430: Undiagnosed Dialog Overtired podcast

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Overtired »
430: Undiagnosed Dialog

15d ago 1:29:49

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In a hilariously ADHD (or just friendly chat) episode of Overtired, Christina wants everyone to know she’s definitely not an anarchist, while Brett and Jeff dive deep into the world of tech and political activism. Amid laughs and nostalgia, they discuss everything from the pitfalls of memory at work, lock boxes for protests, and the anarchist vs. black bloc debate, all while petting cats and reflecting on TV shows that keep them sane. Tune in for tech tips on carabiner and Kali Linux, and find out why Jeff treasures his time in the car with his sons. It’s chaotic, heartfelt, and genuinely overtired.

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Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Reunion
00:30 Memory Lapses and Work Challenges
01:56 Utility Guy Story
03:42 Flipper Zero and Productivity Tools
04:57 ADHD Conversations and Podcast Dynamics
07:32 Mental Health Corner: Brett’s Turn
30:29 Sponsor: Rogue Amoeba
32:14 Mental Health Corner: Jeff’s Turn
37:45 News Consumption and Mental Health
43:20 Finding Meaningful Ways to Help
46:53 Personal Protest Experiences
47:04 Transition from Journalism
49:37 Protest Dynamics and Personal Involvement
53:27 Debate on Protest Tactics
01:00:51 Reflections on Anarchism and Activism
01:08:05 TV Shows and Entertainment
01:17:50 grAPPtitude

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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

Undiagnosed Dialog

Introduction and Reunion

[00:00:00]

[00:00:04] Christina: Well, hello again. You’re listening to Overtired and the three of us are back. I’m Christina Warren and I’m joined. Yay. By all three of us, uh, or by my other two co-hosts, Brett Terpstra and Jeff Severns. Guntzel. Hey guys.

[00:00:17] Jeff: Hello.

[00:00:18] Brett: episodes in a row have we had? Three of us. Is it just two?

[00:00:22] Christina: I think this is

[00:00:22] Brett: like a bunch,

[00:00:24] Christina: I think this is just two.

[00:00:26] Jeff: Not enough

[00:00:27] Brett: have such, I have such a short memory.

Memory Lapses and Work Challenges

[00:00:30] Brett: Like as far as I’m concerned, we’ve never missed an episode with all three of us. Like I, I don’t wanna talk too much about work, but that’s bitten me at work. The fact that I don’t remember, like last week,

[00:00:43] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. I have to, like, I, I, I tend to have a good memory, but sometimes I’ll forget certain things. And so in that regard, I have to like, um. Like write things down, like keep like a running list of like, these are things you need to do, these are things you [00:01:00] have done. Like these are things you didn’t get to do.

[00:01:02] Christina: Whatever.

[00:01:03] Brett: This is not my gratitude pick, but I’ve started making liberal use of timing the app. Um, ’cause it tracks like what document I have open for how long. And I can, like, I can just, I can drag a whole bunch of different, uh, stuff like, uh, documents, websites, et cetera, into one task. Um, because I am currently in a position where I have to report my, my workday to people and, um, so I can, I can easily scrap together, uh, a daily report and then I, it pops up and asked me what I was doing when I was away from my computer so I can write like, surprise visit from the utilities company that took half an hour.

[00:01:55] Brett: Um.

Utility Guy Story

[00:01:56] Brett: Dude showed up at my house, just pulled into the [00:02:00] driveway and started banging on shit. And I walked out and I was like, Hey, what’s up? And he said that the meter reader had reported tight wires.

[00:02:15] Jeff: That sounds like an amazing code in like the Cold War. Cold War, the meter reader has recorded tight wires. Got it. I’ll meet you at the place

[00:02:25] Brett: So he was, he was pulling on shit, banging shit. And,

[00:02:30] Jeff: to loosen the wires.

[00:02:31] Brett: and ultimately he said, and I quote, I’m not gonna fuck with it. Um,

[00:02:37] Jeff: just, you just bang on it for a.

[00:02:40] Brett: well, he was like seeing like, are these wires tight? Um, and like I, my, my, uh, power comes in. I have like a rooftop, not an antenna, but like a post. That it’s all overhead, uh, power that comes in from the [00:03:00] cables on the street into the top of my house and down in, and that mast, I guess we would call it, um, has started to lean.

[00:03:08] Brett: It’s at about a 15 degree angle and it is not currently pulling up any roofing tiles. Um, but he said, you should probably keep an eye on that. And I said, oh, it’s been in that angle since I moved in, so I never gave it a second thought. But yeah, that’s not a great sign.

[00:03:29] Jeff: That’s not a great sign.

[00:03:30] Christina: No, not at all. Not at all. I just shared this thing in our chat. Um, ma made me think of this not so much about, you know, like the, uh, utility guy, like banging on your door and just being like random and like, I’m just checking stuff out and you’re like, what the fuck?

Flipper Zero and Productivity Tools

[00:03:42] Christina: Um, but, but in terms of keeping track of time and like busy things, there’s, uh, so you guys are familiar with Flipper Zero, right?

[00:03:49] Jeff: Well, what’s funny yes. Is you, you sent this, I looked at it, I’m like, it looks like a flipper. And then saw that it was a flipper device.

[00:03:54] Christina: Yeah, so, so, so, so the flip,

[00:03:56] Brett: this before.

[00:03:57] Christina: So the Flipper Zero people just launched like [00:04:00] two days ago, like this new thing called, um, a busy bar. And, and it’s a little expensive, um, but it’s, you know, fully open and hackable and whatnot, so that’s pretty cool. Um, but it’s basically, it’s, it’s like, um, it’s, they’re calling it like a, a productivity multi-tool with like an LED pixel display.

[00:04:18] Christina: And so it can integrate with software both on the desktop where that you write for it. And it includes like an offline API and stuff, JavaScript and Python, so that you can, it can be like an on air sign, um, and, and do shit like that. So like, if you’re recording a podcast, you could have it like outside your office and it would show like, Hey, I’m like.

[00:04:33] Christina: Recording, but you can also have like, has like a button on it that you can like press and start and pause to have like a, a pdo, you know, type of thing. But it can also, I guess, probably work with other types of tools where you’re customizing things so you could like, you know, show like how much time you have left of a task or whatever.

[00:04:50] Christina: I don’t necessarily know if this would be useful for you, Brett, but I saw this the other day

[00:04:54] Brett: it’s a fun toy.

[00:04:55] Christina: it’s a fun toy. Yeah.

ADHD Conversations and Podcast Dynamics

[00:04:57] Brett: For, for the listeners, I [00:05:00] will, um, acknowledge that our topic list this week has zero items on it. We all showed up

[00:05:07] Jeff: I don’t think people need to know that it’s not it.

[00:05:09] Brett: I, I feel like, I feel like it’s, I feel like it’s fair warning that this is gonna be just an a DHD conversation with zero limitations, zero guidance. We’re just gonna, we’re, we’re gone with the flow.

[00:05:23] Jeff: I’m gonna argue with calling in an A DHD conversation ’cause I think it’s just gonna be a chat between friends.

[00:05:28] Christina: Yeah, I think so.

[00:05:30] Jeff: We don’t have to, we don’t have to diagnose

[00:05:32] Brett: it’s like

[00:05:33] Christina: I was

[00:05:33] Brett: it’s not a gay wedding, it’s just a wedding.

[00:05:36] Christina: well, exactly, exactly, because like every conversation with like the three of us, it’s gonna be an a DH ADHD conversation. You should just know that going in. So this is just a convo amongst friends. Like, I don’t feel like we need to, again, like to, to, to Jeff’s point, we don’t need to diagnose this.

[00:05:49] Christina: We don’t need to like pathologize it like just a fucking convo. Um.

[00:05:54] Jeff: podcast. It will be bullshitting. Welcome to

[00:05:56] Brett: So here’s, here’s what makes an A DHD [00:06:00] conversation to me is my partner is autistic and is all about deep dives. Um, they like to, if a topic comes up that they’re interested in, they wanna drill down on it and they want to, like, they could talk about the same thing for the length of the party, like all the way through.

[00:06:22] Brett: And for me as an A DHD person, I’m much more surface level. Like I wanna, like a topic reminds me of another topic, reminds me of a personal experience, reminds me of something I wanted to tell somebody. And like I just kind of skim along the surface. And it’s not to say I don’t enjoy like depth to things, but my mode of conversation is much more skimming and I guarantee you.

[00:06:52] Brett: That unless Christina goes down a K hole for some reason, which could happen, um, UN unless that [00:07:00] happens, we’re just gonna jump around. It’s gonna be a bunch of topics and to me that’s an A DHD conversation versus maybe a normal or autistic conversation.

[00:07:11] Jeff: It’s, it’s such a limited spectrum of options. Like I, I am just gonna say that I am gonna sit in my, I like to talk about a lot of things and whether I have a diagnosis or not, that’s just me talking about a lot of things. But it’s fine. It’s fine, it’s fine. Let’s do it.

[00:07:27] Christina: have interest. It’s fine. Um,

[00:07:29] Jeff: call this, let’s have it.

[00:07:30] Christina: yep. All right.

Mental Health Corner: Brett’s Turn

[00:07:32] Christina: Let’s start with, uh, with, with Mental Health Corner. Who wants to go first?

[00:07:35] Jeff: Hmm. Rock, paper, scissors.

[00:07:38] Christina: Mm-hmm.

[00:07:38] Brett: I can kick it off.

[00:07:39] Christina: All right. Kick us off Brett.

[00:07:40] Brett: Overall life is really hard right now. Um, I have found solace in, um, so I’ve been writing a, uh, Lauren Ipsum generator that is easily, um, adapted [00:08:00] to different styles.

[00:08:02] Brett: Like there used to be like a bacon lipson generator and a hip sum, uh, like a hipster lips sum generator.

[00:08:10] Jeff: someone that made one outta Metallica lyrics.

[00:08:13] Brett: can do that. I just made a 19 84 1 this morning. Um, it’s super

[00:08:19] Jeff: outta transcripts of this podcast.

[00:08:21] Christina: Oh my

[00:08:21] Brett: you go.

[00:08:22] Christina: I was gonna say, I was like, I was, I was like, I’m gonna make a tailor of some gen. I’m sure. I’m sure someone already has, but Yeah, I should, yeah.

[00:08:28] Brett: Yeah, like I, I’ve been using chat GPT, I’m, I’m just like, give me 100 plural nouns related to this topic and then like pacing them into the configuration files. And it’s a, it’s a pretty damn good Lauren MSO generator. I’m publishing it as a gem, um, um, that can be used as a library, but also comes with a binary and I’m incorporating it into my MD Lipsom project that outputs [00:09:00] markdown Laura sso.

[00:09:01] Brett: Um, but I have found solace in that. That’s like, I wake up at between two and four in the morning and I code on that and it’s like the only comfortable part of my day while I’m coding that I can forget about. Um, I can forget about the last email from my manager, and it is, it’s all I have right now.

[00:09:32] Jeff: That’s awesome. You caused me to look up, uh, a list of Lauren Ipsum, uh, generators, and I’d like to just, I’d like to just share a few, if that, if that’s, uh, okay. We’ve got the, um, Obama Ipsum, which, which fills out a paragraph as that is the true genius of America, A faith in simple dreams, an insistence on small miracles.

[00:09:52] Jeff: Okay, that’s one. We’ve got a, uh, busi as in Gary Busi,

[00:09:56] Christina: in Gary.

[00:09:57] Jeff: uh, which is [00:10:00] Busi Ipso. Ah, met. Have you urinated, have you drained your bladder? Are you free? Because if you haven’t, it will only come out later. I’m giving you some information that your bodily fluids may penetrate your clothing fibers without warning.

[00:10:10] Jeff: That’s that

[00:10:10] Brett: that’s very thematic.

[00:10:13] Jeff: Let’s, uh, let’s pick, let’s just pick one more please. Hold on, please. Hold on. Um, let’s see. We got Sagan, uh, we got Heisenberg. Um, we’ve got, uh, tuna journo. Okay. Anyway, you get it. It’s a lot of fun. Uh, I’ll put this list in the,

[00:10:30] Brett: So, yeah, and I made this, I made this tool that I’m making, you can add user dictionaries to it. So anything that you can compile, you have to each, there, there are a bunch of text files and each one is a part of speech. You get your articles, you get your, uh, verbs, your plural verbs, your singular verbs, et cetera.

[00:10:55] Brett: And, um, and you just, you fill in all of those [00:11:00] files and you’ve created a dictionary that then you can call by its directory name and. This is outside of the GEM Configuration directory, so it’s completely static for the user

[00:11:14] Jeff: Can I.

[00:11:15] Brett: anyone who makes a good, a good one. I’ll add to the default repo

[00:11:21] Jeff: So the question is what makes, uh, an app cross the line into being a Brett turp app? And the answer is, it starts with the sentence I made it so you can add your own blank.

[00:11:33] Brett: that is, that is a principle I learned from TechMate up until I switched to Mac and started using TechMate. I had never. Really experienced the idea of extensibility. I had used Home Seer and I had developed like visual basic scripts for home automation, and that was, that was technically a extensibility, but this idea that you could [00:12:00] actually change the way an app functions and add your own features to an app blew me away.

[00:12:06] Brett: Um, like a ogar became my hero because like his whole focus was extensibility. It was the giving power to his, admittedly very technical user base. But

[00:12:21] Christina: Right.

[00:12:22] Brett: I just got a review on set about basically how it was too complicated to configure, marked and set up. Set only allows a thumbs up or a thumbs down. Um, so it, it was a thumbs down.

[00:12:40] Brett: Um, and he, dude, in this review, he listed at least four bugs that I wish he had reported through the bug tracker, but they were admittedly real bugs, so I’m not mad at him.

[00:12:56] Christina: Well, no, I mean, and honestly, I’m sorry. We can’t [00:13:00] expect users to go through official bug reporting channels. Like, unless you make it super fucking easy. Like where people know, like as part of onboarding where a bug

[00:13:08] Brett: when you’re on Set App or the Mac App store, it just, it isn’t easy

[00:13:13] Christina: No, it’s not. No, it’s not. And, and frankly, like book reporting is a hard problem to solve and like you, and you

[00:13:19] Brett: If you go to

[00:13:20] Christina: you can.

[00:13:21] Brett: if you go to the help menu and Mark, there’s a submit a, uh, submit an issue item that will take you directly to the ticket site. But yeah, that’s not obvious to your average end user, so yeah, I get it. The most common review I get on Set App is, um, when I create a new file, it’s just a blank page and I can’t type into it, even though the Descript is very clearly, clearly this is a previewer, not an editor,

[00:13:56] Christina: Right, right. Well, but the

[00:13:58] Brett: in the title [00:14:00] of

[00:14:00] Christina: no, and, and, and I, and, and you’re not wrong, but you know, people don’t read. It might have to be one of those things that, like, even as a popup, like if you’re getting enough of that, even on the setup version where you can say, you know, note

[00:14:13] Brett: Yeah, there’s a whole splash intro screen. There’s a, there’s like a whole first time you launch it, it explains all of this. These people are clearly just canceling out of the splash intro screen. And then trying to do what they, for some reason, assume it should do because they saw the word markdown in it and just plus it’s set up.

[00:14:37] Brett: You didn’t pay for this shit, like, not directly. Anyway.

[00:14:42] Christina: Yeah. I mean, never underestimate how entitled people are about stuff, right? Because in their mind they’re like, well, I pay for setup and everything I get on this should be valuable, otherwise I’m gonna cancel my, you know what I mean? Like,

[00:14:53] Brett: I don’t, I don’t hate that idea. I, I think setup should be a curated set of [00:15:00] apps that should work and do what they say. You just should read what they say they do. If, and this, this last review that I’m talking about, he clearly knew what Mark did. And like I said, I’m not mad at him. He,

[00:15:16] Christina: No, he reported a bunch of bugs, which are good. Yeah.

[00:15:18] Brett: Um, and it’s useful information. Uh, it does bum me out to get negative reviews in general, but yeah, as far as negative reviews go, this one was legit.

[00:15:30] Christina: Are you able to, um, uh, respond and at least be like, thank, thank you for the, you know, the, the, the, the bug reports. Um, I’d like to.

[00:15:39] Brett: I always wait a day before I respond to a negative review just so I can like, absorb and like what I’m telling you right now is what I should reply with. Um, when I first got the review, my response was, yeah, it’s a complicated app. Of course it’s complex to set [00:16:00] up.

[00:16:00] Jeff: Is this a good time to talk about your text expander expansion for, for responding to people who complain about the app?

[00:16:06] Brett: Yeah, I feel like this, we have no topics. This whole thing could be one weird long mental health corner. I

[00:16:13] Jeff: the story. Tell the story of that. I don’t know if that’s been talked about in a long time

[00:16:16] Brett: Wait, which one?

[00:16:17] Jeff: you used to have a text expander snippet when you had to respond to somebody writing you and being mean about the app that I think you typed like fuck right off and then it expanded to a very like, diplomatic response.

[00:16:29] Jeff: I’m not sure

[00:16:30] Brett: Yeah. I don’t have that one anymore. I’ve lost it, but yeah, uh, I can, I had it so that I could type my instantaneous reaction and it would expand to you. Thank you for your feedback,

[00:16:45] Jeff: it’s a really, I mean that’s like a kind of a powerful move.

[00:16:49] Christina: Honestly, I was gonna say, like, I was gonna say like, so I, I can’t use Text Expander, um, at, at work, but I, I could probably use like the, the built-in, um, macros [00:17:00] thing, or I could find another, you know, macro tool to, to, to use. Um, we just can’t use other people cloud stuff. Um, on, on a

[00:17:08] Jeff: can use a Mac.

[00:17:09] Christina: Yes, yes. Can use a Mac, but it’s just third party.

[00:17:13] Brett: a Chrome pc,

[00:17:14] Jeff: Well, Chromebook.

[00:17:15] Christina: no. They, they, I mean, I, I mean they, they would like that I’m sure, but no, I, I was able to get a a, an M four, um, pro with 48 gigs of ram, um, only, um, 16 inch only, um, five 12 SSD, so that’s, you know, uh,

[00:17:32] Brett: My work computer is a 256 gigabyte Intel 12 inch MacBook Pro. Yeah.

[00:17:40] Jeff: Wow. Yeah.

[00:17:43] Christina: Um, yeah,

[00:17:45] Brett: Christina, you were saying you couldn’t use text

[00:17:48] Christina: Yeah, I couldn’t use, but I could use something similar and No, but that, that could be like a useful thing where like sometimes you see stuff and you’re like, okay, I’m just gonna type in like my default reaction and it’ll, you know, expand to something nicer. [00:18:00] Like, um, and, and that would be useful in, in certain like, actually plenty of non-work scenarios too.

[00:18:07] Christina: Like, I, I, I like that idea of being like, okay, go fuck yourself, can become I’m here. Your feedback and you know, I’ll take this

[00:18:15] Brett: I, uh, I mentioned this last episode, um, but I shadowed this person who currently administers the AI and data science blog and no longer, I now administer the AI and data science blog, and they had a Confluence page with all of their response snippets,

[00:18:41] Christina: yes,

[00:18:41] Brett: and it takes, like, it takes that page, I’m not kidding, 20 to 30 seconds to load.

[00:18:49] Brett: So you have to go to your bookmark. You wait 20 to 30 seconds, and then you manually copy the response out of the page, add it to [00:19:00] Wrike, which also takes 20 to 30

[00:19:02] Jeff: But gives you the time you need to breathe and settle down.

[00:19:07] Christina: Yeah. Cc?

[00:19:09] Brett: and then you paste it, and then you edit it. But with I, I copied that entire page into text. Expender

[00:19:15] Christina: Yep.

[00:19:16] Brett: added a bunch of fill-ins so that I could modify, like, based on the context of the reply. And I feel like this is exactly what text expander and text plays were made for is customer service replies,

[00:19:32] Christina: Oh, no, totally.

[00:19:34] Brett: what I’m doing.

[00:19:35] Christina: No. No, totally. I mean, and I think that’s why like text expander, like pivoted, like to the enterprise market and, and some of those other, you know, things have too because, and, and consumers always get pissed off about that ’cause they’re like, what do I have to pay for a subscription and why do I have to do this and that?

[00:19:48] Christina: And you’re like, I, I mean, I get it. Um, and, and there are, um, like there’s, um, who, who makes it text? Uh, it’s not text place. It’s, uh,

[00:19:56] Brett: Um, type ator.

[00:19:57] Christina: type in inter Yeah. Type it, which, um, if [00:20:00] I were going to use one, probably would be the one that I would be able to use at work. Like I, because I could make that work locally.

[00:20:05] Brett: no, there’s no cloud.

[00:20:07] Christina: Right. And so, and, and I have a license for it and it’s a great app. Um, also it’s lower resources, which sometimes matters like, it doesn’t matter like on my stuff, but it is lower resources. But like text expander. Yeah, you’re exactly right. Like for a customer service scenario where you have like a kind of a internal shared set of snippets that people can edit or just like take definition of an add to, like, you can imagine that if you’re in a call center or something, you have to have a tool like that, you know, in your responses.

[00:20:38] Christina: Well, who am I kidding? Is all about to be AI soon, but like, assuming you still have a call center staffed by, you know, pseudo humans. Like this is totally, whether you’re doing email responses or chat or tickets or whatever, like if you know that you have, you know, the, the top like, like 30 or 50 most, you know, common things like having [00:21:00] like that library of stuff that you can just auto insert, you know, with a few keys has to be very useful.

[00:21:07] Brett: I would like to take this opportunity to say that Text Blaze is a very good product and is very low resource. Um, I. Like, it doesn’t even show up on my activity monitor. It’s way down at the bottom and it has a few, I’ve like, it can’t expand after Whitespace the way text expander can, which has taken a lot of getting used to and it can’t run scripts, which is why I have been developing so many different APIs, like the Markdown Lipsom, API, because if I wanna, if I wanna alarm Ipso snippet, that’s truly dynamic.

[00:21:48] Brett: I need, it can, it can pull from a web API, but it can’t run a script locally. So I just build web

[00:21:56] Christina: So you, so you just, okay, so you’re, so basically

[00:21:58] Brett: which is not accessible to [00:22:00] every user.

[00:22:01] Christina: not at all. Not at all. Because most, most, most users are gonna be like, well, where am I hosting this? Or where is this being done? Or Do I have these API keys in my environment? Yeah. Um, but like, yeah. ’cause at that point, yeah. Um, is, is that like a design decision?

[00:22:13] Christina: Do you know, from their like perspective or?

[00:22:17] Brett: I think it’s just a shortcoming. Maybe they’ll get to it eventually. Um, I, the, the expand after spaces thing, I think is just a shortsighted,

[00:22:29] Christina: Yeah.

[00:22:29] Brett: um,

[00:22:30] Christina: That seems like a

[00:22:31] Brett: design. I think it seems like a design decision, but I think it was shortsighted, whatever it

[00:22:37] Jeff: Is there anything about it that you would say it does, that text expander doesn’t, that you like?

[00:22:45] Brett: Um, I had an answer to this question previously, but like when I, so Text Expander sponsored my blog for like a decade and, and I would [00:23:00] never use anything other than text Expander because they were so supportive of my work. Um, but then like Greg was. Greg left, retired, left the company, and when they reevaluated all their sponsorships, I didn’t make the cut and I don’t think they’re doing many sponsorships

[00:23:21] Christina: No, no, I, no, I, I, I think, yeah. ’cause yeah, they used to, you know, sponsor like my podcast back in the day and things like that too. Like, and it,

[00:23:28] Brett: then I started, yeah, I started exploring like other topics and a former employee of Text Expander was now working for Text Blaze and he got me in with a free, like enterprise level account. And at that time I felt it was important to let my readers know why I was even trying out text Blaze after a decade of evangelizing text expander.

[00:23:58] Brett: And I had all the [00:24:00] reasons, but I’ve forgotten them.

[00:24:03] Christina: Yeah, I mean, I think the resource thing is probably a good one. Like, again, like it’s not, it’s not a problem for a lot of people. I think the fact that, um, yeah, I mean, similar to me, like, like I use, well, so, and actually, you know what I could use ’cause we, ’cause people have it set up. What I could use at work and what I should use at work is, uh, Alfred, um, just, just set up Alfred, um, stuff for, for text expansion.

[00:24:26] Christina: Right?

[00:24:26] Brett: Yeah, well, launch Bar has

[00:24:28] Christina: launch part does too. Yeah. Launch

[00:24:30] Brett: or snippets anyway.

[00:24:31] Christina: Exactly. And, and, and, um, uh, like Alfred’s allowed, um, Raycast is allowed, albeit not with the AI stuff. Um,

[00:24:40] Brett: about keyboard Maestro, which can expand based on regular expressions.

[00:24:44] Christina: Oh yeah. All that stuff is allowed. The, the, the only thing.

[00:24:46] Jeff: keyboard.

[00:24:47] Christina: Yeah. Yeah. The only, the only thing that is, is kind of like band at work is like if it’s, you know, relying on kind of like a, a, a third party cloud.

[00:24:54] Christina: And even then, like, it’s not as if they, so the way I have mine configured it so that I is, is [00:25:00] that I have an exception because I’m a package managed user, which means that I use home brew. So I don’t have to like, go through this process of getting apps approved or not approved, like whether they’re allowed to run in your system or not.

[00:25:11] Christina: And it, and it’s not that heavyweight of a process in comparison to how it could be, like, they actually do it pretty well, but they take security seriously. And like, I don’t wanna ever have anything that would be work related, stored in any cloud that is not like the corporate cloud that we use. Right.

[00:25:27] Christina: Like, so, so like obsidian is allowed to be used, but you can’t use it. Um, like you can’t sync with your mobile device unless you have like a a, a

[00:25:37] Brett: What about like,

[00:25:38] Christina: device.

[00:25:39] Brett: oh, you could use Google Drive to

[00:25:41] Christina: Yes, yes. But it would have to be corporate drive.

[00:25:44] Brett: Yeah,

[00:25:45] Christina: Which, which the problem with that is, is that corporate drive then, like, I, I couldn’t use it on any other computer, but I could use it like, just on

[00:25:52] Brett: what’s the point then?

[00:25:54] Christina: Right.

[00:25:54] Christina: Right, exactly. So, well, I mean, the point would be, I guess that if, if, if I needed to set up a new computer or if I used [00:26:00] multiple machines, right. So, which, which, which I don’t. So, but, but again, that, this kind of goes back to like, what’s the point? So like, you know, but, but at GitHub we didn’t have the same level of restrictions.

[00:26:11] Christina: Um, because I mean, I think they would’ve liked to, they’re just the IT team’s not that big and, you know, they’re not gonna have the resources to, to be able to put that stuff in place. Um, but yeah, but I used, I used Ator, frankly, more for the resource usage stuff than kind of anything. Because if I had a lot of stuff running, like I did note that, you know, and I, I pay for tax expander.

[00:26:33] Christina: I still do out of kind of loyalty. But, you know, it, it, it can, it, it can, um. Be kind of a resource hog where it’s like type data. Not having that wasn’t an issue. And then I, and then with the add additional thing, I’m like, okay, I know that I’m never going to have this, you know, um, I’m not syncing across multiple machines and I, I don’t need a cloud aspect.

[00:26:57] Brett: you know, so, okay [00:27:00] vs. Code is a resource hog, but what shocked me last time my computer froze up. Um, and this is a computer with 128 gigabytes of Ram and it froze. And I got the, the force quit dialogue that listed all of the apps that were Resource hogs, Flo Todo, which I used to run like a Facebook SSBA single slate browser.

[00:27:28] Brett: Um, so I just have a single Facebook app that is sandbox from everything else, and it was taking up 128 gigabytes of Ram.

[00:27:39] Christina: So, so clearly has a bug. Yeah.

[00:27:41] Brett: It has a leak, and it was ob, it was paging out, and it, it locked up my system. So negative for Flo Tado.

[00:27:51] Jeff: That’s crazy.

[00:27:52] Christina: Yeah. That is sense. I’ve, when that happens, I always, when we’re talking about like bug reports and like I try to be like the good [00:28:00] user who’s like, okay, if I notice that that this has happened, like yeah, there’s clearly a memory leak or there’s some sort of other thing going on if this is happening. And I usually try to report it and sometimes it gets responses and sometimes it doesn’t.

[00:28:11] Christina: But Yeah,

[00:28:12] Brett: I will, I will report it to Flo Tado, even though I’m not sure that app is actively, uh, in development right now,

[00:28:21] Christina: Yeah, that’s always the hard thing about stuff like that. Yeah. Um, and um, yeah, um, SSBs are actually the hard thing at Google because obviously we can create progressive web apps. But we can’t, at least for work resources, um, for, for non-work resources, you can use whatever browser you want. And some people who do testing, which I don’t, can do testing on other browsers.

[00:28:43] Christina: Right. If like that’s what their job is. But like, work stuff can only be used in Chrome, like period

[00:28:50] Brett: Are you allowed to add extensions to Chrome?

[00:28:53] Christina: Yes, yes. Now there are some that are going to be like, that are like unilaterally banned that they like, you know, full [00:29:00] on like block, but that’s few and far between. And then they do have like a curated Chrome store.

[00:29:07] Christina: Stuff that maybe they’ve altered. Right? So there might be like, like versions, like people maintain forks. Sometimes it’s part of their job. Sometimes it’s just people wanting to do it because they’re, you know, committed to it, who will maintain a fork of a popular Chrome extension internally only. Right.

[00:29:22] Christina: So that it doesn’t exfiltrate anything. Yeah, no, I mean, the, it, it’s weird ’cause like I, I go through this process of being both frustrated sometimes by the, the, the barriers that are set up, even though I understand why they are, and also being insanely impressed at like how much infra, like is internally built up.

[00:29:42] Christina: Like, the fact that like so much, so many internal tools exist, or, or, you know, whether they’re recreations of things that exist elsewhere or not, is, I’ve never seen anything like it, like in, at least in terms of competence, like Microsoft. For has like internal versions of a lot of stuff, but [00:30:00] most of it is very similar to the, the stuff that they sell externally.

[00:30:04] Christina: Um, and, and GitHub, um, obviously develops GitHub on GitHub but uses a lot of third party tools. Google like, does a tremendous amount of stuff all internally and sometimes they, there are like external versions and sometimes there’s not, and you’re just like, oh shit. Like, a lot of people way smarter than me work at this place and maintain

[00:30:26] Brett: that’s so much cooler than working at Oracle.

Sponsor: Rogue Amoeba

[00:30:29] Brett: This episode is sponsored by one of our favorite developers, RBA makers of powerful audio software for the Mac. They’ve been developing audio focus apps for the Mac for over 20 years, going all the way back to OS. So Harold, Chris, Harold corrected me.

[00:30:49] Brett: I always say iOS apparently, and this time I’m going to get it right, going all the way back to OS 10.2, which is Jaguar, since [00:31:00] it’s been a while. Their latest versions make it a snap to get started with. No need to restart your Mac. I personally love Sound Source and loop back and use them all the time.

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[00:31:32] Jeff: All praise. All praise. Audio hijack.

[00:31:36] Brett: It can do just about anything with application audio or microphone input and has a ton of automation possibilities. Learn more about all of Rogue Amiga [email protected] slash Overtired. That’s mac audio.com/ Overtired. Listeners of Overtired can save 20% off any [00:32:00] purchase through the end of May with the coupon code Overtired.

[00:32:04] Brett: Just go to mac audio.com/ Overtired and use the coupon code Overtired.

[00:32:11] Jeff: Yes, you should.

[00:32:12] Christina: Hell yeah.

Mental Health Corner: Jeff’s Turn

[00:32:14] Brett: Fucking A. All right, so we’re half an hour in and we’re still on what is technically my mental health corner. So how are you guys doing?

[00:32:25] Christina: Jeff, go ahead.

[00:32:26] Jeff: abdicating your mental health corner? Is that what we call it? Abdicating? Um, I’m doing good. It’s, you know, it’s sunny and warm. It, it makes everything go away for a minute. Um, but there isn’t too much to go away. Uh, yeah, I’m doing, I’m doing well. I’m, I had a really nice, I feel like I always report this when it happens, but I had a nice trip.

[00:32:46] Jeff: It took my youngest son to spend a couple days alone with his older brother at college. Uh, it got to and stay in his dorm ’cause there was an empty bed there and stuff. And so it was really, it was really cool to be able to do that. And he went to some classes and [00:33:00] they went and saw a movie and hung out and who knows what else.

[00:33:03] Jeff: I mean, I actually don’t think there was much else, but it’s not my business anyhow. Um, so it was really sweet. Uh, and, and just nice to have that time. My, you know, it’s like an 11 hour drive to where my son goes to college and I’ve found that those are just the best. Times with my kids because you’re not, it’s nothing’s forced.

[00:33:24] Jeff: You’re not asking them to answer a question at the end of the day that, you know, they just don’t wanna talk about school. Whatever it is. It’s like you can just sit there. I always let them DJ the whole 11 hours, like, and you can just kind of sit there and like let things come up. And I find that to be an amazing way to just be with either of them.

[00:33:42] Jeff: So that’s always just like, I just feel really good after that and kind of carry that with me. Um, other thing I, I just realized this is so dumb, but. I don’t read ever. Like, I mean I don’t read books ever. I love to read books, but I just cannot, I can’t read ’em when I’m laying down in bed ’cause I fall asleep right [00:34:00] away.

[00:34:00] Jeff: And I had a book club, we had this book club for a while. I’ve probably talked about. That was kind of amazing ’cause the whole premise was to read the books that like you kind of were interested in that you feel like if it was 1940, uh, you would’ve read it in high school. But, um. But you don’t have any reason to read it.

[00:34:16] Jeff: It’s how we read, like War and Peace. It’s how I read Donkey Hte, all these books, Moby, Dick, whatever. Um, and uh, and it was an amazing thing, but it just kind of fell apart for reasons that groups fall apart. Um, but this morning I woke up and I’m like, obviously been reading so much news and everything, all the obvious stuff that we’re all going through and, and how much space it takes up in our head.

[00:34:36] Jeff: And I read, I don’t, nobody has to read, uh, Donte, but I highly recommend reading the prologue because it’s fucking amazing. Um, and so I just read the prologue ’cause I get a kick out of it. And then like the very beginning of the setup of Donte, which is also hilarious. Um, and it was not only delightful to read and laugh at something that definitely had nothing to do with this moment.

[00:34:58] Jeff: I mean, you can make stretches and [00:35:00] metaphors or whatever, but, um, but what happened was then I, you know, I stopped reading and I started my day. I took my kid to work like whatever. But like, I. My head was filled with the book, like my head was not filled with the tariffs and everything else. And that was like the first time for a long time.

[00:35:16] Jeff: Like I just had like echoes of impressions from just this very short bit I read this morning and I was like, huh, this, I think I just may have discovered an important, uh, durability tool for me, um, uh, in this, in this day. So that was kind of, that was really nice. Felt really good. Felt like an unburdening.

[00:35:35] Jeff: Yeah. ’cause I can’t, I was like, ah, I’m not gonna even look at the news for a couple days, which I think is a good thing to do. I don’t think there’s any reason not to look at the news for a couple days. You’re not a bad advocate, you’re not a bad carer about the rights of people in the world. You’re not a bad anything.

[00:35:49] Jeff: It’s just something you need to do. And I often can’t do it. Not in a, I’m not an obsessive news reader, but like I do, well I guess, I mean, like the way I read news is [00:36:00] I do open the New York Times app a few times a day and I tell. My dingus to tell me the news. Even sometimes, even though sometimes it means she tells me about the history of the juice.

[00:36:09] Christina: right.

[00:36:10] Jeff: I do ask her to tell me the news a few days, uh, a few times a day, but I’m not like crazy obsessive about it. But man, it’s a constant flow. It’s like constant, constantly flowing through my, my bloodstream. So anyway, that was, uh, it was a funny revelation to have, but it’s also just a very, like, nowadays revelation to have.

[00:36:28] Jeff: And so again, I will say, read the prologue, Don Kte, if you love novels, like at all, if you love reading fiction, like you have never read a prologue and you won’t believe that this was written in like the fucking 16 hundreds or whatever is the 17 hours. I forget. So that was, that was nice. That, and the sun today has got me feeling pretty good.

[00:36:49] Christina: I love

[00:36:49] Brett: Jeff, do, do you get, uh, do you subscribe to Means tv?

[00:36:54] Jeff: I don’t know what that is.

[00:36:55] Brett: It’s a, we’ll call it an anti-capitalist network.

[00:36:59] Jeff: Okay.

[00:36:59] Brett: [00:37:00] Um, they just added some anarchist content, but it’s mostly socialist content. Um, and they have a means daily news. That is, if you wanna get, like, news that includes, like, successes in labor movements, you know, instead of just like what the tariffs are gonna do to the economy.

[00:37:25] Brett: Um, it’s a, it’s a fun place to get news.

[00:37:27] Jeff: you’re one of these guys that likes good news. See, I’m not even, I’m not attracted, I’m not even attracted to good news. I can’t even say

[00:37:35] Christina: I’m, I’m, I’m exactly like you Jeff. Like, it, it, it, it doesn’t like, I don’t actually like, in some ways, like, it’s cool if it’s there, but like, I don’t want to curate that way personally.

News Consumption and Mental Health

[00:37:45] Christina: Like, I like my, my news addiction and it’s gotten a lot better and I’ve had to do it because it’s been, and sorry if I took over your mental health corner, um, uh, is that like, for my own mental health, I have to, like, I’ve had to disconnect and [00:38:00] disengage with news and, um, even though I haven’t been a reporter, uh, as my full-time job for a long time now, like, it, it took years and years.

[00:38:10] Christina: Like it, I, I’ve, I’ve said this on the p before, like it was, um, it was January 6th. That was like the moment that kind of broke me because it was, I realized one of the first big, like. Massive, like mass casualty, kind of like real time, like scenario, well, not mass casualty, but like, you know what I mean?

[00:38:28] Christina: Like, like one of those like, like felt at the time, like world changing

[00:38:32] Jeff: There were things that died that day.

[00:38:34] Christina: Right, right. Exactly.

[00:38:36] Jeff: and a lot of things died.

[00:38:37] Christina: right. And, and I had to process it like not a reporter, which was really fucked for me because I, it, it, it, you know, I had become so desensitized to having to process that sort of stuff in, in real time.

[00:38:53] Christina: And you think about it as, okay, what are the stories that we’re assigning? What angles are we doing? How are we getting the news [00:39:00] out? What are the important facts? What is real, what is not, what is gossip? Like you, you just, you handle the, the trauma frankly, of it all in a different way. And, and I had to like process it like a regular person and, and that really fucked me.

[00:39:13] Christina: But it was also kind of a good reminder for me to be like, okay, since this is not the sort of stuff that you’d live with day in and day out anymore. You don’t have to be part of this all the time. And I know that for you it’s different because sometimes you have to be connected to stuff for your job and you

[00:39:29] Jeff: I don’t anymore.

[00:39:31] Christina: right?

[00:39:31] Christina: Well, but, but, but you have, but you know what I mean, but like, even some of your research, right? There might be things you’re like, okay, I need to be plugged in on this. And so I have to be aware. And, um, and, and certainly from my job now, like I need to be plugged in with like AI announcements and stuff.

[00:39:44] Christina: And like, that can obviously go into lots of complicated, you know, like different ways to process things. But it’s not the same as like the world is ending, you know what I mean? Or, or, or, or democracies and shambles and like the terrible stuff [00:40:00] that’s happening around us. And so for my own, like mental health, I fully agree with you.

[00:40:05] Christina: Like, it doesn’t make you a bad person, doesn’t make you anything. If you’re like, you know what? I don’t wanna fucking look at this right

[00:40:11] Jeff: Because you’re not helping anybody by reading the news. There are things you can do out of having read the news that you can do to help people. It actually doesn’t help anybody that you’re reading the news,

[00:40:18] Christina: Well, and the thing is, is I think that there’s a difference, right? Like there’s a difference between being like obstinate and willfully, like, uh, refusing to acknowledge what’s happening around you and refusing to do it and actively engaging in it, right? Like, like, like, like I feel like it’s a problem if you just, you know, put your fingers in your ears and you’re like, I don’t see it.

[00:40:41] Christina: I don’t know it, it’s not happening,

[00:40:43] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:40:43] Christina: right? Like, I feel like that can actually be problematic. And, and, and if people need to do that for short term periods, you know, you do. You. But I feel like long term that is actually a problem. People don’t acknowledge the reality around them and, and, and the suffering and, and the bad things.

[00:40:57] Christina: Like I feel like that’s a problem. But there’s a difference [00:41:00] between being like, I know how bad things are and I need to actively read every New York Times, or Wall Street Journal, or Bloomberg or whatever, headline, right? Like

[00:41:08] Brett: there’s the, it’s possible to be aware of all the bad things that are happening without dwelling on it in an obsessive way.

[00:41:18] Christina: Totally, totally. And, and like this is one of the reasons why, like, I’m not really posting about politics or anything else anymore on social media. And, and I think some people think that it’s because like, you know, it’s directives from bosses or whatever. No, that’s not at, although I’m sure that they would prefer that I not speak about political things.

[00:41:35] Christina: Right. And fair enough. But like, that’s not what it is. It’s that it’s frankly that at this stage of the things that are happening, like I’ve had kind of a, a come to Jesus moment with myself where I’m like, my opinion doesn’t matter and I’m not helping anybody by like, I know what I mean. Like in some cases it does, I look back at like my, my past actions and I don’t regret them or anything, but I’m like, okay, [00:42:00] what were you accomplishing?

[00:42:01] Christina: And, and, and at a certain point it does sometimes feel like, and people again, like other people can. Process and, and can comment and can do whatever they want, however they wanna do it. And I won’t judge that. Like I, I really do my best not to judge that. But like for me, it’s just kind of a thing where I’m like, okay, like what am I accomplishing by commenting and continuing to reify how bad this shit is?

[00:42:23] Christina: Like, is this making me feel any better? Is this doing anything for me? And if it is great, right? For some people, like that could be a way of getting through some of the trauma and getting through some of the stuff would just be to talk about how bad it is. And I respect that. I just feel like, you know, we, we’ve gone through a really difficult last eight years and now things are just the point where I’m like, I don’t have it in me to do it anymore.

[00:42:50] Christina: I just don’t.

[00:42:52] Jeff: yeah. Yeah. I feel, I think a lot about like, um, seasons in life too. Like our lives have seasons, like they [00:43:00] have long seasons, but then there are little short seasons and like, I often think, I can’t help but think back to like a season of my life where I was willing to get like shot or blown up and almost did for my convictions and in order to care about a thing, an issue, a people, whatever.

[00:43:15] Jeff: And I think that that was great. And I’m, I’m proud of myself for having, I’m proud of younger me for having done that.

Finding Meaningful Ways to Help

[00:43:20] Jeff: But like what I’ve settled into as an old man in this moment, and I learned this from the George Floyd uprising or, or sort of encoded it into my brain is like, I am very comfortable knowing that.

[00:43:35] Jeff: I will see an opportunity at some point for a way I can help and I will help. And, and it may be, it may take me longer than other people. It may take me longer than some people think it should. But there is no too long because at some point you come into the game and the people that came in the first wave have burned out.

[00:43:53] Jeff: And you do need a second wave. You do need new people. You always need people. And, and if I, I mean, if I waited [00:44:00] until I was 72 to do something meaningful again, um, will have, it will be meaningful that I’ve done it. And, and like one of the things I, I still think back to a lot, um, is like, so during the uprisings, like the first night.

[00:44:16] Jeff: When everyone was outside the police precinct, the one that ultimately burned down and was, was abandoned. Um, I went out there ’cause I felt like I had to, and it was fucking scary. Like everything was off balance. Like, um, you know, everybody was, everybody on both sides was. Behaving in a way, and this isn’t a judgment, this is just what happens to humans when something is that elevated.

[00:44:40] Jeff: Because what happened was so incredibly fucked. Um, everybody was just, it was, you know, it’s one of those things like any protest, and especially once the National Guard was here, the idea you, you, you look and see is a million protesters and a and a hundred, you know, national Guard. But actually what’s happening here, even if it’s basically [00:45:00] under control, is, is the line between chaos and, and great harm And whatever state you’re looking at now is just one person’s decision.

[00:45:08] Jeff: And that decision could be, I threw a bottle and instead of hitting a, an officer’s. Or a National guards person’s helmet, it hit their face. And that national guards person then reacted as however they were always gonna react when they got their face hit right with a, with a bottle or whatever, like it was, that it’s that fine of a line.

[00:45:25] Jeff: It’s true for things going well too, right? Like, it’s true for things that inspire movements, whatever. It’s often one person’s decision. It’s, it’s in the context of a movement and, and all these things, but it’s often one person makes one little decision. You may never know what that person was, who that person was, or what that decision was.

[00:45:42] Jeff: Anyway, I, in all of that and that chaos, and it was scary. And, and you know, you’d have the windows open and you’d smell the smoke and hear the, you know, non-lethal rounds that, you know, would take people’s eyes out but wouldn’t kill them. Um, I got a call from a friend who was working as a medic [00:46:00] at the protests every night, and she knew I had a workshop.

[00:46:04] Jeff: And she said, Hey, do you have respirators? And I was like, do I? And, and so what she did is on her way down to meet up with the medics before that night’s stuff really ramped up. She came over and like it was James Bond movie with the guy that has all the special weapons. I had laid out every kind of respirator on a picnic table.

[00:46:21] Jeff: And she came by and was able to go, this one, this one, this one. And then she brought it down and they were tear gassing the shit out of people at this point. She brought it down and, and a handful of medics had had these respirators and were able to help because someone knew to ask me. I knew that that was an opportunity in a way I could help.

[00:46:37] Jeff: And it felt really meaningful. And I think that in these times it can be so easy to beat yourself up ’cause you’re not doing this or that or to judge actions, whatever it is. But like. The only way movements or change happens is everyone kind of finds their place.

Personal Protest Experiences

[00:46:53] Jeff: And we’ve talked about this a million times.

[00:46:55] Jeff: For me, the place was never holding a sign. I was at protest, but I could never hold a sign. I just [00:47:00] couldn’t do it. I could be a body there. I can’t hold a sign. I’m too much like, well, that just doesn’t say everything.

Transition from Journalism

[00:47:04] Jeff: I mean, well, you know, I, I just don’t know, not to mention copy editing signs, but, um, but like, the last thing I’ll say about this, ’cause it was something you, you triggered for me, Christina, when you were talking about ha like either having to, or also being able to process something not as a journalist, I still, there’s such a crystal clear point at which I knew I was not a journalist anymore.

[00:47:27] Jeff: And it’s true ’cause I haven’t been one since then, but it was awesome. So I had been laid off from public radio and public radio is like so funny ’cause it’s so clearly like liberal and left leaning. But it, it works so hard to just, even in how voices are to just seem very reasonable, whatever else. And I always like, I both appreciate that and it drives me fucking crazy.

[00:47:47] Jeff: Um. Yeah, it mostly drives me crazy. But, um, but anyway, there was a march commemorating the, the murder of Philando Castile here who

[00:47:57] Christina: Mm-hmm.

[00:47:57] Jeff: by a police officer. Um, [00:48:00] and this march was destined to make its way down a entrance ramp to highway 94 and, and to shut it down. And I was there. This was still the point at which when I attended protests, I put a long skinny notebook in my back pocket just ’cause I don’t know why, like, partly I just, that helped me.

[00:48:15] Jeff: ’cause I would take, I would just take, write things down for myself ’cause it’s how I’ve always been. But also sometimes I knew I was going to see other journalists. I saw what the hell. Um, but this time I just had one because I, I wanted to be able to document ’cause those are great. No, those are great notebooks to put in your hand and document.

[00:48:30] Jeff: And, uh, and I’m walking and, and it becomes clear. People are starting to go down to 94 and I’m not really a, like lead the way and shut down the freeway guy, but I totally will go and watch but stand in the middle and recognize that I’m both a witness and a participant in that sense. And so. The whole march starts, like veering down the, the entrance ramp and, and at the, at, just at like the sort of pivot point where it’s very clear who’s going down and who’s not.

[00:48:56] Jeff: I run into two journalists I know, and one of them had, had never met me. [00:49:00] And, and the one goes, Hey Jeff. And then he says the other one, Hey, this is Jeff ler. You know, he used to work for NPR and all these say whatever the guy’s like, oh, I’ve always wanted to meet you. And they go, what are you doing here?

[00:49:09] Jeff: And I was like, just checking it out. And I said, and I just kind of proceeded down to 94 and participated in the shutdown of the freeway. And, uh, and that felt amazing. I was just like, nah, just checking it out. And, uh, but, but I’m also walking down here as you can see, and I have no press pass. So I was like, all right, I’m not a journalist anymore.

[00:49:27] Jeff: And that’s awesome. Not that I couldn’t still be a journalist, I wanna be really clear about that. But like, that was just like a, I think I wanna be on the other side of this now.

[00:49:35] Christina: Which honestly is kind of freeing in a sense.

Protest Dynamics and Personal Involvement

[00:49:37] Christina: Like, I don’t know, like what the, what the, um, like rules and requirements were for the places you worked, but that was always a really hard thing for me. Like I remember. Um, uh, covering like some of the, um, like the protests like, uh, you know, in, in, in 2015 and stuff.

[00:49:52] Christina: And like, I had to be really careful. Like, you know, I had like, I, I would cover them and, but I had to be removed in a [00:50:00] certain sense. Right. And obviously you can’t be, like, I would be, you know, shouting along with folks and like, if I needed to make an argument, I could that like, well I need to fit in so that, you know, people don’t like look at you weird or whatever, you know, and you’re documenting things in like a, you know, reasonable way.

[00:50:14] Christina: And, you know, you go and you like have like the lawyer’s numbers, like written on your like arm and stuff, you know, in case you get arrested and, and, and, and all that. Um. Which never happened, but you know, there, you never know what it’s going to be like. And, but like there did always feel like there had to be like this separation to a certain sense.

[00:50:33] Christina: Like even though I frequently what would happen is I would go just to go myself and then I would find out that I was the only reporter from my publication there. And then I’d be like, well, fuck, well now I can’t just be here for me now I have to be like less involved. You know what I mean? Like, I am no longer

[00:50:49] Jeff: Seeing the news value. Just so you know, I’m here now and I can report back.

[00:50:53] Christina: Right.

[00:50:53] Christina: Well, well, right. And, and so, so it would be almost, the inverse would be like, I went at first like to maybe be involved and like, oh, I’m separate from this. This isn’t like my main [00:51:00] beat. This is me as a, as a, you know, citizen. And then it becomes, okay, now I have to shift him to being an observer. Right. And, um, and so I imagine like, I don’t know, like what the lines were for you, that there has to be something like, even though it’s weirder to not have the press badge and whatnot, there’s also something freeing about being like, well, no, I can participate however I see fit, and I don’t have to like, hold up, like those lines of like journalistic, like, you know, integrity or ambiguity or, or whatever, you know?

[00:51:27] Jeff: Yeah, it’s true. I mean, I always, and, and even when I was a journalist, the thing I think I always considered myself secretly was a participant observer in research terms. ’cause like I knew that whether I was there as a reporter or not, if I’m a body in the crowd, I’m a body in the crowd. And, and that felt meaningful, uh, to me.

[00:51:44] Jeff: But

[00:51:46] Brett: The, uh, the best article I read in the last week was about how to make lock boxes. Are you familiar with lock

[00:51:53] Jeff: yes, I grew up in the nineties.

[00:51:54] Brett: Yeah. Um, like. Tools to [00:52:00] lock yourself to objects or to other people to impede anything from the downing of a tree to traffic on a busy street. And this article fascinated me because it talked about how to like build it with carabiners so you could quick release if you needed to run, but no cop could get their arm in how to add multiple midline bolts so that the cops wouldn’t know which ones to cut to get you out of it.

[00:52:33] Brett: How to reinforce it with fucking Kevlar. It was, it was funny. It was funny, but also it felt, it felt pertinent because I also can’t carry signs. I just, I won’t do it because it feels like going to protest in general feels somewhat futile to me. Like the average protest doesn’t make [00:53:00] any difference at all.

[00:53:01] Brett: A well-behaved stay within the fenced area, protest doesn’t make a difference. Um, but a protest that is, um, obtrusive, can make a difference, uh, can make a statement. And to me, like the idea of lock boxes of really like fucking shit up that I can get into.

Debate on Protest Tactics

[00:53:27] Jeff: I would just, I’ll, I’ll say one thing about protests. I never feel particularly great at like very kind of mainstream feeling protests, but if they don’t happen, then the slide goes faster. Like it’s important that they happen. But I’m with you. Like I don’t, I’m rarely at a protest and really inspired, but, but I am inspired by the fact that this is still a community that’s,

[00:53:50] Brett: I wanna be a part, I want to be a part of the crew that enables the protest to be fully what it can be. I wanna be [00:54:00] the person that stops traffic. I want to be the person that distracts the cops. I wanna be the person that makes it possible for that protest peacefully to be all it can be. Um, being the protester doesn’t appeal to me.

[00:54:17] Brett: I used to carry a lot of signs in my early twenties, late teens, um, and it, it, it grew on me that it was futile. Like we weren’t making a difference. But the black block, as much as protestors often fear, uh, what the black block does. Often provides cover and ability to your protest.

[00:54:47] Christina: Yeah.

[00:54:47] Jeff: Don’t get me started on black block. We’ll, we’ll, we’ll just have a fight.

[00:54:51] Brett: No, it’s okay.

[00:54:53] Jeff: I think that it’s. It’s literally masquerading as something more meaningful than regular protests. [00:55:00] Like I have watched so many black, black people, I’ve known them. There are people in my life I care about who are black block.

[00:55:04] Jeff: I know people that have been, there are people in my life who are prosecuted by other people in my life for being black block, and I support them a thousand percent. Uh, you know, like someone’s indicted, like I know what side I’m on. Um, I have experienced black block in my life and in my long life as an activist, as spoiled kids who are looking for a fix of some sort.

[00:55:27] Jeff: And easy cover, easy cover for provocateurs. Like

[00:55:30] Christina: I, yes, no, I, I fully agree with

[00:55:32] Brett: but I would say that the primary complaint about the black block is that they cause property damage.

[00:55:39] Jeff: Oh yeah. That’s not a complaint of mine.

[00:55:41] Brett: yeah,

[00:55:42] Jeff: I mean, it’s, it’s like, it’s, I think that

[00:55:44] Brett: is not people.

[00:55:45] Jeff: it’s true. I will say, actually I’m gonna retake, I’m take my thing back. I have seen the property damage and looked at it and gone. You actually didn’t help. You only heard at this

[00:55:54] Christina: Yeah, I was, I was

[00:55:55] Jeff: broke a window of that small business over here, which happened a ton here.

[00:55:59] Jeff: Like

[00:55:59] Christina: I [00:56:00] was. I was

[00:56:00] Jeff: That probably felt good, but it didn’t help anything. And if anything it ratchets up. I, this is what I don’t like doing things like that while masked to me. I’m not gonna say it’s like cowardice ’cause I

[00:56:10] Christina: I am

[00:56:11] Jeff: a whole philosophy. Yeah. I’m just saying like, uh, before I get to that, right, like to me, and this is what I found, find powerful about nonviolent action, and I might very specifically say nonviolent action because people think of nonviolence as, as passivity, is that when you hide and when you then do things hidden, it creates a sort of tension and a ramping up and a sort of calculus in a, in a crowd that I have only ever seen lead to near disaster for everybody.

[00:56:42] Jeff: Whereas when you are locking yourself up to a tree or whatever else and you have no mask on and you are saying, this is a risk I’ve decided to take and I’m doing it. Masks are a tricky thing now because of surveillance and AI and everything, but like, I, I do not, I, it’s like property damage. Yeah. If I’m not like, oh my God, my heart [00:57:00] hurts because this capitalist entity got its window broken or something.

[00:57:04] Jeff: But I don’t, I’ve only experienced it be as a threat to myself as an activist doing serious work. It’s only way I’ve ever experienced it is that now, now everything is ratcheted up a little bit, and now we’re in the land of you do that just a little differently than maybe would’ve happened and all of a sudden they’re shooting or there’s

[00:57:22] Christina: I, well, this is what I was gonna say.

[00:57:24] Jeff: for everybody when you do that.

[00:57:26] Christina: I was gonna say, ’cause that’s what ha that, that, that’s my problem with it. Like I, I’m not a fan of property damage and it’s not because I care so much about the property. Um, although I think you make a great point about, yeah, there are small businesses and individuals and people like, who have their cars messed up, who like, might not have the type of insurance and stuff, you know what I mean?

[00:57:43] Christina: Like, there are like people who didn’t do anything and you’re fucking up their stuff because okay, great. It made you feel better, but what did it do? But, but my, my biggest thing is exactly what you said, that second part, which is that I think leads to two things. One, I think it embodies people sometimes.

[00:57:58] Christina: And I, and I agree with this [00:58:00] also with, with like sometimes the black box type thing. Is that, um, is that it? Um, black blocks, whatever, um, is that it like, uh, can enable and encourage, um, this comes with poverty, damage to people who aren’t involved and aren’t part of the whole thing to just take part in the melee.

[00:58:18] Christina: And, and then the movement gets tainted by that, right? Like you see that a lot with looting, like people who loot stuff are usually not like the people who were part of the protest, but the people who came around and were like, well, we might as well, you know, like, if, if this stuff is here for free for all and then everyone gets tagged by it.

[00:58:35] Christina: And then the secondary thing is that, yeah, this now creates an environment where law enforcement can go in and can and can take action because they, they can make a claim that things were at risk or that things were getting dangerous to, to a certain degree. And it can go into a much more, um, like

[00:58:52] Brett: is pacifying law enforcement your goal though?

[00:58:55] Christina: Well, I, I think that I don’t really care about pacifying law enforcement. I’m saying I don’t [00:59:00] want people to get shot. I, I don’t want people to get shot and killed. And if you are going there and you’re going with the understanding that, yeah, I’m gonna be willing to get shot and killed for my protest, all power to you.

[00:59:12] Christina: But I don’t think that’s how most people are doing things. And, and I don’t think, and I, I think a lot of times some of your most vocal people are the, to your point, like what you said earlier, Jeff, are the fucking like spoiled like kids who don’t have any experience, who have places to go back to who don’t really, aren’t even there for the convictions.

[00:59:30] Christina: They’re just there for like the surface stuff. It’s like the, it’s the fucking Occupy Wall Street bullshit. It’s, it’s the fucking like, like Chaz and, and chop bullshit. And it doesn’t accomplish anything. Like we had a lot of people who genuinely died, like in, in Chap and cha, uh, chop and Chaz and fuck law enforcement.

[00:59:48] Christina: I’m not here for any of that. But like, when you create a kind of an environment that people try to portray as being like this, you know, like. Like great [01:00:00] kind of idyllic, uh, community environment. And it wasn’t that. And then three people got shot and died, like, fuck off. Like, you know, like it wasn’t a, a good environment.

[01:00:09] Christina: Like it wasn’t some sort of like utopia sort of thing. It was, it was a bunch of people who might’ve had some good intentions and I supported them. Like we, we gave water and we were like in support of what they were trying to do. And then it just morphed into this thing that wasn’t, and I don’t think it was helpful.

[01:00:25] Christina: And I think that it, you know, hurt a lot of things more ultimately than it helped. Um, I’m fully in favor of people if they wanna, you know, fight the system that way. And they wanna do it if they feel like violence is the only way to get it across. Maybe sometimes it is, but I don’t have to participate in that.

[01:00:41] Christina: And, and I don’t necessarily think that always, um, furthers what the goals are. But I’m also, I wanna be very clear and I don’t have any problems with people who are this.

Reflections on Anarchism and Activism

[01:00:51] Christina: I’m not an anarchist and I have absolutely no desire to be an anarchist. That is not my bag. If that’s how people wanna, wanna associate and do things all power to [01:01:00] you, you have that right?

[01:01:01] Christina: That is not my, my position or like my affinity. So

[01:01:08] Jeff: This is

[01:01:08] Brett: So Christina, how are you?

[01:01:10] Jeff: wait, I just wanna point out what people can’t see is that through all the, all this conversation, Brett is leaned back, you know, pretty, pretty well in his chair, probably as far as it goes. And he has a, a beautiful, beautiful, furry cat, uh, up to his neck and he’s just slowly stroking the cat’s neck.

[01:01:27] Jeff: And the nat the cat is so happy and it, you don’t even look like a mobster. You look like a, you know, something far nicer. Um,

[01:01:33] Christina: little bit like a mobster.

[01:01:34] Jeff: that’s a, that’s a layer in this conversation right now that nobody

[01:01:38] Brett: I’m a very nice anarchist.

[01:01:40] Christina: No. And I, and,

[01:01:41] Jeff: of very nice

[01:01:42] Christina: And again, like I, I wanna be very clear, like I respect like that, that, that is like the stuff that you follow and like, support, like I really do. Um, that’s just not my position. But like I don’t have any problem with people who do that. It’s just not like how I choose to, you know, express my, my beliefs.

[01:01:56] Christina: But I have no problem with people who do do that. And I feel like we need people like [01:02:00] that who are out there. I’m just not one of them. Like,

[01:02:02] Brett: You said

[01:02:02] Jeff: don’t conflate. Don’t conflate anarchists with black block

[01:02:05] Christina: oh, I’m not. I’m

[01:02:06] Jeff: not you. I’m talking to Brett, like I feel like I have a lot of lovely anarchists in my life and some of them

[01:02:12] Brett: Yeah. Well that’s

[01:02:13] Jeff: black block, but they do. It’s not fair to anarchism

[01:02:15] Brett: the people with the lock boxes, the people without the mask, those are often anarchists.

[01:02:21] Jeff: Yeah, exactly. Yeah,

[01:02:22] Brett: not saying like you have to be black block

[01:02:25] Jeff: yeah, totally. I know you’re not, yeah, yeah. What does the cat

[01:02:28] Christina: No. And, and, and to be clear, like I feel like people, like if you’re willing to put your own face and your own like, like name and stuff on top of it, like that is brave as fucking hell. And I think that’s amazing, right? Like if you’re willing to actually take the consequences to it, like that to me is incredible.

[01:02:43] Christina: Um,

[01:02:44] Jeff: what’s tricky now is like there are, I understand and I can hear someone saying as they’re listening or like banging their head against their, uh, I don’t know what, if you’re listening to this on your phone that like there are anew, there are reasons for people to wear masks and so it’s not mask wearing [01:03:00] that I think either of us is coming down on.

[01:03:01] Jeff: It’s the sort of like, I am specifically, I’ll be honest, thinking of a kind of mostly young white activist who is masking up and breaking shit as kind of what I have in mind. And I also recognize that I am probably over overly narrow in how I describe it. Partly because I have a bo, I have a. Bodily response to it.

[01:03:21] Jeff: Having watched that stuff draw people who have come to a protest without, um, without being prepared to get hurt, having watched people in that position get drawn into the risk of being hurt, including children in strollers. Um, because of what if I’m being really cruel and ungracious because of what feels like daddy issues, not anarchism.

[01:03:42] Jeff: I mean, the black guys,

[01:03:43] Brett: that’s

[01:03:44] Jeff: I just, I look at like, oh yeah, that’s a daddy issue right there. That’s not anti-capitalist

[01:03:49] Christina: Right, right, right. And

[01:03:51] Jeff: dads can.

[01:03:53] Christina: No, and, and totally like people, there are very valid reasons to have masks and stuff, but I feel like sometimes it, I, but [01:04:00] I will still say even then, like it’s one of those things where I’m like, I really respect, like, um, like there was this, uh, uh, employee protest, um, at, uh, at Microsoft, uh, last week, like on the fricking 50th anniversary, which is ballsy.

[01:04:12] Christina: And look, I wouldn’t have done it and I don’t think it accomplished anything, but I respect the hell out of the people who did that, did that under their own faces and under their own names. And, and I’m like, you know what I mean? Well, I mean, look, if you’re going to, you know, interrupt like a, a major event or whatever, and, and you’re doing it for those reasons and you’re gonna do it for the things you claim, like, I’m sorry, I think you do need to do that with your own face and with your own name.

[01:04:35] Christina: I think that if you do it, otherwise, I, I think it’s fucking cowardly. Um, uh, because it’s not like anybody was at risk for getting. You know, shot or anything like that wasn’t a risk there. Um, if you, but if you, like, if you’re gonna do that stuff and you know that you’re gonna get fired, and of course you’re gonna get fired, like, that’s really brave.

[01:04:52] Christina: But do that under your name and your face. I think, again, I wouldn’t have done that and I don’t think it accomplished anything, but I really respect the people who did it, did it [01:05:00] like openly, you know what I mean? Like, that’s, that’s bravery. That’s bravery that I certainly don’t have. Um, I mean, I, I, I don’t know.

[01:05:08] Christina: I guess if it was something I had strong enough convictions about, maybe right? But like, I would never pretend that like I have it in me, like I’m too risk averse to do a lot of that type of stuff. Um, but I respect people who, we do need people who will do that. You know, we do.

[01:05:26] Jeff: Yeah. Yeah. We need all types for sure. Brett and Christina, just because Brett brought up the nineties, uh, and, and the sort of direct action days, the, like the, really the beginning of the lockbox era in our generation, I have put a link to young child Jeffy interviewing Noam Chomsky in the, in the WTO protest era.

[01:05:48] Christina: Oh wow.

[01:05:49] Jeff: in the, a link in the show notes. I, I think I was, was, what is it, like 99 or

[01:05:55] Christina: Yeah, that that was the

[01:05:56] Brett: I was, I saw Noam Chomsky at the U of M in 99.[01:06:00]

[01:06:00] Jeff: Did you? Yeah. I got to go to his office and interview him.

[01:06:03] Brett: Oh, wow.

[01:06:04] Jeff: It was awesome. And I, and there’s even a great scene at the end when he pulls down a couple of photos of his children and grandchildren that, that I really, that I

[01:06:13] Brett: All right.

[01:06:13] Jeff: So, and he says the word Pokemon, which was a goal of mine because I talked to a friend who was his literary agent.

[01:06:19] Jeff: I’m like, look, I’m interviewing him. Chomsky One, I’m terrified. Two, gimme something, uh, that I can ask him about that isn’t gonna be an every other Noam Chomsky interview. Which of, as you remember, was like one a day if you were counting. And he is like, he’s fascinated with Pokemon and the, and the naming of it and the linguistics of it.

[01:06:36] Jeff: I was like, got it. Thanks. So I did get him to say Pokemon at one

[01:06:39] Christina: Which is freaking awesome. Awesome. Honestly, like I would be so proud of myself. I’d be like, I got him

[01:06:43] Jeff: I was, I wasn’t even like, by the end, I wasn’t even like, I interviewed Noam Cho. I’m like, I got Noam Chomsky to say Pokemon.

[01:06:50] Christina: which

[01:06:50] Brett: was the same year I met Jello. B Alpha,

[01:06:53] Jeff: Awesome. Oh man. My son just discovered Jello opera and, and just listened to one of

[01:06:58] Brett: like spoken word. Yeah. Okay.

[01:06:59] Jeff: well, [01:07:00] no, first Dead Kennedy’s

[01:07:01] Brett: Yeah.

[01:07:01] Jeff: and then, um, ’cause he is in a punk rock band. And then, uh, I was like, have you heard his spoken word? He is like, well, yeah, I was just wondering. I don’t really like poems.

[01:07:08] Jeff: I was like, oh brother, these are not poems. You’re gonna love it.

[01:07:12] Brett: I don’t remember what I said to Joe Biafra. I just remember like, this was at Little Tijuana’s before it was like a,

[01:07:20] Jeff: Everybody, everybody in, in the nineties, if you, uh, if you had just left a punk rock show and you needed food, it didn’t matter if you were high or not high straight edge or not, you were going to little tiwan as, and you were in love with one of

[01:07:33] Brett: For dollar pitchers of beer. I dated most of those waitresses, um,

[01:07:39] Jeff: Oh

[01:07:39] Brett: but I don’t remember what I said to him, but his reply was, don’t be an asshole. And I wore that as a badge of honor for so long.

[01:07:49] Jeff: J Pi Alfred, who’s almost definitely an asshole, but I love him to death. Awesome. Christina, we we, uh, we gotta roll around

[01:07:58] Christina: Yeah. No, and I [01:08:00] already, I already kind of talked about mine, I guess. I

[01:08:01] Jeff: Yeah, you did. You

[01:08:02] Christina: Um, yeah, I mean, so, uh, yeah, no, we’re good.

TV Shows and Entertainment

[01:08:05] Christina: Um, I, how one of the ways like talking about like disconnecting from like the news and stuff is like, I’ve been watching a lot more TV and um, ’cause it TV has been good. Uh, the last, uh, little bit like we had.

[01:08:18] Christina: We had severance, um, which, which obviously ended was great. We had White Lotus, which I very much enjoyed. I don’t think it landed the ending. Um,

[01:08:26] Jeff: still so fun

[01:08:27] Christina: it was still so fun. Exactly. And, and, uh, and the drama now around that season that, that Jason Isaacs just being like a shit stir and just like giving these interviews where he’s just making it worse and you know that he knows it.

[01:08:39] Christina: ’cause he’s like, I read everything about this. And I’m like, wow, man. Who would’ve thought that? Like, the guy that plays the dad, like, like the, like the doped up dad also, he’s British and he did such a great southern accent, like,

[01:08:50] Jeff: Andy’s Daddy Malfoy,

[01:08:52] Christina: yeah, yeah.

[01:08:53] Jeff: took me halfway through the

[01:08:55] Christina: Oh my God.

[01:08:55] Jeff: I know this fucking face?

[01:08:57] Christina: Yes, yes, you’re right. Daddy Malfoy. But like, he did such [01:09:00] a fucking good job, like playing like the Rich Southern guy.

[01:09:04] Christina: And I know that, I know the rich Southern guy incredibly well. And like, he fucking like, nailed it, like, like the acts and everything, but then he’s just being such a shitster, so I’m like, I’m, I’m here for it. Um, the, uh, the last of us, uh, season two, uh, premieres, um, this week, I’m looking forward to that Hacks just came back.

[01:09:24] Christina: Um, that’s one of my favorite shows. I don’t know if either of you have watched that, but

[01:09:27] Jeff: No.

[01:09:28] Christina: so, it’s a, it’s a, I think you both would really like it. It’s on, it’s on HBO Max whatever. Um, it’s, uh, stars, uh, gene Smart and um, uh, Hannah Eve. And it is, um, uh, created and written by um, two of the people who were heavily involved with Broad City.

[01:09:47] Christina: Um, and um, and it’s, uh, but, but it’s um, and I love Broad City. Like I’m a broad city like all the way. ’cause it was my. You know, I wasn’t single, but like every other aspect help really did relate a lot to [01:10:00] my life at that time. It is a much better show. Um, it is, um, it, it’s, and it has a broader appeal, so it’s about this, um, woman who is a, a Las Vegas like standup comedian, like she’s in this universe.

[01:10:13] Christina: Uh, I guess she maybe would be kind of like an Elaine Stitch type, although I guess younger, but like very famous, well known. Um, has like a, a show like on, on the strip, uh, at one of the biggest Dinos, um, is also a QVC person and they’re wanting to kind of. Kick her out. Um, and there’s this, uh, gen Z um, uh, bisexual writer from Los Angeles who got in trouble because of some stuff that she tweeted and they share an agent.

[01:10:40] Christina: And the agent is like, you have to like write, she should write jokes for you. And they have kind of a, you know, love hate relationship with one another. And, um, and it’s going into its fourth season and, and the show has shifted a lot since then, but it’s, it’s a comedy and it’s, you know, one Emmy’s for being a comedy, but even though it’s like a half hour, like there’s a lot of heart [01:11:00] to it.

[01:11:00] Christina: And it’s one of those things where it’s almost like, it’s like a comedy that it’s kind of a drama underneath and in some ways, but the acting is so good and it’s very funny. And, um, and season four already is really good. So watching that. Um, and uh, yeah, and like I said, I’m looking forward to the last of us, uh, season two, like very here for that.

[01:11:22] Christina: Um.

[01:11:23] Jeff: So here for it. I’m re I’m almost done rewatching season

[01:11:26] Christina: same, same. I’m trying to like remind myself and I’ve played the game, so like I know the whole

[01:11:30] Jeff: I have not, my kids have, but I, and I’ve not played, uh, the second game, so I don’t know anything about what’s about to happen, which is very exciting. Although I kind of bet it’s amazing to have played the game and then watch the

[01:11:41] Christina: Yeah, no, the adaptation is so good. Like, I, I think I said this last year, I was more impressed by the fallout adaptation because they had so much less to work with. Like they had to capture the vibes of the game, and they did perfectly, like speaking of White Lotus and Walton Goggins, like, he was great on Fallout, but like, and I, I loved [01:12:00] Fallout for that reason.

[01:12:00] Christina: But the last of us is like taking what, in my opinion, is like one of like the best like video games like ever and turning that into tv. And then in some ways, like there were some episodes in the first season that like transcended the source material, which you never see with adaptations. And very rarely do.

[01:12:21] Christina: Right. Like the Godfather would be one of them. Right. But like, it, it’s, it’s

[01:12:24] Jeff: Definitely better than the book.

[01:12:26] Christina: well, I mean, I think the book is good, but like the, the movie is like other level and then like the, the sequel is like, you know, other level. Right. But like, you know, it, it’s rare that you have things that transcend the source material and like, it definitely did.

[01:12:39] Christina: So, um,

[01:12:40] Jeff: My godson is a kid in the next season of Fallout

[01:12:44] Christina: oh, that’s awesome.

[01:12:45] Jeff: it’s just, he’s in some scenes here and there, but he got to be in one scene that was just him and an actor that is not yet, uh, known to be in this season, and he didn’t know who it was gonna be, but the actor takes off his helmet and reveals himself in this scene.

[01:12:59] Jeff: And, and I just [01:13:00] say it, it was like, holy fuck. Yeah. It was amazing.

[01:13:03] Christina: That’s so

[01:13:04] Jeff: He showed me all these scenes of getting his makeup set up and like all this amazing stuff. It was so cool. He is just like, uh, he’s about 10, you know? He is like a little

[01:13:12] Christina: Nice. Well that’s, that’s fantastic for him.

[01:13:15] Jeff: Shit, Danny Glamour. Did I get the age of my godson wrong?

[01:13:18] Jeff: It’s Danny Glamour’s son. I, I take it, I

[01:13:21] Brett: Friend of the show, Danny Gl, we haven’t heard from for

[01:13:25] Jeff: He is gonna be in my house. He listens to every episode. He, he like basically live tweets, but on messaging to me when he is

[01:13:32] Christina: Nice. Nice. I love that. Um, uh, the other of, and I just will mention it real quickly. Neither of you have seen it, but I will recommend it, um, that the pit just ended its first season.

[01:13:45] Jeff: Looks good.

[01:13:45] Christina: It’s really good. So a lot of people have made comparisons to er, which is completely fair because it is from, it stars, no.

[01:13:52] Christina: Wiley as an ER doctor. Um, and, and, and, um, and, but this time they’re not in Chicago. They’re in, they’re in Pittsburgh. Um, hence like the [01:14:00] name is kind of a double entendre. ’cause like, they, they call the pit, like where like the, the ER is, and then it’s with two T’s because Pittsburgh, um, and the, the, uh, executive producer is John Wells, who was.

[01:14:11] Christina: One of the main people behind ER and also the West Wing and the creator was a long time writer on er. Um, but the shows other than both being in emergency rooms, like they’re different, right? Like there are obviously it’s 30 years, you know, after er, so a lot has changed in emergency medicine and stuff, but it’s, it’s a really good show.

[01:14:31] Christina: And the concert I think is really clever. And this is how they were able to, to have it to be a relatively low budget, like probably four and a half million an episode or so, which in these days is fairly low budget, is that they basically do an hour from each shift. So like, it starts at like 8:00 PM and then like, uh, or like 7:00 AM or something, and then like ends like.

[01:14:54] Christina: Like midnight or whatever. So it’s like 15 hours of, [01:15:00] um, a whole shift in the er. So

[01:15:02] Jeff: Oh,

[01:15:02] Christina: what, so what’s cool about that is that you see like some of the same patients, like from episode to episode, because that’s one of the underlying things is that, that are 40 million, you know, people that health insurance and who use the ER as their primary doctor.

[01:15:17] Christina: And so you have people who are like waiting all day and then you have like big, you know, events happen and like other stuff and like, you know, doctors kind of come in and off shifts, although most of them are throughout the whole time. It’s, it’s really good. It’s really well done. The acting is incredible.

[01:15:30] Christina: Like the acting is so good and the writing is really good. And, um, and it’s already been renewed for a second season. They’ve already committed. They’re like, we’re going to. Um, do this once a year. It’s kind of like traditional tv. So like they’re already starting to write the next season and it’s gonna be back in January and like that.

[01:15:48] Christina: I also appreciate, ’cause a, it’s like 15 episodes is almost like a network TV length series, right? Like it’s certainly better than what you, what we get in streaming for the most part and b, for them to be [01:16:00] like, no, this can be something you can count on, you know, to come back every year versus having to wait like however many years it’s been since the last of us, or, or whatever, you know?

[01:16:09] Jeff: yeah. That’s all I should probably get to that. By the way, my godson is 13, I mean 12, sorry. 12. 12. But, but was a rockstar long before

[01:16:18] Brett: Did you just text?

[01:16:19] Jeff: fallout. Yes, I did. Yeah.

[01:16:21] Christina: well, you know what, in fairness, in fairness to you, like if he’s 12, he’s probably pa, he’s probably playing 10.

[01:16:26] Jeff: Hmm. Yeah, that’s right. That’s what I meant.

[01:16:29] Brett: Yeah. Yeah,

[01:16:30] Jeff: I was like, these are Hollywood rules. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Hollywood rules. Uh, last TV recommendation. Well, one, my wife and I are watching Season Two of Bad Sisters, which is just an awesome

[01:16:41] Brett: That’s so good.

[01:16:42] Jeff: So good. But we also are just finishing up. We got it took us forever to get to it, but season three of Sex Lives of College Girls, which by the way, when it’s up when my kids pass, I feel a little whatever, but, but I love, it’s a, Mindy Kaling is behind that show, but I love how afterschool special that show

[01:16:58] Christina: Oh, totally. Totally.

[01:16:59] Jeff: [01:17:00] so awesome.

[01:17:01] Christina: No, totally. Although I will say like, after Renee rap left, like I knew it wasn’t getting renewed. I was like, your star is, I was like, your star is gone. Like,

[01:17:09] Jeff: her so much. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But anyway, it’s a fun,

[01:17:13] Christina: It’s a fun

[01:17:14] Jeff: It’s stupid as

[01:17:15] Christina: So dumb. But it’s, I

[01:17:16] Jeff: it’s, but that’s what makes it like an afterschool special, but with sex, like it’s so awesome. Anyway. Also, Timothy Chala Me’s sister is, could not be more, more different than Timothy Chalamet and is fucking amazing.

[01:17:31] Jeff: Better than Bob Dylan.

[01:17:33] Brett: We’re an hour and 15 in, do you guys still wanna do a

[01:17:37] Jeff: Yeah,

[01:17:38] Christina: Yeah,

[01:17:38] Jeff: got time.

[01:17:40] Brett: All right,

[01:17:41] Jeff: We’re just hanging out, having a conversation. Brett, having a, we’re just having a regular non diagnose. Uh

[01:17:48] Christina: a conversational

[01:17:49] Brett: Yeah.

grAPPtitude

[01:17:50] Brett: Alright, I will kick off. Um, uh, gratitude Mine is a well-known app among, I think our listeners and [01:18:00] you guys, uh, carabiner. Um, it is a, an app that at as close to system level as you can get, um, on Mac Os, will, uh, change the way your keys behave. And I have for a long time only use carabiner to create my hyper key, which is when you hold down caps lock and it functions as shift control, alt or option and command all as one key.

[01:18:34] Brett: And I’ve done a lot of stuff with that. What I recently got into, like going a little crazy with it and my favorite current keyboard assignment is I can hold down, um,

[01:18:50] Jeff: we fucking go

[01:18:51] Brett: my, I can hold down semicolon with my right pinky, which is right where it is on the home row.

[01:18:58] Jeff: while doing a [01:19:00] Kegel.

[01:19:01] Brett: Then HIJK become, I’m sorry, H-I-J-I-K-L-I tried it with HJKL for a while, so I’m confused.

[01:19:11] Brett: But, but JIKL become arrow keys for me. So I just hold my pinky down and then use my three remaining fingers to move my cursor around. And with carabiner, that still functions with like command and options. So I can do or, and shift, so I can do selections and everything with, uh, with just my right hand, never leaving the home.

[01:19:39] Brett: So CERs my pick.

[01:19:42] Jeff: I’d like to, I’d like to claim, claim a little bit of my time back. Uh, I don’t know. Is that what they

[01:19:48] Christina: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I’d like, I’d like to, I’d like to reclaim my time.

[01:19:50] Jeff: I’d like to, I’d like to give a joke I made there a little more space, um, and contextualize it, which is that for anybody that doesn’t already know, and I’m sure all you know, Brett has some of the [01:20:00] craziest fucking keyboard shortcuts ever and can somehow remember them despite claiming or, or not being able to remember last week.

[01:20:08] Jeff: He and I just suggested that one element of your, um, your keyboard shortcut is that you have to be doing kegels while you, while you press these buttons. And I wanna point out that men should also do cables. I, I is what I understand, which

[01:20:21] Brett: Exercising the PC muscle can give you way stronger orgasms.

[01:20:25] Jeff: oh, thank you sponsor. That was not even why I was told it was good. It’s an, it’s incontinence as you get older, that is actually the thing. But, um. Anyway, just wanted to throw that out, get that joke back in there, make a little space for it

[01:20:38] Brett: Well done.

[01:20:39] Jeff: yeah. Brett, I’m sure most of the listeners have Overtired know about carabiner because of you as of like 13, 14 years ago.

[01:20:46] Brett: Yeah,

[01:20:46] Jeff: ’cause you have been pitching that one hard for so long. You’re the reason I had a hyper key,

[01:20:50] Brett: Back so, so it’s currently carabiner elements, but. Like back when I started using it 13, 14 years ago, it was carabiner. [01:21:00] Um, so carabiner elements is actually my pick for the week, but I’m done

[01:21:07] Christina: Nice.

[01:21:08] Jeff: All right, Christina.

[01:21:09] Christina: So mine and I, okay, I feel bad saying this because, um. Regular people can’t use it right now, although they are starting to issue out invites, which is how I got it. But No, but, but, but I mentioned it just because I, I think they’re gonna start rolling it out more. Um, uh, actively. So Arc, the browser company, uh, the company behind arc, they have a, a new AI focused browser that they are calling Dia DIA and it is WebKit based.

[01:21:37] Christina: Um, which is interesting. Um, rather than, I’m not really sure why WebKit ’cause I don’t really think that there is an advantage to WebKit at all. Um Oh, oh, yeah, yeah, exactly. Like, I mean, if you’re gonna, if you’re gonna use it, I would just use Blink. Like if you’re gonna use, like, in my opinion, I, I don’t, there’s not, there’s conclusively not an [01:22:00] improvement in battery life in WebKit versus Chromium.

[01:22:02] Christina: There’s. Way less of an extension stuff, whatever, regardless. Um, I mean, I don’t have a problem with WebKit, I just don’t necessarily see the point, but, but this is, but it’s still an interesting browser, um, that basically is like AI centric. So like you kind of have like, um, uh, an always open kind of like, uh, window view where you can, you know, ask stuff with like chat GBT or other AI assistance and whatnot, and, and then also ask it about different things that you’re doing and researching.

[01:22:30] Christina: And so it, it’s a cool idea. Uh, dia browser.com is, is where they have, uh, information about it. Um, I’ll see if I can get, uh, an invite for, for YouTube, but it’s, um, it’s, uh, it’s, there are a lot of really interesting, um, we’ve talked about this a lot over the last couple of years, like people taking on different rifts of, of the, the web browser.

[01:22:50] Christina: And, um, I, I am a little bit. Concerned about what this means for arc. I have a feeling that it means that ARC is essentially [01:23:00] just in maintenance mode. I’ve been getting that impression too, which, which sucks because I really like arc, um, a lot.

[01:23:06] Jeff: cool. Very

[01:23:07] Christina: But, um, maybe, I think, I think that Dia they’re trying to basically be a little bit more broad because the only problem with ARC is that once you really get into it, like I think it’s awesome, but the learning curve and like the time that you have to spend with it is significant.

[01:23:21] Christina: Like for me, even I will say that like I had to spend a lot of time with Arc to really have it click for me. And I don’t think that most people are willing to go through that time and I don’t blame them. Um, DIA just in the little bit of time I’ve, I’ve been using it I guess since like Monday, um, on my personal devices and it’s, it’s pretty cool.

[01:23:37] Christina: It is Apple silicon only right now. I hope that they will bring it to um, uh, uh, you know, Intel Max. ’cause there are still lots of them out there. Um, and I would like to use it on my iMac, but, um, it’s, uh, it’s, it’s kind of a cool concept and there’s some really neat ideas and stuff that they’re doing. So Zoia is my pick.

[01:23:54] Jeff: Awesome. Awesome. My, I, because I’m not a [01:24:00] Linux guy, this Linux pick I’m about to make, I will not go on and on about. Um, but I have, so I moved into an operations director role at my organization and we’re like member owned, cooperative with like seven member owners and just one employee who’s not a member.

[01:24:16] Jeff: So it’s a small group, but, um, but like we’ve just never, in the history of kind of leadership in the organization, there’s never been a point where like there’s a lot of thought about security or, or how we might be at risk or how our use of, or, you know, the company’s email might or something goes wrong, how that could impact us, you know, various things.

[01:24:38] Jeff: I’ve played with Kelly Linux, which is where I’m getting with this for over the years, like many times, um, just ’cause I find the toolbox insane. And for anybody that doesn’t know, it’s like it’s a distro of, of, of Linux that is just preloaded with every like, you know, quote unquote ethical and not ethical hacker tool.

[01:24:55] Jeff: You can imagine. I mean, it’s definitely like you, it’s definitely like getting into a tank and [01:25:00] being like, well, this one lets me drive, but that one really fucks people up. Um, but, uh, but I’ve been doing this, I’ve been doing something that, like, I remember I went to a journalism, like a computer journalist nerd conference years ago, and there was a New York Times journalist there, and she did a, she did a whole session called Docs

[01:25:18] Christina: Mm-hmm. Oh, I love that.

[01:25:19] Jeff: was like, yeah, go see all the different ways you’re out there, you are exposed, whatever it is. And so I mostly do what they call, you know, like open source intelligence, uh, is what I’m playing with with Kelly Linux, where it’s just like simple things that there have been services for.

[01:25:35] Jeff: Like type in a username and see. Um, you know, how many accounts exist out there. And honestly, I really recommend people doing that for themselves. ’cause it’s like, if you’re our age and you’ve been on the internet this long, you’re like, oh, fuck that one too. And then there’s a whole, like the, the CLI for have I been pod uh, is amazing.

[01:25:53] Jeff: And you can use all the functions on the website, but you can use, I can like write a script with all of our members on it [01:26:00] and check it and you can of course check passwords, all that stuff. Um, and so I’ve basically been working on like learning all the various tools for open source intelligence and then writing a script that just checks every once in a while for all of our members and, and my family members and some friends.

[01:26:15] Jeff: Uh, and then allows me to sort of like send them information so it can be like, Hey, just so you know, this is where you exist, this is whatever. Um, and it’s great. It’s a step up from what I did a long time ago, which was part of actually the Docs Yourself thing, which is I set up a. A Google, uh, alert for pretty much everybody in my family, every colleague, every whatever else, so that if someone shows up on the internet in a way that they didn’t mean to you, see it right away.

[01:26:39] Jeff: But anyway, I, I love, I mean, I’m not a Linux guy at all, like, uh, but I really love, um, getting into an immersive world like that. And Cali Linux is just like, if you’re interested in a little bit, definitely takes some, like having a tutorial by your side. But like, it’s pretty, it’s pretty enlightening and amazing to just dip in [01:27:00] even just the open source intelligence tools and, and get a sense of what you can know about yourself online.

[01:27:05] Jeff: But what can be known about you? It’s pretty powerful and like humbling.

[01:27:10] Christina: No, I totally agree. I totally agree. And I, I think Cali is an awesome distribution. Um, it’s one of those that you can, like, if you wanna try it out, like you can run it in a BM or you can put it on a USB thumb drive and like

[01:27:19] Jeff: I have mine on a raspberry pie and

[01:27:21] Christina: I was gonna say,

[01:27:22] Jeff: scale.

[01:27:23] Christina: I was gonna say, I was gonna say, um, raspberry pie is great for another thing I would say.

[01:27:27] Christina: Um, and I don’t have any, you know, listeners, this will apply to, uh, ’cause we know our listenership, but if you, because it, it can be so useful for the scenarios that you described, Jeff. I often use it, um, within, um, WSL, the Windows subsystem for Linux because they actually have a version that they’ve, uh, you know, uh, like a distro so to speak, that you can install for WSL.

[01:27:48] Christina: They’ve even, like, we’re one of the first ones to become part of like the modern WSL infra. And so they even have like a whole way where you can even launch like the gooey apps from within Windows. So if you want, but one, and what’s nice about [01:28:00] that, and, and I I think especially think about like cis admin types or people who might be doing these things, is that like, okay, you have a Windows machine, you run, run, run some of these tools.

[01:28:08] Christina: You can also have it integrate with some of like maybe your, your Windows files and other stuff to pipe through without having to do like the normal, you know, VM type of thing or, or, or, or SSH thing. So, um. So, yeah, just throwing that out there. ’cause um, I, I used to sometimes communicate with that team, um, when I would talk with the WSL folks and, and Callie was always like, in my opinion, like one of like the best, like WSL Distros, um, uh, like more, you know, specific ones other than like, you know, like the, a bunch who were fedora or, or whatever.

[01:28:39] Christina: So.

[01:28:40] Jeff: Yeah, well it’s great too because most of the tools, what’s nice is the whole menu’s there. It’s like going to a Denny’s, but you can go have a hamburger at home, like you can go onto your Mac and get into home brew and, and install most of these tools. But like it’s a nice place to just be immersed in it and be like, what’s this do?

[01:28:55] Jeff: What’s this

[01:28:56] Christina: well, that’s the thing. That’s, that’s why I think it’s so great to have it, like on a raspberry pie or on a thumb drive [01:29:00] or like a WSL like instance because yeah, to your point, you can have this installed basically in any Linux TRO or on Mac os. Um, but like, you don’t have to worry about that.

[01:29:10] Christina: It’s all one place and, uh, and, and it, and that makes it really cool.

[01:29:14] Jeff: Yeah. Awesome.

[01:29:17] Brett: All right, well it’s two o’clock here and I haven’t had lunch and I have to pee so bad, so it has been so good talking to you guys. Thank you. But I think we should call it

[01:29:29] Jeff: Get some pee.

[01:29:30] Brett: get some, get some pee. I.

[01:29:31] Christina: Get some pee.

286 episodes

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