248. Existential Sculpting

AlexThis is Do By Friday, a weekly challenge podcast with Merlin Mann and Alex Cox. This week's challenge, do something fun with NFC. Hello. Rabbit, rabbit. This is the first. Well, have you texted me? Well, save it for the challenge. Save it for the challenge. Hi. Hi, Merlin. How are you?

MerlinHello?

AlexHello? Hello? Can you not hear me? Oh, no. Can you not hear me?

MerlinNo, I can hear you.

AlexOkay. I'm sorry.

MerlinYou're coming in a little bit hot.

AlexOh, gosh. Well, it's one of those days where I didn't sleep, and so I'm a little warm, I guess.

MerlinWhy didn't you sleep? Why? You have stuff to do?

AlexNo. No, no, no. Well, if by stuff to do, you mean play with the iOS beta. until 5 a.m. But no, I don't know. Probably because I took a Claritin D like middle of the day yesterday instead of beginning of the day. I did a double dose. I shouldn't have.

MerlinOh, Alex, I'm about to make you so envious.

AlexOh, no. Oh, go on.

MerlinWell, you know, just when I don't know whether things are going well, I discovered things are going well and everything's coming up in Milhouse.

AlexEverything's going well? Like in the world? I don't know.

MerlinSee, now whenever I tell you how I feel about something, then you feign concern or feign happiness that you don't have to have concern. And I'm very scared of talking about my life with you because I feel scrutinized.

AlexListen, listen, jazz, jazz, jazz, they talking. And this did not turn out well for me last time. But I think.

MerlinSounds like you didn't sleep a lot last night.

Alexi would love for editor quinn to to roll back and what what you said i believe uh that's that's what you do is you had heard that things were going well so i was not commenting do you need me do you need me for this one i i am just wondering what's going well because i want to hear about

Merlinyour life because I care. Okay. Okay. Okay. Listen, I have a walk. This is going to be floated with op second. As I've said, don't give the internet puzzles, but I live not too far from

Alexa walk. No, you didn't say that. You didn't say, ah, what's happening right now? What is, what is happening? I'm here. Go ahead. I'm, I'm on a, you know what I'm going to do? I'm,

MerlinI'm literally grunt, grunt twice. If you're being held against your will,

AlexI'm literally going to put, I'm literally going to put myself on a mute. Go ahead.

MerlinNo, don't do that. Please don't do that. No, I have to deal with this with Syracuse. Turn it off. Alex, come back.

AlexNo. Are you saying you want a safe space? I apologize.

MerlinSafe space? Safe space how? Oh, safe space.

AlexFrom away from Mr. Syracuse.

MerlinYou're saying I want a space that's safe.

AlexYeah, yeah.

Merlin50 black slick back hair wigs. Okay. Pancake by drunk dump truck driver. Tim Robinson writes a really good tongue twister.

AlexOh, I haven't seen it yet.

MerlinNo, that's last season. That's last season. Remember Tiny Dinky Daffy, Pancake by Drunk Dump Truck Driver? They don't usually list the cause of death because of the oral. And so it's nice to have a Walgreens near your house. Heck yeah. But it's also nice not to have to go to Walgreens or have to rely on Walgreens. And listen, I don't want to get into a whole thing here. There's a lot going on with Walgreens in San Francisco. It's too much to talk about here.

A bunch of them closed because people just keep walking in and stealing everything. Anyway, we've got it. We've got our suburban Walgreens and whatever. But okay, so I have not liked going there for a long time. You might have heard me once or possibly twice have an anecdote about a weird experience I've had at our Walgreens. Right? Part of it is, as CGP Grey would say, the law of large numbers. I go there often enough that some shit's going to go down.

AlexYeah.

MerlinAnd yes, they do still, I think his name's Tran. Tran still walks me to the counter when he unlocks my deodorant from jail. Even though I've been coming in there for 20 years, Tran still has to walk me up there because Tran knows I'm a flight risk and this could be the longest con of all time. Get a .com job, move to San Francisco, and then find a way to build credibility for 20 years so you can steal a $7 deodorant. Thank you, Tran. Anyway, I'm Tran-phobic. and so that's not funny that's not funny and so i was laughing at something else but you know

what drives me most crazy i mean i just i hate getting prescriptions there as i told you i i don't understand it's like people from another planet i'm dealing with there it's just it's a woman who like wants me like wants to yell my address and stuff it all makes me very uncomfortable

Alexand you know what sucks most of all oh i hate that and then sometimes they yell the name of the medications you're picking up and i'm like okay i mean are you like incongruent like are marjorie taylor green being hippo violation hippo hippo i'm like oh please don't tell everybody i

Merlintake shit a fan um so anyway the thing that's most galling and this is galling to me on so many levels but you know claret and d right you can get that toy claret and that my my uh my daughter's mother gets she gets toy claret and i get the real stuff because i know you got to throw that d right get Put it on there.

AlexOh, yeah. Got to have the D. Yes.

MerlinPut it in my mouth. But owing to that law from like 2003, oh, hey, we're going to stop everybody from making bathtub meth. So we're going to cancel ephedrine, boo. And now you can't buy cold medicine that fucking works without going to the counter and saying, hello, can I please have some cold medicine that works, please? And you can't buy too much because if you buy too much, and I did get the lowdown from my shrink about the exact number of grams that you can have per month in one or two purchases

anyways i'm scared i don't want the federales coming to my house because i want to breathe yeah so i gotta go in there and it's like a fucking rally i can't go too early i can't go don't want to go too late i'll run out yes there are days when i take two rather than one claret and d right so i guess i'm not a i'm not a bathtub meth methier but i i am uh you know you you know

Alexwhat okay there was an old saying at my college um in you not on you so i think as long as the clarity is in you in you not on you basically no no no no no no i mean well it works either way i guess um but the idea was you come back to the dorm and they could get you in they would basically have to get you in trouble or they'd somehow be fired if uh they smelled weed or whatever and they're like listen just we don't care just in you not on you i see you guys can go kiss all

you want just not where i can see it okay and the thing is the confusion that you're feeling now the entire like 30 people of the freshman class in in my dorm like floor was like in not on in not on and then she's just out drugs drugs take drugs outside and then she did get in trouble

Merlinbecause what an interesting story i'm no roderick so what i don't love is and that bugs me it bugs me that if i want to throw the d i gotta go in there i have to interact and listen listen i know i'm walking a line here but let's just put it this way the latest time that i had to go in to throw the d okay i'm i'm nearly always the second person in line there's a person at the counter and then there's me. And I swear to Christ, I don't want to be unkind because this could be a person that's getting medication for like 60 elderly people.

But I'm always behind the person that appears to be remortgaging their house. I don't know. At the ATM, I'm always behind the person who's doing some kind of complicated financial instrument. When I'm at Walgreens, I'm always behind the person who has to pull wads of paper out of a bag and like verify and it goes on. All I want is the fucking Claritin D. It's mental to me. I hate everything about it. I hate everything about it. Now, it's part of an omnibus effort. I have been moving all of my drug-related things to this one family pharmacy that I happen to like a lot and who has a very good relationship with my shrink.

Which shrink is the only person that prescribes me things because I don't believe in doctors. Okay? If I want a new thing, I go to him. And he's a libertarian, so we're good.

AlexSo, of course, it works.

MerlinSo, I go to my family pharmacy. Now I've gotten it down to we're very close. We're like basically three weeks away from everything I need for the entire month. Yes, including the schedule whatever drug that has to be prescribed manually. Right? Like, you know what I mean? When you get the good stuff. Like with Adderall, I had to take in a physical prescription. Well, now they can deal with my shrink who sometimes needs to be bugged a little bit to do stuff. He's a libertarian.

AlexBut here's the thing.

MerlinAnd you know what the family druggist said to me? He said, I said this to him. I says, hey, do you have Claritin D 12 hours? The one that's around 30 bucks? And he says, no, but I can get it for you. I said, you know, because I want to avoid the federales. And he says, well, you know, there's so many grams you get a month and so forth. Long story short, you know, he says, you should talk to your libertarian psychiatrist. Because he can prescribe you Claritin D. And A, it's always two things with my libertarian shrink.

Number one is you're not dealing with this anymore, right? Number two, there's no limit if it's a prescription.

AlexAnd number three, it's paid for by the insurance. Oh, my God.

MerlinSo I walked in there. I trotted in there the other day. I trotted in there the other day. I walked out with two giant boxes of Claritin D with my name on it. And I can take two a day.

AlexOh, my gosh.

MerlinI can take two a day. I don't want to take two every day. I want to take two most. Let's be honest. I take two a lot of days.

AlexMm-hmm.

MerlinI crack the nut. I'm so close. I'm so close to almost not having to go to the Walgreens druggist.

AlexSomeone, you know, you know the lifehacker people. You got to text them and get back on it.

MerlinVery close. Very close to them. I had dinner with one of them once.

AlexYeah.

MerlinGina's terrific. You know that, right? You know Gina's amazing.

AlexOh, Gina Trapani? Yeah.

MerlinYeah. Yeah. I mean, the actual website can kiss my white ass, but I really like Gina and her partner. So that's a nut I cracked.

Alexoh and her her book about google wave and i am in all i'm being totally serious it was such a

Merlinwell-written book and then and i like how she is like yep or my favorite one of my favorite really extremely bad jokes on twitter a long time ago was when google wave finally folded its tent and i think it's not funny but i said like they wanted to turn off google actually wanted to turn off google wave three weeks ago but nobody could figure out how to turn it off like where it was

AlexGina's nice.

MerlinYeah, we had dinner in San Diego, our two families. It was nice.

AlexOh, gay. I'm glad it was nice. Yeah, yeah. Real talk. She was the first, like, lesbian that I saw in tech and was like, holy shit. And so that made me, like, imprint somewhat.

MerlinI slept pretty well last night. I slept. Huh?

AlexPapa D.

MerlinPapa D. Oh, I did. Yeah. Ten amphetamine commandments. Number one, you got to get prescription to the Walgreens. Number two, otherwise Federale is going to be seen.

Number three.

AlexSpeaking of Hamilton. Oh, wait, what happened with Hamilton?

MerlinOh, I have cancelable remarks that we'll probably have to do in the after show.

AlexAgain? It's been canceled like seven times. All right. Let's... Who?

MerlinNo, me. No, no, no, no, no.

AlexOh, cancel remarks. Cool. Oh, this is the one. This is... Oh. Save it for the show. Save it for the show. Yes, we will. Okay. What show are you talking about?

MerlinI also have an anecdote about hamburger panties.

AlexMerlin, if people wanted to hear about your hamburger panties and perhaps why my spouse is being canceled, where could they find that?

MerlinNo way. Do you actually read the things that I've read or you just scan it for trouble?

AlexMy glance at...

MerlinNo one's in trouble here but me.

AlexNo. Okay. All right. All right. Where did... I'm in the dock. I'm in the dock. I don't even... All right. Here is the note. Hey, listeners. Hey, Perry Pals. What's happening? Did you want to have me... Are you doing the bid or not doing the bid? Merlin, I'm going on a break. Hey, Merlin. I'm going to... God, no. Hey, audience. I just called you Merlin.

MerlinStop breaking the Claritin in half, Alex. Jeez.

AlexSometimes Merlin write things in the doc and it says, Merlin has cancelable remarks about Matchy, who is my spouse, and quote, existential sculpting. Why do you... This is why I don't put anything in the doc. What's that, Merlin? I'm taking a break. I'm taking a break. So if you wanted to stay for the after show, I would suggest doing that. You can find the after show at giveusyourfuckingmoney.com and it only takes $5 a month.

MerlinAnd we do want your money. We want you to enjoy the show where we are actually legit grateful. I'm not doing that bullshit thing where I go, it really helps people discover the show.

AlexNo, we really could use the money.

MerlinNo, no, no, no. But like it's, it's, it can't two things be true. You know what I'm saying?

AlexOh, absolutely.

MerlinYou don't mean to be epistemological on Maine. Hmm. But, but, but no, we really do. We do appreciate the support. And, you know, it's, you know, this show, it's a journey. But yeah, you can go to patreon.com slash do by Friday. And so there's that.

AlexJoe Rogan.club. Oh, yeah, that's good.

MerlinJoe Rogan. Wait, what did you get? You got Joe Rogan podcast.club. What is it?

AlexOh, let me see. I think it's, yeah, Joe.

MerlinYou don't even get your own bit right, Alex.

AlexRogan. No, Joe. It's not a bit. Joe Rogan. Yeah.

MerlinPro Smiths, no bits.

AlexNo, no. Joe Rogan. I'm just spelling it out. I thought I had this text expander snippet. I guess not. Joe.

MerlinI think it's Joe Rogan podcast.club.

AlexIt is. It is indeed. That's even better. Oh, that's even better. Oh, look at that. I always forget that our Patreon page has a very cute photo of us, and it makes me happy every time.

MerlinThat's a really cute photo of us. You're very attractive, Alex. I said to him, I have so many problematic things to say about your household. And one of the things I said is, it sounds weird for me to say this, but I really like the way Alex looks. Alex is cute. I said that to my kid.

Alexit's it's interesting because uh yeah you know i'm slowly seeing more and more of my family members for the first time yeah yeah i can tell it's awesome yeah it's it's so fucking weird and so like so great and they keep me like you you look happy in the oh man i'm like oh boy in the way that some people are like did did you lose weight they're like you you look happy and i'm

MerlinThat's so good.

AlexI think I am then. All right.

MerlinI mean, that is good, right? It's nice that they're going to say something weird to you. It's nice that it's nice.

AlexOh, absolutely. Oh, absolutely. This is a me thing, not a them thing. For all the weird shit they do, this is one of those delightful.

MerlinIt looks like you've been retaining pasta.

AlexOh, gosh. I forgot how good, well, not homemade, but fresh pasta. Well, okay. Listen, I did have noodles with butter, but.

MerlinYou Dan Benjamined me a little bit because you just sent me a photo of something. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to say about it or what it was for. But I assumed it was your way. You sent me a beautiful, it looked like an eating out plate.

AlexIt was.

MerlinIt was. Well, hang on. Oh, dear. Okay. It looked like you were dining somewhere. Not that you were eating out. But it was noodles. It was noodles on one of those pretty eating out plates.

AlexMm-hmm. And it was the flat one. Fettuccine? Oh, I'm going to get email.

MerlinOh, the kind of pasta?

AlexI think so. Yeah, yeah.

MerlinYou probably sauced it wrong. Did you heat it in a bowl?

AlexOh, oh. It did. It did. It came in a heated bowl. No, no, no. Here's the thing. It came in a heated bowl.

MerlinDid she cook an egg with a spoon? Anyway.

AlexIt came in a heated bowl, and I could tell that it had been made in salted water.

MerlinOh, you could tell the difference. Was this at a Jardin d'Olive with your family?

AlexIt was with my family, and my grandma picked it. So, of course, it was like really fancy.

MerlinWhat was it like? Were you at an Olive Garden? I call it Giardando Leaf.

AlexNo, no shade against Olive Garden. But yes, it was some French, not a French name, some Italian name. And it was one of those places with a medallion base. The, that's what it's like. The Nintendo Switch in parentheses is like the OLED.

MerlinLexico.

Alexso merlin uh you you uh you you got a good sleep you're a goddamn mess alex i don't hate it but you're a goddamn mess you got some good sleep i am i'm i'm happy but over caffeinated um you you

Merlinknow have you thought you would you consider switching i don't know if you could do this i I mean, hell, I haven't had an in-person meeting with my shrink in forever. You could probably get hooked up with my libertarian. It would really change a lot about the course of your next few years probably. But maybe you could see him on the side.

AlexHere's the thing. I'll save it for the show. I think I'm breaking up with my psychiatrist. Oh, good for you. Save it for the show. After 10 years. 10 years. Wow. Oh, boy.

MerlinWell, you know, there's a season turn, turn, turn.

AlexExactly. Love him, let him know. You slept well.

MerlinI just want to say you posted – I slept okay. I do a little guessing game with myself before I look at my sleep data. I play a game with myself. And I knew once again, once again, that I fell asleep on the couch last night, like I've been doing lately. Because I'm trying to be really timely about when I take my sleeping pill so that I know whether it's working the way I think it will. And I keep just – I woke up last night and, of course, YouTube was on.

AlexOh, God. Autoplay? Were you like –

MerlinOh, I was deep into – I think it's called Manufacturing Consent, the Noam Chomsky documentary.

AlexOh, no. Oh, okay.

MerlinSo I watched a little bit of that and had some ice cream. But I always play a little game with myself of like, okay, how well did I sleep? How long did I sleep? And however long I slept, my goal, I mean, my real goal, the goal inside the goal is to find a way to bring my fucking pulse down. Because the correlation between my pulse.

AlexSame, yeah.

MerlinYeah. I mean, I have a high pulse. I always have. I mean, my resting pulse, my sitting on my goddamn ass pulse rate is in the low to mid 80s.

AlexOh, same.

MerlinAnd of course, then the next day it says you had a 1% reduction in pulse. And it's like, but like last night I was in the 70s and I had like four hours of deep sleep. Not even good sleep, deep sleep.

AlexThat is, oh gosh.

MerlinWhich my wife finds astonishing because my wife gets like half an hour of deep sleep at night.

AlexOh God, I can't. Well, I mean, I can imagine, but I can't imagine having a heart rate of 80. Because most people I know who don't run a ton.

MerlinWait, wait, wait. Is yours higher?

AlexOh, no, no, no. Mine is, I think, oh, what's it right now? Although I think my niece broke my watch, but she is one year old. And she, no, it was totally worth it. I thought it was water because it's waterproof it would also be pasta sauce proof

Merlinoh but they can really get in there with that sauce

Alexyeah really got in there

Merlindid you heat the watch before you sauced it

Alexoh interesting I just made it taste like the ocean first wow

Merlinhe posts once a year but his fab icon looks good it won't say fab icon

AlexHTS oh HSTS yeah a listener

Merlinwas mentioning something about that

AlexOh, God, it's a secret.

MerlinWe have the nicest listeners.

AlexOh, my. Okay, real talk, yeah. It's shocking.

MerlinNo, real talk. Like, I've met, and I don't want to say a thing, but as long as I'm about to be canceled for what I'm about to say about Matchy, I don't know. I'm going to say this in code, and you all know what I mean. I met a lot of really nice people who are very kind and tolerant and educational and useful. Educational. One doesn't want to call one's friends educational, but you all know who you are. You know, looking at you, Angela. there's so many nice people out there who have been really nice to make friends with and i don't deserve it but thank you that said i'm done being sincere you fuckers you posted you i'm gonna say

okay marker here um because who knows what's going to happen here i'm going to say just a thing and then and then and then you can either say you know that's not cool and we'll drop it or whatever but you had reason to post some um a video out in the real world and it was a video of your partner and all I'm going to say is woof. Holy fucking shit. Talk about setting an unrealistic standard for fucking everybody. Oh my fucking God. I mean, you could take this further if you want, but I

practically zoomed in Alex. I was like, you've got to be fucking kidding me. I don't have a before picture here, but what you posted, holy fucking shit. You see that? You see that stuff every day?

AlexI know, right?

MerlinDamn, son. Because this whole thing, this whole thing as we've been going down this road at every step of the way, I'm like, oh, come on. Come on. I live in San Francisco and I don't see success stories like this. Holy shit. I mean, dude. Matt's got to be in his corn at this point. That's, I mean, that's a look.

AlexYeah.

MerlinAnyway, I'll be canceled, but I just wanted to say, you know, thumbs up.

AlexI, well, I think what Merlin, good old pair of pals, is mentioning is that my spouse is even.

MerlinHe's supposed to be real casual, like, oh, yeah, here's this thing. It's funny.

AlexOh, OK. So one of our super secret slacks that is very exclusive. I post. He took my ATP hat and accidental tech podcast. Go, go. It's the Casey show. And I was just listening. It was. I see. But I just posted a video of him because I asked if he even knew what the initials ATP meant. And I just thought it'd be funny because, you know, he's pretty close with a couple of the hosts. And he indeed knew, actually.

And he knows what an M1 is. And I was like, wow.

MerlinDamn. But not just that.

AlexI think what you're talking about is he's pretty hot and quite muscly.

MerlinThis is like me meeting the girl who'll wear the nurse's uniform. Yeah, you posted a photo and the video. And anyway, I just wanted to say, and that's probably, I don't even know how or why that's inappropriate. But if it is, I apologize and you should cut this out. But I just wanted to say thumbs up.

AlexNo, I think you're commenting that my spouse, he has just become really more confident in his body after having top surgery.

MerlinOh, it made me so fucking happy, Alex.

AlexI didn't cry.

MerlinI was like, that must feel so good. That must feel so fucking good.

AlexYeah, and he's like, is it okay?

MerlinTo just get to be, this is me.

AlexThis is me.

MerlinHere I am.

AlexWell, we did get hate crammed. We did get hate crammed a couple times, but it was.

MerlinWhy are you going to do that to my cancelable anecdote?

AlexSorry, sorry. I didn't mean to. I didn't mean to harsh your mouth. Well, that's the thing, though. It was so. Is that where people remember? Harsh your mouth.

MerlinDifferent people remember Rashomon harshly.

AlexI was going to make an anime joke and then it got real. That's the one where you fuck a pillow, right? No, no, no. Is that manga?

MerlinManga the one where you fuck a pillow?

AlexNo, that's the, that's the, no, hentai's the octopuses?

MerlinOh, Metal Gear full Evangelion Gundam suit.

AlexI thought you had been introduced. Install more pylons. Weren't you introduced to Attack on Titan?

MerlinJust out of the corner of my eye.

AlexDid you find it incredibly upsetting?

MerlinWell, one of our really good pals, they enjoy anime too. And so I think that's been a little bit of a gateway. But I don't know. I mean, you know, I've gotten copies of anime things that I'm supposed to watch. There's been a piece of homework sitting in the dock for Reconcilable Differences for a really long time. I think Perfect Blue probably.

AlexAbout six years. Yeah.

Merlinwell no no I saw the other one I saw the ambitious one with the astronaut woman and the camera crew that was good

Alexoh interesting

MerlinI did I finally saw it I didn't update my review on Letterboxd I think it's my only review on Letterboxd it seems very ambitious was the review

Alexyep yep that's he's a very talented young man we should start the show

Merlinand I'm sorry I'm sorry if I said anything

Alexbeyond a compliment

Merlinit's just like i just want to exalt the entire experience of that and just be like yay you know

Alexwe're still here yeah i it's it's awesome that uh well so after this is the first time he's been able to be topless at the beach and be topless going swimming and that was like i was like is this gonna upset you because you can't do this yet i can't even imagine how difficult that must be yeah and i was like no no dude are you kidding are you fucking kidding me Like, get the fuck out of here. And yeah, it was a wonderful, wonderful day. So thank you. Thank you. He's going to appreciate that.

MerlinOh, I hope so. I mean, I just, I don't know. God damn it. Fuck this. What happened? What happened to us, you know, talking about dicks and stuff?

AlexI know. I know. Normally, I don't get emotional this early.

MerlinI'm going to know. So I may have to just go straight to my burger panty aunt's anecdote.

AlexI'm really confused about the panties and the.

MerlinI feel like I'm at the work of Salvador Dali. A little bit.

AlexA little bit. eggs crutches ants jesus gala and that's in that if someone were like salvador dolly'd be like yeah i know that name and it's important and there's some things um oh oh there's a there's a link there's a link here doll dolly the dolly the ant what is oh this is too much i don't get dolly the sheep and the ah what is wait that's not tell the door what the heck what we are doing two different shows i hope that both of them are good um but oh boy so so sleep how's how you going

Merlinmerlin how are you going are you alex family is furious at apple um i'm i'm doing pretty pretty good so it's wednesday a less optimistic day so i feel all right about that you're my wednesday mostly you're my person you're my wednesday oh i wish i was wednesday oh my god today we watched it's that uh grazes are our regrettable morning show like what the fuck god you and matchy are like oh god it's something the other two started really which is like you know something like i

say some days a kid and i go to cafe uh most days kid and mom go to the cafe they bring back bagels and coffee hot chocolate and that's like the morning thing we do and um then they watch graze most days and they play that creepy clown music that's a little song they play at the end it's the last thing you hear in a clown's van.

AlexBut today was the one.

MerlinToday's the one where, oh boy, it was a crazy one. Where, well, first of all, it's from that period where, who's Boat Hat? That's McSteamy, right?

AlexOh, yeah. No, no, no. That's McDreamy.

MerlinFuck. Okay, so McSteamy, it's from that period where he's like a little too slender and his head doesn't look as big anymore and it's really confusing from that period.

AlexIt's also, it's got Teddy. It's got Teddy.

Merlinmy Grace girlfriend. And it's the one, and then Sandra Oh.

AlexOh, she, yes, yeah, I'm sorry. She just deserves so much better than Owen.

MerlinAnd the woman from Fame is there. You know, what's his name? You know, Derek Jeter's mom is there and she's visiting. She's got big earrings on. She's doing surgery. Meredith and Lexi?

AlexHer little sister. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MerlinBut she's a surgeon, right? And they're doing surgery And they think there's the African-American woman who just got out of law school. And there's the tumor. And the line is so well-defined. They feel like they should go for it. And Derek is doing another surgery where he's got the eyeglasses with the eyeglasses on him. And they call him twice. He doesn't count. They decide to go ahead and do it themselves.

AlexDude, I literally think you and Matt were watching the same episode yesterday. Because I was like, ah, don't turn it off. Turn it off. Oh, my God.

MerlinAnd the spoiler, I mean, the spoiler is now she has Broca's aphasia, which is the aphasia. There's two kinds of aphasia. It's always two aphasias with you, and I can't decide which one I would want to have less. Let's return. Will you please write down aphasias?

AlexAphasias. Yes, yes, yes.

MerlinYeah, but then they nicked her, I think. They thought it was clean. They thought I could take it right. And Derek said, why didn't you call me? And they said, we did, Derek. We called you twice. And then we went in. Their parents come in. She talks to them, and she's having trouble. I can't believe they didn't discover it until that very moment, but okay, whatever. They nicked her.

AlexI have

Merlinvery upsetting it was very oh and they also did the baby surgery

Alexthe guy that Alex Alex is

Merlinthey did a surgery they did a surgery on a baby and my kid said is that a puppet I said probably it's a little bit like a puppet she's not upset by any of this I find it very upsetting to watch a baby they call it Peds

Alexand it's a Peds

Merlinthey're working on it and that's Alex right Alex is Peds

Alexyeah yeah the angry boy who's really really soft inside yeah yeah He has a stupid watch.

MerlinEveryone on that show is too emotional.

AlexOh, interesting. Interesting. Yeah, big cancel day.

MerlinExcept for Trainspotting. Well, Trainspotting gets pretty...

AlexWait, who's Trainspotting?

MerlinTrainspotting's the guy from Trainspotting.

AlexI've only seen that movie once because that upset me as well.

MerlinOh, really? It's funny because I finally showed my kid the beginning of Trainspotting so she could see the guy that I refer to on Grey's Anatomy as Trainspotting. Oh, God. Trainspotting looks, he looks, he's so much younger. He looks so different, but you can totally tell it's him.

AlexAll right. I don't know the man's name.

MerlinTrainspotting Grace.

AlexKevin, Kevin McKitt. Well, that doesn't say. Oh, yeah. No, fuck that guy. He is my lead. Oh, I hate him. Owen, Owen. I hate him so much.

MerlinLook, look at it. Look at how young he is in this photo.

AlexThat's him? Oh, God.

MerlinThat's him in Trainspotting.

AlexOh, I, maybe.

MerlinSo I call him Trainspotting. Yeah.

AlexYou know what? Maybe I don't hate Trainspotting. I just hate this actor with every fiber of my being.

MerlinWell, it's also got, what's the guy's name? Not Jackie Earl Haley, but it's also got that guy that used to go with, like we said, at least in junior high, used to go with, used to go with Angelina Jolie. They met on Hackers. And then Johnny Lee Miller, I want to say. Is that his name? Johnny Lee Miller? He's in Trainspotting. Johnny Lee Miller.

AlexDid all of her boyfriends have three names?

MerlinOh, interesting.

Alexlike gary david gary that kind of thing uh the oh god you're right poor oh oh wait no this i don't like when people are like hey man i love this show and i i put it to the top of my queue every week i'm like really there are a lot of good podcasts i can recommend really what are you talking about i don't know uh wait johnny lee miller and who is this guy sometimes credit as johnny Oh, he's in Transpac. What is this in?

MerlinGo search for him and Angelina Jolie.

AlexThat's right.

MerlinYeah, you'll probably see them in Hackers.

AlexOh, which I still haven't seen. I think it's called Hackers. Yeah, yeah. So they cracked the encryption.

MerlinI'm in.

AlexI think it came out around the same time. Let me look. Do you remember Network? Network, Sandra.

MerlinThe 1976 Patty Chayefsky.

AlexNo, no, no, no.

MerlinCindy Lumet movie? Okay.

AlexThis is... Did I hallucinate this movie? I mean, it wouldn't be out of character.

MerlinYou're talking about The Net?

AlexYes. Thank you. Thank you.

MerlinTalking about the Sandra Bullock vehicle, The Net. And that's where the character Pi appears on your screen. And then I think you get the ringed.

AlexIs he... Mm-hmm. Or incepted. This movie was what we would watch in computer class when... What? It was when...

MerlinAt the time, that was seen as a very silly movie.

AlexWell, apparently, in 2009, it was not seen as a silly movie by my computer teacher, who was about 98 years old, and thought that Linux was a company. Oh, boy.

Yep. But, oh, gosh.

MerlinThis is the year of Linux on the desktop.

AlexIt's pronounced Linux.

MerlinActually, it's pronounced Linus.

AlexIs that? Oh, gosh. Linus.

MerlinThat's his real name. His name's Linus. Wait, is his name Linus Pauling, or is that the guy who invented vitamin C? Who am I thinking of?

AlexWow. Invented vitamin C. Is that like inventing the D? How do you invent a vitamin?

MerlinNo, you throw the D.

AlexOkay.

MerlinYou invent the C.

AlexOkay.

MerlinAlso, vitamin C was also a solo artist that had a hit in the late 90s, and I had seen her performing with the band that she was in before vitamin C, whose name escapes me. What was the name of that band? Vitamin C girl band.

AlexYeah, and it was as the, it is.

MerlinIt was one of those letters to Cleo type names.

AlexVitamin C graduation song. Yeah, Friends Forever. Yeah.

MerlinOh, look at her. She's so cute.

AlexOh, this song. I mean, it was played at every graduation in the 90s, I believe.

MerlinBut she was in like a pretty hard rock and indie rock band.

AlexReally?

MerlinOh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

AlexOh, wow.

MerlinWhat's the name of it? They used to come to the cowhouse all the time. Eve's Plum, which is a joke.

Alexhaving fun with the name of

Merlinactress from the Brady Bunch Eve's Plum there you go yeah

Alexanyway

Merlinum I guess that's it for this week yeah yeah

Alexthanks for tuning in am I recording I mean I am okay yes I am I double checked oh I oh gosh a friend of the show Mark Bramhill I think got my loop back to to work, but I was too afraid to test it on this show. So I'll throw one of my other shows under the bus and test it then. But I, I'm very excited to, you know, play very disarming noises out of the blue.

MerlinI got to figure out how to use that someday.

AlexIt's on my list.

MerlinOh yeah. You, we, we wanted to talk about the toilet snake.

AlexOh, okay. Yes. Yes. Just in the early morning times, I saw a headline from CNN World, man bitten by neighbors escaped python while sitting on the toilet.

MerlinYes.

AlexAnd I immediately thought this is either Florida or Australia.

MerlinYou say to yourself, it's got to be Australia.

AlexYes. Yeah, exactly.

MerlinWhere else would a python come out of a toilet?

AlexMm-hmm.

MerlinExcept, if we're being honest, Florida too. But it's got Australia all over it.

AlexAnd no, no, it was Austria.

MerlinAustria.

AlexRight? So I was close.

MerlinI just, the only reason I want to mention this, you see the headline I put in here.

AlexI did.

MerlinSo I look at Google News a few times a day, which I don't know why I do, but I still do out of habit. No, no, I just look at it sometimes. And you know, sometimes there'll be like a persistent thing that just won't go away. Like even if it's a thing I want to hear about, like Matt Gaetz, sometimes it's just like there'll be something there over and over and over. And I say, ah, show me less of this, show me less of this, show me less of this. But the headline that I saw probably seven times yesterday was the following headline. Austrian man bitten by python during visit to the toilet.

And I was I could not stop. I understand, you know, what this is in The Guardian. And, you know, we're two countries divided by a shared language. Did he visit the toilet? Because it kind of sounds like he's on vacation. Now, I could see a German doing that. But Austrians have more dignity than that. Would you go on a toilet vacation?

AlexI mean, is there a bidet? I have to go visit the toilet.

MerlinNo, I'm not going to take a huge, I'm not going to do an absolute paint job on it. But I am. But I am going to visit it. Take some photos. Pick up some souvenirs.

AlexSometimes you just got to check the mud pies. Yeah, exactly. He's probably just asking some questions. Yeah.

MerlinHe's just asking. It's like Joe Rogan Podcast Club.

AlexYeah, exactly.

MerlinJust asking the question. you had a visit to the toilet do you ever visit the toilet

Alexas i'm doing practicing my math i love you toilet oh i gotta douche your fanny do uh go to the math as you're on the on the lift you gotta

MerlinI got to pack your vagina in your bum bag and smile, smile, smile.

AlexI just think it's so funny that the C word that most men in America won't say is just a regular old, regular, like.

MerlinIn England. In England, you mean the C word there is a little more casual.

AlexOh, I'm sorry. I forgot. What was the C word? What was that? What? I see.

MerlinClitoris.

AlexOh, gosh. well no and and i'm like maybe maybe and i hope this isn't true but i'm like what if a large portion of edgar wright's audience just really likes hearing the c word which like well there's that other headline did you see the one about the woman did you see the

Merlinone about the shit the lady from ealing did you see that no this is an english story there was a lady from ealing okay and she said she had no sexual feeling till a man named boris came and test your clitoris now you have to peel her off the ceiling i i thought that was an amazing story

Alexis he canceled i mean if he was canceled for a poem like that good good on him he got his head

Merlinstuck in a bucket okay so let's come back to the burger panty ants later i don't think we have time for that we have a lot of content here oh and anyway so so you said you put up that video of matchy and when i was thinking about whether or not i wanted to even say anything privately even uh i was saying i was saying that i think um i think in my head i was sitting there and i typed this uh because i think that i think matchy is succeeding at what i will call existential

Alexsculpting oh interesting yes because because because people no no and not just physically

Merlinlike there's that old joke about like well how do you make michelangelo's david you know you get a big piece of stone and cut away everything that's not michelangelo's david yeah oh fuck that's so good that's so good let's like how do we take away all the parts that uh aren't us oh my god

Alexthat's so good you can have that if you want oh my god no that's that's so good what do you want to work on should we workshop it or is that close enough no that's that's exactly i mean that's what

Merlini i i mean it implies too much physicality really it's more like you know anyway i'm selling past

Alexthe clothes i think it's i think it's a good phrase no no no yeah it's it's not just about chopping off of your tits it's like a gift oh wow that's so good that's so good have you ever

Merlindone some existential sculpting oh yeah i think i i think i do it all the time because i think all

Alexof covid was sort of an existential and continues to be an existential sculpt for me yeah maybe

Merlinmaybe i mean but in terms of the sort of mindful willful purposeful ness of life i um yeah i mean for example, if I'm going to be corny for probably the fourth time, how do I spend more time developing the parts that are who I'd like to be? How do I spend more time developing the parts of who I'd like to become rather than stressing about the things I never was?

Does that count?

AlexThat's really good.

MerlinThat's really good. I mean, it kind of counts, right?

AlexIt's really good. You should write a book.

MerlinYeah. And like, I don't know. I think that can go for lots of things. And in my ex-racket, Like it was a thing where you would you would really I don't know. Part of the whole tips and tricks culture is getting you to obsess about these things you don't want to be anymore. And I think it's much more difficult to have an affirmative vision for who you'd like to become. I think that's more complicated and subtle. So it doesn't get the clicks as much.

AlexBut yeah, no. Well, anything, this is probably not a good take or a take that doesn't make sense. But I wonder if we're going to have another sort of culture whiplash where we go deep into finding nuance in terms of on the left. Not like Fox News being like, well, were they facing the flag? It just didn't look good. It wasn't a good look. but just uh being how like recognizing oh gosh we're we were all pretty cringe during that we

we really lost our minds you know talking about the covid times yeah i not just the covid times but just like the early 2020s and uh yeah you know like the um i think you call it manufactured outrage um of you know the just performative outrage yeah yeah and just i mean i i don't know I have participated. We've talked about this a whole ton, and I'm sure I've just beaten it absolutely to death. But, I mean, that's, I don't know.

Like, I'm sure I have posted an Instagram graphic at some point. And I'm like, is this really, am I yucking someone's yum, or is this just not my yum? Like, I don't know. I don't know. well I mean like it's

Merlineven setting aside an idea that's become very important to me but setting this aside the idea that you know you don't have to have a strong feeling about everything let alone share that like it's okay it's okay to not have strong opinions but if I were gonna really I don't know run some shit up the flagpole how's this for an idea like do you if you're really being honest about yourself and not who you think you are but who you actually are are you the sort of person get ready for false dichotomy but it's a good one um i think there's a certain kind of person

who could choose you could choose to be the sort of person who tries to seek out people who um are are are becoming you know sort of like the aristotle idea of being versus becoming like people who are like a willful work in progress or like you know to quote the great Paul Benedict, I'm just as God made me, sir. Like, you know, you, but no, I mean, I don't know if I wanted to be real reductive about this, I would say something is unkind as well. Right now in the world, there are people who are excited to see victories for people who are becoming who they

want to be. And then there are people who are celebrating losses for those people instead of, and instead are really celebrating the people who never really were who they think they are. and that's a tough culture clash between this whole idea of like, I don't know, I mean, everybody's so mad about everything to begin with, but if you really feel like you never got to be the coal miner that your grandfather was and now you have, you know, a Black, a Blue Lives Matter flag on your truck,

I don't know. I don't have a dick about it, but like, and the thing that I think is deceptive that we all need to keep an eye on, which goes to what you're saying here, I think, is if you think of yourself as that first kind, but you act like you're the second kind, keep an eye on that. If you think that you're embracing actual diversity and people flying their freak, I can never say that. Flying their freak. 50 slick black hair wigs.

AlexThat was a real cocks up.

MerlinYou think you're the sort of person who celebrates all that fun diversity, but then you behave in a very narrow and reactionary dick way well maybe you should put your candle under a bushel basket because

Alexthat's not very nice yeah and i god i the the first time i think i really think this was like the first time that i uh opened the twitter app to like look at twitter and not just post something and almost immediately i did a smarky bitchy response to somebody and i'm like why did i assume that was in bad faith what the fuck is that it's difficult it's so difficult not to

Merlinand like but there's but like this is it's i mean this is gonna sound silly but it's really complicated where as stipulated um regardless of the the disparities and how much the two of you know each other there is a certain kind of like familiarity a para-familiarity that you can simulate with somebody because you know a bit about them. Right. And I mean, like that could be that could be Griffin McElroy eating a banana sideways. Like on the one hand, yeah, sure. It's

brought a lot to his life. But on the other hand, can we please just come up with another thing? You know, or then that becomes this sort of like, wow, people can be really unkind to strangers in a way that they think is promoting intimacy, which if you're on the other end of that, like, how would you feel about it? How would you feel about it if you were just going through your day And then somebody like threw a cliche at you really hard.

And so I struggle with that sometimes. Like I had some bit like we brought up on the line. It's been on a pretty good run lately.

AlexAnd I have a bop bop bop. But anyway, it's been on a good run.

MerlinI know.

AlexI like Susan. I like Susan. I really like Susan. I'll just say that.

MerlinAnd so I'd said something in the show came out and somebody responded saying, I think actually, ironically enough, I think they might have said something like, oh, the McElroys

Alextold me i'm not supposed to like this show anymore oh boy as you can guess like that's a complicated

Merlincliche to have thrown at your face for me my hand is my fingers my fingers hovering over the button and of course oh that owns i let it go because what if i misunderstood that right i can't tell what space they want me to play with them in and i'm trying to and it doesn't hurt me to say nothing there's no reason the entire fucking world that i need to respond just to feel like i i have like what i'm gonna i'm gonna like defend i'm like what sir walter raleigh laying my cloak across the

Alexmud puddle excuse me

Merlinthe white knight is here move aside move aside i'm here to defend something but i'm not sure what i

Alexsure am mad here's my screenshot oh well

Merlinwhat are you gonna do oh boy interesting though interesting to think about anyway you know uh It's time to get back to butts and farts and absolute paint jobs. But if you're not sure why you're unhappy right now, ask yourself if you're becoming the person you want to be.

AlexAnd don't lie in bed thinking about that all night, though. You should sleep. You should really sleep.

MerlinOh, yeah. Well, you know, do you have a time? Pop quiz, hot shot.

AlexYes.

MerlinI'm ready. Caffeine, all the stimulants. Do you have a mental model for which different kinds of stimulants you can, can't, should, shouldn't have at a given time of day?

AlexYes, absolutely.

MerlinI mean, in my case, like I really try not to drink coffee usually after like 11, but especially like after 12 or 1.

AlexNo way.

MerlinI'll have some like herb tea that's got caffeine in it a little bit because it's really mild. But it's weird. I mean, I could gobble so much shit all day long. I could take drugs all day long and nothing would affect me. But sometimes caffeine in particular stays in, seems to stay in my body longer than it's physically, chemically accurate. It's technically supposed to be all out of my body. And yet I notice a difference in my sleep if I have it too late. Do you get that? Do you have a standard for that?

AlexThis is interesting because I was talking about this with my possibly soon to be ex-psychiatrist. And he was like, well, that could be, you know, that number of 12 hours of it being in your system. It varies with everybody by immune system, blah, blah, blah. But with you, it could just be propelling you more so into a minor hypomanic state. I know that's a little bit, whatever.

MerlinNo, but you're more jacked up. You're more jacked up than you'd like to be.

AlexAnd that could have been me last night. I doubt it. I think it was just the Claritin. But it makes sense. And I bet you've possibly experienced the same thing when taking ADD meds. Yes.

MerlinThat was really tricky when I was taking Adderall.

AlexRight. Yeah.

MerlinBecause it's the, I don't know. I mean, there's different kinds of drugs. God, this is true of some edibles. It's true of lots of things. is that like you really need to get a handle on how strong this is, how fast it hits, how long it lasts, and what the taper off is. I know I sound like a real veteran druggie, but I think that's true for coffee. And the thing is you need to modulate that over time. So, you know, as I've said to the point of cliche, I mean, I used to be able to eat anything, drink anything, do anything, and still go to bed pretty much when I chose to. Just go lay down and you fall asleep, which is not true anymore.

There's so many different factors that mitigate how well, deeply, how quickly I'll go to sleep. And yeah, for sure. And sometimes it takes, it takes, everybody's done this where you go like, god damn it, why do I feel so fucking crazy right now? And you're like, oh, that's right. I had a big coffee two hours ago, or whatever. Or I didn't eat today, or I didn't drink water, or I didn't take a shit, or whatever it is. All the kinds of things that help our body be a body. That we are, we seem to like unconsciously be fighting all the time. If you take a shit ton of

stimulants, and you know in your heart that that taper off is going to be running into like you know late night hours no bueno well

Alexi'm gonna take i'm gonna start drinking oh some stimulants oh yeah i got some monster uh oh all that taurine and well this might we might get into this a little bit with our uh challenge later but i i have a lot of apps to remind me to to drink water and eat and still you're still at this Oh, absolutely. No, no. Yeah, absolutely.

MerlinHow is this? Like at one point you bought, didn't you buy like a...

AlexOh, no, no, no. I don't know.

MerlinE-bottle that like tells you when to drink water and you've had apps?

AlexLike what do you just drink water? No, no, no, no. I, because I forget. Because I, if the same reason our watch tells us to stand, which I actually also do like, because at least...

MerlinI turned a lot of that stuff off a little over a year ago.

AlexI changed it. Well, I actually...

MerlinI changed my activity thing to like the lowest it would go.

AlexOh, I've turned it all off now and just have my own little stand dingus. But I haven't gotten like one of those water bottles that it's like fill it up to this point. No, I just use, what's it called? Oh, Waterminder.

MerlinOh, of course, Waterminder.

AlexYeah, it's really cute. Is that an app? Is that an app, Alex? It is. It's an app that I said I don't use. Oh, don't play that back, Quinn, because I'm sure that I messed that one up.

MerlinNo, you did fine. I understand. I mean, again, now I'm being that guy because I'm being that guy, for example, that would say to me, why do you procrastinate? Why don't you just go do it? You're like, OK, thank you. That's very helpful.

That's what I'm saying to you, essentially. Like to me, I just drink water all fucking day long to the point where I probably have some toxicity.

AlexWell, that's the thing, though. you or at least for me now i drink water all day until i don't and that's when it's like it could be disaster not disastrous and like like i'll feel like absolute shit in fact i'm pretty sure that now that i am like perhaps over hydrated like if i don't when i'm dehydrated it's like when some people get really hangry uh which has never been really a thing for me but gosh i am a whole grumpy grump if i have not had uh my water and not even like my you know

pee water we joke about but just plain ass basic water and i i do think it's kind of funny like it is funny like ah elix can't remember to do anything without you know a phone beeping and telling them but it's also like you're like yes it is ridiculous but our current world is also ridiculous this so i mean i for a while i was like okay is this like a two wrongs make a right type of thing or are we i i mean i don't know like like it's it's like okay a light switch is great so why

am i changing this but it's also yeah i i mean i don't know i'm like um what well why should we use electric cars i the other cars work fine i there's really i know i know it's so lost right I am okay. Okay.

MerlinIt's okay that I'm lost. Not all who wander are lost and not all who are lost are wandering.

AlexOkay. Well, uh, are you the kind of person you talk about calendars a lot? If you didn't, I do,

MerlinI do. And account, a calendar. I just, it's funny you should say that. Cause I was just thinking that not turning off, like to, to, to, to leave on the thing that says you're supposed to stand for 11 hours today. Are you supposed to get this much exercise? Like to have that on for a fucking year where like for a few months of that, at least you literally never left the house. Like, boy, that's that's very count. That's very like the same kind of anti pattern as like write novel this week. You know, calendar stuff. Yes, I do. I'm somewhat obsessed. I'm obsessed on Maine about calendars.

I mean, I spend I spend a lot of my day actually not thinking about calendars. But for purposes of this discussion. Hell, yeah, I love calendars.

AlexWell, that's the point is loving calendars probably means you don't have to think about them. because you already have. Yeah.

MerlinIf you trust your calendar, you don't need to obsess about it.

AlexAnd that's how now I am with my dumb little... Hey, dummy. Eat something. Drink something. Eat me. He's like, get over here. Ding.

MerlinOh, my God. I love that movie so much. I still think the color stuff is weird in it.

AlexLike how it's color graded? Well, yeah.

MerlinI mean, okay.

AlexIs it racist now?

Merlinthat's from before color grading in the usual coen brothers sense something's fucked up though if you go back and re-watch that and it is in at least i think hd we're talking here about adam's family values um the best adam's family it's a very good movie and it's got baranski but like in a lot of the scenes especially at camp look at the color of like people's look at the color of people like there's a weird orange-ish unnatural hue to a lot of the characters in it oh i mean i

Alexhave a perhaps um you know you know what maybe expert todd can weigh in on this but i i thought that was perhaps because they still wanted that dingy the scene that we are talking about i think is that like is it through the whole it's several of the episodes like there's like the there's the

MerlinThe wonderful, like, I want to say not the first scene at camp, but one of the first scenes at camp where it becomes very clear that Wednesday and Pugsley are, like, definitely not like the other kids. And they're already kind of in trouble with the counselors. Played by, who is it? It's Christine Baranski and it's the guy from Ally McBeal, right?

AlexAnd other funny 90s children's movies, but I can't think of them right now.

MerlinYeah, he likes a fresh bowl.

AlexIndeed.

MerlinAnd, yeah, it's a bit like, I don't know. I don't know if it's in all of them, but every time we watch it, it's been a while now, but there's a while where we're watching it once a month or so because it's really funny. All the camp stuff is a riot. The Uncle Fester stuff with Joan Cusack is so fucking good.

Yeah, I don't know. This is really not important.

AlexI figured it might be one of those things.

MerlinIf you watch a Twilight Zone now, it looks so goddamn cheap because that show was made. You know what? Serling wrote almost all of those.

AlexI know.

MerlinAnd it was all creative.

AlexHe wrote the other 51. Oh, gosh. That's very good. I like that.

MerlinBut they made it so quickly and so inexpensively. And, of course, you get a lot of shadows and booms and frame and all that kind of stuff. But you watch anything from the 60s and, like, it looks shockingly cheap and shoddy. Because it was never – I mean, like, when I watch Match Game at night, like, I'm amazed. Like, because, like, that was never meant to be on a 66-inch TV. I mean, most of us didn't even have color TVs. I didn't have a color TV until I was 21. um but anyway but like that's that's i when there's a thing that looks weird to me in a movie

i often assume probably erroneously that it's it's some artifact of like we wanted this to look good for being cheap or we wanted this to look good for this screening environment and that kind of stuff but i'll bet you if you go back and watch the camp stuff you'll look orange

Alexi'll bet you i almost did the thing which uh you you actually um your your voice i was i was your parapal last night and that I was like, maybe I should catch up with things in the Merlinverse before tomorrow. And so I'm driving back from the suburbs and you, I'm back to work, we're talking about the 60, what I think of now is the 60-90 rule when something looks like it's either from

Merlinthe 60s or the 90s. Oh, my kid says, is this from the 60s or the 90s? She does it just to vex me. I know it.

AlexI, for years, years and years, because, of course, my dad introduced me to Godfather, the Godfather, probably at a too young age. But I always thought it was just made in that time period because you don't have a frame of reference when you're 10. I don't know.

MerlinI'm being all like wound up about this, but I was, I mean, I'm just, just quote unquote young enough to be of that age where like it was, I think it was around my age, but definitely after my age later and beyond where people were like, I cannot watch something in black and white. Like, I didn't mind it because we had a black and white TV. Everything was in black and white, like I say. But, like, I think it's for young people, if you watch something in black and white, well, the Avengers TV show and Battleship Potemkin and Duck Soup and The Sneeze are from very different times.

Like, some of that is from 1965 and some of that is from 1890-something. but because it's black and white it just reads as old especially if it's silent i guess like i was watching the general the other day which uh i i don't know what that is it's the um it's the uh uh buster keaton movie where he's in love with the girl and he's got a train called the general it's a civil war era but it's got some of his most like athletic stunt stuff in it oh okay yes

AlexI've not seen this, but yes.

MerlinYeah.

AlexI like the poster on Wikipedia.

MerlinAnd, you know, when I steal, I steal well. And so this was like the Criterion edition of this, and it looked really good. But, you know, but – and, of course, she loves Duck Soup. It's one of our favorite movies because I'm that guy now. I'm like shared email account dad now. It's one of our favorite movies.

AlexShut up. No, listen. You might be a family guy.

MerlinYou people, go watch Duck Soup. It's going to blow your fucking mind how bananas that movie is.

AlexI've never seen Duck Soup.

MerlinIt's the one I would pick without – when I was a kid, I really liked Animal Crackers because that was kind of what I imprinted on.

AlexSkip the coconuts.

MerlinDon't need it. Really, if you see – you know what? I'm going to get in trouble. Their later movies are not awesome. But the one on the ship – what's the one on the ship?

AlexOh, I have –

MerlinWhere they're in the stateroom and the people keep coming in and more people come in and more people come in. Oh, gosh. They're in the Kipper barrels at the beginning. that's a good one duck soup skip the coconuts skip i don't know some people really like the um what's what's the um what's the uh what's the college one where they're on the football team uh horse feathers horse feathers some people like that i like when movies are 60 minutes

Alexduck soup is like 72 minutes long yes oh 75 oh my oh this i i love this um actually on wikipedia It says 75 minutes, eight reels. And times vary with different versions. And this is in the...

MerlinI got one on my Plex and I can give it to you. Anyways, that's not unusual at all. It's like something from a previous generation. I guess what I'm saying is I was like that too. I was not exactly... I wouldn't go so far as 60s versus 90s. But like when I was 13, could I... Well, maybe a little younger because I was pretty plugged in. Could I identify the 20s versus the 40s, for example?

AlexOh, interesting.

MerlinYou know, I think 20s, 30s, 40s can be kind of confusing. 50s, at least in the cliches of that, like, you know, 50s. But like when we're talking about the 60s, again, something I've said again recently, I think with Roderick, are we talking about the 50s version of the 60s or the 70s version of the 60s?

AlexYeah. No, that makes sense.

MerlinBecause, you know, Dick Van Dyke show was in the 60s, but it looks like the 50s.

AlexI always forget that. We don't say Dyke anymore.

Merlinoh it's funny you cucked me last week with that remark that was funny

Alexput your finger in the dike

MerlinI'm not the what chimney chimney chimney chimney chimney

Alexwow Mary Poppins Mary Poppins it's boring as fuck it's such a boring movie after the song it's so boring

Merlinwait have we talked about this we must have talked about this

Alexand the play dark as fuck the book darker oh well like one of the things when you got a dumb baby

Merlinis like you get kind of excited about there were certain things like i even when i just found out that we would be having our dumb baby there's a lot of stuff where i was like oh my god i can't wait till i can watch star wars with my kid this is so i can't wait to listen to pixies with my kid there was so much stuff like that and of course somewhere deep down on that list was like all the musicals and disney movies i loved as a kid oh we can watch robin hood and um and i was like okay i you know let's watch mary poppins nothing happens for at least an hour it's so fucking long and so fuck i forgot how boring that movie is in my head it's so much better

songs are good songs good movies movies very boring and that's the thing that was also like

Alexeven when i saw it i mean i had we had some electronics and by that i mean like one of those little uh that talking robot that i had on it that was just a tape player but i'm like okay so if I wasn't wait is this like like Max's Jewish robot or that's no my Jewish robot that's like what you know it was it was like a little game and I'm like wait what did I do during the boring parts of Mary Poppins because I'm did I have an attention I doubt that I was interested in any of

this Julie Andrews is sexy enough to keep your attention true oh this explains a lot you can tell

Merlinshe would be a tiger in the sack.

AlexOh God, she's a, she is the most top top of all the tops.

MerlinThere would be so much stuff that like she would never bring up until the right moment. But when she did, it would just be the filthiest stuff. Her idea. No shame. You know, it wouldn't be one of those like, Oh, I'm going to go put on a garter belt in the dark kind of bullshit. Like, you know, she, she would be walking out with like some pretty, some pretty extreme accessories.

AlexYeah, no, that's the, I would, I would guess also that if this blew up, if it like blew up that she was like the kinkiest lady in the world, she would just take it like such a lady. She would be like. Absolutely. Yes. Yes.

MerlinIf the world is to find out that I like to spank and be spank and I do not lose my dignity.

AlexThat would be fine.

MerlinTell the world. I need my tools.

Alexchallenge challenge this this week's challenge this week is uh alexandra's it is and i i have been uh real real obsessed with the obvious obviously the new ios um that that's what the

iphone runs on if you're a normal person listening to this but um yeah all of the new features that are based around automation and location-based stuff and this has been a feature of ios for a couple years now but it's more powerful this year um it was officially in 14 uh oh really Oh, okay. Oh, yeah.

MerlinI feel like before, I think 14 is where you can, you know what, we're probably both wrong or both right. I think 14 is where you could first open up shortcuts, scan a tag. I'm sorry, I'm jumping ahead. Go ahead. Sorry, that's not a point.

AlexNo, that makes sense.

MerlinI just interrupted you for no reason. I'm sorry.

AlexOh, no, no, no. Like, you're right, because I remember it was like, and there's NFC support. And it's like, all right, they can't wait to see what we do with it, if we can do anything with it. And then the following year, it came to shortcuts.

MerlinI made one once that almost worked. I'm smashing my phone against my desk. Did it scan? Did it do it? I better go back and add a thing that says I scanned it. It worked. And then I have seven reminders show up.

AlexIt's, yeah. I mean, I guess not spoilers, but the result of this challenge was I wanted to try out using some new automation. with NFC text, which is a near-field communication. I don't know exactly what power is it.

MerlinI mean, I think just a simple way to explain this is if you can imagine something, it could be a keychain, it could be a card, but basically the kind of way that when, I think it's the same concept as when you show up for work and you scan your badge against the dingus, the door unlocks.

AlexYeah, a lot of, yeah, exactly. A lot of fobs and stuff.

MerlinIt's very, very local. like it's not you know when this makes contact with that it enables a thing to happen and the beauty part here is shortcuts can do an awful lot of things shortcuts are really becoming the new like excitement spackle where like for example now when you do the double tap or triple tap on the back of your recent iphone you can actually launch a shortcut it's not just take a screenshot or take me home or app switcher you can you can trigger you can as they say in the community fire off a shortcut and a shortcut can do a lot of different things so you know the idea here is

you get one of these tags i think the one notion of the challenge i understood it was you know well let's come back up to speed on what you can do with nfc on here can we hook it up to anything exciting and uh and and and uh as you say i i don't know i think it's a pretty exciting time right now i really do i i i run impossibly hot and cold on apple stuff but you know the shortcut stuff is still a little wobbly on the Mac, but there's just so much stuff that you can do. It's almost kind of like the introduction of Siri, but the improvement of Siri after we all gave up on Siri briefly, almost all of us, where it's come back and you're like, oh man,

I guess I need to learn about this. But with Siri, it's always been so difficult to find out what's everything Siri can do. Tell me surprising things that Siri can do. Because in your day-to-day, if you haven't rehearsed this, you're generally just going to be saying the same shit over and over. Turn it up, turn it down, turn on the lights, that kind of stuff. But like, what is stuff I didn't know this could do? And like when you go in and create a personal automation and shortcut, if you haven't done it lately, go in and it might blow your mind. All the things that you can use as a trigger for an event happening.

It's pretty neat.

AlexI am going to send you a link to one of the default shortcuts that is like in the gallery. In fact, I think this should not even be in the gallery. This should be a start. It should just be there. Like that stupid tips app. Like just put this shortcut in the shortcuts app.

MerlinOh, like have an example shortcut that just everybody can click it and play with it immediately?

AlexYes.

MerlinHere's what you can do with this in a way that would be faster than me like showing you a video.

AlexMm-hmm. But also really simple. So what's a shortcut shortcut? it it's like uh a way to use your apps without opening them every shortcut is made of actions give one a try and then it gives you you can either create a note uh play a surprise song from your library or turn on light mode as in light mode on your phone versus dark mode and i was like oh that's that's interesting that's kind of cool and then when it's done it takes you to the actual, like, in the shortcut editor to see, like, how this is made.

And it's like, and now try this one. And I'm like, oh, this is so cool. And this is, like, what it, I had to, it took me, like, two days to learn this when it was workflow before it was acquired on, by Apple. And I, I don't know, I was really pleasantly surprised by that. This morning, I was just kind of dicking around because I didn't realize that my phone, my beta had updated. I'm on the public beta now. It's much more stable.

MerlinFor iOS phone?

AlexYeah, for iOS, iPad. Still not on any Macs, but will.

MerlinI should do that. I'm on the developer for a couple things, and I should get on the public.

AlexIt's much better. and I had a lot of apps not working on the dev one.

MerlinSo if I, wait, so what do I do? I go in, I delete the certificate, restart, check for update. But if I've already got beta X, developer beta X on here, how can that, if that's already on, like that's my operating system, will it overwrite that with the public beta?

AlexYeah.

MerlinNext time it updates probably.

AlexOh no, no, you can do it. you can just go to the it's confusing because you need to go to the Apple public beta page.

MerlinI'm just thinking of how in the past I've had trouble doing migration in Assistant if I'm migrating something that's on a beta. Everything has to be up to the same similar latest update before it'll work. Yes. And some

Alexshortcuts will break. So it's just it takes you and you reinstall the whatever image profile and then you it's over. You know what? I'm getting

Merlinthe thing that says this is not verified Is it privacy where I go to to say don't worry about that?

AlexYes, which is another thing that I hope that they read. I hope that Apple actually reads the feedback that people send because it's just so confusing. It's like, OK, what does that mean? What's the actual text? I can't even remember.

MerlinYeah, I got to say, I mean, like, it's not just a beta thing, although it's definitely a beta thing as well. But sometimes their blah blah text could really use a second pass. it's just it's not really clear what the consequences of something are sometimes and in one sense that could mean in a rare case that'll mean i really fucked myself and didn't mean to but in like in a lot of cases it's more like well i don't really understand what this will do so i'm not going to do it which is you shouldn't have people in that ambiguous

Alexand position do you think that i realized last night um because i was in the merlin man universe was like oh i am what did you it was tops and bottoms again like uh you're a bottom oh top down top down bottom up yeah yeah and uh i there's a syracuse thing he's i thought it was a really

Merlingood way to put i mean he's not didn't invent that he invented follow-up that's all he wants to be remembered for but the idea of like are you the sort of person who like has to take this step by step moving up the ladder and skills or are you somebody like me who just plays with it until it stops obviously breaking which is very much my approach to everything including cold fusion

Alexwell that's the thing is i used to be that person um and this uh i'm trying to figure out whether or not this is me being like nostalgic for childhood not even childhood like that like seven years six years ago of like i'm just gonna play play with this because it is a toy and then the toy will become a tool and i mean honestly it's like it's like when mike mike broke down and of course

Merlinmike mike hurley's talking to the original i have to install this for my work guy and mike on our upgrade was like if you he's like actually like singing a little tune he's like if you want to install the beta just do it if it's fun do it it's a toy let it be a toy well that's kind of the

Alexthing is i was like i'm i can't figure out and i have anything to do this is like all right i'll turn my lights on and off.

MerlinI went out and Googled. I found some really good links, but I really needed... The spoiler alert for me is like, this would have been really different in my life five years ago. But like now, it's actually kind of weird in retrograde compared to other ways I can do almost everything now. Do you know what I mean? It's weird. Even in the space of one year, I'm so much less excited about NFC than I was a year ago.

AlexOh, yes. Same.

MerlinWell, as you say, or as Max would say, you operationalized this a long time ago. For example, I could see this NFC stuff being so helpful for somebody who has to deal with scale issues. So for example, I finally, finally broke down and bought HomePass, which I didn't think I needed, but I now wish I'd had for years. And HomePass, made by the people, the brilliant team that makes stuff like Home Run and things like that. HomePass sounds dumb. Trust me. I thought it was dumb too.

It's a place to put all of your HomeKit codes.

AlexFuck yes. Are you kidding? Oh.

MerlinYeah. Well, no, I've been doing that in photos. But like, of course, the classic Merlin Mann category error number one. I've been diligent about always taking a photo of my HomeKit code. But guess what? I never write down what it's for. So I take a picture of the Eve thing that says, you know, Eve weather. It's like, yeah, but which Eve weather?

AlexWhether or not?

MerlinWhat? No. But you get a HomePass and, boy, if you had this from the beginning, and you can say either add a new device to my HomeKit or use an device that's – add information about a device that's already in Home. And so it says you ask permission to access it. And then I can say, okay, the Eve Room device for my desk. And you can actually take a picture of it. And it adds it right in there. And you can copy and paste. But guess what? At the bottom of every one, Alex, this is so your shit. But you got to scroll, scroll, scroll down to the bottom to create – I think it actually says create an NFC tag for this.

AlexI think that this may be the best $3 I have ever spent, or at least in a long while.

MerlinDo you see what I mean? If you go to a device and then scroll all the way down. And basically, it says something like add NFC. So you hit that. It says, okay, tap the NFC device, scan it. and then it associates that HomeKit code with that NFC tag. So if you're the kind of money bags that has a bunch of this stuff sitting around and you're trying to do stuff with your job at scale, that could actually be pretty handy.

AlexOh, yeah. I mean, that's the thing. Is this making sense?

MerlinCan you explain that better than me, why this would be useful? You had one. Can you describe the one you talked about at cards where you would message people about equipment? What was that about?

AlexI would have different NFC. I actually used cards instead of those little stickers because it felt easier.

MerlinThat's what I've got. I got the ones that look almost like hotel keys, like white plastic cards. I got some of those.

AlexYes. And they break just as easily. But I would. Yeah. Well, that's why I used to duplicate NFC tags, too, because it doesn't work.

MerlinDo some of it real quick in passing. Do some kinds of NFC tags work better than others? Like the stickers are so much less expensive. Do they still work as well as any other NFC tags?

AlexI don't know.

MerlinI wonder if they, it seems like they might not.

AlexAnd that's what I'm trying. I'm like, okay. And also I'm like, do they wear out? Well, just real quick. The thing I would do in a big office is the, I would have in every, like, space that I was working when someone is like, Alex, oh my God, where are you? uh then i would just usually i was doing something and like my hands were like literally occupied and i would just you know tap tap it uh tap my phone to the tag and it would say i am i am in it was just it was a simple text message of i am in the studio i am in the theater

i am in cubby number three uh i hid them under our cubbies and just you're doing that with

MerlinYou're doing that with the hotel key type. Yeah.

AlexIt was just easy. I have found that those work the best. I have yet to find an NFC ring that works, which is a bummer.

MerlinYeah. I bought some of these that were somebody might have been Matthew, but somebody recommended this one and this one and this one. I think that's the ones I bought. So I've got the, you know, the key card ones. I've got several of these incredibly cheap key chains.

AlexSame. And I have come around on the keychains, actually. Well, not because they are good.

MerlinThe stickers are really, if the stickers work as well, and I had some stickers, but I cannot find them to save my life. They really, that would be the best. Because you could do shit like, in my case, I could put it under my desk. I could put it, there's so many places you could put that. A white hotel type keycard is not, it's a little bit ungainly for scale.

AlexRight. And, well, it, I don't know, like, it is, and it, it is, it's easier than, you know, other systems, I guess. But the more, and actually, you brought this up, you big time Alex Coxbrained, I have to say. Well, not, that's taking too much credit. But, you know, like, but with the ultra wideband stuff and with.

MerlinOh, my God, yes.

AlexThings becoming even more precise, like with the biggest problem with NFC and Apple would also say security. But for in day to day use, the just like getting it to work and hitting it, in my case, literally just hitting my phone against a wall until it does a little bloop.

It's just so unreliable. And now it is more accurate.

MerlinIt's I mean, it's unreliable is one word. another that I would put is inconsistent where no matter how much I practice,

Alexwhich is worse,

Merlinlike putting it on the key, quick, quick, quick, quick charger. Like I, no matter how much I do it, I still don't feel confident about it. And when I'm hitting an NFC tag, I I'm not prepared to say that it's not working. I'm not working. Like I have to do it so many times. And yes, I have started adding like, as I do with a lot of my routines and things like an, and I got it like an acknowledgement. You know what I mean? because I can't tell if it went or not. And like I said, the one I made involved a reminder. So then I look over and I've got six new reminders.

I guess it worked eventually.

AlexYeah. And well, gosh, I was so frustrated. I'm just like getting not angry. It is, well, the one little very ugly hack, I did hack, was instead of putting stickers, I got a little, there's like teensy tiny command strip hooks that are like clear. And I just hang one of those key chains on them. And so this isn't because every, like you, every time I go to use an NFC tag, it like,

I'm like weaving it until I get the little bleep loop. But for some reason with the key chain.

MerlinYeah. The whole time I'm thinking, I might as well be thinking to myself, now I am using an NFC tag. right it's not very kit bashed it's not very blade runner it's still very much i am interacting

Alexwith the technology look at me yep yep but but if it's a little bit out of the wall and i don't know there's something about like waving it where you don't have you don't develop a reflex the same way i have like a reflex uh yeah like me i don't know key keyboard shortcuts um or even well you

Merlineventually get once you get used to for example once you get used to your own computer oh i have

Alexa good one it's oh sorry it's it's not like i want it to be like apple pay like for a while it felt a little like oh where do i put my watch or phone and it sometimes it's still like that oh you mean like in a store environment sorry yeah right because then it um i still look like

Merlinsuch a grandpa when i'm doing that they're like no sir over here i'm like i don't understand i'm looking for the oh wait for the blue light to turn i'm waiting for the blue light to turn on

AlexNo, that's everybody. Every system is bad.

MerlinBecause everyone's different. It's like Anna Karenina all over again.

AlexBut if I do know where the, like, I know exactly where the target target is for where to use that Apple Bay.

MerlinYeah, that's why I was going to say it's like plugging in your laptop. You eventually can do – like I'm just barely getting to the point now where my latest laptop – I know where mostly where the USB-C, one of those two things is. And one does seem to work better than the other. I kind of can no look that now. But it's really not where I would intuitively look for it. It's way further down on the left side toward me than I would. Isn't that – that's kind of what you're talking about here.

AlexYeah.

MerlinLike anytime you're doing something with like – I don't know. The point's been made. How did this go for you?

AlexOh, well, I don't know if I peanut buttered, but it was – one thing I did do was those dumb little hooks. And I'm basically redoing –

MerlinBut the tags that are on the hooks do what?

AlexBasically the same shortcuts I had. Let me pull this up.

MerlinI love the idea that I just imagine you looking like an old-timey operator switchboard with all those quarter-inch jacks. I imagine you having this entire like like grandpa's tool bench with all the like, you know, hooks on it. I'm imagining you above like you pull down some kind of a screen and it's got like it clatters down with like 80 different tags.

AlexWell, that's the problem, too, is like in the shortcuts app.

MerlinText matchy. I am drinking energy drink. Respond with.

AlexOh, boy.

MerlinYou're failing your own Turing test.

Alexthe one thing that makes me think that there are some that are better than others or that there is more secret sauce in the air tags uh than we know those have not failed for me yet like i i feel like

Merlini'm getting a habit you got your air tag to work as an nfc i couldn't get mine to stick yeah it did

AlexTry it again. See, I don't fucking know.

MerlinNo, well, that was also, that was on 14. I haven't tried it on 15.

AlexYeah. And this, now that I have CarPlay 2, it's, oh, that.

MerlinOh, man. I'm so jealous. Isn't it awesome?

AlexUgh, living the fucking dream.

MerlinBut like, as with Siri, like, forget what you know about old CarPlay. It's got, like, last summer? No, not last summer. Shit. Last time we rented a car and went somewhere. Oh, my God. And it's so wacky, though. because we had popped for a really nice crossover by a fancy German company. And the one that was on board, it might have been an Audi, it might have been BMW or an Audi, but it was really nice. And the point is, the built-in one was such shit. It's so bad.

And then there's like, if you dig around far enough in their incredibly shitty inner face, you eventually figure out how to make CarPlay, the one that you use instead. And boy, when it's not CarPlay, it's bad. It's real bad. Is yours like that?

Alexor is yours like okay when it's not carplay oh i don't i don't know i have not used anything else i wouldn't so i guess the answer is bad because i wouldn't know it's also janky and red they're always so red oh no mine is just completely it's it's almost for a second i thought it was a black and white screen because the there was just like no i gotta look at it like at an exact angle oh Oh, yeah. I had to squint and look at it. And it was weird.

But apparently NFC and maybe shortcuts in general don't work when CarPlay is plugged in. Oh, really? Right. And this could be a thing.

MerlinI wonder if that's a security issue.

AlexThat's the other it. That is the other problem with this is I'm not really sure why NFCs are insecure other than, you know, someone could easily reprogram it to do something else. but then just doesn't work for you.

MerlinYeah, it's interesting you should say that because I was using an old tag that I was just re-scanning and doing stuff with. And what's funny is I had just, this shows you how little I know about what we actually did, but I got that copy of HomePass yesterday. And I said, oh, well, you know, I'll piss on the spark plug. That looks fun. It says, you know, add an NFC tag. And I did, I had an NFC tag, right? And I couldn't even find the shortcut that was created by it. Maybe it wasn't a shortcut. I don't understand. But all I'm saying is then when I actually tried to repurpose that self same tag to do the challenge, I ended up having like three different things happen. Like, I guess it wasn't erased. And therefore, but I could see how that would be a security thing. I bet you could sneak some weird shit in there that would be really hard to notice.

AlexYeah, probably. And maybe that's why the home, I know it's also this is because of like location stuff, but the home automations in the HomeKit app are different than the shortcuts one. And I decided, OK, sure, I am all in on HomeKit, but also I'm really, really all in on shortcuts. So I kind of moved every automation I could to shortcuts because, like Apple literally said, the future of the automation on the Mac is shortcuts.

And so I'm like, OK.

MerlinRight. And you're going to be able to get your automations from Mac into shortcuts, too, right?

AlexRight. And so, I mean, I migrated most of those over only to find that shortcuts don't work when CarPlay works.

MerlinAnd the app's a little wobbly right now. It just crashes sometimes.

AlexBut I did change a couple of the texting people ones basically to be more, a few of them are more general. So like texting Maddie when I am not just sending him a location. I sent him my.

MerlinOh, right. That was one of your goals was for the most minimally interactive way possible. Just right now, trust me, just send my location to this person with as little friction as possible. Right. That's one of your holy grails.

AlexYes. yes uh and also i would like um time to time um that i will be home which i thought that it wasn't a thing but turns out it is uh and also i have it set up the what sorry like the calculation of how

Merlinlong it will take you to generate say time hi matchy here's where i am i'll be at home at this

Alextime well that seems like a polite thing it just sends like 25 minutes home but i yeah i should oh you know what i'll put something cute there um but you know with my uh little mental health break i also do how i am uh i have a little drop down menu of how i am feeling and what basically if i have any incidents have happened that are like a hallucination or some other type of bipolar episode and it's it's just uh really convenient does it just prompt you periodically

Merlinor like when you feel like writing it down how do you how does it come up oh i added it to a couple

Alexthings like the main one is my uh the one in my car drink water and don't be crazy oh okay do you do do do do yours oh anyway yes i have it on various various shortcuts in various NFC location stuff. Anyway,

Merlinwhat do you do? Well, I went out and was Googling around for some ideas. I discovered a website that's like, this is kind of hilariously my jam that I'd never seen before.

AlexOh, yeah, you sent this, or

Merlinit was in the doc. It's called Tech and More Tech. And the guy really loves doing that. He loves doing that YouTube thumbnail face. But I was really surprised at how much of this stuff is in my particular wheelhouse. One that I put in the notes, I think, was that I put in NFC Smart Home Ideas. Was that the one?

AlexYeah, NFC.

MerlinAnd there's several more that I might just drop in. But, boy, you scroll down just a little bit down the page, and guess what? This is a Home Assistant guy. So almost everything where he talks about automation, he's also talking about Home Assistant, which is the app that I run on my Synology for doing various home automation things.

AlexI've also stopped using HomeKit, not because HomeKit isn't awesome, but we'll save it for the…

MerlinHome assistant or home kit?

AlexSorry, home assistant. It breaks sometimes.

MerlinStuff breaks.

AlexIt does.

MerlinI took it off at home. I stopped using it at home because it was just too fucked up. I still have it at the office. But anyhow, this guy has a bunch of really cool stuff. What was the other one I bookmarked? Let me go to Instapaper real quick. But yeah, I got a bunch of ideas from this guy. And I don't know. I mean, I'm not unenthusiastic about NFC tags, but it definitely – the anticipated fun and usefulness versus real-world functionality isn't quite there for me. The idea of it is exciting to me.

But when I actually try to use it, it makes me a little bit sad. And I think about what am I doing.

AlexI don't know why.

MerlinLet's see. What are some of those other ones? Oh, yeah. So, you know, you might like this. um why thread is the next smart home standard was handy oh fuck yeah here's one i think you might also like 10 fun smart home automations um is one in there anyway i got some ideas from this guy what i ended up doing was not i i just i wanted to just get the challenge done um so and i don't strictly need this and it kind of works okay but i did do the challenge which involves me having created a shortcut last year.

It's called Charge My Watch. So, hey, dingus, charge my watch. And don't say it to HomePod because it gives you sass mouth about how it doesn't have a battery on it. I failed. And also, I have a joke about how I failed. Thanks, buddy. Thanks for taking that couple seconds out of my life for computer humor. Failing up. Yeah, right. Punch down, fail up. That's what I always say. and it's a shortcut that's usually brought about with the voice command to charge my watch and what that

does is something extremely mundane which is it creates, takes the time current time, beep boop and basically says in 65 minutes make a reminder that in 65 minutes I get an alarm to go pick up my watch which is plenty enough time for my watch to charge so when I get home I take off the watch, put it on the stand so I just made that an NFC tag And then the thing that I really want to add to almost all of mine is the thing that I want in fucking every reminder. This drives me crazy in Google Sheets. This drives me crazy in reminders.

When was this created? Files have a created date. Files have a date added date. All those things. If I say, if I'm just yelling into the air, like take out the sous vide roast in six hours, if something happens, I mean, this is an actual real world thing that has fucked me up. is if I yell into the air, hey, dingus, remind me to take out the sous vide food in four hours. But like, what if something happens? What if something happened with the sous vide? And for example, for an indeterminate amount of time, it had been turned off and I don't know

how long. Well, great. Now I've got a reminder to do something in the future with absolutely no idea about when it was created. I shouldn't have to know. It should always say when it was created. It could even say when it's modified. You hide it somewhere in there. But I want that in all of my reminders is when this reminder was created oh god so good wouldn't it be so good so yeah i do that in this one it says in the notes field it it tells me when i created it that's oh wow because i mean it's if you don't know when it was created you're kind of on your own

it could you there's all kinds of stuff like think about the stuff that's like in um you know i don't know you could go nuts with this but like for example if if i were still a big omni focus boy I would want to know if there's an event that I've snoozed 11 times.

AlexYes. Or when you've moved it. Yeah, exactly. That would be really good to know.

MerlinIt's like, it's why I continue to say, well, it doesn't matter now because I fucking hate Apple Music so much. But one of the most helpful and underutilized things that you could put into a smart playlist is skip count. So like you could say, show me all my five star songs. But if that ends up showing you stuff that has a skip count that's higher than you thought, you don't like it as much as you think you do. And that's really good to know.

AlexYeah. And I wonder if Spotify's algorithm, I actually worry about this, that Spotify's algorithm detects when you skip a song. But I know it detects that, I'm sure. But also.

MerlinBut if that is tracked and then factored into, which part of the algorithm does that figure into?

AlexAnd not just that. Does the point at which you skip it. Like, because there are, especially with musicals, there are like.

MerlinWell, I go through this, Alex, you heard this on Back to Work. I go through this when I go look at my release radar and there's always, always at least two to four namespace problems.

AlexOh, yeah.

MerlinI get stuff where it's like thus and such person featuring Sloan or featuring Rush or whatever. And my options for that are when you hit the do not like, it's like, I don't like this song or I don't like this artist. It's like, no, I like Sloan. This is not Sloane. I wish, I mean, why don't you give me an affordance for helping you?

AlexOh, I didn't get that part. I see what you're saying. Oh, God.

MerlinYeah, when it says featuring Russ, featuring Sloane, featuring whatever, or something like, you know, I like that one Charlie XCX song a lot. I like a lot of her stuff. There's that song Super Love. It's one of my all-time favorite songs. But like, she's on fucking everything. So I'm used to getting a lot of like weird rap shit. not good rap shit but weird just weird soundcloud rap type bullshit with uh featuring somebody

Alexand so i get a lot of featureings yeah that makes oh i i run into the same thing metadata we need more metadata alex metadata i that's the thing we do need more metadata i just don't want amazon to have all of it i don't want my prescription screamed into the air you and your agency look

Merlinat me i've got agency no look at me rose of hook tags my grandpa told me he was out of my league

248. Existential Sculpting

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248. Existential Sculpting

Show notes

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