And she was like, there wouldn’t be a book. If my. Was was alive. I wouldn’t have written the book. [00:45:31] I wouldn’t have been able to, to do that. And I think it might have been in the intro, but it, no, it wasn’t in that it was, I think it might have been something with the Atlantic or something, but she like talked about like maybe she did, maybe it was something I just read anecdotally in the Atlantic that when people are giving like tips on memoir stuff, that, yeah, this is what it was. [00:45:49] It was an anecdote in, in the Atlantic where the writer was saying that in, she was in a memoir class in college and the professor would hear people and say, you might have to wait until [00:46:00] people are dead to write that, because that is a very valid thing. I think there are a lot of people who can’t express their truth and how things really are really were. [00:46:09] Until people have passed, which I think all of us can, can relate and experience that and know that yeah, there are things that we can talk about. Even if we talk about it on a podcast like this, that we know our parents don’t listen to. There are things you can’t put out there in the public until people are gone to really get into. [00:46:25] So in this case, you know, she had to wait like her, her mom’s been, been dead for, um, probably a decade, but, you know, she had to wait, like she wouldn’t have been able to write the book and name it that, but it’s also. It’s it’s a provocative thing that will get attention, but she does actually sincerely mean it. [00:46:41] You know, like not that she hates her mother, um, you know, she has complicated feelings about it, but to your point, Jeff, like she feels that relief that a lot of people have and don’t feel emboldened or, or open to say. And that was, there was a lot of discourse, uh, when the book came [00:47:00] out or leading up to its release where people were like very upset by the title. [00:47:04] And then there was pushback from others who were saying exactly what you said, which is no, we need to acknowledge that these are things people feel and that it’s okay for them to feel that. And I think if you read, and I think if you read the book, you definitely understand, at least I, I got the impression and, and I, I would love, you know, you two write, read it or I’ll, I’ll, I’ll, you know, slide you a copy or whatever in your listeners. [00:47:26] Yeah. Our book club, uh I’ll um, you know, I, uh, I feel like she earned the title, you know, like I thought it was I’ll also just, and then I’ll, I’ll shut up. but I thought it was really well written. [00:47:39] She says that like, that’s what she really wants to do. She wants to be a writer or a director. She’s a very, very good writer. And I think that’s what makes this work. Even if you have no context for who she is as a person or as a celebrity, it’s one of those rare memoirs that I’ve read where I went. Okay. [00:47:56] This was in some cases like hard to read [00:48:00] because it’s, you know, there’s a lot in here, but it was actually very, very well written [00:48:06] Jeff: Awesome. [00:48:07] Brett: I think I’m gonna write a book called I’m sorry. I died and then have it published posthumously and, and it will not, it will not be an airing of grievances. It will just be like, I’m just gonna be honest about how I felt about everyone and everything. Um, which by and large is really good. And maybe I don’t say enough nice things to people, but, um, given, given. [00:48:32] Not famous enough to, for there to be like any real estate value to a memoir of my life. Uh, I feel like a post humus, uh, like just have it self published when I die. Like if I don’t, if I don’t check in every 30 days until it not to publish, it’ll just eventually just auto publish a month after my, my passing [00:48:54] Christina: I’m kind of into that. [00:48:55] Jeff: work, get to work. [00:48:57] Grapptitude [00:48:57] Brett: Alright, so, should we skip to gratitude? [00:48:59] Christina: I think we could [00:49:00] just go to gratitude. [00:49:01] Jeff: Yeah. [00:49:01] Brett: do it. So I’ll go first. Can I go. [00:49:05] Christina: You can absolutely go first. [00:49:06] Brett: I’m picking launch bar this week, but with the caveat that I don’t give a shit, what you use, like if you are an Alfred person, if you’re a quick silver person, if you just like to launch things with spotlight. [00:49:18] Yeah. Raycast for sure. Like anything, any kind of launcher fits the bill. I am, I’ve been a launch bar user since it came out, uh, which was in the, in the later days of Quicksilver. I switched from Quicksilver, like before round two of quick, silver Quicksilver has made resurgence, but before round two, I, I became, uh, back in God, like 2000. [00:49:46] I spent like 2006, 2007, I switched to launch bar and, uh, and I just became a dedicated user, uh, Quicksilver kind of fell by the wayside launch bar, ruled the [00:50:00] arena. I became a hardcore fan and then Alfred came out and like everything about Alfred impressed me. I think it’s a great app. I have like, I am no qualm. [00:50:11] I have no beef with Alfred. Uh, I just, I was already quick. So I mean, launch bar was already doing everything I needed it to do. So I’m a huge launch bar fan, but my pick can also incorporate Alfred Raycast, uh, Quicksilver, whatever you, whatever you want, whatever you like. They’re all amazing launchers launchers in general. [00:50:36] Jeff: I went Alfred from Quicksilver and you went launch bar. It’s like, it’s not even a type of person. It’s just like, we all sorted where we sorted. It’s like a Pachinko. It was like a Paco machine, [00:50:45] Brett: It’s just where you landed. Yeah. [00:50:47] Jeff: Yeah. [00:50:48] Christina: I I’ve done. I’ve done like all of them. So I, I went to launch bar first and I was launch bar and I still actually have, like, I still buy launch bar whenever, like it’s, it’s updated. I always buy it. Um, but then, but, but I have like a, a lifetime [00:51:00] Alfred thing. That’s primarily what I use. I recently started using Raycast a little bit and I like it. [00:51:05] There’s some parts of it that I don’t love. Um, so it’s funny. Cause often how I do it, like, cause I have three different Macs, my work laptop, my personal laptop on my iMac. And so I typically have, um, like a couple of them alias. So I have, you know, multiples that I, that I could kind of switch between. So not, not like three at one time I would usually like two at one time to kind of figure out. [00:51:29] And my only thing I think with, with sticking with. Historically has been that it had like a, a little bit more active, like third party community for extensions and things like that. I mean, obviously you, you can still do those things in launch bar, but, but Alfred for a while really kind of had the mind share. [00:51:45] And now a lot of that seems to have gone to Raycast but use what you use, but I’m with you. I love all of them. And, um, for anybody out there, who’s a windows, user, uh, power toys, which is a, a free and open source thing that the windows team actually [00:52:00] builds on GitHub. Um, spiritual successor to the old power toys that came with like windows 95 and shit has a launcher, um, which is mapped to the, the windows space. [00:52:13] Um, like, like thing that works that also has, you know, plugins that people can do and whatnot. So, uh, and, and I, I was sort of responsible for that a little bit because I showed, um, the, the guy who’s the lead of that project, um, an open source, um, Window launcher on, on windows that I had been using that I really liked. [00:52:35] And, uh, and when they started building power toys, that was something that they wound up forking because the, that project wasn’t actively, um, being developed and, um, and, and used, you know, when they were building out the, the, the launcher and power toys. So, yeah. Plus one love launchers. [00:52:51] Brett: Nice work. [00:52:52] Jeff: that is the fourth or fifth windows 95, uh, like shout out on this show since I joined [00:52:58] Christina: I love one does 95. What can I [00:53:00] say? [00:53:00] Jeff: And also, have you noticed that the, the windows 95 launch footage has been kind of moving around Twitter again, where the. Are all dancing, uh, as like which, which one’s had cocaine. Um, . Yeah, but, but especially the big guy in the middle. [00:53:15] Um, [00:53:16] Christina: bomber, come on, man. You know, he’s the one that you, he’s the one we most [00:53:20] Jeff: like, he’s like Craig Finn from the hold steady. His arms are flying and anyway, sorry, but windows 95, go get ’em. [00:53:27] Brett: quick, quick, quick. Subick I just gotta throw in here. Astrol app, have you guys seen astrol app.com? [00:53:35] Christina: I [00:53:35] Brett: It’s a way to tag, add notes and organize your GitHub stars. Like we all star repos. We’re like, yep. Let’s start this repo. And we’ll remember it later, but you get like Christina, you have hundreds of stars [00:53:49] Jeff: I have this problem. [00:53:50] Brett: and to keep track of them, all Astro app is like a, it’s like Pinboard for GitHub stars. [00:53:57] Christina: Huge, [00:53:57] Brett: I’m just gonna leave that in the show notes. [00:53:59] Christina: Leave that in the show [00:54:00] note. Yeah, that’s a huge one. There’s also a, a, um, Chrome extension or, or edge or Firefox, whatever, an extension of everything. But safari, because safari is safari, um, that is called like little star that will also make it a little bit easier for you to organize your stars. [00:54:14] But astrol is great. You can also self host. Astrol like, they’ve got their hosted thing, but that sometimes has issues, but you can host it yourself. I think there’s even a Docker container. So, um, [00:54:25] Jeff: Oh, my God. Astro’s amazing. I literally just [00:54:28] Christina: yeah, yeah, no, no, it, it [00:54:29] Jeff: there I am. [00:54:30] Christina: Yeah, it’s really good. I’m a very big fan. [00:54:32] Jeff: Wow. Needed. Needed. All right. Brett, [00:54:37] Brett: you got something for us. [00:54:38] Christina: Okay. Yeah. So I have, I talked about Canva before. [00:54:43] Brett: Oh [00:54:43] Jeff: the design [00:54:44] Brett: two ADHD people. [00:54:46] Christina: Yeah. The design [00:54:47] Jeff: app. No, I don’t think you have not. What, since I’ve been on. [00:54:50] Christina: Okay, so I haven’t talked about it. Okay. So Canva, um, is canva.com. It is a website web app. There is a Mac app that I think is basically just an electron rapper, which [00:55:00] is fine. Is, um, it’s a subscription. I, I don’t know how much it costs cuz I’m on, somebody’s part of somebody’s team plan, but, but it’s, it’s actually very reasonable. [00:55:09] And if you do a lot of design stuff, like if you’re having to create YouTube thumbnails, for instance, or social media banners or other things, or even just other kind of Photoshop, like stuff, it is amazing. And it is a really, really good tool. Uh, it’s really easy to use, but is also really powerful. And the thing that I really like about. Uh, is that I’ve used. So for instance, I have to make like thumbnails from my YouTube videos every week and I’m in front of a green screen. And you would think that we’re moving, uh, the green screen from your background would be a fairly easy task. Uh, I have Photoshop, I have affinity photo. I have, you know, all these, uh, you know, pixel, I have all these, these things that I pay for, you know, latest version of creative cloud, all this stuff, none of them do it as well as the builtin, as like the free thing for Canva where it’ll remove your background for you, whether [00:56:00] it’s a green screen or something else, it’s actually incredibly, incredibly good, but they have a lot of these templates. [00:56:05] Some of them are premium. So you have to be part of, you know, like you have to be part of their subscription to do it. You know, they’re submitted by others, but it’s, it’s a really great, just like, kind of. Design app for dummies. And, um, honestly, like I look at it and I’m like, you know, this is eating Adobe’s lunch in a lot of regards in terms of like things like Photoshop express and stuff like that. [00:56:27] I’m, I’m a really, really big fan. So CAMBA is my pick, cuz I’m actually have, I’m gonna have to use it in a few minutes. Um, I’ve been very happy with the results I’ve been getting from it, but it’s also easy to use. It’s a lot more advanced than you would think with these sorts of design tools. It’s not gonna be good. [00:56:41] Like obviously if you are a professional designer, you’re not gonna love everything about this, but if you need to do something quick and dirty or you just need to like make something like an infographic or, you know, a graph or like some or other sort of thing, you know, for, for work or for something it’s really, really good. [00:56:58] I’m a really, really big.[00:57:00] [00:57:00] Brett: I am. I am very comfortable in, um, design applications. Uh, I especially affinity stuff these days, but I grew up on, uh, Adobe and, um, I would probably immediately run into the limitations of this, but there’s so much shit I do that. I just need a quick and dirty, good looking. I need a good looking cover photo for a blog post or a podcast episode, and it could be perfect for that. [00:57:31] Christina: that’s what this is perfect for. [00:57:33] Brett: Al works for a yarn shop and she handles their social media and she has, she has dug in and learned a good amount of like Adobe, uh, not Adobe, uh, affinity photo in order to be able to create good looking promos for them. This could actually like I would split the cost of a, the, a yearly pro account is 120 bucks. [00:57:59] That’s not[00:58:00] [00:58:00] Christina: No. And, and, and I think it’s $150 for, for, for a teams thing, uh, for, for the first five people. So, you know, if, if, if each of you want, you could split an account or you could like, you know, like if you wanted to share something like it’s it’s, um, it’s so I I’m on somebody’s teams account. It’s really good. [00:58:16] I think for, for both of you, it’d be good. Like for again, I’m fairly comfortable with design tools, not as comfortable as you are, but I’ve used all of these things forever. But when I was going to like, make a YouTube thumbnail, you know? Okay. So I have to remove the, the, the background and that’s. More challenging than it should be, because for whatever reason, the AI on, on can is, is better. [00:58:37] It just, it’s better than Photoshops. It is. That’s a flat out, that’s a flat out fact. Um, and then, you know, I need to add in like the various elements and I need to, to do, you know, apply certain things, you know, to, to get the, the coloring, right. Or the gradient or this or that. And like the font and like, you know, it takes all this time versus browsing through finding a template that I can customize to my liking and, and then just [00:59:00] snapping it out and I’m, I’m not gonna lie. [00:59:01] Like I I’m much, I’m lazy and it looks good and I’m happy with it. You know what I mean? [00:59:06] Brett: nice. Yep. I’m into it. [00:59:08] Jeff: Yeah. Awesome. Uh, my, well, first of all, I’ve been playing with astrol here and you know what I wish I could do. I wish I could, I could, I could tag it with a certain tag that would cause it to be sent to Pinboard. That would be like an amazing thing. Um, but it’s so good. [00:59:27] Christina: we could write an integration. There might be a way to do an integration. [00:59:30] Jeff: It is so good. And it’s viewer when I click on the various things that are starred is just really well done. And man, thank you. This is awesome. Okay. Uh, my pick is simple. It’s a very old pick it’s by word, like, uh, [00:59:44] Christina: Oh, yeah. [00:59:45] Jeff: I don’t know if you ever used right room back in the day from, uh, Jesse, how do you say his last name? [00:59:52] Gross jeans. [00:59:53] Brett: Gross chain. Yeah. [00:59:54] Jeff: Um, who of course did bike, which has been, uh, I think was a unanimous [01:00:00] recommendation on this, um, podcast. Um, and uh, oh my God. What am, how am I not thinking of the thing that I use all the time? Task paper. Yeah, duh. Anyway, so awesome. Right. Room was great. I remember I used it, man. I lived in New York when I used right room, uh, which was like 2004, I think. [01:00:20] And you could just like, I mean, you will both know this, but you just, you know, open this app and it’s just a big black screen with green type. I mean, you could add, add a couple themes. That was the one that came up and it was just so lovely of an environment to write in. And so anyway by word, when right, you can, I think technically run, um, but by word became my replacement for right room long, long, long time ago. [01:00:42] I mean like a decade or more ago. Um, and I’ve kind of just let it go by the wayside. And then recently I had this just like desperate need to write and focus and I. Popped it in made it full screen and was just able to write. And, um, and ever since then, I’ve been keeping it up [01:01:00] as my sort of note taking app, uh, because it’s just such a lovely environment to write in. [01:01:04] So by word, still, still going, still going strong. I actually don’t know the last time it was updated, but still going. [01:01:12] Brett: I love about byword is keyboard shortcuts, uh, like byword followed the text mate mentality of like, we’re just gonna give you a blank screen with no buttons. Uh, but we’re gonna give you keyboard shortcuts. It was the first time I had the command option up arrow to gradually increase the selection. [01:01:31] If your cursor on the page and you hit command, option up arrow, it’ll select the current word, hit it again. It’ll select the current sentence, hit it again. It will select within like parentheticals or the current paragraph. Hit it again, and it’ll select the whole document and like that kind of, that kind of, and, and like control, command up and down, I think was, it was the first time I saw that for moving lines up and down without having to select stuff like that. [01:01:58] And, and that [01:02:00] became part of my. Space, my minimum viable product requirements for a markdown editor was that it had that kind of power without having buttons for it. Uh, that kind of like under the surface, like it can do exactly what you need it to do in any given time without looking like Microsoft word. [01:02:22] Christina: Yeah, for me, my number one thing with a markdown editor and, and it’s still hard for me to find it to be completely honest is when I was select text and I hit a bracket. I don’t want it to delete the text. I want it to surround the text in brackets. [01:02:35] Brett: absolutely. That is. And I’m pretty sure byword does that. [01:02:38] Christina: sure it does. [01:02:39] Brett: if you’ve played with NB ultra at all, uh, or even multi markdown composer, really good with auto pairing, um, of, of brackets, parenthesis, uh, backs for like code spans. Uh, once you get used to writing and then selecting and hitting the, the surrounding bracket, [01:03:00] uh, it’s hard to go [01:03:01] Christina: It is. It is like, I, I, I found a, I found a workaround for vs code that now doesn’t quite work and I have to figure out another workaround again, but it’s frustrating. Right. So, you know, like mate was so good for so long and I stuck to it for years, partially, honestly, because of like that sort of thing, because I was like, It does the shit that I need it to do. [01:03:21] And I got so used to being able to select text and hit, you know, the Modi and not have it delete it, you know, that I was like, like this ruins it. [01:03:31] Brett: it’s the first thing I test when I open up a new markdown editor to see if it’s something I care about is I’ll select text and hit a, hit a double quote. And if it surrounds it in double quotes, we can keep moving. If not, I’m done, I’m out. Like that’s just basic care of it’s basic user care right there. [01:03:49] Jeff: totally. [01:03:50] Christina: no, but yet I also understand the challenge because you’re like building a multipurpose text editor that isn’t going to be, you know, the response that the most people want. But if you’re [01:04:00] writing the markdown, you definitely do. And it’s funny. I think that I probably do that as a test as well. Brett, probably because you do, because we probably talked about it at some point in the last 15 years and I was like, oh yeah, that makes sense. [01:04:12] Brett: I’ll see if I can find, I wrote an article at some point, uh, my ideal markdown editor and I laid out a list of requirements that, yeah, my mark, my ultimate markdown editor wishlist, I wrote it back in 2012 and people still contact me because they were, you know, they started working on a new editor and they took these requirements into account. [01:04:40] Uh, and, and I still, I stand by everything in this. In this article, uh, which includes auto pairing and wrapping. And if you start a list item, you know, with a bullet and you hit return, it should start another list item. And if you hit return again at an empty line, it should clear the clear, the list out like basic stuff [01:05:00] like that. [01:05:00] Just that’s how a markdown editor needs to work for me. So I will link that if anyone wants to build their own markdown editor, see my article as like, if you wanna build a markdown editor that impresses me. Here’s your MVP? [01:05:15] Christina: But also as somebody who’s been working off and on, on a markdown editor, you can probably tell people like, just not to do it. Right. Like, isn’t that just a world of pain? [01:05:25] Brett: well, okay. So did you ever see, um, what was it called? Uh, shit. I had a, I had a marked on editor. I wrote for WordPress that, that worked inside of the, the built in WordPress [01:05:42] Christina: Oh yeah. I remember [01:05:43] Brett: was, uh, quick, quick [01:05:45] Christina: Yeah. Quick tags, [01:05:46] Brett: mark, mark down quick tags, MD QT. Yeah. And, and I wrote it all in JavaScript and it basically was this layer that sat above the TinyMCE editor in, in WordPress. [01:05:58] And I [01:06:00] incorporated all of this into the WordPress editor and I had a blast doing it. Uh, I think the thing that scares me, uh, working on an app like NBI ultra with Fletcher is, uh, the file Handl. Like you, you corrupt a file and you’ve ruined somebody’s note. You’ve, you’ve deleted somebody’s data. That’s the nerve wracking part dealing with, like, this is what should happen when you hit this key that stuff’s easy and, and pretty fun. [01:06:28] And I did a lot of that with NVL too. Um, that, that have fun with that. If you get into actually being a file manager, like NV, ultra is then you’re treading on like, holy shit, I can’t fuck this up territory, but yeah. Have fun. Make new, make new mark [01:06:47] Christina: I mean, I definitely want that. It’s so funny. Some, one of my former colleagues at Microsoft was like, uh, like nagging me today. And they’re like, when is, when is GitHub gonna make their own markdown editor? I was like, that would be awesome. But I, I don’t know. I don’t think [01:07:00] that that’s on anybody’s roadmap, but I, that would be cool [01:07:04] Brett: All right. That was fun. You guys, [01:07:07] Jeff: It was fun. [01:07:08] Brett: what did we talk about today? [01:07:10] Jeff: Oh, don’t do that shit. Uh, we talked, we talked about styles of conversation and ways of listening slash uh, failing, failing to listen. Quality of [01:07:23] Christina: and quality of presence. Thank you, Jeff. [01:07:25] Brett: we talked about whether neurotypical people even exist. [01:07:29] Jeff: mm-hmm yeah. [01:07:31] Brett: We did not come to a conclusion. [01:07:33] Christina: did not. [01:07:33] Jeff: I said, I don’t believe in that monster, but I was searching for words and monster. Wasn’t the one I meant. So if anybody out there identifies that way, I didn’t mean monster. Uh, I still don’t know what I meant, but I’m not that mean. [01:07:44] Christina: And, uh, and we talked about apps, [01:07:47] Brett: yeah, we, we, we went, we went long on mental health and I feel like we had, we had a lot to say Brett found a therapist. Uh, we, we had a lot, we had a lot to talk about. Um, but then yeah, we got [01:08:00] into Grapptitude and I think all three picks day were, were thought provoking and, and really exciting. [01:08:09] Jeff: Yes, [01:08:09] Brett: won’t, I won’t ruin them for people listening to just this summary. [01:08:13] I won’t ruin the picks. [01:08:14] Christina: but they’re good [01:08:15] Brett: You’ll have to check it out. Yeah. [01:08:17] Jeff: actually, well, I think I picked word. If I’m not mistaken, Christina, you were Excel and then brought you access, [01:08:23] Brett: no, I, I went with pages just to be the rebel. [01:08:25] Jeff: Oh, got [01:08:26] Christina: right, right. [01:08:27] Jeff: Got it. Yeah. Great conversation. [01:08:30] Brett: Hey, you guys get some sleep? [01:08:32] Jeff: Get some [01:08:33] Christina: Get some sleep. [01:08:34] Brett (2): Check out our YouTube channel, follow our twitter and instagram accounts, and sign up for the newsletter! See the show notes for links.