Episode 71 – Bundle This, TextMate

Scott: Friends with Brews.

Scott: Peter, I’m gonna need a lot of this sound today, because…

Scott: What the hell?

Peter: I don’t know, Scott, what the hell?

Scott: What the actual hell?

Scott: Like, that was the most painful…

Peter: This was pretty painful.

Scott: All right, let’s get really meta.

Scott: I have in the past…

Peter: No, we’re not talking about Facebook today, absolutely not.

Scott: I have in the past used an app called SoundSource from Rogue Amoeba to control all my inputs and outputs, and it can do things like increase volume on a specific thing, increase volume on others, blah, blah, blah.

Scott: It’s got very granular controls.

Scott: Like, you can make an app be louder than the other apps, you’re quieter, et cetera, et cetera.

Scott: When I uninstalled that, apparently…

Scott: So then I went to saying, okay, for my input to Peter, I’m going to use my Wave XLR and Elgato.

Scott: I’m going to use my loopback device, which is my mic combined with Farago.

Scott: So when I played the Friends with Brews noise a minute ago, you probably didn’t hear it, right?

Peter: I did not.

Scott: Yeah, and you didn’t hear the bottle sound.

Scott: You can’t hear those sounds anymore because if I try to use that input for you, you can barely hear me.

Scott: Whereas when I had SoundSource installed, it worked fine.

Scott: And that’s even with it cranked to 100% in loopback.

Scott: So I don’t know why, I don’t know why, and I can see it.

Scott: I can see my loopback device in Farago.

Scott: I can look at it and I can see those super low inputs that you were talking about.

Scott: It is very low input in loopback, which means that’s why you were getting the super low input volume.

Peter: Okay.

Scott: But it’s cranked 100%.

Peter: It’s cranked all right.

Scott: But it’s barely registering.

Peter: Barely.

Scott: So I just…

Scott: Anyway, we’re here.

Peter: That much, I…

Peter: Yes.

Scott: I want to eventually solve this.

Scott: But now that I know what to look for in loopback, I can figure out on my own without having to involve you when my levels are normal again using that.

Scott: So that you’ll be able to hear my soundboard again.

Scott: Right now, it doesn’t matter.

Scott: You were about to say something that was going to require a bottle of noise for me, weren’t you?

Scott: You were going to say F the soundboard.

Peter: F the soundboard, indeed.

Scott: Yes, F the soundboard.

Peter: Oh, man.

Peter: I tell you, man, it has been a day.

Scott: It’s been a day.

Scott: It’s been a year.

Scott: It’s been a life of technology.

Peter: But we’ve already established that you’re Scott and I’m Peter.

Peter: And today, I am drinking Joe Coffee’s Nightcap Noir.

Scott: What is it?

Peter: It’s a dark roast decaf.

Scott: Nightcap?

Scott: Why would you have a nightcap?

Peter: And it is really yummy because it’s decaf.

Peter: So you drink it at night when you’re going to sleep.

Peter: It doesn’t keep you up at night.

Scott: Oh, you drink it all day long so that you can go to sleep.

Scott: No?

Scott: Okay, so give me your review.

Scott: Tell me how it tastes.

Scott: Tell me what it’s supposed to taste like.

Scott: Tell me how it does taste like.

Peter: It tastes how it tastes like.

Peter: Well, let’s go to the review, right?

Scott: Yep.

Peter: joecoffeecompany.com/shop/nightcapdecaf.

Peter: That’s the URL here.

Peter: Whether prepared as a brewed coffee or espresso at night or at daybreak, nightcap, our signature decaf coffee, is carefully chosen to fill the decaf drinker with comfort and curiosity.

Peter: We chose our seasonal decaffeinated offering based on the perfection of balance and flavor, aiming for flavor profile that’s sweet, rich, and drinkable around the clock.

Peter: Once we’ve determined the perfect coffee blend to make up the nightcap, we send the coffee to Decamex, a water-processed decaffeination plant in Mexico.

Peter: Currently, nightcap coffee is from the Coro, C-O-R-O, organic coffee growers of Oaxaca, Mexico.

Scott: Oaxaca sounds like something you’d say as a chant while you’re dancing around a circle.

Peter: Oaxaca, Oaxaca, yes.

Peter: So, yeah, no, it is sweet, rich, and drinkable.

Peter: I’ve had it in the morning and now I’ve had it…

Peter: I’m very curious.

Peter: What does this taste like?

Peter: Hmm, I’m curious.

Scott: See, that’s the problem.

Scott: I was like, when you said it inspires curiosity, I was like, do you really want your coffee to make you say, what the hell is this?

Peter: Huh, that’s curious.

Peter: Yeah, it’s good.

Peter: I like it.

Scott: Okay, good.

Scott: Way to go, Joe.

Scott: All right.

Peter: Go Joe coffee.

Peter: Yo, Joe coffee.

Scott: I’m drinking something from Doma Coffee Roasting Company.

Scott: I’ve got that Doma coffee aroma going, apparently.

Peter: Doma.

Scott: It’s a medium roast.

Scott: It’s Columbia Noreenol, and it’s got honey, blackberry and lemon.

Scott: And I’m going to take a sip here and see if I…

Scott: I do taste the lemony-ness, for sure.

Scott: That may be all I taste.

Scott: Okay.

Peter: So you’re drinking lemon.

Peter: That’s all you got?

Peter: You’re like, hmm.

Scott: No, no, no, it’s not bad.

Scott: It’s very mild.

Scott: Like, it’s super mild.

Scott: It’s not, it doesn’t even taste as strong as if somebody stuck a lemon wedge on my coffee and it was dripping into the coffee.

Peter: Okay.

Scott: It’s really, it’s good.

Scott: It’s good coffee.

Scott: It’s very mellow.

Scott: But like always happens to me, and the common theme is always me, the coffee drinker, Scott Wilsey, I can’t taste all the flavors they say I should, but it’s also smooth and mild and inoffensive.

Scott: So I don’t know if the whole world of coffee has gone subtle.

Scott: Everybody’s practicing their art of subtlety, and you’re supposed to determine your ability or correctness or righteousness to be inducted into the coffee inner circle because you can taste those things, or if they just list three things, hoping that your mind will tell you that you taste one of them.

Scott: I don’t know.

Scott: What do you think?

Scott: Help me understand.

Peter: I don’t necessarily taste all the things that are on a list like that, whether it’s coffee or wine or even beer.

Peter: So, yeah, I don’t think it’s necessarily bad, or I’m not going to say that you’re an inferior coffee drinker because you, you know, can’t, like, taste all the things and stuff.

Peter: No, I don’t know.

Scott: Oh, I thought you were going to say it.

Scott: I’m not going to say you’re an inferior coffee drinker because you can’t taste anything, you idiot.

Scott: You said you idiot a lot last time, Peter.

Scott: By the way, oh wait, it won’t be last time by the time people listen to this episode.

Scott: There’s two episodes in between.

Peter: Type cookie, you idiot.

Scott: No, did you notice that at the end, you called people idiot a lot more than normal in episode 68?

Peter: I did not.

Peter: I did not notice that.

Scott: I think it was 68.

Peter: No, no, I did not notice that.

Scott: You didn’t listen to the Neater Piccolitis and-

Peter: That wasn’t me.

Scott: Oh, oh, that wasn’t you.

Peter: It was not me.

Scott: No, it was you.

Scott: It’s just for some reason, you kept calling yourself Neater Piccolitis, and I don’t understand.

Peter: Yeah, I don’t know what was going on with that.

Peter: But I was drinking motor oil.

Scott: But as you pointed out, you wouldn’t have splurged for the Royal Purple if that was real.

Peter: Yeah.

Peter: So it was obviously not me.

Scott: Right.

Scott: Okay.

Peter: Oh, boy.

Peter: All right.

Scott: Peter, now that our blood pressure is slowly…

Scott: I mean, I thought I was going to stroke out for a minute there.

Peter: I’m going to throw this blood pressure cuff on right now.

Peter: Real-time feedback, everybody.

Peter: I’m going to take my blood pressure right now to see what are the effects of having to deal with Audio Hijack Pro and…

Scott: This is a new segment we call How Close to Death is Peter Nicolaitis?

Peter: Now, I’m supposed to be sitting down to do this, but whatever.

Peter: Let’s just see what happens.

Peter: Oh, the batteries are dead.

Peter: I guess I’m not taking my blood pressure today.

Scott: Oh, well, that is so perfect.

Scott: That is so in line with everything else that’s happened so far today.

Peter: Yep.

Peter: Oh, man.

Peter: That’s awesome.

Peter: All right.

Peter: So I need some AAAs in here.

Scott: All right.

Scott: Well, before we start on our main topics, I have a quality of life improvement.

Scott: I don’t know if you’ve noticed, these aren’t my normal glasses.

Scott: These are single focus…

Peter: Computer glasses, yes.

Scott: These are my computer only glasses.

Scott: Oh, yeah.

Scott: And I can see everything.

Scott: I don’t have to do this.

Scott: I don’t have to tilt.

Scott: I don’t have to stare.

Scott: I don’t have to say, someone help me.

Scott: It’s amazing.

Scott: Anyway.

Peter: Those of you who are not watching the video, which is pretty much every one, because I’m the only one watching the video, Scott is contorting his head in various ways that makes him look like he’s being adjusted by an invisible chiropractor.

Scott: Yes, it is an invisible chiropractor.

Scott: A bad one, the kind that broke your knee.

Peter: Man, that was not a chiropractor.

Peter: That was a massage therapist.

Scott: Oh, whatever.

Scott: Well, same thing.

Peter: Yeah, same thing, exactly.

Scott: Same amount of school, right?

Peter: Totally same thing.

Peter: Same amount of doctor.

Scott: That would make a great advertisement.

Peter: I mean, I think it’s a great show title right there.

Peter: Look at that.

Peter: Yes.

Peter: So.

Scott: Oh, my God.

Scott: Okay, Peter, what do you want to talk about?

Scott: You had some things on the list.

Peter: Well, we have a number of things.

Peter: Well, first off, you heard that someone that we know and love, or at least know, is laying off?

Scott: Yes.

Scott: I don’t know if the listener knows, but I think we’ve talked about it here before.

Scott: I switch 99.99% of my Gmail accounts over to Fastmail.

Scott: Everything I have is in Fastmail now with my custom domains.

Peter: Yep.

Scott: And I like it.

Scott: I do pay for it.

Scott: It cost us money, but I am okay with that in exchange for not having to use Google for everything.

Scott: Especially my own personal email.

Scott: It’d be one thing if it was business mail.

Scott: I don’t really have anything to hide.

Scott: It’s not that I have anything to hide personally.

Scott: It’s just my personal mail and I have family members that also use it.

Scott: Right.

Peter: And I switched to Fastmail a little over a year ago myself too.

Scott: Yeah.

Scott: And their system was painless.

Scott: They’re really good company.

Scott: They have got a good setup.

Scott: It just works.

Scott: Their guides on how to transfer everything over is great.

Peter: Yep.

Scott: And today, I saw somebody I messed up on saying, hey, I’m one of the people from Fastmail that’s getting laid off.

Scott: And I haven’t had a chance to look into it at all yet, but that doesn’t sound good, Peter.

Peter: I was just wondering, did they get acquired?

Peter: Are they getting acquired by a venture or a private equity firm?

Scott: Maybe they got acquired by one password who got acquired by…

Scott: Okay, hold on here.

Scott: fastmail.com.

Peter: Real-time review.

Peter: You get to watch us do research.

Scott: Yeah, Fastmail News.

Scott: What the hell is happening with Fastmail?

Scott: I don’t see anything.

Scott: I don’t see anything.

Scott: Google doesn’t find anything.

Scott: Okay.

Peter: I mean, I don’t know they’re a huge provider, but then again, this company has been buying things like Bartender and Voicestream.

Peter: So I have to imagine that they’re at least that big.

Scott: Yeah, I don’t know.

Peter: Anyway, so we’re monitoring the situation, which is using my favorite definition of the word monitoring, which is doing absolutely nothing about.

Scott: And hoping somebody will tell us what’s going on.

Scott: Here’s the thing.

Scott: Here’s how useless search engines are.

Scott: I typed fast mail layoffs.

Scott: Okay.

Scott: I get stuff about Goldman Sachs.

Scott: I get stuff.

Scott: Here’s one that says, cuts layoffs expected in new Lane County budget.

Scott: What?

Peter: That’s good.

Scott: I don’t…

Peter: That’s fast and some of the layoffs will include people who deliver the mail.

Scott: Right.

Scott: That’s true.

Scott: It must be.

Peter: That’s awesome.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: Well, that sucks.

Peter: Maybe.

Peter: Maybe it’s like, maybe they’re just letting go of a bunch of people who suck at their jobs.

Scott: I don’t know.

Scott: I don’t know.

Scott: Yeah.

Scott: Based on that one toot on MasterDone, I would not say that guy sucks at his job.

Peter: Based on that one toot, which is a whole lot of info to go on.

Scott: I feel like I know him pretty well.

Peter: So I made a trip to the place in Vermont for the first time in a month.

Peter: Drove up and back post surgery for the first time.

Peter: And I realized that I had a bunch of different things left over that I needed to buy to finish it out.

Peter: So in a furious fit of spending, I sent thousands of money, thousands of dollars, thousands of money, thousands of monies.

Peter: I sent my monies, just like Nigerian scammers would have me do.

Peter: Please send monies.

Peter: I sent lots of monies to Home Depot.

Peter: Lots of monies.

Peter: So I bought shower heads and shower head controllers, countertops, faucet for the kitchen sink, couple of toilets, freestanding floor style faucet for the bathroom tub.

Peter: And then I realized after I placed all these different…

Peter: And these were all different orders, because I was like, oh, I need to order one of these.

Peter: Oh, okay, great, got it, ordered.

Peter: Oh, wait, I need to order this.

Peter: Great, got it, ordered.

Peter: And so of course, I didn’t consolidate these into a single order.

Peter: I did like five separate orders.

Peter: And then when I got to the end, I realized I had literally ordered everything but the kitchen sink.

Scott: Oh my God.

Peter: So then I ordered the kitchen sink.

Peter: Now, here’s the problem.

Peter: I’m here doing all this on my iPad from Vermont.

Peter: And I realized when I started, my mistake was I had my NordVPN connected.

Peter: So, it’s a, we’ll send you to the closest store here in Manhattan.

Peter: I’m like, no, no, cancel.

Peter: Okay, disconnect, start over.

Peter: But don’t send me to the closest store.

Peter: You know my favorite store, right?

Peter: Send me to the one right over in Lebanon, New Hampshire where my contractor can pick up all his stuff, right?

Peter: Let’s use that one.

Peter: Great.

Peter: We’ll send you to the closest Home Depot in Rutland, Vermont.

Peter: And like, no.

Peter: And so every time I’m ordering these things, I’m trying to place things into my cart and I go to check out, but I have to stop and say, okay, wait, nope, someone else will pick it up for me.

Peter: Here’s his name.

Peter: Here’s his email.

Peter: Not that it matters because they never email the person that you say is going to pick up your stuff.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: Pick it up here at this store.

Peter: Well, apparently I screwed that up a couple of times.

Peter: Now, here’s the thing.

Peter: Since I ordered five different things, right?

Peter: So, okay, one of them is the Showerhead and stuff.

Peter: Let me just see where that’s going.

Scott: Who’s the lucky recipient of Peter’s Showerhead?

Peter: Well, I can’t see where it’s going yet.

Peter: I can look at the receipt.

Peter: Maybe that will tell me.

Peter: No, I can’t look at the receipt.

Peter: I could print it, but I can’t look at it.

Peter: So I just have to take it on faith that nearly $2,000 of Showerhead supply is going to the right place.

Peter: Okay, great.

Peter: Hold that thought.

Peter: Now, let’s go up a little bit.

Peter: So that was the Showerhead.

Peter: Now, on to the countertops.

Peter: Countertops, track delivery.

Peter: That I can track the delivery.

Peter: Yeah, that’s going to Lebanon, New Hampshire.

Peter: Pickup person, Peter.

Peter: Okay, so I screwed up the pickup person on that one, although it’s going to the right place.

Peter: All right.

Peter: Now, there’s the kitchen faucet.

Peter: Deliver to, yep, and pickup person, Peter, again.

Peter: I canceled this order, or I requested to cancel this order.

Scott: Wait, wait, wait, wait, if these are all Peter, you could just have him say, I’m Peter.

Peter: Yeah, exactly.

Peter: But it’s the wrong color, right?

Peter: So this one was brass, but I realized it wasn’t going to match the stainless steel sink, because get this, they don’t carry any brass colored sinks.

Peter: So I canceled that.

Peter: All right, fine.

Peter: Now, a couple of toilets.

Peter: Let’s take a look.

Peter: Hasn’t shipped yet, so I can’t tell where it’s going or who’s supposed to pick it up.

Peter: Wonderful.

Peter: Fine.

Peter: Moving on.

Peter: Kitchen, sink and faucet ready for pickup.

Peter: Pickup person, Peter Nicolaitis.

Peter: OK, now, given that I had a bunch of emails, right, or a bunch of orders, maybe I messed up one time.

Peter: None of these, and I mean none of these have his name on them.

Peter: And I typed his name in and his email address many times while I was doing these orders.

Peter: But wait, there’s one more order.

Peter: The freestanding Roman style faucet bathtub filler.

Peter: That one’s delivering to Everett, massachusetts, Home Depot, closest to my place here in massachusetts.

Peter: And the pickup person is me.

Scott: I thought for sure the pickup person was going to be him this time.

Peter: Yeah, you’d think, right?

Peter: But as far as I can tell, at this point, every order is either nebulous or wrong.

Peter: And I know I made a couple of mistakes while I was doing this.

Peter: I did not screw up every single order.

Scott: Peter, I think every order is nebulous and wrong.

Peter: At this point, I’m starting to feel that way too.

Scott: Oh my God.

Scott: What a hell.

Peter: So this is fun, you know.

Peter: So now here’s the thing.

Peter: They also sent me a message too.

Peter: And they’re like, okay, this should be in stock by July 2nd.

Peter: This will be in stock by July, you know, June 29th.

Peter: And then the others are, you must pick this up by June 29th.

Peter: So the problem is, you know, I don’t want to tell my dude, go there and pick these up on June 29th and now go back three days later and pick up the rest of the stuff or pick up other stuff, right?

Scott: You got to.

Peter: The good news is, the fix to all of these is you call the store where it’s actually going and you just tell them, hey, just hold it for me.

Peter: because last month, what happened is I ordered a bunch of stuff from the same Home Depot, had three different orders.

Peter: They picked them up and they picked up one was a bathtub.

Peter: And this is an expensive bathtub.

Peter: Let’s just leave it at that, right?

Peter: This is a full 72 inch, like, you know, 14 foot deep bathtub.

Scott: Does this bathtub wash your butt for you by any chance?

Peter: No, the toilets do, but the bathtub does not.

Scott: Okay, good.

Peter: So it was, I ordered it on Monday, May 13th.

Peter: And I look online, it says picked up on May 21st.

Peter: They were texting me in June, saying, please pick up your order by May 24th.

Peter: And they kept on texting me.

Peter: And so I called and my contractor was like, yeah, I’ve got the tub.

Peter: It’s right here.

Peter: I’m like, okay, good.

Peter: So I called the store.

Peter: The guy at the store insisted that he had not picked up the tub.

Peter: And I’m like, I’m really tempted to tell my contractor to go there, pick it up, and then return it and get money back for it, if that’s the case.

Scott: Oh my God.

Scott: First of all, they think you’re a time traveler.

Scott: Second, they can’t figure out whether or not an item that has been picked up is still in the store or not.

Scott: Like, that would be a big box.

Scott: I would think they would notice the space where it used to be.

Peter: You’d think, you’d think.

Peter: But again, Home Depot is a big place.

Peter: I mean, you’re talking about like trying to find the Ark of the Covenant there somewhere.

Scott: Well, I wish they would, and I wish they would open it, and I wish they would all melt into goo.

Peter: Like a bunch of Nazis.

Peter: This is insane.

Scott: The whole point of the internet, this is the thing, the whole point of the internet, the reason it was invented, and the reason why What’s-his-face designed web browsers and the web.

Scott: What was this thing?

Peter: Tim Berners-Lee.

Scott: Yeah, yeah.

Scott: Is so that no one would ever have to talk to anyone else again.

Scott: They were like, I’m tired of talking to people.

Scott: I know the Internet, and that’s why they invented it, but it’s not working.

Scott: It’s not working.

Peter: Yeah.

Peter: It’s not working at all.

Peter: I mean, I thought that a lot constantly when I was at my previous job, but like about how much time and effort is wasted, just making IT continue to work.

Peter: It’s like at what point are we at diminishing returns, and we’d be better off just scrapping all this and going back to a pencil and paper.

Scott: But we can’t.

Scott: I honestly think most of society would crumble.

Scott: Like people wouldn’t know how to function.

Scott: Nobody, when you go to, what’s your favorite drive-thru restaurant?

Scott: Do you have a drive-thru restaurant that you like?

Scott: I mean, you and I don’t eat fast food for the most part, but anyway, those kids would never be able to, they wouldn’t know what to do.

Scott: You’d never get your food because they wouldn’t know what to charge you, and you’d give them money and they wouldn’t know how to give you your change.

Scott: They would insist, I don’t know, it’d be crazy.

Scott: It’d be chaos.

Scott: Is that the worst I can come up with of society crumbling, is that the kid at Taco Bell can’t give you your change?

Scott: It probably would be worse than that.

Peter: I mean, we knew that already.

Peter: Like I hired a kid back when I owned a coffee shop, I hired a kid who was supposedly really smart, really sharp kid, really good.

Peter: He’s got so much potential, couldn’t make change.

Peter: Like the cash register told him how much to give back, but he couldn’t figure out how to pick it out of the cash register.

Scott: Okay, that’s pretty lame.

Scott: Now I have had people where they think you give them a 10 and you actually gave them a 20, and you show it to them in the register, you go, this is what I gave you.

Scott: And then they don’t know what to do.

Scott: They’re like, but the register says, I give you this much.

Scott: I’m like, it’s another $10, add $10 to the what?

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: Or have you ever given someone like, you know, your bill is $3 and 35 cents, and you give, I’m trying to think of an example, the change that they’re supposed to give you is equals $5 and something, but you give them an extra $5 so that they’ll give you back a $10 and whatever.

Peter: That just blows people’s minds.

Scott: Well, to be fair, I haven’t seen anybody do that in decades because everyone knows that no one can handle it anymore.

Peter: Bingo.

Scott: Exactly.

Peter: I also have not done it in quite a long time.

Scott: When I was younger, many, many, many, many years ago before I started my 30-some career at Monolith 3000, and I worked in customer retail jobs, I would see people do that and it would blow the minds of the people I was working with and they wouldn’t know what to do.

Scott: Of course, I also worked with people who, I worked in a video rental for a while.

Scott: One movie was $3, two movies were $3.95.

Scott: Then it would start over again.

Scott: The third movie was another $3, the fourth movie was $0.95.

Peter: So you want to buy them in pairs?

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: See, that’s a pattern that I just recognized.

Scott: So if you had four movies, I told them you can figure out the change.

Scott: just pretend like it’s $4 for two movies.

Scott: And then if they get four of them, you’re giving them back 10 cents.

Scott: Why am I giving them back 10 cents?

Scott: Okay, let’s say they got two.

Scott: You’re giving them back 5 cents.

Scott: They couldn’t comprehend this, Peter.

Peter: Yeah.

Peter: Well, certain people, I’ll say, certain people’s minds and brains work differently.

Peter: Like you and I will often approach problems and stuff very differently.

Peter: But yeah, some of this is just basic math, but they haven’t been taught basic math like that.

Scott: But even if you hadn’t thought of that yourself, which is fair enough, like you say, fair enough.

Scott: But if somebody explained it to you, $3.95 is five cents less than $4.

Scott: So you do the math.

Scott: If you have two things with five cents less than the whole amount, that’s 10 cents, five plus five is 10.

Scott: I know you can do that.

Scott: I know you can.

Scott: All right.

Scott: So what are you going to do about your orders?

Scott: Are you canceling them all?

Peter: No, I’m going to wait on some of them.

Peter: And I guess the other, I’m supposed to be heading back up to Vermont on July 3rd.

Peter: So I will just drive to the Everett Home Depot on July 2nd and pick up the shower, the tub floor standing, you know, filler tub filler.

Scott: Are you allowed to have fire?

Scott: What’s the firework situation in Vermont?

Peter: Vermont, you’re nuts.

Peter: The fireworks are illegal, but most of the local municipalities turn a blind eye on the third and the fourth.

Scott: So are you going to light it up at your dad’s house, at your house?

Peter: Unlikely.

Peter: Probably not.

Peter: I may go out shooting out back.

Scott: At your MacBook Pro.

Scott: Right.

Peter: But I’m not going to use fireworks.

Peter: No, I’m not going to use like little firecrackers or bottle rockers.

Peter: That might hurt somebody.

Peter: I’m just going to use my 12 gauge.

Scott: Oh, I thought you were going to bust out the 50 cal and just go to town on Home Depot’s website.

Peter: You know, if I could find my old Chromebook that I gave to my dad.

Peter: Oh, man.

Peter: So OK, so that’s fun.

Peter: Let’s move on.

Peter: Let’s not talk about Macbooks just yet.

Peter: Let’s hold that one.

Peter: But tell me about Warp AI, dog.

Peter: Damn it.

Scott: I’m having to scroll up a mile and a half past a bunch of swear words while we were trying to connect to each other.

Scott: Oh, there it is.

Scott: So Warp AI has changed.

Scott: In the past, Warp, the terminal program that we use to do terminal things.

Peter: We’re not the only ones use it.

Peter: Apparently, some famous people, at least in our circles, use it too.

Scott: Yeah, apparently so.

Scott: But John Gruber knows about it.

Scott: They’ve sponsored it, and he talked about the AI specifically.

Scott: So I don’t know.

Scott: You never know with John Gruber what he actually knows and doesn’t know.

Scott: He’s great.

Scott: I love his podcast.

Scott: He knows so much about Max and stuff like that, but he can also be a little out of touch with things that he didn’t learn when he was in Drexel University.

Scott: Anyway, I didn’t say that out loud, did I?

Scott: Sorry.

Scott: Like I said, I like his show.

Scott: I like him.

Scott: Not a complaint.

Peter: I subscribe to his show, but I’ll confess, I generally only listen to it when you send me a clip or something like that, because I get more value out of listening to the Accidental Tech podcast people summarize what Gruber has either written or said.

Scott: Yeah, but you’re more of a listen for information.

Scott: Gruber tends to go down memory lane and have shows that are fun for me to listen to, because he’s of a similar era to me in terms of his computer use.

Peter: It can be fun, but yeah, that’s generally, generally I want to know like what am I listening to?

Peter: Why am I listening to it?

Scott: And anyway, so Warp AI is a little bit different now.

Scott: It used to be you would hit Control Space and it would pop open a pane to the side and you would type your stuff in there and it would give you answers.

Scott: Now it’s contextual, it’s right in line.

Scott: And so at your command prompt, you just start typing a question or something like that.

Scott: And let’s say you’re getting an error.

Scott: Let’s say you’re trying to run a script that does something in MySQL and it’s failing because your version of PHP is different now.

Scott: I don’t know if this rings any bells.

Scott: Anyway.

Peter: No, it’s never happened.

Scott: So then what you can do is you can run the script to get the error message right.

Scott: And you remember how Warp has blocks.

Scott: So now your command to run that script and the output, which includes the error, is in the block right above your command prompt.

Scott: So you can say, what is happening here?

Scott: Question mark, hit command, up arrow, which attaches that block as context to your question.

Scott: And then it will say, oh, based on the error, here’s what I think is happening.

Scott: And then you’ll say, well, great, fix it for me.

Scott: And it will say, do I have permission to do this thing?

Scott: And you say, yep.

Scott: And it will edit the file for you and bam, it’s great.

Peter: So essentially, Warp AI has turned the command prompt into an English language prompt.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: If you want to.

Scott: If you want to, that’s the key.

Scott: If you want to.

Scott: And you don’t have to.

Scott: You can completely ignore it or you can just use it when appropriate.

Scott: And again, like, here’s a mini tangent.

Scott: I heard somebody that I won’t name on a Mac related podcast this last week talking about GPT and AI in general.

Scott: And he was saying all it’s going to do is teach you bad programming.

Scott: People won’t know how to learn.

Scott: People won’t be able to learn programming for themselves, and they won’t know how to fix the problems that AI does because it’s wrong most time.

Scott: First of all, wrong most of the time probably depends heavily on the model you’re using.

Scott: because I canceled my GitHub Copilot subscription and I’m using Codium in VS Code.

Scott: It is wrong way more often than any other one I’ve ever used.

Scott: And I think it’s flipping between GPT-35 models and GPT-4 models, I’m not sure.

Scott: For sure, it doesn’t always use, because I’m not paying for it and it’s not using my account.

Scott: And what I’ve heard is it will use different models depending on what it thinks it needs to use.

Scott: Probably in order to save them money, obviously.

Scott: And it gets stuff wrong.

Scott: It got some CSS wrong for me the other day and I’m like, dude, you’re not even trying.

Scott: And then it, you know, I said, hey, refactor the script and take these three functions and make them into one function because they’re very similar.

Scott: And it took out some template variables, variables that I was using as templates for a replacement string and it completely didn’t put those in and just failed and I was like, I paste it immediately into Raycast AI and it gave me the correct refactored version.

Scott: I could tell just by looking, this will work and it worked.

Peter: Okay.

Scott: So it does depend heavily on what models you’re using.

Scott: I guarantee it.

Scott: But for me, it is good for programming.

Scott: And the thing is, is that I can look at it when it’s wrong or it does something wrong or it’s just not listening to what I’m saying and it’s doing something different.

Scott: I can look at it and spot it right away.

Scott: The point isn’t these are great for people who don’t know how to program, although they might be.

Scott: Maybe you can look at the code and kind of get an idea and learn something.

Peter: Sure.

Scott: Of course, right?

Scott: because that’s how we learn.

Scott: We look at sample programs.

Peter: Sure.

Scott: We look at other people’s code, etc, etc.

Scott: So maybe it can help you learn.

Scott: But it’s just a time saver.

Scott: The whole point of it is not to let me write a brilliant program that I could never write by myself.

Scott: No, the point is I could do this.

Scott: But when I’m writing a style sheet and it knows based on the stuff that I’ve done above, what I’m going to type next, because I’ve got another CSS variable that I want to define, it’ll define it for me and 99 percent of the time it’s correct.

Scott: That saves time.

Scott: It’s just something I don’t have to type.

Scott: All I have to do is hit tab.

Peter: Yep.

Scott: Why would I not do that?

Scott: because that’s even faster than copying and pasting and changing the one value that I need to change.

Peter: I mean, it’s kind of like pointing and clicking, right?

Peter: I mean, you could say that…

Peter: I mean, and now here’s…

Peter: I’m someone who loves to stay in the command line, right?

Peter: But there are a lot of things that I can do faster by pointing and clicking.

Peter: And when that’s the case, I’ll do that.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: So, you know, but I don’t think my command line skills have gotten any worse since I’ve been clicking.

Scott: So, you know.

Scott: That’s a clicker.

Peter: Yeah, that’s a clicker.

Peter: I mean, it’s like saying, I mean, you could make the same, I would say you could make the same argument against learning any programming language other than Assembler, you know?

Peter: just learn assembly code.

Peter: That’s all you need to do.

Peter: Then there’s no reason to learn anything higher level than that.

Peter: Or machine language.

Peter: just raw machine language.

Peter: Ones and zeros.

Peter: Go there.

Scott: Besides, I think that the motivation to actually learn something well, regardless of what tools you use to help you accomplish it, that’s always going to be part of that individual.

Scott: If somebody is not going to learn how to program, they’re not going to learn how to program no matter what, whether they have GPT or don’t have GPT.

Scott: You can take them back to pre-personal computer days, and they’re not going to try any harder to learn how to program.

Scott: So to me, that just sounds like an old man argument.

Peter: Yeah.

Peter: I think so.

Peter: Sure, there are going to be lazy people who are never going to learn anything, but that’s true anytime.

Peter: So whatever.

Scott: Okay.

Scott: Enough about that, Ran.

Scott: But anyway, try out the new Warp AI integration.

Scott: It’s really nice, and I will say it seems pretty capable.

Peter: Well, as it happens, I’m getting an error in my Z login file, which I can’t fix, and it’s pretty hilarious because I asked Warp AI, how do I fix this?

Peter: And the error I’m getting is userspeter.zlogin colon 17 colon unmatched double quotes.

Peter: So, I look at line 17 and I don’t see any unmatched double quotes.

Peter: In fact, I scanned the entire file and all the double quotes appear in pairs throughout the entire thing.

Peter: So, I asked Warp and it’s like, oh, yeah, here’s the problem.

Peter: Would you like to correct this problem?

Peter: I was like, sure.

Peter: And the correction is to replace that line with exactly the same line.

Scott: There’s some kind of special character.

Scott: Wait, what editor are you using?

Peter: It’s the same.

Peter: It’s the same.

Peter: Exactly the same.

Scott: And it did not work, of course.

Peter: Did not work.

Peter: And I’ve tried re-

Peter: you know, I…

Peter: Yeah, so that’s annoying.

Peter: I don’t know what’s going on.

Peter: But I’ve noticed, again, weird behavior in the Mac OS command line thing for a while now.

Peter: Here’s the other thing, too, though, is it’s telling me that it’s still line 17, even though I moved that offending line up three lines.

Peter: It’s still saying line 17 is the problem every time I start a new zshell.

Peter: So that’s a little weird.

Scott: How are you starting a new zshell?

Scott: Are you starting a new session?

Peter: I’m just opening Warp.

Peter: just opening Warp.

Peter: I quit Warp and open a new one.

Peter: Or I open a new tab or whatever.

Peter: What if I just type zsh?

Peter: If I type just zsh, nothing new there.

Peter: So it doesn’t give me an error.

Scott: What happens if you type source.zushersi?

Peter: You mean.zlogin?

Scott: Oh.

Scott: Oh, yeah.

Scott: Login, whatever.

Peter: It’s my.zlogin.

Scott: I don’t have a.zlogin.

Peter: Onmashline17.

Peter: I don’t know what’s going on.

Scott: What do you have in your.zlogin?

Scott: Do I have a.zlogin?

Peter: All kinds of stuff.

Peter: I have all kinds of stuff in my.zlogin.

Peter: What’s in your.zlogin?

Scott: I have a.zcomp dump.

Scott: I have a.zprofile.

Scott: I have a.zsh under history.

Scott: I have a.zshenv.

Scott: I have a.zshrc, but that’s it.

Scott: I don’t have a.zlogin.

Peter: So I looked into it.

Peter: There’s like.zlogin,.

Peter: zshrc, and a.zprofile.

Peter: And I think, well, I stopped on zlogin because I read an article which essentially said in Mac OS, they’re all pretty much the same.

Peter: So I just consolidated everything into my.zlogin file.

Scott: Oh, okay.

Scott: It’s executed after.zshrc.

Peter: Right.

Peter: But one of them executed like when you would any time, I forget what the criteria for executing those were, but they were different.

Peter: And some of them would happen anytime you open up a new window, and others would only happen like anytime you start a new login.

Peter: So I ended up, whatever, I don’t remember my rationale, but I ended up putting them all in.zlogin.

Peter: That’s where I stopped.

Scott: Well, I can tell you that I don’t have one, and I don’t have that error.

Peter: Nope, there you go.

Peter: Well, I just deleted a ton of different lines out of my.zlogin file and the same error persists.

Peter: So I’m going to say that it’s lying.

Peter: I deleted like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 lines of all that stuff before line 17, and it’s still telling me that the error is on line 17.

Scott: So rename that file to something else and then touch.zlogin and see what happens.

Peter: Move.zlogin to.zlogin.back, touch.zlogin, and quit warp, and warp.

Peter: It didn’t complain this time.

Scott: Okay.

Scott: I just thought maybe warp itself is caching things in a weird way.

Scott: Didn’t you find a bug with them that you reported?

Peter: No.

Scott: Oh, that was your own script that was the problem.

Peter: I had something, yeah, something wrong there.

Peter: Okay.

Peter: So I moved.zlogin.back to.zlogin, and now I’m going to run warp again.

Scott: This is fascinating.

Peter: Unmatched double quotes.

Scott: Peter, you and your double quotes.

Scott: Tell the warp AI to count the number of double quotes in the doeszlogin, and give you a number.

Peter: That’d be helpful.

Peter: So helpful.

Scott: Well, they’re unmatched.

Scott: There’s one missing.

Peter: Man, I tell you.

Peter: So yeah, I don’t know what that…

Peter: I’m counting myself and everything’s fine.

Peter: But it’s just weird that the error stays on line 17, no matter where, no matter what’s on line 17, that’s where the problem is.

Peter: So I need a 16-line zlogin file, obviously.

Scott: I don’t want to tell you how to do your job, but this is where I would paste it into an editor that has autocomplete and syntax highlighting, because if there actually is an error in that file, it will find it for you.

Peter: Well, let me just use TextMate and open that up.

Scott: Well, TextMate probably doesn’t know a bash from a, or a zoosh from a, I guess TextMate’s old.

Peter: It might.

Peter: I mean, if I can find a bundle, is that what I’m looking for?

Scott: See, that’s the thing I hate about TextMate.

Scott: Everything requires a new bundle.

Scott: You got to go find a bundle.

Scott: Hey, what, you want to open this file with your TextMate?

Scott: You got to go load that bundle.

Peter: Yeah, there’s a lot of things that are bundles and extensions and plugins and stuff.

Peter: So anyway, all right, where were we?

Scott: All I can say is, I won’t be meeting with TextMate anytime soon.

Peter: Don’t mate with your text, it’s painful.

Peter: All right, what else we got?

Scott: I don’t know, you had a whole list.

Scott: You wanted to talk about Fastmail, which we did.

Scott: You wanted to talk about Cloud.

Scott: You want to talk about Home Depot.

Scott: You want to talk about Coffee.

Scott: You want to talk about MacBooks.

Scott: You want to talk about wardrobe, parenthesis minus malfunction, parenthesis.

Peter: No malfunctions.

Peter: Yeah, I went shopping.

Peter: My girlfriend informed me yesterday that she didn’t like the way my pants looked.

Peter: Not just one pair, but all of them.

Peter: So she insists that I-

Scott: Are you one of those guys that wears your pants too low?

Scott: Is that why she didn’t like them?

Peter: We’ve had these conversations and know you know I’m not.

Peter: just because you’re the guy who wants to walk up behind some kid who has his pants down below his waist and pull them down to his knees.

Peter: Now, I think that says more about you than me about you wanting to go up and pull guy’s pants down, but I’m not judging.

Peter: I’m not judging.

Scott: I’m pantsing.

Scott: It’s revenge for me being a nerd in high school.

Peter: Bingo.

Peter: Oh, brother.

Peter: So, no.

Peter: So we went to this Uniqlo.

Peter: I don’t know if you got those out there.

Peter: Probably do.

Peter: It’s a Japanese store brand.

Scott: The only Japanese store brands we have around here for clothing.

Scott: Everything costs a minimum of $200.

Scott: No, I’m talking about clothes.

Scott: The only Japanese clothes stores I found around here, the cheapest, dinkiest item is $200 and it just goes up.

Peter: Okay.

Peter: Well, I walked out of there spending around 300 bucks, but I had several pairs of pants and socks and underwear and shirts.

Scott: Man, I want this.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: So anyway, check it out.

Peter: See if you’ve got one in your place.

Peter: Uni-Clo, C-L-O, U-N-I-C-L-O.

Peter: I’m pretty happy.

Peter: The cut and the fit are a little different than what I’m normally used to, but it fits and she seems happy with it.

Peter: So I’m like, okay, cool.

Scott: Hey, what’s your body proportions?

Scott: Do you have longer…

Scott: Is your torso shorter than your legs, for example, proportionally speaking?

Scott: cause that’s me.

Peter: My torso is shorter.

Peter: My legs are longer than my torso.

Scott: Okay, and it still works for you?

Peter: Yes.

Scott: Okay.

Scott: Hey, these are pretty cool.

Scott: I think I can order these online.

Peter: You can.

Peter: So yeah, that’s a free plug.

Peter: They’re not a sponsor of this podcast.

Scott: They should be.

Peter: If they’d like to, sure, we would not turn them away.

Scott: Can you please send Pearson Pan?

Scott: His girlfriend hates the way he looks.

Peter: What if I just ask Warp AI, what’s wrong with my.zlogin file?

Peter: I need to run this and inspect the file.

Peter: Can I inspect it?

Peter: Yes, cat it.

Peter: There are some potential issues.

Peter: Incorrect path variable manipulation.

Peter: Instead of quote, hashtag, which is a comment, path plus equals open parens users, Peter bin, closed parens, you should use the same exact line again.

Peter: It’s gaslighting me.

Peter: It’s like instead of X, you should use X.

Peter: I don’t know, man.

Peter: I’m not getting much out of this Warp AI today.

Peter: Usually, it’s pretty good.

Scott: Yeah, usually it’s pretty good.

Scott: I haven’t had that.

Scott: I’ve had a couple dumb answers here and there where I’m like, okay, I’m ignoring you and I’m going back to Rake SDI, but.

Peter: Syntax error in a function, okay?

Peter: So there’s missing closing quote for one of my functions, it says.

Peter: I didn’t see that.

Peter: So that might help.

Peter: How that’s getting down to line 17 all the time, I have no idea.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: Well, there is a missing close quote right there.

Peter: Look at that.

Peter: And I did just make that today.

Peter: So that explains a lot.

Peter: So now that’s on not line seven.

Peter: Oh my God, this is such a classic human error.

Peter: It’s on line 70.

Peter: Not 17, but it’s on line seven zero.

Peter: Wouldn’t that be a kick in the pants if AI just read it wrong and transposed it?

Scott: But where does the function get called?

Peter: It doesn’t.

Peter: I call it from the command line.

Scott: Oh.

Scott: What?

Peter: But that fixed it.

Scott: Oh, I see.

Scott: You have scripts and stuff in there.

Peter: Yeah, it’s a script.

Peter: It’s an abbreviation.

Peter: I call it Claude, and it’s actually calling the fabric command, but it’s specifying to use the Claude model.

Peter: Other than that, it’s just fabric.

Peter: But that’s funny because no matter what I did, it was saying the error was on line 17.

Peter: I think that’s the red herring.

Peter: It’s not on line 17.

Scott: Yeah, but I’ve never believed…

Scott: Any time anything’s logging errors, I’ve never believed it.

Scott: Tell me.

Scott: Well, I mean, unless it literally is right there.

Peter: Right, but usually I’ve seen it relative.

Peter: You know, it’s either on the lines that’s there, or it’s somewhere above.

Scott: Usually, yeah.

Peter: But I deleted 10 lines, and it stayed on line 17.

Peter: So it was actually on line 7D, which means when I deleted it, it was on line 60.

Peter: But Warp or the Warp Shell, Zshell insisted it was on line 17 every time.

Scott: But here’s what I don’t know about Zshell.

Scott: I’m probably just making this up, and I’m probably 100% wrong.

Scott: But I don’t know how Zshell takes into account both.

Scott: Like, if you have a ZSHRC, and you have a Zlogin, and you have some other custom files, maybe it compiles those things.

Peter: Which I don’t anymore, though.

Peter: I got rid of everything but the.Zlogin, that’s the time.

Scott: Oh, okay.

Scott: Well, I don’t know.

Scott: It’s gotta be some way that Zshell parses it, though.

Scott: It has to have something to do with that.

Scott: Anyway.

Scott: Great.

Peter: Yeah, there you go.

Peter: And then the last thing that I have to share is, I have spent a lot of time, if you see the picture I sent you, reorganizing the basement.

Peter: And given that we are now on Sunday Night Savage World Sessions, we are getting back to my gaming roots, and we are playing through a bunch of classic Dungeons and Dragons basic set modules.

Peter: And it’s an amazing walk down memory lane, like waves of nostalgia.

Peter: So a few weeks ago, while I was cleaning out the basement, I came across my old D&D books, and I’m like, I want to do this again.

Peter: So I told the group, hey, we’re going to stay using the new Savage Worlds game system rules that we use, but we’re going to play these adventures.

Peter: So essentially, we’re telling, we’re using the game, but we’re playing these stories that were defined here.

Peter: So I went to Upwork, and I hired a dude to do data entry.

Peter: And he is essentially at my direction, converting all of these classic D&D games and adding them into our Foundry virtual tabletop, because you can’t buy B2 Keep on the Borderlands, it’s a classic, classic dungeon from the 80s, a classic game from the 80s.

Peter: I have my copy right here.

Peter: So, you know, classic.

Peter: This is, you know, this is like a 40-year-old game.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: And, you know, it was a simpler time.

Peter: All goblins were evil, all orcs were evil, all, you know, elves were fighters, magic users, all dwarves were fighters, etc.

Peter: Oh, I just dropped it again.

Scott: Are you saying that now we have to be all woke about these other creatures?

Peter: Oh, absolutely.

Scott: The reason I want the listeners to understand, I made a joke because somebody at my daughter’s school, literally, they were talking about programs to help kids with special needs like get the help they need and get adjustments.

Scott: Like you can study here, you can do this, that.

Scott: And we were promised that it would not be a woke program.

Scott: And I was like, I don’t even know what that means.

Scott: And the fact that you said that scares the absolute living hell out of me.

Scott: because usually when people use the word woke like that, they mean we would love to continue to be.

Peter: They mean we’re wearing our red MAGA hats.

Peter: I mean, that’s what they mean.

Scott: Anyway, sorry, I interrupted you.

Scott: Yeah.

Scott: Go on.

Peter: just like during COVID, there was as the studio, the yoga studio I teach was starting to open back up again.

Peter: And someone wrote in and they didn’t want to get a lecture on social distancing or vaccinations.

Scott: Oh my God.

Scott: It’s not a lecture.

Scott: I had somebody at work the other day say, Oh, COVID, I haven’t heard of that in a long time.

Scott: And I was like, but it’s never gone away.

Scott: My wife works in health care.

Scott: I can tell you that COVID hasn’t gone away.

Scott: But people just want to pretend like it’s over and we’re done with it.

Scott: If we ever get a real pandemic, we’re going to die.

Scott: Anyway, I noticed on your bookshelf, and this is me being a little scared now because you have an advanced Dungeons and Dragons manual right next to an Aetna life rate manual.

Scott: So I don’t know if you’re taking your game a little too seriously, possibly.

Peter: So in second edition Dungeons and Dragons, they pivoted away the classic, the three core rule books historically have been the Player’s Handbook, the Dungeon’s Master’s Guide and the Monster Manual.

Peter: In second edition, they changed it up.

Peter: So there’s a Player’s Handbook, a Dungeon Master’s Guide, and then the monstrous Compendium.

Peter: And that was made across several volumes.

Peter: And I don’t remember the exact reason they gave it, but they would release these in three ring binder format.

Peter: Why?

Peter: I’m not sure.

Peter: I think it was because they intended so that they would release, you know, like basically one monster per page, and then they could release other supplements, and you could shoehorn them in alphabetically.

Peter: So I just needed a bunch of, you know, binders, and my mom used to sell life insurance, so she had a lot of these binders left over.

Peter: So that’s full of, you know, full of monsters.

Peter: Now, did I actually go and insert them all in those orders alphabetically?

Peter: No, because I wanted to keep my spelljammer-specific monsters here, and my Ravenloft-specific monsters here.

Peter: I never wanted to bleed those in.

Peter: And I always, as you can see, I tried to take pretty good care of my stuff.

Peter: Now, a lot of it is worn.

Scott: Oh, you did take good care of it.

Scott: No, it looks really good.

Scott: But I will say, I don’t think you should tell people, don’t use the phrase, I have binders of monsters.

Peter: Binders of monsters.

Peter: I mean, it’s like having tens of listeners, right?

Peter: I mean, it really is.

Scott: Who was that guy who said, I have binders of women?

Scott: The guy, it was a politician, and they were talking about his hiring practices, and they were like, you know, flaming him for not being diverse enough.

Scott: And he goes, what are you talking about?

Scott: I’ve got binders of women.

Scott: And he was talking about applicants, but it just, you don’t, I’m sorry, dude.

Scott: just the fact that you would say that just really screams clueless.

Peter: Didn’t go where he was, you know, hoping it would go, I guess.

Scott: Right.

Scott: So anyway, Peter’s got binders of monsters.

Scott: I don’t, I can’t wait to see when the monsters try to cancel Peter.

Peter: I’m getting canceled.

Peter: Yeah.

Peter: But no, I mean, if you look at today, like it was a simpler time.

Peter: Hell, the name of the game that I was playing was called Dungeons and Dragons Basic Set.

Peter: Okay.

Peter: So what they released was they released something called Dungeons and Dragons, and then they released Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.

Peter: And then they watered it down again and released Dungeons and Dragons Basic Set.

Peter: And then they built on that to the Expert Set, Companion Set, Master Set, Immortal Rules.

Peter: And that was one fork of the game.

Peter: The other fork was the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.

Peter: And then they released Second Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.

Peter: And then when they came out with the Third Edition, they went back to just Dungeons and Dragons.

Peter: But then they subsequently released another Dungeons and Dragons Basic Set.

Scott: So that is the most open source sounding thing I’ve ever heard.

Peter: It’s pretty funny.

Peter: Yeah.

Scott: But here’s the thing though, I don’t see anything wrong with, like, when you’re starting off and you’re playing one of these games, I don’t see anything wrong with them saying, you know what we’re going to do?

Scott: All these orcs are going to be bad.

Scott: We’re going to make it simple.

Scott: We’re going to make it very black and white for these people so they can get into it, play the game, and they don’t have to deal with all these complexities.

Peter: It was built on JRR.

Peter: Tolkien, Lord of the Rings, right?

Peter: The orcs, the goblins, those guys were bad.

Scott: They were bad.

Peter: The elves, the dwarves, the hobbits, the men, they were all aligned.

Peter: Some of the men were some, there were some bad men, right?

Peter: Okay, right.

Peter: So there were some evil, there was a little gray there.

Scott: Sure, sure.

Peter: But in D&D Basics, like, you know, they broke it down to like in the advanced one, they made a big deal always.

Peter: They got away from this in recent years, but they always made a big deal about your alignment and your character’s alignment.

Peter: You were either lawful good, neutral evil, chaotic neutral, etc.

Peter: And that was the thing is like you had to play this and you had to play your character in such a way to constrain, you know, comply with the alignment constraints.

Scott: So what happens if the people you were aligned with were doing stupid things?

Peter: Well, there’s a separate, a great article in Dragon magazine, of which I have hundreds of issues I’ve also found downstairs.

Peter: Many of them still in the plastic, you know, wrap never even opened.

Scott: Wow.

Peter: They had an article once which was classic.

Peter: It’s called the new front end alignments.

Peter: And it’s the alignments of your players, not the characters.

Peter: And there are things like lawful goody goody, chaotic, stupid, neutral, die tosser.

Scott: That would be me.

Scott: I’d be a neutral die tosser.

Peter: I’m not going to role play or anything, but you tell me what, oh, okay, fine.

Peter: Here’s a d20.

Peter: I just rolled.

Peter: There you go.

Peter: Okay.

Peter: Now I’m going to go back to punching out for a while.

Scott: I think that would be me at first, as I tried to learn the game, I’m pretty sure.

Peter: Right.

Peter: So anyway, that’s been done before, but they got away from alignments later on.

Peter: And so in the basic set, they super simplified it.

Peter: There were three alignments, Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic.

Peter: Now, frankly, they should have just called it Good, Neutral and Evil.

Scott: Sure.

Peter: because that’s what it really means.

Peter: You know, you’re more, the descriptions of Lawful are more good, and the descriptions of Chaotic are just evil.

Peter: But again, you know, like they watered it down.

Peter: So if you were a cleric, you know, a person who gets divine powers, you were human, only humans were clerics.

Peter: If you were an elf, you were a fighter magic user, because all elves are fighter magic users.

Peter: If you’re a halfling, you are a fighter thief, because all halflings slash hobbits are fighters and thieves.

Scott: Seems a little bit limiting.

Peter: If you’re a dwarf, you’re a fighter.

Peter: I mean, right, it was, right?

Peter: Oh, and if you were just a magic user, you’re a wizard, you’re a human, right?

Peter: But when I was a kid growing up, I didn’t know any better, right?

Peter: And the one fantasy novel I read as a kid, the first one I read was The Hobbit.

Peter: I was like, dude, this is that game.

Peter: This is all this is all together.

Peter: This is great, right?

Peter: And then I looked at Advanced D&D and they added half elves, half orcs.

Peter: They had not just, you know, thief, but also an assassin and the rangers and druids and stuff.

Scott: I probably shouldn’t go down this road, but who in their right mind who’s not an orc is going to mate with an orc?

Scott: I’m guessing it wasn’t consensual.

Peter: I see.

Peter: Now that’s racist.

Scott: No!

Scott: Have you seen orcs?

Scott: They’re not the most handsome.

Peter: So, well, I’m going to let you claw your way out of that one.

Scott: No, it’s an orc.

Scott: It’s an orc.

Scott: It’s an imaginary creature.

Scott: And not only that, despite what they may say nowadays, all orcs are bad, I will say.

Peter: Anyway, we play this game and in our game, you know, we’re essentially we’re keeping to the spirit of basic D&D.

Peter: So, but, you know, it’s fun.

Peter: So, you know, it’s just, it’s like I said, though, it was a simpler time.

Peter: You saw an orc, you could attack it.

Peter: It’s fine.

Peter: But then, you know, even even in the 80s, though, there was, I remember in one of the the campaign settings, there was an orc in a town and he operated a moving service, reliable, heavy hauling.

Peter: And, you know, I was like, what, an orc?

Peter: Yeah.

Peter: And yes.

Peter: And they made a big deal out of this orc was, you know, yep, he’s he’s different from the others and he’s cool.

Peter: And then RA.

Peter: Salvatore did the Icewind Dale trilogy, which featured a drow elf.

Peter: And the drow were always regarded as evil, you know, in the original D&D rules and things.

Peter: But this one drow was good.

Peter: And now the way it’s gone is it is completely opposite.

Peter: You know, just because you meet a drow doesn’t mean…

Peter: A lot of people are superstitious.

Peter: A lot of people fear them, but they’re not necessarily evil.

Peter: And you’ll find goblins and kobolds working in the market or in the circuits, you know, whereas it used to be goblins, kobolds kill on site.

Peter: So I get that.

Peter: But we were just going back to play this game because I was feeling nostalgic and it was fun.

Peter: It was simpler.

Peter: Frankly, with all the combinations and possibilities sometimes, it gets a little overwhelming.

Peter: And I’ve just wanted to go like, can we just go back to like a classic fantasy where you’ve got your wizards and your warriors and then maybe something a little roguish and a holy person and okay, we’re good.

Peter: But that’s enough.

Peter: That’s enough choice.

Peter: Let’s just play with that for a bit.

Peter: So there you go.

Peter: That’s what we’ve been doing.

Peter: And so far, it’s been fun.

Scott: I got to say, it looks really cool.

Scott: And the fact that you have all these things still in there in such good shape is very, very cool.

Scott: And I will say that you have changed my mind a lot about these things because bear in mind that I lived in Japan for a lot of my childhood and up until my senior year of high school.

Scott: So I didn’t have exposure to some of these things that were popular in the United States at that time.

Scott: I always thought of Dungeons and Dragons as something that the long haired kids from Metal and Woodshop played.

Peter: I never knew any of those people to play D&D.

Peter: That’s the thing.

Peter: They were not the ones playing it.

Scott: I mean, I’m not saying they shouldn’t, but I thought that’s all it was.

Peter: For me, it was role playing games and comic books and sci-fi novels.

Peter: That was it.

Peter: And I also found dozens of my old fantasy novels going through my old room at my parents’ place.

Peter: Most of my comic books I’m going to be selling, but a lot of the old novels and stuff, I’m like, you know what?

Peter: I actually will reread these, a couple of these, like the Dragonlance Chronicles, for instance.

Peter: So, looking forward to that.

Scott: What kind of pants did you buy?

Scott: There’s shorts, there’s casual pants, there’s wide leg pants, there’s jeans, there’s chinos, there’s sweatpants, there’s dress pants, there’s ankle pants.

Peter: A little bit of all of them.

Peter: I got some of their active wear pants.

Peter: I bought a pair of chinos, a couple of relaxed linens, and a set of jeans.

Peter: Did I say jeans?

Peter: So yeah, back to Uniqlo.

Peter: Not a sponsor, should be.

Scott: Yeah, I like this.

Scott: I’m gonna have to do some shopping.

Scott: Oh my God, I don’t know what happened, but ever since I rebooted my Mac, every time I bring Safari to the front, one password jumps in front of it, and I don’t know why.

Scott: Ah, technology.

Peter: Well, there you go.

Scott: Pantaloons, okay.

Peter: Yeah, I think we’re good.

Scott: I think we’re good, too, Peter.

Peter: I think we should wrap this.

Scott: We didn’t talk about Claude, but I would like to talk about Claude next time, because Raycast AI now supports the Claude model.

Scott: And I gotta say, honestly, the Raycast AI is very capable, very functional now.

Scott: You can give it files, you can give it pictures, it can generate pictures, you can choose all the latest models.

Scott: It does everything.

Scott: They’re really staying on top of the AI.

Scott: So what I am saying is, I’m going to cancel my ChatGPT plus.

Scott: I’m going to keep my open AI API token.

Scott: But I’m going to cancel GPT plus because I just don’t need it anymore.

Scott: I use my API most of the time, or I use apps like Raycast.

Peter: I usually get right to where I’m about at that point, and then I realize like I, oh, I need a quick AI generated image, and ChatGPT has Dolly built in, so I’ll use that.

Scott: Yeah, but you could do that through Raycast.

Scott: I’m just saying, they should be updating those other apps to do that too, I think.

Scott: because it’s clear that you can do it through the API because Raycast can do it.

Scott: So those other apps should be able to build that stuff in.

Scott: Yep.

Peter: Yeah, oh, they absolutely could.

Scott: Yeah, I get it.

Scott: No, I understand.

Scott: But I think from what I’m doing, my use case, I’ve come to the point where I realize I’m not really accessing ChatGPT directly anymore, so I don’t need to.

Peter: Yep.

Peter: Cool.

Peter: All right.

Peter: Well, I think that’s all I got.

Scott: I think it’s all we got.

Scott: I think it’s all we should have.

Scott: We went over an hour, which is unusual.

Scott: We’ll see what happens after editing out.

Scott: Ninety percent of the swear words, but.

Scott: Great.

Scott: What do you say, Peter?

Scott: Last time that I edited, it won’t be the last episode, but last time I edited, you really went off on people for not being able to find our website.

Scott: I guess it wasn’t you technically, but Eleven Labs went off on everybody for not being able to find our website.

Scott: But how do you, Peter, who has some human empathy and kindness in your soul, I think, how do you tell the listener what you want to say?

Peter: I tell people to go to friendswithbrews.com.

Scott: Oh.

Peter: I mean, it’s not that hard.

Scott: What should they do there?

Peter: They should just like, subscribe, contact us, all the things.

Scott: Click on stuff.

Peter: All the things.

Scott: Okay.

Scott: And tell your friends.

Scott: There you go.

Scott: But don’t you have…

Peter: Tell your friends.

Scott: Tell your friends.

Scott: Don’t you have a button of a color?

Peter: I have a button.

Peter: It is red and it is big.

Scott: Is it on your new pants?

Peter: We’re going to…

Peter: And we’re going to push it.

Peter: We’re going to push the big red button on my pants.

Scott: The big red pants button.