0:00:00It's over. Did you enjoy Cortex Miss Grey? I did.
0:00:03Do you know what? I did too. It was a welcome thing at that time in my life over the last
0:00:08couple of months. I've been very busy. Yeah, see it's good to have breaks
0:00:12throughout the year. One time in the year.
0:00:14You don't need an endless ceaseless grind that pulverises your soul into tiny little shards
0:00:23that never ends. No, breaks breaks throughout the year. It makes life, it makes life better, Myke.
0:00:31And you agree. You agree now. No one's forcing you to be here.
0:00:35I feel like you're forcing me to be here. Am I?
0:00:37No, I'm happy to be here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But not every week.
0:00:43I'm in the cottage. Hey!
0:00:45I'm in mega office. All set up now. All finished?
0:00:49100% well
0:00:51It says a hundred percent as it can be, you know, will it ever be a hundred percent? No, it's like that bridge
0:00:57You know the bridge that people paint forever. I don't know what you're talking about. Really?
0:01:02I feel like we've had this exact conversation before so I'm not gonna redo it
0:01:06I have been I have been alerted to the fact recently that
0:01:10The way did I say the name of my office?
0:01:14Makes it sound like it's spelt M e GG AR which I enjoy quite a lot the idea of it being mega our office
0:01:21So that is it. That's the thing. So mega office is fully taking shape. I have a couch my thinking couch
0:01:28Thinking couch. I have a sit-stand desk, which I have stood at once
0:01:33But I can do it if I need to oh and I have a drone now
0:01:41That's a whole thing that I've been playing around with Adina bought me a drone for Christmas
0:01:46Wow
0:01:48Merry Christmas Casey Neistat. What are you gonna do with that drone?
0:01:50I like Casey jr. Thank you very much. Okay Casey jr. Casey jr. Yeah, I
0:01:59I'm I'm really enjoying the drone. What drone did you get? What drones you get? I got a Parrot Bebop 2 and
0:02:07We have basically come to the idea that this is my practice drone
0:02:11You know like the really good drones they're like a thousand pounds or something
0:02:19This is my drone where I learn how to fly a drone. So this is your entry-level drone
0:02:25This is my entry-level drone where like it does it. It does it does a pretty good job
0:02:29And it's also that the controls are easy to use
0:02:33Mm-hmm, so I'm getting used to it. It's a whole big process, you know flying a drone. I
0:02:38Don't think it looks easy. I come home. I'm always impressed by people flying the drones
0:02:44It looks quite hard. I only lost control of it once. Uh-huh
0:02:50I was kind of making it hurt all around me in a circle
0:02:53And this I actually put this in my youtube video like a video that I just put up about my tattoo
0:02:58I put some drone footage at the end of it and the last clip is like the drone flying around me and then like just it
0:03:05Just carries on now
0:03:07In real time that was when I lost control of the drone. It was supposed to just keep going around me and
0:03:13I didn't know where it went. It was behind me and it just went off and nearly hit a tree
0:03:20But the footage looked really good, right and through the magic of editing you can cut it the frame before it would be obvious
0:03:27It's something exactly so it looks like you're a pro. It's the frame before it snaps back
0:03:33We're in like the opposite direction as I try and take control of the thing again
0:03:37That is a fantastic a fantastic Christmas present and I look forward to seeing more drone footage in your future vlogs
0:03:44Yeah, somebody somebody said to me in in the YouTube comments. Why why haven't you taken the drone higher?
0:03:50Mm-hmm, and it's through complete fear of the drone
0:03:54Like it can go a lot higher than I've taken it, but I'm like some so scared of it
0:03:59Like it's it's a really weird feeling to have this thing that I'm both excited about and terrified of it's it's it's like owning a lion
0:04:07It's like you trained it and it's just like a little lion cub but like at some point it's gonna scratch your face off
0:04:13Yeah, it's a wild creature. Yeah
0:04:16But that's kind of what makes it so exciting at the same time
0:04:20I don't have many, I'm not a risk-taking person in that way,
0:04:24you know, like an adrenaline risk-taker.
0:04:26But the drone is a weird kind of bridge for that.
0:04:30But I love it, I love it.
0:04:32I wish I could have seen my face when I opened it.
0:04:35It was a surprise.
0:04:36I was like, "Oh my god, you bought me a drone!"
0:04:38I think that was what I did.
0:04:40But I'm enjoying it a lot.
0:04:42I wish I had more time to go and just fly around parks.
0:04:46- It's very cool looking, and I feel like this is,
0:04:49This is another stage down the path of now being like a professional amateur level vlogger.
0:04:57Prime League.
0:04:58Yeah, yeah, exactly.
0:04:59Right?
0:05:00You're no longer just a beginner.
0:05:01Once you have a drone and you start learning how to make it follow you around one handed
0:05:06or whatever you're going to do with it, then you're moving up there in the vlogging world.
0:05:11That's exciting.
0:05:12It's very exciting.
0:05:13Will you let me fly your drone?
0:05:14Yeah, if you want to.
0:05:15That's a terrible decision.
0:05:18But yes.
0:05:19fly it? Yeah I would totally love it. I've never flown a drone. I think it would be
0:05:22interested to try to fly it. See how high it can go. Yeah so you gotta go. Go high
0:05:26and go far. Like don't see the drone anymore. That's the goal. That's that's
0:05:30what I would want. I can't see it and then there's just a button I press and
0:05:34it comes back right? That's the way it should work. Yeah actually yes. Awesome. See perfect
0:05:38there's nothing to worry about then. I'll fly it real high for you Myke.
0:05:41Oh you? Yeah that's what you're good at. Yeah you go for that.
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0:07:31and relay FM. I've also taken some steps professionally. I've,
0:07:35I've been doing some more serious things as well over Cortexmas.
0:07:40One of them is I have started time tracking.
0:07:43Finally.
0:07:46Yep. I have started time tracking. Um, the,
0:07:51the kind of the reason for this, which I'm, uh,
0:07:53I think we're going to get into a little bit later on,
0:07:55but the kind of the basic reason is because we are, uh,
0:07:59Relay FM is looking to get like a part-time assistant for me to help with
0:08:06some of the work that I do. But before we can kind of go down that road, we
0:08:12need to understand what tasks this person is going to take. And because
0:08:16they're gonna be, you know, the kind of the idea is to kind of do contractable
0:08:20billable hours of this person, I need to work out how long these things actually
0:08:24do take me to do. There's some of the tasks we're handing over. So I have
0:08:28started time tracking everything that I do work related just also because I
0:08:33figure if I'm gonna go down this route maybe it's time to start realizing just
0:08:37how much time I spend on things. Now I am using a service called Toggl.
0:08:42T-O-G-G-L. Toggl is I think primarily a web service. They have apps but they're
0:08:52not great. Like they have an OK iPhone app, nothing for the iPad. I spoke to
0:08:57their customer service over Twitter and it looks like they have absolutely no plans for
0:09:01an iPad app either. It's like, "We'll let you know if things change means never gonna happen."
0:09:07P: Yeah, we've added it to the support queue for feature requests. Like, okay, goodbye.
0:09:12S: But I have been using a friend of the show Federico Vittucci of MacStories
0:09:18workflows that he made for the iOS workflow app as a way to do this. And I was talking
0:09:25to Federico about this and he said "Have you been speaking to Gray?" and I said no
0:09:30and he said "Oh because you both started asking me about this at exactly the same
0:09:34time." Yeah so you you mentioned toggle as recommended to you by Federico a couple
0:09:41episodes ago yeah at around the time I was saying like I'm looking to switch my
0:09:46time tracking systems because I had outgrown my hobbled together Rube Goldberg
0:09:52machine that I was using to track my time previously, which was great, but past its
0:09:57prime. And so, yeah, one of the big things I did over Cortexmas was I had a period of
0:10:04about ten days where I was really rethinking and reworking a lot of things related to my
0:10:14business and one of them was involved in setting up time tracking. And I was really, really
0:10:21Because you recommended this, I tried it out, I found that same article that Federico had written about writing this little workflow to interact with toggle.
0:10:29Because they have an API.
0:10:30Yeah, so you can write these little scripts that it sort of talks directly to the web server so you don't have to use the apps that are on your phone.
0:10:37Which is nice for a bunch of reasons.
0:10:39And I was playing around with it very seriously for a few days and then essentially I harassed Vitigi about this because I started messaging him like
0:10:48messaging him like, "Hey, do you think someone could write a script to do these additional
0:10:55features?"
0:10:56I kind of said this to him, and this is when he said, "I'm working on one for Gray."
0:10:59He's like, "I'm gonna make it a bit easier and then I'll send it to you."
0:11:03He understands my level.
0:11:05"I'll put some instructions in and then you can have it."
0:11:08Excellent.
0:11:09I feel much better then that his effort was doubly well spent then, because I was harassing
0:11:14I'm like, what I would like is to be able to control everything in the API that toggle
0:11:20makes available, right?
0:11:21Like everything I can write to the server, I want to write to the server.
0:11:25And so he was very nice and wrote another custom version of it that could do more, because
0:11:30Web API stuff is a bit beyond my skill level.
0:11:34I was like looking through it and I'm like, I have no idea what any of this is doing.
0:11:38Yeah, the Web API stuff gets really complicated and really program-free very fast.
0:11:43But once he did that, I then took the thing that he gave to me and I modified it really
0:11:50extensively to work with the way I want my own system to work.
0:11:55And I have come up with - we can talk about it more in detail later, like I'm still playing
0:12:00around with it - but just as you have moved from the step of no time tracking at all to
0:12:08work time tracking, I am experimenting with this season doing time tracking for my whole life.
0:12:16So what I'm trying to do is actually just have a timer running if I am conscious about like,
0:12:25I want to have an overview now, not just of my hardcore work, but now that I have a stronger,
0:12:34better, more flexible in many ways system.
0:12:37It's like, let me push this to the absolute max, at least for a little while,
0:12:42and see what that tells me about myself, because
0:12:46I found that the first time I started doing time tracking,
0:12:49you learn a lot about yourself that you don't necessarily realize.
0:12:53Oh boy, do you.
0:12:54Yeah. And so I'm taking that, I'm taking that like, I've done the first stage of this,
0:12:58I'm doing the second stage of this, but this is what, this is,
0:13:01This is what I am dying to hear from you, Myke, because I always push people to do time tracking,
0:13:07and what I'm always trying to do is I'm mentioning like one key case, right?
0:13:12I'm always telling you like, "Oh, you need to know the value of your time in terms of dollars," right?
0:13:17That's always the thing that I'm harping on.
0:13:19But if you can get someone down that path, now we can have the conversation about like,
0:13:24"What does your workday really look like, Myke?" [laughs]
0:13:28So I'll say before before we dig into this and and before I have to go to the corner and cry for a little while
0:13:33Having only been doing this for a couple of weeks
0:13:37I've already started to have the thought of should I track everything like I've had that thought i'm like should I
0:13:42Track the time that i'm reading twitter like so I can see how you've gone down that route
0:13:47Like I can see the value in knowing
0:13:49What i'm doing at all times i'm not going to start doing that yet
0:13:53But I can see that if I continue to keep doing this like I think that I will I can see myself getting to that
0:13:58Point quite quite easily actually it seems like a logical step. Yeah, I would seriously recommend not doing that at the start
0:14:05I don't want to do it right now. It's too much
0:14:07Yeah, exactly
0:14:07like I would honestly wait something like six months of just tracking your work time before you even think about trying to track everything because
0:14:14It's it's enough to do just the work time like I'm constantly forgetting time as it is, right?
0:14:19Like just constantly forget. I have been looking forward to this conversation and dreading it in equal measure
0:14:25Because one like I think it's like a really good thing for us to get into
0:14:29But the other is like I know where it's going
0:14:31I know that you're gonna push me to do the how much is my time worth thing?
0:14:38And I really don't want to do that. Yeah, like I
0:14:41Viscerally do not want to start doing those calculations
0:14:46But here we are so let me tell you what I have learned so far having only done this for about two weeks
0:14:52Basically I've learned some key things and I don't know how I feel about them
0:14:58There are times in the week where the sheer amount of my time that is podcast editing is concerning
0:15:04Mm-hmm the recording time the amount of time that I spend recording is about what I expected
0:15:11But editing time is way out of whack.
0:15:14Okay, so what way out of whack as in you're spending way more time editing than you thought that you were done.
0:15:20Than I thought, yeah.
0:15:21Okay, that's not too surprising. I mean because the shows are the shows are scheduled, right?
0:15:26Yeah.
0:15:26Like this is this is the whole the whole lesson to learn from all of these things is you can't trust your brain for anything.
0:15:31No.
0:15:32Your brain's terrible at everything it ever does, right?
0:15:35Yes.
0:15:35So I like your brain is an adversary like or it's an incompetent.
0:15:39It's one of the two all the time like hey brain. How much time do I spend on editing? Uh, 20 minutes?
0:15:44Like there's no idea whereas where's that you can look at a calendar and see that you have booked in recording slots
0:15:50Yeah, so I'm not surprised that you have a better sense of that
0:15:53But yeah, so the editing is taking longer than you think how I'm like, so there are a couple of shows that throw out whack
0:15:59So like there's this show and there's another show that I edit when I edit very differently
0:16:05Like I'd listen to the entire thing and spend a lot of time on it
0:16:09So when when I do those shows it pushes the numbers up
0:16:14Significantly quickly in the week because I tend to do this at the start of the week
0:16:18So that like throws it out of whack for like three quarters of the week, right?
0:16:22Because I'm aware of those I know how long they take me like so that's that the problem that I have is all of my other
0:16:30shows
0:16:30Shows that I thought took me 20 minutes to edit are taking me about 45.
0:16:36Mm-hmm.
0:16:37And I am not happy about that.
0:16:39Yeah, and that's what can kill you, right?
0:16:42Because you have a bunch of shows that probably fall into that category.
0:16:46Oh, it's like everything.
0:16:47Yeah.
0:16:48Right?
0:16:49Yeah, you're losing half as much time as you thought you actually had.
0:16:51It takes me two to three times the amount of time that I thought it took.
0:16:54Mm-hmm.
0:16:55And this has been a really harsh realization.
0:17:00Mm-hmm, like I was talking to a dinner about this and I was like and I explained it to her
0:17:04She's like, yeah, it takes you about 45 minutes. She's like I know this. Mm-hmm
0:17:08Like I say I'll be back in about 20 minutes
0:17:09I'm gonna go edit upgrade and she knows I'm gone for 45 right like in my mind. It only takes 20 minutes. Mm-hmm and
0:17:15I'm very uncomfortable about this
0:17:18Because I have now opened my idea to the fact that my brain has no idea what it's doing like right
0:17:25I was convinced that that was how long it took me to edit a show like that
0:17:29But I'm not just off by a little bit. It's like a factor of two at minimum.
0:17:33Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
0:17:34This is why it is so,
0:17:36so important to do, because you just cannot trust yourself
0:17:41to have any sense of how long it really takes you to do things. This is why for anybody listening,
0:17:48if you work for yourself, if you're working for a company, if you care at all about how you are spending your time,
0:17:57Just do some time tracking on the things that are like most important to you
0:18:02And you like you will see it revealed how your time is really being spent like whatever you think you're doing
0:18:08You're going to discover where you are surprisingly wrong about yourself
0:18:14So one thing that I was wrong about that
0:18:17I'm happy with is the amount of time it takes me to prepare
0:18:20So I spend more time preparing for shows than I thought I did hmm
0:18:24That's something I'm happy to know. So why is that? Why is that? What do you mean?
0:18:29So like I spend more time putting our documents together and doing research
0:18:33Mm-hmm, and that is the type of time that I'm pleased that I put in
0:18:39Okay
0:18:39Because I thought that I wasn't spending enough time preparing
0:18:42Like I spend about as much time as I thought I should be to make a good show, right? Okay. Okay
0:18:48I see I see what you're saying. All right, that's good
0:18:50Like I was maybe self-conscious of it. Mm-hmm, but I was wrong to be it kind of felt like if I'm not doing adequate preparation
0:18:56I'm kind of like a fraud
0:18:58Mm-hmm, right that like I should be prepared for the shows to make the best show that I can make and
0:19:03There were times where I was like, I'm not doing enough of this. So it's like I'm kind of just like winging it. Mm-hmm
0:19:10Mm-hmm, but that's not the case
0:19:11Like when I look at the actual numbers like I'm spending about as much if not more time than I thought that I should be
0:19:18So I'm happy about that
0:19:20Like and the thing is like the edit is the same side of it, right?
0:19:23which is like making the show better by doing the editing like I agree with that, but it's
0:19:27It's because I had a real idea in my mind of how long that took me
0:19:33like I didn't have a time for the preparing because I I tend to do show prep for
0:19:38Seven days for each show like I'm always doing it
0:19:41You know as an idea comes to me or as a story comes to me like I'll pick it up as I go
0:19:46So like I'm not sitting down for like a block of time and doing it
0:19:49That's how I do the edits. I sit down for a block of time
0:19:53So I thought it took me this amount of time, but I'm really wrong about that and that is
0:19:58That's what's concerning to me the preparing stuff. I don't feel like it's a real suck of time
0:20:03Mm-hmm because it's happening in these little bits and it's also just time really well spent
0:20:10Like this show exists because you put a bunch of time into the show notes, right?
0:20:15All of your shows are better if you put time into the show notes ahead of time.
0:20:19So that's great to find out that, you know,
0:20:23perhaps you had the feeling like you're doing it less because, of course, in any conversation,
0:20:28like conversations evolve as they go on and they're never going to follow the show notes entirely.
0:20:33So there is an element of, even for the most prepared conversation,
0:20:37I mean, both parties are still sort of winging it throughout that conversation.
0:20:42But it's the right kind of winging.
0:20:43It's like informed winging.
0:20:45Exactly, exactly.
0:20:47So maybe that's why you were feeling that way a little bit.
0:20:50But yeah, the editing time, you know, that's something else that's maybe, maybe something
0:20:55can be done about that, Myke.
0:20:57I don't know.
0:20:58What do you think?
0:20:59Not yet.
0:21:00Not yet.
0:21:01Okay.
0:21:02So I've been thinking about it.
0:21:03I've been talking about it and it is a clear thing that I could do something about, but
0:21:08I'm not ready.
0:21:10I am not ready to let go of what I consider to be an important part of the creation of
0:21:14the shows that I do.
0:21:16I feel like many of the shows that I do are as good as they are because of the edit that
0:21:20I put in.
0:21:21So, the difference, I think I've explained this, but a show like this, I go back and
0:21:25listen to the whole thing.
0:21:27For most of my other weekly shows, I don't do that, but what I do is I take notes as
0:21:31the shows going on and then I go in and fix those points. So like I'm editing whilst we're
0:21:35recording because I'm noting the things that need to be fixed and then I go in and just
0:21:40fix it to each one of those points. So what that does is it means that I can get the shows
0:21:44out especially the topic based shows the weekly kind of news focused shows they can come out
0:21:50in a timely fashion which is important to me. But I also feel like I can put a lot of
0:21:54edit time into them because of the way that I do it. But unfortunately it's taking longer
0:21:58And I thought but I don't want to let it go yet because I feel like I would be kind of losing part of my voice
0:22:04of the shows
0:22:05Now there might be you know, I'm starting to think about okay, which shows are most important for that
0:22:11Which shows Matt at least like I'm trying to start like roll these things around in my brain. Mm-hmm, but like I'm not like
0:22:18Mentally ready to let go of anything like that. Yeah, it's understandable understandable
0:22:25You know, it's like how I would never pass the edit of this show to anybody because this is like the most of all of them
0:22:31Mm-hmm, but like it's like with the other shows
0:22:33I mean, you know why that is right just because of the type of edit that we do on this show. It needs our
0:22:40opinion
0:22:42Yeah, but like all of my shows have that to a degree, but it's not as strong, right?
0:22:47It's yeah
0:22:48It's more you're sliding up and down the spectrum of this and cortex is a show which is at the most extreme end
0:22:55of that. And I only have this opinion about my other shows because I do this one because
0:22:59it's changed the way that I edit. So like I more now than like two years ago I feel
0:23:05like my editing is part of the voice and tone of voice and like character of the show than
0:23:13it was before. I've gotten into your mind Myke. You've destroyed me so if you want to
0:23:18take over in editing for me that would be awesome. I do not I do not my job is simply
0:23:23just to keep infecting you with ideas and watch them take root.
0:23:30So we're going to talk about Year of Less again, but this is part...
0:23:34When I was originally thinking about what my Year of Less might look like, it might
0:23:38be handing over some editing work, but now I don't think that's going to be how it is
0:23:42going to be in 2017.
0:23:45There is a silver lining to all of this.
0:23:48I do not work for intense periods of time for as long as I thought I did.
0:23:55This is the other thing I have universally found that people discover.
0:24:00If they're serious, if they're doing the time tracking right, you almost always realise
0:24:05you're way overestimating how much time you're really working.
0:24:10So I, again, I've maybe done this on one quiet week and one busy week, right?
0:24:16Yeah, it's still very preliminary.
0:24:18still very early however I am working out that I maybe work between 20 to 30
0:24:26hours a week in intense time so this includes like recording shows editing
0:24:32shows preparing for shows and dealing with sponsors like and maybe having
0:24:37calls about things it's like that is like solid working time and I'm pleased
0:24:41with these numbers but what's not trackable or a couple of things really
0:24:46is thinking about work and also dealing with the little things that pop up. So like someone
0:24:55might ask me a question, someone might send me a quick email that takes a two second reply,
0:25:01but these things happen for as long as I am awake. So I may only work for five hours on
0:25:09on that Wednesday, but I could do a half an hour's work
0:25:13at nine, an hour's work at 10, one hour's work at 12,
0:25:18and one hour's work at 6 p.m.
0:25:20And it is the, what I've realized is that the fact
0:25:26that this work can happen for as long as I am awake
0:25:30is what makes it feel like I am always working.
0:25:34So I don't want to do anything about this, right?
0:25:39There are ways that I can make this better.
0:25:40I could not look at my email other than a specific time of the day.
0:25:43I could not open Slack other than a specific time of the day.
0:25:46Like I know I can do all of that, but I don't want to do that.
0:25:50That's not how I want to work. Like I currently,
0:25:53I like to work the way that I do, which is to always be working. Right.
0:25:58I will interject here and just say that while for many people,
0:26:03I would recommend exactly the things that you just mentioned.
0:26:07I would not recommend them to you.
0:26:09I still think that your business and your involvement in it
0:26:15really benefits from you being around and available
0:26:18to a lot of different people at a lot of different hours.
0:26:22I really think that your availability
0:26:25makes a big difference to how well Relay is doing.
0:26:28So even if you wanted to crank it down,
0:26:31I think you are in a very difficult position to even do that.
0:26:35So the thing that it is doing though,
0:26:38it is making me feel better knowing this.
0:26:42Good, good, good.
0:26:44Because I am realizing like,
0:26:46I feel like I'm really busy all the time,
0:26:50but it turns out I'm not as busy as I thought I was.
0:26:54Like I am not working. Like my, my,
0:26:59The thing I used to say was I'm working for as much as I'm awake.
0:27:02That's how I felt.
0:27:04And now I understand where that feeling is coming from and now I'm able to fight it.
0:27:10Like I'm able to answer back to my brain when it gets in that mode.
0:27:14I'll be like, "Okay then, smart guy, open toggle and look at your report of the day."
0:27:19Oh, three hours.
0:27:23So like, this is not a, "Ha, look at me.
0:27:26"Like I only work 20 hours a week."
0:27:29Because if I would have tracked my time
0:27:32when I worked at the bank,
0:27:34I would be really keen on seeing what that looked like.
0:27:38'Cause I think it would probably be less.
0:27:40Because like, as I said, this is not like,
0:27:43Myke is chatting with someone, you know.
0:27:45That's not billable.
0:27:46I was like, when I'm chatting to somebody at work,
0:27:48or like I'm going for lunch, or like,
0:27:50this is like pure time where I'm like,
0:27:53this is 100% work, I am doing this, I'm doing that.
0:27:57This is what I genuinely feel like a 40 hour work week
0:28:01actually is for most people, not everyone, but most people.
0:28:05People are not in consistent, constant, intense work
0:28:09from nine to five.
0:28:10Humans do not work like that.
0:28:12- No, humans can't work like that.
0:28:14And I think this is the really clear distinction to draw is,
0:28:20in my old time tracking system, I was only tracking the really valuable hours.
0:28:27Like, did I just spend the previous 40 minutes really writing yes or no?
0:28:33Right, and if the answer was no, I wouldn't track it.
0:28:35And it's like, nobody does eight hours a day of that kind of work.
0:28:41Right, where you are really focused, value generating work.
0:28:46But everybody can be kind of like at work for a really long time and doing a bunch of
0:28:53Low level stuff that makes you feel like I've been working all day. Yep, right, but like but how much real
0:29:00Value creation has occurred here. I have a weird job
0:29:04So my numbers I reckon are higher than most people
0:29:08Like for example this week
0:29:11Monday Tuesday, Wednesday have all been over six hours
0:29:14Mm-hmm, but that is like because the type of stuff that I do is incredibly time intensive
0:29:19It's like speaking to somebody for two hours and then working on it for what turns out to be an hour
0:29:23Like those things can add up quite a lot. Mm-hmm. And what I have really noticed is like so last Friday I
0:29:32Had seven hours of work that I logged. Mm-hmm. I felt like crap last Friday
0:29:38Right and this week like I've been doing a consistent like six hours a day
0:29:43But I feel okay because I knew it was busy week.
0:29:48And it's like this is confirming that feeling and I'm yeah I'm more tired and you know what's
0:29:52been really strange?
0:29:53I've noticed that I've been sleeping in more this week than last week.
0:29:56Like I've been waking up a little bit later.
0:29:58Like it is really opening my eyes to how I work in a really interesting way.
0:30:05Yeah if you pay attention to that you'll see that those those overwork times are like you're
0:30:10gonna pay for it one way or another.
0:30:12I still love and am envious of your busy week and not busy week because you have a bit of
0:30:18that averaging out effect occurring there, which I still think is fantastic.
0:30:24But I'm really glad to hear that you are able to push back against your own brain a little
0:30:30bit when your brain says like, "Oh, I've been working all day."
0:30:34It's like, "Okay, but how much really?"
0:30:37And just the knowledge of that, the ability to push back on that a little bit, I think,
0:30:42can really help reduce the feelings of busyness and stress and overwhelmingness.
0:30:50But you are totally right that the main thing that is untrackable by even the best system
0:30:57is the thinking about work time.
0:30:59That is a futile thing to try to track and that is something that is outside the system
0:31:05and kind of around it all the time and that is again one thing when you're like running
0:31:12your own company or doing your own thing. It's very hard to get away from that, but
0:31:16just trying to be mindful of it I think is very helpful. Like am I thinking about work
0:31:23and doing anything about it now or is it just something that's on the back of my mind which
0:31:30which is causing me stress.
0:31:31Like even just trying to be aware of that sort of stuff
0:31:35within the context of a time tracking system
0:31:37is very helpful.
0:31:38- So it's been a very strange couple of weeks,
0:31:41but good I think overall.
0:31:43Like I've learned some valuable things
0:31:45and it's already made me kind of rethink
0:31:48what I thought 2017 was gonna be like for me.
0:31:52- Wow.
0:31:53- I know, right?
0:31:54Because I was moving down a road
0:31:57and all that's done is just make me take,
0:31:59I'm taking a sooner junction, right?
0:32:02Like, the goal is still the same,
0:32:05but the way that I'm planning on achieving that goal is different.
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0:33:29We had spoken about Year of Less a lot last year, right?
0:33:33That was your theme of 2016 was the year of less, comma me.
0:33:36And as we were approaching the end of the year,
0:33:39I kind of said that that was my plan for 2017.
0:33:43Like my plan for 2016 was make a business work.
0:33:47Like make it really work.
0:33:49That is your plan. Like just do it.
0:33:51Get this machine off the ground and just make it go.
0:33:55So my and also like buy a house like become an adult like but
0:33:592017 for me like I want to look at what year of less looks like
0:34:03mm-hmm and
0:34:05My I had originally considered that year of less would be
0:34:09less
0:34:11content
0:34:13creation
0:34:14hmm, so
0:34:15less shows
0:34:17less editing
0:34:19because
0:34:20Fundamentally, they are the most time intensive things that I do is making the shows. Mm-hmm
0:34:25but then I was like
0:34:28But I like that
0:34:30Right, it's like the reason that I can sit with like six or seven hours of tracked time
0:34:38Is because it didn't really feel like work like it is my job, but I really love doing it. Mm-hmm
0:34:46So is that the right stuff to do less of?
0:34:51I'm not sure.
0:34:53Like I'm not sure that I would be happy
0:34:55with the balance after that, right?
0:34:57Like making less or like turning down.
0:35:00Like my thought was like, okay,
0:35:02maybe stop one or two shows that you're doing right now
0:35:04and stop taking on any new projects.
0:35:07But I love new projects.
0:35:08(laughs)
0:35:09- You do.
0:35:10- It's my favorite thing.
0:35:11- You always get very excited
0:35:13when you have a new podcast in the works.
0:35:15Or like anything right like the vlog
0:35:17Mm-hmm. I shouldn't be doing that. No every number
0:35:22Everything says you should not be doing this
0:35:25But I love it like it is it is like a hobby now like it is just this little creative thing that I get to do
0:35:33and
0:35:35I've kind of come to the realization that that is not what I should be cutting down on I should not be
0:35:40taken away or
0:35:43slimming the reason I'm doing this.
0:35:47Like the primary reason that I wanted this business to exist is so I could support
0:35:53myself to do these things.
0:35:54I don't have a business so I can run a business.
0:35:57Right. Right. Because that's what I would end up doing.
0:36:01My business would exist so I could enjoy being Mr.
0:36:04Business person. Right.
0:36:06And some people do like that.
0:36:07But that's not what I do.
0:36:08Yeah, that's that's that's their thing.
0:36:10But that's not your thing.
0:36:12You know, it was like, I think I mentioned this on the show a long time ago,
0:36:15which was like when I would talk to people in my old job and tell them that I was
0:36:18leaving to start my own thing.
0:36:19And people used to say to me, I've always dreamed of running my own business.
0:36:22Right.
0:36:23Yes.
0:36:23Yes.
0:36:24Like that's not a dream.
0:36:25Right?
0:36:27Like what is the thing?
0:36:28And then they'll be like, I don't know.
0:36:29I just want to have my own business.
0:36:30Like, I think that's the type of person that like will run a business because they
0:36:35like the business, which is totally valid, but it's not where I come from.
0:36:40Like for me, it's like, and I think this is the same for you.
0:36:43Like I think your goals are slightly different to mine, but it's the business
0:36:47is a means to the end and the end is like whatever it is.
0:36:51And for me, it's to just make the stuff that I love.
0:36:55And I think for you, it's maybe more to like to have control of your life.
0:36:58Yeah.
0:37:00And they are like what is caused by the business.
0:37:03And so maybe what I need to do is remove some of the business.
0:37:08So that's where you're going to try to cut down on things.
0:37:10Assistant, not editor.
0:37:13Ah, OK. All right.
0:37:15This is good. This is good.
0:37:17So what we are currently like, the reason I am time tracking
0:37:21is so we can work out how many hours
0:37:25could I give away to someone else?
0:37:28Hmm. Right.
0:37:30Because we know if we want to if we really want to bring somebody on,
0:37:34we have to give them a significant amount of time.
0:37:36so it's worth it for everyone.
0:37:38So we are looking at hiring somebody
0:37:42on a part-time contract basis.
0:37:44I will just take a very slight break right now
0:37:46to say please do not send me any applications.
0:37:49This is gonna be a formal process thing.
0:37:54- Your comment in the Reddit is not an application.
0:37:57- An email is not an application.
0:38:00Until there is a, I will talk about it,
0:38:02I will tell the world when it is there,
0:38:05we are gonna create a real job posting
0:38:08that outlines what we need from someone,
0:38:11what they need, and what they can expect, right?
0:38:13Like it's gonna be a real thing.
0:38:16So please, if you are interested,
0:38:19do not send me anything, because it's not the way, right?
0:38:23Like we're gonna have a real way.
0:38:25Now if you've been listening to this show,
0:38:26you know like we spent a lot of time
0:38:29talking about grey hiring someone and like the process,
0:38:32and we don't have that process in place.
0:38:35There will be one, but we're early in this, right?
0:38:38Like right now we're like still working out
0:38:40what will this person do, like that kind of thing.
0:38:42- Yeah, right now you're even feeling out
0:38:44what are the areas of responsibility
0:38:47that this person could even have.
0:38:48- Yep, we don't even know how many hours it's gonna be.
0:38:50- Right, yeah, you have no idea.
0:38:51You need to do more time tracking to find that out.
0:38:53- Exactly.
0:38:54But primarily right now, what this person will be doing
0:38:57is helping me with coordinating
0:38:58and management of our sponsorship process.
0:39:01The most businessy part of our business.
0:39:04It is like talking to people over emails,
0:39:06arranging and having telephone calls,
0:39:09booking inventory into our system.
0:39:12So like when somebody buys a spot
0:39:13and putting it into spreadsheets and systems that we have.
0:39:16And then ideally as well,
0:39:18this person would kind of help with some copywriting.
0:39:20So helping us put together the bullet points
0:39:22that we give to our hosts
0:39:23so they can talk about the companies that are sponsoring.
0:39:26That is what this person will probably be doing.
0:39:30And I, in a weird way,
0:39:33and I think it's a weird way, I enjoy running our business.
0:39:36But it's not the thing I enjoy the most.
0:39:40And this is the thing that I could conceivably give
0:39:44to somebody else to help me with.
0:39:47If I think of my work as art,
0:39:50then it's harder for me to give some of that stuff
0:39:52away to someone.
0:39:53Like, if somebody filled in for me on Cortex, right,
0:39:58like that would be great for my graphs, you know?
0:40:01But that's not gonna happen,
0:40:02'cause we're in the show, right?
0:40:04It's me and you.
0:40:05So I can't give these things, exactly.
0:40:07And it would never happen.
0:40:09I could maybe get like an impersonator,
0:40:10but great, great, great.
0:40:12- Need a gray impersonator on the show.
0:40:14- Maybe I should look into that.
0:40:15Or maybe I could just like try and do your voice.
0:40:18Or like, you know, just cut together clips
0:40:21from your YouTube videos and, you know?
0:40:24- I'm like, yeah, I'm liking the sound of this.
0:40:26- All right, I'm gonna start getting a lot more stuff
0:40:29right on this show, I think is what's going on.
0:40:32So like I'm just thinking that maybe what I can do is like start to pass off a lot of
0:40:38the things that don't need to need my input.
0:40:43Spreadsheets do not need me.
0:40:46Right.
0:40:47Right?
0:40:48And so this is kind of where I'm coming from.
0:40:50So yeah, so year of less I think is gonna happen, but it is significantly different
0:40:57to what I expected it was gonna be.
0:40:59This is the whole value of doing the time tracking and thinking about what you're doing
0:41:05and just being more aware of your work and instead of having in your mind like a big
0:41:12blob that's just labeled work.
0:41:15If you're doing time tracking, you're pulling out the different pieces, you are thinking
0:41:20about them more intentionally, and then this allows you to kind of siphon it off in your
0:41:26mind into different categories.
0:41:28And this is exactly how I started.
0:41:31Like, you know, the one not super valuable category
0:41:36that I did track, because I just wanted to be aware of it,
0:41:38was what I've--
0:41:39I've threw everything else under the category
0:41:43of administration.
0:41:44So when I was tracking time, I was like, am I doing email?
0:41:47OK, this is administration.
0:41:48Am I doing stuff related to taxes?
0:41:50This is administration.
0:41:52Am I fixing a typo on the website?
0:41:54This is administration.
0:41:55It's like essentially anything that needs to get done, but is not related to
0:42:00Revenue production or product production like all of this just is filed under administration
0:42:07Do you wanna know what one of mine is called? What?
0:42:10sponsor aftercare
0:42:13Sponsor aftercare. Yeah, that is like such and such person has an email that they need but like the deal is already done
0:42:21Now it's just like little bits and bobs.
0:42:24Right, right. There's aftercare that needs to happen.
0:42:26Like fixing a URL or like delivering a contract.
0:42:30Like it's things that are just, they happen afterwards.
0:42:33They're not, you know, they are not directly revenue generating but they need to occur.
0:42:37Right, they're things that need to happen.
0:42:39Mm-hmm.
0:42:39And it was being aware of...
0:42:43Not even the sheer amount of hours that I was spending on administration stuff,
0:42:48but simply becoming aware of, okay, which subcategories in this administration land
0:42:53can I get someone to help me with?
0:42:57And that was what started it off for me,
0:43:00you know, getting an assistant in the first place was, was like you said, does this
0:43:05spreadsheet that I'm just putting some data into, does it need to be my fingers putting in this data?
0:43:10No, it doesn't. And so like, just start building things up from there and, you know, it's
0:43:17It's been nothing but great, and you know I've also had
0:43:20the same experience that you did where you talked about how
0:43:24Adina was aware that like oh you think something's going to take 20 minutes, but it actually takes you 45 minutes
0:43:30I was really aware with a lot of the administration stuff
0:43:33related to
0:43:35posting the podcasts I
0:43:37Realized through time tracking the same kind of thing like I thought this was a 45 minute job
0:43:43tops, but turns out all of the steps took me a whole afternoon and
0:43:48I didn't know this, but my wife always did. When I said like, "Oh, I'm just gonna post the show. I'll be right back."
0:43:54She's like, "He's gone for the whole, like for the next three hours."
0:43:59You emerged from the cave two days later.
0:44:01Bleary-eyed.
0:44:04Yeah, it's like, he thinks he's gonna be right back,
0:44:07But he never is! Like this takes a long time to flip all of the switches and like do all of the things to make
0:44:12a thing go live. And so that was one of these cases of like, okay, these steps, does it have to be me doing this?
0:44:18No, it doesn't have to be me doing this.
0:44:20Also, the time tracking is showing me like I'm losing a whole afternoon every week to this when I mentally think I'm not losing that time.
0:44:28It's like, okay, this one is gonna get passed off to somebody else. And for me, the year of last year,
0:44:36Letting go of a lot of the reigns to that kind of stuff was a big deal.
0:44:42But the end of it was just great. It was fantastic to do.
0:44:46So right now my time tracking is quite basic.
0:44:49So I'm interested to kind of see a little bit how you're doing it.
0:44:54Because all I'm doing right now is I have got some projects and tags.
0:44:58And that's all I'm doing. So a project might be show recording, a tag might be cortex.
0:45:03And that's it. So like I'm just keeping it like super basic because you can add all these like descriptions of the tasks and stuff like that
0:45:09I'm not really doing any of that right now
0:45:11I'm trying to make it as simple as I can for myself to just be adding it in
0:45:14But does that sound like a reasonable system to you?
0:45:18I mean, here's the thing. It's it's so
0:45:21personal doing something like this
0:45:25it entirely comes down to what are you trying to get out of it and
0:45:32You know when I talk people into this I always suggest like just start with the simplest thing possible
0:45:37It's like I've decided to go really high level with it
0:45:41You know yeah, and I think that's that's perfectly fine like event if anybody's starting time tracking against like just track
0:45:48Your your best high value hours and like leave it at that right. That's totally fine
0:45:53Because I think what what happens is you either?
0:45:56discover that this is like a
0:46:00Basically, there's a feedback loop that happens with some people, right? So some people they'll do time tracking and then they'll stop and
0:46:07they'll realize like, "Okay, I have some insights. I have some idea about how my time is being spent,
0:46:12but I don't feel the need to keep doing this all the time."
0:46:14But for some people it ends up becoming a positive feedback loop where you feel, "Okay, I've started this.
0:46:21I'm getting value out of this." And then it can make more sense to try to
0:46:25more fine-grain down
0:46:29what is actually occurring.
0:46:31And so,
0:46:33obviously I'm in that second camp and now, you know, it's been a long time since I've been time tracking.
0:46:38I've been spending a lot of time with toggle and this is why I was harassing
0:46:43Federico to give me every option because I'm going to use them all
0:46:47to do this what I would say as fine-grain as I think is reasonable,
0:46:53but probably most people would think is an unreasonable amount of detail.
0:46:58But the high-level picture for me is I want to be able to see
0:47:03how much time just in total do I spend on Cortex, right? How much time do I spend on Hello Internet?
0:47:09How much time do I spend on the YouTube videos?
0:47:12And I do have breakdowns in there. Like it's going to be interesting to me to see
0:47:18like how much time is spent editing versus recording or how much time is spent
0:47:23writing versus working with the animator. Those things are interesting
0:47:27But ultimately it really is that high level stuff is where most of the value can come out of.
0:47:35So I think as long as you have a reasonable high level breakdown that makes sense to you about what you want to be keeping track of and what is important to you, I think that's fine.
0:47:47fine. But you know, you can get really crazy with this. I'm just thinking that this is slightly
0:47:53crazy, but I set up a little system with toggle using Zapier, the other if this then that service.
0:48:00I set up a timer that starts automatically when I should be awake. And the timer is called
0:48:08sleeping in.
0:48:09Oh, right.
0:48:11So what? That's amazing.
0:48:13So at the minute my alarm goes off,
0:48:16a timer starts, which is called sleeping in.
0:48:19I like that.
0:48:20And I'll tell you, that is really effective
0:48:22to getting you out of bed, because, you know, you're sort of like half awake.
0:48:27And when you're self-employed, there's a bit of like,
0:48:29does it matter if I get up now or five minutes from now?
0:48:33No, it doesn't.
0:48:34It's like, but now it does because someone's watching.
0:48:38Exactly, I have a black colored top level category in my system called sleeping in
0:48:45and I want to see that bar be as small as possible and
0:48:48So that's that's that's an example of like one of these things that like maybe a little bit far
0:48:54But I like I actually want to know like how much time do I end up spending
0:48:59Sleeping past when I think I should be up and then this also acts as like a little motivator
0:49:05And so it's like, you know, as long as it's like a few minutes, that's fine
0:49:08But I just want to see and knowing that it's there is really helpful
0:49:12Yeah, I'm close to like setting up the Zapier stuff to just do some automatic things
0:49:17like I just I don't really need to be pressing buttons to track when I
0:49:21Record shows because I know how long I'm doing that for
0:49:24And so this would just be that like Zapier is like another web service
0:49:28It's like if there's if this than that
0:49:30It's a little bit more advanced with some of the stuff that it can do and it's a paid service as well, right?
0:49:35I think this there is a paid component. Yeah, it's free to a certain level and paid after that
0:49:40So there would be things that I could do that could watch my Google Calendar and it is automatically log time based on an entry
0:49:47Mm-hmm, and I find that kind of thing really interesting
0:49:50This is if I was gonna set like another theme of my year. I'm really interested in making
0:49:57My computers and my technology work for me. Mmm
0:50:01So one of them is and I'm gonna spend some time talking about switching my to-do system at some point
0:50:08Soon on this show as I'm looking at moving to todoist
0:50:12Mm-hmm, because it also has a web API
0:50:15So you can get all of these systems talking to each other. Yeah, and that is becoming an
0:50:22increasingly
0:50:25Interesting idea or proposition to me. Mm-hmm
0:50:28I am putting input into these systems and all it does is just sit there. Mm-hmm
0:50:34Mm-hmm, there is no reason why these things can't be taking the input and turning them into something of use to me
0:50:40And so that's what I'm starting to look at
0:50:43Anything with an automation is it is a total win right? Like it just it pays dividends for forever
0:50:49So I actually, just because I'm curious to see, I do have a top-level project which is called automation
0:50:56because I do want to see like how much time does it take me to actually
0:51:01implement these systems, right, and to actually get these things working and to think about like what is what is the payoff in these?
0:51:08And this is also the case of like, "Oh, okay, we talked about it a bunch on the podcast
0:51:12I end up feeling like I'm working on this stuff a bunch," but the actual time tracking data
0:51:17reveals like this is the time you spend on automating
0:51:20the time tracking thing itself or like I spend a bunch of time reworking my email system to do some stuff automatically. It's like this is a
0:51:28trivial portion of
0:51:31the time you spend working and I'm also tracking it in a time when it is going to be
0:51:38ludicrously lots, right? It's like between the start of December until now I have spent
0:51:4610 hours and 53 minutes working on various forms of like setting up my systems and
0:51:53this is this is a time when I'm
0:51:56redoing my entire time tracking, I redid my entire email, and I'm also
0:52:03redoing a whole bunch of stuff related to my own task management.
0:52:06And this is the kind of thing that like this level happens maybe once every two years on average.
0:52:12And so like it's just it's really interesting just to see in the data. It's like
0:52:16Like this is a trivial amount of time that will dramatically decrease as we go forward,
0:52:22but that just keeps paying dividends forever out into the future.
0:52:25So I'm not even really thinking about doing these types of automation things to save time.
0:52:30It is to have these systems doing something that I cannot guarantee, which is remembering.
0:52:37Yes, yes.
0:52:39It is like computers won't get this stuff wrong.
0:52:43My brain does.
0:52:45Exactly.
0:52:46Exactly.
0:52:47And so I want these types of like redundant systems to be occurring, things to be triggering,
0:52:52things to be firing.
0:52:53And like, I'm really like, you know, there are two people in my life that I'm taking
0:52:57this inspiration from greatly, which is you and Federico.
0:53:00And the way that you two work is something of great interest to me, clearly, right?
0:53:07And I want to be like you both, the way that you work.
0:53:11You know, I've seen some of the things that Federico is able to do with these automation
0:53:15systems and they are frankly mind-blowing and I really want to be able to start relying on this
0:53:22stuff more especially as there is a chance that I am about to start working with another person
0:53:29closely. You know, I work with quite a few people in my life on a very close basis but the way that
0:53:37I would potentially be working with an assistant is very different and I feel like that's going
0:53:42going to start to change the way that I work significantly. So yeah, that's going to be
0:53:47quite an interesting change. And so I figure whilst I'm going through all of this, how
0:53:53about I start putting some systems in place to get a virtual cloud assistant as well.
0:54:00Yeah, having stuff work automatically for you is fantastic. I was playing around with
0:54:08some of the same things of, you know, the way my, like, essentially the way my flights
0:54:14end up in my system, it's like, "Oh, okay, I can have this information pulled out and
0:54:18then just auto-added into the time tracker."
0:54:20It's like, "Great!
0:54:21So I don't need to be running a timer or anything that says, like, 'Oh, I'm on a plane right
0:54:24now.'"
0:54:25It's like, "Nope!
0:54:26This just fires off automatically.
0:54:28I never have to think about it."
0:54:30And it's just there.
0:54:31It's just there as part of the data.
0:54:32And anything that can happen automatically is a big win.
0:54:36I was actually really annoyed because I was digging around in workflow and I wanted to write a little workflow that could pull out like the exercise and mindfulness data automatically.
0:54:49But it seems like I can't quite do that. But it's like, "Ah, here's the thing. There's data right there. I just want to automate it and pull it out. Eventually that'll happen, but not right now.
0:54:57Right now I still need to be flipping switches manually, but anytime you can set something
0:55:02up automatically and then just never think about it again, I feel like it's such a huge
0:55:06win.
0:55:07It really is.
0:55:08One last thing with the time tracking, though, is I think you've been doing it for two weeks
0:55:14and that's great, but you really can't trust the data until you've been doing it for a
0:55:20little while.
0:55:21Sure.
0:55:22you do always have this... in the beginning there's two things that are happening.
0:55:27One is you're setting up and getting used to the system in the first place,
0:55:32which can be quite a mental shift.
0:55:35Like you were saying as well, you're kind of forgetting about timers sometimes
0:55:40and you just have to think about it.
0:55:42You're even thinking about how do you categorize stuff.
0:55:46And then this can also end up causing a bit of an observer effect
0:55:50where you can end up feeling like you're kind of performing for the clock because you're much more aware of like,
0:55:56"I am time tracking now. I should really be doing something."
0:56:00Like this is like the Hawthorne Effect, like any kind of observance will increase productivity on a temporary basis.
0:56:09Like there's an observer effect here, it's just that the observer is you.
0:56:12And so I think it's useful just to be aware that if you can establish this as a habit,
0:56:21you end up with truer data later on, when this is just something that's just part of what you're
0:56:27doing every single day. Yeah, like what I'm seeing right now are just like early trends.
0:56:32Mm-hmm, yeah exactly. But it's not data that I can build upon because I mean I've had like two weeks,
0:56:41Especially with the way that my calendar flows, the way that I structure it, I need like multiple multiple weeks
0:56:46to get a really good idea of what of even if like a quiet week, busy week is even a thing.
0:56:52Right. Yeah, that's an excellent point, right? This might be entirely in your mind.
0:56:56Right? You're just thinking like, oh my week with Grey, it's so relaxing
0:57:00there's only one one show to do like it's quiet week, very little work, but it might not be the case.
0:57:06Yeah, I've renamed it to like Stroll in a Meadow week, you know?
0:57:09Yeah, yeah, that's right. That sounds about right
0:57:11But yeah, so that's just a thing to be aware of and and yeah
0:57:16It's a good point you if you can establish it as a habit
0:57:19it's it's fantastic and again the thing that I'm attempting to do which I find is
0:57:25So much harder than I would have guessed at the start is with all my crazy workflows adapted from Federico stuff
0:57:34In toggle what I love is if you start a new timer it automatically stops the old one
0:57:40So you don't need to be like stop the old timer start the new one
0:57:43I've been setting it up so that I can just on my phone like press a bunch of buttons and it will
0:57:48Automatically start like a very specific new timer and what I want my goal to be is that
0:57:54For this season essentially like I wake up, and I'm always just starting a new timer right that like throughout the day
0:58:02there's no point that I ever like stop a timer. I'm always just starting something new until the end of the day, and then I stop it.
0:58:08But when you're doing very intensive time tracking, and what I am finding absolutely fascinating is
0:58:14how
0:58:18intentional it forces you to be about the whole day.
0:58:21And like the first few days that I was doing this, like I'm having a hard time
0:58:25logging eight hours of what I'm doing. Like there's there's so much like
0:58:30Intentional time where you think like what exactly am I doing in this moment? Like what is what is this thing? Like I have found that
0:58:37absolutely
0:58:39fascinating to observe like not just not just the work hours, but like all the hours, what are you doing and
0:58:46being aware of how often your brain kind of
0:58:49Slips into like I'm not really thinking about what I'm doing mode and and trying to fight that
0:58:55existential time tracking
0:58:57It totally is it totally is but I have I have two categories
0:59:02That I've put in my system which are like unintentional video games and unintentional media consumption
0:59:11Like here is the thing
0:59:21That is a like if you pay attention to it. That is like a subjective experience that can happen
0:59:27And I think it happens to a lot of people where it's like did you mean to watch a bunch of YouTube videos?
0:59:33Or did it just sort of happen and it's an hour later. I will notice that I have been like
0:59:39accidentally playing Super Mario run
0:59:42Mm-hmm this week. Mm-hmm. Yeah, so it's like I need to go and do that thing
0:59:47Just after two games, right exactly, right, but that but that's that's how your brain gets you, right?
0:59:53That's how your brain tricks you. It's like oh, we're just gonna get one more, you know pink coin
0:59:57That's all it's gonna be. We just got to finish that one, right? And then like two hours later.
1:00:00So like, but I think that is a perfect example of a like a category that I'm just being aware of as a thing.
1:00:08Because I also think it's important to to divide it into
1:00:12intentional versus unintentional. Like what I don't want to do is be tracking a category like video games.
1:00:20Because video games are a form of enjoyable recreation for me.
1:00:24But what I'm trying to see this season with the time tracking is like I want to shift
1:00:28more of my video game and media consumption time
1:00:33from the unintentional category to the intentional category.
1:00:38Like that's that's one of these things that I'm trying to see with like my leisure time,
1:00:42how am I spending it, and and just how to be more intentional about the things that I'm doing.
1:00:47You keep saying season?
1:00:50The great TV show this season of Grey's life. Oh
1:00:54Yeah, okay
1:01:00He's been cool out I didn't realize I didn't realize I was doing it
1:01:06Okay, so
1:01:10Sometimes I I will realize that I don't like a word and
1:01:14I'll end up trying to find a better word to describe what it is that I'm thinking about and
1:01:20And for me, one of these things that has just happened, I will try to fix it in the future,
1:01:24but I don't know how much I can do it, is I've always thought in terms of quarters,
1:01:28but I've just never liked that. And so in a bunch of my documents and other things,
1:01:34essentially anywhere that I had the word like quarter, I've switched this over to think about
1:01:39seasons. Like seasons make way more sense to me. So it's season as in like fall and summer,
1:01:46not season as in this season on The Grey Show.
1:01:49But you don't really mean fall on some other dude, you mean Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4?
1:01:54Well, I mean, you know, yes, but not really. You know, because I'm not actually...
1:02:05The reason I can... Here's the thing. The reason why I kind of didn't like Q1, Q2, Q3, Q4 is when
1:02:11I'm thinking about my own... Basically, like, I have just come out of... Look, you asked me the
1:02:16question like you're pulling on a little thread it's really fun to watch you scramble well no i'm
1:02:22not scrambling what i'm trying to do is thinking about like how much do i have to explain to give
1:02:27you a satisfactory answer no i get i tell you i let me see if i can help you like you don't work
1:02:34january to march like april it's not like that exactly yeah but it is still cut into four but
1:02:41But it's not four by three.
1:02:43- Yeah, that's about right.
1:02:45And really, I'm also using season because in some ways,
1:02:50my business intentionally really slows down over the summer.
1:02:56And so the summer season is almost like not even,
1:02:58like it's very different from all of the other ones.
1:03:02And so it almost feels like I actually kind of have
1:03:04three seasons that I really need to think about work,
1:03:07which is spring, fall, and winter.
1:03:11So basically, like, talking about the quarters was just overly precise.
1:03:14And I was aware, like, it kind of bothered me when I talked about my quarterly reviews.
1:03:19Because if I look back on, like, documents and little notes to myself that I create,
1:03:24I realize it's actually, well, I tend to do three of these a year.
1:03:30And there are times where it feels like, okay, just like now, I just came out of a really big
1:03:35"I'm doing a huge review" session.
1:03:38And it's like, and this was very much like, it is winter. I'm thinking about what is coming up.
1:03:42I tend to do one in April, and then I tend to do another really big one when I come back after the summer in
1:03:49in the autumn, in like September. And that's why I was just thinking like, these quarters don't mean anything.
1:03:54I don't like this word. It's not an accurate description for what I'm doing. And I'm always,
1:03:59I always hate things that are overly precise.
1:04:02I'm just always aware of that. And so I thought like, I'm gonna stop using this word in
1:04:06in my own documents and in my own little planning things.
1:04:09So that's the answer to why I'm using the word season,
1:04:12is that's sort of mentally how I'm thinking about things
1:04:16instead of talking about quarters.
1:04:18Does that answer your question, Myke?
1:04:19- It does, it does.
1:04:20- I'm glad that amuses you.
1:04:22- You don't do quality reviews anymore,
1:04:24you do season recaps.
1:04:26- No, it's seasonal reviews.
1:04:28It's season recaps, there's no show, there's no show.
1:04:31- Are you sure?
1:04:32- Although I could be recapping the previous season,
1:04:34I essentially do that.
1:04:35- Exactly.
1:04:36- Okay, maybe that can be part of the process.
1:04:39(laughs)
1:04:42- This episode is brought to you by our friends
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1:06:56Is there a 2017 theme for CGB Grey?
1:07:01You mean year of less was like, you know, that was a thing.
1:07:04Do you have do you have a 2017 theme?
1:07:07Is it year of more?
1:07:09I know why you're asking this, Myke.
1:07:11Because you want to know ahead of time what your theme for next year is going to be.
1:07:18We're done.
1:07:19We're done.
1:07:20I'm listening everyone.
1:07:22I do have a theme. This year it's going to be a little bit more vague and it's not going to be a surprise for close listeners to the show.
1:07:35But I'm saying that this year is going to be the year of new,
1:07:41which is a thing I had kind of trialed and started thinking about in my previous season review in September,
1:07:49when I came back after that summer and I mentioned it on the show at some point.
1:07:52But I've been toying around with this idea for the upcoming year.
1:07:57And in some ways I don't like it because it doesn't quite strike at the heart of what I'm doing,
1:08:04what I'm doing, but I can't come up with a better way to
1:08:08summarize in my own mind, like, what is it that I'm aiming for?
1:08:13In the same way that the Year of Less was also like a kind of a terrible description of what was actually occurring,
1:08:18but in my mind seemed like the right label.
1:08:20So this year is going to be the Year of New. That's the theme.
1:08:26"New what?"
1:08:27I don't know, Myke. This has come about because...
1:08:32Like I was aware that when I was doing the Year of Less, like one of the things I was trying to do is
1:08:37pull myself out of the business to
1:08:42try and free up some of my time for possibly other things and
1:08:47the Year of Less was incredibly successful
1:08:52and I feel like the Year of Less is now just going to be the life of less.
1:08:55This is a thing that I feel like I have internalized and is now part of my decision-making process.
1:09:02Like I'm really aware when I'm thinking about projects,
1:09:04I think of them all in terms of the year of less and about ability to hand them off or when would they finish
1:09:10in a way that I just
1:09:12didn't a year and a half ago before I really started this. So that has been very much internalized.
1:09:18But
1:09:202016 for me,
1:09:22it was a funny year because it was a really
1:09:27successful year for me.
1:09:30But it also felt like even though I was removing myself from the business and gaining back some time,
1:09:38I didn't feel like I was
1:09:41amalgamating that additional time into
1:09:44anything new. Like I wasn't necessarily doing anything with that time. That wasn't just like more
1:09:53administration work or something else.
1:09:59And so I'm aware with the Year of New that what I'm trying to do, and what I actually spent a bunch of
1:10:05my seasonal review planning for and setting up, is
1:10:10trying to amalgamate a bunch of that time into more useful batches
1:10:16that give me the opportunity to do other stuff in any form. And so
1:10:24Some of these, like, I don't have a very clear plan here. It's just like I have a list of
1:10:29personal projects and some side projects that I have wanted to work on for a long time, but in
1:10:352016 essentially made very little progress on because I wasn't really using the additional time gained in
1:10:43blocks in a useful way.
1:10:46So that's something that's on my mind. I'm also just aware of
1:10:52with the year of new, part of what I'm trying to do is
1:10:55align my working calendar with my wife's working calendar so that when she is not working I can also be
1:11:03there more and so we can have the possibility of doing something new, like maybe traveling somewhere.
1:11:09Which usually when she has off, unless it's the summer, I would always find myself just too busy to really go
1:11:17away somewhere else. So there's a lot of things
1:11:21for me that are in this label, but it's related to just trying out new things and
1:11:27some novel experiences
1:11:30Like this is this is all for me. What I'm thinking of is like the year of new year of new stuff
1:11:36Does year of new mean year of more?
1:11:40I think the time tracking will have to show that right because there's I'm just realizing there's like a bias effect when you do things
1:11:47that are
1:11:49different than what you normally do, your brain tends to think of these things as taking up more time or like you're being really busy.
1:11:56And I was just, I'm aware of like wanting to a little bit
1:12:01break out of
1:12:04like the
1:12:052016 routine that I was in. Like there were just, there were like a lot of
1:12:09scheduled times and
1:12:12like one project right after another and so it's just, it's trying to give me more additional
1:12:18time by rearranging, like when is my free time, when is my work time.
1:12:23In terms of more, like I don't know if there will be any more public facing projects.
1:12:31Like I'm not sure if anybody who follows me would feel like, "Oh wow, look at this cornucopia of things that Grey is producing."
1:12:39Like this one feels much less business related and it's much more personal.
1:12:47And this is...
1:12:48That makes sense.
1:12:49Yeah.
1:12:49This is why like there's...
1:12:51You know, there's always trade-offs in life. And this is like it took a lot of
1:12:55thinking about and planning for and setting this up. So this is one of these cases where it's like, well,
1:13:02I am going to have to take some
1:13:04work and energy out of the business and redirect it to the personal if this is going to happen.
1:13:11So yeah, I would say this is much more of a personal one than it is like a...
1:13:16It's not like the year of starting a whole bunch of new businesses all of which are going to be public.
1:13:23Like that is not what the year of new is.
1:13:25That makes more sense.
1:13:27Yeah, it's one of these things like it's interesting talking out loud to someone about it because I'm realizing how hard it is
1:13:34is for me to articulate what in my head seems like a clear path and idea. But it, when the
1:13:44words come out it is not as sharp as something like the year of less. Where there's a very
1:13:48clear goal and this is what I am aiming for. But, so the year of new, it's a bit more vague
1:13:54than last year, but that's what my theme is.
1:13:57We gotta talk about Evernote.
1:13:59Why? Why Myke?
1:14:01whilst Cortexmas is usually a time of relaxation, a time of winding down for
1:14:08all, Evernote decided to take Cortexmas and go in the exact opposite direction.
1:14:14They had a very very busy Cortexmas period.
1:14:17A very successful Cortexmas period, I'm sure.
1:14:19It depends on your metrics. So in kind of mid-December there was a big brouhaha
1:14:29with Evernote and privacy.
1:14:33So they changed their privacy policy
1:14:35to cater for some new features.
1:14:37And the idea was that Evernote would start using
1:14:40the one that is machine learning
1:14:42as a way to help them create kind of new features
1:14:47and new technology.
1:14:48So that they would be kind of using the information
1:14:50that you put into your notes to make suggestions to you
1:14:53and to kind of make your experience better.
1:14:55- Machine learning.
1:14:56- Machine learning.
1:14:57- You have to add it to every project.
1:14:58everything, neural networks.
1:15:01If you haven't got a neural network, there's no point.
1:15:03- Take your product, whatever it is,
1:15:05sprinkle a little AI on it, it'll be much better.
1:15:08- That's how those investment monies come in.
1:15:11However, the policy that Evernote revised and created
1:15:15stated that employees, Evernote employees,
1:15:18would be periodically checking people's notes
1:15:21to ensure that the machine was doing the right thing,
1:15:24that it was categorizing them correctly.
1:15:28That's bad enough because it was automatically opting everybody in.
1:15:33But the worst part was it explicitly stated in the privacy policy, "You cannot opt out
1:15:40of our employees looking at your content."
1:15:45The internet basically set itself on fire over this.
1:15:49Which I don't blame people about.
1:15:51Rightly so.
1:15:52Again your service is marketed as essentially like a brain like here is your digital brain just put everything you ever want to remember into this thing.
1:16:05And it is very rare that a privacy policy is so explicit in telling you what it's gonna do.
1:16:12Usually they're a bit more vague about what's going to happen they're just like no we're doing this.
1:16:20So, Evernote then went kind of on a tumble, as at first they kind of said, "Don't worry,
1:16:27everything's anonymized, so they're not going to know who the note belongs to."
1:16:31This didn't change people's anger, right?
1:16:33Which I guess is not the point.
1:16:35It's not the point that they can say, "Oh, this note belongs to Myke."
1:16:39It's like, these are my things.
1:16:42You shouldn't be reading them.
1:16:44And also, whenever a company talks about their data being anonymized, I've seen enough examples
1:16:50of how trivial it is to de-anonymize the data.
1:16:53And then, and also it's like,
1:16:55do you have your own name in your own note?
1:16:57Right, like, are you anonymizing that?
1:17:00Like, so did somebody read the note
1:17:03to make sure it was adequately anonymous
1:17:05before redacting it?
1:17:07- 'Cause I could literally have a note in my Evernote
1:17:10which had your personal information in.
1:17:13- Right, yeah.
1:17:14- I could have saved your address, your phone number,
1:17:17and your name into an Evernote note.
1:17:19because of their business card app that they had,
1:17:23which saved notes.
1:17:25- Right. - Anywho,
1:17:27eventually, after a few days of just a torrent of feedback,
1:17:32Evernote backtracked on all of this.
1:17:37They published a blog post saying that they would stop
1:17:40this initiative and spoke about how privacy is at the center
1:17:44of what they do and that they would be further revising
1:17:47their privacy policy to strengthen this in the future.
1:17:51They are now going to push ahead
1:17:52with their machine learning program,
1:17:55but without employees looking at notes
1:17:58unless you explicitly opt in.
1:18:00Now--
1:18:02- Yeah, I'll be sure to do that.
1:18:03- I still am not completely confident
1:18:07and comfortable with this because my expectation
1:18:09is this opt in will be a little box that pops up
1:18:11and it's like, "Hey, would you like machine learning?"
1:18:16And then you go, "Hell yeah, I would!"
1:18:17But then it's like tick to say you accept the privacy policy.
1:18:21And that privacy policy is that you can let people look at it.
1:18:27No company should ever automatically opt in
1:18:30anybody for anything.
1:18:32Never, good or bad.
1:18:33You should always, because any automatic opt-in
1:18:36feels like there's something bad behind it.
1:18:40- Yeah, yeah, it does.
1:18:41Because that's why it's an auto opt-in, right?
1:18:43It's like, we just want to move right past this
1:18:45quickly as possible.
1:18:47Then Evernote released Evernote 8.
1:18:49Evernote 8 is a full overhaul of the iOS app.
1:18:52Is it though?
1:18:53Is it though Myke?
1:18:54This is what they're saying!
1:18:56Because here's my review of Evernote 8.
1:19:00Evernote 8, it's less green.
1:19:03Yeah it's the Evernote you always knew and now there are colours to make your text.
1:19:08I mean, I saw that there was a, you know, because you know how like when a company gets acquired now, your response is like, "Oh no."
1:19:18I saw Evernote 8 in the developer notes in the update on my phone, and they're like, "All new version of Evernote!"
1:19:26And I was like, "Oh, here we go again." Right? Like, it's another all new update, and updated it, opened it, took a look,
1:19:34took a look, and I have to say was actually quite relieved that it was not another just like
1:19:41tremendous radical redesign of the whole thing.
1:19:44But then I was baffled by this huge like press campaign about how different it is.
1:19:50It's like this thing seems essentially exactly the same.
1:19:54You just took out all the green.
1:19:55Right now there's just a little green buttons.
1:19:58But if I want to file a note, if I want to categorize anything,
1:20:04It's just as much of a pain in the ass as it always was.
1:20:07It's like, okay, well, you're the same app, Evernote.
1:20:10You know, whatever, that's my review.
1:20:12- I will say it does feel a little bit quicker.
1:20:15Like one of my main problems with Evernote
1:20:17is it took so long to do anything.
1:20:20Like you'd press on a button and it felt like
1:20:22it took longer than it should to open the note.
1:20:25And I've played around with it a little
1:20:27because like I've completely moved on from Evernote.
1:20:30Like I use it for nothing now.
1:20:33And just pressing the plus button to open a new note does feel quicker.
1:20:37Now there's a really interesting Wired article about all of this and they spend an incredible
1:20:43amount of time in this article talking about their machine learning.
1:20:47But it does it in a way that all companies talk about machine learning which drives me
1:20:52bonkers.
1:20:54Everything is what machine learning could do for you in the future.
1:21:00Google will drive me mad at this right now.
1:21:02presentation they have, they talk about Google Assistant and they show these videos which
1:21:06are amazing but it doesn't do any of this stuff. It's like this is what Google Assistant
1:21:12could do in the future.
1:21:14Right, yeah.
1:21:16So like this article talks about how like soon you might be able to take a photo of
1:21:20a whiteboard after a meeting, stick it in Evernote and the app will automatically pull
1:21:23out action items and add them to your to-do list. That would be amazing.
1:21:27When it does it, if ever.
1:21:29But I could say that, just so you know, in the future, machine learning will be applied
1:21:34to cortex and we'll do all of your thinking for you.
1:21:37That's how it's gonna happen.
1:21:40I just love that a big part of their redesign wasn't the redesign.
1:21:47Like Evernote 8 was gonna be about laying the foundations of machine learning, but like
1:21:51three weeks before, they burned that bridge with everyone.
1:21:57And they're saying like, oh, in this like big piece, like it was a big like kind of
1:22:00like a big editorial piece with Wired.
1:22:03And they're talking about how like they need access to our data and they promise to be
1:22:07transparent.
1:22:08You ruined it.
1:22:09Like we've spent a lot of time talking about Evernote because I think it is one of the
1:22:13products that like I would say maybe of all of the apps that we use, a large portion of
1:22:18our listener base uses just because they've been around for so long.
1:22:22Yeah, yeah.
1:22:23Yeah.
1:22:24Evernote has been around for forever.
1:22:26like 10 years or something. You know like I remember using Evernote very early on in my bank
1:22:33career. Like you know it was like a good like 10-12 years ago something like that now. So like
1:22:40there is a chance that like you've either used it or you're using it but like at this point they are
1:22:46just they are like the old elephant. Yeah well I mean this the other reason the company is sort of
1:22:52interesting is this discussion around it being like the first dead unicorn.
1:22:57You know this idea of like this is a company that a ton of venture money has been poured into that did incredible
1:23:05expanding and that's had this very long period of seeming like it had no idea what it was doing.
1:23:12I know as the joke goes busy selling socks right when nobody cared
1:23:16that they've the company has like
1:23:19downsized. So I think it's an interesting thing to
1:23:23especially because like Evernote seems
1:23:26fundamentally like such a simple thing. I know we've discussed it before but I'm just like baffled
1:23:31why they have all of these offices and so many employees and all of this this other stuff.
1:23:35So I think it's it's an interesting company
1:23:38to discuss. It's obviously like it's a thing that I want to succeed because I'm tied to it.
1:23:43I have nowhere else to go so it has to.
1:23:45But it is it's
1:23:48frustrating and sort of weird to see like the privacy policy thing was obviously very upsetting and it's like okay
1:23:54I'm glad you backtracked but it's concerning that this was a this was your idea in the first place. Yeah, and
1:24:01Like brand new Evernote 8 which is exactly the same but with promises of machine learning
1:24:08It feels like are these the new socks?
1:24:10like are I have a hard time imagining that like the
1:24:15the best machine learning people in the world when they think of where they're going to work.
1:24:19Evernote is the first place on their list of where they might want to work.
1:24:24Like it's a very... it just feels weird. It feels weird. It feels like you're making a bunch of promises.
1:24:32And it's like, "What I don't want to see Evernote are promises. Like I want to see this thing like work really well.
1:24:38I'd like to be able to file notes in a convenient way on my iPad."
1:24:43It was just still just infuriating.
1:24:47It's like, again, this is my own particular use of Evernote, but I never open up Evernote and add a note that way.
1:24:53I'm always using the share sheet and sending something to Evernote and then dealing with it later.
1:24:58But Evernote is one of the like the very few apps where I feel like I have to go to my Mac to do a
1:25:03bunch of stuff in any kind of timely fashion because I don't want to tap 10,000 times to sort my notes.
1:25:08But that was the first thing I checked when I opened that app like, "Oh, can I categorize stuff more easily?"
1:25:13Nope. I will be curious though to see if in this update it finally does the thing which
1:25:19supposedly is a feature of the pro service, which is the ability to download all of your notes onto your device and
1:25:28I've had that toggled like download everything please. I've had that toggled on all of my devices
1:25:34Never works. Never works. Not ever. Which is a great thing to discover like when you're flying on an airplane
1:25:42You want to look through a bunch of notes for a project that you're working on. It's like, oh they're not here.
1:25:46Or, the notebooks that it does download, my absolute favorite thing is, by download it means downloads the text, but no attachments.
1:25:54Like, oh, okay, great, thanks, thanks.
1:25:57So, I'll be curious to see if that actually works this time around, but I haven't had the time to test that out.
1:26:02Let alone give it time to actually download the thousands and thousands of notes that I have.
1:26:07I feel sorry for you.
1:26:09I feel sorry for me too, Myke.
1:26:11like you just stuck now like you've tried everything you just stuck with you stuck with them
1:26:16yeah Microsoft OneNote people please don't recommend it to me again
1:26:20if I haven't been able to explain to you yet why it's not useful for me I'm not going to achieve that
1:26:26just please don't recommend it anymore I'm fully aware it doesn't work for me but thanks
1:26:30oh I have a recommendation for you
1:26:32oh what is it Myke?
1:26:34Microsoft make this app it's called OneNote
1:26:37oh thank you
1:26:38it does what you need
1:26:40I'm sure it does except for the parts that I need you're not using it, right? Yeah
1:26:44I'm holding it wrong use one note better
1:26:47Yeah, that's a great solution
1:26:50So during cortex miss the cortex subreddit were keeping themselves entertained
1:26:57Whilst the show was was having its seasonal break and
1:27:02I I there are a couple of things that popped out to me that I really enjoyed. Mm-hmm. One of them is a
1:27:10a Google doc, which was created by the Reddit user, DoctorOpenMind, where they are going
1:27:17through the show, and they're up to episode 37, and they're going through and writing
1:27:22out the things that they have learned from the show. But they're not like completely
1:27:30as you would expect them to be. So like there are lessons in there, but there are also like
1:27:37pieces of information about us. Like for example, how to be more productive. Gray feels more
1:27:43productive if he works while the dishwasher or the laundry machine are working.
1:27:47It's true. It's true things, but they're like weird things. It's kind of like a,
1:27:53it's an interesting thing to like look through this document and see like what did this person
1:27:57pick out. Yeah, no, this is really fun to see. It's like somebody's personal trip through Cortex
1:28:04and making notes as they go along about various things.
1:28:07So yeah, I think this is definitely something to just take a little look through.
1:28:12It's very interesting to see what somebody else gets out of the show.
1:28:16And it's a lot of work to compile it all together into this big document.
1:28:20But I definitely was interested to flip through the pages
1:28:24and see what they were getting out of the various episodes.
1:28:26And also, there is something which I have wished for for a long time.
1:28:32And it's finally happened.
1:28:36Somebody has taken a part of our show and created an animation.
1:28:43And they picked a great moment which was actually in episode 37 where we're talking about stickers
1:28:49in iOS 10.
1:28:51And I have watched this video three times and I find new hilarious things in it every
1:28:57time.
1:28:58So I'm going to put it in the show notes.
1:29:00I really recommend people watch it. The animation style is like super weird in like a great way.
1:29:08It really reminds me of grade A under A. I could see that. I could see that. Yeah.
1:29:14Because it's like super bare bones but full of inside jokes and everything is written in comic
1:29:19sans. Which I love. Yeah it's a fun little animation to look at. It's very Microsoft
1:29:27paint style looking and the thing that I'm aware of is the person who put it together,
1:29:32they spent a ton of time on it because as someone who's done animation, like I'm always
1:29:38just so aware of all of the cuts and all of the changes that have to happen on the screen
1:29:42and the video is so fast in some places so this is a huge amount of work but I have to
1:29:48say I really enjoyed it and it was very funny to hear that little segment of you and me
1:29:55talking about you sending me stickers with like dopey music playing underneath
1:30:00it the whole time right just it made the thing very entertaining so it looked
1:30:04like a fun Cortexmas project for someone and listeners should check it out