Episode 92 – This is a Podcast

Scott: Friends with Brews.

Scott: Peter, I have a question for you.

Peter: Scott, I have an answer for you.

Peter: It may not be a good one.

Scott: You’re always preparing, just go.

Peter: You got to tell me if you’re going to override me.

Scott: Sorry, I know.

Scott: I clicked it by accident and I tried to stop.

Peter: Okay, so I was preparing coffee.

Peter: I’m always preparing coffee.

Peter: You don’t just eat raw beans and swish it down with water.

Peter: That’s what I was preparing.

Scott: Hold on, I’m going to record that again.

Peter: What are you preparing?

Scott: You’re always preparing.

Peter: Just go.

Scott: Okay, there.

Scott: Now I’ll slide that back in front of you saying you’re preparing coffee.

Scott: Sorry, that was a technical, that was a Scott Willis-y finger problem.

Scott: I have finger problems these days.

Scott: Have you heard?

Peter: I have heard.

Peter: How’s that going?

Peter: Is it getting any better?

Scott: I think so.

Scott: I have another appointment in the next week.

Scott: So basically, the idea is the surgery for a ripped finger tendon sucks.

Scott: The outcomes are not good.

Scott: He recommended I don’t do it, which says a lot because it means that he doesn’t get a new wheel on his Mercedes.

Peter: I was going to say a new yacht, new boat payment.

Scott: Well, it’s just one little finger.

Scott: I don’t.

Scott: Anyway, so the thing is to keep it in the splint and keep it straight for six weeks, and then which is almost up now.

Scott: And then then then hopefully it creates enough scar tissue that it will actually hold the finger in the position.

Scott: The problem is, if I’m not careful, like what even just removing it, there’s been a couple of times where I’ve bumped the finger.

Scott: Sounds to me like your guy is there.

Peter: No, this is a call from Columbus, Ohio.

Scott: Anyway, I am a little worried that it’s not to the point yet where bumping the finger won’t rip whatever scar tissue is built up.

Scott: But anyway, I’ll find out when I go in later this week or later or early next week, I think it is.

Peter: Gotcha.

Peter: Now, what you were hearing was a non silenced, but screened call on the new iOS 26.

Scott: So what do you mean by screened call?

Peter: I think I’ve been using have call screening is now built into the operating system.

Scott: So you can say, is that iOS 26?

Scott: I’ve been using the betas for so long on the phone that I don’t I genuinely don’t remember.

Scott: I thought that was something that came earlier, but I guess I’m pretty sure it’s new.

Peter: So but you heard that ringing and you may have also heard my Apple Watch SE ringing as well, because I didn’t.

Peter: Yes, dear listener, I am back in the Apple Watch ecosystem as well as I’m not recording it, but I am listening to the audio back through my AirPods Pro 3s.

Peter: So I’ve had a couple of hardware upgrades and an operating system upgrade since we last recorded.

Peter: Cool.

Peter: Yeah, so far, I agree with your assessment.

Peter: The noise canceling on the AirPods Pro 3 is very superior to the 2s.

Scott: Yeah, it’s really good.

Peter: I did log a support ticket with Apple yesterday and confirmed that I am one of many people who cannot get live translation to work.

Peter: The solution is wait for an update from Apple.

Peter: So wonderful.

Scott: Nothing works.

Scott: Nothing works the way I want it to work when I expect it to work.

Scott: How do I?

Scott: That was weird.

Scott: Yeah.

Peter: So anyway, yeah, other than that, how are things on your end?

Peter: I mean, besides your finger.

Scott: I like how, just as you say that, the network connection goes terrible.

Scott: Things are going good.

Scott: Things are going good.

Scott: I want to tell you about my today’s coffee, and I want to also tell you about the fact that I’m using the Kalita Wave pour-over method again for reasons that you might be familiar with, Peter.

Scott: Why do you think I went back to the pour-over method?

Peter: Because you had met your daily intake of plastic.

Scott: You just kept talking about microplastics, and I had successfully pushed it out of my mind, even as I was pushing the plastics down through the tube, the AeroPress tube.

Scott: And, but you kept mentioning microplastics, and I was like, damn it, he’s probably right.

Scott: This thing is probably just shedding microplastics into the coffee.

Scott: Presumably the filter would stop them from going in, but doubtful.

Peter: Sorry slash you’re welcome.

Scott: So now I’m doing pour-over again, and I gotta say I’m better at pour-over now, and I don’t know why.

Scott: I’m very inconsistent in my pulse method.

Scott: I don’t always put the same amount of water in each pulse.

Scott: I don’t always end up with the same total amount of water, but there you go.

Peter: Sometimes taking a break from things and going back to them is actually beneficial.

Peter: So there you go.

Scott: What about…

Scott: There’s a rest period.

Scott: Does that work with life, life in general?

Peter: It’s not just physical training.

Peter: Taking a mental break from something, a vacation, absolutely can help.

Scott: No, but I mean taking a break from life.

Peter: You know, it depends on how much of a break, I guess.

Scott: How severely you break your connection with life.

Peter: How severely you break your connection with life.

Peter: That’s it.

Scott: Okay, I’m drinking Tony’s Coffee, Mexico Chiapas.

Scott: That is the name of the coffee, and the description is as follows.

Scott: Year after year, Peter, year after year, this coffee is an absolute crowd pleaser.

Scott: Fidisi produces fair trade organic coffee in the reason of chiapas.

Scott: Fidisi was founded by six groups located in the municipalities.

Scott: I like how instead of telling me about the coffee, they’re telling me about some society cooperative, De La Sierra Madre thing that I don’t know or care about.

Scott: But anyway, here we go with the Fidisi.

Scott: It was founded by six groups located in the municipalities of Mottosintla and Siltepec.

Scott: I feel like I’m Donald Trump trying to say, a cinnamon fuh fuh fuh fuh.

Scott: A cinnamon, a cinnamon mn mn mn.

Peter: A cinnamon, just don’t use Tylenol.

Scott: I’m drinking Tylenol, Peter.

Scott: Being part of the cooperative is, oh my God, just tell me about the actual coffee.

Scott: They don’t.

Scott: But anyway, supposedly it’s roasted almond, cocoa and creamy mouth feel.

Scott: And I can believe the almond and the cocoa.

Scott: It’s a good coffee.

Scott: It tastes good in the pour-over method.

Scott: And I’m not a huge Tonys coffee fan.

Scott: I’m sorry, Tonys.

Scott: But by the way, your god darn or whatever descriptions of federations don’t really help me want to drink your coffee, okay?

Scott: So there’s that.

Scott: That’s the continuing your website sucks theme.

Scott: Anyway, it’s a good coffee.

Scott: I like it.

Scott: I’ll recommend it.

Scott: I’ll give it a thumbs up.

Scott: And there you go.

Scott: Cool.

Scott: You know how on the Vergecast, they have a podcast within a podcast where Brendan Carr is a dummy?

Scott: We should have the podcast within a podcast where your website is a dummy.

Peter: Your website is a dummy.

Peter: That’s a good one.

Peter: Well, speaking of that, let me attempt to locate the website for Down East Coffee Roasters.

Scott: Yes.

Scott: You showed me the other day a bag of coffee that you were in the act of purchasing.

Scott: Well, you were in the act of carrying around in a basket.

Scott: You were in the act of basketting and it had a guy smoking a pipe on it.

Scott: And I’m assuming that some people feel that ashes resemble coffee grounds.

Scott: I don’t know.

Peter: Sure.

Peter: I mean, it was like when I asked my friend when he was drinking a porter for the first time, I was like, what does it taste like?

Peter: And he said, tar.

Scott: See, I would have gone with leather couch, cigar.

Scott: That’s funny.

Peter: Well, anyway, I do have a link to Down East Coffee Roasters Deep Sea Dark Roast.

Peter: Now, full confession, dear listener, apologies.

Peter: I’m not drinking it live on the show because I had two cups of it already this morning, and it’s one in the afternoon my time.

Peter: So let’s, Scott, do your magic.

Scott: I will do magic and you will hear Peter discussing this coffee in all its glory.

Peter: That’s great.

Peter: Good morning, Friends with Brews listener.

Peter: This is Peter again doing another brief solo cast review, just in case we don’t get to recording this one on the podcast together.

Peter: I am drinking this morning a cup of Down East Coffee Roasters Deep Sea Dark.

Peter: Now, if you’ve listened to this podcast for any length of time, you know that this sounds like it’s right up my alley.

Peter: Description, tasting notes, smoky, roasted cashew, toffee.

Peter: Description, sorry, that was the tasting notes.

Peter: This is the description.

Peter: Jump start your day with a bold blend of coffees harvested from Columbia and Sumatra.

Peter: Roast forward, deep sea dark, dazzles with raw sugar sweetness.

Peter: I gotta say, this one’s pretty good.

Peter: So I’m drinking it just black.

Peter: I ground it at a fairly middle ground on my grinder and brewed it in my AeroPress.

Peter: I have not added anything to it, even more water.

Peter: So it’s about four ounces of coffee.

Peter: On the back of the box, by the way, or the back of the bag, it says, the Down East name is inspired by the arduous nautical voyages coffee beans took centuries ago to reach America.

Peter: Today we honor that tradition by tirelessly scouring the globe for superior growing conditions.

Peter: With steadfast commitment to quality, we search for singularly perfect altitudes, climates, and soils farmed fairly and sustainably.

Peter: Only then can coffee beans be destined to bear the Down East name.

Peter: Down East Coffee Roasters, they’re in Pawtucket, Rhode Island.

Peter: So normally one state away from me, although as I record this, I’m in my place in Vermont.

Peter: So an initial sip or a second sip, I should say.

Peter: It’s very smooth.

Peter: Just the slightest hint of bitterness, not at all sour.

Peter: It does have a very deep, smoky, dark flavor.

Peter: And it is really good.

Peter: I think the strength is just pretty good, just the way it is.

Peter: But I will treat myself to one teaspoon of hand, a half and half.

Peter: I think I burned that.

Peter: Even though I like the way the coffee tastes, I do think in general that, you know, cream and sugar generally makes it taste better.

Peter: I’m not going to do sugar, though.

Peter: I’m, since getting back from my trip to Berlin, I’m trying to be a little more health conscious.

Peter: So, and not that I went off the rails, mind you, but okay, I’m rambling.

Peter: I’ll save the rest for when Scott and I actually record.

Peter: Cheers.

Peter: So I am on their website, and I noticed that I click the brewing instructions, the little carrot drop down, and nothing changes.

Peter: So apparently you’re on your own when it comes to how to do this.

Peter: But yeah, I overall, you know, I made a second cup after recording that review this morning, and it was good, both of them, both times.

Peter: I might have even gone back.

Peter: Did I go back for a third cup?

Peter: I don’t even remember.

Scott: I don’t remember.

Scott: I thought you might have said you had three cups already.

Peter: I had a second cup.

Peter: I know that one.

Peter: I think I went back for a third cup because it was before noon.

Peter: And I was like, I’ll be hopped up.

Peter: But let me try.

Peter: Coffee, coffee, water.

Scott: Coffee, coffee, water.

Peter: Coffee.

Peter: It looks like I only, yeah, it looks like I only did two cups today.

Peter: I thought about a third cup.

Peter: Maybe I ground the beans for the third cup and never actually brewed it.

Peter: And at this point, it’s a little too late in the day for me to go back for another one.

Peter: But yeah, second cup was good.

Peter: So consistency.

Peter: That’s got to be my new rule because as we know, I have definitely gone from thumbs down to thumbs up and from thumbs up to thumbs down between cups before.

Peter: So I need to at least two data points on all my reviews.

Scott: Yep.

Scott: And to be honest, I’m pretty sure at least one of those, I actually flipped your thumb on, but I don’t remember if I flipped your thumb on the other ones.

Scott: Who knows what the website says, Peter?

Scott: Who knows what you said?

Scott: No one.

Peter: Nobody knows.

Scott: This is a podcast.

Scott: That I can say for sure.

Peter: We know this is a podcast.

Peter: That is true.

Scott: All right.

Scott: So now that we’ve gotten our drinks out of the way.

Scott: Oh, wait.

Scott: Okay.

Peter: Yeah.

Scott: So we listened to your review.

Scott: We listened to my review, indicating that I believe that they have a co-op or an association somewhere.

Scott: And now what do you have to talk about today, Peter?

Peter: So real quick, just first impressions of the AirPod Pros 3s and the Apple Watch SE, if you’ll allow it.

Scott: I won’t indulge such topics.

Peter: Real quick, the AirPod Pros 3, they fit well.

Peter: It feels to me like the left one feels looser than the right.

Peter: And I put in the biggest, the largest pro tips that they came with.

Peter: That said, I went for about a three and a half mile run this morning and it was fine.

Peter: It did not fall out.

Peter: So it just, the fit feels ever so slightly different from left to right, but it does seem snug enough like the pros.

Peter: So I’m happy about that.

Scott: That’s disconcerting though.

Scott: I hate that feeling.

Scott: I would notice that.

Scott: I would always be thinking about that if I felt like it was that way.

Peter: But the noise canceling, as you had mentioned, is far superior to even the AirPods Pro 2, which is great.

Peter: I wish I had them on my flight back from Germany, but next time.

Peter: Let’s see, what other new features?

Peter: I don’t know if it has any other new features, really.

Scott: The only new feature I know of that you and I would care about is the heart rate sensing.

Peter: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Peter: Heart rate.

Peter: OK, so here’s the thing.

Peter: I started my workout and my run and I was wearing the Apple Watch.

Peter: As is always the case, I started out just jogging down to the bottom of the driveway and my light, easy jog, this is a recovery run, and my watch is telling me, your heart rate is 162 beats per minute, which for me is working hard.

Peter: And so what I always do, I just came to a full stop, I pulled out my iPhone because now I can see heart rate on the iPhone, as well.

Peter: And as I’m looking at it, it dropped to 101 beats per minute, and then now to 87 beats per minute.

Peter: And then from there, I believe I had a fairly accurate reading for the rest of my workout.

Scott: I feel like Apple’s algorithms unduly weight their initial readings into the entire rest of the workout.

Scott: And what’s funny for me is, I tend to get low balled.

Scott: You always get high balled.

Scott: Are we still talking about watches, and we’re not on the dark web, are we?

Scott: Okay, anyway, you get high balled, and I get low balled, and sometimes I’ll be working super hard, and it’s like 115, and I’m like, yeah, I don’t think so.

Scott: And it’s interesting.

Scott: Now, initially, when I first got the AirPods Pro 3, I started to work out on the bike, and it looked like what I would have expected it to be, and I got all excited thinking, I wonder if it’s actually using the AirPods Pro 3 and for some reason, they’re more accurate than my watch on my wrist.

Scott: But ever since then, it’s been the way it was before.

Scott: I always seem to get a little bit low balled.

Scott: If I do a short workout and get my heart rate up, and then I start a new workout, then it starts up in the heart rate zone that I would expect.

Scott: Weird, don’t like, Apple, fix your dog poo, whatever.

Scott: But anyway, continue, my apologies.

Scott: But it’s just interesting to me that it always high balls you and low balls me.

Peter: Yep.

Peter: So I’m curious, though.

Peter: I’m like, one thing that I noticed immediately was like, oh, I’m back in the Apple ecosystem.

Peter: I’m out of the Garmin ecosystem because of the issue on a previous podcast with my Garmin.

Peter: I need to ship that back, which is why I was waiting to do that was, you know, until I got my Apple watch, because I didn’t want to be completely without a watch for however long it takes Garmin to get me back.

Peter: And I went with the Apple watch SE because, you know, we’ve established that it’s possible, but unlikely that the Ultra 2 is still going to be or the Ultra 3 will be Ultra enough for me.

Peter: So really without all the extended battery life and the SOS features that I don’t use because I have a phone with me at all times.

Peter: There’s no real compelling reason for me to get the Ultra anymore.

Peter: So and then I went and looked at the differences between the SE and the series 11.

Peter: And again, not really that much of a difference.

Peter: So I’m back to a 44mm Apple Watch SE for the first time, third edition.

Peter: So far it tells time, and despite me enabling one of the newfangled weird faces where the dials are all 3D and bizarre and stuff, it still tells time.

Peter: I definitely noticed it was nice being able to send you an audio message using the watch, not having to grab my phone.

Peter: It was again convenient to say, Hey Dengus, I drank water and have it ask me how many ounces, and me tell it and it log it for me.

Peter: I had it add a few things to my shopping list yesterday, and it said that it added, but then I got to the grocery store and they were not on the shopping list.

Peter: But when I came home, they were.

Peter: So not sure why that happened.

Peter: Yeah, not exactly.

Scott: Here’s some things you could have bought, Peter.

Peter: Yeah.

Peter: So in some ways, I kind of missed the Garmin.

Peter: You know, the analysis of the running and stuff, I think is superior in the Garmin app for sure.

Peter: But also, Garmin has been telling me that I’ve been getting really lousy sleep.

Peter: And at times, I have been getting really lousy sleep.

Peter: But last night, with the new sleep score in iOS 26, Apple’s been giving me higher ratings.

Peter: And I felt pretty good last night.

Peter: Last night felt like the second best sleep I’ve had in over a month.

Peter: Luckily, the best sleep I had in over a month was Friday night last week.

Peter: Right before I did my 28-mile long run.

Peter: So that was just great, because I would hate to wake up after a night of poor sleep and then plan to run more than a marathon.

Peter: That’s like my biggest fear for my race coming up soon.

Peter: So anyway, in general, thumbs up for the AirPods Pro 3.

Peter: And so far, with less than 24 hours of experience with it, thumbs up for the Apple Watch SE.

Scott: Nice.

Scott: Very good.

Scott: So now you’re saving a lot of money on Apple Watches.

Scott: However, your watch budget in total is probably about the same, yeah?

Peter: Yeah, because I have two watches.

Scott: Right.

Scott: You have two watches to keep upgraded.

Peter: But well, yeah, but the Garmin’s apparently tend to have like an eight-year life span.

Scott: Well, there’s already newer Garmin’s than what you bought.

Scott: That was the thing I didn’t understand is I don’t think the Garmin that you bought is even the latest Garmin sports watch.

Peter: It’s not.

Peter: Oh, no.

Peter: Now, to be clear, Garmin has multiple lines of different sport watches, but the Forerunners and the Phoenix are those are the ones that I see most runners using.

Peter: But for me, this one was pretty much the cheapest.

Peter: It was like buying an SE, really.

Peter: It was the cheapest way to get into the Garmin ecosystem and check all the boxes that I need.

Peter: So the Forerunner 955 Solar, it’s a few years old, but I mean, it’s going to last for, like I said, foreseeably, they say that it runs, last like eight years, and they’re still selling it right now.

Peter: It’s like, hey, big sale, save $200 for more than I paid for mine.

Scott: So what you’re saying is you don’t anticipate any change in the way that the sun interacts with solar components in the near future?

Peter: I mean, if we burn down more of the ozone, I think I might have less filtration and therefore, it might charge even more in the future.

Scott: Yeah, your watch might be 100% charged all the time.

Peter: All the time, and I might be burnt to a crisp.

Scott: Yeah, you’ll be riddled with skin cancer, but your watch will always be charged.

Scott: It’ll be great.

Scott: Oh, man.

Peter: So anyway, yeah.

Peter: But I did kind of miss the Garmin a little bit, but I’m at the point now where the rest of my workouts and my runs for the next few weeks are pretty generic and tame, so I don’t think I’m gonna miss the precise, like the interval trainings and the stay within these zones and stuff and the ability to just send to my watch without having to custom create those workouts.

Scott: Well, I was wondering if you get to doing something, right?

Scott: And muscle memory is trying to kick in if you’re gonna be confusing yourself back and forth going, what the AF am I doing?

Scott: How does this even work?

Peter: It was a little bit, but again, I remembered how to use the Apple Watch to do everything I needed to do.

Peter: So yeah, so it wasn’t that bad.

Peter: So, so I know we’re cutting it short, but we did get a tiny bit of a late start and I’m technically supposed to be on another call right now.

Peter: So I should probably put a pin in this one and wrap it up pretty quick.

Scott: Wow, that’s quite the pin.

Scott: Okay, let’s see.

Scott: Oh, before we go, I just want to say, I will do this very quickly.

Scott: As you know, and as we have talked about, the AI model race never ends.

Scott: And now I’m actually trying to use Claude again, as my main AI model, my main, because I’m not like these guys on YouTube, Peter, that can afford to pay $200 a month for all the models.

Scott: I can’t, I won’t, I can’t, I won’t.

Scott: Anyway, it’s stupid.

Scott: Anyway, the point is now I’m using Sonnet 4.5 and trying to see how it works.

Scott: And it’s actually pretty good so far.

Scott: I haven’t done a lot with it yet.

Scott: I haven’t tried any, you know, fix this script for me and see what it destroys.

Scott: But I will say that it still did tell me one time so far, you are absolutely correct.

Peter: You’re absolutely right.

Scott: Yep, you’re absolutely right.

Scott: So you’re absolutely right is the keyword of the day.

Scott: You’re absolutely right that I think we should go.

Scott: You’re absolutely right that I will put your coffee review in here and it’ll be good.

Scott: And yeah, this will be a short one.

Scott: We’ll get back towards life next time.

Scott: And you can tell me what you think of iOS.

Scott: You can tell me what you think of Liquid Arfs, as you like to call it.

Peter: I stole that from the Vergecast.

Peter: Dear listener, if you want to find us and have forgotten that you already found us, you can find us again at friendswithbrews.com.

Peter: And with that, let’s just like not waste any more time and go ahead and push that big red button.

Scott: And tell our friends.

Scott: Tell your friends.

Peter: Tell your friends.