Cuckoo, Aura Frame, & Local Arcades
About This Episode
We watch a new documentary series about the woman whose innovations changed the way catch serial killers, test out an inexpensive grooming gadget that promises to handle all your manscaping needs, and discuss the current state of one of our favorite hangouts: the local arcade.
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Show Notes
- My Name is Earl » youtu.be/J8c9lL1SAVg?si=MqfGYtyyvoadx1F3
- Cuckoo » youtu.be/sBoPoKL0EQY?si=cbiE1MP-Fc0EVaVF
- Mastermind: To Think Like a Killer » youtu.be/BbZF_WluzPI?si=t2-Q1l4Wzgh5AnlI
- Braun 5-in-1 Men’s Trimmer » amz.run/9TZW (affiliate)
- Aura Carver 10.1″ Digital Picture Frame » amz.run/9TaJ (affiliate)
- Chainsawman Lego Figure » amz.run/9SYW (affiliate)
- Quantum Break (2016) » store.steampowered.com/app/474960/Quantum_Break/
- Shapez 2 » shapez2.com/
- Only Murders in the Building Season 4 » youtu.be/dKyX8rocAB8?si=Z3R23mGkXfKTRX5a
- Beetlejuice Beetlejuice » youtu.be/As-vKW4ZboU?si=SNXHOINt349jBVhe
- The Crow » youtu.be/djSKp_pwmOA?si=laPDUEJz7otT1ScE
- Email the show » podcast@genxgrownup.com
- Visit us on YouTube » GenXGrownUp.com/yt
Transcript
| Speaker | Transcript |
| Jon | Welcome back GenXGrownUp Podcast listeners to this episode 175 of the GenXGrownUp Podcast. |
| Jon | I’m Jon. Joining me as always, of course, is George. Hey man. |
| George | Hey, how’s it going guys? |
| Jon | Good, it would not be a show without Moe. How you doing, Moe? |
| Mo | Hey, how’s it going, everybody? |
| Jon | In this episode, we’ll watch a new documentary series about the woman whose innovations changed the way we catch serial killers, test out an inexpensive grooming gadget that promises to handle all of your manscaping needs, and discuss the current state of one of our favorite hangouts, the local arcade. |
| Jon | Before we get into those topics and men, what are you shaking your head at? |
| George | i’m just up I’m just upset. It’s not a show without mobile, which implies it could be a show without Georgia, apparently. |
| Jon | Why? |
| Jon | Well, sometimes I say it’s not a show without you. Every other show, you gotta have one of you. |
| George | In this ep+isode, we’ll watch a new documentary series a+B1:C13bout the woman whose innovations changed the way we catch serial killers, test out an inexpensive grooming gadget that promises to handle all of your manscaping needs, and discuss the current state of one of our favorite hangouts, the local arcade. |
| Jon | That’s the rule. |
| George | I don’t believe that’s ever been uttered. |
| Jon | I’m gonna go in the back catalog. I’ll have to dig one up. I’m sure I have. Okay. we you better We’ll bet a quarter on it, yeah? |
| George | Okay, fair. |
| Jon | Okay, I bet you a quarter. |
| George | Yeah. We won’t be able to use it it in our cave, but we’ll bet a quarter on it. |
| Jon | All right. |
| Mo | That’s right. |
| Jon | Right, maybe I’ll have to bet you 50 cents then if you want to use it in the arcade. Before we get to those topics and many more, and it cannot be a show without George either, it’s time for some fourth listener email. |
| Jon | Look, if anybody takes time to write into the show, we know the three of us are liable to potentially listen. If you do and drop us a line, you are the fourth listener. And the fourth listener for this episode is Eric M. |
| Jon | Subject line of ah subject line of his email is love the backtracks. Here’s what Eric has to say. |
| Mo | Nice. |
| Jon | Hello, GXG. I’m relatively new to your podcasts and YouTube, and I’m having a blast going through your back catalog. |
| George | OK. |
| Mo | Yes, thank you. |
| Jon | Amen. That’s the way to do it. When you find us, consume all past media. Thank you very much. Believe it or not, I found myself agreeing with George two times, two times on old backtracks. |
| George | Wow. |
| Mo | Wow, that’s huh. |
| George | Wow. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | Out of 185 attempts, I guess. |
| Jon | I was going to say, keep in mind, he listened to 300 pieces of media and found two. |
| Mo | Even a broken clock. |
| Jon | Eventually, that’s right. ah He says, first, George Atari Pac-Man holds its own against its arcade brother. |
| Mo | Not even close. |
| George | Thank you. |
| Mo | Not even close. |
| George | Thank you. |
| Jon | I vividly remember my first exposure to any Pac-Man and it was Atari Pac-Man at my cousin’s house. I was enthralled. He called the fruit of vitamin, which that’s really the manual. |
| Jon | That’s what they call it in the manual actually is a vitamin. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | e |
| Jon | And that’s what I call it to this day. When I saw Pac-Man in an arcade, I wondered what was wrong with the sounds and what was with that ugly black background. |
| Jon | he’s He’s got it all turned around. |
| Mo | Oh. |
| Jon | Oh, Eric. |
| George | It just goes to show what everything you’re exposed to first is what you’re going to be driven, drawn to. |
| Jon | um |
| Jon | Mm-hmm. |
| Jon | and |
| George | That’s, it’s like you guys with the blues brothers. |
| Jon | Oh, yeah, yeah. |
| Mo | Yes, absolutely. |
| George | I don’t get it, but you guys love it. |
| Jon | Yeah, and it’s like the, you know, who was your first James Bond? Who was your first Doctor Who? |
| George | Right. |
| Jon | Something like, you know, that’s yours. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | And the rest you compare to them, I get that. |
| Mo | Yes. |
| Jon | I get that. George doesn’t have that excuse. I know he played the real Pac-Man first, though, so you can’t call that first. |
| George | Hmm. Yeah, that’s, that’s true. |
| Jon | Yeah, yeah. ah Eric goes on to say, put my hat, couldn’t find the second one. |
| Mo | For the life of me. |
| Jon | Yeah, fruit, fruit. |
| Mo | That was seven lines down. |
| Jon | Okay, guys. no for it Okay. Eric goes on to say, for the life of me though, I can’t remember the second agreement with George, but I swear there was another one. I’m as shocked as you. |
| Mo | oh Allegedly. |
| George | oh yeah Wow. |
| Jon | yeah |
| Jon | Lastly, he says, your Gen X kids’ books backtrack rekindled so many good memories. The three investigators, Gen X’s Hardy Boys was my absolute favorite book series. I got my first library card so I could read each volume. |
| Mo | Nice. |
| Jon | Beverly Cleary, How to Eat Fried Worm, Super Fudge. |
| Mo | Oh yeah. |
| Jon | Oh, Super Fudge. So many great books. no one leads trip to that No one leads trips down memory lane better than GXG. Your fourth listener, Eric. |
| George | That was nice. |
| Jon | Awesome, Eric. |
| Mo | Nice. That was cool. |
| Jon | That’s magnificent. |
| Mo | I mean, you only agree with George once, but that’s okay. |
| Jon | Thank you. right You can only prove one. |
| George | Oh Lord. |
| Jon | right There’s an alleged second. |
| George | We’re going to start the podcast like that right now. Okay. All right. |
| Mo | I’m just, you know, |
| Jon | Eric, thank you so much for taking the time to write in. We love that you found this love that you’re digging it up back catalog and we’re happy to you agree with George. Somebody has to agree with him, so might as well be you. That’s great. |
| George | I mean, has anybody ever stated that they agree with Mo? I haven’t heard that email come in yet. So I think I’m ahead. |
| Mo | it’s implied |
| Jon | If you would like your email featured here on the show, it is drop dead easy. Just hit us up at podcast at jenxgrownup.com or read every single one. And most of them like Eric’s eventually make the show. All right. With that good business behind us, it’s time to jump into the body of episode 175 after this quick break. |
| Jon | Okay, it is time to talk about media we have been checking out since we last spoke. Now, of course, this could be comics or books or music or television or whatever you have been enjoying. George, let me start with you. What have you been checking out lately? |
| George | Yeah, I mean, nothing modern. It’s ah over a decade or maybe too old at this point. I can’t even remember when it first came out, but there was a TV show ran for about four seasons um starring Jason Lee called My Name is Earl. |
| Jon | Hmm. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Oh yeah, yeah. |
| George | I, yeah, I really enjoyed the show. I’m a kind of a Jason Lee fan back from his Kevin Smith beginnings, you know, with mall rats and movies like that. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| George | um Earl is centered around a premise where this guy who’s basically a ne’er-do-well, dumb, petty criminal guy, ah he buys a lottery ticket one day, scratches it off, wins $100,000 and immediately gets hit by a car. |
| George | as the lottery ticket floats off into space. And while he’s in the hospital, he’s watching Carson Daly on MTV, who is talking about the properties and beliefs of karma, which he decides must be why the lottery ticket was taken from him. |
| George | Karma is punishing him for all the bad things he does. So he starts a list of all the bad things and wants to correct or make amends for each of those bad things in order for com karma. |
| Jon | Ah. |
| George | to help him he does get the lottery ticket back and hilarity ensues it’s not just jason lee from the kevin smith group it’s also ethan suppley who is one of my favorite character actors he’s really fun um There’s a really rich cast. |
| George | But the thing I wanted to talk about, because I’m rewatching this right now with my wife. Those of you know, my wife’s had a major stroke ah within the last eight or nine months. And so we try to spend a lot more time together doing fun stuff. |
| George | And this has become one of our rituals, watching two or three episodes of My Name is Earl every evening. She goes, my name is Earl. |
| Jon | That’s cool. |
| George | She repeats the whole thing. She loves it. While I was watching it though, I was stunned at the number of cameos from celebrities in this series that I didn’t remember. |
| Jon | Oh, Oh, really. |
| Mo | Were they famous then or did they become famous after? |
| George | They were famous, super famous then, and became and some became famous later, but yeah, so I’ll give you some examples. |
| Mo | ok Okay. Okay. |
| Jon | Okay. |
| George | ah First off, Clint Howard. Ron Howard’s a slightly older brother, I think, whatever. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | Oh yeah. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | he’s Ron Howard’s brother, he’s been in every Ron Howard thing. |
| Mo | He looks older. |
| George | Marley Maitland, the actress who’s hearing impaired. |
| Mo | Oh yeah. |
| Jon | Okay. |
| George | Roseanne Barr. Right? This was right when she was off. Jon Leguizamo was in this. um ah just great Christian Slater was in it for a while. |
| Jon | Oh, |
| George | Of course Carson Daly, like I mentioned. Jon Favreau was in a few episodes. Giovanni Ribisi plays an ongoing character through all four seasons. That’s one of the ne’er-do-well accomplices of Earl. |
| George | um I’m just running down a list. Jenny McCarthy’s in it. Craig Nelson was in it as a prisons warden who was dumb as a box of rocks and kept giving Earl ah like these little gift certificates to get time off of his sentence for every good thing he did for the warden kind of thing. |
| Mo | Heh heh. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | yeah |
| George | I create a Adam Goldberg Michael Rappaport was in it for like a season and a half nor mcdonald was there as um ah he played a burt Reynolds character which if you know nor mcdonald he does a great burt reynolds impression. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah. |
| Jon | Oh, he does. |
| Mo | Celebrity Jeopardy. |
| George | Really funny. |
| Jon | Somebody jeopardy. |
| George | Um, just, I mean, I, Howie Mandel, Melissa Milano was a love interest for a little while. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | I could keep going on and on and on. It’s just a crazy amount of people to the point that the reason why I put it on the last one in season four episode that we just watched was Betty White as a witch lady of the town. |
| Mo | Oh, oh. |
| Jon | Oh, awesome. |
| Jon | It almost reminds me of, ah like if you watch old episodes of the Twilight Zone or something like, something black and white from the fifties or the sixties, right? |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| George | e |
| Jon | And you see these people that were nobodies then. But my name is Earl, it’s only like the 2000s, right? This is a fairly modern show, 10, 15 years old. |
| George | Yeah, pretty. Yeah. |
| Jon | These people were already somebody, and that’s almost that’s almost like a practice that they don’t do all that much in sitcoms anymore. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Jon | Like, what did you see celebrities come on to the office, right? Rarely, rarely. |
| George | A few here and there toward the enders ending seasons. |
| Mo | at the At the very end, they did. |
| Jon | but Yeah, when they were doing stunt casting, when yeah, when Corel was gone, but otherwise, they don’t typically do that anymore, but old shows did that, but that’s… |
| Mo | Yeah, at the very end. |
| George | Yeah. Right. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah, I don’t remember. |
| George | I mean, |
| Jon | and you You said you’re rewatching. You’d watched the whole thing before. Did you remember that many celebrities the last time you saw it? |
| George | I did not remember any of the celebrities I don’t think. |
| Jon | Oh. |
| George | i I don’t even know if I finished the series when it originally aired, because it ran for four seasons. And I remember about two, maybe two and a quarters worth of storylines, it feels like. |
| George | um Just to go back to some of the celebrities, the reason why Norma Donald was playing a Burt Reynolds son character was because Burt Reynolds was his father in the show as another character. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| George | Burt Reynolds was another celebrity appearance. |
| Jon | Oh. |
| Mo | Oh, got it. |
| Jon | Oh. |
| George | One of my favorites though, Sean Astin as we all know from the Lord of the Rings stuff, with Charles Dutton doing a Rudy storyline in an appliance store that Earl worked in. |
| Jon | Oh, yeah. |
| Mo | Yeah. Oh, wow. |
| Jon | Huh. |
| Jon | That’s kind of Goldbergsian, like you bring in people to kind of play roles that kind of related to in the past, yeah. |
| George | It’s just so fun. Like it was so tongue in cheek and so much going on in this thing. |
| Jon | Mm. |
| George | If anybody wants to go back and pick up a show, it’s four seasons, 20 to 30 episodes per season, 25 minutes an episode. It’s tightly written stuff that happens in season one is talked about all the way throughout. |
| George | So none of the so far, none of the like Threads are left untangled. They’re all really well written. I just find it a fun series that I’m sharing with my wife right now that has so many people in this. |
| Jon | Hmm. Yeah. |
| George | It’s that’s the part that surprised me the most. The second part is just how much more I’m enjoying it after such a long time away. So there’s plenty of new stuff out there. |
| George | Jon and Mo are going to talk about some of that new stuff right now. But if you want something that you may have missed from back in the day, that’ll make you feel happy. go watch an episode or two of My Name is Earl and enjoy yourself. |
| George | So that’s what I got for the podcast today. |
| Jon | Give you some happy. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | Jon, how about you? |
| Jon | I went to see another horror movie as I’ve done recently when there’s a good or potentially good horror movie. I do the thing where my daughter and I will drive and meet halfway. It’s like an hour and a half between us to go to a movie and see a cool horror movie. |
| Jon | And we did that again. We did it with long legs we talked about last time. And there’s this new film coming out called Cuckoo. It was actually a trailer that aired before long legs and we saw it and went, oh, that looks cool. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| George | Hmm. |
| Jon | In fact, my family, we all have this thing when we’re watching trailers in a theater. The midway through the trailer, we’ll all give like a, Like a gladiator thumbs up or thumbs down. Like, do we want to go see it or not? |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | Are we interested? And we both gave it a thumbs up. It looks really good. |
| Jon | But it wasn’t, as it turns out. |
| Mo | Surprise. |
| Jon | Yeah. so so No matter. It could just not be for me. So I’m not going to spoiler the movie, but I’m not saving it for anybody because I’m not going to recommend it. |
| George | Oh. |
| Jon | It’s almost difficult to talk about because I’m not sure I understand what happened in the movie. |
| George | Hmm. |
| Mo | No. |
| Jon | It’s one of those. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| Jon | I can tell you the premise and then what my feelings about it, but it won’t take long. The basic premise is there’s a young lady, she’s like 17 or so. She’s reluctantly living with her dad, stepmom, and their young daughter in Germany. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| Jon | um She so doesn’t want to be there. She keeps calling home and wanting to go there. And you know the owner of the lodge is kind of creepy and gives her a job. and you start to see like there’s these women in the woods chasing her around. And over the course of the film, it becomes, is it horror? Is it like a creep show kind of thing? Is it a Twilight Zone kind of thing? the the The cuckoo bird favors into the film somewhat. There’s like a logo of the cuckoo bird and you find out. The thing that plays into it is something I’d heard when I was in maybe middle school or something that something the cuckoo bird does is it, |
| Jon | lays its eggs in the nests of other birds and lets them raise the eggs. |
| George | Mm-hmm, right. |
| Mo | in other birds. Yeah. Mm hmm. |
| Jon | yeah So you can imagine that’s playing in somehow like the parentage of these children and that kind of thing. |
| George | Yeah Sure |
| Jon | and But what happened in this movie is it just kept taking turns that I think they think were twists and all they were were just more confusing. |
| Jon | I even saw reviewers say the more it explained itself, the more complicated it got. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | Have you ever watched a movie like they they rip off someone’s mask and they zoom in on the face and I go, who the fuck is that? Am I supposed to know who that is? |
| George | The right, yeah. |
| Jon | what Did they look like somebody or did I do not recognize an actor or whatever? And it’s, there was interesting things in it. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | And if you want to see a modern horror film that does interesting things, okay, watch it on streaming maybe. |
| George | Hmm. |
| Jon | But it wasn’t, you know, we talked about Long Legs before how it was, it was a great movie, but it wasn’t the great horror movie we thought. This one but positioned itself as this amazing horror movie. The actors did a serviceable job, ah this unnecessary special effects in some cases and motivations. |
| Jon | Why are people doing what they’re doing? |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | It just isn’t something that I can recommend. If you’re, go see Long Legs twice before you see this once, you know. |
| George | And Jon, I know, you know, we’ve talked about this many a time on the podcast. You and I are big horror fans. We’ve seen tons of horror movies between us. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | And I know your daughter is raised right. And she’s a horror fan as well. |
| Jon | Thank you. |
| George | But you mentioned at the beginning of this, this was one of those films where you guys kind of met in the middle on a trip to go see. Is that right? |
| Jon | Mm hmm. Right. Yeah, yeah. |
| George | Okay. So I’m just curious, is the hassle of making that kind of a trip, does it color your enjoyment of it or all, or is this movie just totally really cuckoo as the title implies? |
| Jon | Yeah, that’s a great question. |
| Mo | you see |
| Jon | It’s actually the opposite of what you might expect. |
| George | Okay. |
| Jon | It’s not the hassle. Actually, to get to visit with my daughter for a couple of hours is awesome. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | The hour drive is not a big deal. |
| George | Sure. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | So if anything, I would tend to err on the side of, oh, it was great because I had a nice time. you know We get to cut up and make jokes and catch up. |
| George | Ah. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | And she spills the spills the tea about work, which is what the kids say these days. |
| Mo | Really? |
| Jon | So yeah, that’s what they say, yeah. |
| Mo | OK. All right. |
| George | Yeah, like the the most modern of drinks, tea. |
| Mo | All right. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | It stands for something, whether it’s tattling and it’s short. |
| Mo | Alright, |
| Jon | You know, they abbreviate everything. I couldn’t tell you. Anyway, we get to hang out. |
| Mo | alright. |
| George | I mean, we used to say spills the beans, which was coffee, right? |
| Jon | Spill the beans. That’s right. Yeah. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | But |
| Jon | Yeah. Well, they didn’t like all that caffeine. They went to tea a little less caffeine. |
| George | Oh, because tea has no caffeine. |
| Jon | maybe I don’t know, but. |
| George | There you go. |
| Jon | No. |
| Jon | So I don’t think it colored this. If anything, it would it would have shaded it positively. |
| George | Hmm. |
| Jon | We both are evaluating in terms and really it’s like we both came out of it going, well, we should have seen something else entirely or seen something we’ve already seen again. |
| George | Wow. |
| Jon | It just, it was really weird. |
| Mo | Wow. |
| Jon | So normally I try to bring something I really like. |
| George | Wow. |
| Jon | I don’t like to dog on something, but I feel like I should warn people that it’s really weird. Don’t spend your money on it. Don’t spend your A-list, you know just not premium anything. When it streams, which by the way, I’m sure it’ll be streaming within a week, because it’s not going to be in the theater very long. |
| Jon | Interesting stuff, not awesome. |
| Mo | Oh, OK. |
| Jon | So, Mo, how about you? |
| Mo | Huh. |
| Jon | What have you been checking out? |
| Mo | Well, OK, I’m talking about something that actually was good. um So, yeah. |
| Jon | Hallelujah. |
| Mo | So one thing, all three of us are big documentary fans, right? We all love a good documentary. |
| George | oh yeah. |
| Mo | well And Jon turned me on to this one, um which was called is called Mastermind to Think Like a Killer. And it’s a documentary about Ann Burgess, the one who started the FBI serial killer squad, you know, that the profiling squad group. |
| George | Oh, |
| Jon | he |
| George | Wait, it was a woman? I thought it was a guy that started that squad. |
| Mo | Well, there was a guy in the FBI brought her in as a psychiatrist. |
| George | Okay. |
| Mo | And it goes into basically her life, because she’s the one that really started the idea of profiling. Like, she’s the one that came up with that as a concept and how to find similarities. |
| George | Huh. |
| Mo | like Because the FBI, they were doing some interviews, but they had basically, and the documentary goes in this, they had all this information, all these tapes of people they interviewed, but they didn’t know what to do with it. |
| Jon | Mmm. |
| George | Right. |
| Jon | Mmm. |
| Mo | They just had all this information. She was able to take that information and quantify it. like she |
| George | Cause everything I’ve seen like other documentaries and fictional shows, it’s always showing one or two FBI male agents that are the ones who created profiling or whatever. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Well, they created the division for sure, you know, but, but she is the one that they brought in because basically she wrote a book about rape and how, and it really changed things. |
| George | Okay. |
| Mo | Cause like, you know, before it was like, Oh, the woman’s fault, all that stuff back in the seven, you know, but like craziness. |
| George | Right. Yeah. |
| Mo | So that changed all that. And so she, but she interviewed women who had been raped and got their stories and was able to come up with like statistics and numbers and all that stuff. |
| Mo | And they saw that and they’re like, Oh, this is the kind of person we need to look at this data and help us figure it out. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. Hmm. |
| George | This feels like a hidden figures kind of storyline. The one where the lady was the mathematician at NASA. |
| Jon | Oh, right. |
| Mo | Yeah. Although they, the two guys respected her like a ton. I mean, like one of the first cases they sent her, they stay go themselves. |
| George | Okay. |
| Jon | Hmm. |
| Mo | I mean, they, they were like, she’s the one, you know, and it’s all about her. |
| George | Wow. |
| Mo | And let me tell you this woman, she was, Pretty remarkable. I mean, if half of what they talk about, and this is true, which it was because they talked to her, her husband, her kids, you know, um, you know, she just, it it was amazing. |
| George | Wow. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | And, you know, and when the first cases they found was a serial rapist, that was like the first case and do the work that she did and the stuff that she did to quantify it, they were able to do a profile. which led to the guy’s arrest, you know, and and the documentary kind of goes through that and how, you know, basically, it’s all about her with the whole documentary. |
| George | Huh. |
| Mo | But it’s it was it was super good. And there was that HP, I think it was a Netflix. They did like a fix, not fictional, but like a story about the beginning of this thing, too, with ah shoot the name of the show now. |
| Mo | But it’ll come to me. But anyway, they did one. um And the first time, but there was the first, uh, serial killer they interviewed and they talked to the guys too, who were part of this as well. |
| Jon | Yeah, what was that? |
| Mo | And it was just funny. The guy’s like, yeah, you know, when I went to go interview so-and-so who killed all these different people, you know, the guy looked at me and says, you know, I could break your neck for anyone to come in this room. |
| Mo | ah Like really. And he’s like, then we said, nobody goes interviews by themselves. yeah It’s like new rule. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Let’s write that down. But it was super interesting just to see her and how she helped develop this whole science that now is like really the basis of finding these things. |
| Jon | Yeah, it was dramatized in the series you were talking about called it’s called Mindhunter. |
| Mo | That’s the one. |
| George | Mindhunter, yeah. |
| Mo | That’s what mind hunter. |
| Jon | Yeah, so it was the two guys, and then there was the woman they brought in as a doctor, a consultant. |
| Mo | Yes. Yes. |
| Jon | It was all fictionalized versions of those people, but it’s that woman who is the woman who’s featured in this documentary series, and you get to meet the real woman who, like they were just FBI, they were cops, and she came in, she’s like, I have the science, let’s apply this, and gave, they changed from the guys in the basement who were just kind of winging it to people that were using science, and that’s what really, yeah, doing science in the basement, right, difference. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Right. |
| Mo | We’re literally in the basement. Yeah. |
| George | Right. |
| George | he |
| Mo | And they literally were in the basement. So, you know, but it’s good. |
| Jon | Yeah, that’s right. |
| Mo | It’s super, super interesting. It’s three episodes. So short, you know, easily digestible. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Each one, it gets heavy because they do talk about the crime. |
| Jon | Yeah, yeah. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | So I’m the warrant for people with small kids, all this stuff. |
| George | Sure. |
| Mo | If you’re, if you’re looking for uplifting story, ah but it’s. |
| Jon | Go watch My Name is Earl, right? |
| George | it’s not my name is earl |
| Mo | Yeah, go watch my name is zero. |
| George | yeah |
| Mo | Like I would say alternate. two earls and one of these and two earls and one of these. |
| Jon | ah One of each. |
| Mo | Yeah. But, um but no, but I guarantee it’s, it was super interesting. Kept me captivated. Um, and well worth the time. |
| Jon | Cool. Yeah. Great. Thanks Mo. We’ll be right back. |
| Mo | So since we all have a Tekken toy today, yay, I decided to order them in order of usefulness. |
| Jon | Hmm. Hmm. |
| George | Yay. |
| Mo | So, Jon, you’re first. |
| Jon | Hmm, okay. Okay, yeah. |
| George | Because it’s the most useful or the least. |
| Mo | With most useful, we’re going most useful to to least useful. |
| George | Oh, most useful. |
| Jon | Oh, why the most? recent Okay, right. |
| George | Okay. |
| Mo | But not saying it’s bad, just, you know, less practical. How about that? |
| Jon | Not an order of fun necessarily, just usefulness, practicality. |
| Mo | Right. Exactly. Exactly. Just practicality. |
| Jon | Okay, yeah. |
| Mo | All right. so |
| Jon | Well, mine starts with a quick story. So since I was in my late teens, I have a little bit of ah a van dyke that I wear. I clean shave it on the sides of my face, but I have this little you know mustache and a little thing on my chin, little little facial hair. |
| Jon | And i kind of I don’t have it shaggy to try to keep it trimmed. So I have a beard trimmer that I use all the time to keep that together. And so the story is that ah it was a couple of weeks ago and I was going to trim my beard. |
| Jon | It had been a while. It was getting a little shaggy. And so I got my beard trimmer out and turned it on and went, and it died. |
| George | Hmm. |
| Jon | Midway through, half trimmed. so So I’m like, oh, the battery died. I changed the batteries. It still didn’t work. So I was able to beat on it. you know They had used the percussive maintenance, they call it. |
| Jon | You beat on it until it works a little bit just to even it out. |
| Mo | e |
| George | Right. |
| Jon | I had to find a replacement. So the last time I bought one of these, I was buying it for portability because I traveled all the time. And so what I had was one that you know had um rated as you know a good travel one. |
| Jon | But I was looking for one now. I didn’t want to spend a bunch of money trying to keep the budget low. and But I wanted… to Because, you know, if you have facial hair of any kind, you got to keep it neat or you just look like a, you know, you look like a ah vagrant. |
| Jon | You’re walking down like you didn’t get trim. So I did. I looked around. I looked at a lot of them looking for a low budget and high functionality. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | And I ended up buying one by a company I’ve heard of many times before, Braun. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah, big name. |
| Jon | ah B-R-A-U-N, Braun, yeah. |
| George | oh yeah |
| Mo | Yeah, big name. |
| George | yeah |
| Mo | Yeah, yeah. |
| Jon | Only 30 bucks. So what I found was, and this is better than the one that I had that probably paid 60 bucks for some years ago, they call it this five in one trimmer. And it’s called that because not only does it have the standard trimmer and a couple of attachments, you could pull that off and it has like, it’d be like ah like different nozzles for your pressure washer. |
| Jon | You can pop off the end and pop a new one on on the on the the end. |
| Mo | Right. |
| Jon | It has one that is like a like an ear and nose hair trimmer. |
| George | Oh yeah, yeah. |
| Jon | So it has that mechanic to it. |
| Mo | he |
| Jon | You take that one off and it has like an edger and it has a couple that are like for if you want to trim your like what nice long for your action, your hair on your head or shorter if you want to trim like your beard or whatever. |
| Jon | I kind of, you know, joked in the and the intro for all your manscaping needs in reality, though it’s called a men’s trimmer. Ladies could use this too for, you know, maintaining the edges on their hair and the trim and that kind of thing. |
| Jon | But my initial reaction to it was it I guess four or five, six years of technology advancement. It’s also rechargeable. It doesn’t have any removable batteries like the one that I had. |
| Jon | um the ah The things you take off are you can wash them in the sink. it’s It’s water washables. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| Jon | You have to worry about that. And the motor is like really, really fast. You know, if you have any kind of edger, have you trimmed your hair with anything? If it’s too slow, it starts to pull and and like tug, get to hair in your head. |
| Mo | Oh, ouch. |
| George | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Yeah, it tugs your hair. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | This one, when it’s fully charged, or even half charged, yeah. |
| George | Or if it’s dull. Yeah. |
| Mo | Yeah. Yeah. |
| Jon | Fully charged, or even half charged, it is like, really and it is cranking. And so it is super smooth to trim. ah Whatever you need, to you know, these sideburns or whatever you need, your eyebrows, as we get older, that kind of thing. |
| Jon | mini adapters on it, it’s got all the different pieces. ah So really, it’s a very practical item, as you said, Mo. |
| Mo | yeah Nice. |
| Jon | If it if it’s something you need, you you really need it. If you don’t, don’t even bother looking. But if you’re looking for a moderately priced one, this Braun 5-in-1 that I’ll give Mo a link to, he can throw down the show notes for you. |
| Jon | I’ve had it for a couple of weeks now, and it works better than the one I had before that was more expensive. So there you go. So let’s move along. So you’re saying that this next one is less useful, Mo? |
| Mo | less practical, but not as practical as yours, but still more practical than what George has. |
| Jon | Okay. All right. Okay. |
| Jon | Okay. |
| Mo | How about that? |
| Jon | Got it. |
| Mo | So it is. |
| Jon | Sure. |
| George | What? |
| Mo | um So, OK. |
| George | No. |
| Mo | Yeah. Trust me. |
| Jon | You’ll see. |
| Mo | So when we go through. |
| Jon | Trust trust me. |
| Mo | um |
| George | I’m not trusting you. |
| Mo | Trust me, they, so mine has a little bit story too. |
| George | No. |
| Mo | So, um, so I’m going to go visit my mom in Korea in September. So I would be taking a long ass flight there, but I was trying to figure out something to bring her, you know, and again, she lives in Korea, so you don’t get to see her hardly ever. |
| Mo | You know, it’s just, it’s a long trip. So. I was we had gotten her a digital picture frame many years ago, like way back when the early days of this digital picture frames, you know, and I remember going to her house about six months after we got to her and it was still showing the default pictures like she never like and this is after we had I had set it up to work. |
| Jon | Oh yeah. |
| George | Mm. |
| Mo | So somehow she did something and reset it back to the factory default. So I’m not sure how what she did there. |
| George | Wow. |
| Mo | So it just left it like that and didn’t tell anybody. So I was like, okay, the let me think about trying to get her. I want to get her another one. So you send her pictures of the grandkids, great grandkids, all that fun stuff. And so I found one on Amazon, of course, what’s called the Aura Carver. It’s a 10, uh, about a 10 inch digital picture frame. And the thing, the reason why I got this is you could configure it remotely from any phone that has the app. |
| Jon | Oh, |
| George | Okay. |
| Mo | So I could you get you remotely send pictures to it. |
| Jon | yep. |
| Mo | You could also on Wi-Fi in the other end, it’ll just put the new pictures up for you automatically. um It comes with you get free unlimited picture storage on their cloud storage, which I find to be pretty crazy. |
| Mo | ah Maybe they, you know, maybe hit a limit at some point, but right now it’s like you’ll so you can store as much as you want. The, it also has a, uh, you can even send like, like, if I have like the grandkids do like a, Hey grandma kind of thing with voice, it’ll play the sound. |
| Mo | I’ll do little short videos as well on this. Uh, you can set up through the whole carousel. how You know, you set how long all this from your phone, you know? Um, and I, as I opened it, I was like, had like neat things. |
| Mo | Like it says, okay, here’s how you set it up. And when the questions it asks is, are you setting this up now for its permanent location? Are you setting this up but temporarily? |
| Jon | Oh. Oh, |
| Mo | So I’m like, as soon as I saw that, I’m like, okay, somebody was thinking. |
| Jon | ah you get it. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | yeah Yeah, they get what this is. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | I said, nope, this is temporary Wi-Fi. It’s like, OK, because then when we get there, you’ll it’ll go through the setup process again to set up permanently. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | But I was able to set it up, connect it to my phone. um It has a QR code that you can send to people that they will then have access to the picture frame as well. So multiple people can do it as well. And it just seemed like it’s just it it just seemed like the perfect thing to get her you know while she’s there that you know we could constantly send her updated pictures and change them out and you know just kind of keep things going for her. |
| Mo | so |
| George | Yeah. So it seems like, cause all of the things you’re describing, I’ve been toying around with, with like buying, um, or not buying, but just pulling apart old laptops with that have screens on them and then putting a raspberry device or something like that in it and software that’s freely available to configure. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah. |
| George | But it seems like this company is doing all of that for you, which automatically makes me think there’s a premium price attached for doing all that work for me. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | It’s not cheap. Yeah, it’s not a cheap frame. |
| George | Okay. |
| Mo | It was 150 for the frame. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | Whoo. |
| Mo | um Actually, I got it on a slight sale, so it was like 129. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | But as a gift for a grandma grandpa thing, yeah. |
| Mo | yeah it’s It’s built really well. It’s super solid. like you Some of the things you pick it up, you’re like, ooh, this is built well. It may not be, but it feels that way. you know They could have put lead weights in it, who knows. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | But ah it feels super solid. um Again, just going through the setup on the app, you know I was like, okay, they made this stupid easy to do. Like you know he said, within 10 minutes, I had a bunch of pictures on it going already. |
| Mo | it was I was changing the times on them, you know all that stuff. so you yeah what i i I saw the price, I was like, but I was like, eh, it’s my mom. What am I gonna do? |
| George | Right. Yeah. That’s what I’m sure they counted on that. |
| Jon | It sounds |
| Mo | Yeah. Oh, yeah, for sure. |
| Jon | It sounds like you’re paying for the the idiot proofing, the bullet proofing, the convenience, the the streamlining of the interface almost. |
| Mo | Absolutely. |
| George | And the unlimited storage because that hardware most talking about is super cheap, especially if they’re buying it in bulk and manufacturing. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | Well, yeah. |
| Jon | Mm-hmm. |
| George | So you’re probably paying a head for that free unlimited storage. |
| Jon | Yep. |
| Jon | Yeah, that’s a good point. Yeah, they’ve they’ve subsidized this free storage into the price of the hardware most likely, so. |
| Mo | Yeah, probably. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah. |
| George | Which is fine. I’m okay with that. |
| Jon | Of course, yeah, you’re gonna pay for it somewhere. yeah Otherwise, otherwise it’d say link it to your Dropbox or something, you gotta pay for Dropbox then. So you gotta pay it for somewhere, yeah. |
| Mo | Right. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Right. |
| Mo | I’ll tell you the question. |
| Jon | Nope, sorry. |
| Mo | Nope. So Okay. |
| Jon | Good. |
| Mo | Let me jump into that. Um, yeah. So like I said, it’s, it’s a super, super practical. It’s 100 for the weekend. It’s for my mom. That’s nothing. You know, honestly, when it comes to scope of the world, um, it’s, it’s super well built. |
| Jon | There you go, there you go, yep. |
| Mo | So I’m going to be very, very happy with it. I think, or she will be very, very happy with it as long as she keeps it plugged in and doesn’t screw with it. |
| Jon | No. |
| Mo | Um, so now we’re going to move to George and you will see why his is, I’m not saying it’s the least fun or not even the best, but it’s the least practical of the gifts. |
| Jon | Hmm. |
| George | You’re full of shit. This is one of the most practical things I’ve ever bought. |
| George | So in all seriousness, ah you guys know we’ve talked about it over a few podcasts recently. My son introduced me to an anime, Mo, you watched it as well called Chainsaw Man. |
| Mo | Yeah, crazy stuff. |
| George | ah both of us Both of us were totally enamored with the series. And of course, since that series was so fun for us and everything, I’ve started to see Chainsaw Man everywhere. |
| George | T-shirts, plushies, figurines. |
| Mo | e |
| George | Well, also, Our buddy Jon, who loves to get other people to spend their own money, decided he would get in on the bandwagon of Chainsaw Man. |
| Jon | Yes, I do. |
| George | He found a Chainsaw Man building block kit. Now it’s not Lego, but it’s Lego adjacent, let’s say, but, um, and it is one of the, the types of Lego figures that I saw getting more and more popular on like Lego master. |
| Mo | Okay. Right. |
| George | So you have the Lego mini figs, which are, you know, the torso and the legs and the head and the arms, and they’re all mostly in one uniform kind of shape. |
| Mo | he |
| George | But then if they wanted something that was a little bit more customizable they would build like out of regular Lego pieces a figure that was you know like three to six inches tall and they would use parts that you wouldn’t expect for the different anatomy parts like so they would build the arms out of weird things the nose would be one of those little sloping Lego things and that kind of stuff they have the little googly eye lego pieces that they would put on well that’s what this chainsaw man building block kit is uh so immediately i cursed it Jon under my breath then well publicly sure |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | all right |
| Jon | Yup. |
| Jon | Yup. |
| Jon | Oh, it wasn’t under your breath. It was publicly. |
| Mo | All right. |
| George | Then I went and I bought two of them, one for me and one for my son, Michael. |
| Jon | Oh, how cool. |
| George | So ah he’s already built his. I haven’t had a chance to build mine yet, but seeing his, he took it to work with him one day when it was going to be a slow day. And he just built it in between ah the assignments that he had and he brought it home. |
| George | And it’s got the little demon figure puppy looking thing that comes with chainsaw man. |
| Mo | Oh, the cute thing. Yeah. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Jon | Oh, like sidekick. |
| George | it’s got um yeah it’s got pikito and it’s got chainsaw man and chainsaw man is not perfect right it’s not it doesn’t look exactly like the figure that i’ve got from my son recently but it’s not really supposed to be this is a a bendable posable lego inspiring kind of thing so |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | Hmm. |
| George | To me, it’s a hundred percent practical because it reminds my son and I of a thing that we shared. I can understand why it’s practical to no one else in the universe who doesn’t have the same experience that my son and I do. |
| George | But to me and him, it’s very practical because it’s a thing that just strengthens that little bond, that memory, that little link that we’ll have for, you know, however long I’m alive to just go back and remember you. |
| George | You remember when we watched chainsaw man and you have the shirts and I gave you the figure and you bought me the Lego and blah, blah, blah. |
| Mo | you see |
| George | It’s just, it’s nice to be able to do that kind of stuff and to have a fun, just a brief moment of building something. |
| Mo | Oh, for sure. |
| George | It takes like maybe 20 minutes, I think he said to build, but it’s just fun. |
| Mo | OK. |
| George | And it was only like 15 bucks. So not terribly pricey either. |
| Mo | Nice. |
| Jon | yeah |
| Mo | OK. No. |
| Jon | I’m coming around, Mo. That might be more practical than certainly my thing. |
| Mo | Is it really? |
| Jon | Very very similar, very similar to yours though, right? It’s for strengthening that bond between family members kind of thing in a different way, different way. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah, that’s cool. Well, I’m happy that I sent you that link and made you buy money, or I made you spend money. |
| Mo | Bye. |
| George | Yes. You made me buy money. |
| Mo | Spend money. |
| George | I would love to buy money. Is there an exchange rate for that? How do you do that? |
| Jon | Can I get a discount, please? Maybe you spend money. |
| Jon | You use that as the out, we’re all good? |
| Mo | Yeah, I’m good. |
| George | Yeah. Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah, cool. I was about to say blooper, then, oh, we made it funnier, that’s better. |
| George | All right, time to talk about games. And once again, all three of us have something to discuss. Jon and Mo actually have specific games where I have more of a broad topic that I want to cover. |
| Jon | Yep. Got it. |
| George | Jon, let’s go ahead and start with you because like my name is Earl, your product that you want to talk about is almost a decade old as well. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah, yeah. ah so I like to like to take plays out of the George playbook. Sometimes it’s double dipping and doing two or three things. Sometimes it’s going way back in time. |
| Mo | hu |
| Jon | This time it’s going, going, taking a throwback and digging in. And so, You know, after i was I was convalescing, after I was sick and starting to feel better, I had to spend a lot of time, you know, sitting down with my leg elevated, relaxing. |
| Jon | And so what do you do? You play games. And so I’m looking through a back catalog rather than spending money. I’m like, what old stuff did I play and never finished? |
| Mo | Hmm. |
| Jon | And I came across, you know, you’re looking through the list and you’re like, oh yeah, quantum break. It’s a game published in 2016 by Microsoft Studios. |
| Mo | Sounds familiar. |
| George | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | Yeah. And I guess, so now I’ve played it for several hours. When I played it back in 2016, 17, whenever I got it, I bought it on pedigree. I played a little of it and I must’ve liked it okay, but I didn’t finish it, which is, I’m bad about finishing games and series and movies and whatever. |
| George | Right. Yeah. |
| Jon | you know and We all have some of that. you Something else comes up. It was shiny. You run off in that direction. So I decided to sit down and spend some time with Quantum Break. The premise of the game is it’s a third-person action-adventure shooting game. And the idea is that you’re going to this university where they’re doing some experimentation. A guy used to work with or knew in school. He’s working with manipulating time somehow. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| Jon | and you go there he asks you to come late at night he’s doing some experiment that you find out is kind of off the books. A disaster happens and time is screwed up and you start to find out that this guy traveled in time to be there in the first place and it’s this action adventure game where you develop time travel abilities because you are you were in the you know, the epicenter of the accident. |
| Jon | So you’ve gotten these chronotons or whatever in your body. And you get these abilities like to slow down time like Max Payne or to zip from one place to the other like you’re you’re moving fast like the flash for small periods of time. |
| Jon | But what I didn’t know all that is fun. All that on its own didn’t have to be a time travel the game action adventure game what Microsoft Studios did and why this game is still $40 today I think now almost 10 years later. |
| Mo | Wow. |
| Jon | is as you play through the game, they have what’s called an act and then a scene. |
| Mo | Great. |
| Jon | Remember you think act one, act two, act three, there’s act one that you play in the game and then The decisions you make, they stop. And then it starts Scene 1, which is full motion video of all of the actors and the characters who you’ve been seeing in the game. They’re modeled right after the actual actors who are voicing them because then they portray themselves in the scene. And in a very Bandersnatch kind of way, |
| Jon | the things you did in the playable game change what happens in the movie that you watch. And it’s like a 20-minute episode that you get to watch. |
| George | hu |
| Jon | ah Lance Reddick, a treasure actor who he lost just a couple of years ago, he plays kind of a henchman bad guy as only Lance Reddick can. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah, yeah. |
| George | Oh, yeah. |
| Mo | Mm-hmm. |
| Jon | And when I first saw him in the game, I’m like, that’s Lance Riddick. I don’t know his voice. I’m like, and it looks like him too. Well, yeah. Cause he’s also playing the live action guy in in the movie too. |
| Mo | Yes, him. |
| Jon | And a lot of guys who are recognized as you know kind of character actors are in this. |
| George | Yeah, like the main character is Aaron Ashmore, right? |
| Jon | Yes, that’s right. Yeah. who’s It’s who you get to play as. Yeah. And did you tell me, I think we talked about this. Does he have a twin brother or is he has? |
| George | He does. Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah. Well, that that guy’s in this in the game too and in the movies. Like, so a quick example, I’ve kind of given you everything you need to know about whether this game is for you. A quick example is, sometimes you play the bad guy, you play the evil guy, because you can make decisions for him. So after all this breaks loose, you make a decision. The Lance Reddit character says, well, we can either, we can launch a campaign of PR and get everybody to kind of get on our side, and they’ll think that we’re the good guys, or we can eliminate all the people that know the secrets and hush-hush and kill some people. Which path do you want to take? |
| Jon | And so depending on which one you take, very different movie you get to watch about what happens after the fact. |
| George | Hmm. |
| Jon | And then finally, like you might see somebody doing something in that movie. And then in the next act, your time traveling, you might get to go back and do something and act upon that. Because cool time travel stuff like Back to the Future. |
| Jon | Marty was up in the rafters watching himself play that kind of cool stuff. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Right. |
| Jon | Yeah, so, Quantum Break, still kind of premium these days. It was, look, it was a 60, $70 game when it was new, still like 40 bucks. You can probably get it on sale once in a while, keep an eye on it, but it’s something that I missed out on and didn’t know how much was in it until I actually spent enough time, way more than I thought. |
| Mo | Okay, cool. |
| Jon | So, yeah, worth checking out. How about you, Mo? What have you been playing? |
| Mo | ah So I’ve been playing a game, it’s a sequel to a game I played, I guess a few years ago, it’s called Shape, Shapes with a Z at the end. |
| Jon | Okay. |
| George | Mm, of course it does. |
| Mo | It’s a sequel called Shapes 2, and basically it’s one of these kind of like construction games where basically everything’s built on a small 2×2 little grid. |
| Jon | That’s good name for save. |
| Mo | And there’s geometric shapes that you could cut, rotate, color, attach. And you’re doing all that to basically like ah do assembly lines to create the target shape at the end. |
| Mo | you know so it could be So it could be like a so ah full circle at the bottom all for it and making a circle with a square layered on top. |
| George | Oh, okay. |
| Mo | you know And you have all these different |
| George | So kind of a logical progression thing. |
| Mo | Exactly. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Yeah, yep very much so. |
| George | Yep. |
| Mo | And um the first game I played like crazy. I mean, it’s i my brain just seems to love these kinds of things where, you know, just sort of building on top of things and you kind of put it together. And so my fear, of course, is like anything with the second game, like, oh, are they going to ruin it? |
| Jon | Crazy. |
| Mo | You know, they’re going to change it too much or whatever. and Apparently, they did something really weird is that they listened to the people who played the game, and they actually implemented a lot of the things that people were saying, like, this would be really helpful. |
| Jon | crazy |
| Mo | like They added a thing where you could you could build like a whole section, and then you’re like, oh, can I cut that section and make a copy of it someplace else because I need to do the same activities again. |
| Jon | Mm-hmm. |
| Mo | you know um Yeah. |
| Jon | Say writing subroutines and re reusing the subroutine, yeah. |
| Mo | yeah yeahp reusing stuff You can now and they give you you could do that. You could save it out so you can pull them up later if you build like the perfect thing that it takes us two by two and it breaks up into four pieces and does it whatever you know, um it’s just super super fun. |
| Jon | Mm. |
| Mo | It’s one of these things that it just you know, even when you do it, you’re like, there’s a better way. Like, you know what I mean? Like I could make this more efficient or I could do it faster or I could do it this way. |
| Mo | And then you can do the same thing again, just cause you like, I could do it better. You know, um, <unk> I’m still going through the early phases cause you don’t, it doesn’t give you everything at once, which is also a good thing. Like it kind of feeds you the new tools as you go along and you have to like, it gives you simple targets. |
| Jon | Hmm. |
| Mo | You have to meet first. And as you get them, you can buy up these upgrades and new tools, et cetera, et cetera. It gets more complicated. So. I’ve only played it. It only came out dropped yesterday. Today’s the 60th. |
| Mo | So dropped an eight 15 and I put in a few hours already on this thing. |
| Jon | Oh. |
| Mo | And it’s, it’s like say it’s just a ton of fun for me. |
| George | Well, I just love the fact that somebody found a way to gamify IQ, SAT questions into something that Mo was in love with now. |
| George | Cause that’s what it feels like, those questions where it’s like, okay, here’s a quarter of a circle. Here’s a half a circle. Here’s three quarters of a circle. Here’s a dot. What’s the next thing? You’re like, uh, |
| Mo | yeah yeah Yeah, one the examples of that they listen to people is like you could do layers like you could do like something on top of another thing and they when they showed it. |
| Jon | Oh, yeah. |
| Mo | the other game and sometimes it’s hard to see because they got is really small, right? So this one now you can you click in the shape and it doesn’t explode a view. |
| George | Mm. |
| Mo | You see all the different layers that you need to put through. |
| Jon | Ah, yeah. |
| George | Uh. |
| Mo | So it tells you layer one, layer two, layer three. um You have multi-level conveyor, plus it’s all conveyor belts and all that stuff, which again is just a ton of fun. So if you’re if you’re into that type of game, |
| Mo | My recommendation is get the first one, shape Z, just because that’s a ton of fun by itself. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. Yeah. |
| Mo | Then by the time you’re done with that one, hopefully this one will come down in price. I mean, it’s 20 bucks. It’s not like a fortune, but you know, this one will go through this little beta phase and then you’ll be able to upgrade and move right into the second game and never see your children. |
| Jon | Hmm. |
| Jon | I was thinking the exact same thing you just said, Mo, and I looked. The first one’s like 99 cents, most everywhere. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | Oh, there you go. |
| Jon | So it’s like app priced for a full game. |
| Mo | No. Yeah. And again, tons of fun. |
| George | Nice. |
| Jon | Yeah. Mm-hmm. |
| Mo | So that’s what I have. So George, you said you have a discussion for us. |
| George | I do. I want to talk about something before I do, though, I just got ah an email and I mean, literally like as we started recording this podcast that I think it’s important to let our people know about because of timeliness and all course, we’re going to be a week or so late, but um Epic Game Store has just released a mobile app. |
| Mo | Oh. |
| George | that not just let you buy stuff let you play stuff right like ah you guys can’t see their faces but both Jon and mo just shrunk back from the screen go whoa so there’s only three games available on the platform to play right now fortnite fall guys mobile and rocket league side swipe |
| Jon | Oh, really? |
| Jon | Oh. Yeah. |
| George | But there are more games to come. It’s available ah across the world on Android and on iPhone. It’s available in the European Union only. I don’t know why the US wouldn’t have been first. |
| George | Maybe Epic is based out of European Union. |
| Mo | ah maybe |
| George | I’m not really sure. But apparently you can download it now. If you got um one of these emails, you can download it to your phone if you have a compatible device. I just think that’s really interesting that Epic is trying to do something that Steam has never done well. |
| George | Even with Steam Link, you still got to have your computer and you got to have a good connection for the streaming and everything. |
| Mo | It’s yeah. |
| Jon | Right. |
| George | Epic could be trying to flip the script a little bit because GOG apparently has a really great system going with Amazon right now. |
| Mo | Mm |
| George | Like half the games that are free on that Amazon Prime stuff are GOG games. |
| Mo | hmm. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | Steam is the juggernaut. Looks like Epic’s trying to throw their hat in the arena. |
| Jon | Good for them. |
| George | So yeah, something for you guys to look at. |
| Mo | Sweet. |
| Jon | Yeah, competition is good for all of us. |
| Mo | Absolutely. |
| George | Absolutely. Now the discussion I wanted to talk about is something that’s a little bit more closer to home for Gen X gamers and Jon alluded to it in the tease earlier. I wanted to talk about modern local arcades. Now I’m not talking about your Dave and Busters or your franchise restaurants that have whatever on the side with ticket games or something like that. I mean, people who are trying to preserve what we grew up with like 20 or 30 arcade games, maybe 10 or 15 pinball machines in probably some cheap abandoned warehouse space that they could find and afford in your town. |
| Mo | mm hmm. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | And I wanted to talk a little bit about the experience of going to one of these. So we have one here in my hometown called Flipping Great Pinball. And I know the guys who run the place, they’re really good guys. ah They come out to Infinity Con, which is a convention that I help run here in Tallahassee, ah bringing out some arcade games and pinballs and everything. They’re definitely on the side of trying to preserve the experience for people like us. But I do have an issue, |
| George | not |
| Jon | Mm-hmm. |
| George | I hate to even say that because they’re so nice and they’re so good, but I have an issue with the system that I think modern society has forced them into. So Jon Moe, when you guys would go play in an arcade when you were younger, what’d you take with you? |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Quarters. |
| George | Right? |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | That was all you needed. |
| Mo | As many as I can fit my pocket. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | As many as you could shove into your pocket, fist full of quarters. |
| Jon | Yeah. Maybe maybe a couple of $1 bills. I’ll go to the change machine. |
| Mo | Yeah, a couple of bills. Yeah, for change. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | virginia Yeah. |
| George | Right. Well, now you have to take a credit card. |
| Mo | Hmm. |
| Jon | Hmm. |
| George | Because almost all of these modern old style local arcades have had to go the route of free play with hourly charging. |
| Jon | Oh, |
| George | So you go to them, you pay either an hourly fee for that one hour, or maybe you buy an all day pass. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| George | And then you go play the games as you want. Now here’s the difficulty I have with that. Number one, the prices they have to charge in order to be able to pay for rent and electricity and everything else. |
| Mo | e |
| George | They can feel a little high. What I’ve seen in my research and my research has been limited to just Florida and Georgia, uh, local arcades looks to be between eight and $12 per hour per adult. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | Wow, that’s a lot of quarters. |
| George | Now there’s some, that’s a lot of quarters. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | There’s some, uh, there’s some bundle packages for like families and of course a day pass or a half a day pass at some places or a weekend pass. Uh, the one I’m talking about even has an annual pass for $399. |
| Mo | Jeez. |
| Jon | Whoo. |
| George | Now, if you’re going to go every day, they’re open. |
| Jon | That’s a dollar a day. That’s not so bad, right? |
| Mo | Yeah, yeah. |
| George | That, that may not be too bad for you. |
| Jon | A little over a buck a day. |
| George | Um, a lot of these arcades though, they’re not the primary income source for these people. So they’re not open all seven days of the week. |
| Jon | Right. |
| Mo | Hmm. |
| George | Like flipping grade is only open for four days a week. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | They’re not open. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| George | Uh, like on, so I think it’s Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, they’re open Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. |
| Jon | Sure. |
| George | Um, and I’m just curious what you guys think if you’ve gone to any of these, because to me it changes. |
| Jon | here |
| George | The experience that I have in that place, I went with my son recently and I was like, well, we’ll just play for an hour. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | Cause we need to get back home. But with two of us for an hour, it became more affordable just to buy two day passes than it was to pay for the hour. And then we would probably play another 30 minutes. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | So rather than for two, one hour passes, it was better to do the day thing. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Right. |
| George | I’m just wondering what you guys think or if you’ve experienced this. |
| Mo | Yeah, I’ve been to a couple of them and it’s kind of kind of mixed as part of it. It’s like it’s kind of nice to just sit there and play whatever you want. You know, I mean, there’s something to say about that. But then I think that’s the fact that when we had to spend money on a game. |
| Mo | it kind of like limited. It was like a gate control for how many people were on a game. You know what I mean? Like it was like ah like, it was like a built in, you know, where you don’t get like some random person just like on the same pin motion, just endlessly, like not leaving, you know? |
| George | Uh huh. |
| Jon | Mhm, yep. |
| George | Yeah. Mm hmm. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | And I, there should be some basic etiquette that if you’re at one of these places, when you finish the game, if there’s people waiting, you move, right? |
| Jon | Yeah, because you used to put your quarter up on the glass and you said I was next. |
| Mo | Let somebody else play. |
| Mo | Right. Exactly. |
| George | Right. |
| Jon | It was simple. |
| Mo | Exactly. |
| George | Now that’s kind of removed. |
| Jon | Now you have no quarters, right? |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Mo | So, and the other thing is that the, it it’s actually just way more expensive than when we were kids playing, like $5 would last me a really long time. |
| Mo | You know, you know, we’re now, you you know, at $5 an hour, that’d be, that’d be rock bottom prices at these places if we went to them. |
| George | Sure. |
| Jon | Oh, yeah. Yeah. |
| George | Well, and I don’t know that they could afford to even stay open with, you know, the overhead of rent and paying employees if they have any and electricity, not to mention the maintenance and upkeep. |
| Mo | Right. |
| Jon | Right. |
| George | Now flipping great pinball, they, they have everything from super old fifties pinball machines all the way up to modern like, uh, stern pinball machines with Deadpool and all that stuff. |
| George | They have. a whole wide gambit as well as a lot of arcade games for everything from our Donkey Kong Galaga days all the way up to the modern rhythmic Japanese games. |
| Mo | Good variety. |
| Mo | oh |
| George | Um, and they’re always trying to bring in whatever they think their audience wants. Maintenance isn’t always perfect. |
| Mo | Yeah, that’s what I was gonna bring that up. |
| George | You know, some of these machines get worn out really quickly. And, you know, if it’s not your primary revenue source, if you’re having to work a nine to five job, how much time do you get to spend at making sure that the pinball is perfectly level or that the Donkey Kong buttons are all, you know, firing correctly. |
| Jon | Yeah. yeah |
| George | It’s a, it’s a hit or miss bag. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah, yeah. I’ve seen about, I would say three different types. There’s a type you describe. ah There’s one down St. Augustine area, an area called Anastasia Island. |
| Jon | And it’s one of those, you pay a certain fee and it’s all day, but it’s like, let’s say it’s like 15, 16 bucks all day. They don’t have an hourly thing, but you can come in and be there all day. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| George | Right. |
| Jon | ah The other of two types that I’ve seen, they seem to make it work by making the arcade, not the primary source. So you have these arcades. |
| George | Market, sure. |
| Jon | where they’re making their money on on on selling liquor, on selling food and appetizers and things like that. And they have the games on free play. And then there’s the one step kind of in the middle of that, which is they have a bar and they sell food and everything, but you still pay for the games, but you can pay on a per game basis, right? |
| Jon | You can say, oh, I’m gonna play this game once, that’s all I need. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| Jon | I don’t need to pay the daily, yeah. |
| George | but |
| George | But it’s not a quarter machine. it’s You don’t pay with quarters in a lot of those times. |
| Mo | Yes, the tokens. |
| George | It’s that stupid card that you charge up like Dave and Buster’s thing. |
| Jon | Yeah. Yeah, sometimes it’s tokens. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah oh, yeah. The charge of cards. |
| Jon | Sometimes it’s cards. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | They find a way to get you to pay for it. I think it depends upon it. And you nailed it. It has to do with how can I afford to stay open? If I’m only making money off of you playing games, you’re not going to get money off of me playing Donkey Kong because I’m going to spend three quarters and be there an hour and leave. |
| Mo | yeah |
| George | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | And that’s not enough to you stay open. I get that because, you know, the economy has changed. |
| George | Right. |
| Mo | Yeah, absolutely. |
| Jon | A quarter is not a quarter anymore. It’s about 15 cents. |
| Mo | Yeah, that’s for sure. |
| George | Sure. |
| Jon | But And then to Beau’s point, it changes the complexion of the arcade because now, the The commodity of how well can I do with the game is irrelevant. |
| Jon | I can just play any game as much as I want, and I don’t have to get good at it. The high score means nothing. cause You hit continue all you want and keep trying. |
| George | Right. |
| Jon | So it’s it’s a sign of the times. Look, traditional arcades are gone. So we have to fight. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | If you want to be alive at all, people have to find a way to keep the doors open. And it comes down to, you know, paying that hourly or finding another way to keep the doors open. |
| George | Yeah. I mean, just to give you an example from this past weekend of how things have changed so dramatically. So my son and I were in there playing. We mostly went to go play pinball because that’s kind of my thing right now. |
| George | And my son loves it as well. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | But then toward the end, my son was like, well, let’s play a few video games, dad. |
| Jon | Hmm. |
| George | Let’s do that. And he saw a Gallagher machine. He’s like, well, dad, we got to play your Gallagher. So I’m like, okay, sure. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| George | So we start playing and. I’m doing you know fine you know normal galaga gameplay there’s nothing wrong with the game whatsoever it’s playing well the it was a little hard to see the screen was kind of dim but other than that it was it was just perfectly serviceable for the experience we were having um I got to I got past the high score on the first ship and then he was we were looking at our watches I’m like okay yeah I’m just gonna die you play as long as you can and then I’ll just let all my ships die and you just keep trying the best you can because Galaga is not his game you know he’s like a fortnite guy or something like that so um we get done with my first ship ah he plays his first ship goes out yeah moderately quickly I get to my second ship I start ah letting the guys just dive bomb power goes off on the machine instantly |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | he |
| Mo | What the hell? |
| Jon | Oh, oh. |
| George | It comes back up. So that tells me it was a power supply, not an interruption because none of the other games on the bank went down. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Right. Mm hmm. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | So I knew the power supply inside the Galaga machine had some kind of fault and it popped and then went back. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| George | In the old days, if I had a high score in a machine and that shit happened, I would have lost my goddamn mind screaming about wanting my quarterback plus an extra quarter for the inconveniences of not having my high score recorded. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah. |
| George | But in this case, I didn’t even worry about it. Now, maybe that’s because I’m older, but I was looking forward to putting GXG on that high score screen for Galaga. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah. Yeah. |
| George | And when it didn’t happen, I was like, eh, that’s okay. Everything that I was, I would have been mad about had I been a kid spending a quarter on it. I found myself going, eh, that’s okay. |
| George | It’s all right if this pinball isn’t quite level. Eh, that’s okay if these lights aren’t working on this thing. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | It just feels like that we’re, we’re willing to accept less and pay more because we just don’t have much of a option anymore. |
| Jon | options. |
| George | There’s, there’s no mall for the foot traffic to these arcades to be enough to support them. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | yeah Yeah. |
| George | Like I said, they have to be in these warehouse district kind of places or, you know, somebody’s farm barn or some shit. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | So yeah, just, I don’t know. It’s just kind of sad to me, but at least somebody’s trying to do it. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | The only thing I’d say is I think back in the day, it was their economics were that every machine had to work, right? Because a machine that wasn’t working wasn’t generating income. |
| George | Sure. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. Losing money. That’s right. |
| Mo | We’re now, since they’re not looking at it on a per machine anymore, it’s the floor, right? |
| George | Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | It’s everything. |
| George | No, if they have a sign that says arcade, they’re going to get those people to come. |
| Jon | No. |
| Mo | And so if one machine is broken, |
| Mo | Yeah. And if there’s one machine broken, we got 14 other machines. We’ll get to that one when we can. You know, so I think that’s why I think the maintenance, that’s one thing I was to say, like everyone I’ve gone to has had the machines have not been awesome as far as condition. |
| George | Yeah. Now granted, they’re super old machines. They’re 30, 40 year old machines and they’re trying to bring them back, but it’s not like there’s companies reliably making parts for all of them anymore, right? |
| Mo | Oh, yeah. yeah |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| George | You know, there’s there’s no midway anymore building these machines or these parts. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Jon | It’s all aftermarket stuff. And like you said, some that’s not their primary job is doing that. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Jon | So it’s like, well, maybe I’ll fix it later. |
| George | But I’m glad at least people are trying to keep that part of my childhood afloat. |
| Jon | Me too. |
| George | And um I’m super thankful to have one here in my town that I can go to. And, you know, I made some suggestions to them that I think might drive some revenue for them, like some different ways to configure the pricing and stuff, um because I was like, look, |
| George | I’m, I can’t afford to come back all the time at the prices you have set. But if you had like a weekend family pass where we could pay for it for the month, like 40 bucks for the month where me and like two other of my family members could come and play every weekend on Saturday and Sunday, I buy that in a heartbeat. |
| Jon | yeah |
| Jon | Find a way for me to give you money and make it make sense to me. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Mo | Right. |
| Jon | yeah Yeah, i’m glad I’m glad they’re trying at least. |
| George | No. |
| Mo | Yeah, exactly. |
| Jon | Yeah, I don’t want them to die. Keep finding a way. |
| Mo | Absolutely. |
| Jon | gentlemen, you know, before we wrap up the show here toward the end, we’d like to take a few minutes to talk about the things we’re either looking at now or looking forward to between now and the next time we get together. And the window’s a little broader because we have more conventions coming up. So we have a couple of rewind cycles coming through. So it’ll be almost a month before we talk again. So Mo, what do you have coming up on the horizon? |
| Mo | Let’s see, the first thing is I found out ah through the releases just ah website that George brought up to us. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | um I found a there did a ah watchman. |
| Jon | Yep. |
| Mo | from the comic book, there’s an animated show Watchmen that came out. It says it’s chapter one. |
| George | Oh, right. |
| Mo | I’m looking at it. It looks interesting. I mean, I love the Watchmen. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | So if it’s if it’s also stays true to the comic book, I think it’s going to be awesome. um I know this was on the last time people talked about this, but Alien Romulus is we’re going to actually go see it tonight. |
| Jon | Yeah, yep. |
| Mo | So I’m super excited about seeing that one. |
| Jon | Okay. |
| George | Okay. |
| Mo | But what I’m really looking forward to is on eight twenty seven is ah the new season of only murders in the building. Season four. |
| Jon | Oh yeah. |
| George | and Okay. |
| Mo | you know, ah Martin Short, C Martin. |
| Jon | Steve Martin. Yeah. Mark short. |
| Mo | um I don’t know, something about that show just, yeah, it just makes me feel good when I watch it, you know? |
| Jon | It’s cute. |
| Mo | um So I’m just super, super looking forward to the new season of that. So how about you, Jon? |
| Jon | Yep. |
| Jon | ah Yeah, so, ah ah they have well, a couple films and a TV show that you may or may not know about. First, there’s a film coming out August 30th called Afraid. And the AI in Afraid is capitalized. |
| Jon | So it’s all about artificial intelligence. |
| Mo | she |
| Jon | I seem to find out maybe, I might have read somewhere that it might even be in the Megan universe, or maybe it’s related to Megan, I’m not sure. doesn’t matter. It’s about AI going crazy. It’s a nice family and they install this, ah you know, like digital assistant, put little cameras up all around the house and it starts taking over. |
| Jon | Think of me as another mother, you know, it’s like it’s it’s doing things for the family and trying to take over. |
| Mo | Oh, okay. |
| George | Right, yeah. |
| Jon | So I love those. You wanna say it’s like apocalyptic future, but it’s like apocalyptic present. It’s like stuff that’s kind of happening now, so it’s interesting. There’s my first foray in any kind of anime, looking forward to Terminator Zero, a new anime series hitting Netflix, August 29th. |
| Mo | Oh. |
| Jon | It’s official canonical Terminator universe, the James Cameron Terminator, but it’s kind of going back to the, I don’t know, I don’t know much about it, |
| Mo | oh |
| Jon | but it It looks like anime and I’m like, am I going to like it enough? Can I watch it? Because I just, that style doesn’t grab me, but Terminator is going to get me in the door. So I’m excited to see what they do with that. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Jon | And then finally, of course, September 6th, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, I’ll stop there. |
| Mo | Oh, yeah. |
| Jon | I won’t say it a third time. And that’s the name of the sequel. |
| George | he |
| Jon | That’s a genius name for a sequel to Beetlejuice, by the way. And if they ever do a third one, you know what they’re going to call the third one. but but like It’s such a legendary film, the original. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| Jon | We’ve talked about it. We did a whole backtrack about it here. It can’t be as good as you want it to be, but I’m absolutely interested. Of course, Michael Keaton reprising his role. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Jon | He has said he very much likes it. He probably has to contractually say that, but we’ll see. |
| Mo | Yeah, we know the writers in it, too, you know. |
| George | Hehehehe. |
| Jon | I’m optimistic about what they do, right? Yeah, I’m optimistic. I hope it it’s good. George, how about you? What do you got coming up? |
| George | Well, first off, we were talking about horror movies earlier. There’s a new horror series documentary kind of thing based um in the stuff we love. And it’s on the shutter network. It comes out on August the 27th. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| George | It’s called Horrors Greatest. |
| Jon | Oh. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| George | Don’t know anything else about it other than it looks interesting. I saw the trailer and it’s a documentary style interview kind of thing. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| George | um Again, freaking icons on earth is coming out with another new series. |
| Mo | Jeez. |
| George | We’re right in the middle of Spider-Man right now. |
| Jon | Man. |
| George | Icons Unearthed Harry Potter releases August 21st on Vice. |
| Jon | Oh, there you go. |
| George | i mean yeah i don’t They must have had all these things in the can and then Vice started to have financial problems and he said, shit, put them all out there. |
| Mo | There’s something. |
| George | Let’s get them so we can try and make some money. ah But I love the Icons on Earth series. |
| Jon | They’re great. |
| Mo | Mm hmm. |
| George | They do a serviceable job of telling the stories. You get a lot of background stuff, a lot of things you don’t see in other documentaries, which is nice. They do a lot of interviews with people who make the films or TV shows that they’re talking about. |
| George | um But then the thing I think I’m most looking forward to is the new crow movie, August 23rd. |
| Mo | Oh, I have such trepidation about that movie. |
| George | Well, I have trepidation about anything that goes back to something I already love. Now, I love the Brandon Lee movie, but I love it for a different reason than most people. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | I love it because it got me into the ah graphic novel. I’m not going to call it a comic book, but I’m going to call it a graphic novel because that’s truly what the Crow comic books, ah you know, whatever were. |
| George | um And those are outstanding stories. Those are crazy. They’re slightly different than the Brandon Lee Crow that we know. I’m not even going to talk about the Crow Los Angeles or what the fuck ever those some the sequels were. |
| Mo | Oh yeah, that’s stupidity. |
| George | um But this one looks like it’s going to hold more to the comic book. than it is the Brandon Lee film. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| Jon | and |
| George | So that for somebody like me holds like a lot of promise. So I’m really looking forward to that. I hope they do it justice. Like you say, Mo, I don’t want it to, you know, fall flat on its face, but the crow August 23rd in theaters, it’d be nice for something like that to do a good job going back to an old like IP and actually doing it well. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| Mo | Yeah. The trick is to think of it as a new movie. |
| Jon | Cross my fingers for you. |
| Mo | Like just, it’s its own thing. Just, just, you know, just yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah, go back to the source material. |
| George | It is. It’s supposed to be its own thing. |
| Jon | Start again. |
| George | Yeah. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | So, oh, let me jump into that. Uh, yeah. |
| George | Do you want me to bring you in? |
| Mo | Could you, I don’t know why I’m blanking on how to do that. |
| George | Okay. Five, four, three. I’ve talked an awful lot and I’ve asked a lot of questions, but my questions are not nearly as important as the Patreon question that Mo curates for us every podcast. |
| Mo | Oh, absolutely not. |
| George | Mo, what do we have on tap this time? |
| Mo | Oh, and so this time we have a question from Joe H. And, you know, again, we love our patrons. And again, if you want to get your question read here, all you gotta do is submit it through Patreon. Super simple. All you need is become a member for a dollar a month, even just a dollar. |
| Mo | We’ll look at your question and we’ll put it on the show. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | But this question I thought was pretty topical and actually kind of interesting, um which is how do you stay productive and motivated working virtually, which I think we all do to some extent, different levels, but we all, you know, work from home at times and that kind of stuff. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. Yeah. |
| Mo | So Jon, I’m gonna save you for last cause you, that’s all you do is work virtually. |
| Jon | Okay. |
| Mo | Um, yeah, your work is virtual. |
| Jon | My work is virtual, let alone where it’s at. Yeah. |
| Mo | Um, how about you, George? |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | So what do you do that they kind of help you stay focused? |
| George | Well, so I guess my first question is, do they mean on Gen X grownup or my regular nine to five or nine to five? |
| Mo | I think that’s up at nine to five. |
| George | Okay. |
| Jon | Your real work. |
| George | So my answer is going to be the same, no matter which one, it was just the qualifier was going to be different. |
| Mo | Okay. |
| George | Somebody yells at me is the answer either my boss, my wife, or Jon. |
| Mo | Oh, okay. |
| George | So that’s how I stay motivated and keep working. Truthfully, I’m super old. |
| Mo | You don’t want to get yelled at. |
| George | I’ve been working since I was 10 years old. I don’t have a lot of motivation anymore to keep doing stuff for other people. My sole motivation is to sit my butt in my recliner, watch old movies and play pinball. |
| George | That’s about it. But as far as know in series when it comes to working virtually, um we started working during the pandemic as most companies did. We just really never went back. |
| Mo | Yeah. |
| George | Like we did this trial thing for a while. We’re three days in the office and two days out of the office. But that quickly gave way back to five days out of the office kind of thing, ah physically, I mean. |
| Mo | she |
| George | um Our company built its systems around that model. We are a data center, so it’s not that difficult to do it that way. We just have to have a few people on site to do smart hands kind of work. |
| Jon | ye |
| George | um And we’ve done a pretty good job of it. We have our meetings, we have our ticketing systems, we have our customer calls. um As far as staying motivated, to me, it feels the same as I did before. |
| George | I just need a paycheck. And this is a job I know how to do pretty well and they’re willing to pay me for it. So that’s how I stay motivated. |
| Mo | Okay, good, good. So for me, I guess I think that kind of, again, it was kind of pandemic start to kind of set this trigger, like, okay, we’re all working from home. I think our company at Workforce suddenly realized that people could work from home, you know, because before that it was like, oh no, you know, we’re never doing that. And all of a sudden they realized that, hey, people are actually working longer probably. So for me though, it’s, I do two things. One is I make sure I stop at least once an hour and take five minutes to do something because, you know, i I’ll just get engrossed in something next to no, like I forgot to eat. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Uh, and the second thing is this may sound weird. I need to have background music of some sort. |
| Jon | Oh, really? |
| Mo | I cannot focus in quiet. |
| George | Mmm. |
| Mo | I don’t know why maybe because normal offices, people are talking and all that stuff never bothered me sitting here when it’s just quiet, my brain sort of wanders. I’ll look over my shoulder. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Oh, There’s a new thing on Plex, you know? |
| Jon | You need the noise, yeah. |
| Mo | yeah Oh, look over there. |
| George | he |
| Mo | Next thing I know, I’m like, you know, doing something I shouldn’t be doing. So, um yeah, so just basically just putting on like some music, just having it go. No, I’m not terribly loud, but just having that going, I’m able to focus. |
| Jon | Hmm, yeah, it really helps. |
| Mo | So, yeah, how about you, Jon? Since this is your us what you do. |
| Jon | Yeah, really, I mean, it’s it’s a work like any other work, right? it’s The difference is I’m not answering to anybody except us. you know it’s a you know I’m answering to ourselves, you know so there’s not another boss. And so it would be easy to get distracted, not stay productive. The number one way I do it is, |
| Jon | having a stack of things, either it be a checklist or a Trello board or something like that, having a bunch of things to do, because my problem is I get bored is the wrong term. I get burned out on a single task often. And so I can then drift. It helps me if I burn out on that thing and I go, oh, I can go and work on this other thing. Like what’s coming up? What’s in the list? I can, there’s things three items down. Let me go work on the three items down list. Because if I can hop from task to task, it keeps me fresh. |
| Mo | ok Okay |
| Jon | And, you know, if i’m if I’m editing and I’m going, I don’t want to edit right now. Let me go work on some graphics. I don’t want to work on graphics right now. Let me go do some social media posting. Right. So I can kind of cycle. And as long as I know what things need to be done and I have that checklist or that board of stuff, that’s what keeps me motivated. And in turn, if you’re motivated, then you stay productive. So that’s pretty well. That’s pretty much my system. |
| Mo | There you go. That’s awesome. Well, Joe, thanks so much for the question. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Great question. Thanks for being a patron, especially. |
| Jon | Thank you, Joe. |
| Mo | And again, if you want to get your question read here on the show, all you got to do is go to patreon dot.com slash genics grown up as little as a dollar a month. |
| Jon | Yep. |
| Mo | You know, a little more wouldn’t be bad though, but you know, a dollar a month and send us a note with your question and we’ll put it right here on air. |
| Jon | Mm-hmm. We’ll get it going, yeah? |
| Jon | Yeah, and speaking of which, I want to thank two more new patrons who have joined us since the last time we had a chance to speak. ah Paul Driscoll, thank you, Paul. |
| Mo | Nice. |
| Jon | And user D84. It goes by a handle. I want to thank both of you for becoming a patron. Just like Mo said, you headed over, opened up your wallet and set up a regular recurring pledge to support us. And you can do it for as little as a dollar a month. You become part of this amazing group of people that do support us at the goodness of their heart. We’re doing the show. We’re giving it to you for free. If you get something out of it, please consider helping us out. It means the world to us and absolutely keeps us motivated. That’s another way we stay motivated is when you support us and we know you appreciate it. |
| Jon | All right, that is gonna wrap it up for this edition of the show. Don’t worry though. If you’re worried, don’t worry. We’ll be back in two weeks with another one. um No, we’re not. We’ll be back in a few weeks with another one, but next week is our backtrack where you take a single nostalgic topic and dig in deep. Mo, why don’t you tell the fourth listener what they can look forward to next week on the backtrack? |
| Mo | Oh yeah. If you grew up in the eighties, you totally know about the satanic panic that happened. If you listen to the wrong music, you played the wrong games, you watched the wrong shows, any of those can send you to hell. |
| George | Mmm. |
| Mo | Uh, so, um, and we’re going to talk about that next week in the podcast. And there was a lot of really bad things that came out of that. |
| Jon | Mm hmm. |
| Mo | Not, not talking about Satan worshipper stuff, just bad repercussions from this whole movement. |
| Jon | Yeah. |
| Mo | So we’re going to get into all of that. |
| Jon | In fact, a lot of people. Yeah, that’s going to be a good one. And it’s one that is from the research. I know it’s going to have had it from the research. I know it’s going to be a good time. So you don’t want to miss that one. Until then, I am Jon George. |
| Jon | Thank you so much for being here. |
| George | Yes, sir. |
| Jon | Mo, you know, I appreciate you. |
| Mo | Always fun, man. |
| Jon | Fourth listener, it’s you, though. We all three appreciate most of all. And we can’t wait to talk to you again next time. Bye bye. |
| George | See you guys. |
| Mo | Take care everybody. |
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