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Roderick on the Line

Ep. 127: "Fermi in a Van"

 

00:00:00   this episode of Robert on the line is [TS]

00:00:02   sponsored by Squarespace the all-in-one [TS]

00:00:04   platform that makes it fast and easy to [TS]

00:00:06   create your own professional website [TS]

00:00:07   portfolio and online store for your free [TS]

00:00:11   trial plus ten percent off anything you [TS]

00:00:13   buy please visit squarespace.com and the [TS]

00:00:16   very special offer code supertrain at [TS]

00:00:18   checkout better web starts with your [TS]

00:00:20   website [TS]

00:00:20   [Music] [TS]

00:00:25   hello hey John hi Merlin how's it going [TS]

00:00:29   pretty good [TS]

00:00:32   what's the matter where they man John [TS]

00:00:35   huh oh no things are good things are [TS]

00:00:39   good you know is one of those it's just [TS]

00:00:41   one of those like how good can things be [TS]

00:00:44   you know what I mean yeah how good can [TS]

00:00:47   they be really yeah you know it's a [TS]

00:00:50   common there's a comment coming there's [TS]

00:00:51   a meat-eor giant meteor gonna wipe us [TS]

00:00:53   out [TS]

00:00:54   I didn't know about this yeah how good [TS]

00:00:56   can we feel that a BuzzFeed thinks I [TS]

00:00:58   should catch up on that day what if you [TS]

00:01:01   were on reddit you would know I you [TS]

00:01:03   gotta get off the Red John I've never [TS]

00:01:05   been on reddit [TS]

00:01:06   oh I'm follow a tumblr site that puts up [TS]

00:01:12   pictures of cute animals from that site [TS]

00:01:14   but that's about it [TS]

00:01:15   yeah every once in a while someone says [TS]

00:01:17   I should do an ama from reddit I thought [TS]

00:01:19   you were gonna do what i thought i saw [TS]

00:01:21   you scheduled for one of those i don't [TS]

00:01:22   think i ever was but in any case I I [TS]

00:01:25   don't understand the interface i look at [TS]

00:01:26   reddit and it looks like it's you know [TS]

00:01:28   it looks like an organizational chart [TS]

00:01:30   yeah or like a like an outline for a [TS]

00:01:33   term paper [TS]

00:01:34   yeah it's gonna get a tree format at [TS]

00:01:37   reformat right and and you know what [TS]

00:01:39   when i first got on the internet 1990 [TS]

00:01:43   art 7mm and I would go on the newsgroups [TS]

00:01:49   or rather I would go to the internet i [TS]

00:01:52   would go to a place where people were on [TS]

00:01:53   the internet and I would look over their [TS]

00:01:54   shoulder while they were on the news [TS]

00:01:55   groups and i would say why are you doing [TS]

00:01:59   this [TS]

00:02:00   what what is this about and they were [TS]

00:02:02   like all see you go over here and [TS]

00:02:04   there's a guy that tells you how to [TS]

00:02:05   build a ham radio [TS]

00:02:07   I'm like I mean yeah but I did didn't it [TS]

00:02:09   never appealed to me [TS]

00:02:11   partly because i didn't like the didn't [TS]

00:02:14   like the way that it looked like the way [TS]

00:02:16   it was shaped and read it's like that [TS]

00:02:19   for me [TS]

00:02:19   yeah i mean i think in some ways and [TS]

00:02:22   this is really reductive but I i think i [TS]

00:02:26   sometimes feel like you can break it [TS]

00:02:28   down into these two general levels of [TS]

00:02:31   interest and anything about a site like [TS]

00:02:33   metafilter which is similar in some ways [TS]

00:02:35   even metafilter like some percent of the [TS]

00:02:38   time [TS]

00:02:38   I'm most interested in what people have [TS]

00:02:41   to say about the link but a lot of times [TS]

00:02:43   I'm really most interested in the link [TS]

00:02:44   right and and I think the thing that [TS]

00:02:47   makes the internet hard for me to [TS]

00:02:49   understand sometimes is that there are a [TS]

00:02:50   lot of people who are weary more [TS]

00:02:52   interested in the comments and the link [TS]

00:02:53   that's not a judgment but then it is a [TS]

00:02:55   real difference in some ways that they [TS]

00:02:58   see the link as the jumping-off point [TS]

00:02:59   for providing opinion and having witty [TS]

00:03:02   repartee right now and i had to come [TS]

00:03:04   tend to be more interested in ruminating [TS]

00:03:06   on the link [TS]

00:03:07   yes especially by myself in in solitude [TS]

00:03:10   agreed and agreed [TS]

00:03:12   yeah i was thinking as I loaded up my [TS]

00:03:14   briefcase today to come down here in my [TS]

00:03:16   briefcase briefcase i have that was [TS]

00:03:19   loading up my briefcase i was thinking [TS]

00:03:22   that in my dad's time there is no my dad [TS]

00:03:25   put nothing electrical in his briefcase [TS]

00:03:28   with the exception perhaps of a micro [TS]

00:03:32   cassette recorder for a to dictate right [TS]

00:03:37   but there were no there's no cabling of [TS]

00:03:40   any kind in my dad's briefcase you [TS]

00:03:42   didn't have like he had to plug anything [TS]

00:03:44   in when he got to work or nothing and [TS]

00:03:46   nothing ever got plugged in when my dad [TS]

00:03:48   was at an airport he never plugged a [TS]

00:03:50   single thing in in his life and as I am [TS]

00:03:54   as I'm loading up my briefcase just to [TS]

00:03:57   come down here to talk to you and I'm [TS]

00:03:59   like oh I gotta get that other cable and [TS]

00:04:01   I go over and I get a cable and I stick [TS]

00:04:03   it in a so-called right and I need that [TS]

00:04:05   cable for that other thing and I go get [TS]

00:04:08   that cable and pretty soon you know your [TS]

00:04:10   briefcases just like it's just a [TS]

00:04:12   spaghetti of of different wires the [TS]

00:04:15   x-rated it was like a bomb yeah right [TS]

00:04:18   and and and and it caused me to think [TS]

00:04:21   that up until probably about I would say [TS]

00:04:26   into the nineties if your if your work [TS]

00:04:31   entailed that you were using electrical [TS]

00:04:34   gizmos it was a ninety-nine percent [TS]

00:04:38   chance that you were a technician that [TS]

00:04:40   you were either you're a blue-collar [TS]

00:04:42   person and you had a briefcase full of [TS]

00:04:45   gizmos because your job involved you [TS]

00:04:48   doing some [TS]

00:04:49   monitoring of some HVAC equipment right [TS]

00:04:53   and now it is completely flipped and [TS]

00:04:57   every everybody is carrying around [TS]

00:05:00   electronic equipment all the time you [TS]

00:05:02   are measured in fact your status is [TS]

00:05:05   measured by how much is mala g you have [TS]

00:05:09   in your bag not how little my dad never [TS]

00:05:11   had a single and no one he knew had a [TS]

00:05:14   single gizmo right yeah yeah I get what [TS]

00:05:19   you're saying and it's funny because [TS]

00:05:20   like as much as you get like a new [TS]

00:05:22   laptop bag or a new briefcase in your [TS]

00:05:24   case you know if you simply adapted to [TS]

00:05:26   that because when you when you're [TS]

00:05:27   describing somebody who dealt with gives [TS]

00:05:30   us for living not thinking about like a [TS]

00:05:31   phone repair person yeah right he had a [TS]

00:05:34   hardshell case he had a goddamn van [TS]

00:05:37   yeah starting to think I don't need a [TS]

00:05:40   backpack i need of an he had a van with [TS]

00:05:42   a ladder on the top right yeah and and [TS]

00:05:44   it's ended it [TS]

00:05:45   you know it's good the culture could [TS]

00:05:47   have gone a lot of different ways we [TS]

00:05:49   could have gone it's like that are that [TS]

00:05:51   famous our crumb drawing of of of [TS]

00:05:54   progress right and first it's horse [TS]

00:05:57   drawn carriage and then it's a [TS]

00:05:58   locomotive and then it's phone wires and [TS]

00:06:00   and el Caminos and more and more the [TS]

00:06:03   landscape is filled up with phone wires [TS]

00:06:05   in encroaching technology and mr. the [TS]

00:06:09   sort of little or lesser known coda to [TS]

00:06:12   that drawing were that his three [TS]

00:06:14   possible versions of the future and one [TS]

00:06:17   of them was like hover cars and electric [TS]

00:06:21   and and serve Jetsons houses and one of [TS]

00:06:25   them was a completely blown out [TS]

00:06:28   landscape of just like dystopia and then [TS]

00:06:34   obviously the one that he / this is hard [TS]

00:06:36   it's hard for me to reconcile this with [TS]

00:06:38   what I know about our crumb but the [TS]

00:06:40   third option of his three options was a [TS]

00:06:44   kind of ecouture Pia of years it's [TS]

00:06:47   and tall forest and people you know a [TS]

00:06:51   community of people living in a natural [TS]

00:06:53   hippie style it's an option it's an [TS]

00:06:58   option it but it seemed to me that it [TS]

00:07:00   seems like our chrome would have he [TS]

00:07:02   would have desired that the future [TS]

00:07:04   looked like everyone wearing spats and [TS]

00:07:07   straw boaters and playing the banjo [TS]

00:07:09   actually how the future turned out haha [TS]

00:07:13   we are living in an R crumb dream future [TS]

00:07:16   that even he didn't envision didn't [TS]

00:07:18   carry their pictures around with them [TS]

00:07:20   yeah I got picked on a lot by so yeah I [TS]

00:07:25   but i wonder i mean we went this way [TS]

00:07:29   IRA do you remember the osborne computer [TS]

00:07:31   I i know of it i have my my best friend [TS]

00:07:35   in high school his father was an early [TS]

00:07:37   adopter and he owned an oz burn which [TS]

00:07:41   was the first briefcase computer that [TS]

00:07:44   was the size of it was this it was [TS]

00:07:47   bigger than a been at our computer right [TS]

00:07:51   bigger than what we would call a [TS]

00:07:53   necessary I'm what would you call that [TS]

00:07:56   yeah I know what you mean like it's [TS]

00:07:57   bigger than a desktop computer it's it's [TS]

00:07:58   it's not not at all portable but much [TS]

00:08:01   smaller than the mainframe or mini [TS]

00:08:02   computers that we thought of as being a [TS]

00:08:04   computer at the time [TS]

00:08:05   yeah and the entire screen was about the [TS]

00:08:07   size of an iphone to disk drives and [TS]

00:08:12   today he actually brought my friend [TS]

00:08:14   brought that down to our they brought it [TS]

00:08:16   over to my house sometimes and you know [TS]

00:08:19   plate we played games on the osburn [TS]

00:08:22   and to think that that is in a museum [TS]

00:08:25   now [TS]

00:08:26   [Music] [TS]

00:08:28   no that's that's it is haha episode of [TS]

00:08:36   rock on the line is once again sponsored [TS]

00:08:37   by our very good friends at Squarespace [TS]

00:08:39   the only one platform that makes it fast [TS]

00:08:42   and easy to create your own professional [TS]

00:08:43   website portfolio and online store make [TS]

00:08:46   the whole process so simple they have an [TS]

00:08:48   easy drag-and-drop interface with [TS]

00:08:50   beautiful free templates that you can [TS]

00:08:51   tweak to suit your needs all the [TS]

00:08:53   squarespace six designs are responsive [TS]

00:08:55   so they look great on every device and [TS]

00:08:57   Squarespace also offers free 24 x seven [TS]

00:09:00   support to live chat and email with [TS]

00:09:02   dedicated teams based in New York City [TS]

00:09:04   dublin and Portland guys I love [TS]

00:09:06   Squarespace because they take care of [TS]

00:09:08   all the hard and annoying stuff about [TS]

00:09:10   running a website i promise you as a [TS]

00:09:12   season technologist there's a lot of [TS]

00:09:14   hard and annoying stuff about running a [TS]

00:09:15   website but with squarespace they handle [TS]

00:09:18   all the front end the backend [TS]

00:09:19   integration design SEO you're free to [TS]

00:09:21   spend your time doing nothing but [TS]

00:09:23   putting up your own great stuff you're [TS]

00:09:25   writing your photos your store your life [TS]

00:09:28   it's just the best crazy part is [TS]

00:09:30   Squarespace plan started only eight [TS]

00:09:32   dollars a month and that includes a free [TS]

00:09:34   domain name if you sign up for a year so [TS]

00:09:36   please remember to tell Squarespace that [TS]

00:09:38   you heard about him from her pals at [TS]

00:09:39   Robert online because listeners of this [TS]

00:09:41   program get a free trial plus ten [TS]

00:09:43   percent of any package they choose by [TS]

00:09:45   using the very special offer code [TS]

00:09:47   supertrain at checkout our thanks to [TS]

00:09:49   squarespace for supporting rod on the [TS]

00:09:51   line we could not do it without this [TS]

00:09:53   know there are a lot of ways I could go [TS]

00:09:55   with that but I got tired of hearing [TS]

00:09:56   myself talk haha i am you know what I [TS]

00:10:02   notice is you know everybody everybody i [TS]

00:10:05   know but but for probably all kinds of [TS]

00:10:08   obvious reasons most people i know have [TS]

00:10:10   a smartphone of some kind you got an [TS]

00:10:12   iphone android phone you got to whatever [TS]

00:10:13   phone but like in my neighborhood which [TS]

00:10:16   is mostly you know people from Asia lot [TS]

00:10:19   of chinese people on home so many people [TS]

00:10:24   still have like a clamshell like a flip [TS]

00:10:26   phone feature phone interested in it i [TS]

00:10:28   mean that the interesting thing about [TS]

00:10:29   that is though I mean [TS]

00:10:31   see now I'm gonna get our mom back again [TS]

00:10:33   but like the funny thing is like we get [TS]

00:10:35   these I get a new phone every what two [TS]

00:10:38   years three or something like that you [TS]

00:10:41   know and as you've noted you got to get [TS]

00:10:43   there the reckon the right charging [TS]

00:10:45   cables and you get all synced up and [TS]

00:10:47   it's it's a weird thing though that like [TS]

00:10:50   these folks have the same roughly the [TS]

00:10:53   same phone that I had before I got an [TS]

00:10:56   iphone so like they've got like a mid [TS]

00:10:58   2000s level phone it looks like it's [TS]

00:11:01   been at the bottom of a fish tank for [TS]

00:11:03   six yrs a razor [TS]

00:11:05   oh yeah well in a lot of cases like the [TS]

00:11:07   samsung phones man you could hammer [TS]

00:11:09   nails with those things those old nokia [TS]

00:11:10   phones like their another really strong [TS]

00:11:12   and I guess those bands still work if [TS]

00:11:14   you need to have a phone and that's what [TS]

00:11:15   people use it for today their [TS]

00:11:16   interaction is they they have that phone [TS]

00:11:18   for phone things and they talk about it [TS]

00:11:20   sometimes and then close it up and put [TS]

00:11:22   their pocket and they said I'm you act [TS]

00:11:23   like they're asleep [TS]

00:11:24   it's a thing but you know and I don't [TS]

00:11:26   really feel like assistant assistant [TS]

00:11:28   insightful as your other more and i [TS]

00:11:30   guess haha i remember that was a time [TS]

00:11:37   when that I am [TS]

00:11:39   why do we need more than three TV [TS]

00:11:41   channels [TS]

00:11:42   what's the deal haha you got for you got [TS]

00:11:48   three VHF channel he had to a UHF [TS]

00:11:50   channels wait what-what-what are good [TS]

00:11:53   people do you could only watch one at a [TS]

00:11:55   time [TS]

00:11:56   it's a matter but I you know but you [TS]

00:11:58   know that the one thing I will say [TS]

00:11:59   though is that I i think that this might [TS]

00:12:01   come out of certainly comes out of the [TS]

00:12:03   rapid pace of technology and it comes [TS]

00:12:05   out of my still even though i'm getting [TS]

00:12:07   to be older and I'm not as interested in [TS]

00:12:09   New nerdy stuff by a long shot [TS]

00:12:11   as I was even five years ago even now [TS]

00:12:14   still I find myself like i don't i don't [TS]

00:12:17   feel like things have gotten that much [TS]

00:12:18   easier because by the time they're all [TS]

00:12:20   the bugs have been worked out of you [TS]

00:12:22   know whatever iOS or standard whatever [TS]

00:12:24   by the time I'm getting the hang of that [TS]

00:12:25   there's a new one and then I sit on that [TS]

00:12:27   for a while are my backup still working [TS]

00:12:29   is this thing still oh now like my wife [TS]

00:12:32   my wife and it for the last three years [TS]

00:12:33   had 14 copies of every contact my wife [TS]

00:12:36   my wife [TS]

00:12:37   no I here's the thing with my wife she's [TS]

00:12:39   got a but I've got in there and I have [TS]

00:12:41   like once a year I go in and I [TS]

00:12:42   definitively decided I actually have a [TS]

00:12:44   built-in purpose [TS]

00:12:45   program then we'll help me locate and [TS]

00:12:48   delete but like her contacts now are so [TS]

00:12:51   screwed up that she doesn't like she [TS]

00:12:53   mostly has 14 copies of the same contact [TS]

00:12:57   so she has something like 5000 contacts [TS]

00:12:58   or in some cases i guess maybe this app [TS]

00:13:02   got it wrong and now in some cases [TS]

00:13:04   you'll have a contact that has 35 email [TS]

00:13:06   addresses from different people [TS]

00:13:08   associated with me and so now i'm just [TS]

00:13:10   to the point where I open that up and i [TS]

00:13:11   look at it and go you know what I should [TS]

00:13:13   just burn it down if you never added [TS]

00:13:14   from the whole yeah I want you to take [TS]

00:13:16   this piece of paper write down the the [TS]

00:13:18   note phone numbers and email addresses [TS]

00:13:19   of five people that you really need and [TS]

00:13:21   let's start over [TS]

00:13:22   oh no you know the thing to do is to of [TS]

00:13:25   course to send it above a bulk email out [TS]

00:13:28   to everyone in your contact list i sent [TS]

00:13:30   out a blast saying reply to this with [TS]

00:13:35   your with your contact information [TS]

00:13:37   because I dropped my phone or whatever [TS]

00:13:38   right [TS]

00:13:40   reply yes men and then only the people [TS]

00:13:42   that reply [TS]

00:13:43   those are those are your only true [TS]

00:13:45   friends like those notes I get from [TS]

00:13:46   people that I haven't even have enough [TS]

00:13:49   that i haven't haven't talked to them in [TS]

00:13:51   15 years we have a lot of them in 15 [TS]

00:13:54   years and maybe had one interaction with [TS]

00:13:56   them look during the Clinton [TS]

00:13:57   administration and I still every year to [TS]

00:14:00   get an email from them with their [TS]

00:14:02   updated contact deets [TS]

00:14:03   yeah yeah here here's a my new my new [TS]

00:14:06   email address [TS]

00:14:07   yeah like your new email address who [TS]

00:14:10   changes email addresses [TS]

00:14:11   yeah I don't know as the market i'm john [TS]

00:14:14   time marches on [TS]

00:14:15   I feel like I I've touched on this over [TS]

00:14:17   the over the years in talking to you but [TS]

00:14:21   but but they're the but i want to say it [TS]

00:14:24   again which it there was naught which is [TS]

00:14:28   that that uh sort of sort of elaborate [TS]

00:14:33   on what i was saying a minute ago that [TS]

00:14:36   the way we use the word tech and we [TS]

00:14:40   talked about tech now like it is a like [TS]

00:14:44   it's kind of a new realm right like tech [TS]

00:14:48   the tech economy is we think of tech as [TS]

00:14:50   a as a thing that's only been around for [TS]

00:14:53   15 years [TS]

00:14:55   and it can be virtually anything it can [TS]

00:14:57   mean television set-top boxes it could [TS]

00:14:59   be an app on your iPhone it could be it [TS]

00:15:02   could be all these different things and [TS]

00:15:04   it's like we suddenly invented a way to [TS]

00:15:06   use technology that we never had before [TS]

00:15:08   yeah yeah and-and-and like technology [TS]

00:15:10   somehow didn't exist before but but in [TS]

00:15:14   fact like over the course of that means [TS]

00:15:17   just since the Industrial Revolution [TS]

00:15:19   there have been innumerable periods [TS]

00:15:22   where where the culture at the time was [TS]

00:15:25   fascinated by the new technology right [TS]

00:15:29   everybody you know the cotton gin or the [TS]

00:15:31   head or the Machine rolled cigarette or [TS]

00:15:34   the or the automobile for Christ's sake [TS]

00:15:37   and the technology of the moment is [TS]

00:15:41   super fascinating to people and seems [TS]

00:15:45   like it's revolutionized the way the [TS]

00:15:48   people conduct their lives and then the [TS]

00:15:52   the kind of the dust settles and that [TS]

00:15:54   technology becomes commonplace and [TS]

00:15:58   people stop talking about it right they [TS]

00:16:00   go back to the the more important or [TS]

00:16:02   more interesting business of talking [TS]

00:16:04   about ideas or of talking about what I [TS]

00:16:10   mean this is politics even and we're [TS]

00:16:13   living in this this kind of extended [TS]

00:16:16   period where we're talking about tack [TS]

00:16:19   and interacting with tech as though that [TS]

00:16:22   isn't that is in itself culture and oh I [TS]

00:16:28   get what I mean like yeah it's like in [TS]

00:16:30   the in the late seventies early eighties [TS]

00:16:32   I think newspaper started realizing that [TS]

00:16:35   people were dying and so they started [TS]

00:16:36   having a section in the paper called [TS]

00:16:38   health and suddenly for the first time [TS]

00:16:40   you started seeing stuff about whatever [TS]

00:16:42   peach pits of curing cancer or whatever [TS]

00:16:44   and that became like a hot thing and now [TS]

00:16:46   today it's not unusual to see a section [TS]

00:16:48   anywhere of something called tech [TS]

00:16:49   because people are using text to look at [TS]

00:16:51   Tech and texts its own thing [TS]

00:16:53   Tech is its own thing and and in a way [TS]

00:16:55   it certainly in the in the little ghetto [TS]

00:16:58   that we live in [TS]

00:17:00   like tech is the topic and and when I [TS]

00:17:05   was younger or I mean one but when we [TS]

00:17:07   used to prognosticate about tech it was [TS]

00:17:10   always that tech was going to facilitate [TS]

00:17:12   the conversation tech was going to you [TS]

00:17:15   know and that is part of the [TS]

00:17:17   conversation we're having now that tech [TS]

00:17:18   is just starting a conversation about [TS]

00:17:20   tech yeah right and i couldn't be less [TS]

00:17:24   interested / overtime an ocular point of [TS]

00:17:27   view john glenn podcast talk about [TS]

00:17:29   ah nothing this up but uh but you know [TS]

00:17:33   you know what I'm saying like I do i do [TS]

00:17:34   I see lasting I keep waiting for tech to [TS]

00:17:37   stop being the topic and for that [TS]

00:17:40   because I do feel like ultimately it is [TS]

00:17:43   but it lowers the quality of the [TS]

00:17:46   dialogue I'm I'm i feel like i am down [TS]

00:17:49   not thats that's a maybe maybe a [TS]

00:17:53   disparaging way to put it but i feel [TS]

00:17:55   like i am i am talking to a bunch of [TS]

00:17:58   people with the cables in their vans all [TS]

00:18:00   the time but that those people are are [TS]

00:18:04   presenting themselves and imagine [TS]

00:18:05   themselves to be part of the like the [TS]

00:18:08   the real like think thinking level and [TS]

00:18:12   repeat their firm in a van [TS]

00:18:13   yeah probably for me in a van with the [TS]

00:18:17   ladder on the top 500 index in peace [TS]

00:18:21   better scary for me man with the ladder [TS]

00:18:24   on top what I was terrified of I had [TS]

00:18:26   this terrible a realization the other [TS]

00:18:29   day that you know you and I both have [TS]

00:18:35   prepared our long lives to be uh [TS]

00:18:41   prognosticator and then thinkers and [TS]

00:18:44   hosts and toasters and you know like we [TS]

00:18:49   imagined when we were young that there [TS]

00:18:52   was a very important job [TS]

00:18:55   in the world which was hard to get and [TS]

00:18:59   really a prize when you got it which was [TS]

00:19:01   that you were a person with some [TS]

00:19:04   thoughts about things that people wanted [TS]

00:19:07   to hear [TS]

00:19:08   uh-huh and you were the you were the [TS]

00:19:11   voice are you were the three were the [TS]

00:19:13   the thinker the public person the [TS]

00:19:17   citizen artist and I have this sort of [TS]

00:19:22   terrible moment when I I was reflecting [TS]

00:19:25   back on the eighties when as you do [TS]

00:19:30   yeah that's the terrible nothing more [TS]

00:19:32   from this terrible moment when I I i [TS]

00:19:35   remember the Spotted Owl controversy [TS]

00:19:39   here in the northwest and trying to [TS]

00:19:43   tease out all the different sides of it [TS]

00:19:45   when when it was really fun it embroiled [TS]

00:19:48   here and realizing that but the answer [TS]

00:19:52   was that it wasn't possible to save all [TS]

00:19:57   the lumberjack jobs and the Lumberjacks [TS]

00:20:01   were protesting on the streets of [TS]

00:20:03   packwood or wherever the hell they lived [TS]

00:20:05   and they were saying like we're losing [TS]

00:20:07   our jobs to this to this bird and two [TS]

00:20:12   and what it really was was that we were [TS]

00:20:14   shipping all of their work all their [TS]

00:20:16   jobs / 22 Asia we're putting the raw [TS]

00:20:20   logs on boats and sending them to Asia [TS]

00:20:22   rather than milling them here but the [TS]

00:20:24   owl was a scapegoat but they were [TS]

00:20:27   marching and saying like we are losing [TS]

00:20:29   our jobs and and that they presented it [TS]

00:20:34   as this kind of like I mean we can't [TS]

00:20:36   lose our jobs so you have to find [TS]

00:20:38   another solution other than that we that [TS]

00:20:41   we stop cutting down trees or that would [TS]

00:20:43   you know and i remember having that the [TS]

00:20:46   insight that like oh these are these [TS]

00:20:49   jobs are gone that these there are there [TS]

00:20:52   won't be these lumberjack trolox no [TS]

00:20:54   amount of protesting will change the [TS]

00:20:56   reality of that [TS]

00:20:57   yeah the the sad truth and the and the [TS]

00:21:00   truth that no politician kind of has the [TS]

00:21:02   guts to stand up and say is like no it's [TS]

00:21:05   already happened [TS]

00:21:06   and it was the same with the autoworkers [TS]

00:21:09   in detroit right about the same time [TS]

00:21:11   like hey we're losing our jobs and these [TS]

00:21:14   are good union jobs that were paying a [TS]

00:21:16   hundred and fifty thousand dollars a [TS]

00:21:17   year for us to lean on a broom and smoke [TS]

00:21:19   cigarettes and we can't lose these jobs [TS]

00:21:22   and I was like well yeah in fact they're [TS]

00:21:24   there already gone and you made a bad [TS]

00:21:27   choice by leaving on a broom and smoking [TS]

00:21:29   a cigarette and it kind of worked for a [TS]

00:21:33   while but now it's over and and and [TS]

00:21:37   watching those groups of workers have [TS]

00:21:41   the slow dreadful realization that that [TS]

00:21:45   they're put it there wasn't going to be [TS]

00:21:47   it wasn't just a matter of going over [TS]

00:21:51   and getting another job across the [TS]

00:21:53   street it was that the whole thing was [TS]

00:21:55   done and the ones that could adapt did [TS]

00:21:59   and the ones that couldn't are on Social [TS]

00:22:01   Security right now and yelling about [TS]

00:22:03   obama but that this realization that you [TS]

00:22:07   and I maybe have prepared our whole [TS]

00:22:09   lives imagining that what we do and what [TS]

00:22:13   we can do was some kind of rare talent [TS]

00:22:17   that that the world desperately craved [TS]

00:22:20   and now we have arrived at precisely the [TS]

00:22:26   moment when it is hardest which is to [TS]

00:22:27   say middle-aged and I just I'm realizing [TS]

00:22:32   like it maybe maybe our jobs have been [TS]

00:22:37   are starting to be outsourced in the [TS]

00:22:41   sense that every teenager has an opinion [TS]

00:22:44   and the values that right values it [TS]

00:22:47   equally with ours and it's and it's know [TS]

00:22:50   and they're better and they're better at [TS]

00:22:52   engaging with the people who are [TS]

00:22:53   primarily there to make comments who are [TS]

00:22:55   going to make a lot do a lot of the [TS]

00:22:56   heavy lifting for them right [TS]

00:22:58   well in back to that previous thing [TS]

00:22:59   there's nothing in one of the many lost [TS]

00:23:01   episodes that people here we talked [TS]

00:23:03   about college I don't remember when it [TS]

00:23:04   was when we talk sometime ago you and I [TS]

00:23:06   offline about college and and it's and [TS]

00:23:11   and events in particular in the context [TS]

00:23:13   of college being something that was I we [TS]

00:23:18   tell me if I'm putting this [TS]

00:23:19   right but that for both of us and maybe [TS]

00:23:22   for our generation i guess or for you [TS]

00:23:23   know II similar middle-class white kids [TS]

00:23:25   college was something that was just you [TS]

00:23:28   were gonna go to college and every [TS]

00:23:29   decision that you made on the way to go [TS]

00:23:32   into college was primarily an [TS]

00:23:33   opportunity to screw up your chance to [TS]

00:23:35   go to college [TS]

00:23:36   it wasn't it wasn't something and again [TS]

00:23:38   i'm sorry there's a bit of that we could [TS]

00:23:40   but that but no seriously though that [TS]

00:23:42   there was that we both I think we both [TS]

00:23:43   shared that sense that like every every [TS]

00:23:46   known or unknown thing that was on the [TS]

00:23:49   path for us was well for one thing on [TS]

00:23:51   one path here at that path is you're [TS]

00:23:53   gonna fucking go to college right [TS]

00:23:54   inexorable march so you going out and [TS]

00:23:57   drinking that beer it's not just about [TS]

00:23:58   you breaking a rule about drinking a [TS]

00:24:00   beer when you're underage [TS]

00:24:01   it's about the fact that could really [TS]

00:24:03   screw up your with your one opportunity [TS]

00:24:05   to be something nowadays and so the [TS]

00:24:08   thing that in thinking about them will [TS]

00:24:10   go a little bit John Rother care but in [TS]

00:24:12   talking about what you're saying here i [TS]

00:24:14   wonder if one thing we lose or are are [TS]

00:24:16   losing or have lost in some ways i mean [TS]

00:24:19   i think that many people that are really [TS]

00:24:21   excited to go to college for the sake of [TS]

00:24:24   going to college I just it feels it's [TS]

00:24:26   become so wrote and so costly and so i [TS]

00:24:30   don't know i mean there's a part of me [TS]

00:24:31   that like once I was in college I was [TS]

00:24:32   really into it because here's the thing [TS]

00:24:34   yes on some level I thought of myself as [TS]

00:24:36   a future Dick Cavett but i also was [TS]

00:24:38   really open to the idea that there was [TS]

00:24:40   so much stuff that I knew the name of [TS]

00:24:42   but I didn't know anything about it and [TS]

00:24:44   I was really open the idea of something [TS]

00:24:46   okay well you have you talked to your [TS]

00:24:47   butt a little bit about Shakespeare here [TS]

00:24:49   how about you read some of those you've [TS]

00:24:51   talked about these these novels in these [TS]

00:24:52   great works these classics well now [TS]

00:24:53   you're going to read those you're gonna [TS]

00:24:54   go see all these paintings that have [TS]

00:24:56   been named check and we're going to talk [TS]

00:24:58   about them in context so there's at [TS]

00:25:00   least some part of me that was really [TS]

00:25:01   open to being a vessel for a while and [TS]

00:25:03   taken i'm not saying it had any great [TS]

00:25:05   impact right I did particularly well [TS]

00:25:07   with it but i wonder if that state of [TS]

00:25:09   mind is is different or maybe if I if I [TS]

00:25:11   work was unique at that time I don't [TS]

00:25:13   think i was i think we were I was people [TS]

00:25:16   like me were pretty hungry to go [TS]

00:25:18   somewhere not to be wrong but to [TS]

00:25:20   definitely be open to the idea that [TS]

00:25:22   there was shit tons of stuff that I [TS]

00:25:24   didn't even know I needed to know and [TS]

00:25:26   then once i had that I would be in a [TS]

00:25:28   better position to conduct myself as an [TS]

00:25:30   adult [TS]

00:25:30   and I wonder if if if that isn't unique [TS]

00:25:33   I wonder if that's still as pressing [TS]

00:25:35   feeling as it is today because it and [TS]

00:25:38   I'm not trying to be dismissive I'm not [TS]

00:25:39   trying to be an old man but I do get the [TS]

00:25:41   sense that there's less especially as [TS]

00:25:43   the idea of a canon has kind of withered [TS]

00:25:45   on the vine for better or for worse [TS]

00:25:47   sometimes for better um you think people [TS]

00:25:50   still have that same feeling of going [TS]

00:25:51   like what I'm gonna go out today and [TS]

00:25:53   learn what I might be wrong about I'm [TS]

00:25:54   gonna go out today and like figure out [TS]

00:25:56   all these ways that somebody could set [TS]

00:25:58   me straight a little bit [TS]

00:25:59   no i don't know i don't think that that [TS]

00:26:01   that is the feeling because I don't [TS]

00:26:03   think that there is a sense that you can [TS]

00:26:05   be wrong about a thing in the same way i [TS]

00:26:09   think that that the the idea that we [TS]

00:26:11   have that you could be wrong that you or [TS]

00:26:13   or rather that you could be right [TS]

00:26:15   you could be more right was predicated [TS]

00:26:19   on an understanding that there was a [TS]

00:26:21   limited amount of knowledge right there [TS]

00:26:25   were there was a cannon you went to [TS]

00:26:26   college and there was that there were [TS]

00:26:29   still more books than you could possibly [TS]

00:26:30   read in a lifetime but you could read [TS]

00:26:34   ten percent of the books and from that [TS]

00:26:37   ten percent get a pretty good picture of [TS]

00:26:39   what the common understanding of truth [TS]

00:26:42   was and I idea and I think that's I [TS]

00:26:45   think that's completely blown out of the [TS]

00:26:46   water now right [TS]

00:26:48   everybody's got their own micro truth [TS]

00:26:51   and in that sense I think college is [TS]

00:26:54   over there's no there's no reason it [TS]

00:26:58   increasingly I feel like colleges is [TS]

00:27:00   another one of these uh like temp it's a [TS]

00:27:04   it's a timber business where the already [TS]

00:27:07   kind of over [TS]

00:27:08   it's already over and people are still [TS]

00:27:10   going because of that because of inertia [TS]

00:27:14   well because I mean I heard a thing on [TS]

00:27:16   planet money we're talking about the [TS]

00:27:19   kinds of jobs that have the highest and [TS]

00:27:21   lowest average incomes so for example if [TS]

00:27:24   you're going to if you you know what a [TS]

00:27:26   petroleum engineer can make you can go [TS]

00:27:29   to college and say well I'm going to go [TS]

00:27:30   become a petroleum engineer because [TS]

00:27:32   there's a pretty good chance that for at [TS]

00:27:33   least the next five to ten years that's [TS]

00:27:34   still gonna be a pretty good gig and I [TS]

00:27:36   know I'm going to start in in the six [TS]

00:27:38   figures the day I step out of that [TS]

00:27:39   program right that has busy but that has [TS]

00:27:41   a very what's funny about that as as [TS]

00:27:43   difficult as that work is as smart as [TS]

00:27:46   you have to be to do it as as hard as [TS]

00:27:48   you're gonna have to work to get through [TS]

00:27:49   that that is oddly similar to the same [TS]

00:27:51   kind of vocational job that I had [TS]

00:27:53   vocational training that I was [TS]

00:27:55   completely not interested in when i was [TS]

00:27:57   a kid i did not want to fix I didn't [TS]

00:27:59   want to fix air conditioners I did not [TS]

00:28:00   want to fix cash registers or not that [TS]

00:28:02   was not you know work of the mind [TS]

00:28:05   well yeah I exactly and a petroleum [TS]

00:28:06   engineer spends a lot of time looking at [TS]

00:28:08   graphs looking looking at printouts of [TS]

00:28:12   yeah they're bears they're setting off [TS]

00:28:15   charges are sending sound waves into the [TS]

00:28:17   earth and watching it bounced off of [TS]

00:28:19   stuff uh you know different layers of of [TS]

00:28:23   schist or or felt bar and then they're [TS]

00:28:28   really there they're interpreting charts [TS]

00:28:30   basically in the same way that a that a [TS]

00:28:32   radio repairman is they've just been [TS]

00:28:35   taught how to do it [TS]

00:28:36   it's more complicated than I mean I'm [TS]

00:28:39   not even sure if it's more complicated [TS]

00:28:40   than been tuning a crystal set but it [TS]

00:28:43   doesn't feel like that it doesn't feel [TS]

00:28:45   like upper campus right all that stuff [TS]

00:28:49   at the University of Washington there [TS]

00:28:51   are the lower campus is where all the [TS]

00:28:56   new buildings are it's where all the [TS]

00:28:58   excitement's happening it's where all [TS]

00:29:00   you know you walk into these these [TS]

00:29:01   buildings that have been for the old [TS]

00:29:03   buildings that have been rehabilitated [TS]

00:29:05   and every wall has a little cluster of [TS]

00:29:09   av adapters and and little hook ups and [TS]

00:29:14   USB ports and and they're all [TS]

00:29:18   purpose-built for what people imagine or [TS]

00:29:23   what people in 2009 imagined the modern [TS]

00:29:26   classroom was going to be because we [TS]

00:29:28   were all going to be Power pointing one [TS]

00:29:30   another and it was you know books were [TS]

00:29:32   gone and and science science science [TS]

00:29:35   science and then the upper campus is is [TS]

00:29:39   getting smaller and smaller and it's [TS]

00:29:43   this area up there where people are [TS]

00:29:46   still studying poetry or or like I mean [TS]

00:29:49   can you think of a more relevant thing [TS]

00:29:52   then poet than studying poetry but I [TS]

00:29:54   mean the classic game classic is like [TS]

00:29:56   you know our history right right but but [TS]

00:29:58   when I was when I was entering college [TS]

00:30:00   like those were precisely the things [TS]

00:30:02   that interested me [TS]

00:30:03   mhm art history was one of my all-time [TS]

00:30:06   favorite class and colleges 20th century [TS]

00:30:08   painting [TS]

00:30:09   yeah one of one of four possible majors [TS]

00:30:12   for me right there were only four [TS]

00:30:14   conceivable ones English philosophy [TS]

00:30:18   history art and and iím one of a mean I [TS]

00:30:29   think entering freshman at the [TS]

00:30:31   University of Washington now I mean they [TS]

00:30:33   even in 1985 I don't think that many of [TS]

00:30:36   them measured in the admit majored in [TS]

00:30:39   the humanities but certainly a lot [TS]

00:30:41   larger percentage than are doing it now [TS]

00:30:44   I you know it right there that's the [TS]

00:30:46   real automotive industry because think [TS]

00:30:48   about that perfect storm on the one hand [TS]

00:30:50   I mean I I you know I don't want to [TS]

00:30:53   overstate this but i can already see [TS]

00:30:55   that like when I was a kid we had a [TS]

00:30:57   music class there was a gymnasium as you [TS]

00:31:00   go to do Jim things there were all these [TS]

00:31:02   things that were not strictly the [TS]

00:31:04   academic stuff but I mean you had a [TS]

00:31:05   music class you learn to a little bit [TS]

00:31:08   play a little bit of an instrument learn [TS]

00:31:09   about rhythm and learn about George [TS]

00:31:10   Gershwin and all that kind of stuff like [TS]

00:31:12   I you know i don't i don't i'm guessing [TS]

00:31:14   the Copeland is not in the Common Core [TS]

00:31:17   it in the way that it was when we were [TS]

00:31:20   kids [TS]

00:31:20   so on the one hand you have fewer and [TS]

00:31:22   fewer people who are getting that [TS]

00:31:23   everyday and let's be honest we're not [TS]

00:31:25   just talking about middle-class kids [TS]

00:31:26   there are a lot of kids that would not [TS]

00:31:27   learn about that stuff at home they're [TS]

00:31:29   not going to listen to their parents you [TS]

00:31:30   know eight tracks of the planets or [TS]

00:31:32   something like that and then you know [TS]

00:31:34   but then on the other hand think about [TS]

00:31:35   where the money comes from at a [TS]

00:31:36   university not just the tuition but [TS]

00:31:38   think about the grants think about where [TS]

00:31:40   that money goes that's not going to be [TS]

00:31:41   coming from you know the National [TS]

00:31:43   Endowment for the Humanities probably [TS]

00:31:45   going to be coming from exxon well and [TS]

00:31:47   increasingly universities get a lot of [TS]

00:31:49   money from the patents that they [TS]

00:31:51   developed ID so I and I don't want to [TS]

00:31:55   give too much away but but the I just [TS]

00:31:58   had a very interesting meeting of of [TS]

00:32:00   this arts commission [TS]

00:32:01   that i'm on the music commission in the [TS]

00:32:03   arts commission had a joint meeting and [TS]

00:32:05   we were talking about the kind of we [TS]

00:32:08   were we were pie-in-the-sky in because [TS]

00:32:10   we're the those commissions are doing a [TS]

00:32:12   really good job in seattle now and [TS]

00:32:13   people are excited about them and [TS]

00:32:15   companies are coming around and and the [TS]

00:32:17   and the the proposal was kinda like all [TS]

00:32:20   right if we were going to envision a [TS]

00:32:23   forward-looking arts curriculum for [TS]

00:32:26   Seattle Public Schools and we felt like [TS]

00:32:29   we could present it to the world and and [TS]

00:32:32   take money from people and and actually [TS]

00:32:34   build it like not just build a [TS]

00:32:36   curriculum but build up an academy and i [TS]

00:32:39   just purchased outline if implemented [TS]

00:32:40   yeah and really build a physical [TS]

00:32:43   structure that has drinking fountains [TS]

00:32:44   and and classrooms and is a place that [TS]

00:32:47   that people go and what would it look [TS]

00:32:50   like and we went around the table and [TS]

00:32:51   this is a the these are the people at [TS]

00:32:53   the Commission are like all the super [TS]

00:32:58   altruistic mind set [TS]

00:33:00   nobody's there to personally profit it's [TS]

00:33:04   it's a it's a lot of work to be on one [TS]

00:33:06   of those commissions and we're trying to [TS]

00:33:07   make the city better but every single [TS]

00:33:10   idea was like well you know what we need [TS]

00:33:11   we need to you know we need a classroom [TS]

00:33:13   on like video game design and we need a [TS]

00:33:15   classroom on like you know graphic art [TS]

00:33:18   design all this sort of design and and [TS]

00:33:23   electronic music implementation classes [TS]

00:33:26   where it's like we got to teach them how [TS]

00:33:28   to use the tools the pro tools and the [TS]

00:33:31   this tools and the part tools so that [TS]

00:33:33   they can go out and like make commerce [TS]

00:33:38   huh [TS]

00:33:40   and as it as I wanted it sits one [TS]

00:33:42   without anybody saying its kind of [TS]

00:33:44   driven by the idea of a market right the [TS]

00:33:47   cut the the commerce commerce word never [TS]

00:33:49   got used it was just that as we because [TS]

00:33:52   the thing is nobody wants to say well [TS]

00:33:54   the kids should know what be all every [TS]

00:33:56   single kid should be forced to learn the [TS]

00:33:59   clarinet god forbid it right i mean all [TS]

00:34:03   everybody on the thing wants to be [TS]

00:34:04   contemporary they want to give stuff [TS]

00:34:06   they want to have a curriculum that kids [TS]

00:34:08   are interested in they want to they want [TS]

00:34:10   to be ahead of the game [TS]

00:34:12   head of their parents and not yet not [TS]

00:34:16   force the clarinet on a bunch of kids [TS]

00:34:17   that are using their iphones to make [TS]

00:34:20   music but in doing that the whole [TS]

00:34:24   curriculum was at as initially [TS]

00:34:27   envisioned was dependent on companies [TS]

00:34:31   interacting with the schools and and and [TS]

00:34:35   and sort of like predicated on the idea [TS]

00:34:39   that we were giving them real skills and [TS]

00:34:43   not a bunch of like nothing so in order [TS]

00:34:46   to attract that kind of interest by [TS]

00:34:48   which we mean corporate money it has to [TS]

00:34:50   appear uh it has to appear very modern [TS]

00:34:54   mhm and very practical right so then [TS]

00:34:58   that way Microsoft maybe we'll come in [TS]

00:35:00   and give us five thousand zunes or [TS]

00:35:03   something [TS]

00:35:03   it's not about bringing somebody with a [TS]

00:35:06   bassoon every once in awhile huh well [TS]

00:35:08   and so it's so so it kind of came around [TS]

00:35:10   the table to me and I was like listen [TS]

00:35:12   it's not like we have the opportunity to [TS]

00:35:15   develop an arts curriculum with a [TS]

00:35:18   capital A arts and I don't think that [TS]

00:35:23   that is technology dependent i mean i [TS]

00:35:25   think it's it's important that we do [TS]

00:35:26   have a room somewhere where where we can [TS]

00:35:29   learn how to use protools and it's [TS]

00:35:31   important to have a room somewhere we [TS]

00:35:33   can use you know learn how to use a [TS]

00:35:35   photoshop or whatever like tech rooms [TS]

00:35:39   are important for sure but talking about [TS]

00:35:43   art is already a mysterious project it's [TS]

00:35:49   already complicated and difficult hard [TS]

00:35:51   to even it's hard to even agree on what [TS]

00:35:53   that means i guess you could argue [TS]

00:35:54   that's always been the case in [TS]

00:35:56   twentieth-century but i think it's at [TS]

00:35:57   more than ever it's very difficult to [TS]

00:35:59   come up with some version of art that [TS]

00:36:01   doesn't either feel like dusty or full [TS]

00:36:03   of charlatans [TS]

00:36:04   yeah exactly Thank You exactly and yet [TS]

00:36:07   without it like we can't see that ground [TS]

00:36:11   to to the dusty history right we can't [TS]

00:36:16   say like provocative art is just a thing [TS]

00:36:18   that has been colonized by [TS]

00:36:21   Russian mobsters and it's all just [TS]

00:36:24   Damien Hirst garbage now like we have to [TS]

00:36:30   continue to have a language of art and [TS]

00:36:32   we have to continue to provide the [TS]

00:36:34   opportunity for people to challenge us [TS]

00:36:38   through art whatever mean you know I at [TS]

00:36:41   and I reflect back on the jesse helms [TS]

00:36:43   like auntie and I nea write a hearings [TS]

00:36:50   of the nineteen eighties again fucking [TS]

00:36:52   nineteen eighties got damaged the worst [TS]

00:36:54   johnny was the cells bad but like this [TS]

00:36:56   whole business of like what is art and [TS]

00:36:58   and watching and actually being in a [TS]

00:37:02   position sitting at a table where I [TS]

00:37:04   might have some small voice in [TS]

00:37:07   determining some aspect of an arts [TS]

00:37:11   curriculum in seattle and realizing that [TS]

00:37:14   I'm swimming against the tide even to [TS]

00:37:17   suggest that the arts are in some way [TS]

00:37:19   anything but a trade that the arts are [TS]

00:37:24   something something that transcend [TS]

00:37:27   training and become a kind of theory and [TS]

00:37:34   practice that it that requires that you [TS]

00:37:39   know they're recording some ways [TS]

00:37:40   requires difficulty and requires that [TS]

00:37:44   people be trusted and and and really [TS]

00:37:50   like turning loose right if all they had [TS]

00:37:52   were clarinets they would make something [TS]

00:37:55   amazing with clarinets it isn't it [TS]

00:38:01   doesn't matter that the tools be a [TS]

00:38:06   avant-garde or that it's at the very [TS]

00:38:09   least a three legged stool because if [TS]

00:38:11   you had if think about you know when you [TS]

00:38:13   have music classes in the past or [TS]

00:38:14   something like that [TS]

00:38:15   I mean you could hand somebody I'm like [TS]

00:38:17   I said clarinet because that's that's [TS]

00:38:19   that's not the best one to start with [TS]

00:38:20   but even if it's one of those got off [TS]

00:38:22   the recorders if you had somebody a [TS]

00:38:24   recorder and just show them how to play [TS]

00:38:26   scales and modes and maybe sure that [TS]

00:38:29   things about rhythm time signatures and [TS]

00:38:30   that kind of stuff you would that would [TS]

00:38:32   now that's a pretty fucking dusty class [TS]

00:38:34   because all you [TS]

00:38:34   gonna do is play scales you're not going [TS]

00:38:36   to actually making you music the second [TS]

00:38:38   leg of the stool has to be well now that [TS]

00:38:40   we know enough not even everything now [TS]

00:38:43   that we know enough we can actually play [TS]

00:38:45   hot cross buns or three blind mice [TS]

00:38:47   whatever whatever whatever your regional [TS]

00:38:49   version of that is and it's not going to [TS]

00:38:50   sound great but now you're making a [TS]

00:38:52   little tune now wouldn't it be great for [TS]

00:38:54   the third leg of that stool soldier [TS]

00:38:55   learn a little bit more about music and [TS]

00:38:57   how people take those technical skills [TS]

00:38:59   apply the craft of this song that [TS]

00:39:02   somebody has put together and then what [TS]

00:39:04   does that mean context and god dammit [TS]

00:39:06   that can mean so many different things [TS]

00:39:08   and I like I look at my kid and like [TS]

00:39:10   right now she is pretty obsessed with [TS]

00:39:12   making stuff all the time [TS]

00:39:14   our house is upside down there's glue [TS]

00:39:16   everywhere there's glitter glue there's [TS]

00:39:18   origami paper on fucking everything [TS]

00:39:19   she's kind of exciting things that all [TS]

00:39:21   it's all this thought technology glitter [TS]

00:39:24   glue glue with glitter [TS]

00:39:25   Oh No and boy does it get everywhere [TS]

00:39:27   because it because you thought you had [TS]

00:39:28   trouble getting glitter out of things [TS]

00:39:29   ask yourself about glitter glue haha [TS]

00:39:31   it's like spray poo [TS]

00:39:34   I don't want it but nobody like I see [TS]

00:39:37   this with her see I really see with her [TS]

00:39:39   right now where she's teaching herself [TS]

00:39:41   she likes fancy writing more than [TS]

00:39:43   regular writing so now she is tracing [TS]

00:39:46   things in cursive and trying to teach [TS]

00:39:47   yourself cursive because she just likes [TS]

00:39:49   the way that it looks she writes letters [TS]

00:39:51   to herself in cursive and then she [TS]

00:39:53   illuminates them with with stamps and [TS]

00:39:55   thinks she's cut out of magazines that [TS]

00:39:57   you know she I'm not saying it's great [TS]

00:39:58   art but she walks around with a legal [TS]

00:40:01   pattern of independent we walk around [TS]

00:40:02   the park and sheshe not very well but [TS]

00:40:04   draw stuff all the time and like how [TS]

00:40:07   long is she gonna have that how long is [TS]

00:40:10   she going to have that urge to just make [TS]

00:40:12   move your hand and make stuff up here on [TS]

00:40:13   a page and the thing is I mean I'm torn [TS]

00:40:16   on the technique technology issue [TS]

00:40:17   because i do think of it as a class [TS]

00:40:19   thing in a lot of ways and the thing is [TS]

00:40:21   if you have an iPad in the house if you [TS]

00:40:23   have a Mac in the house like there are [TS]

00:40:25   plenty of resources even crappy open [TS]

00:40:27   source apps but you could learn to use [TS]

00:40:29   logic at the age of ten maybe protools [TS]

00:40:31   but you could you can learn to do [TS]

00:40:33   garageband on ipad that's all there [TS]

00:40:36   I don't get me to track for that [TS]

00:40:38   necessarily but there are a lot of kids [TS]

00:40:40   that don't have that and I don't want to [TS]

00:40:42   just put them on some you know 20 year [TS]

00:40:43   old pc you know with some busted ass [TS]

00:40:46   program crashes all the time [TS]

00:40:47   yeah it's not you think I do think all [TS]

00:40:49   those things do work together it's and [TS]

00:40:51   it's not like so many problems at least [TS]

00:40:53   in my estimation we fall short when we [TS]

00:40:56   skip get too reductive about trying to [TS]

00:40:58   focus on one aspect of it jesse helms [TS]

00:40:59   did that by looking at bullets in a [TS]

00:41:01   man's ass and saying ergo we should not [TS]

00:41:03   find art right you're throwing out all [TS]

00:41:05   these other things that are really [TS]

00:41:06   valuable but even when we when we teach [TS]

00:41:08   things like it's you have to understand [TS]

00:41:10   it starts with the every little kid has [TS]

00:41:12   a natural urge to make cool stupid stuff [TS]

00:41:15   so I'm just about race cars sometimes [TS]

00:41:17   it's about aliens [TS]

00:41:18   sometimes it's about disney princesses [TS]

00:41:20   but they have accomplished compulsion to [TS]

00:41:23   make that stuff what this is this is why [TS]

00:41:25   I'm terrified of them of Minecraft I [TS]

00:41:28   don't understand it so Karen minecraft 2 [TS]

00:41:30   i'm not gonna go booga-booga but i have [TS]

00:41:32   to run away from it because it just on [TS]

00:41:34   the basis i'm saying just on the basis [TS]

00:41:36   of the elementary school and what [TS]

00:41:37   t-shirts kids wear it seems to become [TS]

00:41:40   like an entire lifestyle to every is a [TS]

00:41:43   lot of girls but especially every little [TS]

00:41:45   boy around six seems to be getting like [TS]

00:41:47   absorbed into Minecraft yeah and and the [TS]

00:41:49   language that adults are using the the [TS]

00:41:53   articles that i read about it in wired [TS]

00:41:55   and the articles that i read about it [TS]

00:41:56   everywhere I are all you know really at [TS]

00:42:01   pains to talk about how creative it is [TS]

00:42:04   inclined without collaborative and how [TS]

00:42:06   it requires i mean i read an article not [TS]

00:42:08   very long ago and I'm sure everybody [TS]

00:42:09   listen to this podcast also read that [TS]

00:42:12   said that minecraft actually increases [TS]

00:42:15   literacy because kids are going on [TS]

00:42:18   minecraft hack blogs and reading at [TS]

00:42:22   reading above their reading level [TS]

00:42:24   because they are interested in figuring [TS]

00:42:26   out a passionate about it they're [TS]

00:42:28   passionate about it and their passion is [TS]

00:42:30   causing them to teach themselves to read [TS]

00:42:32   on blogs and I read this thing and I was [TS]

00:42:36   just like seriously really is this where [TS]

00:42:38   we are is this the resisted the the the [TS]

00:42:42   point in the conversation where I mean I [TS]

00:42:44   feel like raising my hand and saying uh [TS]

00:42:46   maybe the fact that Johnny can't read is [TS]

00:42:50   is the is the thing to address not not [TS]

00:42:55   to clapping and praise minecraft for [TS]

00:42:57   teaching for giving kids a reason to [TS]

00:42:59   learn to read I'm keeping my powder dry [TS]

00:43:00   on this [TS]

00:43:01   one and I'm trying and trying to help [TS]

00:43:02   you keep your powder dry okay because [TS]

00:43:04   it's a new thing it's a new thing but [TS]

00:43:06   like I guess that it always seems like [TS]

00:43:08   whenever something is new and we're not [TS]

00:43:11   familiar with it like you and I are not [TS]

00:43:12   familiar with it we see the worst [TS]

00:43:13   aspects of it which is the same thing [TS]

00:43:15   happened when people want to make [TS]

00:43:16   computer games like why don't you want [TS]

00:43:18   to go do your math homework why are you [TS]

00:43:19   why are you doing all these computer [TS]

00:43:20   games money on a way that kind of his [TS]

00:43:22   kind of math homework what I'll say is [TS]

00:43:25   and i I don't I can't have the numbers [TS]

00:43:27   to say with whether that observation [TS]

00:43:29   about reading blogs is true what i will [TS]

00:43:30   say is my daughter is much more [TS]

00:43:32   interested in reading something if she [TS]

00:43:33   likes what she's going to read the [TS]

00:43:35   cancer like in and that started with us [TS]

00:43:36   reading comics before she could talk to [TS]

00:43:39   like now she'll sit there with a comic [TS]

00:43:41   book and I can see her and it's one [TS]

00:43:43   thing that like I accidentally got right [TS]

00:43:44   was the comic books because a kids comic [TS]

00:43:47   book hasn't you can really look a good [TS]

00:43:49   comic book you know so has great art and [TS]

00:43:51   you can tell the story of sequential art [TS]

00:43:53   and you can release us out a basic story [TS]

00:43:55   and then when you learn a little bit [TS]

00:43:56   more about reading you can figure out [TS]

00:43:58   some of the words and then if you don't [TS]

00:43:59   know the word you can like try to figure [TS]

00:44:01   out the rest of it in context but let [TS]

00:44:02   them think about it like you know [TS]

00:44:04   anything where you really wanted [TS]

00:44:05   something like you'll apply all of your [TS]

00:44:08   devilish childish wits to trying to [TS]

00:44:10   figure out how to get that thing so i [TS]

00:44:13   don't know i mean i don't think the [TS]

00:44:15   argument is the same as as often gets [TS]

00:44:18   used with musical instruments right i [TS]

00:44:20   sat down at with a piano teacher so from [TS]

00:44:23   1977 to 1981 and in the course of the at [TS]

00:44:28   four years of weekly piano lessons I [TS]

00:44:31   learned not sane because every week I [TS]

00:44:35   was supposed to go known and now and [TS]

00:44:39   then and a techie eventually will play [TS]

00:44:42   the moonlight sonata poorly [TS]

00:44:44   yeah I i had no interest in any of you [TS]

00:44:46   know and and the argument that somebody [TS]

00:44:48   should have sat down with me and gone [TS]

00:44:50   like it like here's the basic met here's [TS]

00:44:53   how to basically play uh this Elton John [TS]

00:44:57   song [TS]

00:44:57   ding-ding-ding-ding-ding [TS]

00:44:58   ding-ding-ding-ding-ding doing and give [TS]

00:45:00   me a song and and just start there is [TS]

00:45:05   it's very convincing because it's very [TS]

00:45:08   convincing to me that that would have [TS]

00:45:10   been a better method because it's not [TS]

00:45:12   what happened [TS]

00:45:13   right and it's easy enough to assume [TS]

00:45:14   that before yeah right like I didn't [TS]

00:45:16   like playing the piano and I didn't [TS]

00:45:19   learn how to play the piano despite [TS]

00:45:20   throwing tons of artillery at at the [TS]

00:45:24   problem I never I never took the beach [TS]

00:45:26   but if I had if I'd been if my teacher [TS]

00:45:31   had been a long hair had been like [TS]

00:45:33   here's how to play on John man get with [TS]

00:45:35   the times i can picture myself going [TS]

00:45:37   like yeah but in fact the way I learned [TS]

00:45:41   to play the piano was well actually the [TS]

00:45:44   way I learned was that I got hired in [TS]

00:45:46   harvey danger and that's not going to [TS]

00:45:47   work for everybody but but other great [TS]

00:45:50   story eventually I came back to the [TS]

00:45:53   piano on my own and I sat down at it and [TS]

00:45:56   I started picking the way and it because [TS]

00:45:58   I had because I because i needed to and [TS]

00:46:02   now i am I do play the piano but i have [TS]

00:46:06   no depth or breath at the thing right [TS]

00:46:10   mi my mom by contrast can sit down and [TS]

00:46:14   sight read and play [TS]

00:46:18   she painted up as a kid well yeah [TS]

00:46:21   because she was taught piano in the in [TS]

00:46:23   the nineteen thirties or night back in [TS]

00:46:25   the sticks in Ohio [TS]

00:46:26   yeah the one where where they where the [TS]

00:46:28   where the teacher sat on a tall stool [TS]

00:46:31   and hit you with a rod and I'm not [TS]

00:46:34   broken foot him I get kicked your broken [TS]

00:46:38   foot until you learn to play the piano [TS]

00:46:38   how but my of my mom characterizes [TS]

00:46:42   herself as having no gift and she can [TS]

00:46:48   sit down and play Tchaikovsky and I and [TS]

00:46:54   I look and I'm just like mom that's [TS]

00:46:55   incredible back that's amazing [TS]

00:46:58   and she just just misses it with a wave [TS]

00:47:00   of her hand like well I'm you know I'm a [TS]

00:47:02   I'm a poor musician and the I just was [TS]

00:47:06   forced to learn this [TS]

00:47:09   I was forced to acquire this this habit [TS]

00:47:12   for this is probably like learning long [TS]

00:47:14   division it's not anything we go I i [TS]

00:47:16   really want to be able to work out some [TS]

00:47:18   of this division I've heard on the radio [TS]

00:47:19   it sounds like work [TS]

00:47:21   yeah super and I think she approached it [TS]

00:47:23   that way and when she sits down she does [TS]

00:47:25   play that music for pleasure she likes [TS]

00:47:28   to hear it and she likes to you know [TS]

00:47:30   feel her fingers kind of figure out the [TS]

00:47:34   patterns again but she her take on it is [TS]

00:47:38   very is almost completely absent of art [TS]

00:47:42   right she just learned a thing up by [TS]

00:47:46   rote and now she can do it she sees the [TS]

00:47:49   black dots on a piece of paper and she [TS]

00:47:51   knows that that means push down this key [TS]

00:47:53   to my ear [TS]

00:47:57   it sounds beautiful look I mean I [TS]

00:48:00   wouldn't i wouldn't say that it was like [TS]

00:48:02   a like art fall but i mean it's it's [TS]

00:48:06   like she's playing this beautiful music [TS]

00:48:09   from the page and if she and I were both [TS]

00:48:11   invited into a hotel lobby and someone [TS]

00:48:14   said would someone like to sit at the [TS]

00:48:16   piano and entertain us like what my mom [TS]

00:48:18   can do is a thousand times more useful [TS]

00:48:21   in that situation than what i can do you [TS]

00:48:23   play commander thinks aloud twice [TS]

00:48:24   yeah I would sit down and be like yo ya [TS]

00:48:27   died out back dumped out by ok i got [TS]

00:48:32   three more stick around everybody and [TS]

00:48:36   and so I mean honestly the idea that [TS]

00:48:39   that that that honey attracts more flies [TS]

00:48:43   than vinegar that the is that the folks [TS]

00:48:47   saying is that the Bill Clinton saying [TS]

00:48:48   you catch you catch more flies with [TS]

00:48:50   honey than vinegar i think is is the [TS]

00:48:52   folks saying yeah right and so this idea [TS]

00:48:54   that the way to teach people the best [TS]

00:48:56   way or the only way to teach people is [TS]

00:48:58   by um you know appealing to their to [TS]

00:49:03   their interests [TS]

00:49:05   it always a I mean what it suggests to [TS]

00:49:09   me is that that the earlier step of like [TS]

00:49:14   establishing their interests was super [TS]

00:49:17   duper important and a lot of times that [TS]

00:49:19   just comes that windows closed now we [TS]

00:49:22   are at least it's hard to pry open the [TS]

00:49:24   way the way that window got established [TS]

00:49:26   was that mom and dad were like oh yeah [TS]

00:49:28   just go play with the fucking ipad while [TS]

00:49:31   mommy and daddy talk or whatever you [TS]

00:49:33   know like the the initial establishment [TS]

00:49:36   of the interests was not i mean most [TS]

00:49:38   people don't take the care that you took [TS]

00:49:40   to say like I want you to get into this [TS]

00:49:43   i want to show you this you know i mean [TS]

00:49:45   most adults that I mean they're talking [TS]

00:49:47   about their kids talk about the ipad as [TS]

00:49:51   you know sort of there there little [TS]

00:49:53   guilty about it like we yeah we give [TS]

00:49:55   them the ipad for sure usually just to [TS]

00:49:59   give us some space for some time to [TS]

00:50:01   think ur so we can speak a paragraph [TS]

00:50:03   this week to ya and so and that is that [TS]

00:50:06   is like that is omaha beach in this [TS]

00:50:10   kid's mind like here's the period is [TS]

00:50:13   like you for years from now we're going [TS]

00:50:16   to talk about well the only way we can [TS]

00:50:18   get Johnny to learn to read is by latch [TS]

00:50:21   is by putting him on minecraft blogs [TS]

00:50:23   because that's his interest you know [TS]

00:50:25   that's where that's where his interests [TS]

00:50:27   are and it's like I wonder why that's [TS]

00:50:29   true and and it all seems very passive [TS]

00:50:34   right it always seems like we're just [TS]

00:50:36   reacting and all Johnny wants to do is [TS]

00:50:39   is strums guitar so we're trying to [TS]

00:50:42   teach him English bye-bye [TS]

00:50:45   you know having him learn songs in [TS]

00:50:47   english reading fake books he's reading [TS]

00:50:50   fake books and I think it's a thread [TS]

00:50:51   through this that has family on Hugh [TS]

00:50:57   that has been I'm sure much better [TS]

00:50:59   articulated by people for centuries but [TS]

00:51:01   but there does seem to be a basic [TS]

00:51:03   problem which is and this sounds like [TS]

00:51:05   the plot of some kind of a kids movie [TS]

00:51:07   yes yes yes lot of kids we but you know [TS]

00:51:10   the thing is when you're when you're a [TS]

00:51:11   grown-up and you gotta look kid and you [TS]

00:51:14   got all these ideas and like some of the [TS]

00:51:16   some popular kinds of ideas are like I [TS]

00:51:18   you need to go um take karate or you [TS]

00:51:21   need to go go to soccer because there's [TS]

00:51:24   character things and you'll get exercise [TS]

00:51:26   and there's all these different things [TS]

00:51:27   but you know whatever there's a hundred [TS]

00:51:28   different reasons why you would do [TS]

00:51:29   something like send your kid to soccer [TS]

00:51:31   or importantly in this case why you say [TS]

00:51:33   i want you to take piano lessons now the [TS]

00:51:37   thing is you as a parent see this in [TS]

00:51:39   such a vastly different way you see it [TS]

00:51:41   as like hey maybe this could be the next [TS]

00:51:43   client gold or you see this as I wish [TS]

00:51:46   I'd learned how to play piano or any of [TS]

00:51:47   the dozens of other reasons why it seems [TS]

00:51:49   like a great idea the kind of kind of [TS]

00:51:52   force a kid into learning a musical [TS]

00:51:54   instrument or learning of you know any [TS]

00:51:57   kind of crafty things going to [TS]

00:51:58   controlling lessons and the thing is i [TS]

00:52:00   can I apologize for how obvious it's [TS]

00:52:01   obvious this is but I think about it a [TS]

00:52:03   lot [TS]

00:52:03   the way I describe what might do what my [TS]

00:52:05   daughter does like my daughter is not [TS]

00:52:06   sitting around thinking about making [TS]

00:52:08   great sequential art she just likes the [TS]

00:52:10   way it feels to drawing a page i think i [TS]

00:52:12   think she likes smooching her hands [TS]

00:52:14   around the glue [TS]

00:52:14   I think she likes the way that feels and [TS]

00:52:16   i think it's it's important to I don't [TS]

00:52:20   know how to do this but I feel like it's [TS]

00:52:21   important to get give opportunities for [TS]

00:52:24   people to play like that and I think [TS]

00:52:26   about you see me on your piano i called [TS]

00:52:28   The Wolverine cord right where I I hold [TS]

00:52:30   my pinky with my thumb and I play triads [TS]

00:52:33   with my three middle fingers you see me [TS]

00:52:36   do this shoot that snaked not damaged [TS]

00:52:39   mix all right over for chili but like [TS]

00:52:42   that's how I learned I learned because I [TS]

00:52:44   wanted to be able to like I just thought [TS]

00:52:46   that was fun I'd sit around you know it [TS]

00:52:48   down time you know at church events we [TS]

00:52:50   hang out and like play try to figure out [TS]

00:52:52   how to play songs on the piano [TS]

00:52:54   just cuz it was fun it felt good it's [TS]

00:52:56   not good you could play loud you could [TS]

00:52:57   bang on it it was play much more than it [TS]

00:53:00   was learning i'm not saying i'm in a [TS]

00:53:02   mini prodigy piano but I see this in my [TS]

00:53:04   daughter so yeah my brought my acoustic [TS]

00:53:06   guitar home it the office forever i [TS]

00:53:08   finally brought it home so we could you [TS]

00:53:09   know it's fun to just play around [TS]

00:53:11   I thought a long time ago will claim [TS]

00:53:13   will play songs and sing together but [TS]

00:53:15   what she really likes his wife Sonia [TS]

00:53:17   photo this she likes walking up to it [TS]

00:53:18   and kind of banging on the strings [TS]

00:53:20   standing over on the stand like almost [TS]

00:53:22   like it's a cello and iíve shown her [TS]

00:53:25   how to do two chords that she can mostly [TS]

00:53:28   replicate the one she's best that is in [TS]

00:53:30   a 5 that was the easiest course i could [TS]

00:53:32   think of in terms of you know the the [TS]

00:53:35   strings are too hard to press down you [TS]

00:53:36   know the two middle strings at the 2nd [TS]

00:53:38   fret and then I should our after that [TS]

00:53:42   children a minor and she's not great at [TS]

00:53:44   it but she still stand in front of the [TS]

00:53:46   guitar facing the guitar and with the [TS]

00:53:48   totally wrong finger push down mostly [TS]

00:53:51   the right places right on the front [TS]

00:53:52   which drives me crazy because it buzzes [TS]

00:53:54   but she sits there and she plays these [TS]

00:53:56   little chords really shitty and then she [TS]

00:53:58   goes into this crazy d Boone thing where [TS]

00:53:59   she just keeps going up and down and [TS]

00:54:01   back and you know what it's like to be a [TS]

00:54:02   little kid playing with a guitar and I'm [TS]

00:54:04   put it out of my mind like this katar [TS]

00:54:06   the strings are going to break the [TS]

00:54:07   guitar my break [TS]

00:54:08   she has so much fun just banging around [TS]

00:54:10   on that and I don't know if that'll [TS]

00:54:11   invention ever [TS]

00:54:12   Jeff utility i was thinking more like [TS]

00:54:14   Stanley Stanley Clarke still join whom I [TS]

00:54:17   think enough Stanley Clark Jordan like [TS]

00:54:20   Jordan yeah this married name [TS]

00:54:22   yeah you said teacher just teach you [TS]

00:54:24   some tips start teaching songs like you [TS]

00:54:26   know it's it doesn't just drawn persuade [TS]

00:54:28   a button boom [TS]

00:54:31   well I think what you're getting at is [TS]

00:54:34   this is this is this crucial thing [TS]

00:54:36   justin is not about me I'm trying to [TS]

00:54:37   remember like how fun it is just fuck [TS]

00:54:39   around and have nobody sitting there [TS]

00:54:41   correcting you and just if she wants to [TS]

00:54:43   bang around on that guitar like go ahead [TS]

00:54:45   go nuts and sometimes i will say hey you [TS]

00:54:47   want to see the other court you want to [TS]

00:54:48   so think maybe I'll get a ratard for a [TS]

00:54:50   birthday I don't know she didn't love [TS]

00:54:51   the piano we got her but she's gonna [TS]

00:54:53   play and it'll be fun and it's not going [TS]

00:54:55   to be pressure for her to get back up [TS]

00:54:57   segovia by the time she's aight i think [TS]

00:54:58   it's more and I think it's more probably [TS]

00:55:00   more fun for her to play on Dad's guitar [TS]

00:55:01   than to have one of her own but like I a [TS]

00:55:05   big part of this is this can take it [TS]

00:55:08   dovetails with this this idea that [TS]

00:55:10   there's nothing new Under the Sun but [TS]

00:55:12   that that so much of so much of making [TS]

00:55:17   art is [TS]

00:55:18   reinventing the wheel and you can sit [TS]

00:55:22   there and and shape their little hands [TS]

00:55:25   and and and teach teach teach teach [TS]

00:55:28   teach like like art is a thing that can [TS]

00:55:33   be known and I think that that is in a [TS]

00:55:36   way a really important part of the [TS]

00:55:38   process but then there's that other [TS]

00:55:40   thing which is at a certain point and a [TS]

00:55:44   and I i think the jury's out where that [TS]

00:55:47   point is but you have to reinvent it [TS]

00:55:50   somehow you have to be able to act as [TS]

00:55:53   though as though it's like beyond [TS]

00:55:57   thunderdome and you are a tribe of kids [TS]

00:56:01   living it in a in a lucky little valley [TS]

00:56:07   that's separated by a great desert [TS]

00:56:09   uh-huh and it is the dying time and the [TS]

00:56:13   and you are you are inventing your [TS]

00:56:15   culture with just the faintest memory of [TS]

00:56:19   what the what came before you write that [TS]

00:56:23   it has to feel like your own even if [TS]

00:56:25   it's your own cover of The Kinks there [TS]

00:56:27   has to be something about it i mean i [TS]

00:56:29   don't that's exactly what you're saying [TS]

00:56:30   but like I think part of it is that it [TS]

00:56:31   really feels like some kind of [TS]

00:56:32   transplanted culture when you try to to [TS]

00:56:35   pop this culture into a kid like an [TS]

00:56:37   Atari cartridge and then expect them to [TS]

00:56:39   go all da bak or something like yeah you [TS]

00:56:42   can you can see the kids in in [TS]

00:56:43   rock-and-roll the kids in their twenties [TS]

00:56:45   now whose parents put them in Nirvana [TS]

00:56:50   t-shirts when they were three years old [TS]

00:56:53   18 years ago right i mean you can kind [TS]

00:56:58   of see them you see them even i'm sure a [TS]

00:57:00   like they're there are a couple of kids [TS]

00:57:03   and my daughter's preschool who have a [TS]

00:57:06   moment's if you will you know like their [TS]

00:57:10   parents are trying to push them toward [TS]

00:57:13   being cool from a very young age in the [TS]

00:57:18   hopes i think that being that if they [TS]

00:57:20   are cool that'll that they won't have a [TS]

00:57:24   heartbreaker they won't have problems [TS]

00:57:25   growing up [TS]

00:57:26   like the solution the solution to so [TS]

00:57:30   many problems is to just be one of the [TS]

00:57:33   cool ones and I mean and that is that's [TS]

00:57:38   that's that's painful and true well yeah [TS]

00:57:41   well put [TS]

00:57:42   it's so different from my approach which [TS]

00:57:44   is to say you are going to be a nerd i'm [TS]

00:57:48   going to force you to be one it's going [TS]

00:57:51   to suck and through that through that [TS]

00:57:55   heart that heart those many many hard [TS]

00:57:57   years you're gonna grow up to really [TS]

00:57:59   appreciate um how how fun it is to be an [TS]

00:58:04   adult and my name's see the pain not [TS]

00:58:06   have your dad not have your dad forcing [TS]

00:58:09   you to take your letter you're helping [TS]

00:58:11   her understand that she will be an [TS]

00:58:13   outsider [TS]

00:58:14   yeah right and that because you know [TS]

00:58:16   being an outsider [TS]

00:58:17   well I mean ultimately like she's going [TS]

00:58:19   to decide right and and she's already [TS]

00:58:20   decided that what she's gonna be as a [TS]

00:58:22   princess but and that's wonderful [TS]

00:58:25   because a my understanding is they make [TS]

00:58:27   a lot of money [TS]

00:58:28   ok let's get down the princess cut but [TS]

00:58:32   that but watching I'm house facebook [TS]

00:58:34   came through my feed the other day I [TS]

00:58:37   somehow got on facebook again found the [TS]

00:58:40   key under your mat I'm really trying to [TS]

00:58:43   curate my feet I'm not reading the news [TS]

00:58:45   on twitter anymore i read iced I I [TS]

00:58:47   signed on to the internet the other day [TS]

00:58:50   and then and I was like you know what [TS]

00:58:53   I'm you like that in front of the [TS]

00:58:56   internet but i'm gonna go over he went [TS]

00:58:59   down to the cold room open the cage went [TS]

00:59:01   in putting your key i'm gonna go over to [TS]

00:59:04   Twitter and see and I'm you know what [TS]

00:59:06   i'm gonna do i'm going to go over to [TS]

00:59:07   Twitter i'm going to read the news i [TS]

00:59:09   haven't done it in a couple of weeks I'm [TS]

00:59:11   gonna just going to read my news feed [TS]

00:59:12   and see what I come up with and I got [TS]

00:59:15   over there and i started reading and I i [TS]

00:59:18   read a couple of things about the [TS]

00:59:20   Ukraine that were interesting and I saw [TS]

00:59:22   a couple of things you know the [TS]

00:59:24   about this and that I thought were yeah [TS]

00:59:26   that's pretty interesting and then I [TS]

00:59:28   clicked on a retweet of somebody's and I [TS]

00:59:34   read it somebody's blog post and I was [TS]

00:59:36   like wow okay and that blog post was in [TS]

00:59:38   response to another blog post about that [TS]

00:59:40   they felt about the dave chappelle i [TS]

00:59:42   read that last night that was a good [TS]

00:59:44   luck you reach it with it and that I [TS]

00:59:45   thought that that person's writing was [TS]

00:59:47   really great that both pieces were were [TS]

00:59:50   very nuanced that yeah it was it was a [TS]

00:59:53   fascinating conversation and gutsy gutsy [TS]

00:59:55   anak but it got into a little bit of you [TS]

00:59:57   know more my stomach was starting to get [TS]

00:59:59   butterflies [TS]

00:59:59   butterflies [TS]

01:00:00   because I was like well I don't know [TS]

01:00:01   instead I don't I don't have a comment [TS]

01:00:03   here I'm just I'm just just reading the [TS]

01:00:06   news just reasons in your head you can [TS]

01:00:08   just imagine the thousand different kind [TS]

01:00:10   of like intellectual bumfights there [TS]

01:00:11   that you like just watch too drunk I [TS]

01:00:15   said each other that's exactly right i [TS]

01:00:17   mean but like I just like this just [TS]

01:00:19   people representing the absolute worst [TS]

01:00:22   yeah point of view on either side of [TS]

01:00:24   this I just gonna be in each other with [TS]

01:00:26   sticks [TS]

01:00:27   I very studiously did not read the [TS]

01:00:29   comments on either blog you know I [TS]

01:00:31   didn't want to go down i just read the i [TS]

01:00:34   just read the blog didn't see any [TS]

01:00:35   reaction gifs just didn't didn't get did [TS]

01:00:37   you know just stay away from it stand [TS]

01:00:39   away from it and then I and then I'm so [TS]

01:00:42   I'm back up to the surface of Twitter [TS]

01:00:44   and i'm reading along and and then [TS]

01:00:47   there's and Hodgman has a little a link [TS]

01:00:49   to his tumblr and i click on it and it [TS]

01:00:52   is a graph of the all the John's that [TS]

01:00:57   have influenced each other and all the [TS]

01:00:59   John's that are that make a very [TS]

01:01:02   interesting little cluster of john hope [TS]

01:01:06   that was a first draft and it said [TS]

01:01:09   Flansburg lanell huh [TS]

01:01:12   Stuart attachment called Najman Colton [TS]

01:01:14   and I'm just innocently looking at the [TS]

01:01:19   fucking news for two seconds and i click [TS]

01:01:23   on a friend's link which was a link that [TS]

01:01:25   he was that was just somebody made and [TS]

01:01:29   he was real tweeting it i'm sure he [TS]

01:01:31   didn't do that and and now I've only [TS]

01:01:35   been on the news side of this thing for [TS]

01:01:38   for honestly two minutes and I feel bad [TS]

01:01:42   I've seen a thing that made me feel bad [TS]

01:01:44   right and i just closed it all down was [TS]

01:01:47   just like why did I go and read the news [TS]

01:01:49   on Twitter I am trying to I'm trying to [TS]

01:01:53   not have those feelings and under the [TS]

01:01:56   Internet provides so many opportunities [TS]

01:01:58   hell did well you did exactly what you [TS]

01:02:00   should do you sound like you came into [TS]

01:02:02   it thinking maybe it'll be different [TS]

01:02:03   maybe that's why i'm away this is a fun [TS]

01:02:05   thing [TS]

01:02:06   yep i'm gonna go over there I'm gonna [TS]

01:02:07   read some stuff I'm going to learn about [TS]

01:02:08   the news i'm going to see people making [TS]

01:02:10   things [TS]

01:02:11   and so but anyway as I closed down [TS]

01:02:13   twitter i went over to facebook i had [TS]

01:02:18   not had enough i had not had enough [TS]

01:02:20   Marilyn I went to facebook and I and for [TS]

01:02:24   whatever reason the facebook like [TS]

01:02:26   alchemy of just like Oh what would you [TS]

01:02:29   like to see today I mean they're like [TS]

01:02:31   the room temperature deserted you're on [TS]

01:02:32   there just like would you like some flan [TS]

01:02:36   that's the one kind of dessert we have [TS]

01:02:38   no no that's not true we have flan and [TS]

01:02:40   we have a new scale and surprising thing [TS]

01:02:43   so one surprising thing you need to know [TS]

01:02:45   today about flan and I get over there [TS]

01:02:48   and and the person's website that I go [TS]

01:02:52   to the third the person's facebook page [TS]

01:02:54   that I go to see is a guy I haven't [TS]

01:02:56   thought of in years [TS]

01:02:57   some guy went to high school with who uh [TS]

01:03:00   he was a bro when we were in high school [TS]

01:03:03   and I'm deposited on his facebook page [TS]

01:03:07   and he is a bro now he's an Alaska bro [TS]

01:03:11   he has a he he's a 45 year old man with [TS]

01:03:14   a goatee not a mustache either like just [TS]

01:03:18   a chin goatee and his his his facebook [TS]

01:03:22   pages just picture after picture of him [TS]

01:03:24   wakeboarding and of him doing some more [TS]

01:03:29   wakeboarding and other kind of you know [TS]

01:03:31   him holding a giant salmon and him you [TS]

01:03:35   know with his arm around his like [TS]

01:03:37   embarrassingly much younger wife and [TS]

01:03:41   then him with his two adorable little [TS]

01:03:43   like kindergarten age kids both of whom [TS]

01:03:47   have super cool dude haircuts and his [TS]

01:03:51   dad had a permanent sneer on all through [TS]

01:03:55   high school and and college you know [TS]

01:03:57   like ass like the kind of smug sneer of [TS]

01:03:59   somebody that that had been born with [TS]

01:04:02   money and a little bit of a pan he's [TS]

01:04:05   sort of a pan man but but much more but [TS]

01:04:07   like in Alaska that version [TS]

01:04:11   he's he's grown into being a pan man he [TS]

01:04:13   was a skinny kid now he's kind of us at [TS]

01:04:14   least it looks much more like a pan guy [TS]

01:04:17   but whatever his job is I don't know [TS]

01:04:19   it's um it's probably something in the [TS]

01:04:22   financial sector or maybe he sells [TS]

01:04:24   bulldozers or something he's doing well [TS]

01:04:26   he's successful guy and every aspect of [TS]

01:04:31   his life looks amazing [TS]

01:04:33   if you're if you are judging your adult [TS]

01:04:38   life on the strength of the aesthetics [TS]

01:04:40   of a bones brigade VHS tape from 1984 [TS]

01:04:44   right like he's the groan is a grown-up [TS]

01:04:47   skater Alaska style and I'm looking at [TS]

01:04:52   his facebook page and it's just like my [TS]

01:04:54   head is just spinning I've just come off [TS]

01:04:56   of this two minutes on the Internet [TS]

01:04:59   where I where I got confused and [TS]

01:05:01   delighted and then ultimately like sad [TS]

01:05:04   and now i'm over here i'm looking at [TS]

01:05:06   this alternate history of my life where [TS]

01:05:09   it's like I know this guy like I haven't [TS]

01:05:12   seen him in 15 years but I know this guy [TS]

01:05:15   we grew up together and I'm looking at [TS]

01:05:18   his life as presented on facebook and [TS]

01:05:22   it's causing me to be causing my stomach [TS]

01:05:26   to churn and I'm i feel light-headed [TS]

01:05:29   I'm wondering if if I would have been [TS]

01:05:33   happier if I just gotten really into [TS]

01:05:35   wakeboarding because big because it [TS]

01:05:39   seemed too good to be true or you're [TS]

01:05:41   somehow slightly envious of his of his [TS]

01:05:44   bro lifestyle is that in fact that the [TS]

01:05:48   fact that it all fits together so well [TS]

01:05:49   not that it seemed too good to be true [TS]

01:05:51   because i know that it is exactly as it [TS]

01:05:53   seems and that can't lie on facebook you [TS]

01:05:56   can exaggerate their well except that [TS]

01:05:58   except that I know this guy and his [TS]

01:05:59   adult life looks like his teenage life [TS]

01:06:02   it looks like is it looks like it is [TS]

01:06:04   this is the life that his father [TS]

01:06:06   provided for him right there were all [TS]

01:06:08   kinds of guys at my high school that [TS]

01:06:10   like had brand new Chevy stepside [TS]

01:06:12   pickups when they were 16 years old and [TS]

01:06:16   never talk about there was a kid at my [TS]

01:06:17   high school who drove a 57 Corvette to [TS]

01:06:23   school right [TS]

01:06:25   and the license plate was a personalized [TS]

01:06:29   license plate that said THX thanks [TS]

01:06:32   thanks dad [TS]

01:06:34   yeah right so dad bought him the [TS]

01:06:39   Corvette and got a blaze got in the [TS]

01:06:42   plates had to it like the ultimate just [TS]

01:06:46   like here's my son and I'm gonna make [TS]

01:06:48   him simultaneously the coolest kid on [TS]

01:06:50   campus and also the world's biggest [TS]

01:06:53   fucking chode like that he's giving you [TS]

01:06:55   get an iphone like when the wallpaper is [TS]

01:06:57   you give him a thumbs up for something [TS]

01:06:59   about right [TS]

01:07:00   it's the it's the original it's the [TS]

01:07:03   original just like you are always going [TS]

01:07:04   to be under my thumb kids so never [TS]

01:07:06   forget it right thanks dad thanks dad [TS]

01:07:08   and and it's a it's a thing I think rich [TS]

01:07:11   dad's do to win the inert like make [TS]

01:07:14   their sons i don't know like to it's a [TS]

01:07:17   maybe it is a a and Agamemnon thing [TS]

01:07:21   where you just like keep your son down [TS]

01:07:24   because you're afraid he's going to kill [TS]

01:07:25   you and and have sex with your wife but [TS]

01:07:31   it but in any case like this was the [TS]

01:07:34   problem when I was growing up all the [TS]

01:07:36   the kids that were successful in Alaska [TS]

01:07:39   were kids whose lives to like their [TS]

01:07:45   ambitions were 22 well seemed incredibly [TS]

01:07:51   simple right [TS]

01:07:53   the that there's no neuroticism in the [TS]

01:07:57   life of a guy who goes from wakeboard [TS]

01:08:00   adventure to wakeboard adventure that [TS]

01:08:03   not a big hand ringer right like Laird [TS]

01:08:05   Hamilton does not he mourns the death of [TS]

01:08:09   his friends who were killed by a big [TS]

01:08:12   wave but he's not [TS]

01:08:15   yeah he doesn't wonder or what you [TS]

01:08:18   presume that Laird Hamilton does not [TS]

01:08:20   wonder about his his purpose or whether [TS]

01:08:25   he's doing a good job [TS]

01:08:27   and that neuroticism is the thing I want [TS]

01:08:30   to exercise from my own life [TS]

01:08:33   it's the thing that I love and the least [TS]

01:08:35   interested in any more about myself and [TS]

01:08:39   so I go on this guy's website and I'm [TS]

01:08:40   like that website Facebook thing and [TS]

01:08:43   nothing about his actual existence [TS]

01:08:44   intrigues me except what I perceived to [TS]

01:08:48   be the simple like me like mono culture [TS]

01:08:54   of it just like he's like he's [TS]

01:08:57   considered got several successful [TS]

01:08:58   doctorates in being 18 like he's he's a [TS]

01:09:02   very accomplished has reached the [TS]

01:09:03   highest lovely is like a 33rd level monk [TS]

01:09:06   of of being a teenager [TS]

01:09:07   yes might work and then from there I [TS]

01:09:10   mean I as i was driving down here today [TS]

01:09:12   i passed by the bus stop [TS]

01:09:14   that's down at the corner of my block [TS]

01:09:17   and Skeeter was sitting out there [TS]

01:09:18   rolling a cigarette and Skeeter wears [TS]

01:09:21   one of those Peruvian hats with earflaps [TS]

01:09:24   and so-and-so is unmistakable because [TS]

01:09:28   I'm you know like how many guys are [TS]

01:09:29   rocking that look right now so I'm [TS]

01:09:31   driving by the bus stop and I'm seeing [TS]

01:09:32   Skeeter and its eight thirty in the [TS]

01:09:34   morning and he's rolling a cigarette and [TS]

01:09:37   I had that consciousness having formerly [TS]

01:09:40   been a smoker and a drug addict that [TS]

01:09:43   like oh right on [TS]

01:09:44   Skeeter's having his first smoke of the [TS]

01:09:46   day or maybe it's his second but like [TS]

01:09:49   he's marking his days marking his [TS]

01:09:52   passage through the day one cigarette a [TS]

01:09:56   time until he can get his first drinkers [TS]

01:09:59   first hit a dope which might might have [TS]

01:10:01   happened already [TS]

01:10:03   and you know it's like you're marking [TS]

01:10:05   the day cigarette cigarette smoke [TS]

01:10:08   cigarette cigarette cigarette beer tok [TS]

01:10:11   cigarette cigarette tok tok beer beer [TS]

01:10:14   beer beer beer beer cigarettes beer [TS]

01:10:17   cigarettes beer and then the days over [TS]

01:10:18   and and that's there's something very [TS]

01:10:22   comforting about that and reassuring [TS]

01:10:24   like you always you always have that as [TS]

01:10:27   your stubbing out the last cigarette you [TS]

01:10:30   have the next cigarette on the horizon [TS]

01:10:31   and you just are kind of leapfrogging [TS]

01:10:35   lily pad to lily pad throughout the day [TS]

01:10:38   and you never are just at sea wondering [TS]

01:10:43   like how am I gonna make it [TS]

01:10:44   how am I gonna make it to dusk and and [TS]

01:10:48   this guy his facebook page i was looking [TS]

01:10:50   at is doing a version of that with his [TS]

01:10:53   life it's just like jet ski jet ski tok [TS]

01:10:57   tok TV show TV show here kitty kitty [TS]

01:11:01   haircut haircut haircut and then now [TS]

01:11:04   he's got kids [TS]

01:11:04   so then it's hockey practice hockey [TS]

01:11:06   practice and his goal is to make his [TS]

01:11:10   kids really good hockey players and [TS]

01:11:12   really cool kids in high school so [TS]

01:11:14   that's his new project and there's no [TS]

01:11:19   there's no neuroticism he never second [TS]

01:11:22   guess is that he never wonders if he if [TS]

01:11:24   that's the if he's doing the right thing [TS]

01:11:26   his kid comes home and he's like yeah [TS]

01:11:28   bad there was a skin on the playground [TS]

01:11:30   is real fag and I told him to fuck off [TS]

01:11:32   and his dad like yeah yeah like there's [TS]

01:11:35   no there's there is never ever going to [TS]

01:11:39   say like well son maybe you should walk [TS]

01:11:43   a mile in that kid's shoes [TS]

01:11:45   I mean it's just stories not even sure [TS]

01:11:48   how to approach the topic matter and [TS]

01:11:50   yeah like I'm not only do I want to give [TS]

01:11:52   you this really kind of like mushy [TS]

01:11:54   advice it's hard to understand but i'm [TS]

01:11:55   not even sure how to talk about this [TS]

01:11:57   ya know it doesn't do that doesn't pop [TS]

01:11:59   into his head it's just like Oh some kid [TS]

01:12:01   was a fag and you told him to fuck off [TS]

01:12:03   that's right and that is the brewskis [TS]

01:12:08   that simplicity uh you know it's so it's [TS]

01:12:14   so ugly it's so it's so like dark to me [TS]

01:12:20   but it's but if my own darkness is such [TS]

01:12:27   a drag [TS]

01:12:29   I haven't seen this page and been in [TS]

01:12:31   this particular corridor [TS]

01:12:33   um but I'm mama uh cheer you up making [TS]

01:12:37   this dark [TS]

01:12:37   ok I I said something a long time ago [TS]

01:12:39   which is something along the lines of if [TS]

01:12:42   you want to learn what somebody fears [TS]

01:12:44   losing watch with a photograph which i [TS]

01:12:46   think is really it's kinda true and the [TS]

01:12:48   horrible losing my lunch room [TS]

01:12:51   but no seriously if you look at that so [TS]

01:12:53   my only addendum to that today is and I [TS]

01:12:56   don't think this is just about facebook [TS]

01:12:58   but I maybe this is just that I've [TS]

01:12:59   become a darker person but I think also [TS]

01:13:00   sometimes when you watch what people [TS]

01:13:03   photograph or put differently here when [TS]

01:13:05   you watch what people put on social [TS]

01:13:06   media [TS]

01:13:07   it might be the thing that you most fear [TS]

01:13:08   losing but it's I think sometimes it's [TS]

01:13:10   the thing they fear may not love them as [TS]

01:13:13   much as they love it [TS]

01:13:14   mm or maybe the thing that they're have [TS]

01:13:16   equivocal feelings about our complex [TS]

01:13:18   feelings about and one nice thing about [TS]

01:13:19   a photograph that you put on a page or [TS]

01:13:21   one nice thing about a succession of [TS]

01:13:22   photographs of your absolutely perfect [TS]

01:13:25   vacation is that it cements in your mind [TS]

01:13:28   the idea that this when a certain way [TS]

01:13:29   and meets a certain story and i'm [TS]

01:13:32   honestly I'm not trying to back on this [TS]

01:13:33   guy because I do this [TS]

01:13:34   everybody does this when I take a [TS]

01:13:35   picture of my kid and put it somewhere [TS]

01:13:37   because this feels like emblematic of [TS]

01:13:39   what I think things are how this how [TS]

01:13:41   this thing is happening whether it [TS]

01:13:43   really is happening that way or not but [TS]

01:13:44   increasingly the way we take photos or [TS]

01:13:48   tell stories or put things in social [TS]

01:13:49   media or a way of like telling ourselves [TS]

01:13:51   a story that helps make our life make [TS]

01:13:53   more sense [TS]

01:13:54   you can call that branding calls other [TS]

01:13:55   stuff you can do whatever you want but I [TS]

01:13:57   think sometimes when you put that stuff [TS]

01:13:58   up [TS]

01:13:59   it may be that that he has more complex [TS]

01:14:01   feelings about those things or worries [TS]

01:14:03   that those things have complex feelings [TS]

01:14:05   about him setting aside his what's [TS]

01:14:06   called a starboard [TS]

01:14:08   it's called his boogie boogie night [TS]

01:14:09   what's called as we're border wave wave [TS]

01:14:13   breakers waverunner but I think [TS]

01:14:15   sometimes that becomes a way I mean [TS]

01:14:18   nobody there aren't that many people who [TS]

01:14:21   primarily put up photos of their kid [TS]

01:14:23   being unhappy or sullen because that's [TS]

01:14:26   not the story that you want on the [TS]

01:14:28   bookstore that you want on the one of [TS]

01:14:29   the books is that we had a birthday [TS]

01:14:31   party and it went okay at least in this [TS]

01:14:33   one photo [TS]

01:14:34   how many photos I mean like my [TS]

01:14:35   daughter's fourth birthday party had a [TS]

01:14:36   blowout birthday party for her at the [TS]

01:14:38   park and there was stuff and like and [TS]

01:14:40   she was like crying and running away [TS]

01:14:43   from the group the entire time and then [TS]

01:14:45   I'm honestly how the birthday want to [TS]

01:14:46   get a funny picture for dressed as [TS]

01:14:47   spider-man because a cool costume she [TS]

01:14:49   got but but you know it's all that shit [TS]

01:14:52   in life is so much more complicated then [TS]

01:14:54   you can put into a facebook post it's [TS]

01:14:56   gonna get a lot of thumbs and that's not [TS]

01:14:58   a criticism because it is a new way of [TS]

01:15:00   telling a story about ourselves whereas [TS]

01:15:02   it used to be a really big deal [TS]

01:15:04   I have my picture in the paper when I [TS]

01:15:05   was about six and that seemed like about [TS]

01:15:08   the biggest thing in the world I was [TS]

01:15:09   photographed a library and I thought it [TS]

01:15:11   was the coolest thing in the world and [TS]

01:15:13   that became really like this thing [TS]

01:15:14   showed people look look I must be [TS]

01:15:16   important I'm in the paper [TS]

01:15:17   here's me like reading a microfiche or [TS]

01:15:18   whatever and I don't know I guess I I [TS]

01:15:21   feel like it's not anything against that [TS]

01:15:23   guy is not just to to check your [TS]

01:15:24   shoulder I think everybody struggles [TS]

01:15:26   with the stuff i think everybody looks [TS]

01:15:27   at other people's stuff not purely in [TS]

01:15:30   the sense of Envy in the sense of oh I [TS]

01:15:32   wish with I had or gel I wish I had what [TS]

01:15:34   they had her jealousy i wish i had it [TS]

01:15:36   and they didn't or the boy that guy's a [TS]

01:15:37   tool house his life so together that's [TS]

01:15:40   that's what you put up that's what you [TS]

01:15:41   do that's the version that you print [TS]

01:15:43   because it's kind of expresses hope [TS]

01:15:45   about how the world can be and and so [TS]

01:15:48   like I think have to take all that stuff [TS]

01:15:49   with a tremendous grain of salt [TS]

01:15:52   you know that people had to be [TS]

01:15:53   SuperDuper positive about lots of stuff [TS]

01:15:56   in public until they get really scared [TS]

01:15:58   when they get scared em I think when [TS]

01:16:01   people tend when people get scared in [TS]

01:16:02   life is the time they tend to be most [TS]

01:16:04   honest about or most forthcoming about [TS]

01:16:06   what they really worried about but most [TS]

01:16:08   of the time you'll do anything you can [TS]

01:16:10   to not have to talk about that and [TS]

01:16:11   that's what those pictures are that's [TS]

01:16:13   what does boogie boards and haircuts are [TS]

01:16:15   is an opportunity like this is the world [TS]

01:16:17   as I hope it is [TS]

01:16:18   yeah i i i i went down a rabbit hole of [TS]

01:16:24   talking about this guy [TS]

01:16:26   oh where you know I i tried to make it [TS]

01:16:29   one of my core competencies that I have [TS]

01:16:31   empathy for bros right like they like [TS]

01:16:37   I'm I'm I'm profoundly aware that they [TS]

01:16:40   are human beings and that their that [TS]

01:16:42   they're not monsters and and and sky [TS]

01:16:46   there's their pleasures are simple [TS]

01:16:48   yeah and there's this guy is you know it [TS]

01:16:50   in a way like a guy i know well and and [TS]

01:16:52   even somebody he was never a friend but [TS]

01:16:55   it would was a guy that if i was back in [TS]

01:16:57   Anchorage I ran into a bar I'd be glad [TS]

01:16:59   to see him [TS]

01:17:00   it was and so the way i was describing [TS]

01:17:03   my experience of up watching him was [TS]

01:17:06   what you know I got a little um I got a [TS]

01:17:10   little shitty about it and and really my [TS]

01:17:14   experience was a hundred percent [TS]

01:17:16   internal and had nothing to do with him [TS]

01:17:20   he who knows what his life is like I [TS]

01:17:23   don't even know what his life is that [TS]

01:17:25   was like when he was 16 years old [TS]

01:17:27   um but you know my experience of sitting [TS]

01:17:31   and studying not the facebook page of [TS]

01:17:35   somebody that I know well not the [TS]

01:17:37   facebook page even if somebody that that [TS]

01:17:40   I'm that I'm interested in how they're [TS]

01:17:43   doing but I landed on the facebook page [TS]

01:17:45   of somebody that I did not buy I I'm not [TS]

01:17:49   transacting anything with them nor will [TS]

01:17:51   I ever again [TS]

01:17:52   engine thinking about him too much yeah [TS]

01:17:55   and wandering through as you say the [TS]

01:17:58   their their idealized presentation of [TS]

01:18:01   their life and seeing even in their [TS]

01:18:03   idealization of their life nothing to [TS]

01:18:07   interest me only things to critique and [TS]

01:18:09   judge and field and and ultimately [TS]

01:18:13   critique and judge myself against you [TS]

01:18:17   know because i did not i didn't come [TS]

01:18:18   away from that feeling that that I it in [TS]

01:18:24   a way yeah I I've always preferred my [TS]

01:18:28   worldview or methodology to those guys [TS]

01:18:32   those old friends of mine from from [TS]

01:18:35   Alaska it's why I left Alaska it's why I [TS]

01:18:38   never felt like it [TS]

01:18:39   I i truly belonged to that culture but I [TS]

01:18:45   i was critiquing myself against that [TS]

01:18:49   incredulously in that [TS]

01:18:52   it feels like that's of that is that is [TS]

01:18:56   a way of living it's a pen and a valid [TS]

01:18:59   one and when he gets to the end and [TS]

01:19:01   looks back at his life he's not going to [TS]

01:19:03   probably burden his kids on his deathbed [TS]

01:19:06   with a lot of talk about all the things [TS]

01:19:09   he wishes he done you know that one of [TS]

01:19:13   what i think as i get to be a middle [TS]

01:19:15   aged person my great great fear the [TS]

01:19:17   worst thing I could do to my kid is to [TS]

01:19:20   start start now saying things like well [TS]

01:19:27   I could have we could have lived in [TS]

01:19:30   hawaii but it didn't work out that way [TS]

01:19:33   or I wish died you know I wanted I there [TS]

01:19:38   was a time I thought maybe I would do it [TS]

01:19:40   make a television show but it did you [TS]

01:19:42   know kids love boring and irrelevant [TS]

01:19:44   stories that are ultimately really safe [TS]

01:19:46   right and the thing is you know this was [TS]

01:19:48   the this was mad as my dad got older we [TS]

01:19:51   had a lot of these conversations he was [TS]

01:19:53   like well I should have been a senator [TS]

01:19:55   and I would say like that [TS]

01:19:58   stop it shut up what are you talking [TS]

01:19:59   about like your you lived an amazing [TS]

01:20:01   life and you know this like this these [TS]

01:20:05   certain niggling regrets and that's what [TS]

01:20:10   I don't want that's how that's what I [TS]

01:20:12   don't want for myself and and I guess [TS]

01:20:15   ultimately like the the the passionate [TS]

01:20:20   feeling I had about this guy's facebook [TS]

01:20:22   page that caused me to like finally turn [TS]

01:20:26   off the internet and stay away from it [TS]

01:20:28   was that I was contrasting my self-doubt [TS]

01:20:33   against his right and and perceiving at [TS]

01:20:38   least that he had none and i don't think [TS]

01:20:41   you could I don't think you could even [TS]

01:20:42   go on my facebook page and perceive that [TS]

01:20:44   I had no self doubt [TS]

01:20:46   um put that but that steps self-doubt [TS]

01:20:50   what the what good is it what is the [TS]

01:20:53   evolutionary advantage of it [TS]

01:20:57   I don't know yeah it and and and I'm [TS]

01:21:01   saying all the I i would like to think [TS]

01:21:03   in the facebook of my mind that the [TS]

01:21:07   self-doubt that I am utterly riddled [TS]

01:21:08   with has in practical terms had most of [TS]

01:21:12   its usefulness running out of it already [TS]

01:21:14   right all the times that I could have [TS]

01:21:16   used that self-doubt i feel you have you [TS]

01:21:19   pretty exhausted and you know I I need [TS]

01:21:21   some of the other stuff now [TS]

01:21:23   yeah thank you that's just weird give me [TS]

01:21:25   a month give me a month with the [TS]

01:21:26   opposite of self-doubt i'm grateful that [TS]

01:21:29   i had it because it made me into the [TS]

01:21:32   person that I am and that is I think it [TS]

01:21:36   in the long run a good thing the [TS]

01:21:38   self-doubt that I had contributed to me [TS]

01:21:40   being thoughtful but I'm fucking done [TS]

01:21:44   with it now plz like I would like to [TS]

01:21:47   just act and eat and poop and live and [TS]

01:21:57   not brood because the right the rate of [TS]

01:22:01   return is like that at zilch now on [TS]

01:22:06   brooding and so maybe I need to just [TS]

01:22:10   start being a tambourine right it's [TS]

01:22:13   really is a fantastic time for [TS]

01:22:15   technology [TS]

01:22:16   thank god we've got it brings the world [TS]

01:22:26   right to your doorstep [TS]

01:22:28   ah they're making all the bills for [TS]

01:22:31   phone stuff that we pay all the internet [TS]

01:22:34   is so that we can go and find new ways [TS]

01:22:36   to be completely riddled with self-doubt [TS]

01:22:38   yeah I can and seriously stopping [TS]

01:22:41   watching the twitter feed has made me [TS]

01:22:44   happier [TS]

01:22:44   absolutely and taking facebook off my [TS]

01:22:47   phone has made me happier there's no [TS]

01:22:49   question about it and so I i keep coming [TS]

01:22:53   keep coming maybe back to [TS]

01:22:57   it's like it's like it's like stopping [TS]

01:22:59   eating sugar right then [TS]

01:23:02   then friday night you have an ice cream [TS]

01:23:03   because you feel like you've deserved it [TS]

01:23:05   and then your kind of back on the sugar [TS]

01:23:08   training and the and the the feeds the [TS]

01:23:11   various feeds out there that are trying [TS]

01:23:13   to pitch lives to me are just there the [TS]

01:23:18   their mind sugar and that is so [TS]

01:23:23   antithetical to go to the story that [TS]

01:23:27   we're being told by tech that these [TS]

01:23:30   things are hurting their connecting us [TS]

01:23:32   that there that they are I mean that the [TS]

01:23:34   implicit live all this stuff is that is [TS]

01:23:36   making us closer to other people [TS]

01:23:38   yeah I just be honest it's making us [TS]

01:23:40   further from ourselves [TS]

01:23:41   yeah exactly and and and and and what's [TS]

01:23:44   terrifying is that there there's a part [TS]

01:23:46   of me that's like well for instance i [TS]

01:23:48   just got a sonos system [TS]

01:23:51   oh right the Sooners the home speaker [TS]

01:23:54   thing I got a sonos home speaker thing [TS]

01:23:56   and i said i spent a whole day setting [TS]

01:23:58   it up in my house and i'm not somebody [TS]

01:24:01   that listens to a lot of music around [TS]

01:24:02   the house but all of a sudden I got like [TS]

01:24:04   this really interactive stereo system [TS]

01:24:09   and we had a really nice weekend at the [TS]

01:24:15   house because there was music playing in [TS]

01:24:17   every room all of a sudden where there [TS]

01:24:19   had never been where that we had never [TS]

01:24:21   been possible circle and I was like you [TS]

01:24:26   know this is very interesting like this [TS]

01:24:28   is this is a new kind of a new take on [TS]

01:24:31   this and I'm and unfortunately like I [TS]

01:24:35   only have four albums on my iPad so I'm [TS]

01:24:39   just listening to these four albums over [TS]

01:24:40   and over you feel Collins albums and [TS]

01:24:42   then two other ones well yeah and then [TS]

01:24:44   there's that then there was that one it [TS]

01:24:45   was I got the I gotta try to get you to [TS]

01:24:48   work i got the box set of the early [TS]

01:24:50   duran duran records and personally what [TS]

01:24:52   that meant is there's like seven [TS]

01:24:54   different versions of hungry like the [TS]

01:24:55   wolf because there's like the Berlin mix [TS]

01:24:58   and then get like planet Earth in [TS]

01:24:59   Aramaic and somehow I couldn't figure [TS]

01:25:01   out how to arrange the queue so that it [TS]

01:25:03   wasn't playing things in alphabetical [TS]

01:25:05   order so just played hungry like the [TS]

01:25:08   wolf like seven times [TS]

01:25:10   anyone else in every room in every room [TS]

01:25:13   but you know but it was really exciting [TS]

01:25:15   and and and right away I start to think [TS]

01:25:17   like maybe I should download one of [TS]

01:25:19   those apps that allows me to raise and [TS]

01:25:22   lower my garage door opener from my [TS]

01:25:24   phone and then I was like I don't have a [TS]

01:25:27   garage [TS]

01:25:28   first of all and second of all like no [TS]

01:25:31   stop stop it leave it leave it [TS]

01:25:36   do not turn do not hook up your security [TS]

01:25:38   system and your house lights to the [TS]

01:25:43   internet like don't that technology is [TS]

01:25:47   still in beta and you are not an early [TS]

01:25:50   adopter of that shit [TS]

01:25:53   leave it hmm i am NOT German and your [TS]

01:25:59   skin is so tight so he says I don't know [TS]

01:26:06   what are the winter but it's the line [TS]

01:26:08   [Music] [TS]