146. Internet Numbers Man

Speaker BThis is Do By Friday, a weekly challenge podcast with Merlin Mann, Alex Cox and Max Temkin. This week's challenge, use rechargeable batteries.

MaxHere we go. Hey, I think we got it this time. Hot hands. Hot hands. The two of you guys should not be allowed to be in a room together. Why? I can feel the anxiety. I can feel that you're both sweating and your hearts are racing. Beta blockers. Beta blockers.

I'm going to have another one now. All right. Let's all pop a beta blocker. Let's all pop a beta blocker and do an improv warm up.

Speaker AOh, God. This little blue boy saves my life. Let's do a little improv warm up together. I feel like you guys have had a lot of tech support. Yes and

AlexGive me a city Okay

MerlinHere's your city We're not divorced What? Did you ever hear that story? You ever heard that story? I told you that story, right?

MaxNo, no Right before you go on stage And you start an improv show You go Everyone You sort of like Touch each other on the back And you go Got your back Got your back Yeah

AlexOh god

MaxI would just

AlexWalk into the sea Over and over again I would resurrect myself

MaxPeople should do that more I got your back

Speaker Bno no no why do you like being touched let's do a little zip zaps up do you like to be touched

Merlinme or max i i think i like being touched for a little longer than is healthy that gives me really gives me something to think about the seven second hug is totally normal and

Maxfine totally normal and fine you can leave anytime you want uh well let's see for our listeners may not have pieced together exactly what's going on but you guys are uh let's just say you're in an undisclosed location, but you're together. And I'm also out of town, but I'm in a different city, and I'm recording from my hotel room. And we've had, shall we say, extensive technical difficulties. No!

Speaker BWhat?

MaxOnly time will tell if we're managing to record your end. I know that we're recording my end.

MerlinOh, come on. That part's easy. You know what? It's gonna be

Alexfine i'm gonna go touch alex's back now the problem the problem is merlin cares about you hearing us which you know i don't even know if you listen yeah i'm not gonna listen to a word

Maxthat you say checks out checks out where where are you i'm in seattle i'm in my hotel room in seattle and i'm going what's that nothing go on what hotel yeah what hotel oh uh it's one of the fancy ones that it's not one of the packs ones i'm staying at like a slightly nicer hotel because i don't need to be by the convention center um and i'm going to uh pike place market when we're done with the podcast with friend of the show seth boyer oh oh yay oh we're gonna go we're gonna go

see them toss the salmon you know that real oh the fish throwing place right right right right

Speaker Athe real that real seattle shit i want the real style i said really get in there yeah i said seth

MaxTake me to the real shit. You know, what are the locals doing? He's like, we got to go to Pike Place Market. You go, you buy a Pearl Jam wig.

Speaker BWhat a normal thing to do.

MaxThere's a magic shop there that I want to see. So Seth is very, very kindly accommodating my madness and going to the Pike Place Market. I came up with a good marketing idea for Seattle, though. Okay, let's hear it. This is free. So I think maybe we should get this on John Roderick's radar because I know he's pretty plugged in you know in the seattle sort of scene here but check this out i think when you go to pike place market you should okay hear me out i think you should be able to meet fraser crane

Merlinokay is it a fraser crane is it like meeting santa at the mall is it is it literally kelsey

Speaker Agrammar exactly when you go to magic kingdom is it literally mini mouse i take i take your point

Merlinokay how about this what if you go and it is kelsey grammar but you get to choose which character you meet maybe you want to meet him as beast in the x-men and he's a big blue boy let's toss salads and scrambled eggs i love this idea other seattle people could you meet a dead

Speaker Bgrunge rocker from the heroin yeah wait no i thought it was a shotgun oh no no not him oh

Merlinwow too soon i want to meet him okay i was i was gonna say somebody like uh i don't know i know one of those long-haired guys who does heroin. Maybe he's a force ghost. This is a great idea. That sound needs all the help it can get.

MaxI'm just saying, when you go to Disney, you want to meet Ray, okay?

MerlinYeah, yeah.

MaxAnd when you go to Pike Place Market, you want to meet Niles. You just do.

AlexI honestly, there's the indie show Grey's Anatomy. They should just line up in front of every hospital and give me their autographs. And then I would like them to pat me on the back. But it's like they've erased Seattle from that show. And it's very, very disappointing. Whereas like Frasier, it's like, hey, look at the, remember they had the green screen?

MerlinIt was for outside where you could see like a space needle and stuff?

AlexYeah, yeah.

MerlinIt's like here, you know, I mean, the Golden Gate Bridge is leaving the north side of town. And it's somehow always in every scene. It's just, it's, I mean, I get it. It's the Rice-A-Roni problem. title oh you take the cable car to work no no one does that no one does that it costs twice as much as a regular ride on anything else and it only goes down this one little area that only tourists go to so

Speaker Ano I do not ride the race-a-roni I'm not riding the roni I heard something crazy of kooky and crazy about the do you know the show

MaxChicago Fire yeah I feel like I've heard of it

Alexlike the spin-off of Chicago PD, right?

MaxI don't know. There's all these like Chicago shows where they like, yeah, I think it's like PD and fire. Oh, shit. And there was a Kelsey Grammer one, right? Didn't you play like the mayor?

AlexI don't know. I have no idea.

MaxThere was one where it was called like the boss, right? And it was Kelsey Grammer. Oh, okay. I need to really catch up on this guy. I haven't seen any of these shows. I've never seen a single episode of any of these shows, but they do, they like film around the office and in my neighborhood all the time. So there's like street closures and stuff. Weird flex, okay. I heard the other day, So basically the premise of Chicago Fire is that there's these like cataclysmic, like awful events all happening to this one firehouse in like one block of Chicago. There's always like a toxic gas leak and then a building explodes.

And like it's always like some crisis for the firefighters like every week.

MerlinYeah, that happens on children's shows, too. There's a Welsh animated show called Fireman Sam. And it's basically about. I've seen this. Fireman Sam is basically about this cursed village with the most incompetent fire people in the world. And they're like, there's one little boy, Norman Price. There's one little boy that causes a lot of problems and there's flaming paper airplanes. And they're fucking always setting the kitchen in the firehouse on fire. It's the worst.

I mean, it's like, I don't know. It's like working at a drug clinic and being all gacked out all the time. It makes no sense. Oh, blimey, there's another fire. that's a good that's a good premise now what would that be if they made a show about cards

Speaker Aagainst humanity what would that be about probably someone's always mad at us on the internet

Maxalas i used to enjoy your cardboard treats uh so i oh so i heard the other day that they have some sort of deal with me the city or something where they will never show like the skyline of chicago in such a way that you can orient yourself to know where this firehouse is because they don't want to have it in a neighborhood because that would make that neighborhood look bad does that

Speaker Bmake sense yeah that's so stupid i love it it's really weird yeah like people can't associate

Maxthat's so fucking weird it's part of the deal of that show is that they can never reveal where it's supposed to be taking place well isn't this also the problem i've never seen

Merlinthe program. I was a little old. I was in college. I think I got pipe away. Isn't this the murder she wrote problem?

AlexOkay, I have no idea. Is this the show with the old lady and the cat?

MerlinWell, she's old by some standards. I don't know about the cat. I don't know who the cat is. But people keep getting fucking killed in her tiny little town in I don't know, it's like fucking Maine or something.

AlexSo it's a real town and people went to visit it?

MerlinIt's called Jessica'sville.

Speaker BAh, okay.

MerlinI don't know.

Speaker BI'm just trying.

MerlinYes, and.

Speaker BYes, and. Here we are in Spain. All right.

AlexOh, okay. But really, this is not a bit. Okay. San Francisco is so interesting. It's so interesting. It's very big. It's so, so big.

Speaker BI have been late to everything

MaxWell you know everyone got mad at me When I said I would be at Merlin's on time And then I was about 45 minutes late

Speaker BOh I beat you oh my god

MaxBut I just want to say it's not as easy Not now who's laughing not as easy as it seems

Speaker ATo get to Merlin's I think it's a teachable moment

AlexFor everybody now who's breaking Out into a cold sweat How's your hotel Alex oh boy Oh thank you Merlin yes and Oh boy okay I have to Actually take a photo

MerlinDo you want a beta blocker I got a beta blocker

AlexOkay, here's the problem. I want to try it.

Speaker AYou should take some more beta blockers. Okay, hold on. My pulse is six.

Speaker BHold on. Is your pulse supposed to be six?

MerlinMy watch is blowing up, but I don't care. Okay. I'm so relaxed.

Speaker BI want a beta blocker.

MerlinReally? No. Oh, shit. Yes, it'll be fine. I don't want to have to testify in court about this.

AlexYou did it. As long as there's not a cashew in it.

MerlinWell, I can't promise that. No motorcycles implied.

AlexOh, it's a real baby. Oh, my gosh.

MerlinOkay. Well, do you have low blood pressure? I need to ask for a minute.

AlexI do not have low blood pressure.

MerlinThe pharmacist, when I pick this up, the pharmacist is like, oh, this is a ref. Oh, can I tell you? Oh, wait. Before you do a hotel bit. Can you hear us okay, Max? I feel like I'm yelling a lot because I'm worried you can't hear us. I can hear you. Okay. All right, cool. Okay. So I go in to pick up my beta blockers. And, of course, it's the same fucking – our pharmacy, this Walgreens, is farcical. You go in there, everybody's inscrutable, if you know what I mean. So I go in there. I go in there and the lady goes, pick up. And I go, and I say, man, very quietly. And she goes, man. I said, yes, man.

First name? Merlin. Okay, address. And I go, 1492 Santa Maria Lane. And she goes, 1492 Santa Maria Lane. And I go, hmm.

The cue here is that I'm speaking quietly because I don't, OPSEC, I don't want you screaming my name in a Walgreens. And she goes, okay, propranol is ready. Gamapentin's not ready yet. Come back later. Thank you. Okay, thank you. You want that? You want to wait? And I said, no, no, just the beta blocker's fine. And then she has to call over the pharmacist. The yelling pharmacist comes over. And he goes, refill? And I say, yes, it's a refill. He says, okay, what are you taking this for?

Speaker BWhat? That is not legal. That's not legal.

MerlinI'm taking it for anxiety. Oh, I figured because this is a lot to take. Do you take all these every day? I said, no, I take them as needed.

Speaker BIt's not a joke. It's not a joke.

Speaker AIt's like the Trader Joe's checkout line philosophy of the drugstore counter.

MerlinOh, these are great in pie. Why do you buy so many limes? Because I'm an alcoholic. I'm not making pie. I'm an alcoholic. And so, wait, I'm almost done. And then so he's like, oh, yeah, I figured. That's a lot of these. It's usually for high blood pressure. I said, yes, I know. He says, all right, well, do you have high blood pressure? And I said, I know not to talk because the more I talk, the more they'll talk. And I said, no.

And he says, okay, well, symptoms of low blood pressure would be that you feel dizzy. So if you start to feel dizzy, that's because you have low blood pressure. And what I want to say is, first of all, I'm here for anxiety. And you're fucking freaking me out by yelling about my anxiety in the Walgreens. But I also wanted to say, listen, fella, the last thing I got to worry about is my pulse being low. And I wanted to show him my watch. but instead I said thank you

how's your hotel Alex and

Alexand yes and hold on hold on I'm gonna check my pulse

Merlingot some media oh let me see mine

Alexoh I was at 95 that's healthy oh boy

MerlinI'm at 76

Alexwhat in the world

Merlinwell I'm usually before I started taking this shit I was clocking 90 regularly

Alexoh dear you know what I don't want to heartache

MerlinDo you know about beta blockers, Alex? Do you know what they do?

AlexThey, I assume, lower your blood pressure.

MerlinThey block, oh God, that table's filthy. I'm so sorry. They block a certain kind of adrenaline that generates the feelings associated with anxiety. So you can still have an anxious thing happening, but your pulse doesn't go through the fucking roof.

AlexThat is-

MerlinAddress!

AlexYeah, I just realized that's a bit in-house. Just like, okay, we've- Okay. People, I swear to God, people are going to tweet and say, Alex is right. First, Merlin had a bit in Golden Girls, and now you have a bit from House. Oh. Oh.

MerlinSo you think I'm an old gay?

AlexSyracusa. Syracusa. I'm talking about the things that you watch. Oh, that's very exciting. How's your hotel, Alex? I'm excited. Oh, boy. Okay. All right. I sent you something in the super secret text channel. I thought I had found a deal on a hotel. The hotel is San Francisco. There's just everything inside. It's like a Portlandia sketch.

MerlinPlease read all of this. This is like, you know, like when you want to say like free guitar lessons and you tear off a strip? This hotel that won't be named. I can't believe you chose where you chose to be.

Speaker BIt was.

MerlinYeah. All right. Anyway, it looks like somebody printed 40 of these on a sheet of paper and then and cut them into one inch strips.

AlexThey did not even use like a paper cutter. This is definitely.

MerlinBut at least it's center aligned and not justified because then I would have to set the place on fire.

AlexAll right. Like, I've lost the words.

MerlinH1, drink up.

AlexOh, God. All right. All right. There is in, I think, what is Helvetica? No, maybe Verdana. This is important to the story. Drink up. In an effort to reduce waste and toxicity caused by plastic water bottles, we're pleased to offer you our complimentary, environmentally friendly, reusable, hotel blank, blank, blank water bottle. For your convenience, we offer, capital and bold, flow water, filtered water stations in our hallway vending areas and fitness room.

Flow water is seven times... 7X. 7X purified, enhanced with electrolytes, trace materials. Minerals. No Oxford comma. Minerals. And activated oxygen. Enjoy! Enjoy! And then there's the wonderful... The logo. The logo of the hotel in... Oh, it's real blurry. I just thought I was sleepy this morning. Didn't have my glasses. Nope, nope. So, in our hotel room... I should say, going to the hotel room, there's no water.

It's reasonable not to buy... Do you say purchase? Like, purchase the water bottle in a hotel room. But I was really thirsty. And I was like, I want some water. And I thought maybe there would be a convenience store.

MerlinOh, like when they got that tube of Voss?

AlexYeah, the tube of Voss or those Fuji that's like $13. Oh, no, don't worry, though. I went to Walgreens. This Walgreens next to our hotel doesn't open until 9 a.m., so that's on me. But, oh, look, there's a food truck behind our hotel in what they call the resort area because there's benches and picnic tables. and a food truck from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Or I'm sorry, I'm sorry, 6 p.m. Or 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. So I'm like, all right,

I'm going to go get a water bottle from here maybe. And they, look at this Merlin. Yeah. They sold me for literally $15. Oh my God. A path water, it's called path water. Path water, oh, that sounds terrible. Yep, yep. Oh, look at all their social media. But it's, listen, listen, Max. It is itself a reusable water bottle. So when you open it, it says refill, not landfill.

So I am supposed to reuse this water bottle sold at the hotel after I was shamed for not using the water bottle. That wasn't in the room even. I went to the front desk and they handed me this water bottle.

Speaker AOh, gross.

AlexAnd the paper was in it. The paper was in it. I did not include that story. No, no, no. But the TV, front and back in the hotel, is very clean. The rest, there's yellow sheets, and there's lots of throw pillows. Lots of throw pillows.

MerlinOh, there's so many invisible dingleberries in those pillows.

AlexYeah, yeah.

MerlinHow's your water, Max?

MaxWell, I haven't really explored this hotel room. Let's see what this is. Okay, I've got some glass. I've got some glasses here I would use those glasses they look maybe like they were clean it's just drinking water it's just tap this hotel has like a card in it saying there's nothing in the room there's no like stuff in the room which it's kind of nice honestly they don't have a bunch of shit out on the what is that thing when you're in the bathroom

the counter, the bathroom counter there's not like a bunch of stuff but there's like a little sign that says if you forgot something we've got it Give us a ring and we'll give it to you for on loan or for the taking. And then it's like cell phone chargers, coffee maker, lip balm, apparel tape, hair bands, humidifier.

Speaker ABorrowing a lip balm? Is it like a lip balm library? Sewing kit.

Speaker BNail polish.

MaxI think a lot of hotels give you a bunch of shit littered throughout the room. This hotel is very clean. There's not a lot of stuff everywhere.

MerlinI think those are like if you get, not lush, but if you get that stuff, I think that's because that particular bathroom business unit has worked out a deal, right? Don't you think? Yes. Because that's advertising for those folks. Yeah, you know, this is a whole revolution now where more and more places are getting the squeezy pumpies in the shower instead. I got a squeezy pumpy. You got a squeezy pumpy? Oh, by the way. I got a squeezy pumpy. You got a squeezy pumpy. Okay, I think that's a thing. And also, just so you know, Alexandra, when you leave town, you will no longer be able to buy a bottle of water at the airport as of this week.

Speaker BWhat?

MerlinWell, you'll no longer be able to buy a plastic bottle of water. It must be a metal bottle of water because they banned the plastic at SFO.

AlexYou know what? Good thing I bought this water that is refillable aluminum bottle. 100 percent.

Speaker AHow are you supposed to take water on the airplane?

AlexYou bring a refillable water bottle. Yeah.

Speaker AWell, you do that thing. Like, it's the new fucking yoga mat.

MerlinWhere does the water come from? Oh, Hetch Hetchy. Probably. What? Oh, sorry. It's a place where we get our water from. It's like 100 miles away. Oh, all right. We have great tap water.

MaxOh, no, no, no. Okay, so let me try again.

MerlinOh, no, they got squirty boys. They got squirty boys, like a shake machine littered around by where they have the garbage cans. You go and you fill your water in one of those.

MaxSo you stand right over the open trash in the airport. Yes.

AlexThey're next to the bathroom.

MaxOkay, and then you just position your refillable water bottle.

AlexYeah.

Speaker ANow, I get a little weird about those refillable water bottles. Oh, of course you do. You gotta think about the cross contagion

MerlinI mean, you think no German Has ever touched that nozzle?

AlexI mean, it's just not being cleaned

MerlinAs much as it should be

AlexI'm sorry I didn't hear you I was making a bad joke

MaxIt's not being cleaned as much as it should be Oh, no Why?

Speaker AYou think they cleaned those shake machines at McDonald's? I don't think they cleaned it

MaxOh boy, I went I went to the on the way to Gen Con I stopped at a McDonald's and they have the new global menu now

Alexwhat's this?

Maxthey have like a global treats menu now like as in international? it's all international yeah it's like international treats

Speaker Agive me some idea what that is like a burrito or a wrap? the one that I tried was a Stroopwafel McFlurry I love Stroopwafel that shit was good that's gotta be my pole dancer name just for what it's worth

MaxIt was like big crunchy clusters of cookie and caramel in the McFlurry. It was good as hell.

AlexThis sounds delicious.

MaxI endorse this product. It was really, really good. I like me a Stroopwafel.

AlexThis and a side of sourdough bread. Oh, my God.

MaxAnd what else? And then this week, I also did go to Popeye's, and I got the spicy chicken sandwich from Popeye's that everyone's talking about. And it was outstanding. It was really good. Oh.

AlexAnd he didn't give me a biscuit.

MaxWhat's your review? It was excellent It was really good It was better than Popeyes Or I'm sorry

Speaker ABetter than Chick-fil-A Chick-fil-A I like them both That's problematic The Popeyes thing That everybody's worked up about

MerlinIs this a new product For Popeyes?

MaxYes It's brand new It's the chicken sandwich It's basically It's kind of I mean for lack of a better Descriptor It's kind of

Speaker AA Chick-fil-A chicken sandwich It's sort of a clone But in the Popeyes Taste and style Correct It's the Popeyes breading which is a much better breading it's the it's the real it's the real flaky breading

Merlinthe popeyes breading i know exactly what you mean i i i have to stop going popeyes and mcdonald's i i've asked my daughter to remind me i never want to go there not again but mostly not um and also it's right near where we buy our our miniatures and our paints um over on divisadero and it's a treat for me sometimes i get to go in there and i'll get a three-piece spicy white meat with red beans and rice. They were just shut down for roach infestation is a thing we're dealing with. So I don't know if I want to get the spicy thing there.

MaxI love a chicken sandwich. Wow, that's the, on this microphone, on my end of the microphone, the trolley car is very audible. This is like a 4D experience. That's good that you've set up your podcast, Merlin's Podcasting Academy for witches, for young witches and wizards.

MerlinMerlin's, it's called, The full name is the Podcast Academy for Boys. Hi. Hi. Hi, I'm Merlin Mann. Do you want to be a good podcast boy? Come on in. I got beta blockers. I got beta blockers. Your mom said it's okay. Tell her I said hi.

MaxIt's a good thing that you've established Merlin's Academy of Podcasting for Boys. Right on the trolley line.

MerlinIt's in the current of me. It's in the current of me. It was close to my house and I could afford it. And then I went, oh, no. Oh.

I have tried everything. The thing is, if you lay on the ground, the ground literally shakes. Like, sometimes you'll hear, like, things tinkling.

Oh, that was a big one. Anybody else feel that?

MaxMerlin, you're pupils. This could really have an impact on their learning.

MerlinHe gave us candy. He gave you candy? Well, beta blockers. He said you said it was all right. It's shaky there.

MaxThey're sitting there waving an XLR cable around going, Wegardium Leviosa. The trolley comes through.

MerlinHey, Ephraim. Ephraim, you want to lay on the ground? Why don't you lay on the ground? See what it feels like. It's shaky, huh? Huh? Have another beta blocker. Ephraim, are you okay? Ephraim. Ephraim, let me feel your carotid artery.

MaxDid you guys see that Donald Trump said, quote, I am the chosen one this morning? He's the king of the Jews.

Speaker BI am the chosen one?

MaxNo, he said it's a new thing. It was about the trade war with China.

Speaker AWhat? So he said the same day he said he's king of the Jews.

Maxhe also said he's the chosen one yeah wow yeah he said i'm the chosen one i the clip was a little less crazy you know here's the thing is like like like i think he was joking i'm not clear on it i mean he's always joke he's always joking and not joking right like because when he does his when he trump loves to joke about being president forever yes and you know and and how that drives

Merlinthat drives liberals crazy when he says that i know and i know well he you know he even remarks about that they think it's crazy i've heard some people say 24 years 32 years right he's trolling

Maxand i and i hate that it works on me because i know that it's deliberate but it does work on me

Speaker Bi'm very upset i'm triggered he's actually bullying grown men and it is i i don't understand

Alexwhy it's working it does it's like when you retweet him like why why would you let him get into your head yeah it's it feels like you're giving him permission well i don't listen i mean

Maxthat i think about trump for for five hours a day but i don't i try not to personally i try not to like inflict that on others like that's just my own burden of like yep yep uh have you considered

Speaker Aagain um just just going off the twitter no i'm i heard he's mostly off at this point you know what

MaxI've been I've had a couple months of like travel almost every week and that is nearing an end in I will be home for for like the rest of the fall in pretty soon. And I think that for me, the pattern is like when I'm traveling a lot, I'm on Twitter all the time because I have more of those moments where I'm like in a cab or in an elevator. And then I'm like, what do you do for you have two minutes. Right. And it's like, well, it's not really enough time to like read a book or learn a magic trick. You know what I mean? It's like those little,

so it's like, yeah, I'll jump on Twitter and see what everyone's saying. It somehow feels, it's very alluring because doesn't it have a little bit of that feeling of like.

MerlinYeah, I mean, you're away from home, but you're still connected.

MaxIt's not even the away from home. It's that it's like, okay, you have just a little bit of time. And there's something about Twitter that feels almost like maybe you're doing something. You know, it's like, wow, I'll see what the people are saying. Like, it's, you know, oh, I'll check in on, like, the discourse. You know, it's like I could just play Threes on my phone, but Threes is, like, fully self-indulgent, right? And I'm like, wow, this is just a waste of time. But if I go into –

Speaker BOh, right, right, right.

MaxTwitter has, like, a little bit of this allure of, like, oh, no, it's not a waste of time. I'm, like, in the mix.

Speaker AI think our president –

MaxDo you guys know – does that make sense?

AlexIt does.

MerlinIt kind of does?

AlexI mean I was actually going to say I was off Twitter for a couple days not intentionally but it was the opposite like I had long stretches of time where I pat myself on the back and said yeah you're going to read a book I had no idea what the fuck was happening for like three days and I missed many messages because I'm very very popular missed any sort of news did not know 25th amendment now oh pray for Amazon Why are we praying for Amazon?

MerlinOh, boy. Let's check it on Twitter. I just have to say, just in passing before we're done, I think the man has a Tobias Funke problem. He does not realize. So I don't think he was deliberately saying a Jesus thing. I think he said he accidentally blew himself, basically. You know what I mean? I think he's got a Funke problem where he just says shit that everybody else interprets in the way that it comes across to their mind, because it doesn't occur to him that the way he says it and just the weird way, the weird way that he says everything.

I'm not going to do the impression because I know you don't like it. But his thing about fucking Greenland today, did you see that one? You love to see it.

Speaker BI have no idea what's it.

MerlinAll right, all right. So this is what I woke up to today. Let's see. Oh, God. My proposal to the politically correct automobile companies. Title case. Okay, wait, let me find this here. Lame stream media, doing great. All going great. Let's see. He had a threaded thing about his visit to Denmark, I guess.

Speaker ALet me find this.

MaxDo you have a favorite Trump impression? Do you think anyone – Trump is really interesting.

MerlinYeah, the Comedy Central guy. I think he's really good. Trevor Noah? No, the fellow that does the Trump show.

MaxOh, oh. Is that Anthony –

MerlinYeah, yeah, that guy.

MaxIs that Anthony Adamoniak or something? You know, it's interesting I think he's doing a Trump impersonation But I don't think he's necessarily Got like an angle on the guy

Speaker AWell, I just think he does the best Like, you know He really does sound like And look like

MaxYeah, I mean, Alec Baldwin

Speaker ADoes a serviceable Like

MaxImpersonation I mean, you know who's really You know who's really good Is the guy who used to read the tweets On the Trump cast Oh, yeah I'm looking for his name now. Oh, shoot. I know this. He's great. No, but none of those people are doing a comedic impression. None of them have an angle on him in the same way that Dana Carvey did the Bush senior. Oh, right, right, right, right. It's a subtle distinction, but it kind of bugs me that no one's cracked the impression yet.

No one knows how to sort of make fun of Trump in a way. Maybe it's just because the guy is so unserious.

Speaker AOkay, I'm going to read this now.

MerlinOkay. Denmark is a very special country with incredible people. But based on Prime Minister Meta Fredrickson's comments that she would have no interest in discussing the purchase of Greenland, I will be postponing our meeting scheduled in two weeks for another time, five dot ellipsis, five dot four dot ellipsis. The Prime Minister was able to save a great deal of expense and effort for both the United States and Denmark by being so direct. I thank her for that and look forward to rescheduling sometime in the future.

He canceled a trick. He canceled his trip to Denmark and said that she was nasty because she will not consider selling a country to him. He's president. He's president deals.

I'm sundowning now. I'm sundowning.

Speaker AWhat do you think is happening with this Denmark Greenland thing? He's a dog with a bone. It's just a thing that occurred to him and they went, oh, great idea.

MerlinYou should buy Greenland. That's the cold one, right?

MaxDo you think he saw it on TV or something like that? Oh, I see.

MerlinOh, yeah. Like Matt Gertz? Is he the one who does the real-time connection of what he's watching on Fox to what he's saying on Twitter?

MaxYeah. Like, how did that get in his head? It's interesting. I just love to think about it.

MerlinI know they had parades for gals like you anymore. Maybe you want to put on my reading glasses. Felix's Joe Biden is my favorite thing right now.

Speaker BOh, my God. it's so good.

MerlinIt's so weird. And he must write it. There's no way he's coming up with that. Cause he does sound like somebody's sundowning deranged uncle when he does those. I don't know that they're on parades for gals like you anymore.

MaxHe is upsettingly funny. He's upsettingly funny.

Speaker AUpsettingly fast.

MerlinLike no one. He's so quick. He's so quick. He can come up with a fake name. So fast. Matt's pretty good at the names too, but like, Oh my God. anyways you do uh you do love to see it i love to see it are we gonna dunk on the are we are we going to talk about the variety no don't get that oxygen all right i'm sorry it's a problem is when you when we when we have backlash to backlash about podcasts it's not a good look

Speaker Bit's not a good look it's just a really funny cover okay alex alex how's your funny can you

Maxexplain the thing can you explain the thing that we're not going to talk about just yes please

AlexNo, there's just...

MaxAlex, you brought it up. It's in the show now. Go.

AlexIt's in the show now.

MaxWe won't talk about it, but just say what it is that we're not going to talk about.

AlexThere's a cover story of Variety. Is Conan talking into a microphone, also surrounded by lights? I don't know. It's just a very funny photo, and it's a typical boring, podcasts are booming type thing. And it got people a little angry, including me. And I don't know why. It's dumb. It's like when Trump says he's-

MerlinWell, you should read the exact language because the exact language is the same exact language that they always use that makes it sound, I don't actually care. No, I don't actually care. Really, it's fine. I'm glad people are learning about podcasts. That's good. No, but it's in that same language that is, you know, there's like whatever, the Aristotelian seven kinds of stories or whatever. this this is the kind of story that's about here's a it's a trend piece like here's a thing that's breaking big right now and it's called podcasts and the problem is that as i think the problem is

and i think the reason people get frustrated is that they are new these are people who are new to podcasting which is fine which can be a little seem a little bit carpet baggy but i think really serial was the first one where we all went are you fucking kidding me like there have been so many podcasts for so long and they're not all like angry people from public radio it's like there are people who do podcasts because they love the medium, not because they don't want to work at the New York Times anymore.

Speaker BIt just feels like gatekeeping.

MaxHow many people do we know, just between the three of us, who fully make their living doing podcasts? And not to say that this is like every person could do this, but it's out there. A lot of people, it's an important part of their livelihood and it's their passion.

MerlinI would put it this way. I would say the way that I would phrase it is how many people do we know that probably could live on their income from podcasting? And that answer is I would say I know at least 15 or 20 people probably. I don't know. Yeah.

MaxIt's not substantial. It's a fine. It's like a good. And I know even more people who have like an extremely rich and rewarding hobby that has allowed them to travel all over the world and make amazing friends and connect with people because they do a podcast. And some of them are niche, right? You're doing something that a few hundred people really, really love, and it's their

Speaker Afavorite thing in the world.

MerlinBut even if it's not the money, look at Michael Lewis. Michael Lewis doesn't need the money, but it's helping to promote his book. He's a really good author. He's actually a very good interviewer. His audio is wonderful. That show he did about his book stuff was terrific. I don't think we need to just talk about the money part and just the popularity part.

MaxIt's just that, you know. It's that podcasting doesn't need saving or fixing. Podcasting is going great. It's awesome right now. And the only thing that just pushes my buttons about not just this variety piece, but all this sort of like genre of journalism is this whole idea of like, oh, they're like celebs and Hollywood are doing it now. So like it's arrived like now they're going to come and fix it. And like, what the fuck do these people know? Like they can't even do their own industry. Right. Like all of this, everything they touch dies because they're incompetent and they don't know how to how to make the business model of films work anymore.

Like that's why they can only make six superhero movies over and over again. And there's no movies.

Alexit really that honestly doesn't bother me like the the whole we were here first type of thing feels weird and annoying even though people were here first that that is a good summary of what i

Maxsaid i thank you for thank you for wrapping that up in all bow for me okay okay the it just bothers me no you said that's what i was trying to say and i think you put it in a much quicker oh i appreciate that thank you okay okay that's what i was going for is he kidding i can't tell

AlexI can't tell either. Yes, and? Yes, and? But think about how YouTube for a while was all of these amazing creators were kind of coming up at once. And then, like, Logan Paul and then YouTube storytellers, like, this weird genre emerged because the platform of YouTube itself changed. And now there are very few people who start a YouTube channel because they are like, oh, it's not original or, you know, I want to make money from it.

And it's like embarrassing if you don't have enough followers. And I worry that podcasting is going to become that where if someone does have something that's truly unique and or even if they don't, they are going to feel like, oh, no, that's like hard. And the people who do that make it like it's a job. I don't know. I want it to be open. And God forbid, like, what if Luminary had been a success? Like, in an alternate universe, the world would, the podcasting world would make me very sad if we were all, like, on Luminary or, oh, God, iHeartMedia? Is that what it's called now?

MerlinYeah, I mean, I think everybody's right. I mean, I know of, I'm acquainted with hosts of three different shows that are, without always saying it, basically about reading a Wikipedia article.

You know, there's a whole genre of like weird facts. You could even include stuff like No Such Thing as a Fish, which I think is a very, I'm guessing is a very successful show. I think it was Apple's like best new show a few years ago. And you know what? That's what they do for a living. They look up interesting facts. There's room for so many people to do that. And just because that already exists somewhere else is, it shouldn't be a burden to people doing it. Now the YouTube thing, I, my YouTube is different from, I think most people's YouTube.

We're like, I don't know. I, I'm given to believe Alex, get my back on this, that there's a whole thing that's just about replying to other people's YouTube videos or like like having a hot take on somebody else's youtube video which then leads to more hot

Alextakes isn't that a thing that is storytelling what they call a storytelling youtube where they either tell their own story or and then sprinkle in like they weave it into someone else's video and it's a response to that and there there are people like um i don't know like phil did something i don't know like there are channels who do straight up recaps and then there are ones that recaps of other youtube videos yes correct holy shit but there are also the ones that you're talking about

where it's just like about youtube drama right yeah there's drama and then they like tag other people that are like you know what i'm sure this person's gonna make a video and then that person does make another video as a response to a video from the popular youtuber and they're all just kind of weird and sad. I don't know. Let people like what they like. It's just, there's so much bullying. I went down a rabbit hole of bully YouTube, basically. It's really just, I mean, I know if you

go and watch a lot of Nazi, just quote right-wing videos, like eventually you'll get to the Nazis, but if you watch Jake Paul once, you just get led down this rabbit hole of meanness.

I don't know. Now I've made myself sad again.

MerlinI like a genre that interests me sometimes. It's just, oh God, how many of these did I watch last night? Holy shit. Like there's that weird genre of there's that one guy who just most of his videos, almost all of his videos are just edited together things from other YouTube videos of like, who sang this eight bars from I Dreamed a Dream Best?

AlexOh, well, that's amazing. Yes, yes.

MerlinThat's amazing.

AlexThat's amazing.

MerlinI think it's very cool. Yeah, but it's weird. Here's one that I got into last night, which is mostly, this is a Spanish guy who is called Famous Sing Their Hits. Famous Sing Their Hits before versus plus 20 years later. And it's a four-part series. Here's Russell Hitchcock from Air Supply doing All Out of Love 38 Years Apart. Oh, Debbie Harry. Oh, boy. Simon and Garfunkel. But it's all just he's gone and dug up old and recent performances and put it all together.

Naina. Naina from 99 Luftballoons. I don't know. I'm kind of into that.

AlexI like that. That's like I'm not making my point well because there are so many different kinds of YouTube, just like everybody has a different kind of podcast app because it is open and great. But YouTube seems to be shrinking in on itself. Like think about the awesome bass guy that we all like that makes those bass videos.

MerlinAdam Neely.

AlexYeah. And then you're led down like music YouTube and slowly the videos are older and older and older.

MerlinAnd the Nazi music YouTube.

AlexYeah. But there aren't as many people making them from what I've seen. Like there's a point almost where you can stop after you've watched like Adam Neely and then many old, old videos from like old vloggers. And they're very good. Whereas if you are just going to Nazi YouTube or storytelling YouTube, it is endless. And I don't know. I'm just lock picking guys.

Speaker AYou got to get into lock picking YouTube.

MerlinIt's so good.

Speaker AOh, the lock picking.

MerlinLock picking lawyer rules.

MaxLock picking lawyer. That's the one. Yeah. I fucking love this guy. Did you see the one where he melt the lock with gallium? No, I did.

Speaker AI saw one. Is that the brute force one? I haven't seen that yet.

MaxLook up lock picking lawyer gallium.

Speaker AOkay. Ooh, ooh, ooh.

MaxHere's what I would say. Because I'm listening. I'm trying to articulate my point a little better. And there's something about a medium when before big money is in it. When people are spending thousands of dollars and not millions of dollars in the medium, there's some little moment there where a lot of really cool, weird, creative people, they look at that medium and they go, well, I could do that. And then they make something weird because the boundaries, the conventions and the boundaries aren't defined yet.

And it's like, well, everyone's doing everything and it's all weird. and that attracts a certain kind of person who's like i don't really give a shit if i make a lot of money from this or not but i can but i thought of something weird i can do with this medium and those things like they there's like a real like depth to them like because they're so fully committed and sometimes those people even though this isn't i don't think their main intention they do wind up making a lot of money on it right in like indie games and specifically indie board games like that is the story of cards against humanity of like we we just i just saw people

making their own board games and you know and and we had made this prototype of cards and i was like well shit like we could do that like everyone else is just some guy figuring it out and we never like there wasn't ever an intention to start a company or make any money it just sort of happened because we like made this thing that was that was like real real authentic to the thing that we wanted to make and then at some point like and listen the same thing happened in board games like at some point there was like all this consolidation and a bunch of big industry got into it and now it's like very homogenized and when this year i went to gen con and alan and i alan

who makes exploding kittens and i were walking on the show floor and we were like everything on the show floor was licensed like everything was like oh netflix licensed and movies and franchised and we're looking around and we're going like man this is all coming this is all going to collapse

Merlinlike that becomes a different industry it's like those uh there's certain like comic book companies that aren't the big three that where they'll just like lines, whatever that is, Scooby-Doo or whatever, right? It's a similar deal here where you're not really making games anymore. I don't know what it's like. I hate to say this. We don't have ads on here. A lot of the companies that do a lot of podcast advertising, if you just dig even a little bit beyond the surface, you realize they're not manufacturers. They're marketing companies, right? There are companies where it's just like, oh, no, they're just drop shipping furniture from North Carolina or whatever.

Speaker BBut they bought the factory in Germany. my name is Jesse

Merlinevery time that guy goes my name is Jesse I think it's Jesse Thorne and it confuses me we decided to make a watch out of shirts and we'd give a free pair to every African

Maxjust to wrap up my little train of thought here like podcasting is so exciting and like I love the little scene that we have in podcasting and all of our friends because like people really have like fucking figured this out right like they can do their own weird thing I don't think that most people that we know are like I'm going to start a podcast so I can get rich, I think they're like, I have something to say, and I can just put it on the internet, and people will listen to it, and that's cool. That's cool. There should be more of that. And by the way, the people who do get rich or make any money in podcasting, they generally start with that attitude.

All these people who are like, I'm going to become a millionaire off my podcast, guess what? Their shit sucks, and it rarely connects with an audience. So I like the aesthetic. I like that it's gotten as big as it has, and it still has a little bit of that punk rock indie kind of vibe to it. I like with Dubai Friday That people can go on our Patreon And they can go to giveusyourfuckingmoney.com And they can give us $5 a month And they can become a member of Dubai Friday

Speaker BWow Bravo

MaxAnd we don't have to have any ads And you know what I'm not like very Do you guys feel like a lot of pressure

MerlinI feel like they could give as little as $5 a month And I love that I love that they can do that I love

Maxand if you do that you get our exclusive after show that we record and this week only you will get a special special bonus bonus episode of about 20 minutes of Alex and Merlin just frantically yelling about audio hijack and plugging chords in and out I saved all the audio and we will edit and post that

Speaker AI just love that people can do that

MaxI just it's so

Speaker Ait's so punk rock that they can give us money

MaxI know let me ask you this I don't I actually really love this I do not feel like a ton of pressure to dramatically grow the audience size. Shit, no. I don't like Dubai. Oh, no, no, no. Do you guys wake up every morning and you're like, man, how do we get more listeners to the Dubai Friday empire? I don't care. It's awesome. I love how it is.

AlexYeah, no, but I wake up thinking, how am I going to disappoint people today? But it's not just an audience. It's everybody in my life ever. So it's just an avalanche.

MaxAnyway, I like that. I've been through other industries where we've had this cool moment and then it's kind of collapsed. And so I now have a little bit of wisdom to say things are really, really good now. These are the moments that we will look back on and go, those were the good times. We will look back at 2019 at some point in our lives and we will go, those were the salad days.

Speaker AThat was it. I totally agree.

MerlinI totally agree, especially in the sense that as somebody who – I miss my own podcast. I miss You Look Nice Today. I didn't appreciate it much at the time. I didn't appreciate enough how much I loved doing that and the response from other people. But even now, we get a new episode of Mabim Bam every Monday. That's still happening. That's not going to happen forever. I get a Flophouse every other Saturday, and that makes me so happy. I don't know how often You're Wrong About comes out, but probably every other week. But every time a new episode comes up, I'm excited.

All of those shows are not going to be around forever. You know what I mean? at some point, you know, you're going to go back and listen to him and re-listen to him. But like, to that point, I totally agree. Just another quick thing. And I think about something that John Gruber said when we did that talk at South by Southwest that some people like. We were talking about blogging and we didn't, I don't think we even realized at the time how much that was kind of the end of the good blogging era in whatever that was, whatever year that was. But he said, we were talking about, you know, the motivation to do what you do. And I realized it seemed like kind of a bust-a-gut talk for two successful white men to give. But, you know, the truth is,

he said something about, you know, you could see these guys coming a mile off. The people whose motivation is to get into this for strictly mercantile reasons. And I mean, I'm not here to say that professional people can't do great work moving into a new genre, because they absolutely can. Something I've said to y'all many times and in our Slack is that I do feel like I tend to enjoy and stick with podcasts by people who used to be or are writers rather than people who are or used to be broadcasters. I feel like there's a really fundamental difference. I think a lot of, in my heart, I feel like a lot of broadcasters,

former public radio people, mainstream media people, I think if they were honest, they would admit they feel a little bit like they're slumming because that's the thing they've got to do. Whereas people that used to be writers, I think they're grateful to have the gig. And motivations don't always have to make a difference, but I think they can, not least because whenever you go into a new thing, a new genre, try a new project, your motivations, let's just give two distinct, but maybe related motivations. If your motivation is to be liked by people who do what you do, that's going to create a certain kind of

attitude about how you do what you do, right? Related to that. If your motivation is like, I want to get better at the thing that I do, that's it. Now you shade a little more into, what if your motivation is to just get more numbers and you want to get more numbers because you can get ads and you can get ads and then get more ads i think that can be a very corrupting primary motivation it doesn't mean you don't want to make money to to be motivated by those

Speaker Ato me good things can i share a great a great little a great little brain worm with you about

Maxthis about that exact thing please i want to enter make i want to make a new file a new entry in the dubai friday canon okay so there's a japanese magician that uh jordan that jordan and simon and I all think is a master. He's a pretty young dude named Shoot Agawa. And he speaks just a little bit of it. He's not like... His English is okay, but he's not a native speaker in English. But Shoot is like a god of... His shit is so

next level. It's so deceptive. This guy's got crazy chops and all his own original stuff. It's really humbling to see him perform. And I think a lot of the people that I'm friends with in magic really look up to this guy, Shoot. And we're like, Shoot's the real deal. And most people have no idea who he is and they haven't heard his name. And Jordan one day was talking to – Jordan is like my magic teacher. And Jordan was talking to Shoot. And Jordan said to Shoot, he said, Shoot, do you know there's these really famous YouTuber magicians?

And a lot of what they do is they teach magic tricks for free on YouTube. and they expose magic on YouTube. And they're sort of like cool YouTuber, like Casey Neistat wannabe. Have you guys ever, I don't know why you would have,

Speaker Abut this is a whole sub-genre on YouTube.

MaxNo, no, I didn't know that. It's a thing.

MerlinOh, I have seen, like when we watched that one trick by the guy who won the contest, I went and saw some reaction videos and that kind of stuff.

Speaker ASo I think that's what you're talking about. That's always what they're doing is it's like,

Maxyes, they're taking some magic performance that goes viral and then they're doing like I react to Eric Chien at FISM. And it's like, you know, it's like, oh, hey, no big deal. It's this guy's life's work that he's made these three minutes of entertainment and now I'm going to monetize his performance on my YouTube channel and like expose the secrets and judge it and talk about it. It just bugs.

Speaker BIt just needles me. Oh, that's shitty. I thought like I don't even.

MaxNo, it needles me. And they give away. Anyway, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Anyway, these guys, they kind of suck. And most people in Magic are like not super into them. And Jordan, anyway, Jordan is talking to shoot one day, the master, and Jordan says to shoot, what do you think of so-and-so YouTuber who's, you know, he's got three million subscribers or whatever, and he's making tons of money doing this. And shoot, you know, he shoots Japanese, so he's trying to be respectful, and he thinks about it for a second, and he sort of shakes his head, and he goes, I think he is Internet Numbers Man.

Oh, my God. Internet Numbers Man. Internet Numbers Man. internet numbers man. I'm sorry that was a whole side thing but what you're talking about Merlin of like the Yeah, no, that's it. That's internet numbers man. Yeah. I think when you're saying there's broadcasters who get into podcasting because they want to become internet numbers man.

MerlinI totally agree and then like I know this is not related. God damn it. I know this is not related but it feels related. You know, I understand you got a fucking podcast network or like whatever. You have a studio let's say in New York City. You've got maybe it's like WNYC, let's say, for the sake of argument. Yep. And you really need to bootstrap your new show. So what do you do? Well, first of all, you start jamming other fucking shows into an existing feed where somebody has the express interest of listening to this particular program, and you start jamming shit in there and go,

wow, you know what? We know you're going to be really excited about this new show we're doing that has fuck all to do with the show that we do, but here it is, and here's an episode. And then maybe you start doing that more. And then you start doing stuff like, oh, you have guest hosts where you don't have to work as hard. And then you start, you know what I mean? You kind of Terry Gross it a little bit. She's earned it. Like she's been in this shit for 40 years. She's earned some time off in her 60s or whatever. But, you know, it's just there's so much shit where it's like, wait a minute. Where's the regular three hosts? They should show up every goddamn week, put out this show on time and try.

And part of trying is setting aside bullshit that is insulting to your listeners. I'm not usually this particular guy, but it's so skeevy. how many people with shows I really love will walk right up to the edge of bullshit in doing what they do. And this is something I said to Syracuse, I think in the last episode of Reconcilable Differences. But you know when Seth and Saul open up their hardware business in Deadwood? All right, open for business. We got pans. And the guy comes in and goes,

check this out, 50 cent bar of soap. I found a $5 bill in it. Over there every hour, They're giving away $5 in a bar. And Seth walks up to the guy and he's like, take your business elsewhere. Because that's what it is. You show up and you take somebody's fucking magic video and reveal it. You put bullshit in the feed. You do all of this stuff. And all this stuff, it's not terrible, but it is bullshit. And now you're just not as good anymore. Because now you're the person who does, you're playing a game.

And you're trying to show somebody there's $5 in a bar of soap. Even if you're like, it's not that different from a fucking reply guy who just shows up and is like, or like wants to talk about their chemtrails inside, you know, Maggie Haberman's mentions or whatever. Why? You've never seen so many phonies in your whole life is what I'm saying.

MaxI've got everyone all upset. It's just, it's something, there's something about the mob mentality of like once someone starts sort of juking the stats and doing that dumb bullshit, then everybody feels like, well, I'm a sucker. I don't want to be the only sucker who's not doing it, right? Yes. And so everybody sort of rushes towards that stuff that's really annoying to the actual listeners.

Speaker AWell, you know what? Think about boarding a plane, Max.

MerlinThink about when you're boarding a plane. And everybody's in a fucking boarding group. You have a number. If your number is three numbers away, you do not need to be standing right next to where the line is right now. You don't. There's no need for that. You know who does that? People who are in first class. It's the funniest fucking thing in the world. is they will just, with their little stupid fucking carry-on bag, they will just like a vulture, just like a diarrhea vulture, just stand there and like,

I gotta get on there. It's like, guy, guess what? You're in first class, guy. You've got a chair. They've got a chair for you that they're not going to give to anybody else. And there's a hole in the ceiling where you can put your fucking bag, chill out, move, Let old ladies and children get on the goddamn plane. Nothing is being taken away from you. God, I hate people today.

MaxSo there's the crabs in a bucket thing. There's the mob mentality thing. But then you've also got on the platform side, at some point there's so much stuff out there that everyone's like, why can't I find all the good stuff? And then they start to do algorithms. And guess what? The algorithms, usually these platforms wind up in a state of a parasitic sort of codependence on the people who are doing these gimmicks because the people who are doing the gimmicks are internet numbers guy.

And guess what? They bring in the fucking numbers.

MerlinAnd now that's the thing. That's the thing. And that's the new normal. I don't know if my plane thing made sense. I just wanted to say, those guys start swarming and then everybody else swarms. And then pretty soon, you've got this crush of people like a fucking Who concert moving nowhere except closer to where they don't need to be. And that's the internet.

MaxI find myself thinking that all the time. I'm like, you know, I don't know, whatever the trip, everyone's streaming on Twitch. I sometimes I find myself I'm sitting at my desk going, am I I don't want to be the only sucker who's not doing this. Am I missing out? No, no, no, no, you don't. I mean, I've it's I'm just saying, like, you guys must feel that. I mean, you can relate to that feeling, right? Of like, yes, everyone's doing this and I don't want to be the only sucker who's not. So there's the social side, but then there's also the platform side, which is like like I was saying, like it's just like.

At some point, there becomes an algorithm that sorts stuff, and the stuff that, sadly, the stuff that gets sorted to the top tends to be all this bullshit that we don't like that we're talking about.

AlexBut that doesn't... It feels like that doesn't need to happen. Like, sub-pop is still a label, and the golden days of music in various genres will come and go, but I think there are enough people in independent podcasts with enough money that they're not going to let that happen. like do you i i don't think the flop house is going to start doing reruns and i don't think

Merlinatp is going to be like i can't even imagine this is dave davies in for elliott kalen no but it it's

Maxa it's a bit of a bummer if if conan if podcasts are a thing now because conan's doing a podcast

Speaker Bno he but he's been doing it for years too and it's pretty good like i i like it and that's why

Alexit's weird is because he did it on a whim and he's like there doesn't need to be another he even says this in the variety piece there doesn't need to be another comedian interviewing people and it was like that but then his producers are like no you're conan o'brien you have it makes sense it makes a

Merlinton of sense for him to do it it's pretty good he's playing in a smaller pond than he used to and he needs to have some hustle for his shit it makes sense and it's i don't think they've ever

Alexrerun something that he he's done and that is why that's that's also why it's funny to me that he's on the Variety cover because this show has been around so long and it's really, I mean,

Merlinnot so long. I mean, is that correct? Was he gone for a long time? I feel like this is a recent in the last year show.

AlexNo. Conan wants some friends. Colonel O'Brien needs a friend. Yeah.

MerlinOkay.

AlexAnd they did announce, oh, I think at the very end, like he's rebooting or doing something.

Speaker BBut let me see.

MerlinNo, no. Well, 2018.

Speaker BOh, you're right. Oh my God, yes.

MerlinSo here's the thing Yes, yes, 2018

Speaker BOkay

MerlinIntroducing Conan's new podcast Oh, I love those Here's the podcast that's coming

Speaker BThat's fun in the feed We've all done it

MerlinWe've all done it Batteries

Speaker BWait, no It's been an hour I need pho, we're starting two hours late And I'm starving Alright This was Merlin's challenge?

MerlinHello. Yeah, so my thing was, I just mentioned, I think in passing, at some point, I guess in the after show last week, that I think we may have done this once before. I like the idea of completely arbitrarily just look over some old episodes and do some catch-up, if you like follow-up on an old thing where there's something new. And the reason I mentioned that was very specifically because, hey, congratulations, Max Temkin. You got me into these goddamn Eneloop batteries.

I'm all in on Eneloop batteries. So the challenge this week was to get some rechargeable batteries and do stuff with them. So that's what we did.

MaxI've been on the Eneloop. So I heard about the Anteloups from, I think, from the Giant Bomb guys. I think they turned me on to Anteloups like years ago. And they're basically like super high quality AA and AAA rechargeable batteries. And what's happened for me is over the course of the last year or so, every time I need a battery in anything in my house, so if a battery dies or if I buy something new that needs batteries, I throw out the old battery and I replace it with an Enteloup and then the end once the Enteloup is in now

I I don't have to throw those out you just recharge those and I think over the course of about a year I think I've now replaced every single battery in my house with double that's where I am that's right and I got and I got a couple of different chargers right so I have a charger in my office and I have a charger in the kitchen and that what that what's nice about that is I don't have to like you know it makes it a little more convenient for me when I'm feeling lazy to like actually remember to plug the batteries in. And then the other trick for Anteloops that I've discovered is you're going to need more, you want more Anteloops than you need

because the trick is not to, when your remote dies, the goal is not to recharge the batteries overnight and not have a remote. The goal is that you have like hot batteries ready to go to pop into the remote. Then you charge the dead ones and you put them back in the drawer. So you always have fresh batteries in the drawer.

MerlinThat was going to be one of my tips too is that, I mean, this has gotten so much a thing that we do that it's just plugged in in our kitchen because of how often I do this. But my tip would even be, and they're costly, so you don't want to go too crazy, but definitely buy more than you think you need. And what I do is I have one box that is these needs to be charged. And then another one, I have one of those storage ones, like a storage thing, a bespoke battery storage thing. And that's what I do. So, you know, we've got stuff like under counter, under our cabinets, we have these lights where we don't

have electric lighting under there, but like you wake up in the morning, you want to make coffee, you don't want the overhead light. And it's one of those little touch, touch the little metal thing and the lights turn on LEDs. We do those. We've got, again, battery powered motion sensor lights in our garage. We've got LEDs on little strips in our pantry. So yeah, same thing here, Max, where it started out with, you get these, you charge them, you top them off. And then, you know, you can, when they run out, you replace. It's been however long, probably almost a year now.

And I'm finally, I think I'm finally all in because there are some things we hardly use at all. But like all of my flashlights, all of the lights. And Alex, you had said like, how would you need that many batteries? And it's like, well, a combination of a kid plus gadgets plus lots of lighting. And I think they're terrific. You know, the best advice you gave, and then I'll shut up, is when you said, you know, don't overthink the charging thing. just you know once they're all charged once they're all installed they're gonna go bad only a little at a time not bad but they're gonna empty a little at a time and you just put them in overnight and

Maxyou're done you don't want to overthink it they're great yeah that's that's here's my i have general life advice for just do by friday listeners in general which is this there's some things in your life and they're usually like little shits that you need and they're never where you want them you know what i mean like like uh i would say like chapstick is a is maybe an example of this

AlexWe've talked about this all the time. Just two of everything.

MaxAt least. At least. No, no. See, apparently I don't talk about it enough because I...

Speaker BAll right. You're right. You're right.

MaxScissors. Look at this. I'm always near scissors.

AlexWhat is it with scissors? I feel like that's one of the things. People just take them.

MaxScissors is such a good example.

AlexThat's... Oh, they're just so easy to take.

MaxWe had one scissors in our kitchen for a long time, And I would use it to like cut open a thing of bacon and then I'd need to wash it. But I would also need to like open a bag of coffee by the coffee maker. And I would also need to open Amazon boxes for it when I had an Amazon box in the kitchen. And at some point I realized like what am I doing with my life that I have this one pair of scissors that I'm just like, you know, use it. No, you know what? Now I have fucking four pairs of scissors in the kitchen and I have one. I have one by the coffee. I have one. I got a food scissors that I use to, you know, for meat and stuff.

Speaker AAnd I have one that's just for Amazon package. Poultry scissors? Poultry? poultry scissors.

MerlinI have the Marco scissors right here, Alex.

AlexThe Marco, did he do another blog post about scissors?

MerlinYeah, but I tried some of the premium ones. I wasn't really into it. Can you say what they are? Sure. These are so sharp. They are really upsettingly sharp, and I will look them up.

Speaker BOh, no.

MerlinYeah, no, but these are, oh, these are good. Keep talking. Alex, did you get batteries?

Speaker BWhen I, I truly. I have a jar. of failure. What? Jar of failure. Peanut butter. No. Honestly, quite the opposite.

AlexI was skeptical of not like if they were good or not. I was just like, there's not that many batteries in my life. I was wrong. Not in my house. I still don't know. There's nothing in my house that needs a double A battery except. Weird. No flashlights? Nope. what are they? The ones that you crank I have a cranker to recharge

MerlinGod, you're a monster

Alexbut there are two very very important things my zoom which requires four AA batteries and it takes up a whole bunch of power and I have to change those fairly often because the, what's it called? Self discharge? Oh boy

Merlinmanual release yep every time i cook with the instant pot i say i have to do a manual release

Alexbut more importantly we have this huge wait hold on i went to the rechargeable because they when they are just like what's the standby time on these um how long can

Merlinthey stay well you know what's interesting is uh i you know me um i got a spreadsheet for everything and when i got these i did some spreadsheets and uh they they say often that they're fully charged when they arrive that ain't true they'll still take a few hours of charge also just for fun when i take them out and they've been sitting for a while i do top them off before i put them in personally so i don't know what the standby is that's that's i think that's part of the problem with these is they probably don't they i wouldn't i wouldn't expect these to maintain their level for

Maxa year oh i this is crazy i just throw them in a little bin and i use them when i use them and like the thing with double a batteries is like i don't have any applications for everything that i have that's like i need this to last the power to last like forever it's like it's rechargeable now flashlights i don't all flashlights are i think well i guess i have like a single double a battery in my flashlight. Hmm, hmm, hmm.

AlexWe have... I got the Marco flashlight, too. Wait, wait, wait. The marker flashlight?

MerlinMarco.

AlexMarco flashlight. I'm informed by listener

MerlinJohn Syracuse that it's not pronounced Fenix, it's pronounced Phoenix.

AlexPhoenix.

MerlinI said Fenix. F-E-N-I-X. I would say Fenix.

AlexFenix is better.

MerlinSo you like them, Alex? You like the battery boys?

AlexI was like, these are fine, they're normal, but we have a gigantic sound rig for live Cards Against Humanity shows that involve 12 different lav mics and 12 receivers. So I just did a test. I put like three in three.

Okay, no. So six. Yep, I can do math. Used six of the antelopes. I like to call them antelopes also. And then just use regular double A's. And not only did the antelopes last longer, they lasted two shows worth. Like so that's like regular alkaline batteries. Yes. Which is what has. So I use the pro ones, which I guess last longer, but they took forever to charge. And I don't crazy. Yeah. And I don't know what it is. But like after every show, we end up basically throwing away 24 batteries because it's on for like three hours.

MerlinIt does feel, you know, of the things, that does feel so shitty. It feels so shitty for us to have those little under-counter lights. My wife forgets to turn it off in the morning. We don't see it because now it's light out. This is not on her. But, like, and now that's three batteries we throw away, which is gross. Like, of all the shit, I mean, I'm not the most environmentally woke person, but, like, God, it just seems so unnecessary.

AlexYeah. So the challenge, not peanut butter. No peanut butter. No peanut butter.

MaxWhat are your other, what are your other, so we have scissors. batteries what are your other little shits that you have i have chapsticks all over the house i have oh uh clipper nail clippers you're gonna want those all over the place microfiber glass

Merlinjapanese nail clippers for sure um i've got the greatest nail clippers in the world they're great

Speaker Ai think i'm converted i'm fully converted over to those those are really excellent

Merlinyeah yeah put one of those in your toiletries bag for your your set aside travel bag i have so many things like this it's not something i'm extremely proud of but like for example like there's shit i need to do in the basement and i don't want to have to remember like there's so much stuff in the basement where i could really benefit from a knife and other kinds of tools so now i have one of my less fancy leather man leathers men that i just that i just leave down there the japanese amazon package opening uh knife i have one of those down there uh you guys got those you got the Japanese package opening knife?

Speaker AOh, yeah.

AlexOh, wait. Yes, yes, yes. I'm sorry. The cardboard one. Yes.

Speaker AThat's the one I stabbed my hand with. Oh, no. The yellow one is blunt. Oh, no. Never mind.

MaxI have a different Japanese one.

Speaker AOh, you got to get in on this.

MerlinI have shits like that. I love shits like that. I do a lot of stuff. Like, yeah, you know, I just I deploy things in various places. I have like a like, you know, a lot of people like, oh, gosh, I got an iPhone and it came with these. It used to be you get the headphones or whatever or, you know. And so just keep those around. Keep those in a glove box. You're going to need them someday, especially if you have a kid who lost your itemetics that are brand new. Not that I'm mad.

AlexOh, my.

MerlinBut stuff like that, just keep them around, know where they are. Even like I have a Ziploc bag full of five-watt dongles. I don't know when I'm going to need them. But oh, these cables. Oh, so Max, also, I'm trying a new multi-cable. The Belkins I haven't been able to get.

AlexYeah, they're sold out like everywhere.

MerlinReally? Okay, so that one, how do you describe that, Alex? It's like a half a Hydra?

AlexIt's beautiful. Yes, it's like a half hydra or just like spindly alien arms. They're kind of like the Arrival. Oh, look it.

MerlinOh, they are the Arrival. They're Evan Costello. So, Max, this is a braided cord with USB-A on one side. And then coming out of that are two lightnings, a mini, and a USB-C.

Speaker BWhat? They know.

Speaker ASo you could do all of them. Two lightnings?

Speaker BYeah.

Speaker AWhere is that? What's this called? It's Chinese. I'll find it. Um, uh, but, uh, is it, is it available on amazon.com for purchase? Well, it's available on Amazon prime now. You can have in two hours. Let me look. What's it, what's it called? What do I search for?

AlexOh my God. I just remembered. I don't know. I'm looking for it.

MerlinThe site is garbage. The, the Amazon prime site is the prime now site is so bad.

AlexI literally didn't know there was a website and thought you could only use the app. Uh, but, but what, since you're in San Francisco, what's the most wild thing you can get on prime? Because it lives here basically. Right?

MerlinOh, there's, my goodness, so many things.

AlexOh, wow, even opening the app. Rubber, oh.

MerlinYou get more things? Rubber ducks?

AlexThere's a rubber duck for outdoor play.

MerlinOh, dear. Extremerestraints.com.

Speaker BThey'll buy, they'll bring you luggage. There's water-friendly electronics.

MerlinI mean, I like, I, okay, so it sounds like I'm dragging these guys and I'm not. I bought the Studio Neat version of this, and it's cool. but it is a huge cable and I don't think it works on some super high capacity USB-C things and so this is a less costly option which I can't find for some reason let me look at my orders yeah what can you get on Prime now do you guys have full Whole Foods delivery there on Prime now

Alexnot on like a very limited selection okay can you order like food food through Prime Now?

MerlinOh, well, Amazon has a whole food food thing here.

AlexOh, okay. Like, well, in Seattle, I opened Prime Now and it was like an Uber Eats or Postmate DoorDash situation.

MerlinOh, I hate to admit I love Uber Eats. Boy, they'll do you a McDonald's in 22 minutes, baby.

AlexWoo! They also have, my rating is the same on Uber Eats as it is in the Uber app. How do you know? How do you look that up? I just asked my Uber driver one time

Merlinbecause I had an Uber Eats sticker. No stats, no stats.

AlexDo you not look at your Uber number?

MerlinOh my God, no. I don't want to know what anyone thinks about me ever.

Speaker BOh, it's...

MerlinOh shit, how could you live with that? You know what you need?

Speaker BThat's rough. Who's ready for beta blockers? Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha!

Thank you.

146. Internet Numbers Man

Show notes

Transcript

146. Internet Numbers Man

Show notes

Transcript

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